Monthly Archives : February 2011

A Voice in the Wilderness

A Republican over at Frum’s site has some advice for the GOP that will undoubtedly be ignored: if Republicans in Congress want to build on their 2010 gains, going on the warpath against environmental protections might be a flawed strategy. Recent polling and focus group work indicates that roughly three-fourths of Americans ““ including 61…Continue Reading…

The Upside to Global Warming

A climate blogger goes down the yellow brick road: The Egyptian dictator, Hosni Mubarak, has resigned, finally relenting to weeks of massive protests. Is he the latest casualty of climate change? I think I see an upside that everyone else is missing. If more oppressed populaces, inspired by the Egyptians (who were inspired by the…Continue Reading…

O'Reilly's Gift to Mankind

There’s a cosmically splendiforous spin-off to this Bill O’Reilly story from last week. H/T: Bad Astronomy

Is the Southwest on Borrowed Time?

Living in a marginal (but stunning) landscape with obvious constraints has its drawbacks when too many people move there and the natural resources become depleted. In the American Southwest, those drawbacks are not really being felt by the hordes who live there now. Yet. But based on my own knowledge of the drought history of…Continue Reading…

The Bombthrower is Back

In his rise to power as a Republican congressman, Newt Gingrich developed a reputation as a rhetorical “bombthrower.” And that was before Bill Clinton stepped foot in the White House. By the mid-2000s, the former Speaker of the House (he left Congress in 1999), seemed to grow mellower, and even recast himself as a treehugger. …Continue Reading…

Where Are My Minions?

With great pithy I tried to caution people not to get so bubbly over the supposed wiki/peak oil revelations.  I suppose if I can’t get my three year old to listen to me, why should anyone else? Fortunately, there is somebody much more learned and well-placed than me on the case. Maybe he’ll have better…Continue Reading…

Blues Break

Turn it up. Are you listening!

The Gang That Can't Talk Intelligibly

A few days ago, House Republicans held their first hearing on climate science. Actually, as John Broder reported in the NYT, the ostensible purpose of the hearing was to review the economic impact of pending limits on carbon dioxide and other heat-trapping gases. But much of the discussion focused instead on whether climate science supports…Continue Reading…

The "Oprah" of New Media

I’ve been growling all week at the stream of stories and blog posts dissecting the business angle to the AOL acquisition of the Huffington Post. As if that were all that mattered about this news. But one post by Jeff Jarvis, a journalism professor and new media maven, got me barking mad. Now I generally…Continue Reading…

What the Hell?

Can anyone give me the ten-second elevator speech about this latest climate controversy–the one involving Eric Steig and Ryan O’Donnell? That would be the speech going up. Then on the way down, can anyone give me another primer on why this dust-up matters? I’m serious. When even this guy calls it an “incredibly complicated story”…Continue Reading…