Republicans Hate Their Grandchildren
Eleven days ago, I was relieved that the Administration stood firm on anti-EPA riders, but asked, "what will the level of EPA funding be? If Congress and the White House agree to serious cuts that starve the agency of necessary personnel, then the absence of a rider is a Pyrrhic victory." Well, now we know the answer: One of the hardest hit institutions is the Environmental Protection Agency, whose power Republicans have sought to curtail in recent years through a var...
CONTINUE READINGWill Bombay Choke the Queen’s Necklace?
Marine Drive in Bombay, better known as the Queen's Necklace (pictured), is one of the most beautiful waterfronts in the world. That's why it is so depressing to learn that the Maharahstra state government seems to want to destroy it. Per DNA India, the state's chief minister, Prithviraj Chavan, is meeting with Union Environment Minister Jairam Ramesh to gain approval for the six-lane structure, which Chavan says will be "built on stilts." Yecch. Like most mega...
CONTINUE READINGThe Dying Dead
Can something that's Dead still be dying? It can if it's the Dead Sea and if it's rapidly disappearing. And it is. Check out this piece from this month's Scientific American, which details the disappearance of the Dead Sea -- which is really a highly saline lake -- due to four states (Israel, Jordan, Syria, and the Palestinian Authority (if that counts as a state)) drawing their freshwater supplies from its primary feeder, the Jordan River. How is this for a stati...
CONTINUE READINGWill AB 32 Regulations Move Ahead Despite the Court Ruling?
We've extensively covered the litigation over California's landmark climate change law, AB 32. Now, per the Clean Energy Report, CARB might be able to move ahead with the cap-and-trade regulations anyway: the trial court might very well stay its decision pending appeal, which is not unheard of, and according to the state's attorneys, occurs automatically upon appeal: The order rejected requests made by state attorneys in February to allow the GHG rules to continue to ...
CONTINUE READINGAnother Sane Conservative on Climate
Nancy Stiles is the new Republican State Senator from Portsmouth, New Hampshire. She believes in low government spending and decentralization. Libertarians like her. But importantly, she seems to have not been infected with the climate denial crazy of many in her party. While Republicans in the state Assembly have voted to have New Hampshire secede from the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative, the northeast's cap-and-trade plan, Stiles is fighting in the state Se...
CONTINUE READINGPathway to Farm Subsidies
Paul Ryan is one of the great intellectual and political frauds of our time. You don't need to do much more than read through Paul Krugman's and Jonathan Chait's work eviscerating his budget proposal, which carries the Orwellian name of "Pathway to Prosperity." But Legal Planet readers should be aware of something else. If there is one place where progressives and conservatives usually can agree, it is on the issue of farm subsidies, which are not only grotesquely...
CONTINUE READINGEndangered species bizarro-bill introduced
In the Superman comics, everything is backwards in Bizarro World. I thought I must have been unknowingly transported there when I read H.R. 1042, introduced by California Democrat Joe Baca, imaginatively (if incoherently) named the "Discredit Eternal Listing Inequality of Species Takings Act" (the DELIST Act, get it?). (Hat tip: ESA blawg.) The text of the bill is even less coherent than the title so it's a bit tough to parse, but let's try. It would give certain spec...
CONTINUE READINGHow NOT to Report on Climate Change
My eye couldn't help but be drawn to this headline from the Times of India: 'Nearly 80% of mango crop ruined by climate change'. Wow, I thought. Even for a pessimist like myself, that's quite a lot. And how did they determine that? Then I looked at the story. Here's the lede: Alphonso, the king of mangoes, has fallen victim to climate change. The state government's preliminary estimate is that nearly 80% of the mango crop has been destroyed, said agriculture m...
CONTINUE READINGBush-era EPA § 404 veto survives judicial review
A federal court in Mississippi has rejected a legal challenge to EPA's 2008 veto of a Clean Water Act § 404 permit for the Yazoo Pumps flood control project. (Hat tip: PLF Liberty Blog.) The Yazoo Pumps project was an anachronism, even by pre-environmental era standards. (This brief history of the project is based on the court's opinion.) In the 1940s, Congress authorized a flood control project which would protect populated and agricultural areas at elevations more ...
CONTINUE READINGClimate Denial Legislators Struck by Scientific “Friendly Fire”
Paul Krugman has a great column about the so-called climate science hearing last week: So the joke begins like this: An economist, a lawyer and a professor of marketing walk into a room. What’s the punch line? They were three of the five “expert witnesses” Republicans called for last week’s Congressional hearing on climate science. Krugman continues with a discussion of one of my Berkeley colleagues: But the joke actually ended up being on the Republicans, when...
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