The Seventh Sense

Oh Please Oh Please Oh Please Oh Please

Sarah Palin weighed in on climate change this week in a painfully bland op-ed in the Washington Post.  (No, of course she didn't actually write it -- Bill Kristol, I'm guessing, did).  It was largely a rehash of one of her Facebook posts on the subject, where words like "science" and "experts" were put in scare quotes.

On Laura Ingraham’s radio show today, Palin continued her attack on climate change. But when Ingraham asked if she would be willing to debate Al Gore on the issue, Palin demurred, saying that if it was in the wrong “forum” she would “get clobbered”:

INGRAHAM: Would you agree to a debate with Al Gore on this issue?

PALIN: Oh my goodness. You know, it depends on what the venue would be, what the forum. Because Laura, as you know, if it would be some kind of conventional, traditional debate with his friends setting it up or being the commentators I’ll get clobbered because, you know, they don’t want to listen to the facts. They don’t want to listen to some reasonable voices in this. And that was proven with the publication of this op-ed, where they kind of got all we-weed up about it and wanted to call me and others deniers of changing weather patterns and climate conditions. Trying to make the issue into something that it is not.

INGRAHAM: But what if it’s an Oxford-style, proper debate format. I mean, he’s going to chicken out. I mean, if you challenge him to a debate, do you actually think he would accept it?

PALIN: I don’t know, I don’t know. Oh, he wouldn’t want to lower himself, I think, to, you know, my level to debate little old Sarah Palin from Wasilla.

Yeah, Sarah -- I don't think the question of whether or not you will get "clobbered" depends on the forum or the debate rules.  Okay, maybe you might win the swimsuit competition, but if it was the kind of debate in which you were to argue your position with supportable facts, well, yeah -- you might have some problems there.

But anyway, I think this is something I would like to see.  Pay good money to see.  Let's make it happen.

EPA: Greenhouse Gases Endanger Human Health

That may not sound like news, but it is.

Believe it or not, this was an open question under the Bush Administration.  In fact, during the Bush Administration, the EPA did nothing to regulate.  It was so bad that several states (like Massachusetts) and environmental groups tried to sue the EPA to do its job.  The EPA at the time argued that it did not have the authority under the Clean Air Act do regulate greenhouse gases.

The case went all the way up to the U.S. Supreme Court, which held in 2007 that the Clean Air Act did oversee greenhouse gases provided that the EPA concludes that greenhouse gases do endanger human health.

A new administration has taken the shackles off of the EPA, and today they are planning to announce that, in their view, greenhouse gases harm humans and therefore the EPA will start regulating them.

Speaking of the environment, all eyes are on Copenhagen this week.  Kyoto didn't work out so well; the new agreement (one hopes) that will incolve China and other developing countries might be better.  Krugman is optimistic; I am not.

UPDATE:  Matt Yglesius writes that business groups are freaking out over the EPA's newfound commitment to control carbon emissions, adding that the EPA's power to seriously make effectatious changes in this area is overblown.

I'm So Sick Of "Climategate"

Let me get this straight.  The email of one British university gets hacked and stolen, and when you cherry-pick the results, it allegedly shows that the scientists "faked" data to make it look global warming was caused by human activity?

Look, assuming all that is true, I would like the proponents of this "gotcha" to answer me one question: What are you saying?  Are you saying that, therefore, the notion that global warming is caused by humans... is false?!?  That the thousands of studies conducted by governments and universities ALL OVER THE WORLD are fake???

Because if you can't claim that, or support, then "Climategate" means nothing.  It's a tempest in a teapot.

That said, Huffington Post has a must-read which demonstrates just how blown up and, yes, manufactured, Climate-gate really is.

Republicans' Boycott of Climate Change Bill Committee Fails

The Senate Environment and Public Works Committee have been working for weeks on a bill to address climate change, and Republicans on the committee wanted to stop it.  Their tactic?  Not showing up.  Republicans were aware of committee rules saying that no business could go forward unless two members of the opposite party were present.  So, every day this week, they sent one member, who would make a perfunctory appearance, then leave.

It didn't work:

With Republican boycotting the proceedings, Committee Chairman Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.) relied on a little used interpretation of committee rules to move the legislation. Traditionally, two minority members are required to conduct committee business.

Boxer said that she passed the bill “in full accordance with long-standing committee and Senate rules.”

“This is not a procedure we wanted; it’s a procedure that’s available to us,” said Boxer. “The majority has to be able to do its work…otherwise the whole Senate could come to a screeching halt.”

It won't be long before Republicans start to complain that climate legislation is going through without their input, etc., and waah waah waaah how unfair it is.

The thing about bipartisanship is that both parties -- at a minimum -- have to show up.  Republicans can't complain now (or later) about how they were cut out of the loop when they themselves, on their own initiative, boycotted legislative procedure.

Melt The United States

Think about how vast the United States is.  Leave out Alaska and Hawaii and just focus on the lower 48.  Think about how expansive it is, how long it takes to travel from one end to the other.

That's about the size of the Arctic polar ice cap -- during warm months -- for the end of the last century.

Even during the warmer months, the Arctic ice cap was unpassable.

Well, that's soon to be a thing of the past.

A new study reveals that the polar ice cap will be navigable during the summer months, within a decade. 

And in 20 to 30 years, it will be entirely gone during the summer months.  That's right.  The North Pole (including Santa's house) will be ocean. 

In the upcoming months, there's going to be bills and debate in the Congress on the subject of global warming, and you know where the political parties will line up.  You're going to be hearing a lot of misinformation from interest groups (big oil) and GOP politicians and pundits fiananced by those interest groups, including the ridiculous conard that global warming doesn't exist.  It's going to make the health care debate look reasonable and adult by comparison. 

But Santa Claus is drowning.  So it's time to saddle up.

The Cove Trailer

A documentary about dolphins is one thing.

A documentary about dolphins which plays like The Bourne Identity?

Yeah, I'm curious....

Stats From The Cash-For-Clunkers Program

The Top Ten Cash for Clunkers Trade-Ins:

1. 1998 Ford Explorer
2. 1997 Ford Explorer
3. 1996 Ford Explorer
4. 1999 Ford Explorer
5. Jeep Grand Cherokee
6. Jeep Cherokee
7. 1995 Ford Explorer
8. 1994 Ford Explorer
9. 1997 Ford Windstar
10. 1999 Dodge Caravan

The Top Ten Cash for Clunkers New Cars:

1. Ford Focus
2. Honda Civic
3. Toyota Corolla
4. Toyota Prius
5. Ford Escape
6. Toyota Camry
7. Dodge Caliber
8. Hyundai Elantra
9. Honda Fit
10. Chevy Cobalt

[Source]

Smart, money-saving, and good for the environment.

Conservatives are now deriding the C-4-C program as an example of a government program that doesn't work and was mismanaged.  To the extent that there was a government screw-up, it was only because it was so popular.  “Cash for Clunkers” — the government program giving people a $4,500 voucher to trade in an old vehicle for a newer, more fuel efficient one — has been so successful that Congress is considering appropriating more money for it to continue.

America's Best Idea

Wondering what documentarian Ken Burns (The Civil War, Baseball, Jazz) has been up to?

He's putting the finishing touches on his six-part documentary, National Parks: America's Best Idea, which premieres on PBS on Septmber 27.

Yeah.  Not a grabber.  Not for me anyway. I mean, an hour or two, at best.  But six parts?!?

But it's Ken Burns, so I'll give it a shot.

Snakes In The Carolinas

No, not another post about Mark Sanford.

I'm talking about snakes.  Actual snakes.  Big ones. 

I'm talking about Burmese pythons up to 25 feet long that eat kitties and poodles and potentially, babies.

Now scientists fear this invasive species is silently slithering northward.

***

"The question is really, well, can they survive in a place like South Carolina or North Carolina or Arkansas or Tennessee?" [NC biology professor Mike] Dorcas said.

Let's hope not.

