Category Archives: activism

So opines the conservative Ventura Star on the proposal by Duncan Hunter, a Republican Congressman, to turn Santa Rosa Island over to the military as a hunting preserve. According to the Star’s flinty editorial, this is the second time that Hunter–the powerful chairman of the House Armed Services Committee–has proposed making this large national parkContinue reading ““Dishonest, Sneaky, and Unnecessary””

A chart from a just-released study conducted by Roper Research for the National Environmental Education and Education Fund, showing how Americans break down in their attitudes towards the environment. Their conclusion: Education helps. My conclusion: 1/3 of this country is hopeless. (Click to enlarge…and read.)

The first world-wide protest against global warming, via The New Zealand Herald.

Once upon a time, the Bureau of Land Management and the Forest  Service administered public lands for citizens, taxpayers and extractive industries. This wasn’t ideal (it’s well-known that the costs of road-building, for example, outstrips the revenue the FS receives from timber sales) but at least some of us could walk freely on public landsContinue reading “Forest Service Eludes the Law”

Terry Tempest Williams is an adventurer in prose. Although she writes thoughtfully, she has an fierceness that gives her books great power. She’s revered by many readers I know for "Refuge," which explored the connection between the cancer that struck her family and the environment in which she grew up in Utah. As worthy asContinue reading “Saving the American Soul — Or Trying To”

A week ago Tom Toles of the Washington Post published a sketch of a cartoon he never quite finished–quite possibly because the story it meant to illustrate never made the papers. But it’s yet another jaw-dropping example of an administration pressuring the Environmental Protection Agency to do whatever its bedmate, in this case the coalContinue reading “Whatever You Say, Dear Coal Industry”

Yesterday I mentioned that the environment (love this planet, hate that word) is far more popular than so-called conservatives would have you believe. Only belatedly did I realize I hadn’t given any evidence for that claim. But there’s no doubt about it; in fact, it’s even more popular than I knew. On the local front,Continue reading “Sending a Message via the Polls”

Democrats and leftists are excited about the accelerating crack-up of the Bush administration, which–as acerbic Dana Milbank of the Washington Post noted in the aftermath of Katrina–no longer can even effectively stage a photo op. (Interesting, Fox News is now taking the position that supporting the troops means attacking those trying to shove words intoContinue reading “Making the Connection”

California governor Arnold Schwarzenneger on Tuesday issued emergency orders to protect farmworkers from heatstroke. The rules, to take effect in two weeks, will give farmworkers the right to time in the shade if they report symptoms of heatstroke. Three things about this are striking. First, that Schwarzenneger appeared with farmworkers, including the family of heatstrokeContinue reading “Arnold Defies Repubs, Stands with Farmworkers”

An Earth Day item that’s too enjoyable to let pass unnoticed…last Friday the US EPA’s administrator for the West, Wayne Nastri, presented thirty-seven individuals and organizations with an Environmental Achievement Awards for their efforts to preserve the environment in 2004. (The award doesn’t have a cute nickname yet.) Among the winners was a man whoContinue reading “Look at Mother Nature…and Neil”