Gristmill

Recapturing the red flag

Ed Kilgore of NewDonkey has a thoughtful post up on how the Dems might regain ground in the South. One tidbit jumped out at me. When listing the tactics used by successful Dems in the South -- "Mark Warner of Virginia (elected in 2001), Phil Bredesen of Tennessee (elected in 2002), and Mike Easley of North Carolina (elected in 2000 and re-elected easily in 2004)" -- he finishes with this:

...and most important, (d) convinced conservative rural voters that public sector activism and new technologies could create economic opportunity in regions left for dead by conventional Republican economic development strategies.

This is vital to understand clearly. Dems are always going on about "populism," wondering (a la What's the Matter With Kansas?) why the very people getting screwed by scorched-earth Republican economic policy keep voting those same Republicans back into office. But what do these pundits offer as an alternative? Too often a return to the early-20th-century populism of trade protectionism and social programs.

What Kilgore's describing is something else, not a populism of resentment (against "fat cats") but a populism of hope -- the idea that there are ways to revitalize rural areas with cutting edge industries, with helpful partnership ("activism") rather than hand-outs from government.

What does this have to do with environmentalism?

Dear Patricia J. Sadowski of Whitefish Bay, Wis.,

I don't know whether to shake your hand or smack you upside the head (ahem, metaphorically).

On the one hand, your letter to Newsweek (third one down) introduces a very large audience to the vital environmental issues related to the tsunami, namely that poor land-use decisions, deforestation, and heedless development removed many of the natural barriers that might have helped protect the coastlines. Kudos.

But then you pin the blame as follows: "It seems our endless desire for 'progress' bears responsibility."

First of all, must you put "progress" in scare quotes? Are you trying to play into the stereotypes that bedevil the environmental movement and provide its enemies cover?

Second, "our endless desire for progress" is not at fault. Presumably you wouldn't condemn the poor coastal peoples of Sri Lanka for wanting a measure of the health and comfort you enjoy? What's at fault is an irrational, poorly planned process of development driven by the short-term greed of small, corrupt government and business elites. The answer to this problem is not to renounce progress but to open up and reform governments, enforce the rule of law, develop more intelligently and sustainably, and seek prosperity in a way that distributes the benefits to those in need as well as those who already possess wealth.

Better progress. Smarter development. That's what enviros should be pushing for.

Love,
DR

You gotta be kidding me

Factory farms are a major source of pollution in the Midwest, and regularly violate air quality laws and regulations.  The Bush EPA's solution? Exempt them from Clean Air Act standards.

Look! No more violations!

Here's a press release from the Environmental Integrity Project:

Hydrogen ho!

Here's a great speech from Metaldyne CEO Tim Leuliette on energy independence and what a real push for a hydrogen economy would look like (PDF) (he calls Bush's $1.2 billion Hydrogen Fuel Initiative "a token gesture"). It's a relatively good (and short) read, but if you want the cliff notes and some juicy quotes, check out the summary at Green Car Congress.  Here's a tidbit:

It's an issue we raise periodically and then put away when concerns fade from the nightly news. It's an issue we like not to talk about unless we have to. It's an issue that with one senseless act, one government collapse, one hiccup in a global distribution system, will become our worst nightmare.

The issue is the drug that our industry, our society, is hooked on...it's called oil.

Land of the free, home of the spent uranium

I was medium-surprised to read that the U.S. just signed a 10-year agreement to take spent uranium fuel rods from Australia, but I was outright baffled to read that "the U.S. already accepts spent fuel containing uranium previously enriched in the U.S. from 41 countries." We do? Where do we put it?

Inhofe is better than fiction

Ladies and gentlemen, I give you Senator James Inhofe (R-Okla.), chairman of the Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works: global warming is "the second-largest hoax ever played on the American people, after the separation of church and state." Awesome!

Hm.

Over the last two days, a question has circulated around the NEW office, asked by green architect and NEW friend Rob Harrison. His quandary: Which car should he buy to replace an automobile that was totalled?

He's narrowed his choices to four -- a super-efficient Toyota Prius, a VW or Subaru station wagon, or a 1992 Honda Accord -- and is weighing factors including price, reliability, safety, utility, and environmental performance.

I can't claim any special expertise on the subject, but I can say this much (and I'm preparing to duck when people start throwing blunt objects at me): For most city dwellers, buying a new Prius is a fairly expensive way of reducing your environmental impacts.

Oxford green, for now

Did you know that the University of Oxford is run entirely on renewable energy? Me neither. But maybe not for long.

Who you gonna believe?

I'm currently writing a review of Michael Crichton's new book State of Fear (should be done and published next week, several months after anybody gives a damn). In it, smarty-pants characters who think global warming is a hoax argue against borderline-retarded characters who believe it's a real phenomenon. The smarty-pants cite many scientific papers in support of their view; the borderline-retarded do not.

Setting aside the dubious literary merits of this arrangement, it raises an interesting question I think people ought to discuss more forthrightly: Why do non-scientists believe what they believe about global warming?

(Warning: extended ramble ahead. Click at your own risk.)