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Hypocrisy yet again

I really really really wish everyone would go read this post by Matt Yglesias, and then read it again. He's making a point that I've made many times before: the monomaniacal focus of pundits and (many) activists on hypocrisy makes neither substantive nor tactical sense.

Driving less is great, but producing more oil is a less-desirable reaction

In this post, David echoes what seems to be conventional eco-wisdom on high gas prices:

It's good that gas prices are rising. We want people to buy more fuel-efficient cars and drive less.

I'm not so certain.

More on Chafee, believe it or not

At the risk of beating a dead horse, let me return to this Chafee question one more time, from a slightly different angle. Yes, it will bore you.

Me and Al Gore

Next Tuesday, May 2, I'll be sitting down for a conversation with Al Gore, a man who, as they say in the biz, needs no introduction. We'll be speaking about his new movie, An Inconvenient Truth, and related matters.

What should I ask him?

Should enviros view high gas prices as good news?

Like many environmentalists, I tend to think that gasoline prices -- even at today's wallet-rending heights -- are too low.

In fact, no matter how high the market price for petroleum goes, it ought to be higher, since it won't include the so-called "external costs" of using oil. For example, whenever I burn a gallon of gas in my car, I'm creating pollution and climate-warming emissions; fostering overseas military entanglements; increasing the risk of oil spills and pipeline leaks; siphoning money from the local economy into the bank accounts of unsavory oil magnates; yada yada. Each of those factors carries a cost -- sometimes intangible, often hard to quantify, but real nonetheless. And because I don't pay those costs when I fill up -- I just let the rest of the globe pick up the tab -- I tend to buy more gas than I otherwise would.

Chariots of Fire

After the pre-screening of An Inconvenient Truth last night in Washington, Al Gore told a crowd of think-tank denizens, activists, and media types that change in American history moves at two speeds: "slow and lightning." Recalling the Civil Rights era, he added, "When we see something as a moral issue, a lot of change can happen quickly."

Grappling with the implications of climate change as a moral issue is becoming more common. Earlier this year, the Evangelical Climate Initative issued their call to action, proclaiming, "Millions of people could die in this century because of climate change, most of them our poorest global neighbors." More recently, in March, John Podesta struck a similar note in a speech at Harvard on clean energy and global warming(PDF): "Beyond the price and the politics that are necessitating change, we, in the United States, have a moral obligation to change."

On different paradigm question, Gore made a key distinction after the film: The movie's animated clip of greenhouse-gas thugs pounding Mr. Sunbeam originated with Futurama, not the Simpsons.

Climate science, say hello to Decision Science

Recently, the issue of how to frame the global-warming debate has come up repeatedly. David sums it up here.

It's gotten me thinking about the confluence between climate science and decision science. Communicating about global warming can not be reduced to a simple up or down vote on the use of doom and gloom, or a tradeoff between bad science and a complete value change. In the end, how, when, and most importantly, why people start to seriously address global warming will be 1/10th about the climate science and 9/10ths about good ol' wacky human decision making.

New Wired green issue goes a little overboard

The latest issue of Wired -- the "green issue," now de rigueur in the magazine world -- has Al Gore on the cover, and the story on his "resurrection" is fantastic. It's one of the best things I've read on his post-2000 activities.

Some of the rest of the issue, however, is irritating -- nothing so much so as this risible chart by Josh Rosenblum, a rating of various environmental groups based on a set of scientific criteria known as How Much They Agree With Josh Rosenblum. The more green groups collaborate with private industries and support (as far as I can tell, any) high-tech responses to environmental problems, the closer they come to Wired true north. Any tension with business, or reservations about nuclear power or coal gasification ... well hell, that's just hippie.

And speaking of hippies: the "Rise of the Neo-Greens" practically bursts a blood vessel admiring the clever young fashionistas "triangulating between the hippies and the hip."

Craig Williams took on the Pentagon to stop chemical-waste burning

“We’re a little outnumbered, and a little outspent,” says Craig Williams, “but we’ve turned around decisions by the biggest bureaucracy on the planet.” Williams, founder of the nonprofit Chemical Weapons Working Group and a cabinetmaker by trade, has been fighting for more than two decades to ensure that the U.S. military disposes of chemical weapons […]

PSA: Net neutrality

There's great hue and cry in the blogosphere lately over "net neutrality." I won't attempt to summarize it here, as it's fairly complex. The best way to understand it is for you (and your friends) to watch this short video.

It's not strictly an environmental issue, but in the sense it that it could degrade your access to information, it is a threat to any progressive cause. Don't let the telecom bastards get away with it.

(via Dymaxion World)