Dumping Waste Into Clean Water Doesn't Violate The Clean Water Act

SCOTUS ruling today:

The Supreme Court ruled Monday that the Clean Water Act does not prevent the Army Corps of Engineers from allowing mining waste to be dumped into rivers, streams and other waters.

In a 6-to-3 decision that drew fierce criticism from environmentalists, the court said the Corps of Engineers had the authority to grant Coeur Alaska Inc., a gold mining company, permission to dump the waste known as slurry into Lower Slate Lake, north of Juneau.

I don't know the details of the case, so I'm not going to comment on whether the decision was sound or not.

I will say this though.... if the ruling is sound, then they need to either change the name of the "Clean Water Act" or enact a better one.

Q: When Is It Time To Start Ignoring George Will Columns Attempting To Debunk Global Warming?

(1)  When you read something like this...

and/or

(2) When George Will starts citing cartoons to support his position.

Earth Day

 

Lake Mead, near Las Vegas, Nevada, taken last week. The “bathtub ring” records the water level less than a decade ago. Until recently, there was a “No Fishing” sign on the cantilevered pier. The road on the left was carved from what used to be lakebed. The triangle-shaped hill in the upper right is Pyramid Island, although it’s no longer an island. The protruding landform in the upper left is Saddle Island—also no longer an island. The water volume of the lake is down by more than half since 2000. The Southern Nevada Water Authority estimates that it will be significantly lower by July. The main reasons for this are declining snowmelt and increased water use for irrigated agriculture.

Any questions?

Quote Of The Day

This Week With George Stephenapolous:

STEPHANOPOULOS: So what is the responsible way? That’s my question. What is the Republican plan to deal with carbon emissions, which every major scientific organization has said is contributing to climate change?

BOEHNER: George, the idea that carbon dioxide is a carcinogen that is harmful to our environment is almost comical. Every time we exhale, we exhale carbon dioxide. Every cow in the world, you know, when they do what they do, you’ve got more carbon dioxide.

Boehner has just demonstrated why he is in no position to be an opponent of efforts to address climate change.

Because to be an opponent of something, you have to at least be on the same playing field.

Carbon dioxide is a carcinogen?  He's right when he says CO2 is not a carcinogen, but that has NOTHING to do with global warming.  It's a non sequitor from left field. 

But carbon dioxide, in high levels, contributes to the destabilization of the planet’s climate.  And it does kill.  (Anyone remember Apollo 13 and the part where they had to replace the scrubber?  That's because the old one was broke, forcing the astronauts to be living in an environment full of their own CO2 emissions).

Then Boehner says, "Every cow in the world, you know, when they do what they do, you’ve got more carbon dioxide."

Uh... no.  Cow farts do not consist of carbon dioxide.  And if John Boehner thinks that cow farts are no different from human exhalation, he is more than welcome to lift the tail of a cow and put that theory to the test.  I'll even provide the stool for him to sit on.

No, bovine flatulence is actually methane, and yes, it does genuinely contribute to global warming, albeit not on the same scale as industrial activity.

But the larger point here is that you can't do much to address the global warming issue properly in the face of powerful politicians as ignorant as Boehner.

Ice Shelf Breaking Up

The Wilkins Ice Shelf is a shelf of ice in the Antarctica, one of ten on the Antarctic peninsula.  

Due to global warming, it has been breaking up for a couple of decades.  In the 1990s it measured 6,200 square miles.  Now it is thought to be at least half that size.

Scientists were still unsure how long the retreat of the ice shelf would be.

But events over the past couple of days have led them to conclude that the break up will be sooner than expected.

This is because an ice bridge over 60 miles long -- but at its narrowest just 1/3 of a mile wide -- kept the Wilkins shelf intact to the Antarctic.  But something happened to that ice bridge.  It was there two days ago -- now it is a mass of shattered ices and bergs (shown above right).

This means that the Wilkins Ice Shelf itself -- an area the size of Connecticut -- could break off from the Antarctic soon.  Scientists hope the shelf will remain in its current position for the next few months, since the Antarctic summer is coming to a close.  But once the Antarctic winter ends and temperatures rise again, the Wilkins Ice Shelf could float away from the rest of the continent and breakup.  

The 17-frame animated gif below shows the breakup from satellite imagery, in sequence from March 22 to today.

The island visible in the upper left of the image is Charcot Island, and Latady Island at the bottom. The Wilkins Ice Shelf is connected to these by an ice bridge. 

The 60+ mile ice bridge is visible as a narrow strip near the center of the image (I've added a blue circle to the area on the first frame --focus your eyes there).  

Over the course of the photos, you can see ice bridge turn into something resembling shattered glass by the last image (taken earlier today).  You can also see breakup of the ice bridge to the "southeast" of where I drew the blue circle.

Global warming a hoax?

Why Many People Can't Take Congress Seriously

Exhibit A.

This is Representative John Shimkus, Republican from Illinois.  He serves on the U.S. House Subcommittee on Energy and Environment, a body which considers, among other things, global warming and climate change.

Below is a clip of Representative Shimkus speaking on March 25 in the Energy and Environment Subcommittee.  He is expressing his view that global warming is not happening because..... wait for it... the Bible says so. 

That's right.  God had declared in the Bible that He would not destroy the Earth again in a flood, therefore there was no threat of worldwide flood from global warming.

Look, I'm not knocking God or the Bible.  But I do think we run into serious trouble when biblical interpretation dictates environmental policy.... or any policy coming out of Washington, for that matter.

Shimkus also believe, contra scientific evidence, that limiting CO2 in the atmosphere is a bad thing because plant life thrives on CO2.  Therefore, he says, capping Co2 emissions will kill plants.  Nice theory, but not true.

Shimkus, by the way, was aware of the Mark Foley scandal (where House Representative Mark Foley was making advances to teenage male congressional pages) years before the story broke.  He knew of it, but didn't inform anyone of it.

UPDATE:  On Republican Senator James Inhofe gets the runner-up award, for saying today on the Senate floor that global warming can't exist because his home state of Oklahoma just got a snowstorm.

I loved how he prefaced his remarks about "not getting into the science".  Yeah.

When Volcanos Tweet

Yes, Mount Redoubt in Alaska, the volcano which erupted last week, has its on Twitter account so you can follow along.

Greenland and Iceland

From Michael Steele, the chairman of the RNC (which is second in charge of the Republican Party right behind Rush Limbaugh) on global warming:

“Thank you, thank you,” he said. “We are cooling. We are not warming. The warming you see out there, the supposed warming, and I am using my finger quotation marks here, is part of the cooling process. Greenland, which is now covered in ice, it was once called Greenland for a reason, right? Iceland, which is now green. Oh I love this. Like we know what this planet is all about. How long have we been here? How long? No very long.”

Sigh.

The port of Qaqortoq, Greenland:

    

 Glacier Lake, Iceland:

And yes, Iceland does have a lot of "green", and Greenland does have a lot of "ice", but they weren't named at a time when the reverse was true.  Greenland, by the way, was named "Greenland" not because it was entirely green, but because its discoverers wanted people to think it was full of bucolic green pastures, and thus settle the place.

Waxman In

Dingell is out and Waxman is in as Energy And Commerce Chair.  That may seem like inside-politics baseball, but it is kind of a big deal. This is a huge victory for environmentalists. TPM has the details:

Dingell, who first entered the House way back when Eisenhower was president, had been the head Democrat on this committee ever since 1981.

But many of the more liberal members over the years came to view him as too friendly to Michigan's auto industry and hostile to environmentalists -- especially on issues like climate change and carbon limits.

It also shakes up Congress' seniority system and is yet another sign that the political momentum is squarely in the camp of aggressive Dems. Waxman played a lead role in staking out a far more aggressive stance towards the Bush administration than many other more cautious Dems would take.

The willingness to address the global warming crisis could be the single most important change ushered in by the Obama administration - and now with Waxman taking over from Dingell, the prospects for real action just got that much closer to realization. 

