Culture & Ethics
Big Decisions to Come in 2026
The Drain is a weekly roundup of environmental and climate news from Legal Planet.
I spent much of 2024 warning about the nihilistic goals of Project 2025 and then spent 2025 watching a lot of it come true. Our collective project for 2026 is to settle on solid alternatives to MAGA and decide on candidates. Luckily, last year also brought a growing resistance movement, lots of litigation, and unpopularity …
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CONTINUE READINGWe are Drowning in Plastic. Will a New Law Save Us?
The Drain is a weekly roundup of environmental and climate news from Legal Planet.
My family recently spent a warm November morning ankle-deep in mucky, brackish water, fishing out used condoms and syringes near Venice Beach. It stands out as one of the best days I’ve had all year. We were volunteering with Ballona Creek Renaissance, a local nonprofit that alongside Friends of the Ballona Wetlands organizes creek cleanups …
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CONTINUE READINGAmerica’s Dirty Pictures: The Forgotten ‘Documerica’ Reminds Us How Far We’ve Come
The Documerica project, housed at the National Archives, provides a vivid window into environmental destruction circa the 1970s.
In recent decades, environmental laws have not only been challenged in courts and Congress; they’ve also taken a verbal beating. They’ve been denounced as “job killers”, “government overreach,” “radical environmentalism,” a “war on coal,” and, lately, just “woke.” It’s become all too easy to focus on the costs of regulation and forget why we adopted …
CONTINUE READINGShould Private Firms Be Involved in Cooling the Planet?
Private firms like Stardust Solutions want to get in on planet-cooling interventions. Here’s the OK, the bad, and the ugly about startup involvement.
A story at Heatmap News last month reported that an Israeli-American startup firm, Stardust Solutions, has received $60 million in venture funding for a new type of particle they propose can be used to inject in the stratosphere to reflect a little sunlight and (temporarily, imperfectly) reduce global-average heating from greenhouse gases. The company aims …
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CONTINUE READINGClimate Change is Coming for Your Coffee
The Drain is a weekly roundup of environmental and climate news from Legal Planet.
My drug habit is becoming more expensive thanks to the dangerous duo of climate change and Donald Trump. The cost of coffee keeps going up. I saw firsthand why this is happening back in May on an eye-opening trip to Acre, Brazil, where I toured a couple of farms in the Amazon. One was a …
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CONTINUE READINGHalloween Hacks for a Warming Planet
Pretty or scary or brave? There’s a climate costume to suit all tastes and all ages.
Children will be roaming the streets tonight dressed as Superheroes, Princesses, and Evil Villains. But really, these invented figures can’t hold a candle to the real ones in our world. Here are some new custumes, suitable for a world facing a climate crisis.
CONTINUE READINGWhat Went Wrong with News Coverage of the LA Fires
The Drain is a weekly roundup of environmental and climate news from Legal Planet.
When disaster strikes your town, you rely on journalists to help explain what happened and why. Last January, many of us in Los Angeles turned to The LA Times as unusual firestorms kicked up and ultimately destroyed parts of Altadena and Pacific Palisades. The LAT’s journalists and photojournalists did incredible coverage from lots of angles, …
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CONTINUE READINGEnvironmental Groups and the New McCarthyism
The Administration’s search for a vast leftwing conspiracy could ensnare some environmental groups.
The White House’s reference to a “vast network” rings a historical bell. A speaker seventy years ago decried “a conspiracy on a scale so immense as to dwarf any previous such venture in the history of man.” That speaker was Joe McCarthy. Environmental groups weren’t active during his time, but does anyone doubt that they would have been on his hit list?
CONTINUE READINGAt a Loss for Words? Resist Climate Silence
The Drain is a weekly roundup of environmental and climate news from Legal Planet.
A few years ago, I was writing about how President Joe Biden was flying around the country to promote his landmark climate law without uttering the word “climate.” Seems so quaint. Now, we find ourselves in a place where “climate change” is on a list of banned words maintained by the U.S. Energy Department, along …
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CONTINUE READINGNew York Climate Weak
The Drain is a weekly roundup of environmental and climate news from Legal Planet.
Now is the time for courage. Now is not the time to pull punches or pull speakers. We need more speech — not enforced silence. That’s why I’m not a big fan of shutting down campus speakers, even those who might spread climate obstruction. Like Vicki Hollub, the CEO of Occidental Petroleum, who was being …
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