Let's cut the bullshit - there's plenty of money to go around

from truthout...

The United States isn't broke; we're the richest country on the planet and a country in which the richest among us are doing exceptionally well. But the truth is, our economy is broken, producing more pollution, greenhouse gasses and garbage than any other country. In these and so many other ways, it just isn't working. But rather than invest in something better, we continue to keep this 'dinosaur economy' on life support with hundreds of billions of dollars of our tax money. The Story of Broke calls for a shift in government spending toward investments in clean, green solutions—renewable energy, safer chemicals and materials, zero waste and more—that can deliver jobs AND a healthier environment. It's time to rebuild the American Dream; but this time, let's build it better.

yeah, what if...? it's a lovely idea... it's also the RIGHT idea... first, however, we've got to put a stop to the vested interests whose wealth and power is based on the status quo from buying elected officials to make sure their vested interests are the ones that get served... which takes us right back to the occupy movement...

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Air quality: Obama gives away the store - yet AGAIN...!

why doesn't obama just make it official and switch to the republican party... at least i wouldn't have to constantly deal with such massive cognitive dissonance...

note the highlighted item in the first paragraph...

Obama Pulls Back Proposal to Tighten Clean Air Rules

The Obama administration is abandoning its plan to immediately tighten air quality rules nationwide to cut reduce emissions of smog-causing chemicals after an intense lobbying campaign by industry, which said the new rule would cost billions of dollars and hundreds of thousands of jobs, officials said Friday.

The Environmental Protection Agency, following the recommendation of its scientific advisers, had proposed lowering the so-called ozone standard from that set by the Bush administration to a new stricter standard that would have thrown hundreds of American counties out of compliance with the Clean Air Act. It would have required a major effort by state and local officials, as well as new emissions controls by industries and agriculture across the country.

The more lenient Bush administration standard from 2006 will remain in place until a scheduled reconsideration of acceptable pollution limits in 2013, officials indicated Friday.

ya gotta give the man credit... the balls-less wonder knows which side his bread is buttered on...

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What happens when we shit on Mother Nature

mother nature shits back...


Aerial photo taken shows ruptured wall


Villager checks his yard flooded by toxic mud


Rescue workers clear up toxic sludge

An aerial photo taken, Oct. 5, 2010 shows the ruptured wall of a red sludge reservoir of the Ajkai Timfoldgyar aluminum plant in Kolontar, Hungary. The sludge, a waste product in aluminum production, contains heavy metals and is toxic if ingested. A third person has died in flooding caused by the rupture. Six people were missing and 120 injured in what officials said was an ecological disaster. The government declared a state of emergency in three counties affected by the flooding.

truly horrifying and, if not contained or dealt with rapidly and effectively, could mean an even broader environmental catastrophe...

In Brussels, the European Union said it feared the toxic flood could turn into an ecological disaster for half a dozen European nations — those downriver from Hungary along the mighty Danube — and said it stood ready to offer help.

"This is a serious environmental problem," EU spokesman Joe Hennon told The Associated Press. "We are concerned, not just for the environment in Hungary, but this could potentially cross borders."

it's time we realized that our callous disregard for the planet we all share has consequences...

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Another little-reported power to screw us and the planet over

how many more of these little gems are tucked away in the baskets of legislation that's been passed since the bush coup d'etat...?

Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff has used his power to bypass environmental laws so he can restart construction of a fence on the Arizona-Mexico border.

Chertoff's action made public on Monday allows construction to go forward on about seven miles of fence in the San Pedro Riparian National Conservation Area near Naco, Arizona.

Work on nearly two miles of the fence has been suspended since Oct. 10. On that day, a judge ordered a delay on its construction.

She ruled the federal government had not fully studied the environmental impact of the fence.

Congress gave Chertoff the power to waive environmental and other laws to build border barriers when it passed the REAL ID Act in 2005.

the real id act...? no shit... who woulda thunk it...?

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The border fence protects the environment

from those scummy, litterbug, illegal immigrants who are leaving their families behind and risking their lives trying to find a better life...

Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff on Monday defended the construction of a fence along the southwest border, saying it's actually better for the environment than what happens when people illegally cross the U.S.-Mexico line.

"Illegal migrants really degrade the environment. I've seen pictures of human waste, garbage, discarded bottles and other human artifact in pristine areas," Chertoff said in a telephone interview with The Associated Press. "And believe me, that is the worst thing you can do to the environment."

there's one thing that officials in the bush administration have in common... they all have the sensitivity and compassion of a goddamed toilet seat...