Screwing The Environment Before The Clock Runs Out

Meanwhile.... Bush is still the president.

And he can still do a lot of things.

By law, new regulations and executive orders don't take effect until 60 days after they are issued, which means if Bush is going to do stuff, he has until November 20 to get them done.  (The Clinton Administration messed up on this -- they issued a lot of executive orders and regulations after the deadline; the Bush team came in and was able to withdraw hundreds of them and/or modify them with a Republican slant).

The Washington Post recently did a story on the regulations that the Bush folks are trying to squeeze through at the last minute.  As you might guess, these regulations really screw with the environment and consumers:

The new rules would...lift constraints on private industry, including power plants, mines and farms...clear obstacles to some commercial ocean-fishing activities, ease controls on emissions of pollutants that contribute to global warming, relax drinking-water standards and lift a key restriction on mountaintop coal mining.

....A rule put forward by the National Marine Fisheries Service and now under final review by the OMB would lift a requirement that environmental impact statements be prepared for certain fisheries-management decisions and would give review authority to regional councils dominated by commercial and recreational fishing interests.

....One rule, being pursued over some opposition within the Environmental Protection Agency, would allow current emissions at a power plant to match the highest levels produced by that plant, overturning a rule that more strictly limits such emission increases. According to the EPA's estimate, it would allow millions of tons of additional carbon dioxide into the atmosphere annually, worsening global warming.

A related regulation would ease limits on emissions from coal-fired power plants near national parks.

A third rule would allow increased emissions from oil refineries, chemical factories and other industrial plants with complex manufacturing operations.

It looks like they're cutting corners to get it done, too.

Rushing to ease endangered species rules before President Bush leaves office, Interior Department officials are attempting to review 200,000 comments from the public in just 32 hours, according to an e-mail obtained by The Associated Press.

The Fish and Wildlife Service has called a team of 15 people to Washington this week to pore through letters and online comments about a proposal to exclude greenhouse gases and the advice of federal biologists from decisions about whether dams, power plants and other federal projects could harm species. That would be the biggest change in endangered species rules since 1986.

In an e-mail last week to Fish and Wildlife managers across the country, Bryan Arroyo, the head of the agency's endangered species program, said the team would work eight hours a day starting Tuesday to the close of business on Friday to sort through the comments. Interior Secretary Dirk Kempthorne's office, according to the e-mail, will be responsible for analyzing and responding to them.

The public comment period ended last week, which initiated the review.

House Natural Resources Committee Chairman Nick Rahall, D-W.Va., whose own letter opposing the changes is among the thousands that will be processed, called the 32-hour deadline a "last-ditch attempt to undermine the long-standing integrity of the Endangered Species program."

At that rate, according to a committee aide's calculation, 6,250 comments would have to be reviewed every hour. That means that each member of the team would be reviewing at least seven comments each minute.

It usually takes months to review public comments on a proposed rule, and by law the government must respond before a rule becomes final.

"It would seem very difficult for them in four days to respond to so many thoughtful comments in an effective way," said Eric Biber, an assistant professor at the University of California at Berkeley School of Law. Along with other law professors across the country, Biber sent in 70 pages of comment.

And sure enough, after the "thorough" review in four days, the Bush Administration announced new regulations the following Monday.

There will be many more of these quick and dirty regulations in the weeks to come.

Effect of Global Warming On Polar Bears

Bad and sad:

The best known consequence of disappearing sea ice in the Arctic is the loss of the polar bear habitat.

"The Arctic sea ice melt is a disaster for the polar bears," according to Kassie Siegel, staff attorney for the Center for Biological Diversity. "They are dependent on the Arctic sea ice for all of their essential behaviors, and as the ice melts and global warming transforms the Arctic, polar bears are starving, drowning, even resorting to cannibalism because they don't have access to their usual food sources."

Well, Now She's Just Out And Out Lying

On global warming, this time:

MORE PALIN FUN --  AP reports:

Pressed about what insights into recent Russian actions she gained by living in Alaska, Palin told Gibson, "They're our next-door neighbors and you can actually see Russia from land here in Alaska, from an island in Alaska."

Riiiight.  And I can look up and see the stars and moon.  That makes me an astronaut I guess.

The New McCain Ad Against Obama Is Staggeringly Dishonest On So Many Levels

McCain's new TV ad, "Pump", blames Obama for rising gas prices.

On its face, it is silly.  Obama has been a one-term senator.  How can one man be responsible for rising gas prices?

Here are some very worthwhile critisicms of the ad:

• Daily Kos' BarbinMD:   "John McCain has often said that he would run a respectful campaign, but he never said anything about running an honest one. [...] Did he forget that his own campaign said: '...allowing new offshore drilling would have no immediate impact on supplies or gas prices.' Did he forget all that or is he just lying?
• Drum: "Is the McCain campaign losing it? In an ad today about spiraling gasoline prices, the narrator asks portentously: 'Who can you thank for rising prices at the pump?' This is accompanied by [Obama's picture] and background noise of a crowd chanting 'Obama! Obama!' Are they serious? They're going to try to convince the American public that Barack Obama is responsible for $4 gasoline? Or is this one of those pseudo-ads that never really gets aired anywhere and is released just to see if it can get some press attention from suckers like me? Regardless, this is really lame."
• Benen: "For McCain, it appears the equation is simple. If abandoning honor and honesty will give him the presidency, then so be it. The truth, McCain has concluded, is for losers. To anyone who cares about reality, the ad doesn't make a lick of sense. McCain has to hope, desperately, that we're all idiots. For example, the ad says gas prices are high 'because some in Washington are still saying no to drilling in America.' How's that, exactly? No one is saying no to 'drilling in America.' There's all kinds of drilling in America. There's drilling in U.S. waters, and on U.S. land. I don't know of a single U.S. policy maker who wants 'drilling in America' to stop. Worse, the ad wants Americans to believe that prices would be lower if there was more 'drilling in America.' McCain knows that's not true, but hopes to fool just enough people, playing them for suckers. It's shameful."
• Yglesias: "John McCain's new ad says that Barack Obama's refusal to open America's coastline to drilling is to blame for high gas prices. [...] They say nobody ever went wrong underestimating the intelligence of the voting public, but it is staggering that you can't find any credible people anywhere prepared to argue that McCain's drilling schemes will bring any short-term relief from high gas prices or that the long-run price reductions would be anything other than tiny. Meanwhile, it's McCain who has no plan to help bolster alternative fuels and no plan to bolster alternatives to driving."

Lack of honesty aside, the ad simply doesn't work

Open Left's Matt Stoller: "I don't think McCain's attack will work on Obama, since it is saying something that Americans fundamentally don't believe. The ad suggests that prices are rising because of insufficient drilling, and that more drilling will lower prices. That isn't true, and polling suggests people know it isn't true. An ad that says something along the lines of 'this isn't a total solution, but it's a start' would be much more credible as an attack on Obama. [...] If you drilled everything there is in the US tomorrow and oil started coming out of the ground tomorrow, gas prices would drop by about three cents."

Pat Boone vs. The Apes (The Loser? Comedy)

I can't tell if Pat Boone is (a) trying to be funny and failing; or (b) being totally serious and failing. 

Anyway, the crooner is on his (white) soapbox about -- I am not making this up -- "ape rights".  Judge for yourself:

Well, if it weren't for the close quarters and the sad deterioration of his bones and other body parts, Charles Darwin would be spinning madly in his sarcophagus.

Close quarters?  Darwin is buried in Westminster Abbey in London.  Pretty nice digs from what I hear.  But please, evoking the decaying body of a scientist?  Where are we going with this?

Spinning with hilarious joy, that is.

O.K.  So this must be good news for Darwin, whatever Pat is talking about.

I've just read that animal rights activists in several countries are campaigning diligently for apes and chimps to receive virtually all the same legal rights as their supposed human descendants.

Wait a second.  Is Pat suggesting that Darwin was an animal rights advocate?  Where does that come from?

