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The local-food movement may bring red and blue together

Last week, The New York Times ran a feature by Marian Burros on New Seasons Markets, a grocery store chain in Portland that's banking on consumer interest in local, sustainable food -- as opposed to simply organic.

The chain recently completed an inventory of the origins of its stock and has labeled everything grown in Oregon, Washington, and Northern California "Homegrown." They've already got six stores and three more on the way, but remain adamantly opposed to expanding beyond the Portland suburbs -- a testament to their commitment to being grounded in the local food economy.

Environmentalism = bias

Seems Grist is connected, in a six-degrees-of-Kevin-Bacon way, to the ongoing efforts of Bush defenders (I won't call them "conservatives" any more) to free the administration of any responsibility for the Sago mine tragedy -- and many other mining accidents that preceded and followed it.

Jordan Barab has the strange details.

Ha ha, stupid hippies and their, uh, markets!

Want to see what happens when the substance of libertarianism runs up against the prejudices and stereotypes held by libertarians? Read this thread on Hit & Run about Whole Foods recent move to buy wind-power credits. Deeply incoherent.

Ants are as smart as you

Anyone who had a childhood as boring idyllic as mine probably won't be surprised to hear the latest news from the world of science: Ants can teach each other by leading one another to food, etc.

But you might be surprised to know that it's the first proof of teaching among non-human animals. Really? I dunno, my dogs always seemed like they were up to something, the way they giggled and whispered in the corner.

Sen. Ted Stevens: Can this hurt ever heal?

I wrote a little while back on the tantrum thrown by Sen. Ted Stevens (R-Alaska) when his fellow Senators refused to let him attach Arctic Refuge drilling to the defense appropriations bill.

Well, he's still whining:

As the Arctic drilling went down to defeat, Stevens said "goodbye" to the Senate, a remark interpreted by some as a farewell. At the press conference, Stevens said that interpretation was wrong.

"I'm here, I'm going to stay and get ANWR, there's no question about that. It's going to happen."

But Stevens said when he returns to Washington, he will no longer consider some Democrats his friends. The final refuge debate became too personal, he said.

"When I first went there, you would never hear a senator speak about another senator the way they were speaking about me that night," he said. "There are people I've considered to be personal friends without regards to politics, and they were turning into vipers as far as I was concerned. ... The extent of the venom there on the floor, that would never have happened in the days gone by."

Stevens said he has "written off" those friends.

"I'm not traveling with them anymore, and I'm not going to play tennis or swim or do various things with them."

Somebody give this guy a hug!

(via ThinkProgress)

The decline of hunters and anglers augers poorly for conservation

Over the weekend The Oregonian ran a good short series on the diminishing numbers of hunters and anglers in the state. While the state's population has doubled since 1950, the number of hunters and fishermen has declined. (Read the articles here, here, here, and here.) This is not just a Beaver State phenomenon -- it's true nationwide, and it may have some troubling implications for wildlife protection.

The Oregonian seems mostly concerned that without hunting and fishing, fewer people will want to protect wildlife and natural areas. I think that's wrong. Northwesterners are still getting out into nature in vast, teeming, trail-clogging hordes. In fact, wildlife watchers generate substantially more economic activity than hunters and anglers combined.

The more important question -- and the one that The Oregonian gives comparatively short shrift to -- is a basic policy question. As the paper has it:

... who will pay the costs of preserving habitat and managing fish and wildlife? Hunters and fishermen now foot most of the bill, not just through the steep license, tag and access fees they pay, but also through countless hours of volunteer labor, pulling out abandoned fences, cutting down water-sucking juniper trees, planting streamside willows and tending boxes of fish eggs.

In Oregon, as in many other states, hunting and fishing licenses, together with taxes on items like ammunition and fishing rods, pay for a huge variety of conservation benefits -- everything from fieldwork by professional biologists to refuges like Sauvie's Island on the Columbia River. Without those (declining) sources of revenue, the future of conservation may look even more bleak than it already does. So what to do?

Science!

Our science-minded readers may be interested to know that a whole gaggle of sharp science bloggers -- Chris Mooney, Tim Lambert, PZ Myers, and more -- are moving over to ScienceBlogs.com (sponsored by Seed). Their combined firepower is formidable. Bookmark it.

Alaska volcano erupts, ash plume will miss Anchorage

Early this morning, Mount Augustine, a volcano in Alaska's Cook Inlet, erupted, sending a plume of ash 30,000 feet into the sky. As of 10 a.m. this morning, winds were blowing the plume north, and it was expected to miss Anchorage and other nearby population centers.

Besides a few cancelled flights, human impacts have been negligible thus far, so further eco-drama sounds unlikely, and the webcam view is disappointing. The sensationalist in me is already bored. But c'mon, volcanoes are awesome, they have a huge potential to affect human populations and global climate, and in Mount Augustine's case, "further eruptions could take place at any time ..."

9/11 Forgotten Heroes

Just a reminder for you folks who have access to Link TV (DIRECTV channel 375 and DISH Network channel 9410) that 9/11 Forgotten Heroes, the first episode of the Sierra Club Chronicles, will be airing Thursday night (tomorrow!).

Here's a short summary:

The terrorist attack on 9/11 was one of our country's most horrific moments, and the damage continues. Told there were no health hazards in the aftermath, the truth shows there was and many first responders are now afflicted and ignored by our government.

For a full description and trailers, go here.

Update [2006-1-11 16:9:42 by Chris Schults]: If you don't get Link TV, you can download the entire episode from the Sierra Club's website. Go here and click on the "Full episode" link.

Sicken-Me Elmo

California may restrict two chemicals used in plastic baby goods In its continuing quest to make the rest of the country look environmentally retrograde, the California legislature is considering a bill that would ban the use of two controversial chemicals in baby products. Specifically, it would prohibit phthalates, used to soften plastic items like chew […]