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Supreme Court May Muddy Water Law
At the very end of the current term of the Supreme Court, the justices announced that they will review a Ninth Circuit decision that forbids Coeur Alaska, a mining company, from dumping mine tailings into Lower Slate Lake north of Juneau, Alaska. This is not the best news of the week. The company admits that…
Read MoreHeroics and Visions at Earthjustice Forum
Hundreds of people at an Earthjustice energy forum gave a standing ovation to Kansas Gov. Kathleen Sebelius last week in Denver after hearing her tale of fighting off Big Coal so that Kansas could have a clean energy future. Both Gov. Sebelius and Earthjustice presented their visions of what a national clean energy agenda might…
Read MoreSave a Job. Kill a Prairie Dog.
Oil and gas company propaganda trots out old ‘jobs v. environment’ canard. A Denver Post columnist responds ‘Oh yeah? We’ll take our environment over your jobs!’ The Colorado Oil and Gas Association and the Colorado Petroleum Association must have a lot of money, what with record profits for the industry and tens of thousands of…
Read MoreNatural Gas Junkies & Cowboy Junkies
Will Colorado’s Oil and Gas Commission coddle an industry, or protect our air, water and wildlife for when the boom goes bust? On Monday, I waited for two hours to put in my two cents before the Colorado Oil and Gas Commission. I spoke in support of their efforts to adopt modest proposals to protect…
Read MoreBill and I, Part II
Bill is a long-haul truck driver, plying his trade on the highways of middle America. In my last post about him, I told how he called Earthjustice from his truck, attacking environmentalists for bringing him, and America, to the point of economic ruin. He ranted in my ear for 5 minutes about me being stupid…
Read MoreThe Return of Ecoporn
One of the first things I ever had published in a book was a chapter in The Environmental Handbook, a Friends of the Earth/Ballantine Books number, published for the first Earth Day, in 1970. It was called, "Ecopornography, or How to Spot an Ecological Phony." It’s time to dust it off and send it around…
Read MoreBill and I
The voice mail caller accused me of being a Communist, anti-American, out-of-touch, and stupid. Worst of all, he spat out, I was an environmentalist. Bill was furious, like hundreds of callers to Earthjustice in the last two months. Driven to call us by rabid, right-wing radio hosts and bloggers, most folks just wanted to rant…
Read MoreWhat Offshore Oil Drilling Means To Me
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…
Read MoreSilver Lining in the Stratospheric Price of Oil?
The Wall Street Journal reports that the rising cost of shipping everything from industrial parts to living-room sofas is forcing some manufacturers to bring production back to North America and freeze plans to send even more work overseas. This could stem the loss of domestic manufacturing jobs, if not result in a job increase at…
Read MoreOut of Kansas: A Path to Clean Energy
There was more hope than lamentation in a New York Times editorial when it concluded this about the Senate’s recent failure to address climate change: The country needs a new occupant in the White House. We agree—Congress is not likely to take the necessary actions on climate change without strong White House leadership. Fortunately, neither…
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