Yeah, yeah, Pat.  Animal rights advocate, evolutionary theorist.  They BOTH have to do with animals, so they're BOTH the SAME THING.

By the way, I'm just guessing here, but I don't think anybody is talking about giving legal rights to our simian ancestors.  They are, after all, dead.  I think we're just talking about LIVING apes, from whom we most assuredly did NOT descend.

Yes, the Great Ape Project International, based in Atlanta, and other devoted simian lovers around the world, have rallied around a case in the European Court of Human Rights in Austria involving a 28-year-old chimp named Matthew Hiasi Pan.

And they're cheered on by a resolution, adopted just last month by a Spanish parliamentary committee, that would give great apes, such as chimpanzees and gorillas, the right to life, freedom from arbitrary captivity and protection from torture.

Pat is mocking this?  What's his problem?  Does he think chimpanzees should be arbitrarily killed, captured and tortured?

What kind of a sick fuck is Pat Boone, anyway?

If the Spanish court approves the resolution, as it's expected to do, Spain will be the first nation to extend human rights to mankind's closest "genetic relatives." If the European Court in Austria follows suit, it may declare Matthew the chimp a person, and entitled to a legal guardian and funds for upkeep. He already has a lawyer, Eberhart Theuer of Vienna.

Oh, Pat.  Can you read?  Or do you get your info from retarded email spam?

The theory behind GAP is a simple one: great apes differ from us in DNA by only 0.5% difference. The difference between a chimpanzee and us is only 1.23%. Human blood and chimpanzee blood, with compatible blood groups, can be exchanged through transfusion.  We use chimps and other great apes to cure diseases such as rheumatoid arthritis, lupus erythematosis, multiple sclerosis, psoriasis, Crohn's disease and asthma. Chimpanzees also contain unique advantages in evaluating new Hepatitis B and C vaccines, and treatments for malaria, again because of the similarity in their response to these antigens to humans.

But on a psychological level, the great apes are capable of rudimentary communication skills, feelings, rationality and self-consciousness.  The typical great ape is, to put in bluntly, more "advanced" emotionally and mentally than thousands of mentally-impaired humans.

Even then, nobody is advocating that a chimp be "declared" a person.  That would be stupid.  The whole object is to acknowledge that they should be offered some of the same rights as a mentally-retarded person -- like the right to life, freedom from torture and imprisonment, etc.  Is that so silly?

[I can only imagine Pat's response: "Yeah, but they're monkeys.  They throw their own shit excrement!"  To which I respond, "Well, I'm sure many mentally retared people would, or do, too."]

And you thought we had problems with illegal aliens?

Get it?  Monkeys?  Dark-skinned illegal aliens?  Making the connection?   It's okay if you didn't; Pat just made it for you.

Matthew's lawyer says he only wants his client to be treated like a human child, to be declared a person, and granted four of about 50 rights enjoyed by Europeans: the right to life, limited freedom of movement, personal safety and the right to claim property. And of course, a legal guardian.

"Four of about 50 rights"?  So in your earlier paragraph when you wrote "I've just read that animal rights activists in several countries are campaigning diligently for apes and chimps to receive virtually all the same legal rights as their supposed human descendants", you were lying, Pat?  Pulling something out of your arse there?

Or perhaps you lack basic reading comprehension, like our monkey brethren?

In this country, he'd be lining up for food stamps, health care, a driver's license, unemployment insurance, registration to vote (Democrat) – and, maybe later, application for citizenship.

Okay.  I think Pat is being tongue-in-cheek about a monkey getting a driver's license in this country and voting for Obama.  Well, maybe just the driver's license part.  So, let's give him a hearty "Har har.  Good reposte, old spot"

But underlying Pat's sarcasm, he's STILL making the racist connection between MONKEYS and ILLEGAL ALIENS (not to mention MONKEYS and OBAMA).  Why is nobody calling him on this?

Why not run for public office? According to the Yerkes National Primate Research Center at Atlanta's Emory University, chimps share 98.5 percent of human DNA – roughly the same as some career politicians!

And roughly the same as washed up 1950's singers who got famous stealing music from monkeys dark-skinned people.  Ain't that right, Pat?

The same study claims the ape family shares many of the same characteristics as humans, but not capacity for written language or complex emotions, such as guilt or shame. Sounds perfect for some congressional seats, some court benches and chairmanship of some big oil companies.

*rim shot*.  Thanks, ladies and gentleman.  Pat is playing the Sands all week!

Of course, there's still a bamboo ceiling; he couldn't run for president if he weren't born in this country. Arnold Schwarzenegger has been governor of California for two terms, and that's as far up the food chain as he can go. But some chimps have already been movie and TV stars; over 50 years ago, Cheetah starred with Tarzan, Clint Eastwood co-starred with one, and J. Fred Muggs was a big-hit regular with Dave Garaway on NBC.

Don't quite get the comparison there, Pat.  Are you saying that Cheetah and J. Fred Muggs are higher up the food chain because they've been on TV, compared to Schwarzenegger, who has only been governor?

Are you just trying to show off your vast knowledge of monkeys-in-Hollywood trivia?  And if so, why?

Still, some legal analysts warn of a danger in giving apes equal legal status because an animal's rights could conflict or even supersede a human's rights in future court rulings, says USA Today. Richard Cupp, at Pepperdine University's School of Law, having written extensively on animal vs. human rights, says, "I'd call it a slippery-slope-plus."

I thought I would factcheck Pat's last paragraph, and found the USA Today article in question.  Here is how the relevant paragraph in USA Today reads, verbatim:

Some legal analysts warn of a danger in giving apes equal legal status because an animal's rights could conflict or supersede a human's rights in future court rulings. "I'd call it a slippery slope-plus," says Richard Cupp, associate dean for research at California's Pepperdine University School of Law, who has written extensively on animal vs. human rights.

Why, Pat's paragraph is almost word-for-word the same as the USA Today paragraph!  It's almost as if he's aping the USA Today article in a monkey-see-monkey-do kind of way.

Or, as we humans call it, plagerism.  Guess old habits (e.g., stealing songs from other people) die hard.

I guess so …next thing you know, the flaky California Supreme Court, already declaring that marriage no longer has to be defined as a covenant between one man and one woman, may quickly grant that status with all its benefits to a man and his chimp, a woman and her ape, or – God forbid – two male gorillas!

Okay.  Evolutionists?  Check.  Illegal immigrants?  Check.  Gays?  Check.  Bestiality?  Check. 

What other rightwing bugaboos can milk off this lame topic?

Landlords and business owners, watch out! You may soon have no right to forbid occupancy or employment to simians, no matter your religious convictions, or even allergies.

Desegregation?  Check.

Many researchers believe the AIDS virus mutated and originated in a certain type of African monkey, so hospitals may have a lot more to worry about than staph infections.

Because... huh?  Ape rights will result in an increase in AIDS?  I realize -- well, I think -- this is intended to be funny, but one wonders how Pat's mind works sometimes.

And talk about that "slippery slope" – if primates are ceded human rights, why not cats and dogs? And other pets like hamsters and iguanas and snakes and birds? What if George Clooney's pet porker sues him for alienation of affection?

*rim shot*   ha ha ha ha... huh?  Pat is not only suggesting that George Clooney fucks a pig, but that George Clooney cheats on the pig he's been fucking.

Pat, that's cooooold.

Hey, that great humanitarian Leona Helmsley not only left $12 million to her beloved white Maltese, Trouble, but it now turns out she earmarked virtually her entire estate, between 5 and 8 billion, for a charitable trust dedicated to "the care and welfare of dogs"! And not even she demanded that pooches be declared human and granted the same status as American citizens. Obviously, in her view, that would devalue them.

I'm not comedy writer, but somehow "in her view, that would devalue them" just doesn't sound like a workable punchline, no matter how lengthy the set-up.

