Mail Call #7: Trumping Reason (or coherence)

Trump supporters continue to spout confusing word salads at me. I think this person is anti-clean water and voting because of abortion? Or something? You decide:

It is amazing how progressives pick and choose among 'human rights'.  Finding from the right to life a right to feticide.  Finding a right to vote.  Finding a right to my environment's clean water.

Finding, from the right to life, a right to defense of life but not the Right to Keep and Bear Arms.

Truly Meme Magic.  The Alternative Right is right.  TRUMP 2016

On a more positive note, I've gotten a much higher than normal volume of positive email responses to my column about the Clinton/Trump debate, largely from women, and specifically largely from older women who express how much relief and righteousness they felt at seeing what they've been experiencing their whole lives put into words. I find this incredibly humbling and gratifying, but also infuriating that so many women have had to suffer these indignities in relative silence for so damn long.

No. Fucking. More.

On Air: Talking frac sand mining and Wisconsin politics on the People's Mic

I made my first in-studio appearance on the People's Mic last night - it's a progressive talk radio program that runs daily out of Madison from 5 p.m. to 6 p.m. on 92.1FM (and online here).

There's a good chance this will become a semi-regular gig for me, going on the show to talk local and state politics and other related issues, which I'm completely excited about. Simply put: I love radio. I loved playing music on the student station while I was in college, and I love my guest appearances on the ridiculously fun Fundamental Pete's Ass Jammery, and goodness knows I enjoy running my mouth off about current events.

In the installment of the People's Mic from last night we talked about the recent Wisconsin primary elections, how female politicians are treated differently than their male counterparts, and then lots about the controversial frac sand mining that's cropping up in many parts of the state. I was happy to note that people started calling in during that discussion, which I take to mean that folks actually give a crap about the issue. Which is good. You can read an article about sand mining that I contributed to recently here.

Anyway, take a listen, let me know what you think, and be sure to tune in to the People's Mic every weekday evening - you can call in and sound off about whatever is on your mind, too!

The delusional haze of oil addiction

When I first read this Badger Herald piece detailing a lecture by a visiting member of the Ayn Rand Center, I had to chuckle. "Oh boy," I wondered dismissively, "What are those silly Randians up to now?"

Alex Epstein, said lecturer, wanted students to know that oil has gotten a bad rap in recent years, that crude is really our friend, and that so-called "green dogma" has infiltrated our schools such that children are now raised to be environmentalists who actually give a crap about caribou herds in Alaska. The horror!

Granted, the Ayn Rand Center isn't exactly the most influential institution in the country, but many of the uber-libertarian ideals espoused by folks like Epstein do permeate our politics to a disturbing degree.

What folks like Epstein seem to be championing is the sort of responsibility-free liberty that allows human beings to do pretty much whatever they want, regardless of consequence. The important thing, as far as I can tell, is that no one is telling them what to do.

The problem, of course, is immense: This petulant refusal to think long-term, examine the hard facts of a situation, or take into account the needs of others, can only lead to ruin. We're already reaping some of the rotten fruits of that sort of thinking now, in our rapidly shrinking glaciers and ice sheets, massive plastic debris fields in the middle of the ocean, groundwater and soil poisoning, more extreme weather patterns, and even the oppression of entire peoples as the result of selfish policies.

Epstein is right enough when he points out that oil (petroleum) has helped shape the modern age, and that it's present in many of the products we rely on today. What he entirely fails to grasp is that our over-dependence on oil has led us down a very dangerous path, one that has resulted in destruction of ecosystems, bloody human conflict, and health hazards. We're long overdue to do what Epstein and is ilk so often laud in regards to the wrong thing: innovate.

There are viable and safer alternatives to using petroleum in our goods and gas tanks. If even half of the money and time dedicated to the oil industry were put into researching and developing alternate sources of fuel, I have no doubt we'd already be well on our way to a much more balanced world.

That will only happen when more people are willing to take a long, hard, critical look at the current situation and then be willing to dedicate real elbow grease and heart to making the necessary changes. That also means striving for a real balance between individual liberty and community responsibility. Let Ayn Rand spin in her grave. We could tap it as a source of clean energy.

EDIT TO ADD: Hahaha, well at least the oil industry used to be honest about what they did.

Too late for a wake-up call, past time to get moving

This post is part of Blog Action Day 2009: Climate Change. Read a good, more light-hearted take on the subject over at Dane101.

The world is changing. That much is a given. But whether or not you believe that some of that change is due to human interference and is detrimental to our overall survival is an issue that has only grown more contentious as the evidence mounts in its favor.

For too many people on both sides of the debate, too, the argument has mutated into an ego contest: "I'm right, you're wrong, ie: a moron." But that isn't helpful to anyone, and certainly not our planet. This isn't about political parties or nationality. It's about the very long-term security and viability of our home: Earth.

I admit to allowing my temper to flare all too often when it comes to the topic of climate change. I've been studying the effects for as long as I can remember, and when the overwhelming majority of research and evidence points to massive disruption of the Earth's environment as the result of man-made pollutants, it's difficult to understand where those who so vigorously deny it are coming from.

It's easy to say that they just don't care, are selfish, deluded. And certainly, those people exist. But I think most folks are just confused, misled, and probably scared. Hell, I'm scared. It would be much less unsettling to just turn my head and say that everything we're seeing is merely the result of natural cycles, and that we've nothing to worry about. I would much prefer that be the truth.

But it comes down to simply not being willing or able to ignore the evidence. I've been fortunate to have had a very decent level of education in the sciences and scientific method. I've had good teachers who've explained the more complicated ins and outs of environmental science to me. Not everyone has had the luck I've had, though. And in the absence of good teachers, many people are left with politicians and the media as their source for information about climate change.

But soundbytes and talking points can't even come close to explaining what's really going on. They generally either come off sounding too preposterous and alarmist, or overly simplistic and ignorant. That's a major problem that needs to be addressed. We need far better general science education in this country, and we need people to point out the bull when they see it. We need accountability.

