Solyndra: Separating Fact From Fiction
Conservatives in Washington are working hard to turn the Solyndra solar power company bankruptcy into a broad attack on government support for green energy. Our posts following this controversy present the facts and the context that counters the scandal-mongering from the right. Read more »
Conservationist Conservatism
Does anyone think that Congresswoman Michele Bachmann has a clue about, much less an interest in, protecting the environment, even as she supports more drilling off the United States coastline? Read more »
Newt's Big Fail: How He Couldn't Lead Conservatives Into Taking Climate Change Seriously
Newt Gingrich is supposed to be the intellectual leader of the conservative movement. Yet his fellow conservatives were completely uninterested in following his lead away from denying climate science and towards climate solutions. Read more »
Dim Bulbs In The GOP House Majority
Just like a light bulb that burns intensely bright just before it goes dark for good, the Republican majority in the House is burning intensely before its light goes out and it votes to repeal energy efficiency standards for light bulbs. Read more »
A Good Toilet For Rand Paul
Sen. Rand Paul said that hasn't had a functioning toilet in his home for 20 years. He seems to believe the federal government is not allowing him to own a functioning toilet. Bill Scher owns a functioning toilet, so, flush with facts, he walks the senator through the process of how a federal environmental regulation spurs private-sector innovation as well as public benefits. Rand Paul's anti-government arguments are shown to be full of ... Read more »
Related: Grist picks up the Rand Paul toilet challenge. More »
Never Mind Super PACs: How Big Business Is Buying the Election
September 5th, 2012
On January 27, 2010, one year into his term, President Barack Obama used the occasion of his State of the Union address to issue a warning. The Supreme Court had just opened the “floodgates for special interests—including foreign corporations—to spend without limit in our elections.” He was speaking about the ruling in Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission, in which the Court struck down nearly a century of law, granting corporations vast new leeway to influence the outcome of elections. In the months after Obama’s speech, the American Petroleum Institute, an oil industry trade association that represents hundreds of multinational oil and gas companies, would demonstrate just how prescient the president’s warning was.
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Coal Industry Paying Schools To Tell Kids: "Doubling Of Atmospheric CO2 Is Very Beneficial."
The Washington Post published an investigative report on how fossil fuel companies are "spending significant sums of money" to directly fund public schools that teach biased curriculums that promote their industries. Read more »
Drawing Battle Lines In the Clean Energy Standard Fight
President Obama privately met with the head of the Senate energy committee about drafting legislation to set a minimum level of clean energy that power companies must produce. And he delivered a speech in Pennsylvania touting the plan for a "clean energy standard" as well as promoting other initiatives -- some of which a don't require congressional approval -- to improve energy-efficiency in buildings. On one hand, this is heartening. But did the president make a mistake in offering another unilateral concession? Read more »
"Drill Baby Drill" Bill Doesn't Even Let America Keep What It Drills
The House passed a bill to expand coastal drilling in the Gulf of Mexico and eastern seaboard without careful consideration of environmental and safety risks. Instead of allowing America to keep its own energy, the House bill simply continues taxpayer subsidies to multinational oil companies so they can sell the oil wherever in the world they like and rake in obscene profits. Read more »
Set The Course: Make The Case For Capping Carbon ... With GE
It wouldn't appear to make much sense for the President to prioritize the climate crisis in his State of the Union address. But he should, for one simple reason: his Environmental Protection Agency has already begun doing something about it. So he best defend it. Read more »
