Barack Obama
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Stand up for rural America while you still can
The assault on rural America continues unabated. For the past six months dairy farmers across the country have suffered a historic drop in milk prices while operating costs remain high. Since December 2008, the price that farmers are paid for the milk they produce has plunged over 50 percent, the largest single drop since the […]
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Congress is the problem
Felix Salmon blogs at Reuters about the seeming exhaustion of Obama’s political capital — on both climate change and financial regulations, he just can’t seem to get what he wants out of Congress. I think Matt Yglesias and Ryan Avent both have the appropriate response: the problem here is not Obama, but Congress. Indeed, the […]
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Robert F. Kennedy first challenged our Ponzi scheme pursuit of growth for growth’s sake
Robert F. Kennedy was assassinated 41 years ago last week. He challenged our monomaniacal pursuit of GDP in “one of the most beautiful of his speeches,” as Obama described it an August 2008 NYT profile of his economic thinking. Obama is one of the few major politicians who constantly challenges our unsustainable economic worldview today […]
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Obama admin will scrutinize mountaintop mining, but not stop it
The Obama administration on Thursday announced new steps to reduce the environmental damage from mountaintop-removal (MTR) mining, a controversial and highly destructive practice used to extract coal from Appalachia. Activists from the region and the environmental community say that’s a nice first step, but they’re disappointed that the admin isn’t planning to rein the practice […]
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Breaking: Obama says mountain crimes can be regulated
“Mountaintop removal is a crime–and ought to be treated as a crime.” — Al Gore “Mountaintop removal is a crime against local people, nature, our children, and our planet.” — Dr. James Hansen, NASA The Washington Post headline this morning cut to this chase: “Obama is Right to Allow Mountaintop Removal Mining.” Only two days […]
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Newt Gingrich: “I am not a citizen of the world.”
“Ich bin ein Berliner” – not! The other intellectual leader of the GOP – the one whose first name isn’t Sarah – summed up the narrow minded and ultimately self-destructive “every-country-for-themselves” mentality of the modern conservative movement Monday. Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich was keynoting the biggest GOP fundraiser of the year for the Senate […]
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Will health care eclipse climate in Congress this year?
Halfway through the second debate of last fall’s presidential campaign, moderator Tom Brokaw asked the candidates what their top priority would be if elected. McCain hemmed and hawed, but Obama answered in plain language: energy is “priority No. 1” and health care “priority No. 2.” Fast forward. In an NYT Magazine piece this weekend on […]
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Snap, son! Baseballer Ryan Howard gets White House garden tour
Here’s some good stuff, via Obama Foodorama: While a camera rolls, White House chef/gardener Sam Kass shows baseball star Ryan Howard around the White House garden. They have some great dialogue, climaxing with Howard’s reaction to the garden beehive: “Oh snap, son!” Kass hips Howard to the genius of composting–food scraps go from the White […]
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Obama on climate action: “Tough decisions and… concrete actions”
President Obama was asked a question today on global warming at his press conference with German Chancellor Angela Merkel: Q: And another political issue, if I may. Madam Chancellor, climate change. Germany, Europe are putting concrete targets on the agenda, concrete reduction targets. Will America in the post-Kyoto process be willing to commit itself to […]