Americans especially also need to get over our deeply ingrained belief that the needs and desires of the individual should always trump those of the community. There's a balance to be struck. Individual rights and liberties are incredibly important, but they end when they begin to impede upon the rights and liberties of others. That's where the recognition of the importance of the greater community comes in. If enough individuals refuse to see that some of their actions cause harm to others, then we need to step up as a collective and stop them.

So you may not like littering laws, but the community needs to enforce them for the benefit of all. Interconnectedness. It's not just a hippie ideal. It's the reality on the ground of life on Earth. Our ecosystem is a delicate, finely tuned thing. And it's not as though we've only thrown a small wrench into its inner mechanics with our pollutants. We've been lobbing the equivalent of nuclear bombs at it for centuries now, and it's time to pass some serious nonproliferation laws.

Carbon dioxide is all well and good until it reaches extreme, high levels, at which point it becomes toxic. NASA scientists have already determined the the ideal maximum of CO2 in the atmosphere should be just 350ppm - but we've already outrun that, which means that it's time to make serious efforts at cutting back. Like a human body with sugar and fat intake, there's only so much CO2 the Earth can handle before things start going wrong.

And they've already started going wrong. The trick with climate change is that it isn't just about the average temperature of the planet rising bit by bit, it's also about wilder and more frequent extremes. More hurricanes. More draughts. Stronger storms. Hotter heat waves and colder cold snaps. The seasons shifting, little by little, from their usual patterns.

Right now it's all too easy for people living in better circumstances to ignore the very real problems caused by climate change. Because it's the folks who reside in poorer countries, and/or in places where there's less of a buffer between them and the environment, who feel the adverse effects first. There are even entire countries at risk of being wiped off the map because of rising ocean levels. Whole ways of life are threatened.

Short of the sky actually falling with a note attached that reads, "Due to human-caused climate change," I'm not sure what will convince some of the die-hard deniers. For some people, it's just too much to process. They argue that fighting climate change will result in unnecessary abrogation of rights and economic disaster. And they'll be right if we don't go about things with a clear head. But what they fail to see is that if we do nothing, in the long term, we'll end up with economic disaster and the dissolution of society anyway - only, on a much larger, more catastrophic scale.

We've missed our wake-up call. It's high time we got working.

The good news for Oct. 2, 2009

Friday news dump time! All of it worthwhile. And hey, if you're in the Madison area tonight and are in the mood for some fine tunes and even finer ladies, my band, Little Red Wolf, will be playing a show at the High Noon Saloon at 9:00 p.m. - opening for Brighton, MA and Company of Thieves. We'd love to see you there! More here.

• [Channel3000] Chicago loses out on its bid to host the 2016 Olympics in the first round of voting. A great wailing and gnashing of teeth can be seen and heard to the south. While I think it would have been fun to have had the cycling events up here in Wisconsin, I'm not all that bummed about the decision. Honestly, getting the games is always a mixed bag at best for the host cities, and we should really be focusing our time and money on things like education, the environment, and transportation (our lack of current light rail may have been a factor in the no vote, and I suspect the less-than welcoming environment for foreign visitors seeking visas was as well).
• [Badger Herald] Erstwhile Dist. 5 Dane County Supervisor Wyndham Manning has decided not to run for re-election. The Herald handled the announcement with relative kid gloves, considering the pretty harsh criticisms their editorial board has lobbed at Manning in the past. Personally, the times I've met the guy he's always been friendly and approachable, but I've also gotten the distinct impression that he was perhaps unprepared for the full duties of this particular job. It is perhaps best, then, that he's recognized that a run for second term would be unwise.
• [Wisconsin State Journal] A new club that opened on the outskirts of Middleton, Outer Limits, really wants to let their ladies show some skin to patrons waving dollar bills. And Middleton's efforts to stop them are, like, totally unconstitutional. Never mind that the club originally applied for and got their liquor license under the guise of just being a "sports bar." And never mind that they're skipping right past applying for a permit and going straight for the lawsuit. I actually think the "no nudity" laws we've got in Dane County are bull, but it doesn't help the cause when you act like douchebags about it.
  
• [Yale E360] So those big bad beasties we're so prone to vilify and kill off? Things like wolves, bears, big cats and the like? Yeah, turns out depleting their numbers so drastically ain't such a great idea, as it leaves the so-called "mesopredators" to run rampant, and they can wreak some serious havoc on local ecosystems. Baboons, for instance, have apparently flourished so much in parts of Africa that they've been destroying crops and "menacing villagers" (which, though it sounds hilarious, is a bad thing).
  

Good groundwater management means saying no to bottled water plant

Crystal Geyser Roxane, a springwater bottling company headquartered in California, wants to build a bottling plant in Marquette County.

Last week, the company met with area environmental groups to lay out their proposal...

...which calls for a 100,000-square-foot bottling plant in the town of Oxford just west of Highway 51 in Marquette County. The company intends to eventually pump as much as 300,000 gallons of water per day or about 240 gallons per minute.

The proposed site is adjacent to a stream called Allen Creek and is surrounded by wetlands. But current groundwater laws would offer little protection to such nearby surface waters, which could be lowered by high-capacity wells.

It's a terrible idea, but then, I think bottled water in general is, with only a few exceptions, a terrible idea. We should be working collectively to protect what is the most precious resource on Earth, making sure that it's available in clean, cheap form to everyone. Instead, the tendency is too often to simply throw up our hands and leave it to the for-profit water companies.

It's the great rip-off. And bottled water isn't even necessarily any better than what comes out of our taps. Since bottled water is regulated by the FDA (and not the EPA, as our municipal taps are), the laws governing its quality are quite different. From a National Resources Defense Council report on the matter:

• City tap water can have no confirmed E. coli or fecal coliform bacteria. FDA bottled water rules include no such prohibition (a certain amount of any type of coliform bacteria is allowed in bottled water).
• City tap water, from surface water, must be filtered and disinfected. In contrast, there are no federal filtration or disinfection requirements for bottled water.
• Most cities using surface water have had to test for Cryptosporidium or Giardia, two common water pathogens that can cause diarrhea and other intestinal problems, yet bottled water companies do not have to do this.
• City tap water must meet standards for certain important toxic or cancer-causing chemicals, such as phthalate (a chemical that can leach from plastic, including plastic bottles); some in the industry persuaded the FDA to exempt bottled water from the regulations regarding these chemicals.
• City water systems must issue annual "right to know" reports, telling consumers what is in their water. Bottlers successfully killed a "right to know" requirement for bottled water

In addition, bottled water operations suck groundwater out of communities that could otherwise be managing and using the resources on their own terms.

