Climate Politics
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What might Sen. Byron Dorgan’s retirement mean for climate legislation?
Sen. Byron Dorgan, a 18-year veteran Democrat, dropped a late-day bombshell, announcing he will retire when his term ends this year. Dorgan’s announcement represents an opportunity for Republicans: North Dakota is a Republican-leaning state, where President Obama got just 45 percent of the vote last year. What’s bad news for the Dems in the longer term […]
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Richard “Dick” Pombo running for Congress again in California
Pombo and an old pal.Enviros were thrilled when Richard Pombo, a Republican who represented California’s 11th congressional district for seven terms, was ousted from his seat by a renewable-energy geek in 2006. Pombo had been deemed Public Enemy No. 1 by the environmental community, which invested big bucks in the effort to beat him. Amanda […]
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Pollan on ‘The Daily Show’
[vodpod id=Video.16083146&w=425&h=350&fv=] As health care, finance, and climate bills lurch through Congress, buffeted and compromised by the very industries they seek to rein in, the question of whether our political system is actually capable of real reform arises. Could it be that corporate lobbies are so powerful that current dysfunctions are entrenched? Are we doomed […]
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Milk may be cheap but dairy workers shouldn’t be
Barry Estabrook has a piece up on the Atlantic reminding us that agriculture practiced on any scale anywhere in this country relies heavily on migrant — usually undocumented — laborers to perform the hardest, riskiest jobs. And sometimes they die. [A]t about 4:00 in the afternoon of December 22, José Obeth Santiz Cruz, a 20-year-old […]
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James Hansen vs. cap-and-trade
NASA climate scientist James Hansen has a new book out about climate policy, with excerpts in this month’s issue of The Nation. And in my view, he’s got a pretty good policy idea: tax carbon, and use the revenue to give out rebates in equal, per capita shares to every U.S. citizen. It’s a twofer […]
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Rationality, welfare, and public policy
In response (I think) to my post on efficiency and economists, Matt Yglesias cautions against abandoning the presumption of rationality just because people don’t consistently maximize profit. It may be rational in some circumstances to sacrifice profit for gains in time and attention. There’s more to personal welfare than money. Anyone who advocates efficiency runs […]
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France rejects carbon pricing policy
One of the purported advantages of a carbon tax over cap-and-trade is that it would be simple, as simple as grandma and apple pie and just as hard to frak with. That view has taken a bit of a blow from the latest news out of France. The French Constitutional Council has rejected a tax […]
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Economics as pathology
I’m technically on vacation, but the wife and kids are watching Chicken Little up in the hotel room right now, so I’m going to sneak in here for a quick post. Ted Gayer — senior fellow and co-director of the Economic Studies program at the Brookings Institution — has an article in Forbes today, ostensibly […]
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Dear NGO leader: Still want my $100? Answer these five questions
Whoa! This is much harder than I thought. Not only did I receive several new email solicitations since I asked how each of us should spend $100 to support the climate movement; my head is spinning as I read the many persuasive responses to that post. Why the confusion? All these green groups do seem […]
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How environmentally friendly is Washington’s congressional delegation?
The following was submitted by Environment Washington. Today, Environment Washington is releasing our annual scorecard on Washington’s congressional delegation — documenting the lawmakers’ environmental votes over the past two years. These scorecards are an important tool to educate the public about the voting records of their elected officials and to help citizens learn who is […]
