Archive for the "Politics" Category

  • Help rebut misleading and mean-spirited anti-biodiversity Forbes article

    [caption id="attachment_1136" align="alignleft" width="185" caption="Forbes blogger Larry Bell is wrong about the biodiversity crisis and wrong about global warming"][/caption] I've used this blog as a forum to highlight authors who deny the biodiversity crisis as a scam or hoax. We now have another example, unfortunately featured on the widely-read business website Forbes. I posted

  • International Year of Biodiversity 2010: Heading Towards Failure?

    On January 11 this year, the United Nations announced that 2010 is the International Year of Biodiversity (IYOB). Activists and environmentalists were delighted. We can imagine the words "about time" on their lips. Likewise, scientists were pleased. They had long wanted a higher profile for a relatively neglected area of the biological sciences. We've certainly seen some positive attention. For example, in July the UN appointed actor Ed Norton as International Goodwill Ambassador for the IYOB. There's been plenty of hype and bandwagon jumping, but what about results? We're now three quarters into the year. Let's take stock and evaluate the IYOB. Has

  • Losers in the skeeter wars

    [caption id="attachment_949" align="alignleft" width="300" caption="Monarch butterflies were among the most visible casualties of the spraying in Grand Forks, ND. (Images courtesy of Wikipedia.)"][/caption] An article in North Dakota's Grand Forks Herald reports that residents woke last Thursday morning to a " jarring spectacle of dying butterflies and dragonflies on the sidewalks." The die-off, including thousands of monarch butterflies, was brought about by routine seasonal spraying to control mosquitoes. An editorial points

  • Ecological science-based environmental conservation outcomes

    Here's an interesting organization: Ecological Internet, Inc. We do not promote or endorse specific companies, but I thought Ecological Internet has a mission with which we can readily identify. According to their Facebook page, they "specialize in the use of the Internet to achieve ecological science-based environmental conservation outcomes." The non-profit organization manages several large web properties including Climate Ark, Forests.org, Water Conserve, Rainforest Portal, Ocean Conserve, New Earth Rising. Their web presence focuses on providing "a variety of environmental news tracking,

  • Help stop trade in conflict minerals

    [caption id="attachment_865" align="alignleft" width="178" caption="Cellphone illustrating how conflict minerals are used in its production (Image credit: Enough Project)"][/caption] You've probably heard of blood diamonds, which fund armed conflict in mostly poor and underdeveloped parts of these worlds. Blood diamonds are part of a larger market in conflict minerals. These similarly rare and valuable commodities are mined by corrupt governments or marginal paramilitary

  • Suit Seeks to Protect 70,000 Additional Acres for Cape Sable Seaside Sparrow

    WASHINGTON— The Center for Biological Diversity and Florida Biodiversity Project filed suit today to obtain a larger protected area for the highly endangered Cape Sable seaside sparrow by reversing a Bush-era decision that struck down 70,000 acres of critical habitat identified by scientists as essential for the survival of the rare songbird. The lawsuit is part of a larger campaign on the part of the Center to undo a slew of decisions by the Bush administration that ignored the government’s own scientists and weakened protections for endangered species. More

  • Biologists Call on Obama Administration to Overturn Bush Rules That Cut Science Out of Endangered Species Decisions

    WASHINGTON - April 27 - More than 1,300 federal and independent scientists with biological expertise and three leading scientific societies today called on the Interior and Commerce departments to overturn rule changes made in January that weaken the scientific foundation of the Endangered Species Act. In a letter, the scientists urged the department secretaries to rescind changes to Endangered Species Act regulations that allow federal agencies to decide for themselves if their own projects -- such as roads, dams and mines -- would threaten imperiled species. Previously, federal agencies were required to consult with biologists at the U.S. Fish and

  • Pushing back the NBAF

    National Bio and Agro-Defense Facility The proposed National Bio and Agro-Defense Facility (NBAF) would research high-consequence biological threats involving zoonotic (i.e., transmitted from animals to humans) and foreign animal diseases. It would allow basic research; diagnostic development, testing and validation; advanced countermeasure development; and training for high-consequence livestock diseases. And best of all, it will be run by Homeland security. NBAF in NC: NOBIO pt.1 from LibertyTUBEtv on

  • Diebold Accidentally Leaks Results Of 2008 Election Early

    Diebold Accidentally Leaks Results Of 2008 Election

  • Sometimes you really have to ask, “Can they be serious?”