Which is why I was heartened to read that state legislators are going to be reviewing our groundwater laws, hopefully with an eye toward tightening regulations on high-capacity wells--like what CGR wants to build. These super suckers draw at least 100,000 gallons a day, and no doubt have a detrimental impact on surrounding wetlands, streams, and aquifers.

Water experts, such as George Kraft, who heads the groundwater center at UW-Stevens Point, have estimated that 90 percent or more of the state’s surface waters, including springs, are unprotected from excessive pumping as a result of the weaknesses in the state’s laws.

This is important, because in Wisconsin "70% of residents and 97% of communities rely on groundwater as their drinking water source." I don't think anyone can emphasize enough just how important our access to clean water is, and just how dire the situation is becoming.

Those of us lucky enough to live in the relative affluence of these United States have, for the most part, not yet felt the really negative effects of water strain, but it has already started to creep into the lives of people in places like California or Georgia. And in less developed countries, things are already pretty dire. There are simply too many people using too much water.

We're not in trouble because there's not enough water - we're in trouble because the water has been polluted and wasted by us. Through a combination of smart conservation and higher efficiency standards, plus better regulation of how our water resources are utilized, we can come out on top. I do believe that. But I also believe it's going to take some serious elbow grease and a major shift in perspective to make happen.

One good place to start? Change attitudes about bottled water. It has its place - providing a temporary reprieve for people without access to clean drinking water until such time as the public stuff can be cleaned up. Emergency preparedness and response. As a casual beverage for those with access to good tap water, though? That's just needless--not to mention destructive--decadence. Americans throw away something like 2.5 million plastic bottles every hour, so we're talking massive amounts of waste here, too. We can do better.


(photo by AdamCohn on Flickr)

If Earth Day is every day, do we still need an Earth Day?

Today is Earth Day--a date set aside to pay special attention to our environment, a day with roots in the activism of the late '60s and early '70s but that has since spread to be celebrated in countries all across the globe. Which is a good thing, since this whole "Earth" thing is somewhat important for everyone living on it, y'know?

The first Earth Day looked a lot different than it does now, at least in the US. On this day in 1970, an estimated 20 million people took to streets, campuses, and town centers in one of the largest demonstrations in our country's history. As told by Elizabeth Kolbert, writing in The New Yorker:

The first celebration of Earth Day, on April 22, 1970, was a raucously exuberant affair. In New York, Fifth Avenue was closed to traffic. People picnicked on the sidewalk; dead fish were dragged through midtown; and Governor Nelson Rockefeller rode a bicycle across Prospect Park. Students in Richmond, Virginia, handed out bags of dirt (to represent the “good earth”); demonstrators in Washington poured oil onto the sidewalk in front of the Interior Department (to protest recent oil spills); and in Bloomington, Indiana, women dressed as witches threw birth-control pills into the crowd (no one was quite sure why).

Spurred on by Wisconsin's own Senator Gaylord Nelson and the man he hired to get the event coordinated, Denis Hayes, the original Earth Day exceeded even their expectations (for an informative look at the history of the modern movement, check out the documentary "Earth Days," which I had the chance to check out when it came to the Wisconsin Film Festival). Since then, awareness of the many and varied environmental issues facing our planet has only spread. It's not as though no one had been thinking or attempting to do anything about any of those problems before, but since that day in 1970, environmentalism has definitely gone mainstream.

And as with anything that does so, there have been ups and downs for the movement along the way. While we have seen an increased emphasis on creating products and services that are biodegradable, reusable, renewable, and non-toxic, plenty of companies have also used this sort of "green chic" solely as a means for cashing in, relying on what's called "greenwashing" to sell products that aren't really all that eco-friendly.

In a very cynical sense, I guess those of us serious about environmental action should be glad that corporations see this has something popular enough to even just imitate. It has also meant, at very least, that the percentage of products that actually are quite green has gone up considerably.

But there is growing discord from some corners of the movement over the commoditization of Earth Day and the green movement. And rightfully so. That anyone could see these things merely as means to a profit, and not as something to be done with care, forethought, and good intention, is fairly insulting to anyone who's worked hard for the cause.

Still, the overwhelming consensus seems to be that we need the holiday now more than ever, to continue building real awareness of the issues, to have a special day set aside to recognize the efforts of those people who work year-round to find practical, revolutionary solutions to the problems we face, and to bring new people into the fold. (Grist has a great series of interviews with various environmentalists about their perceptions of the Earth Day holiday, and it's well worth a look.)

It's good that we have a far more progressive, environmentally aware administration in the White House now. It's good that more and more people are taking the issues of climate change, pollution, overpopulation, etc. far more seriously. It's good that we're able to find ways to combine economically viable business models with green practices. And it's good that we still take this day to remind ourselves of the struggle--all that we've accomplished, and how very much work remains to be done. Because we need all the encouragement and motivation we can get to tackle such a monumental and important issue.

Happy Earth Day, all. And keep fighting the good fight--all year round.