It occurs to me, at the risk of being shouted down by Matthew's legal supporters, that a novel solution to all this might be: Leave all primates in their natural habitat, where they've always flourished, and quit dragging them into the confusion and turmoil of modern society! It didn't work for Tarzan, and it sure didn't for Cheetah!

Pssst, Pat!  I think that's what Matthew's legal supporters are trying to achieve.  So this whole time, you've been having fun at the expense of people with whom you actually agree.

I know this all sounds ridiculous, and it is. As ridiculous as former Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O'Connor's serious suggestion that we ought to look to Europe for some of our legal precedents and judgments.

Liberal judges?  Check.

As if our unique and precious Constitution with its Bill of Rights didn't provide Americans with the best and highest form of jurisprudence ever devised on this planet, creating the best and freest society in history.

Shhhyuh, dude.  As IF.

Look to Europe?

That's for the dogs. And now, the apes.

So sayeth Pat Boone, adding "I mean. Come ON!  If pigs could fly!  But that's a horse of a different color!  Hahahahaha!  I crack myself up sometimes!  Hahahahahah!  Beeeern-a-diiiine...."

Pictured above: Pat Boone, Concerned About Monkeys and Illegal Aliens Driving Cars, Mixing with General Population

The EPA Has ADD

News today:

Climate change will pose "substantial" threats to human health in the coming decades, the Environmental Protection Agency said yesterday -- issuing its warnings about heat waves, hurricanes and pathogens just days after the agency declined to regulate the pollutants blamed for warming.

That's reassuring, coming from the federal government.  Unfortunately, the EPA was saying something else only last week:

In a 588-page federal notice, the Environmental Protection Agency made no finding on whether global warming poses a threat to people's health, reversing an earlier conclusion at the insistence of the White House and officially kicking any decision on a solution to the next president and Congress.

The bottom line, I think, is that the EPA does believe that global change does threaten human health, but they aren't going to do anything until Bush gets out of office.

President A-Hole

You know, it's not just that he's wrong; it's that he's arrogantly wrong.  Proud of it.

Read this:

President George Bush signed off with a defiant farewell over his refusal to accept global climate change targets at his last G8 summit.

As he prepared to fly out from Japan, he told his fellow leaders: "Goodbye from the world's biggest polluter."

President Bush made the private joke in the summit's closing session, senior sources said yesterday. His remarks were taken as a two-fingered salute from the President from Texas who is wedded to the oil industry.

Now, this is from the British journal, The Independent, so keep in mind that the "two-fingered salute" is the Brit equivalent of the "one-fingered salute" in our country.

In other words, President was snotty and snide about our country being the world's biggest polluter, and world leaders at the G8 correctly understood his comment to be snotty and snide.

Six more months of this doofus.

UPDATE  Hilzoy weighs in...

In a sane world, no diplomat would care about such things as: the shape of the table used in negotiations, whether they personally are treated with basic respect, etc. But we do not live in that world. We live in a world populated by human beings with egos. And that creates a wonderful opportunity: to get things we want not by conceding anything of real importance, but just by listening earnestly when the Minister of Whatnot wants to tell us about his grandkids, or by holding the door for His Excellency, or -- who knows? -- by not giving one's rival leaders "the verbal equivalent of a kick in the nuts."

Giving up that opportunity is just dumb, if you care about whatever it is that you're trying to get other countries to agree with.

But what's even dumber is to make other countries so annoyed at you that they don't agree to deals they might otherwise sign on to, just because you've been such a jerk. If you do that, you're not just failing to get potential freebies; you're giving up real successes for no reason at all. Again, imagine the counterpart from normal life. Suppose you were engaged in a complicated contract negotiation, and it turned out that your lawyer just couldn't keep herself from telling the other negotiators what total assh*les and idiots they were. She might be right. And you might feel tempted, for a moment, to think: good for you! that's telling them! But that moment would pass, and when it did, you'd either sit her down for a long stern talk or fire her. Because she's endangering your prospects for success for no good reason.

Obviously, there are moments when you have to blow up, and when blowing up can be productive. But the G-8 meeting was not one of them. Moreover, when losing your temper works in negotiations, its working generally depends on its being rare, and on other people believing that it's not calculated. When a normally self-controlled and decent person blows up, it can, under the right circumstances, be a salutory shock. But if it's your standard operating procedure, you're just a jerk.

When I read people saying things like "More please", or "Horray!", I think: these are people who are willing to sacrifice our success in actually getting what we want for some short-term emotional gratification (and pretty dubious emotional gratification at that.) Why they would think that it's a good idea is completely beyond me. It's like discovering that a car dealer can be induced to give you a free car if only you gratify her ego, and thinking not: Wow! How wonderful! but: Why the hell should I cater to her psychological needs? (To get a car without paying for it, silly!)

Except that in this case, it's not the diplomat (or President) who would get the car; it's all of us.

No More Christmas, Because Santa Drowned

This is very disturbing news:

No ice at the North Pole

Polar scientists reveal dramatic new evidence of climate change

It seems unthinkable, but for the first time in human history, ice is on course to disappear entirely from the North Pole this year.

The disappearance of the Arctic sea ice, making it possible to reach the Pole sailing in a boat through open water, would be one of the most dramatic – and worrying – examples of the impact of global warming on the planet. Scientists say the ice at 90 degrees north may well have melted away by the summer.

"From the viewpoint of science, the North Pole is just another point on the globe, but symbolically it is hugely important. There is supposed to be ice at the North Pole, not open water," said Mark Serreze of the US National Snow and Ice Data Centre in Colorado.

If it happens, it raises the prospect of the Arctic nations being able to exploit the valuable oil and mineral deposits below these a bed which have until now been impossible to extract because of the thick sea ice above.

Seasoned polar scientists believe the chances of a totally ice-free North Pole this summer are greater than 50:50 because the normally thick ice formed over many years at the Pole has been blown away and replaced by huge swathes of thinner ice formed over a single year.

This one-year ice is highly vulnerable to melting during the summer months and satellite data coming in over recent weeks shows that the rate of melting is faster than last year, when there was an all-time record loss of summer sea ice at the Arctic.

"The issue is that, for the first time that I am aware of, the North Pole is covered with extensive first-year ice – ice that formed last autumn and winter. I'd say it's even-odds whether the North Pole melts out," said Dr Serreze.

"I Cant Heeeeear You"

The White House is full of children.

In 2007, the Supreme Court ruled that the EPA must determine whether greenhouse gases represent a danger to health or the environment.  The EPA, under Bush Administration influence, had been dragging its heels on the issue, saying that it was not part of its duties.  The Supreme Court said, "Oh, yes it is".

So the EPA made its determination.  They studied the issue and concluded that greenhouse gases are pollutants that must be controlled.  They sent -- by email -- their findings to the White House, who would then have to, you know, do something about it.

But those clever people at the White House had a plan.  Knowing what the email contained, they decided not to open the EPA's email.  That was back in December (although we're only finding out about it now).

Following that clever ruse, the White House set out to pressure the EPA to water down their original conclusion:

This week, more than six months later, the E.P.A. is set to respond to that order by releasing a watered-down version of the original proposal that offers no conclusion. Instead, the document reviews the legal and economic issues presented by declaring greenhouse gases a pollutant.

Over the past five days, the officials said, the White House successfully put pressure on the E.P.A. to eliminate large sections of the original analysis that supported regulation, including a finding that tough regulation of motor vehicle emissions could produce $500 billion to $2 trillion in economic benefits over the next 32 years. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the matter.

Both documents, as prepared by the E.P.A., “showed that the Clean Air Act can work for certain sectors of the economy, to reduce greenhouse gases,” one of the senior E.P.A. officials said. “That’s not what the administration wants to show. They want to show that the Clean Air Act can’t work.”

The EPA, by the way, is supposed to be an independent agency.  From its website:

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) was established in the executive branch as an independent agency pursuant to Reorganization Plan #3 of 1970, effective December 2, 1970.

