Articles by David Roberts

Gosh, they just seemed like normal folk!

The CS Monitor's Brad Knickerbocker has a competent backgrounder on the recently arrested "eco-terrorists." There's not a whole lot new in it, particularly about ELF, which is what I'd most like to see some solid reporting on. He does point out that activists in this extremist community (centered in the Northwest, principally around Eugene, Ore.) deny that the feds have the right people, but I suppose that's to be expected.

This passage, however, jumped out at me:

New head of mine safety administration is a coal man from way back

Shortly after Bush became president, the head of the U.S. Mine Safety and Health Administration, Dave Lauriski, stepped down. Lauriski had spent his entire career working for coal companies. As his interim replacement, Bush appointed David Dye, who'd only joined the MSHA six months earlier.

On Tuesday, Congress will hold confirmation hearings on Richard Stickler, Bush's nominee for new permanent MSHA head. Stickler too has been a coal-industry man his entire career, principally at Bethlehem Steel -- where, between 1980 and 1992, 13 miners died in coal operations. Three of those miners died at mines directly managed by Stickler.

Last week, the United Mine Workers asked Bush to withdraw Stickler's nomination. It didn't happen.

Looks like the Sago tragedy hasn't made the feds any tougher on the coal industry.

Makower hour

I'm getting stuck in a cycle. Joel Makower writes something, I say, "hey, that's interesting, I should link to it," forget for a few days, he writes something else, I say, "hey, I should link to that, but first I should link to that other one," and then forget again, and so on.

So anyhoo, to bust out of this cycle, see interesting Makower posts on:

• the 2006 Global 100 Most Sustainable Corporations,
• new "nutritional labels" that Timberland will be putting on all its shoe boxes, and
• interesting uses of "web 2.0" widgets to track corporate chicanery.

Some stuff in The Nation

The Nation, like just about every lefty media outlet in the world, is running a "Real State of the Union"-type series in their latest issue. It's about what you'd expect. Of particular interest to Gristmillians are Raul Grijalva on "Coming Clean and Green," Marcy Kaptur on "Saving Small Farmers," and Dennis Kucinich on "The Big Fix" (about reconstructing New Orleans).

And while you're over there, you might as well check out Mark Hertsgaard's "Green Power," about the German Green Party, "without question the most influential environmentally based party ever" (despite having been booted from the ruling coalition in the last election).