The good news for Feb. 6, 2009

Frankly, I'm too brain fried today to type up a proper post. I think all this Koschnick nonsense did it to me. Whatever the cause, though, I'll be bopping over to Der Rothskeller tonight for some hot Los Campesinos! and Titus Andronicus (the band, not the play) action, so that's likely to help the situation a bit. My new band is also doing some work on our new rehearsal space tomorrow, which I'm excited about. It'll be quite nice to have a proper, private room in which to make our music without too much bother to neighbors and the like. And soon we may actually have a name! Imagine that. In the meantime, here are some interesting bits of news for you to digest:

• [Capital Times] The Charter Street power plant here in Madison will burn bio-mass fuels and not coal, according to Gov. Doyle. The station had been one of the worst pollution offenders in the state until legal action was taken to force it into compliance. This is great news, as bio-mass puts far fewer particulates into the air and is generally far, far less disruptive to harvest. The creation of a bio-mass industry could also lead to significant job creation. It's damn nice to get some good news here and there.
• [Badger Herald] The three banks that loaned the Overture Center money for its construction are threatening to foreclose if the debt isn't repaid soon. Things just keep getting worse for the beleaguered center, don't they? Seems like the majority of those involved in decision making, both on the OC and bank sides of things, have been fucking up left and right. I have no desire to see the place closed and hope some equitable solution is worked out, but things sure don't look too hot right now.
• [Wisconsin State Journal] The Dist. 2 alderman debate was last night. I can still only detect minor policy differences between the candidates. Ultimately, it seems to boil down to dissatisfaction with the style and communication techniques of the incumbent.
• [Fat Cyclist] Fat Cyclist is one of my favorite bloggers. He's currently promoting Twin Six, an awesome cycling apparel company, as they're donating 50% of every cent spent on their goods today to the Lance Armstrong Foundation to help fight cancer. Go check it out and buy something already!

The good news for Jan. 7, 2009

So much news, so little time. Most of the articles I've collected for your reading pleasure today have to do with the environment, and green technologies (except for the abortion one, which probably isn't as "green" as one of the comments wryly suggests). I've written extensively on the subject of sustainability and conservation, and I'm always on the lookout for news of positive developments on those fronts. There's plenty of doom and gloom involved, so we all need some reassurance from time to time, no? Anyway, I encourage you to check out the following articles:

• [Grist] In the midst of the many and varied pile-of-shit rule and legislative changes being pushed through the pipes at the last minute, the Bush administration went ahead and authorized the creation of the largest marine sanctuary on Earth. Excellent! Still, I can't help but wonder: Do these guys realize that you can't just designate a few patches of land and sea as nature reserves and then go off and plunder the rest of the planet? It's all connected, you jerks!
  
• [TreeHugger] Macintosh's annual bonanza-o'-self-promotion is on, and they've just announced the development of a laptop battery that's both far more long-lasting and recyclable. Pretty cool, Mac, pretty cool.
• [World Changing] Smart folks ponder the future, and what big questions and events will shape it the most. Unsurprisingly, climate change takes center stage.
  
• [Capital Times] UW Health is considering whether or not to add second trimester abortion services. Anti-choice advocates are, naturally, livid.
  

Thoughtful economic stimulus package needed, emphasis on 'thoughtful'

The economy is ill. We all know it. Several hundred point fluctuations in the stock markets have become so common place that they barely raise eyebrows anymore. Hundreds of thousands of jobs have been lost. Too many homes foreclosed. Banks and large corporations are going belly up. The auto industry is on life support.

President-elect Barack Obama has called for the creation and implementation of a massive economic stimulus package, something on par with (or greater than) the New Deal policies of the 1930's. He wants hundreds of billions of dollars to go toward unfreezing the markets and creating enough new jobs to get us all back on track again. A major attribute of those jobs, Obama says, should be that they are in "green" sectors of the economy.

Because the environment is ill, too.

Some people don't believe that we can both right the economy and the environment at the same time, that focusing on conservation and sustainability will only hinder the markets and make things worse for us all.

What many other people are saying, though, is that we can have it both ways. We'll all need to ante up and kick in, work hard, to make it happen--but it can happen.

The November/December issue of Mother Jones includes a series of articles dealing with this very conundrum, and they're all well worth the read. Perhaps the most important thing to take away from them, though, is this number: 350.

And what does that mean, precisely? James Hansen, the NASA scientist who in 1988 was one of the first public voices to warn that burning fossil fuels was warming the earth, recently published a paper in which he (and several coauthors) laid out the case for "Target Atmospheric CO₂" levels. It says:

If humanity wishes to preserve a planet similar to that on which civilization developed and to which life on Earth is adapted, paleoclimate evidence and ongoing climate change suggest that CO₂ will need to be reduced from its current 385 ppm to at most 350 ppm.

The Mother Jones article goes on to clarify:

Get that? Let me break it down for you. For most of the period we call human civilization, the amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere hovered at about 275 parts per million. Let's call that the Genesis number, or depending on your icons, the Buddha number, the Confucius number, the Shakespeare number. Then, in the late 18th century, we started burning fossil fuel in appreciable quantities, and that number started to rise. The first time we actually measured it, in the late 1950s, it was already about 315. Now it's at 385, and growing by more than 2 parts per million annually.

And it turns out that that's too high. We never had a number before, so we never knew whether we'd crossed a red line. We half guessed and half hoped that the danger zone might be 450 or 550 parts per million—those were still a little ways in the distance. Therefore we could get away with thinking like the young Augustine: "Lord, make me chaste, but not yet." Not anymore. We have been told by science that we're already over the line.

Scary as that is, it's not an impossible goal. Some might balk at how much of a challenge it might be, or how much reaching that number will alter the economic world as we know it. But, as always, I ask this: Would you rather the alternative? A world toxic to life itself? I hope not.

The fears of the greedy souls so thoroughly entrenched and invested in a fossil fuel dependent society are well-founded, and frankly I'd like to see their worst nightmares come true--A world powered by human innovation that leads to sustainable, renewable sources of energy and technologies.

Obama has the right idea when he calls for a vast stimulus package that focuses heavily on creating "green jobs" - but the devil's in the details.

His promotion of so-called "clean coal" is, unfortunately, misguided. Coal is not and is not likely ever to be clean. From its extraction through habitat destroying processes, to its harnessing through pollutant spewing factories, coal is far from the answer.

We should also be wary of the calls for more infrastructure spending. While it's incredibly important to upgrade our aging bridge, sewage, and power transmission systems, we shouldn't allow expensive and unnecessary road building projects to weasel their way into the game, too.