That means political branches can't mess with it.  But this is the Bush White House.  *Sigh*

12 Year Old Girl Schools United Nations Delegates

This girl's speech is impressive:

Really?

Al Gore's "Inconvenient Truth" Becoming An Opera

First it was the film and the book. Now the next stop for Al Gore's "An Inconvenient Truth" is opera.

La Scala officials say the Italian composer Giorgio Battistelli has been commissioned to produce an opera on the international multiformat hit for the 2011 season at the Milan opera house.

Chopsticks

I don't use them because I can't.  They're awkward and, well, kinda pretentious.

Now there's a better reason not to use them: they're destroying the rainforests.

Oh, By The Way, It's The End Of The World

The Washington Post:

Climatic changes appear to be destabilizing vast ice sheets of western Antarctica that had previously seemed relatively protected from global warming, researchers reported yesterday, raising the prospect of faster sea-level rise than current estimates.

While the overall loss is a tiny fraction of the miles-deep ice that covers much of Antarctica, scientists said the new finding is important because the continent holds about 90 percent of Earth's ice, and until now, large-scale ice loss there had been limited to the peninsula that juts out toward the tip of South America. In addition, researchers found that the rate of ice loss in the affected areas has accelerated over the past 10 years -- as it has on most glaciers and ice sheets around the world.

***

"Something must be changing the ocean to trigger such changes," said Rignot, a senior scientist with NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory. "We believe it is related to global climate forcing."

Even Al Gore, in An Inconvenient Truth, was concerned only about the ice shelfs on that (relatively) small peninsula in the West. 

But if we're talking about melting extending to the whole western half of the continent -- well, that doesn't bode well for sea levels.  Coupled with the well-documented melting of Greenland, we are facing this scenario:

Of course, a rise of 20 meters (as depicted above) is not a sure thing -- certainly not in most of our lifetimes; it would take significant melting for that to occur.  But even then, a sea level rise of less than a meter, certainly possible within currrent trends and predictions for this century, is certainly nothing to ignore.  Here's Manhattan enjoying a mere 0.7 meter rise in sea level.

Can't happen, you say?  Guess what?  It already is happening.

Lede Paragraphs That Give Me Pause

Daily Mail:

Pope Benedict XVI has launched a surprise attack on climate change prophets of doom, warning them that any solutions to global warming must be based on firm evidence and not on dubious ideology.

"Firm evidence" such as walking on water, changing water into wine, resurrecting the dead -- that sort of thing?

UPDATE, IN THE SAME VEIN -- From our favorite Christian news service, a Christian doctor has some advice...

If Christians plan to use hypnotherapy, says Dr. Stevens, they should use extreme caution. "The Bible talks to us about [being] alert and self-controlled -- and in hypnosis you're really giving the control of your mind over to someone else," he warns.

The Story Of Stuff

If you haven't seen The Story of Stuff, you really should.

House Oversight Report On Climate Change

Summed up as follows:  The Bush Administration has “engaged in a systematic effort to manipulate climate change science and mislead policymakers and the public about the dangers of global warming.”

Highlights and key findings:

• The White House exerted unusual control over the public statements of federal scientists on climate change issues.
• The Administration’s censorship of climate scientists was widespread - 150 federal climate scientists from eight federal agencies personally experienced at least one incident of political interference during the past five years.
• The White House systematically minimized the significance of climate change by editing government climate change reports.
• The White House edited EPA’s [Environmental Protection Agency] Report on the Environment.
• The White House eliminated the Climate Change Section of EPA’s Air Trends Report.
• The White House was involved in editing EPA’s legal opinions.

Greenpeace Whale-Naming

When whales are rescued, they get tagged.  They also get a rather unimaginative name -- something like "Willy" (from Free Willy).

Greenpeace has a poll where you can name the next rescued whale.

Most of the choices are very earthy and multicultural.  For example:

Aiko - means 'little love' in Japanese

Gana - means 'song' in Hindi

Kigai - means 'strong spirit' in Japanese

Nurani - means 'conscience in Bahasa Indonesia

Talei - means 'special, rare or extremely valuable' in Fijian

They also through in one joke-y name.  Well, with the polls almost closed, guess which whale name is prevailing:

Looks like a runaway for Mister Splashy Pants, although you can still vote.

Innovation Of The Year

Popular Science magazine has annouced it's "Innovation Of The Year" and it really is something to get psyched about.

We all know what solar panels are and what they do.  But the problem with solar panels is two-fold: (1) they are big and bulky; and (2) they require buttloads of silicon to manufacture and silicon is expensive.

These factors make for expensive solar panels.  Solar panels cost about $3 for every watt of energy they produce.  Coal, on the other hand, costs $1 per watt of energy.  So if the idea is to save money, solar is not the way to go.

Until now.

The "Innovation of the Year" is something called Powersheet solar cells.  Rather than a bulky panel, it is a thin sheet about five times the width of aluminum foil.  It does the work of a solar panel.  Without silicon.

Essentially, it comes off a rolling press, and best of all, it costs around thirty cents per watt of energy produced.  That's ten times cheaper than solar panels, and three times more efficient than coal and gas.  And being a sheet rather than a panel, it is flexible and can go on any type of roof.

And, of course, it is "green".

This is not something that we'll see fifty years from now.  This is a product which is ready to roll out NOW. 

Read more here.

Al Gore Wins Nobel Peace Prize

Well, he shares it:

Former U.S. Vice President Al Gore and the U.N.'s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change have won the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize for their work towards raising awareness about global warming.

The Nobel committee cited them "for their efforts to build up and disseminate greater knowledge about man-made climate change, and to lay the foundations for the measures that are needed to counteract such change."

The IPCC and Gore will each receive a gold medal, a diploma and split about $1.5 million. The award ceremony will be held Dec. 10 in Oslo, Norway.

"Through the scientific reports it has issued over the past two decades, the IPCC has created an ever-broader informed consensus about the connection between human activities and global warming," Ole Danbolt Mjoes, chairman of the Nobel committee, said in making the announcement.

"Thousands of scientists and officials from over 100 countries have collaborated to achieve greater certainty as to the scale of the warming."

The Nobel committee praised Gore as being "one of the world's leading environmentalist politicians."

He is probably the single individual who has done most to create greater worldwide understanding of the measures that need to be adopted," said Mjoes.

How many other people have won an Oscar and a Nobel Peace Prize?  My guess?  Zero.

Only a matter of time before the Supreme Court gives Gore's medal to Bush.

WMDs On Our Coastline

The Army has admitted to secretly dumping over 64 million pounds of biochemical weapons materials -- along with 400,000 chemical-filled bombs, land mines and rockets and more than 500 tons of radioactive waste -- off the coast of the United States.

(Click graphic to enlarge)

Thought you might like to know that.  This guy found out....

"Stupid In Space"

I heard this interview on NPR this morning too, and I almost fell out of the bed:

Showing that there is no place safe from idiocy, here's an absolutely astronomically stupid comment from NASA Administrator Michael Griffin.  A statement so stupid, it makes the invasion of Iraq and the management of Katrina look like genius.

Michael Griffin NASA Administrator has told America's National Public Radio that while he has no doubt a trend of global warming exists "I am not sure that it is fair to say that it is a problem we must wrestle with."

Griffin confirms that global warming exists, and in fact only hours before NASA had issued a report showing that ice in the Arctic was being lost at higher rates than previously predicted.  So what's behind Griffin's Qué será, será attitude?  Is it a fatalistic view that we can't do anything about global warming?  Nope.   

In an interview with NPR's Steve Inskeep that will air in Thursday's edition of NPR News' Morning Edition, Administrator Griffin explains: "I guess I would ask which human beings - where and when - are to be accorded the privilege of deciding that this particular climate that we have right here today, right now is the best climate for all other human beings. I think that's a rather arrogant position for people to take."

There you go.  Trying to stop global warming is arrogant.  Who are you to say folks in Norway that they can't have palm trees!

