Free California

EPA Administrator Refuses Global Greenhouse Gas Waiver The State of California took the leadership in the 1970's to reduce air pollutants and emissions from automobiles because the population was highly concentrated in urban areas. These areas, including San Diego, the Bay Area and Los Angeles were trapping smog. People couldn't breathe, or needed to wear aspirators and masks. These centers have geographic features which contribute to the problem and cause difficulties for smog because they are either built in basins and surrounded by mountains or they are trapped between the westerly winds of the ocean and mountains to the east. They couldn't wait for the federal government to take action.

Derangement and Denial

Appearing at The Jaundiced Eye, the Independent Bloggers' Alliance, and My Left Wing. Update: Blog Action Day 2007 has been declared by its organizers an "unprecedented success." They have documented the participation of 20,603 bloggers who blogged on the environment on October 15, 2007. With that the Blog Action Team appears to have folded its tent and gone home, taking their graphics with them. (Art for this entry has been replaced.) Thanks for reading. Krugman hits it out of the park once again, with a send-up of conservative dissonance. Faced with the reality of Al Gore's Nobel win, denial rules the right. On the day after Al Gore shared the Nobel Peace Prize, The Wall Street Journal’s editors couldn’t even bring themselves to mention Mr. Gore’s name. Instead, they devoted their editorial to a long list of people they thought deserved the prize more. And at National Review Online, Iain Murray suggested that the prize should have been shared with “that well-known peace campaigner Osama bin Laden, who implicitly endorsed Gore’s stance.” You see, bin Laden once said something about climate change — therefore, anyone who talks about climate change is a friend of the terrorists. And so the slime machine slugs along in its tireless disregard for troublesome facts. Still more merriment was to be found on Fox News Sunday, where Bill Kristol and Charles Krauthammer came not to praise Gore but to bury him. Sarcastically calling Gore’s win “deeply moving,” Kristol disparaged Gore and the Nobel prize itself, saying “it’s a prize given by bloviators to a bloviator”: KRISTOL: Friday, I felt a warm glow thinking that this man got the Nobel Peace Prize for bloviating about global warming. I mean, it’s a prize given by bloviators to a bloviator for nothing. What did he — he was Vice President of the United States for eight years. I missed the Clinton administration’s bold initiatives on global warming and carbon caps. Did they enforce the Kyoto Treaty? I don’t think so. You know, so he gets the Nobel Peace Prize for talking. Claiming that the Nobel Peace Prize is “the Kentucky Derby of the world left,” Krauthammer was even more shrill than Kristol, saying “Al Gore now joins the ranks of Yasser Arafat, the father of modern terrorism.” He then claimed the award “has nothing to do with peace” and that “it gives it to people whose politics are either anti-American or anti-Bush, and that’s why [Gore] won it.” Laying aside, for the moment, the hilarity of warmongers like Kristol and Krauthammer discussing what does and doesn't advance peace, I must point out that the issue of global warming, which the Nobel committee has underscored with Gore's award, has a very direct connection to issues of peace and security. Or so the Pentagon learned when it commissioned a risk assessment study... which they promptly buried. Appointed to head that study was Edward W. Marshall, or "Yoda," as he is referred to in Pentagon circles. The findings could only prove embarrassing to an Administration in denial of the reality of global warming. Climate change over the next 20 years could result in a global catastrophe costing millions of lives in wars and natural disasters.. A secret report, suppressed by US defence chiefs and obtained by The Observer, warns that major European cities will be sunk beneath rising seas as Britain is plunged into a 'Siberian' climate by 2020. Nuclear conflict, mega-droughts, famine and widespread rioting will erupt across the world. The document predicts that abrupt climate change could bring the planet to the edge of anarchy as countries develop a nuclear threat to defend and secure dwindling food, water and energy supplies. The threat to global stability vastly eclipses that of terrorism, say the few experts privy to its contents. 'Disruption and conflict will be endemic features of life,' concludes the Pentagon analysis. 'Once again, warfare would define human life.' Global warming, a bigger threat than terrorism! Where is our war on greenhouse gases? Krugman explains why the Bush Administration has it's head in the sand -- looking for oil, presumably -- while we are teetering on the brink of a genuine security nightmare. Today, being a good Republican means believing that taxes should always be cut, never raised. It also means believing that we should bomb and bully foreigners, not negotiate with them. So if science says that we have a big problem that can’t be solved with tax cuts or bombs — well, the science must be rejected, and the scientists must be slimed.

Scott's sues eco-friendly startup

Demetrius told me about this story a few weeks ago, but I never got around to reading the whole thing for myself. On break today, I saw a story in the Business section of the Columbus Dispatch: Scotts' turf war Miracle-Gro brand sues tiny startup over packaging, eco assertions ...and resolved that I would actually post something about this tonight. The makers of garden products Miracle-Gro and TerraCycle are as different as mature plants and seedlings. The Scotts Miracle-Gro Co. is a $7 billion global business with broad brand recognition, a 59 percent market share and Roman columns framing the entry to its corporate headquarters. TerraCycle Inc. is a fledging startup with $1.5 million in annual sales, an infinitesimal share of the market and a graffiti-covered warehouse with used tires on the lawn where the rose bushes were before someone stole them out of the ground. But Scotts sees similarities between the two plant-food makers. So, the Goliath of plant products sued late last month, accusing TerraCycle of copying its look and falsely asserting that its organic products are better than synthetic ones such as Miracle-Gro's. "I don't think their claims are valid," said TerraCycle Chief Executive Tom Szaky, a 25-year-old Hungarian-born entrepreneur who dropped out of Princeton in 2003 to create an eco-friendly company. TerraCycle's products are made from worm waste and packaged in used plastic bottles and jugs. "They're claiming that (the colors) yellow and green are theirs," he said, referring to Scotts. He added, "Miracle-Gro has sued us over advertising. I've never bought an ad." ... TerraCycle, which has yet to turn a profit, has created the TerraCycle Defense Fund through its Web site to help defray legal costs. Click here to read the rest of the article, and here to check out TerraCycle's web site. Visit Sued By Scotts to donate to the TerraCycle Defense Fund, to find a store near you, or to purchase TerraCycle products online. (There are also links to PDFs showing other lawn and garden products with yellow and green labels.)