Unfortunately, all too many state governors and mayors have sent reams of just such proposals off to the Obama administration. Right here in Wisconsin, Gov. Doyle is requesting funds for a much disputed plan to expand I-94 from Milwaukee to the Illinois border. John Norquist, CEO of Congress for the New Urbanism, writes that:

Though it will achieve only minimal reductions in drive times, it is projected to add more than 200,000 automobile miles per day. Say hello to 130,000 pounds in new daily carbon emissions (assuming the average miles-per-gallon of cars on the road climbs to 30). It’s the kind of project Exxon might dream up to get cars back on the road after seven unprecedented months of declining driving.

That's not the direction in which we want to go if we want any chance at getting our emissions down to the recommended 350.

We should instead be focusing on developing better mass transit systems, like the proposed Midwest commuter railway that would link cities like Madison, Milwaukee, and Chicago. Things like that would get more cars off the road while helping a wider range of people to get from city to city, all the while cutting down on emissions and creating jobs (we'll need people to build, operate, and maintain those rails, after all).

Intentional, well-thought out urban infill would help, too, making more people less dependent on their cars to get them to their jobs, grocery stores, schools, etc. It would free up more land for conservation, and for sustainable farming that could serve local communities.

We need to make a serious, concerted push to pump more money into those industries and organizations working to innovate greener modes of transportation and energy. Right now, alternatives and renewables only receive a pittance in terms of tax incentives and government grants, while the oil, coal, and natural gas industries sit pretty and fat. Our priorities need to pull a 180.

And in the meantime, we need to put a hard cap on the amount of CO₂ our nation releases, heavily taxing those industries that exceed set limits (and making them pay for permits to do so). The companies would then, presumably, pass those extra expenses on to consumers, who would likely cut their usage dramatically.

To offset the burden placed on the consumer, however, the government could take some of the money earned from the industry payments for their emissions, and maybe money from a gas tax as well, and give it back to us regular folk by way of a monthly check (or something similar), then invest the remainder in helping create newer, cleaner, more affordable means of powering our lives in the long-run.

There are many opportunities to go about this the right way, and just as many to go about it the wrong way. We have lots of smart, thoughtful people out there working on the problems right now. What we lack is the national (and international) willpower and cooperation to properly fund their efforts, and to see this through to the hopefully less bitter end.

We can hope that an Obama administration understands that, and acts on it--but we also need to make sure they do. Hold them accountable. Speak up. Don't allow yourself to be cowed by pretty rhetoric or the easy path. Make it happen. We have to, now, before the pendulum swings so far out and up that there's nowhere to go but crashing down.


(h/t: Sprawled Out)

The good news for Dec. 12, 2008

Friday news dump edition! The world is always full of news, really, but these days it does feel like there's an especially large pile of it weighing down on us. Terrorist attacks in India, a cholera outbreak in Zimbabwe that's being ignored by its awful leader, worldwide economic collapse, etc. etc. So you'll understand why only one of my links is to something that's potentially good. It was hard to find!

• [Capital Times] A new gay dance club may well be opening its doors on Willy St., should the neighborhood not object to its location. The name of the club, Plan B, is pretty silly, but generally I'm all for more gay-friendly establishments, especially ones that have good DJs (fingers crossed!).
• [Salon] Oh Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich, you may as well be a character in a David Mamet play. Happily, Choire Sicha has seen to it that we're made aware of the eerie (and hilarious) similarities. Next you'll be blaming women for everything that goes wrong in your life!
• [Chicagoist] Speaking of Blagojevich, here's a hilarious illustration of the man parachuting himself into prison.
• [San Francisco Chronicle] Still-President Bush is still pissing on everything good in this country, pushing through administrative rule changes that aim to effectively gut the Endangered Species Act. Screw polar bears and mountain frogs, am I right?! (I've written about some of the other fabulous last-minute changes the Bush admin is pushing through, too)
• [Green Building Elements] Had to quick add this one, because it's so incredibly awesome and I want to do this for myself someday: Hand-Build an Earth Sheltered House for $5,000.
  

Bush admin to check nation's oil one last time

I'm told that in the sport of wrestling, there's a colorful bit of slang that refers to a rather, uh, interesting move - an "oil check" - wherein one competitor gets a little friendly with the other competitor's rear end. It's meant to startle and distract them enough that the perpetrator can get a leg up in the match.

So when I read this Washington Post article detailing the Bush administration's last minute push to pass a whole slew of really terrible deregulatory legislation, I couldn't help but feel like they were trying to oil check the whole nation.

We've all been learning the harsh lesson of what happens when you deregulate the economy (some of us already knew what would happen, but the warnings went unheeded by those in power). How, then, can we justify ignoring those lessons completely when it comes to industry and the environment?

Here are just a few of the things the Bush admin is trying to do:

...lift a requirement that environmental impact statements be prepared for certain fisheries-management decisions and...give review authority to regional councils dominated by commercial and recreational fishing interests.

...

...allow current emissions at a power plant to match the highest levels produced by that plant, overturning a rule that more strictly limits such emission increases. According to the EPA's estimate, it would allow millions of tons of additional carbon dioxide into the atmosphere annually, worsening global warming.

A related regulation would ease limits on emissions from coal-fired power plants near national parks.

A third rule would allow increased emissions from oil refineries, chemical factories and other industrial plants with complex manufacturing operations.

These are all, according to White House spokesman Tony Fratto, "well reasoned and are being considered with the best interests of the nation in mind."

You'll understand, I hope, if I utterly and completely distrust you, Tony. Unless, of course, what you mean by "best interests of the nation" is "best interests of industries with enough money." Then I'd believe you were telling the truth.

I have to give points to the Bush administration for sheer ambition. They've already done a mighty fine job of fucking things up pretty royally for the country and the world, but even now, just a couple of months before the end of Bush's term, they're still doing their damndest to continue with the raping and pillaging.