The part that Griffin seems to be forgetting is the billions of people who would die if our current economy collapses due to sinking cities and shifting growing regions.  Might the future inhabitants of tropical Greenland be happy as they gaze southward over the swollen sea?  Maybe.  But I'm not anxious to sink Miami to find out.  Idiot. 

Oh, and expect this to become part of the standard kit for those on the right.  I give it ten hours before Rush gets around to "trying to stop global warming is racist."  Start your stopwatch.

Griffin’s remarks are stunning, coming just days after his own agency released a report warning of the “disastrous effects” of climate change:

Even “moderate additional” greenhouse emissions are likely to push Earth past “critical tipping points” with “dangerous consequences for the planet,” according to research conducted by NASA and the Columbia University Earth Institute.

With just 10 more years of “business as usual” emissions from the burning of coal, oil and gas, says the NASA/Columbia paper, “it becomes impractical” to avoid “disastrous effects.”

Chris Mooney weighs in on this too:

What Griffin is ignoring is the whole issue of risk and its distribution. Our global society is set up for--adapted to--the current climate. But now we're moving in the direction of raising the sea level considerably--even as much of the global population is coastal--and melting large amounts of ice, while also altering the occurrence of phenomena, such as droughts, that could have a dramatic impact on food and water supplies.

How can anyone think this is not a tremendous societal risk, even if there might be some people--in, say, Buffalo, New York--who may actually have more pleasant weather under global warming?

NASA is already backtracking. James Hansen, the agency's top climatologist, is slamming his boss. Assuredly there will be many more jeers and groans over the course of the day.

Something To Think About

"Extinction rates are rising by a factor of up to 1,000 above natural rates. Every hour, three species disappear. Every day, up to 150 species are lost. Every year, between 18,000 and 55,000 species become extinct," he said.

"The cause: human activities."

Read more.

By The Numbers

What's this a picture of?

It's a picture representing the number of plastic bottles used in the United States every hour (2.5 million).

Here's a partial closeup of the same image:

And an even closer close-up:

Lots more like this can be found here.

Encyclopedia Brown And The Case Of The Missing Bees

This actually troubles me:

vanish without a trace.

Billions of bees have done just that, leaving the crop fields they are supposed to pollinate, and scientists are mystified about why.

The phenomenon was first noticed late last year in the United States, where honeybees are used to pollinate $15 billion worth of fruits, nuts and other crops annually. Disappearing bees have also been reported in Europe and Brazil.

Commercial beekeepers would set their bees near a crop field as usual and come back in two or three weeks to find the hives bereft of foraging worker bees, with only the queen and the immature insects remaining. Whatever worker bees survived were often too weak to perform their tasks.

If the bees were dying of pesticide poisoning or freezing, their bodies would be expected to lie around the hive. And if they were absconding because of some threat -- which they have been known to do -- they wouldn't leave without the queen.

Since about one-third of the U.S. diet depends on pollination and most of that is performed by honeybees, this constitutes a serious problem, according to Jeff Pettis of the U.S. Agricultural Research Service.

Maybe they were raptured?

Seriously, nobody like bees (they, you know, sting), but they are a vital part of the food chain, on top of which we sit.  If bees don't pollenate the crops, the crops don't grow.  If they don't grow, we don't eat (and the animals that we eat, don't eat).  That can't be good.

Sheryl Crow Has Cooties, Apparently

How Laurie David tells it:

In his attempt to dismiss us, Mr. Rove turned to head toward his table, but as soon as he did so, Sheryl reached out to touch his arm. Karl swung around and spat, "Don't touch me." How hardened and removed from reality must a person be to refuse to be touched by Sheryl Crow? Unfazed, Sheryl abruptly responded, "You can't speak to us like that, you work for us." Karl then quipped, "I don't work for you, I work for the American people." To which Sheryl promptly reminded him, "We are the American people."

At that point Mr. Rove apparently decided he had had enough. Like a groundhog fearful of his own shadow, he scurried to his table in an attempt to hibernate for another year from his responsibility to address global warming. Drama aside, you would expect as an American citizen to be able to engage in a civil discussion with a public official. Instead, Mr. Rove was dismissive, condescending, and quite frankly a bully.

Jesus' General has more on Sheryl Crow's cooties.

Step It Up!

My days of citizen activism (I'm ashamed to say) are largely behind me, but that doesn't mean I still can't plug it.

Saturday, April 14, is a National Day of Climate Action, with thousands of events and demonstrations taking place all over the country.  Check it out.

P.S.  For local folks here in Winston-Salem

April 14, 2007 10:00AM to 12:00PM

Event Description:
Join your friends and Sierra Club members at Hanes Park near downtown Winston-Salem from 10-noon. We will be across the street from Mock Orange Bikes at the corner of West End Boulevard and Reynolda Road. Kids, come get your face painted, everyone else, step up and sign petitions for local and national action to stop global warming! And for bikers- 2 ride options! 10:00 Join the Mock Orange Road bike ride for a faster pace, 50 mile ride. 10:30 A more casual pace ride of 12-15 miles. Look for us at the Step It Up banner in the park. We may even have live music!! And of course, wear GREEN to show your love for Mother Earth. Also learn about other local events in this run-up to Earth Day -- films, fairs, green building designs, all in Winston-Salem, all in April, all to help us be more informed citizens regarding the important topic of Climate Change. See you there!

There's also a candlelight vigil in the evening.

Major Environmental Victory in Supreme Court

It was close, 5-4, but the Supreme Court handed down its opinion on the controversial EPA case.  The case was relatively simple: does the Clean Air Act give the EPA the authority to regulate greenshouse gases?  The EPA (under Bush) said "no".  States sued, saying to the EPA, "Hey. Do your job."  The EPA said, "It ain't our job".

BACKGROUND FROM THINK PROGRESS:

Some background: the case emerged in 2003 after the EPA rejected a petition calling for the federal government to restrict emissions of greenhouse gases — most notably, carbon dioxide. The EPA’s general counsel argued in a memo that “[carbon dioxide] and other [greenhouse gases], as such, are not air pollutants,” and “substantial scientific uncertainty” still exists about the effects of carbon dioxide on the environment.

The statement meant the Bush administration would not have to regulate carbon dioxide emissions under the Clean Air Act. The U.S. Court of Appeals upheld this view. (The Washington Post would later report that “two of the jurists who helped decide the case” had “attended a six-day global warming seminar…sponsored by a free-market foundation and featuring presentations from companies with a clear financial interest in limiting regulation.”)

CNN gives the skinny:

The court had three questions before it.

--Do states have the right to sue the EPA to challenge its decision?

--Does the Clean Air Act give EPA the authority to regulate tailpipe emissions of greenhouse gases?

--Does EPA have the discretion not to regulate those emissions?

The court said yes to the first two questions. On the third, it ordered EPA to re-evaluate its contention it has the discretion not to regulate tailpipe emissions. The court said the agency has so far provided a "laundry list" of reasons that include foreign policy considerations.

The majority said the agency must tie its rationale more closely to the Clean Air Act.

"EPA has offered no reasoned explanation for its refusal to decide whether greenhouse gases cause or contribute to climate change," Stevens said. He was joined by his liberal colleagues, Justices Stephen Breyer, Ruth Bader Ginsburg and David Souter, and the court's swing voter, Justice Anthony Kennedy.

The lawsuit was filed by 12 states and 13 environmental groups that had grown frustrated by the Bush administration's inaction on global warming.

Opinion here (PDF)

It should be noted that the, given the tone of the opinion, the EPA is going to be hard-pressed to come with a reason NOT to address global warming.

The Republican War On Science: White House Tries To Muzzle Global Warming Research

ABC:

Bush administration officials throughout the government have engaged in White House-directed efforts to stifle, delay or dampen the release of climate change research that casts the White House or its policies in a bad light, says a new report that purports to be the most comprehensive assessment to date of the subject.