      Tensions are running high. Environmental issue? Yes. Social issue? Yes. Financial issue? Yes. Bad idea? Duh. Who wouldn't want a chemical lab for testing some of the deadliest and most incurable diseases known to man just down the road from their homes - our homes? The apparent tide of "official" support for the proposed National Bio- and Agro- Defense Facility (NBAF) in Butner, NC is ebbing, in part through the Hurculean efforts of the folks at

  • As we head into Super Tuesday

    Stuart Hurlbert Presidential Candidates 2008 and The Environment (PDF) presents information allowing comparisons among candidates as well as comparison of their records with those of the "Fantastic Fifteen", the 15 members of Congress who got the highest overall environmental scores in our 2006 analysis of environmental voting records. As in our earlier analyses, it is argued that strong environmental credentials belong only to politicians who work both to reduce per capita environmental impacts AND to lower population growth rates. Not too surprisingly, none of the current

  • Science Debate 2008

    "Science Debate 2008," launched today by a group of concerned citizens, is calling for a Presidential Debate on Science and Technology policy. Science Debate 2008 already has the support of almost sixty eminent scientists (including 11 Nobel laureates), business leaders, journalists and editors (including the editors in chief of both Science and Scientific American), politicians (including several members of Congress and two former Science Advisers to the President), the president of Princeton, and several presidents of large science organizations. Follow it here

  • Peter Gleick Reports on a Looming Water Crisis

    David Hawxhurst The BBC dubbed Peter Gleick an environmental visionary for his work on water issues. Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars Fresh Air from WHYY, November 27, 2007 · A MacArthur Fellow and co-founder of the Pacific Institute, Peter Gleick runs one of the nation's leading water-conservation assessment centers. The institute's biennial report, The World's Water,

  • Looks Like Saying Conservation isn’t Enough

    Some of billionaire Ted Turner's land in Mullen, Neb., is seen in a June 26, 2007 photo. Turner owns the largest buffalo herd in the country, many of them on the 425,000 acres he owns in Nebraska. Turner, who made a fortune and a name for himself by founding CNN, has amassed 2 million acres _ almost two Rhode Islands _ to become the largest private landowner in the country over the past decade. Read the full article

  • The Fight of Thomas Linzey

    Thomas Linzey has stated that this country has never really had an environmental movement, because movements drive rights. Agencies like the EPA are designed to regulate environmentalists, not corporations. After nearly a 100 years of a growing environmental movement, things have steadily gotten worse inspite of having more people involved, more environmental organizations, more money for environmental causes then ever before. Well then, what are we doing wrong? He says that movements drive rights, and these rights are ultimately codified into law. In the case of America, rights have been forced into law and eventually into the constitution. Thomas Linzey, a

  • Why not better, not bigger, not this?

    This Orange County, Calif., Water District plant will purify sewer water to feed drinking water supplies, but not directly to the tap. It used to be so final: flush the toilet, and waste be gone. But on Nov. 30, for millions of people here in Orange County, pulling the lever will be the start of a long, intense process to purify the sewage into drinking water — after a hard scrubbing with filters, screens, chemicals and ultraviolet light and the passage of time underground. More

  • Newt Gingrich Jumps on the Save the Earth Bandwagon

    Alex Scholz Former Speaker of the House, Newt Gingrich, has just coauthored a book on the environment, A Contract with the Earth, with former zoo CEO Terry Maple, forwarded by the venerable Harvard biologist, E.O. Wilson. One might quibble about the strength or Newt Gingrich's environmental record, still, I like to give people the benefit of the doubt. Obviously E.O. Wilson has. The almost presidential candidate has seen the light on the environment. That's a fine thing.

  • Global panel releases final report on climate change

    The IPCC has released its final synthesis report of the 4th assessment, summarizing 20 years of effort to understand climate change. The future looks tough, but solutions are available if we can find the leadership to implement them. BBC news report

  • Bhadra Relief Package Declared the Best

    Alladi Jayasri - India's National Newspaper The Hindu covers Krithi K. Karanth's work in India CRYING FOR A BETTER DEAL: A good relocation package for forest dwellers to save the tigers from the man-animal conflicts.

  • FWS Tacitly Accepts Massive Damage to Everglades

    Stuart L. Pimm Background Since 1993, water managers have dumped historically unprecedented amounts of water into the western part of the Everglades — and not the East, which is the natural flow path. In doing so, they have destroyed the natural vegetation over nearly 1000 square kilometers in the West, leaving the eastern Everglades too dry and prone to fire. What has limited their ability to do more damage, has been the Federally listed Cape Sable sparrow. In the past, FWS has made it clear that the western populations of this bird were essential to its survival. Indeed,

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