Tag: environmental

Seeking to protect fossil-foolish interests is at the core of the Republican House majority’s agrenda.

“We think what we can be is the canary in the coal mine,” Republican Representative Darryl Issa told reporters.

Congressman Issa’s words are prophetic — evidently he and his colleagues consider themselves to be the ‘canaries in the coal mine’ since they are taking steps with the newly introduced Continuing Resolution to kill off as many canaries in the coal mine to protect Americans from environmental, safety, and other risks.  For example, the proposal includes a 22 percent reduction in the Center for Disease Control and Prevention, massive cuts in basic science research, budgets slashing seeking to essentially eliminate U.S. government research on climate change, … a true anti-science syndrome agenda.

There are many, many serious problems out there.

And, there are real opportunities to be had from taking on those challenges in smart ways…

Sadly, too much attention is given to those who deceive about the challenges and distort the implications of the options before us.

Best-seller lists, the air waves, oped pages, and blog posts have been filled with Steven Levitt’s and Steven Dubner’s shallow, truthiness-laden Superfreakonomics.   The continued attention feeds on itself, as ignoring the deceptions and  the mediocre interviews booked due to the authors’ Super(freaky)star status has the problem of giving it credence due to non-truthful truthiness and misleading mediocrity on the critical issue of climate change science and other issues. There essentially innumerable works more worthy of our attention and engagement, even if we constrain ourselves simply to books also published in 2009.

Thus, after the fold, ten books published this year that are more worthy of your time and money that the shallow distortions from the Super Freaky Economists of Superfreakonomics.

Shut up already!!!

President Obama has said favorable words.

Al Gore says supports it.  Paul Krugman says support it. Two Nobel Prize Winners.

WTF are you to question the President and two Nobel Prize winners?

That is a question received, in more than one space, when it comes to the Waxman-Markey American Clean Energy and Security (ACES).

Well, with all due respect to our President and the infallibility of Nobel Prize Winners (Kissinger (’73), James Watson (’03), etc …), we should be clear that the bill, as drafted, falls far short of what is necessary and, well, quite likely falls short of what is possible.

The other day, the Environmental Defense Action Fund opened voting for ‘the people’s choice’ as to the best 30-second video to explain how a Cap & Trade program to control carbon dioxide would help cut the nation’s dependence on oil. Putting aside questions as to Environmental Defense’s devotion to a CAP uber all, the best video seemed clear:  The Thinking Cap.   This choice seemed clear, evidently, to many as this video was the runaway victor for EDAF’s $1000 “People’s Choice” award.  (The Climate Activists’ Choice Award.) But the experts, the experts had a different perspective.  They went with the foul-language oriented Cursing Cap.

You know the saying that if a tree falls in the forest and no one is there to hear it, did it really make a sound? Well, some governments and companies are banking that the public needs to hear or see uncontacted tribes before we care that they are being killed or relocated in the name of oil and mahogany.  Companies are invading indigenous lands of uncontacted tribes causing their deaths, yet officials claim that unseen tribes are nonexistent mythical creations of anti oil and logging developments.  The tribes are then forcibly relocated or members killed sufficient to terminate the tribe’s continuity with future generations. Yet, some would like the public to believe that no one was harmed because the tribes are mythical.  

In the coming days, for those not actively on the Democratic National Convention (DNC) floor, The Big Tent will be one of (if not the) places to be.  And, much of the Tent will be colored Green.  Much of The Big Tent’s agenda will focus on Green initiatives, energy efficiency, and Global Warming.  

Looking at this schedule makes this blogger envious of those able to attend.

And, a few tinges of off-green makes this same blogger concerned.

That is, truly enjoing the Onion‘s 3 July 2008 Green Issue: “Our All-Paper Salute to the Environment.”

Well-done satire provides a painful window on the soul of an issue.

And, the Onion specializes in that well-done satire.

This issue pulls together some top environmentally-oriented satire from the past decade. Lets take some bites of that green onion …

But, first, some related breaking news …

There is a debate, subdued at times, between various approaches toward changing the planet to the better.  In many ways, my viewpoint (on the optimist side) tends toward the ‘enviro-capitalist’, thinking that we can work to structure the economy to make the right choice, the easy (and preferred) choice.  There is a challenge between using financial mechanisms as a tool to move toward a A Prosperous, Climate-Friendly Society and going overboard.  

The line can be thin … or thick.

GreenSumption or Greening our Choices?