Researchers for the non-profit watchdog Government Accountability Project reviewed thousands of e-mails, memos and other documents obtained through Freedom of Information Act requests and from government whistle-blowers and conducted dozens of interviews with public affairs staff, scientists, reporters and others.

The group says it has identified hundreds of instances where White House-appointed officials interfered with government scientists' efforts to convey their research findings to the public, at the behest of top administration officials.

The report is slated to be released tomorrow at a hearing before the House Science Committee, which is investigating the issue.

The Evangelical Crackup

Time was where "evangelical" evoked names like James Dobson and Jerry Falwell and, by necessary extension, the conservative GOP agenda.

But Kevin Drum points to a considerable crack-up within the evangelical movement, which casts "old guard" evangelicals (Dobson et al.) on the outside of the National Association of Evangelicals (now headed by Richard Cizik), looking in with noses pressed to windows. 

The issue that is causing the rift is global warming:

The latest round is a letter from the dinosaurs asking the National Association of Evangelicals to fire Richard Cizik, ostensibly because he thinks we ought to do something about global warming. When you get to the end of the letter though, you find out what their real problem is:

Finally, Cizik's disturbing views seem to be contributing to growing confusion about the very term, "evangelical." As a recent USA Today article notes: "Evangelical was the label of choice of Christians with conservative views on politics, economics and biblical morality. Now the word may be losing its moorings, sliding toward the same linguistic demise that "fundamentalist" met decades ago because it has been misunderstood, misappropriated and maligned." We believe some of that misunderstanding about evangelicalism and its "conservative views on politics, economics and biblical morality" can be laid at Richard Cizik's door.

Well, that's clear enough, isn't it?

It certainly is.  In other words, these Christian Right leaders are accusing Cizik of messing with their brand.  This is a rather audacious complaint.  It's as if Dobson and company view the "moral agenda" of evangelicals as their exclusive birthright.  But no longer, with young turks like Rev. James Wallis:

A new generation of pastors has expanded the definition of moral issues to include not only global warming, but an array of causes. Quoting Scripture and invoking Jesus, they're calling for citizenship for illegal immigrants, universal healthcare and caps on carbon emissions.

The best-known champion of such causes, the Rev. Jim Wallis, this week challenged conservative crusader James C. Dobson, the chairman of Focus on the Family, to a debate on evangelical priorities.

"Are the only really 'great moral issues' those concerning abortion, gay marriage and the teaching of sexual abstinence?" Wallis asked in his challenge. "How about the reality of 3 billion of God's children living on less than $2 per day? … What about pandemics like HIV/AIDS … [and] disastrous wars like Iraq?"

Nice to see this shift.  Hope to see more.

Polar Bears And Soviet-Style Directives

The efforts of the Bush Adminstration to keep everyone "on message" (no matter how absurd that message is) are Stalineqsue:

Internal memorandums circulated in the Alaskan division of the Federal Fish and Wildlife Service appear to require government biologists or other employees traveling in countries around the Arctic not to discuss climate change, polar bears or sea ice if they are not designated to do so.

Over the past week, biologists and wildlife officials received a cover note and two sample memorandums to be used as a guide in preparing travel requests. Under the heading “Foreign Travel — New Requirement — Please Review and Comply, Importance: High,” the cover note said:

“Please be advised that all foreign travel requests (SF 1175 requests) and any future travel requests involving or potentially involving climate change, sea ice and/or polar bears will also require a memorandum from the regional director to the director indicating who’ll be the official spokesman on the trip and the one responding to questions on these issues, particularly polar bears.”

The sample memorandums, described as to be used in writing travel requests, indicate that the employee seeking permission to travel “understands the administration’s position on climate change, polar bears, and sea ice and will not be speaking on or responding to these issues.”

Electronic copies of the memorandums and cover note were forwarded to The New York Times by Deborah Williams, an environmental campaigner in Alaska and a former Interior Department official in the Clinton administration.

“This sure sounds like a Soviet-style directive to me,” Ms. Williams said.

Me, too.

Right-Wing Noise Machine Still Attacking Gore

Anonymous Liberal:

The right-wing noise machine really is a remarkable thing to behold. Al Gore wins an Oscar, gets some well-deserved recognition for his efforts, and within hours the Republican noise machine is already in full smear mode, trying to undercut Gore's message by attacking him personally.

It began this morning when a group that no one has ever heard of--the Tennessee Center for Policy Research--issued a press release claiming that Al Gore's utility bills reveal that his house in Nashville uses 20 times more energy than the average American household. This, according to the group, makes Al Gore an enormous hypocrite.

***

At the heart of all this nonsense is the bizarre notion that somehow the wisdom and importance of Gore's message about global climate change would be called into question if it could be shown that Gore doesn't always practice what he preaches. Putting aside the fact that the case against Gore is incredibly weak, why does any of this matter? If Gore were to leave his backdoor open all winter, thereby wasting thousands of kilowatts of energy, would that somehow make his slide show less convincing? If it were demonstrated that Gore's house is not as energy efficient as it could be, would that somehow render his tireless efforts to bring attention to this important issue less meaningful? Of course not. This entire line of attack is just a meaningless sideshow, an effort to distract the American people from the substance of the issue itself.

The Gore Smear

The rightwing noise machine has set its sites on Al Gore.

A group as sprung up overnight, calling itself the Tennessee Center for Policy Research (it is, despite its official sounding name, a rightwing organization founded by a member of the conservative thinktank, American Enterprise Institute).  It issued a press release, picked up by Drudge Report, rightwing blogs, and Fox News, claiming that Al Gore's utility bills for his house in Nashville show that he uses 20 times more energy than the average American household. This, according to the group, makes Al Gore an enormous hypocrite.

I'll let Anonymous Liberal do the debunking:

This is a textbook example of the mindless swarming behavior that is so typical among right-wing partisan flacks. First, everyone on the right--from top to bottom--simply assumed that the content of this press release, which was put out by an organization none of them had ever heard of before, was factually accurate. Actually, that probably gives them too much credit. It's not that they assumed it was accurate, it's that they didn't care. The press release was chalked full of truthiness, and that was good enough.

The press release claimed that Al Gore's home in Nashville consumed 221,000 kilowatt hours (kWh) of electricity last year compared to a national average of 10,656 kWh per household. I have no idea whether the number cited for Gore's house is correct, but let's assume it is. The 10,656 number comes from data published by the Department of Energy. But it's an average of all households nationwide (including apartment units and mobile homes) and across all climate regions. As it turns out, the region in which Gore lives--the East South Central--has the highest per household energy usage of any climate region in the country, a good 50% higher than the national average quoted in the press release (I assume this is due to the combination of cold winters and hot, muggy summers). So that's misleading in and of itself.

Moreover, Gore lives in a large home (10,000 sq. ft.). If you look at the data, it's clear that Gore's energy usage per square foot (even assuming the 221,000 kWh number is accurate) is well within the average range for his climate region. So all this accusation boils down to is a claim that it is somehow "hypocritical" for Al Gore to live in a large house.

That's awfully weak. Gore's a former Senator and Vice President of the United States. Does he have to move into a studio apartment before he has the right to talk about climate change?

And more importantly, as Think Progress reports, even this watered-down hypocrisy charge entirely misses the point. What Al Gore wants people to do is reduce the carbon footprint of their residence as much as possible and then purchase carbon offsets to reduce the remaining footprint to zero. Gore has installed solar panels in his home, he uses fluorescent light bulbs and other energy saving technology, and he purchases his energy from Green Power Switch, a provider which utilizes solar and wind power. He then purchases carbon offsets to reduce his remaining carbon footprint to zero.

Could Gore use less overall energy if he and Tipper moved into a one-bedroom apartment? Of course. But he's not asking people to move into smaller homes. He's asking them to reduce their carbon footprints, which is exactly what he has done. He practices what he preaches.

Still, these sort of facts about Al Gore aren't likely to deter the self-congratulatory right, now convinced they have "caught" Gore in an act of hypocrisy.  This is how they operate.