This has been quite a week for proponents of offshore oil drilling. It's as if last week's Jim Cramer Today Show appearance lit a fuse. Or more likely, as if Jim Cramer is privy to major pols' backroom strategizing sessions.

Both Bush and McCain have called for an end to the moratorium on offshore drilling on our coasts. Joining the call was Florida Governor Charlie Crist—who forged bonds with enviros recently when he called for an end to the construction of new coal-fired power plants in his state (following Earthjustice's successful advocacy against the largest proposed coal-fired power plant in the country, planned for the edge of the Everglades).

Four-dollar a gallon gas is the ostensible reason for all this talk. The funny thing is, these guys have to know there aren't enough offshore drill ships to go around. Which is why drilling costs have quadrupled in the past six years.

So I ask myself, what's the real agenda here? Besides the obvious get-McCain-elected agenda?

The State of Colorado is about to adopt new rules governing oil and gas development in the state.

The strangely named Colorado Oil and Gas Conservation Commission will soon change the state's permitting process for oil and gas extraction. (If the Commission is supposed to conserve oil and gas, why is everything it does concerned with taking fuels out of the ground?)

As the average price of a gallon of gas tops $4 for the first time this week, TV pundits are having a field day. There's nothing like bad economic news that everyone can understand to bring out the blather.

This morning's "Today" show gave us Jim Cramer, the Screamin' Jay Hawkins of TV stock jocks, on what we need to do to bring the price back down: "Drill more." On all coasts, in the Gulf of Mexico, in the Arctic. "And enough," he said, putting a spell on the nation of morning-show watchers, "with halting drilling for a few months for the sake of endangered animals. I'm a conservationist, but hey, enough is enough."

In my last post I told you about using Freecycle, Craigslist, and eBay to reduce-reuse-and-recycle my way through a total refurnishing of my new, post-divorce life. It was a lot more fun and I found better quality things than shopping at garage sales and second-hand stores. There's really great stuff out there if you follow the ads.

A major benefit is that by not buying new, I wasn't contributing more climate-changing carbon emissions. Another benefit was the interactions I had with the sellers. Every piece has its own story.

Q: What do forests, water, wildlife, and agriculture have in common?

A: They’re all being reshaped, redistributed, and otherwise readjusted by climate change. Now, in real time.

That's the conclusion of the U.S. Climate Change Science Program, which just released a long-delayed government-commissioned report on how climate change is affecting the American landscape.

This is so much on my mind that I've been looking for every way to do something about it I can find.

A new survey reveals that Americans place global warming LAST on a list of domestic priorities. I learned that from an article in ClimateWire.

About a week later, I read an opinion piece by Bill McKibben from the LA Times. Something he said explained to me why Americans are so blasé about global warming. "Americans are constitutionally convinced that there will always be a second act, and a third, and a do-over after that, and, if necessary, a little public repentance and forgiveness and a Brand New Start."