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Know Thine Enemy
I have a simple rule of thumb to decide how to vote on the ever-more-complicated, ever-more numerous propositions that infest the ballot here in California come election time. It is this: Anything that is supported by the Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Association is something that I will enthusiastically vote against. The late Mr. Jarvis and a…
Read MoreWyoming Gags on Natural Gas
The movie "Three Kings" (1999), which follows a trio of American soldiers involved in the first Gulf War, contains an apt, if heavy-handed, metaphor about America’s dependence on oil: an Iraqi torturer forces the black goo down an American prisoner’s throat, making him gag. In Sublette County, Wyoming, life is now imitating art. Picturesque Pinedale,…
Read MoreSpeaking Truth of Power
Once upon a time, in a far-away rectangular state, there was a power source so pure it left no waste and would never run out. And from it sprang the modern environmental movement, not to welcome it, but to kill it dead. Not quite the fairy-tale ending, eh? But the proposed Echo Park Dam, using…
Read MoreRenzi Getting Just "Deserts"
Sometimes, not often enough but sometimes, the bad guys get their just deserts. (And yes, that’s deserts not desserts in case you wondered. But I digress.) We’re speaking today of a congressman from southern Arizona named Rick Renzi. Mr. Renzi, a Republican and chairman of John McCain’s Arizona campaign, persuaded Congress to enact a nefarious…
Read MoreBatten the Hatches, Nail Down the Furniture, Lock up the Valuables…
Sometimes, not often enough but sometimes, the bad guys get their just deserts. (And yes, that’s deserts not desserts in case you wondered. But I digress.) …the next 11 months promise to be even worse than the last 85! By my oh-so-sophisticated calculations we have now endured 85 months of the Bush assault on our…
Read MoreKeeping Colorado Wolf Free
Since the 1930s—following decades of shooting, trapping, and poisoning—Colorado has been a wolf-free zone. There are two ways wolves can return to Colorado: with human help, or under their own power. The Department of the Interior over the last few months made decisions calculated to block both avenues of return. First, the National Park Service…
Read MoreExploiters Rush into Melting Arctic
With late winter, sunlight returns to the North Pole, revealing an ice-bound ocean that looks deceptively like it always has—a frozen, pristine wilderness. Deceptive, because profound and rapid change is underway from the forces of climate change and our relentless quest for energy. Year-round ice that once gouged trenches 1,300 feet below the ocean surface…
Read MoreSalmon, Bass, Owls, Spin
We've had a spate of stories here in northern California about the crash of the fall run of king salmon returning to spawn in the watershed of the Sacramento River.
Read MoreFollow the Money: Environmental Protection Loses Ground
The Bush Administration’s hostility to environmental protection is not news. But seeing the numbers in black and white (or, as in this chart, in red and green) is startling. Created by the Appropriations Committee of the U.S. House of Representatives, it shows that the President’s budget for the Interior Department—which manages national parks, national wildlife…
Read MoreA Bit of Good News
If the polar bears aren’t drowning it’s flooding somewhere and drying to dust somewhere else. Or, as a folk group from my youth sang, "They’re rioting in Africa. . .and Texas needs rain." Plus ça change. With all the horrible news, a bright spot is welcome, and this week’s comes from the World Wildlife Fund…
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