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  • More on the dumbest video from the YouTube debate

    The Wall Street Journal brings you more than you ever wanted to know about that stupid snowman who asked the question about global warming in the Democratic debate. Kill me.

  • Is the environmental movement losing touch with its feminine side?

    This year, Rachel Carson would have turned 100. Had she lived, the “mother of the environmental movement” might have been pleased with how popular environmental causes have become. On the other hand, she might not have liked current shades of green. Don’t lose sight of the forest. Photo: iStockphoto The great lesson of Silent Spring, […]

  • What are you seeing out there?

    Saw a black bear with two very cute cubs today. Stopping by a local grocery to pick up some things, I went to note the sighting on their nature sightings board ("what are you seeing? when? where?") and was amazed by the number and types of animals people were recording: there were so many that there wasn't a scrap of room for mine: there were moose, bear, foxes, fishers, mink, eagles, and even a goshawk already up there ... none of which is remarkable in western Mass., which went from being largely deforested for agriculture as late as a century ago, to now being roughly 70 percent wooded. But the ritual of noting in such a public place what's scampering around strikes me as a good one.

    So if you're seeing interesting wildlife near you, or have spotted some on your summer trips, leave your fellow Gristers a comment about it.

  • An interview with John Edwards about his presidential platform on energy and the environment

    This is part of a series of interviews with presidential candidates produced jointly by Grist and Outside. Update: John Edwards dropped out of the presidential race on Jan. 30, 2008. John Edwards. Photo: Rachel Feierman John Edwards has gone to great lengths to outshine the top Democratic candidates with an aggressive environmental platform. On the […]

  • Brazil …

    … realizes that global warming is going to hurt it too, and starts to come around on the notion of market mechanisms that could prevent further deforestation in the Amazon, one of the principal global sources of greenhouse gas emissions. This is good news — it needs to become more profitable to save the forest […]

  • An oasis amid slaughterhouses and monoculture

    When you make the three-hour drive from Des Moines to Sioux City (pop. 100,000), the heart of Woodbury County, nothing you see raises your hopes for a good dinner. All along the way, lush farmland lies smothered by what seems like one big blanket, alternately colored light and dark green: corn and soy. At a […]

  • Sleep tight!

    I would be remiss if I did not point out that legendary climate scientist Jim Hansen finds it "almost inconceivable that ‘business as usual’ climate change will not result in a rise in sea level measured in metres within a century." That’s some scary sh*t. Hansen seems way out ahead of what any glaciologist is […]

  • Grist’s own Tom Philpott and his farm get written up

    Grist’s own Tom Philpott is apparently too humble to draw attention to the media adulation with which he is being showered. It’s a task I’m happy to take up. The Winston-Salem Journal has a fantastic long piece on Maverick Farms, the small organic farm Tom runs with his co-conspirators. As the piece describes in detail, […]

  • Are wack

    In his SOTU speech earlier this year, Bush proposed updating and reforming CAFE standards. Skeptical? Good. You’re not stupid. As I wrote here, one of his reforms is to make the whole CAFE system "attribute-based," meaning different mileage standards would apply to different classes of vehicles based on their, um, attributes — mainly size. This […]