Climate Politics

Congress’ dimmest bulb laughs at bikes

The energy bill just passed by the House contains a provision that would offer a $20 monthly tax rebate to bicycle commuters. When Rep. Patrick McHenry (R-N.C.) found out, he took to the floor of the House to deliver this speech (via Streetsblog): A major component of the Democrats’ energy legislation and the Democrats’ answer […]

Learning from masters in other fields: What a concept!

David Mamet (author of The Verdict and Glengarry Glen Ross, among other fine things) writes this in his new book Bambi vs. Godzilla: On the Nature, Purpose, and Practice of the Movie Business (a great book just loaded with great snark:

An interview with Hillary Clinton about her presidential platform on energy and the environment

This is part of a series of interviews with presidential candidates produced jointly by Grist and Outside. Update: Clinton suspended her campaign for the presidency on June 7, 2008. Hillary Clinton. Photo: SEIU True to form, New York Sen. Hillary Clinton has done her homework on environmental and energy issues. A member of the Environment […]

A look at Hillary Clinton’s environmental platform and record

Update: Clinton suspended her campaign for the presidency on June 7, 2008. Hillary Clinton. Photo: Roger H. Goun During her years representing New York state in the U.S. Senate (2001 to the present), Hillary Clinton has earned an 87 percent lifetime voting score from the League of Conservation Voters (lower than it might have been […]

Activists pester him about the most trivial stuff

OK, I’m back to defending Dingell (sorry Brian!), mainly because the activists attacking him are acting like idiots. At a town hall in Ann Arbor, Mich., Dingell unveiled the various climate-change proposals he’s going to introduce to Congress on Sep. 1. Press coverage of the event is fairly sketchy, and I can’t find a transcript […]

Damn Environment, It’s Always Getting in the Way

Partisan eco-impasse stalls budget vote in California California’s massive state budget is nearly six weeks overdue, and a partisan eco-impasse is a major factor. The state Assembly passed a spending plan in late July, but it’s stalled out in the state Senate. The current sticking point: the 37-year-old California Environmental Quality Act, under which the […]

Is he losing his influence?

Glenn Hurowitz writes that Dingell may finally be losing his influence: Part of the reason for Dingell’s decreasing power is that he’s become rather unpopular within a Democratic caucus that’s willing to tolerate internal policy differences, but increasingly unwilling to accept his barely veiled attacks on Pelosi and his open war with the environmental movement, […]

Micropower is smarter military strategy

This post from Tom Grant at his excellent blog Arms & Influence reinforces the point I (channeling Amory Lovins) made in this post, namely: The centralized power grid in Iraq is intrinsically vulnerable to terrorist attack, thereby crippling our efforts to create some measure of security and civil society. Our determination to rebuild it, rather […]

Reversing Reagan’s joke

This phrase was the punchline to Ronald Reagan's cruel joke about the nine most dangerous words in the English language. Well, maybe it's getting to the point that those words can be used in a positive way. Paul Waldman, in an online article at The American Prospect, writes:

As hard as it may be for many progressives to accept it, scarred as they are by years of GOP abuse and the tepid, apologetic stance of their own allies, the time has finally come for them to defend, without reservation, the idea of a vigorous, engaged government. They can finally say, without fear of disastrous political consequences, that sometimes government is not the problem, it's the solution.

On the other hand, Roger Cohen of the International Herald Tribune, writing in the New York Times op-ed page on August 6, seems to want us to not think about solutions:

Economic power lies with central bankers, global corporations and high-rolling masters of the universe. Military power is constrained by mutually assured destruction and the 24-hour news cycle. What remains are image, perception and identity.

That is, just watch the political fun and games, and strutting, and symbolism; don't worry about global warming, the end of cheap oil, mass extinction, the dying oceans, rivers, and lakes, and the deforested landscapes. The "central bankers, global corporations and high-rolling masters of the universe" will be sure to keep business-as-usual going, and there's nothing we can do about it.

Watch him on ‘OnPoint’

Very good piece here from E&ETV ($ub req'd). Worth the time to watch. Description: