Politics

Meg Whitman Would Suspend AB 32

In a rather stunning and little-noticed op ed last week, California GOP gubernetorial candidate Meg Whitman — former CEO of EBay – called on Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger to suspend the implementation of AB 32.  Her rationale?  To create jobs in California.  AB 32, also known as the Global Warming Solutions Act, cuts California’s greenhouse gas emissions …

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The new and improved EPA

Since I’ve suggested elsewhere on this blog that EPA might not yet have achieved full vertebrate status with respect to mountaintop removal mining, I should acknowledge some of the positive steps the agency has taken recently. Three  examples: EPA and the Department of Transportation jointly proposed new fuel efficiency/greenhouse gas emission standards for cars and …

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It’s Déjà Vu All Over Again

Since opponents can’t seem to come up with any new arguments against climate change legislation, they seem determined to recycle the old, discredited ones. Here’s today’s example, straight from the GOP press release: Rep. Jim Sensenbrenner, R-Wis., and Rep. Darrell Issa, R-Calif, today urged the Environmental Protection Agency to include several relevant studies in its …

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Herein of Regulatory “Czars”

Some conservatives like Glenn Beck are now raising alarms about the power of “czars” within the Obama White House.   Although the rhetoric is ridiculous, there is a serious question here.  A long-term trend has been for Presidents to exert more centralized control over the bureaucracy, and as a practical matter that control has to be …

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California Legislature may decide L.A. football stadium can go forward, despite allegations of inadequate environmental review

Great minds may disagree about whether a new professional football stadium (or team, for that matter) would be good for Los Angeles.  But a new last-minute bill that the California State Senate is considering today, which would eliminate further environmental review under the California Environmental Quality Act for a newly-approved stadium complex in the City …

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One Thumb Up? Or Too Soon to Tell?

The Administration has received mixed reviews so far.  The Washington Post said on Wednesday that: The White House’s main effort has been to undo several Bush-era policies on climate control, air pollution and the regulation of roadless forests. Those actions, combined with court decisions that have struck down other rules, have given President Obama a …

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Cass Sunstein Confirmed by Senate

To the dismay of some environmentalists, the Senate confirmed Cass Sunstein as “regulatory czar” today. An undeniably brilliant scholar,  Sunstein is a long-time advocate of cost-benefit analysis as a check on overly zealous risk regulation. (Unfortunately, his views of regulation figured much less in the public debate than a frenzied campaign to mobilize hunters, gun …

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…in which I turn into a left-wing subversive

Glenn Beck has acquired his first (although surely not-to-be-last) scalp from the Obama Administration” CEQ Green jobs Coordinator Van Jones (whose appointment LegalPlanet noted in March) resigned his position Saturday night.  I went to law school with Van, and while I am not a fan, I thought that letting him go would be an unwarranted capitulation …

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Misinformed Attacks on the Law of the Sea

Objections to the Law of the Sea Treaty are based on specious arguments about sovereignty.

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The Kennedy seat

It may be gauche to admit to worrying about this so soon after Ted Kennedy’s death, but the conversations have already begun: How much harder will it be to get to 60 votes on healthcare reform and, more relevant here, climate change legislation without his seat filled?  Massachusetts procedures for finding a new senator, and …

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