Senator Bernie Sanders (I-VT) has long been one of the strongest voices for aggressive action on climate change on Capitol Hill, and Bill Nye has long been one of the strongest advocates for pro-science policy in the United States, so it was quite disappointing that their recent Facebook Live discussion about the need to take […]
human-caused climate change
Posted inPolitical Animal
Marching is Good. Voting is Better.
I bow to no one in my respect for former EPA Administrator Gina McCarthy, but she missed the mark somewhat in her analysis of the Office of Management and Budget’s proposed evisceration of the Environmental Protection Agency: This budget is a fantasy if the administration believes it will preserve EPA’s mission to protect public health,” […]
Posted inPolitical Animal
Nothing in Moderation: Anti-Trump Backlash Will Shrink the GOP
It’s hard to understand the thought process of Republicans, running in parts of the country that are not reliably red, who think they can put just enough distance between themselves and Donald Trump and still hope to survive. Granted, it’s hard to understand the thought process of Republicans generally, but the idea of presenting oneself […]
Posted inPolitical Animal
Extreme Makeover: Senate Edition
Last week, I noted that the old-school GOP operatives urging the Republican Party to support a federal carbon tax as a “market-based” way to address climate change might be better off supporting state-level efforts to put a price on carbon. After all, despite some evidence of bipartisanship on climate on Capitol Hill, House Speaker Paul […]
Posted inPolitical Animal
The Camera Never Denies
Good on Mark Phillips of CBS News for his series this past week on the impact that human-caused climate change is having on our world. After years of US broadcast and cable entities downplaying and dismissing the importance of this issue, it was quite impressive to see Phillips and CBS report on the climate crisis […]
Posted inPolitical Animal
Think Globally, Act Statewide
With climate denier Scott Pruitt poised to take over the Environmental Protection Agency, the states are going to play an important role in determining whether America continues to take bold steps to both reduce carbon pollution and hold the fossil-fuel industry accountable–and the industry and its elected lackeys know it: Concerned about what he calls […]
Posted inPolitical Animal
Angels in America
Blessed are the protesters. And the attorneys. And the mayors and governors… Remember when the right-wing malcontents went after Michelle Obama in 2008 when she declared, “[F]or the first time in my adult lifetime, I am really proud of my country”? Well, for the first time since January 20, 2017, Americans of conscience and compassion […]
Posted inPolitical Animal
A Worsening Political Climate
Sometimes, you just have to appreciate the small things. Ten years ago Monday, George W. Bush–you know, the last Republican to slide into the Oval Office without winning the popular vote–delivered his second-to-last State of the Union Address, and for the first time in a Bush SOTU speech, he acknowledged the reality of a problem […]
Posted inPolitical Animal
You Know the Drill
What will he say during the deposition? “My bad”? For all my skepticism about the effort by young climate activists in Oregon to have the federal courts effectively shut down the fossil-fuel industry, I have to admit this is a clever idea: Lawyers for teenagers claiming the US government failed to protect the environment from […]
Posted inPolitical Animal
Orange Alert
Maybe Donald Trump had better things to do that morning. Perhaps the science-scorning scoundrel would have learned something 35 years ago today, if he had read the report in the New York Times about the crisis that would threaten his city three decades later in the form of Superstorm Sandy–a crisis he would shamefully deny […]
