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Bullied Pulpit

Evangelical association decides not to fight global warming after all You know all the fuss this past year over the evangelical Christian community becoming a powerful partner in the fight against climate change? Well, never mind. The 30-million-member National Association of Evangelicals had been expected to issue a public statement on the dangers of global […]

This Global Thing Is Everywhere!

Weird weather is messing with marine ecosystems along the West Coast Tens of thousands of starved seabirds washed up on West Coast beaches last spring, and researchers are blaming — surprise! — above-normal ocean temperatures and weird weather and wind patterns. Half of the auklets in California’s Farallon Islands didn’t even try to breed last […]

Crops and Robbers

Archer Daniels Midland blossoms with lots of government help Agri-biz giant Archer Daniels Midland had a barn-burner of a quarter, sending its stock price to an all-time high. Why is the “Exxon of corn” doing so well? Why, your tax dollars, of course! The federal government shovels billions of dollars of subsidies at field corn; […]

Who Moved My Panther?

Endangered Florida panthers must be relocated to be saved, say feds South Florida has run out of room for its 80-odd endangered panthers, says the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, and the best way to save the species is to move some of them to other spots in the region. In its official panther recovery […]

The winter of our discontent

Well, feckless Phil saw his shadow this morning, so we've got six more weeks of rain winter to look forward to.

If you're wondering whether anyone used the country's most notorious PR stunt as a platform to talk about other things, the answer is yes. Besides the mass of Pittsburgh Steeler fans, the National Environmental Trust was there, making a point of tying the whole thing to global warming. Fun-stoppers.

Flamey McGassy

Mark Fiore's latest Flash movie is about a subject Bush accidentally forgot to mention in his SOTU speech: global warming.

It's a doozy -- check it out.

(hat tip: reader Elizabeth S.)

Feds Say the Darnedest Things

Bush’s quasi-bold pronouncements on oil prompt criticism, backpedaling In his State of the Union address on Tuesday, President Bush declared that “America is addicted to oil” and that he would “make our dependence on Middle Eastern oil a thing of the past.” Within 24 hours, fiasco ensued. Saudi Arabia’s ambassador said he would ask Bush, […]

Beyond SOTU

New York Times reporter Simon Romero dug up suggestions for reducing oil imports that didn't make it into the president's speech. Among them:

Perhaps the most significant step the nation could take in reducing oil dependence is to change the way cars are produced, according to the Rocky Mountain Institute ...

In fact, overall federal funding for research and development in energy efficiency has declined 14 percent since 2002, adjusted for inflation.

Some measures that President Bush left out of his state-of-union address could also bring big payoffs: measures that might actually curb oil consumption like greater fuel-efficiency rules for cars, a gasoline tax or increasing ethanol imports from Brazil...

"It's remarkable that we're not taxing fuel from Saudi Arabia while we're taxing fuel from Brazil," said Gal Luft, a co-director of the Institute for the Analysis of Global Security, a research organization in Washington that specializes in energy issues.

Nukes and subsidies

It must take a high tolerance for cognitive dissonance to be a small-government Republican nuke-backer:

Senator John Cornyn, Republican of Texas, said he was enthusiastic about nuclear power but questioned whether the government should be subsidizing alternative fuels like ethanol.

It's a wonder his circuits don't fry. Oh, wait ...

And make it clear that Bush is talking smack

Bush's BFFs in Saudi Arabia were a little puzzled by his (now inoperative) comments about Mideast oil:

Diplomatically, Mr. Bush's ambitious call for the replacement of 75 percent of the United States' Mideast oil imports with ethanol and other energy sources by 2025 upset Saudi Arabia, the main American oil supplier in the Persian Gulf. In an interview on Wednesday, the Saudi ambassador to Washington, Prince Turki al-Faisal, said he would have to ask Mr. Bush's office "what he exactly meant by that."

If you know what he means.

In Washington, Prince Turki, the Saudi ambassador, said he was puzzled by Mr. Bush's words in the speech. He said he wanted to know if reducing American dependence on foreign oil also applied to other suppliers to the United States. "Is that a declaration that the U.S. is going to work to be independent of Canadian oil, Mexican oil and Venezuelan oil?" he asked, adding, "I see no threat from America from receiving its oil from the Middle East."

Say what you will about Saudi Arabia, but the guy's got a point. Oil is oil.