I'd say we could just wait and hope for an Obama presidency that would work to overturn all of this nonsense, but the problem is that re-implementing regulations is much, much more difficult than stripping them away.

Afterall, it's always harder to do the right thing.

So start putting some pressure on your elected officials, reminding them that there's more than just the election to worry about just now and that they need to oppose this shit with all their might. Unless they want that oil check, of course.

UPDATE: Oh this just gets better and better. Want. To punch. Something.

Expanding interstates in the age of declining driving

The Wisconsin Department of Transportation wants to expand I-39/90 from Madison to the Illinois border to a whopping six lanes. Frankly, this makes about as much sense to me as does the Pabst Farms interchange project in Milwaukee: none at all.

Though they've come down from their recent extreme highs, I really doubt that gas prices are going to come down so much that we as a nation return to our big gas guzzling cars and frivolous drives to get our mail at the end of the driveway any time soon (if ever). Studies point to a major decrease in the amount of miles Americans are driving, politicians are finally getting the memo about properly funding things like public transportation and walkable/bikeable neighborhoods, and the general trend, though at times frustratingly slow to take hold, is toward a better mix of transportation modes.

Why, then, spend hundreds of millions of dollars on an interstate expansion? The project also includes plans to upgrade old bridges, which I'm all for, but the part where they intend to make it six lanes is, I believe, ridiculous. That money could be better spent on more crucial infrastructure improvements--like the bridges, preexisting roads that are in sorry shape, bike lanes, sewer upgrades, etc.

To say nothing of aesthetics. Big, sprawling interstates are ugly, and the construction of them tends to tear up farm land and countryside, and cause more polluting runoff.

And anyway, should we really be encouraging more vehicles to be on the road? WisDOT is holding public meetings in two locations where anyone can come see and hear about the plan, and offer their input. I'm hopeful that there will be enough reasonable questioning of the lane expansion that it gets scrapped, but then the cynical part of me has been watching what's going on in Milwaukee and isn't so sure that reason plays as big a role as it should when it comes to decisions like this.

Love of a season

The weather this past weekend was about as idyllic as it gets. With the fall colors in southern Wisconsin striving for their peak, temperatures wandered up into the high 70's and the sun shone brightly over a few scattered clouds and a quiet breeze. Naturally, one is all but compelled to spend a great deal of time out of doors when such weather presents itself.

Me and the fella, so compelled, suited up and headed out to do some mountain biking in Waterloo. As we maneuvered our way around roots and rocks and killer obstacles we're not yet awesome enough to tackle, we couldn't help but be constantly marveling at just how gorgeous everything was. The trails wind through acres of land on the side of a large mound/hill that's covered in most places by a combination of pine and deciduous forest. We passed through brightly colored sections where the sun burst through the canopy and sent rays of light down onto the leaf-strewn floor, and other spots where the light breeze shook free a shower of dead pine needles that then drifted down around us.

Seriously, it was almost as though someone had planned it.

After working up a good lather, we headed out to the Eplegaarden to pick out a single pumpkin for future use as a jack-o-lantern. The joint was, unsurprisingly, jumping, as parents and children and giddy college students swarmed the apple orchards and pumpkin fields in a hunt for seasonal produce. We found a slightly more out-of-the-way field where the selection was less picked over and found a specimen that met our exacting standards: no insect holes, a good long stem, and at least one side with a good surface for carving.

It was hard to watch the sun set at the end of Sunday knowing that such a perfect weekend was unlikely to roll around again at least until next year. "I want to bottle today and keep it around forever," said the fella. And I couldn't agree more, but I'm thankful to have been given such a lovely Indian Summer at all. Autumn is my favorite season, but my love for it is always tempered with the knowledge that fall tends to be the most mercurial of seasons, and that once it's done, there's a long winter to get through. Even so, I can't help but love this time of year: the brilliant colors in the trees, the harvest, Halloween, that crisp bite that seeps into the air, caramel apples, pumpkins, and warm kitchens that remind me of being small.

This coming weekend I'll be traveling to Columbus, Ohio for the tenth annual International Drag King Extravaganza, and I'm hoping that the weather will cooperate for daytime excursions to explore various parts of a city to which I've never been before. Will autumn be as spectacular there as it is in Wisconsin? Is that even possible? I admit I'm a little biased toward the natural beauty of my adopted state, but I'll do my best to keep my eyes, ears and nose open to the different--but I'm sure perfectly nice--sights, sounds and smells of fall in Ohio. After all, autumn beggars ought not be choosers.

A car-less you

Gas prices got you down? Thinking about the negative impact on your environment and your health that so much driving might have? Just want to try something new? Then I recommend checking out the upcoming "Car-less U" event - a week of "fun, free eco-transportation events" put on by the Madison Environmental Group's EnAct program.

This is a good chance to get basic information about things like bike trails and routes, bike safety, how to navigate the sometimes wonky Madison Metro bus system, community car programs, and other tips and tricks for lessening your reliance on automobiles.

The full schedule of events is available here.

I love programs like this, because they help to make things like bike commuting and public transportation more approachable for everyone.

And I should mention that dane101 publishes a regular feature about biking called Bike-It-Yourself that offers some pretty good, down-to-earth advice on the subject, too.

The good news for Sept. 16, 2008

There's ever-so much doom and gloom in the world and media, and as unpleasant as it is it's important to pay close attention, but even still, for a slight change of pace I'm going to attempt to highlight some positive news today. Wish me luck.

• [Wisconsin State Journal] Anonymous donors gave $20 million to the UW-Madison School of Music for the construction of some nice, new performance spaces downtown. It's a nice change of pace to hear that people gave money to something other than a law or business school for once.
• [Yahoo News] Firefighter saves kitty through mouth-to-mouth resuscitation! D'awww.
• [The Capital Times] Barack Obama, in addition to pledging to help the Great Lakes, has actually released a detailed plan for how he would go about doing it.
• [grist] A U.S. District Judge tossed out a federal plan that would have allowed more snowmobiles into Yellowstone National Park.
• [TreeHugger] GM finally ponies up photos and specs on their new Volt model of electric-hybrid vehicle. It looks pretty tasty, and the engine design sounds damn cool. Hey GM? More of this if you want your business to do better, and please, keep the manufacturing in the U.S.
• [The New Yorker] This is one of the more insane--and hilarious--essays about Sarah Palin that I have yet to read.
  

