Politics

Our strawberries’ safety: will California approve methyl iodide this year?

As Margot Roosevelt reports in the Los Angeles Times, California’s Department of Pesticide Regulation has signaled that it will make a decision before Governor Schwarzenegger leaves office about whether to approve the use of methyl iodide as a strawberry fumigant.  Farmworker advocacy groups and environmental advocates fear the pesticide will be approved, and are planning …

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Actual Conservative Climate Change Policy!

After all the talk over the last two weeks, here it is: Fresh off a big victory over the GOP establishment on earmarks, conservative GOP senators are opening up a new front in the battle on government spending that could be similar to the earmarks standoff: They are calling on Congress to let billions in …

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Dim Bulbs

It’s good to know that there’s still someone who isn’t afraid to stand up for the use of obsolete technologies and the right of every citizen to overpay for electricity.

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So much for “consensus climate solutions”

Our friend Jon Adler has taken many of us and most progressives to task for not pursuing “consensus solutions” to climate change.  What might these consensus climate solutions be?  Well, Jon insists that it would look something like a revenue-neutral carbon tax (such as is proposed by the superb Carbon Tax Center) instead of a …

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Whose Nature? God, the GOP, and Everyone Else

Some Americans say they don’t believe in climate change because they believe in God – or, more exactly, because of what they believe about God.  A few weeks ago, the New York Times quoted some Indiana Tea Party activists who explained that, because the world was created for human use and benefit, using its mineral …

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More Thoughts About Conservative Climate Perspectives

Climate issues are essentially factual, not ideological. We naturally all come to those issues with our own perspectives. That’s fine, so long as our ideological lenses merely color the facts rather than blocking them from view entirely.

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That Warm Fuzzy Cap-And-Trade Feeling

Cara asks if cap-and-trade skeptics like me still get excited at California’s Mini-Me version. The short answer (for me, at least) is yes. I’m all in favor of California rolling out its own version, and my hope has always been that the California Air Resources Board could develop a successful program that EPA could eventually …

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Why Are Conservatives So Hostile to Climate Policy?

Dan wants to know why conservatives would oppose market-based solutions to climate change that avoid greater government intervention down the road.  I asked last week why traditional conservatives, who make much of preserving traditions through different generations and respecting institutions through time, would also oppose such policies. The answer to both questions lie in their …

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Does Proposition 26 Undermine California’s Climate Change Law?

No.  Not at all.  Legally, we are still all systems go for AB 32, the Global Warming Solutions Act. First, take a look at the careful analysis that Cara, Sean, and Rhead produced a couple of weeks ago.  It notes one extremely important fact about Proposition 26: its retroactive provisions only go back to January 2010, and AB 32 was …

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Election review: what message did voters send about the environment, and how will politicians react?

It’s natural, in reflecting on the recent election, to ask whether and to what extent the results reflect public values about protection of the environment.  (Well, at least for me, since I spend my time thinking about these things.)  My answer: not much.  But the election’s impacts on environmental issues will still be significant. While …

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