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Hubbard on the commitment that has continued to exist

Josh Marshall draws attention to a briefing by National Economic Council Director Al Hubbard on President Bush's new four-point energy plan for covering his ass lowering gas prices. It's hard to pick the most pathetic, revealing part. Josh's favorite has to do with a comparison between Iraq's oil and the oil in the Arctic Refuge. But I think this brief exchange takes the cake:

Q Has the White House considered any sort -- has the White House considered any sort of wider conservation campaign to reduce demand?

DIRECTOR HUBBARD: Well, we announced during Katrina a commitment to -- for conservation measures in the government, and that commitment has not declined at all -- I mean, has continued to exist. And, again, we encourage all Americans to think about conservation as they go about their daily lives.

A look at some of the year’s other toxic anniversaries

Today marks the 20th anniversary of the Chernobyl disaster. As many a retrospective reminds us, that nuclear meltdown initially claimed 31 lives -- but has affected thousands more over the years (the actual number, of course, is a matter of some dispute).

Inspired by a note from university professor William Underwood, I decided to check out a few other 20th-century environmental disasters whose anniversaries fall this year, from mass mercury poisoning in Japan to a mining landslide in Wales.

If nothing else, these stories -- below the fold -- are a reminder that industrial pollution and injustice are nothing new. Oh, and that this kind of thing happens all around the world. Sigh.

As one scientist analyzing a dioxin spill in Italy put it, "I think this accident teaches us that it is better to take care of the environment before these things happen. Not after."

Chafee insures Wehrum confirmation; Roberts insures enduring shame

Looks like it's crow-eating time for yours truly. A while back I defended the Sierra Club's decision to endorse Sen. Lincoln Chafee (R-RI). Then last week, to make matters worse, I smugly implied that enviros should be thankful that Chafee's around, because he might save us from Bush's nominee to head air-pollution programs at EPA, the stinktastic William Wehrum.

Well, the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee voted to confirm Wehrum, on a strict party-line vote. The vote count was 10-8; Chafee cast the key pro-confirmation vote.

So much for that theory!

(h/t to FO at Clean Air Watch)

Anne Kajir combats the greed of Papua New Guinea’s timber barons

The highlands of Papua New Guinea cradle some of the most remote places in the world, and are home to an astounding diversity of languages, cultures, and plant and animal life — including the Asian Pacific’s largest intact stand of tropical forest. Anne Kajir. Photo: Goldman Environmental Prize. Since the 1980s, industrial logging has torn […]

No time to walk

Passed on without comment:

Gov. Ed Rendell yesterday called on President Bush to slap a windfall profits tax on oil companies as a way to offset skyrocketing gasoline prices for consumers.

"It is simply bad economic policy to let profiteering continue unabated," he said at a news conference held at an Exxon/Mobil gasoline station two blocks from the Capitol.

Mr. Rendell drove to the news conference even though the gas station was close to the Capitol. He said he was running behind schedule on a busy day and didn't have time to walk.

(via R-Squared)

Wonder If New Orleans Wrote Them a Recommendation Letter

Army Corps can continue its Missouri River meddling, Supreme Court says In bad news for enviros (why are we always saying that?), the Supreme Court has declined to hear challenges in three cases questioning the Army Corps of Engineers’ authority on the Missouri River. With authority now decidedly in hand, the Corps can continue to […]

Yucca Fool Some of the People Some of the Time

Feds won’t press charges against scientists who falsified Yucca documents Scientists accused of falsifying quality-assurance documents for the proposed Yucca Mountain nuclear-waste site in Nevada will not be charged by federal prosecutors. Emails between U.S. Geological Survey hydrologists from 1998 to 2000 indicate that dates were invented and inconvenient data was deleted as hydrologists conducted […]

Do You Reely Want to Hurt Me?

Low salmon numbers provoke protests, legislation, and a state of emergency Next week is supposed to kick off salmon season in Oregon and California, but the Bush administration is expected to severely restrict or completely bar commercial salmon fishing due to a critically low salmon count in the Klamath River. About 100 angry fisherfolk protested […]

Jane Jacobs

The New York Times is running a long and fascinating appreciation of Jane Jacobs, who died yesterday. I like this:

She came to see prevalent planning notions, which involved bulldozing low-rise housing in poor neighborhoods and building tall apartment buildings surrounded by open space to replace them, as a superstition akin to early 19th-century physicians' belief in bloodletting.

"There is a quality even meaner than outright ugliness or disorder," she wrote in "Death and Life," "and this meaner quality is the dishonest mask of pretended order, achieved by ignoring or suppressing the real order that is struggling to exist and to be served."

Removing impediments to the "real order that is struggling to exist and to be served" -- you could do worse.

Some hope from HOPES

A couple of folks on another post commented on how environmental activity is limited to progressive cities and campuses. Since I just got back from a green campus in a green city, I thought readers might want to hear about some good stuff going on in that small corner of the world.

The University of Oregon's annual HOPES Conference just wrapped up on the 16th. Now in it's 12th year, HOPES is a student-run environmental-design conference. If you are depressed by the level of environmental apathy around you, this was a place to recharge your faith and hope in humanity, especially the college-age segment of humanity.