Who needs an environment, anyway?

Man, apparently it's crazytown week in environmental news. The good James Rowen over at the Political Environment, and also Wayne Bigelow (chair of the Dane County Democratic Party) who mentioned it again this morning on Lee Rayburn's show, pointed out the absurd new rules that the Bush Administration is trying to push through that would essentially gut the Endangered Species Act:

The Bush administration wants federal agencies to decide for themselves whether highways, dams, mines and other construction projects might harm endangered animals and plants.

New regulations, which don't require the approval of Congress, would reduce the mandatory, independent reviews government scientists have been performing for 35 years, according to a draft obtained by The Associated Press.

The draft rules also would bar federal agencies from assessing the emissions from projects that contribute to global warming and its effect on species and habitats.

I'm trying to find another way of saying that this is like "the fox garding the henhouse" because everyone and their mother seems to be using that phrase, but damn if it isn't 100% accurate. Maybe we could call it "the crack addict gaurding the crack house" to make it even more obvious what we're dealing with here.

The officials that are pushing for this change claim that individual federal agencies now have enough expertise to make appropriate determinations about the impact of new construction on wildlife and their habitat, that the new rules make sense and would help cut down on delays and higher costs.

You'll excuse me, however, if I have a hard time believing that no one would abuse this, intentionally or not. Independent oversight and regulation of federal agencies and corporations is an incredibly important part of a functioning democracy, wherein corporate and/or other monied interests are not supposed to run things (not that that's what actually happens most of the time, but we've got to have goals!). And all of this whining about alleged delays and higher costs? I won't lie, it pisses me off a little bit.

We're talking about trying to rationally manage our natural resources--you know, the stuff that allows us to go on living a relatively healthy and balanced life on this here sphere. I get the distinct impression that, left entirely up to lobbyists, corporations and certain politicians who take their money, we'd quickly have ourselves a thoroughly paved over, run down, dirty, dying world. And they'd be dancing a little jig on its corpse with money-stuffed pockets, until, of course, they die of mercury poisoning.

Oh but the world and its environs were already saved 2,000 years ago (give or take a few) by Jesus, and we don't need to do anything more! Or at least, that's according to Minnesota congresswoman Michele Bachmann:

"[Pelosi] is committed to her global warming fanaticism to the point where she has said that she's just trying to save the planet," Bachmann told the right-wing news site OneNewsNow. "We all know that someone did that over 2,000 years ago, they saved the planet -- we didn't need Nancy Pelosi to do that.

Oh Minnesota, why you gotta go and elect someone like that? Too many politicians in my former (and current) home states have been offering up wacky stuff like this as of lates, and I'm starting to worry that there's something in the water...which means I've drunk it too. That might go some ways in explaining the incessent blogging....

Look, even for committed Christians, the whole Jesus dying on the cross thing was meant to absolve us from having to make more burnt offerings, and to forgive us, eternally, for our sins. Unless you decide to apply the latter as a blank check for fucking the world's shit up, then I don't know how it makes sense to say that Jesus already saved the environment, and Pelosi should just back off. It just doesn't make sense! But then, not a lot of what the rabidly pro-development-and-environment-be-damned types say ever makes sense, just cents. Lots of 'em.

UPDATE: And the road through Crazytown continues, with one right-wing think tank declaring that immigrants, both legal and illegal, are to blame for rising CO2 levels.

Powered by sun, day and night

This is incredibly exciting, and perhaps one of the most promising clean energy developments in years (if not, y'know, ever):

In a revolutionary leap that could transform solar power from a marginal, boutique alternative into a mainstream energy source, MIT researchers have overcome a major barrier to large-scale solar power: storing energy for use when the sun doesn't shine.
...
Inspired by the photosynthesis performed by plants, Nocera and Matthew Kanan, a postdoctoral fellow in Nocera's lab, have developed an unprecedented process that will allow the sun's energy to be used to split water into hydrogen and oxygen gases. Later, the oxygen and hydrogen may be recombined inside a fuel cell, creating carbon-free electricity to power your house or your electric car, day or night.

Fingers seriously crossed.

Who gave this guy a column?

I mean, he's a blogger after all. It's generally good policy to just keep us relegated to our own personal web space. Especially if we birth such abortions of grammar, common sense, and logic such as can be found in James Widgerson's latest column at gmtoday.com.

Widgerson is bemoaning the recent report, Wisconsin's Strategy for Reducing Global Warming, and its apparently audacious assumption that global climate change is a real threat and that we ought to take steps to combat it.

Among the litany of already disproved allegations and assertions that Widgerson makes, we have the old "global cooling" bit, the "you can't tell me what to do!" line, the "they'll force us all to live in teepees and ride the bloody trains" hysteria, plus much, much more!

They’re not even acknowledging that global temperatures have leveled off, and that we may actually be entering a period of global cooling.

Eh, not so much. Global surface temperatures are increasing, and the global cooling idea has long since been debunked, even by one of the scientists who originally proposed it. Clearly someone forgot to read much of any of the current research on the subject, including the exhaustive IPCC study from 2007.

They want us out of our cars and riding trains. If we don’t abandon our cars, we are going to have to buy more expensive cars with higher emission standards. We are going to have to buy ethanol to fuel our cars. We are going to have to drive slower because they are going to lower the speed limits. Meanwhile, drivers will have the privilege of paying for new trains (like the ones keeping Waukesha residents up at night with their horns).

When did trains suddenly become the great bogeyman of Wisconsin? While certainly not the end-all-be-all of our transportation woes, trains and mass transit in general do serve the public quite well, both here and abroad. They help cut congestion on our costly highways, and reduce the amount of pollutants being spewed by taking cars off the roads. And ridership is up across the country, showing a growing demand for the service now that gas prices are so high (and don't look to be comin' down any time soon). The real question here should be, why not trains?

