Climate Politics
All Stories
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Big Ban Boom
Robert Zoellick, the Bush administration’s chief trade official, is calling on the U.S. to challenge the European Union’s ban on genetically modified food. Zoellick claims the ban is both scientifically backward and “immoral,” arguing that it deprives starving people in the developing world of food. The U.S. and the E.U. have adopted polar positions when […]
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Pombo and (Unfortunate) Circumstance
U.S. Rep. Richard Pombo (R-Calif.) was chosen this week to lead the House Resources Committee, much to the dismay of environmentalists. As head of the committee, Pombo, who earned only a 9 percent approval rating from the League of Conservation Voters in the last session of Congress, will have significant say in shaping federal legislation […]
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Tuna Sandwiched
Two former government scientists say their superiors shot down years’ worth of research on the effects of tuna fishing on dolphin populations because the findings clashed with the policy aims of the Clinton and Bush administrations. Separate research conducted by Albert Myrick and Sarka Southern indicated that dolphins are exposed to dangerous levels of stress […]
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Glowing Report
The top dogs at the Nuclear Regulatory Commission say they are fully committed to safety — but their own employees are not so sure. One-third of NRC workers question its commitment to public safety, and nearly half would not be comfortable raising safety concerns within the agency, according to a survey conducted by a private […]
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Green groups work together to counter the Bush attack on the environment
It’s been nine weeks since voters turned the national government over to Republican lawmakers, many of whom explicitly vowed to help President Bush and his industrial allies complete what former GOP House Speaker Newt Gingrich (Ga.) failed to do in 1995: dismantle the nation’s basic protections for water, air, wild lands, forests, and public health. […]
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Yurok Me Like a Hurricane
The Bush administration is to blame for last fall’s die-off of 33,000 salmon along the Klamath River in Northern California, biologists from the state’s Department of Fish and Game have determined. They say the fish kill — the largest ever recorded in the West — was the result of the administration’s decision to divert water […]
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Flippering Out
In a lawsuit made public late last week, Earth Island Institute and other environmental organizations have sued the U.S. government for relaxing labeling standards for “dolphin-safe” tuna. The suit stems from a decision by the U.S. Commerce Department to classify as dolphin-safe a previously prohibited method of fishing — in which dolphins are encircled with […]
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Red Tape, Brown Results
The Bush administration released yesterday a list of more than 300 federal regulations that could be altered or scrapped in the coming year, including many pertaining to the environment. The list grew out of an announcement made by President Bush in March, when he urged companies to contact the administration “[if] there are nettlesome regulations […]
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Mitt’s Catch
Here’s a tidbit of holiday cheer: Massachusetts Gov.-elect Mitt Romney (R) has picked Douglas Foy to fill a key position in his administration, and environmentalists couldn’t be more delighted with the choice. As president of the Conservation Law Foundation since 1977, Foy has been an outspoken advocate of environmentally friendly urban planning. (He’s also made […]
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Things That Make You Go Hum-vee
Tax deductions granted by the federal government to small-business owners and the self-employed provide an incentive to purchase oversize, gas-guzzling vehicles like a General Motors Hummer, rather than small, more fuel-efficient cars like the hybrid Toyota Prius. An eligible buyer of a 2003 Hummer H2 could deduct $34,912 of the base price of the vehicle, […]
