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In which your author finally breaks down

This (via Tapped) nails, like nothing else I've read, why I take Bush's reaction to Katrina personally.

And it's not just Bush, it's Brown, Chertoff, any number of politicians, a substantial portion of the commentariat. Sen. Rick Santorum (R-Penn.) said that those who stayed (got stuck) behind in New Orleans should be punished:

There may be a need to look at tougher penalties on those who decide to ride it out and understand that there are consequences to not leaving.

I don't really consider myself a bleeding heart, but for god's sake, thousands of our fellow citizens are sitting in their own filth, old people and babies, dying of sickness, dehydration, illness, suicide ... Why isn't everyone, at every level of government, in a fucking panic about this? Where's the humanity? How can I be a part of the same species as these people? I just don't get it.

Time for me to take a valium and stop reading the news.

Is Esurance the eco-friendliest of them all?

Last night I caught snippets of a new Esurance television commercial. Thinking I heard the words "environment" and "hybrid," I headed over to esurance.com to investigate. For those of you not familiar with Esurance, they are an online insurance company whose animated television commercials feature Erin Esurance, a secret agent with a mission to help you and me crack the auto insurance code.

Once at the site, I headed over to the "ErinCam" where I located the advert in question. In this "episode," Erin encounters a robot destroying a forest to produce paper for those other auto insurance companies. Erin then goes on about how Esurance is paperless -- thus saving customers some green as well as helping to protect the environment. After dispatching the tree-cutting robot (in under 30 seconds no less), she and her partner hop in their hybrid SUV and drive off into the sunset.

I also stumbled upon Erin's "Top Secret" audio files (aka radio ads), some of which also include the Esurance is green message. And go figure, Erin (a fictional animated character remember) even has her own blog.

I dug a little deeper and discovered that going (almost) paperless is not the only planet friendly initiative under way at Esurance. According to their "Our Commitment to the Environment" page:

Umbra on why we shouldn’t waste energy

Dear Umbra, I am doing a big geography project at school on saving energy and recycling. My part is to comment on what will happen if we keep wasting energy. I know the basic information, but I am not sure what to write, as it is to be given out to adults (and I’m only […]

Quotes on Katrina

Michael Brown, director of the Federal Emergency Management Agency:

"Unfortunately, [the death toll]'s going to be attributable a lot to people who did not heed the advance warnings," Brown told CNN. "I don't make judgments about why people chose not to leave but, you know, there was a mandatory evacuation of New Orleans," he said.

Michael Chertoff, secretary of Homeland Security:

Some people chose not to obey [the evacuation order]. That was a mistake on their part.

Bill O'Reilly, conservative talkshow host on FOX News:

Moral of the story: People were warned to get out. Those who stayed paid a price for that decision. If you rely on the government, you're likely to be disappointed. No government can protect you or provide for you. You have to do it yourself.

Barack Obama, Senator from Illinois:

And so I hope that out of this crisis we all begin to reflect - Democrat and Republican - on not only our individual responsibilities to ourselves and our families, but to our mutual responsibilities to our fellow Americans. I hope we realize that the people of New Orleans weren't just abandoned during the Hurricane. They were abandoned long ago - to murder and mayhem in their streets; to substandard schools; to dilapidated housing; to inadequate health care; to a pervasive sense of hopelessness.

That is the deeper shame of this past week - that it has taken a crisis like this one to awaken us to the great divide that continues to fester in our midst. That's what all Americans are truly ashamed about, and the fact that we're ashamed about it is a good sign. The fact that all of us - black, white, rich, poor, Republican, Democrat - don't like to see such a reflection of this country we love, tells me that the American people have better instincts and a broader heart than our current politics would indicate.

(first three via American Progress)

Green group makes early entry into 2006 election fight

And they're off! The League of Conservation Voters has made its first endorsement for the 2006 election, 14 months ahead of time, throwing its green weight behind Washington state's junior senator, Maria Cantwell, and promising to mount "an aggressive campaign" to reelect the Democrat.

Cantwell will need all the help she can get; she's likely in for a tough fight. She won by a teensy margin in 2000, against Slade Gorton, and then proceeded to piss off much of her liberal base in 2002 by voting in favor of the Iraq war resolution. Republicans have determined that hers is one of the five most vulnerable Democratic seats in the Senate and will be pumping resources into the campaign to defeat her. It's not clear who she'll be up against -- state Republican Party Chair Chris Vance and former Rep. Rick White are two prominent potential contenders -- but whoever it is, they'll be well-funded.

LCV says Cantwell was one of only two senators to get a 100 percent rating on the group's 2004 National Environmental Scorecard. Among her eco-achievements as touted by LCV: leading the effort to protect the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, pushing for creation of the Wild Sky Wilderness Area in Washington, fighting to hold polluters responsible for their Superfund messes, and battling Enron on behalf of bilked ratepayers. They should have listed her notable though unsuccessful effort to attach to the energy bill a provision requiring the feds to reduce imports of foreign oil by 40 percent in 20 years.

In Louisiana, oil and water do mix

The so-called "toxic gumbo" in the streets of New Orleans is earning more media attention. An article on CNN.com today quotes Louisiana Department of Environmental Quality Secretary Mike McDaniel: "Everywhere we look there's [an oil] spill ... there's almost a solid sheen over the area right now." The story also describes destroyed sewage plants, natural gas leaks, and oozing vehicles of all shapes and sizes. It is, as McDaniel says, "almost unimaginable." Almost.

We'll have much more on this in the days (and weeks, months, probably years) to come. For the moment, an interesting question comes to mind. How will a southern state not generally known for its high regard for the environment, or for its interest in outside meddling, respond to this crisis?

Stay tuned.

Hurricane Katrina brings a foretaste of environmental disasters to come

If the images of skyscrapers collapsed in heaps of ash were the end of one story — the U.S. safe on its isolated continent from the turmoil of the world — then the picture of the sodden Superdome with its peeling roof marks the beginning of the next story, the one that will dominate our […]

A hurricane expert explains the climate-change connection

As the world watched New Orleans’ devastating descent into squalor last week, questions about connections between global warming and hurricanes reemerged. A few politicians and activists leapt to offer their views, most of which were unmeritorious. So what does the science say? Swifter, higher, stronger? Investigations of the climatology of tropical cyclones (the generic name […]

You Deserve a Break to Hay

City slickers go on farm vacations to get respite from modern life Overstimulated urban dwellers are taking farm vacations to get back in touch with country life — a phenomenon that may help preserve America’s rural landscape. “Agri-tourism” generates considerable, much-needed revenue for Liberty Hill Farm in Vermont; it’s one of just a few thousand […]

A Detox on Both Your Houses

EPA releasing new, stricter rules on human testing of pesticides Researchers would be prohibited from intentionally exposing children and pregnant women to pesticides in order to study the chemicals’ effects, under new regulations being proposed today by the U.S. EPA. The agency formulated the rules — its first-ever on human testing of pesticides — after […]