While I'm not an ardent supporter of ethanol (at least not the corn-based kind), I do believe higher emissions standards are important. They don't have to mean more expensive cars, either. That's the beauty of demand and innovation. The more people--with more cash--that put their minds to the problem, the more efficient and less expensive for the end-user things tend to become. And who doesn't want to get more mileage for their buck?

They even want to reduce the amount of miles we drive through "improved land use." You want to build that house in the country? Your dream will soon clash with the priority of reducing greenhouse gas omissions.

Heaven forbid we work to create more walkable communities, so you don't have to drive miles just to buy groceries or see a movie or go to the park. And take away those sprawling luxury homes on hundreds of acres of otherwise perfectly good land from the few people remaining wealthy enough to build them? Apparently that, too, leaves an awful taste in his mouth.

What's especially strange about this column is Widgerson's assertion that the people who want to implement these allegedly Draconian changes are just a bunch of "elitist" snobs. I guess those dream-house-in-the-country building, SUV driving, public transit abhoring people are just salt of the earth folk with barely two private yachts to rub together. And those elitist snobs? They want to build a more sustainable, healthier, more affordable and pleasant place to live for everyone. If that's elitism, then by gum, hand me a snifter of brandy and take me out to the Skull and Bones meetings because I want in!

More drilling won't help you now

Gas prices skyrocket, and suddenly everyone's crying for more domestic oil drilling. It is human nature, or so it would seem, to deal with disasters as they happen instead of preparing in advance. This most recent example would appear to be no exception.

The big GOP talking point of the day is "More offshore drilling! Open ANWR!" In response to this, the Democratic talking points have been "Implement a windfall tax on oil companies!" and even the confusing "Open more coal power plants!" Everyone's reacting, and very few are actually acting. Don't even get me started on forethought.

Over at folkbum's, a debate erupted over this very subject when it was brought up that the latest feigned outrage was over Obama making some remark about people needing to keep the tires on their cars filled so as to save gas. The comment is pretty much a non-issue in my opinion, but the conversation (if you can call it that) it sparked, and the greater subject to which it relates, is certainly worth examining.

It should be obvious that both Obama and McCain are playing to their percieved constituents on this issue: one calling for more oil drilling and nuclear power, the other for conservation and alternate sources of fuel (and when I say "alternate" I don't necessarily mean all-green, as is the case with his call for new coal-fired plants). Their positions are fairly predictable given their political parties, and neither one is really getting to the root of the problem, or proposing viable, long-term solutions.

It's understandable that people want relief from the crazy high fuel prices, and that they want it now. The transportation industry--the people who bring us our food and other material goods--is especially suffering now, with diesel hitting an average of $4.68/gallon and gas at just over $4.

Here's the thing, though: even if we opened currently off-limits off-shore sites to drilling right now, the data suggests that we 1) wouldn't see any of this new oil for another decade or so, and 2) it would likely only decrease the cost of gas by a few cents.

The Energy Information Administration put out a substantive and informative report on the subject, wherein even after taking an optimistic look at future trends, they conclude that opening the Outer Continental Shelf (OCS) to new drilling "would not have a significant impact on domestic crude oil and natural gas production or prices before 2030." They add that, "For the lower 48 OCS, annual crude oil production in 2030 is projected to be 7 percent higher—2.4 million barrels per day in the OCS access case compared with 2.2 million barrels per day in the reference case. Because oil prices are determined on the international market, however, any impact on average wellhead prices is expected to be insignificant."

What's especially significant about that last part is, as pointed out by the folks over at Climate Progress, that:

Offshore drilling is projected by EIA to deliver less extra annual oil production in 2030 than Saudi Arabia announced it would add this year, an announcement that had no significant impact whatsoever on oil prices. [In fact, oil prices actually went up — see yesterday’s AP story, “Oil prices rise despite Saudi vow to pump more.”]

The Bush Administration's own energy analysts' research flies in the face of what both the White House and the McCain campaign are trying to sell the American people on. Read another great, in-depth look at the shenanigans here.

So, the numbers just don't add up. And neither do the very real environmental risks we'd run by opening more of the OCS to drilling, but for some reason that argument seems to ring less important with certain of the more oil advocates.

Then what about the coal powered plants and the coal-to-liquid fuel of which Obama speaks? Those ideas, too, are sketchy at best--and primarily because people, politicians mostly, are trying to (or mistakenly) conflate the two. They are not the same. While IGCC coal plants (coal gasification, or producing electricity from coal) can be relatively environmentally sustainable if the process includes effective carbon sequestration, the much-touted coal-to-liquids process (producing diesel fuel from coal) is pretty much across the board a bad idea: "because even if the CO2 created in manufacturing is sequestered, the fuel itself releases twice as much CO2 as gasoline when combusted."

What to do, then? Both candidate's are right when they talk about better energy conservation, and that's something we can all implement, in both big and small ways, right now. But it will take more than that to secure a future where we're not destroying the earth in the name of a quick-fix solution.

I've pointed out this article before, but I'm going to do it again because I think it's that good and that relevent: "The Seven Myths of Energy Independence" by Paul Roberts makes an excellent case for why we should be focused more not on "energy independence," but rather on "energy security." That is, the United States cannot hope to move into a more sustainable future without the help of the rest of the world, so working to make this place more secure for everyone is more important than looking only inward in an attempt to solve all of our problems.

Drilling for more oil isn't going to help enough to make a positive difference. Neither will coal-to-fuel plants, or even corn-based ethanol (that's a topic for another post, though). This has nothing to do with political affiliation and everything to do with sound research, planning, and the hope for a better future.

Gas prices are going to suck for awhile, and that's pretty much the only garauntee we have right now. And what we do right now to address the problem will determine whether we continue our slide down into complete energy insecurity and environmental destruction, or whether we pull ourselves up into a greener, more sustainable future in tandem with the rest of our world.

UPDATED TO ADD: This solid essay on the matter from HuffPo.