Republicans Gripe About Former EPA Administrator’s Private E-Mail Addresses, Ignore Bush Appointee’s | ThinkProgress

Republicans Gripe About Former EPA Administrator’s Private E-Mail Addresses, Ignore Bush Appointee’s | ThinkProgress. For years Democrats complained that the Bush Administration was skirting public transparency laws by using personal email accounts to conduct government business, then claiming privacy rights on those accounts.  Karl Rove’s office famously made extensive use of personal/political email accounts to hide official government business interactions and snubbed calls for revealing their content, even deleting thousands of emails.  Throughout the Bush term, Congressional Republicans didn’t complain one bit. Now the same Republicans are trying to create a faux-scandal over global warming science by targeting an email … Continue reading this post

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California ‘Oil and Ag’ Face Rift on Fracking – NYTimes.com

While it is incredibly difficult to permit the construction of relatively inert wind and solar farms in California, oil fracking, which involves pumping billions of gallons of water and millions of gallons of secret chemical cocktails in the ground, occurs with little environmental oversight. California ‘Oil and Ag’ Face Rift on Fracking – NYTimes.com.    

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Eugene Robinson: Obama’s mission on climate change – The Washington Post

Note: As is the topic of constant conversation among those (rightly) concerned about the urgency of the threat of global warming, executive action (specifically through the EPA) represents something of a holy grail when it comes to the feasible opportunities left to us to see real change in climate/energy policies in the near term.  Thanks to a total wall of obstruction from the GOP, the post-stimulus Obama Administration has been a real disappointment when it comes to energy and climate policy. The below piece by Eugene Robinson in the Washington Post sums it up nicely: via Eugene Robinson: Obama’s mission … Continue reading this post

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NationalJournal.com – The Coming GOP Civil War Over Climate Change – Thursday, May 9, 2013

NationalJournal.com – The Coming GOP Civil War Over Climate Change – Thursday, May 9, 2013. “And a quiet, but growing, number of other Republicans fear the same thing. Already, deep fissures are emerging between, on one side, a base of ideological voters and lawmakers with strong ties to powerful tea-party groups and super PACs funded by the fossil-fuel industry who see climate change as a false threat concocted by liberals to justify greater government control; and on the other side, a quiet group of moderates, younger voters, and leading conservative intellectuals who fear that if Republicans continue to dismiss or … Continue reading this post

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Quantifying the consensus on anthropogenic global warming in the scientific literature – IOPscience

Quantifying the consensus on anthropogenic global warming in the scientific literature – IOPscience. An examination of 11,944 peer-reviewed scientific studies & abstracts for discussion on the causes of global warming found that 97.1% of those studies that took a position on global warming supported the position that humans are causing climate change.  Only 2.9% expressed uncertainty or took positions against the theory that humans are causing global warming. There is more scientific consensus on this issue than on settled scientific issues like cigarettes causing cancer, but the media coverage portrays a broader scientific debate and 1/2 of our political parties in the … Continue reading this post

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Cherry-picking one survey to discredit a survey of scientists on climate change – The Washington Post

A survey used misleadingly by the climate science-denying Republican that heads the House Environment Committee actually proves the opposing point: the vast majority of scientists believe humans are causing global warming. Cherry-picking one survey to discredit a survey of scientists on climate change – The Washington Post.

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Low-income students and KIPP charter schools – The Answer Sheet – The Washington Post

Advocates of privatizing education in the US point to the success of Charter schools in improving student performance at acceptable levels of investment.  Critics point out that the Charter schools that propoents hold up as models of education reform are in fact skimming the best students from our education system and are thus not really a model for reform. In that context, I found this Washington Post blog article very useful: Low-income students and KIPP charter schools – The Answer Sheet – The Washington Post. Low-income students and KIPP charter schools By Valerie Strauss — This was written by Richard D. … Continue reading this post

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