Latest Articles
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House Republicans bring strange theories and wacky witnesses to climate hearings
Democratic leaders in the House are pushing hard to get a comprehensive climate and energy bill passed by summer, with discussion of their draft bill slated to begin this week. But at hearings designed to discuss the particulars of climate policy, Republican representatives and their witnesses have been bogging down the proceedings with skeptical rants […]
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Obama’s carbon-cap plan tests Democratic coalition
This piece was originally published in the Omaha World-Herald. Democratic gains in the Plains, the interior West, the Rust Belt and the Old Confederacy have transformed the political landscape. But one primary goal of the Obama administration is straining the geographic diversity of the new Democratic coalition: capping carbon pollution to avert a climate crisis. […]
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Environmental Organizing as Solution to Family Discord
This weekend, The New York Times Magazine ran as its cover story an article entitled “Why Isn’t the Brain Green?” (i.e. why humans don’t generally make environmental choices automatically, even though it’s good for us in the long term). And a front page Monday story in The Washington Post, chronicled how “going green” could lead […]
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Pare down the pesticides
Tip #7: Be a picky eater. Pare down the pesticides in your diet (without cutting too far into your food budget) by focusing your organic purchases on the “dirty dozen” fruits and veggies that tend to be chem-laden to the core. Buying local and organic as often as possible is a good way to help […]
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Umbra advises on elevators
Q. Dear Umbra, Every time I bring a load of groceries back to the condo, I contemplate the energy and number of trips required to get everything upstairs three stories. If I think I can do it in two trips, I do, but on occasion I succumb and catch a ride. How much energy does […]
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Fast action on climate change
This is a guest post from Ted Glick, a long-time progressive and climate activist. More information and contact information can be found at tedglick.com Tomorrow, April 20th, I and over 200 other people around the country and from several countries will be fasting. We’ll be doing so to make a statement that it is long […]
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GOP leader: the idea that CO2 is harmful to environment is “almost comical”
Here’s Rep. John Boehner, the Republican leader in the House, talking to ABC’s George Stephanopoulos today: “George, the idea that carbon dioxide is a carcinogen that is harmful to our environment is almost comical. Every time we exhale, we exhale carbon dioxide. Every cow in the world, you know, when they do what they do, […]
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King coal takedown: Maria Gunnoe
Pray for the dead, and fight like hell for the living” — Mother Jones. Maria Gunnoe is one of seven recipients of the 2009 Goldman Environmental PrizePhoto: Tom DusenberyListen here, King Coal. Maria “Mother” Gunnoe, a fearless community organizer for the Ohio Valley Environmental Coalition in West Virginia, whose home sits on the frontlines of […]
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Gunnoe gets Goldman
Proud to say that one of the Orion Grassroots Network’s own, Maria Gunnoe, an organizer for Ohio Valley Environmental Coalition, has won the “environmental nobel” for her courageous grassroots activism to end mountaintop removal (MTR) in the face of fierce intimidation: Grist’s own Ken Ward has the story in today’s Charleston (WV) Gazette. Maria Gunnoe […]
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States left wondering about EPA’s greenhouse gas ruling
Eighteen months ago, I watched the head of the Environmental Protection Administration shake hands with Mickey Mouse after the two had hoisted a compact fluorescent light bulb for a Disneyland photo op. I’d been promised a sit-down interview with Stephen Johnson, the career EPA staffer tapped by George W. Bush in 2005 to run the […]
