Latest Articles
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We need your presents
This year, Grist's holiday gift guide will be chock full of recommendations from our staff and readers -- hey, that's you!
Have you come across a snazzy new eco-product? Got a time-tested gift-giving tradition that fits your green lifestyle? Let us know what you're giving this year, and why. We'll include some of the most creative suggestions in our merry little guide. (Yes, yes, we know consumption is evil and wrong, and we'll be sure to point that out as well.)
Thanks for your ideas -- and if you need a little inspiration, give last year's guide a whirl.
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It ain’t environmentalists fighting change
Far-right conservatives are fond of claiming that environmentalists use global warming as a cover for their true intent: fight progress! Reverse civilization! Leave us all shivering in a dark room! The idea is that attempts to fight global warming will inevitably slow economic growth and stifle innovation.
That is, of course, exactly wrong. It is the dinosaur companies blocking progress and innovation. They are quite fond of the current playing field, which is skewed sharply in their direction by subsidies, tax breaks, and immense political and social inertia.
It's the little people -- average citizens, small companies, entrepreneurs -- who are trying to free our sclerotic system from the dinosaurs' grasp and kickstart a wave of 21st century innovation.
Want to see what I mean in action? Get this:
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Doing lots of cool stuff
I don't have time to write a whole lot on it, but travel booking website Travelocity is doing lots of cool stuff, including this:
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In San Fran
I'm going to be down in San Francisco tomorrow and Friday, so blogging (from me, anyway) will be light-to-nonexistent.
Hey, have you heard we're having a reader party in San Fran on Friday night? I'm gonna be there, throwin' down, or rockin', or wildin' out, or whatever it is the kids do these days when they drink to excess. I hope some of you regular Gristmill readers are able to make it -- I'd love to put faces with names.
Attendance is looking to be in the multiple hundreds. Should be a blast. If you are going to make it, don't forget to RSVP.
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Big enviro endorsements worked out — for the most part
A spin through the endorsements from big environmental groups this year reveals an overwhelming number of successes. Both Sierra Club and the League of Conservation Voters will probably be sleeping contentedly tonight.
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Gotta get all the schadenfreude out before the day is over
There is much to savor today. But one of the things that most pleases me is that if Webb pulls it out in Virginia, as all signs indicate, Marc Morano's wingnut attack screeds are going to be coming from the minority office of the Senate EPW Committee, in service of a master who's suddenly going to have a lot more trouble finding cameras to record his loopy theories about global warming and U.N. world governance. I hope Morano enjoys his return to much-deserved obscurity.
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If so, what?
Greg Anrig Jr.'s advice to Bush: Be more like Arnold.
Just one year after California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger's political humiliation, with all four of his favored ballot initiatives crushed at the polls, the Terminator won reelection yesterday by 17 points. How did he accomplish such a dramatic turnaround? According to the Los Angeles Times, he 1) apologized for his missteps, which were attributable largely to rigidly adhering to right-wing ideology, 2) realized that his job was about "governing," 3) poured billions of dollars into popular programs, 4) cut bipartisan deals to fight global warming, boost the minimum wage, and reduce the cost of pharmaceutical drugs, and 5) made infrastructure the center of his legislative focus, underscoring his new brass-tacks approach to governance.
My advice to pigs: fly, little oinkers, fly!
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Are the two connected?
Matt Yglesias questions the liberal-hawk "we have to stay in Iraq because of the oil" talking point -- which Bush himself has been deploying lately -- using the standard "oil is fungible" response. Any geopolitical experts out there have thoughts on this perennial debate?
