It’s Déjà Vu All Over Again
Reagan, Gingrich, Bush -- and Now Trump. This is a battle we've fought before.
As the choice of Scott Pruitt to head EPA confirms, we’re about to face a radical attack on environmental protection. We've seen this movie before. Three times, actually, starring Ronald Reagan, Newt Gingrich, and George W. Bush. So this feels in a way like the fourth installment in a horror film franchise. Call it "Return of the Reg.-Eating Zombies, Part IV." Here are some quotes from the 1980 and 2016 Republican platform. They're pretty hard to tell apart: "Ano...
CONTINUE READINGGOP Mayor: “Let’s Talk About the Octopus in the Room”
An octopus in a parking garage? It's a sign of the times.
Jim Cason, the GOP mayor of Coral Gables, Florida, wants us to talk about climate change: "'We're looking to a future where we're going to be underwater, a great portion of South Florida,'" Cason said. 'For all of us down here, this is really not a partisan issue. We see it. We see the octopus in the room, not the elephant.'" (E&E News) An octopus in the room? It's a striking image. If you're wondering what prompted that unusual metaphor, Rob Verchick and I di...
CONTINUE READINGWhat’s wrong with a business-heavy presidential cabinet?
It's not just the revolving door problem or the different ways of conducting work; it's the difference in fundamental purpose
I know this doesn't sound like a post about environmental law and policy, but bear with me. There is a connection. Donald Trump ran for president largely on the claim that his experience as a businessman, and lack of experience as a politician, qualified him to shake up Washington. Just enough people in just enough states bought that claim to give Trump an electoral college win. Trump himself has no experience in the public sector. As he prepares to take over the O...
CONTINUE READINGGOP Climate Denial Is Way Out of the U.S. Mainstream
The Party's stance is out of touch with businesses, the public, scientists, and many GOP voters.
The national GOP seems to be locked into climate change denial. This stance puts the GOP leadership increasingly alone. They’re out of touch with the business community, the public, scientists, and even many of their own voters. Out of Touch with the Business Community In 2015, Shell and BP called for international cooperation to achieve the 2 ° temperature target. Even Rex W. Tillerson, ExxonMobil’s chief executive and Trump's nominee for Secretary of S...
CONTINUE READINGTillerson and Perry – It’s Complicated
They're not as bad as you might think. Relatively speaking.
The immediate environmentalist reaction to Rex Tillerson and Rick Perry -- Trump's choices to run the Departments of State and Energy -- is that these are disastrous choices, like Trump's selection of climate change denier Scott Pruitt to run EPA. That's understandable. After all, Tillerson is the CEO of Exxon. As to Perry, the Washington Post headline says it all: "Rick Perry is picked to head Energy Department, an agency he once vowed to abolish." But that react...
CONTINUE READINGLegal Mandates to Consider the Social Cost of Climate Change
Considering climate impacts isn't just a good idea. It's the law.
Many people seem to think that considering climate impacts and the social cost of carbon was just a policy decision by the Obama Administration, which Trump if he doesn't buy the reality of climate change. But it's not that easy. But there are strong arguments that considering climate change is mandatory. First, the whole idea of considering the social cost of carbon didn't come from the the Obama Administration. Rather, the Ninth Circuit overturned an action by...
CONTINUE READINGYes, there’s some actual good environmental news this week
Approval of regional ocean management plans, California planning for gray wolf return provide grounds for hope
It's not exactly been the best of weeks for those of us committed to environmental protection, and it doesn't look like the best of years coming up. But there is some good news, even in these difficult times. Two items in particular have helped lift the gloom for me this week. First, the National Ocean Council, a little-known group of cabinet-level officials and White House personnel created by President Obama in 2010, approved Regional Ocean plans for the northea...
CONTINUE READINGTrump Has Thrown Down the Gauntlet
Trump's latest cabinet appointment confirms the pattern: he plans to govern from the far Right.
Given that Trump has shifted his positions so often, there’s always been at least a faint hope that he would rethink his vehement opposition to environmental protection. True, he had called climate change a Chinese hoax, but he later said he had an open mind about the Paris Agreement and then he had an apparently cordial meeting with Al Gore. Trump’s nomination of Scott Pruit to head EPA has ended any of those hopes. Pruitt has a record of opposition to environmen...
CONTINUE READINGAnd the EPA Pick Is…
Oklahoma Attorney General Scott Pruitt
According to reports this morning, the EPA pick will be Oklahoma Attorney General Scott Pruitt. We'll hear more about him in the coming days. For me, the story that sticks out most about him is this one - revealing his history of copying and pasting letters written by fossil fuel lobbyists and sending them under his Oklahoma letterhead. The letter to the Environmental Protection Agency from Attorney General Scott Pruitt of Oklahoma carried a blunt accusation: Fed...
CONTINUE READINGGone, Baby, Gone: The Death of Appalachian Coal
It's not just cheap natural gas. Even a coal industry revival wouldn't help Appalachia.
Trump has promised to end the "war on coal" and bring the industry roaring back. The NY Times appropriately called this a "cruel promise," because cheap natural gas has driven coal to its knees economically. That won't change under Trump, who has promised even more fracking and gas production. But, as it turns out, even a revival for the coal industry wouldn't help Appalachian coal miners and their communities. It's not only cruel to give them false hopes. It als...
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