Climate Politics
All Stories
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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, […]
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Activists are split on a proposed wind project off Cape Cod
Look there, friend Sancho Panza, where 30 or more monstrous giants rise up, all of whom I mean to engage in battle and slay, and with whose spoils we shall begin to make our fortunes. For this is righteous warfare, and it is God’s good service to sweep so evil a breed from off […]
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Morgue of Orca
Environmental organizations sued the U.S. government yesterday for failing to grant protections under the Endangered Species Act to orcas in Washington state’s Puget Sound. The population of orcas in the region has declined almost 20 percent since 1996. Earlier this year, the National Marine Fisheries Service acknowledged that the region’s orcas were at risk of […]
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We Got to Get Ourselves Back to the Garden
New Jersey may be the Garden State — but can it be known as green in other ways as well? Gov. James McGreevey (D) thinks it can, and he’s embarking on an ambitious plan to make the state a national leader in clean energy. Earlier this year, the state government agreed to purchase at least […]
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Is That USGS or USBS?
Here’s some news to make you think twice about the reliability of government figures: The U.S. Geological Survey has announced that there is far more coal bed methane gas available in the Powder River Basin than previously thought — while simultaneously acknowledging that the Rocky Mountain West contains far less oil than the agency had […]
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One Night in Bangkok
In a triumph for population-control efforts and another sign that the U.S. is out of step with international policy trends, Asia-Pacific countries yesterday rejected the Bush administration’s stand against abortion and condom use among teens. The vote came during a U.N.-sponsored Asian and Pacific Population Conference, held this week in Bangkok, which concluded with the […]
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Hogwash
The U.S. EPA unveiled new livestock-waste regulations yesterday designed to keep billions of pounds of unhealthful pollutants out the nation’s waterways annually. The rules, which were issued in compliance with a court mandate from a 1989 lawsuit brought by the Natural Resources Defense Council, will require some 15,500 factory farms to obtain government permits to […]
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No Virginia, There Is No Santa Claus
Virginia may be the cradle of American democracy, but it’s also the stingiest state in the union when it comes to the environment. According to a fiscal analysis released yesterday, the state spends less on environmental protections than any other; moreover, current environmental spending rates are lower than they have been since 1984, as calculated […]
