Latest Articles
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Elena Kagan, climate realist
Photo: White House / Lawrence Jackson Here’s the dirt on Earth-hating Supreme Court nominee Elena Kagan: On more than one occasion she was so consumed by her work that she accidentally left her car running overnight, a longtime “friend” told the New York Times. But it’s worth looking beyond this personal eco-foul to examine Kagan’s […]
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Criticizing Cap-and-Dividend by inventing something worse
Sean Casten’s criticism of Cap-and-dividend[1] seems to indicate that he had a really bad day. Implying that former former CEO Peter Barnes, and former software corporate executive Senator Maria Cantwell are Marxists is simply not a propitious way to begin a critique or proposal. The substance does not seem any better. One of his criticisms […]
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‘Love seats’ flirt with creating better bus times
Kadaver off the Record Copenhagen’s buses are introducing another way of getting around while you get around town: “love seats,” or “kærlighedssæder.” (Gesundheit!) A social experiment of Danish bus company, Arriva, these special spots aim to make things a little cozier for those would-be cuddlers who haven’t been feeling the love on public transit. “You […]
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How environmental groups are protesting the oil spill
Since the scale of the BP catastrophe began to register, there have been a lot of questions swirling around the political implications of the spill. Will it help or hinder efforts to pass a climate bill? Should environmentalists seize upon the opportunity to galvanize public support like never before behind an aggressive shift towards clean […]
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Senate climate bill is coming Wednesday
The big day is almost upon us. And the two amigos are confident about the Wednesday launch of their long-awaited climate and clean energy jobs bill. In a joint statement, Sens. John Kerry (D-Mass.) and Joe Lieberman (I-Conn.) write: We are more encouraged today that we can secure the necessary votes to pass this legislation […]
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An oil spill looks a lot bigger in your (yes, your!) backyard
The Gulf of Mexico oil spill is big. Twenty-five hundred square miles big. But that oily mess is out in distant ocean waters, not your backyard, making it difficult to relate to the scale of this petro-tastrophe. Helpfully, Google Earther Paul Rademacher makes it easy to imagine what the oil spill would look like in […]
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Health risks of potassium bromate maybe not so ‘Fringe’
Fringe mad scientist Walter Bishop goes postal over potassium bromate The sci-fi TV show Fringe had a surreally satisfying sequence in the May 6 episode, available on Hulu.com, in which supposedly mad scientist Walter Bishop goes food shopping. Walter, who in the series spends a lot of time in alternate universes, is holding a box […]
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Oil spill update: The ‘junk shot’ solution, BP’s poor safety record, right-wingers discredited
“Eww.” A toxic-smelling trail of “dispersed” oil in the Gulf.Photo: National Wildlife FederationDown $350 million so far and its much-hyped containment dome done in by clumps of icy slush, BP is mulling other options to shut off the gushing oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico. It might try again with a smaller dome. Or […]
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Why it’s worth passing a crappy climate bill
This weekend I was asked to contribute to The New York Times‘ Room for Debate. I was kind of under the impression that the question was, “Is the Kerry-Graham-Lieberman bill worth passing?” Apparently, though, it was, “Does the climate bill stand a chance?” Obviously those questions have different answers! Mine was geared to the former, […]
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Clearing the Clean Energy Innovation Threshold
The latest from the Brookings Institution’s Mark Muro is a perfectly succinct summary of how one should judge the coming Kerry-(Graham?)-Lieberman Senate climate and energy bill, reportedly scheduled for release this Wednesday: What is clear, though, is this: To get to a good bill senators need to deal properly with the revenue–whether from offshore oil […]
