Latest Articles

From Wiener to Whimper

Rubbed the wrong way Climate-change impact aside, here’s another reason not to have meat in the house: “The victims told deputies they awoke Saturday morning to the stranger applying spices to one of them and striking the other with an 8-inch sausage.” The Iceman steameth Seems Mr. Kilmer is making a Val-iant effort to bring […]

Friday music blogging: Aaron Tippin

Newt Gingrich’s American Solutions for Winning the Future is an astroturf group funded largely by Republican billionaires. In the short-term, it’s designed to staunch Republican electoral losses in November by creating a new wedge issue: drilling for oil. In the medium term, it’s taking on a range of other right-wing campaigns. In the longer term, […]

Snippets from the news

• Europe backs further away from biofuels. • American Chemistry Council spends $180,625 in one month fighting Seattle plastic-bag ban. • Flight will use new technologies to save time and fuel. • MTV attacks greenwashers. • Brower Youth Awards given to young environmental leaders.

Environment and energy hot topics in Canadian election

Canada is gearing up for an Oct. 14 election between two main candidates with similar first names but little in common policy-wise. Liberal leader Stephane Dion is campaigning for a “Green Shift” that would include a carbon tax on most fuels, excepting gasoline. Revenue would be used to cut income and business taxes as well […]

Defenders of Wildlife Action Fund endorses Obama-Biden ticket

Defenders of Wildlife Action Fund today joined the growing list of environmental groups endorsing Barack Obama for president, citing John McCain’s pick of Sarah Palin as his running mate as a major reason they will not endorse the GOP ticket. “John McCain’s choice of Gov. Sarah Palin as his running mate confirmed that the only […]

Expanded transit can lead to energy independence

While the Republicans were busy chanting “drill, baby, drill” at their convention, they ignored a much better alternative: riding on buses and trains.  As Diane Carman put it in The Rocky Mountain News: The irony was almost creepy. Thousands of Republicans were gleefully chanting “Drill, baby, drill” inside a convention hall in St. Paul, Minn., […]

Permit me to ignore building codes

I know everyone’s in the throes of the Obama-McCain frenzy, but allow me to divert your attention to a minor ballot initiative in Oregon: Measure 63. Oh it’s fascinating, I assure you. Measure 63 is the last whimpering gasp of the property rights measures that originated in Oregon. Times change. It was just a few […]

WRI updates chart of greenhouse gas targets in 110th Congress

As Kate reported in June, there’s a new climate bill in the mix in Congress, a fairly ambitious bill from Reps. Lloyd Doggett (D-Texas), Earl Blumenauer (D-Ore.), and Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.). The World Resources Institute has dutifully update its "Comparison of Legislative Climate Change Targets in the 110th Congress." Here’s the short story (click […]

Pipeline to nowhere

Remember the natural gas pipeline that played such a big role in Sarah Palin’s acceptance speech? The one God himself blessed? One of the few actual accomplishments on her resume? Turns out not so much: The pipeline exists only on paper. The first section has yet to be laid, federal approvals are years away and […]

World Bank yanks corruption-tainted pipeline funding from Chad

The World Bank has pulled funding from a 663-mile oil pipeline in Chad and Cameroon, having lost its gamble that the project would funnel oil wealth into poverty reduction instead of the pockets of corrupt officials. The bank made the loan in 2000, with the stipulation that 72 percent of oil royalties be spent on […]