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Republican incoherence on climate change
There’s been lots of bashing of Rep. Mike Pence (R-Ind.) here on Grist lately — see Kate here, Brad here — and with good reason. The guy has a good chance of being the next Republican House leader and he is, to put it bluntly, dumb as a box of hair. Guy like this, it’s […]
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Smithfield: don’t worry, we’re testing our Mexican hogs for swine flu
For a lobbyist working the Hill on behalf of an industry, the gold standard is self-regulation. No need to send in inspectors — we’ll test our process to ensure that it doesn’t pollute. Trust us! Astonishingly, pork giant Smithfield Foods has evidently managed to arrange just such a testing regime with regard to its hog-rearing […]
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Pence repeats $3000 lie about green economy, accuses MIT economist of playing politics
This week, Rep. Mike Pence (R-IN) not only lied twice on national television about the cost of a green economy, but also accused the MIT economist who has challenged Pence’s distortion of his work of playing politics. Since March, the GOP has repeated a $3000 lie about about cap-and-trade clean energy legislation, claiming that the […]
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Memo to Hansen 2: Why is the country’s top anti-science blog reprinting your stuff?
I got a lot of responses to my first Memo to James Hansen on his ill-conceived and unhelpful opposition to Waxman-Markey. Needless to say, it gives me no joy to criticize the nation’s top climate scientist, a man who inspired me to write my book and this blog, a man whose work is reprinted more […]
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Urgent letter to EPA and Interior Dept. from coalfield residents
As three million pounds of ammonium nitrate/fuel oil explosives continue to rip through the lush green Appalachian mountains and historic mountain communities every day, coalfield residents from West Virginia issued an extraordinary letter on Wednesday asking EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson and Department of Interior Secretary Ken Salazar to assert primacy over the negligent West Virginia […]
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Is China ready to act on climate? Part 2
Part 1 looked at the “Rise of the Green Dragon?“ Yet, even as China aggressively pursues world leadership in key clean technologies like solar and wind, it has also announced plans to keep expanding coal use at a pace so rapacious it would single-handedly finish off the climate no matter what we and the other […]
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Obama and Biden press House Dems for fast action on climate bill
The Washington Post reported today: President Obama and Vice President Biden urged a group of House Democrats at a White House meeting this morning to move forward with climate-change legislation that has become a subject of controversy among some Democrats and threatened to stall health-care reform. At the same time, E&E News PM (subs. req’d) […]
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The greening of Sarko
Think of Nicolas Sarkozy, and what springs to mind? Carla Bruni, of course. His platform heels, probably. A somewhat aggressive manner, naturellement. Napoleon Bonaparte, pourquoi non? Al Gore attended the October 2007 unveiling of the Sarkozy government’s green program, called “Grenelle de l’Environnment.”Courtesy Elysee.frIndeed the French president is often compared to the diminutive emperor with […]
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House Republicans blow off biz leaders who want climate action
House Republicans are ramping up their campaign against the Democratic leadership’s climate and energy bill — and telling business leaders to get with the program or get out of the way. On Tuesday, a group of key Republicans hosted a summit on Capitol Hill to bash the Waxman-Markey bill as an “energy tax” that would […]
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Ask Umbra on hydro power at home
Q. Dear Umbra, Please tell me you didn’t just imply that hydroelectric is a clean energy source. You didn’t just say that, did you? Brian K.Eugene, Ore. You’ve got the power in your hands.iStockA. Dearest Brian, In my recent column on living off the grid, I pledged to discuss micro-hydro as a power source for […]
