Climate Politics

Between the sheets in the Abramoff scandel

Italia Federici, the founder of the Council of Republicans for Environmental Advocacy (CREA), is the latest target of investigation in the ongoing saga of Jack Abramoff (whose first name might as well be Disgraced Lobbyist), according to recent press reports. Federici, who at the time was dating the coal lobbyist turned Interior Department official J. […]

I do not think it means what you think it means

President Bush "said he took climate change very seriously Tuesday, a day after the US Supreme Court ruled the government must regulate greenhouse gases." In other news, President Bush "said on Tuesday he planned no new action to impose caps on greenhouse gases blamed for global warming."

So keep it up

Think about this article -- descriptively titled "Legislature flooded with bills about climate crisis; poll driven politicians see need to tackle global warming" -- the next time you get an email asking you to call or email your representative on an environmental issue. You keep it up long enough and they get it:

Maddening

I’m way, way, waaay behind on this one, but I nonetheless want to draw your attention to two pieces on the massive, ongoing PR push from the nuclear industry. The first is an editorial in the Columbia Journalism Review on the maddening phenomenon of mainstream news reporters accepting the claims of paid shills (i.e., Patrick […]

Get the Chertoff My Back

States worry as Homeland Security issues chemical-plant rules Funny story: Of the 15,000 U.S. chemical plants, as many as 7,000 are in highly populated areas and at high risk for an accident or attack. Ha! Yesterday, the Department of Homeland Security released the first comprehensive federal rules for tracking the security of such sites. Which […]

Karma Duke

Supremes say upgrading coal plants without reducing pollution a no-no We love the Supreme Court this week. In a unanimous decision yesterday, Big Justice overturned a lower court ruling and declared that Duke Energy did indeed violate the Clean Air Act when it modernized coal plants without paying for pollution-reduction equipment. Duke had claimed it […]

Some signs point to yes

I never thought it would happen, but it looks like a carbon tax might actually become a viable policy option in the U.S. In the Washington Post, Juliet Eilperin and Steven Mufson discuss growing support for a tax over a cap-and-trade system. If you read between the lines, it basically breaks down like this: economists […]

More on Supreme Court decision

In November, the issue of EPA's refusal to regulate greenhouse gas emissions went before the Supreme Court. Yesterday, the decision (PDF) was announced -- 5-4 in favor of Massachusetts, meaning that the EPA does have the authority and responsibility to regulate carbon dioxide as a pollutant. In short, the time to act is now!

In the chutzpah department, EPA actually tried to argue that 1) "any EPA regulation of motor-vehicle emission" was a "piecemeal approach to climate change that would conflict with the President's comprehensive [!] approach" -- comprehensive, I suppose, in the sense that he refuses to take any substantive action in every sector, and 2) such regulation "might hamper the President's ability to persuade key developing nations to reduce emissions" -- a particularly amazing argument, since the president has been working hard behind the scenes to persuade key developing nations not to reduce emissions. Justice Stevens, writing for the majority, made short work of those absurd arguments.

So much BS in so few words!

Here’s a bit on the Supreme Court case from a White House briefing today. Marvel, if you will, at the sheer amount of dishonesty and misdirection packed into these few short paragraphs. Virtually every sentence, every word, needs unpacking. It’s always been a talent of this White House to use a kind of shock-and-awe bullshitting […]

Like, totally geo-green

Interesting: Senators of both parties are pushing for U.S. intelligence agencies to assess the danger to the nation’s security posed by global warming. Sens. Richard Durbin, D-Ill., and Chuck Hagel, R-Neb., Wednesday introduced legislation that would “require a National Intelligence Estimate to assess the security challenges presented by the world’s changing climate,” according to a […]