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More triple-A, context-free journalism from the WaPo, this time on Colorado's western slope

Drilling at the edge of Grand Mesa on
Colorado's western slope

i grew up in colorado and, although i haven't lived there since 1977 (with the exception of 2002), i still carry the mental and emotional scars of the ceaseless environmental rape of my home state... too bad the washington post, with all its supposedly first class journalistic resources, has no access to history, recent or otherwise...

The Bush administration's aggressive drive to promote oil and gas drilling on the western slope of the Rocky Mountains has sparked growing anger here among traditional Republican constituents who say that the stepped-up push for energy development is sullying some of the country's most majestic landscape.

The emerging backlash from ranchers and sportsmen, which is occurring despite an economic boom driven by drilling, is threatening GOP primacy in at least one corner of what has been a solidly Republican West. Long the most reliably conservative expanse of a state that has gone red in six of the past seven presidential contests, Colorado's western third shows evidence of the "purpling" that has made Colorado look increasingly like a swing state.

the western slope and particularly grand mesa contains some of the most beautiful country anywhere, but leave it to the bush administration to not give a shit about anything so poofy as that... what's almost as bad is when a major newspaper ignores history and leads you to believe that what's happening is just another political power struggle... here's what i wrote to the wapo...

what incredibly irresponsible reporting...! i simply cannot believe you wrote this entire article without a single reference to the nearly century and a half of economic boom and bust and environmental rape colorado has suffered in the name of mineral and other resource "extraction," the most recent of which took place in the very same western slope area 30 years ago, leaving rifle, parachute and parts of grand junction and glenwood springs in economic ruin... yes, the oil shale industry that descended on that area in the 70's with all the attendant fanfare turned out precisely as predicted by then governor dick lamm, a huge source of jobs that created an equally huge demand for state and local resources (roads, schools and other infrastructure), which then took a nosedive, leaving behind virtual ghost towns and the voters holding the bag... had you deigned to include that part of the story, the ire of the republicans and the rest of the populace would be infinitely more understandable...

fools...

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Putting environmental protestors on trial in Argentina

typical tactics of a mining company... the esquel mine is owned by u.s.-based, canadian-owned meridian gold...

Residents of Esquel, a city in the southern Argentine province of Chubut, who have been opposing a proposed open pit gold mine for five years, have been sued by the company promoting the project for leaking its strategy to change the community's mind about the mine.

[...]

The provincial government of Chubut granted a gold mining concession to El Desquite in 2002. The ore was to be mined by the open cast method, only six kilometres from Esquel, a city of 40,000, and cyanide leaching was to be used to purify the gold.

[...]

in 2005, the Esquel Residents' Assembly held a press conference and released recordings of a meeting of El Desquite shareholders, members of the board, and consultants, which took place in Buenos Aires in September 2003, six months after the referendum.

The meeting was held behind closed doors in a hotel in central Buenos Aires, and company representatives and their public relations consultants discussed strategies to change the unfavourable attitudes towards the mine in Esquel, by contracting respected residents to be opinion leaders, capable of persuading hardliners.

Other suggestions were providing "social benefits" for residents, and holding meetings, interviews and sending reports to national and provincial political leaders, in order to secure their public support for the project.

To win round the residents, El Desquite advisers recommended coopting prestigious non-governmental organisations such as the Wildlife Foundation (FVSA), Citizen Power (Poder Ciudadano) and the Environment and Natural Resources Foundation (FARN), in order to counterbalance the voices of opposing organisations "like Greenpeace."

"It would be important for developing our strategy to contract them for certain activities," said a consultant who suggested contacting FARN, headed by "a man of prestige, constitutional lawyer Daniel Sabsay," according to the recording of the meeting that was released by Esquel residents and was never denied by the company.

[...]

Using the courts to stop social action "is a new way of discouraging protest and teaching demonstrators a lesson," sociologist Maristella Svampa told IPS.

"Putting protesters on trial is a practice that began with the state, and now it's a recourse used by multinational corporations too," she added.

it could just as well be the u.s...

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Environmental damage as a crime against human rights

and, if anybody would be impacted by the u.s.-led worship of materialism and arrogant disregard for the environment, it would be the inuit...

A delegation of Inuit is to travel to Washington DC to provide first-hand testimony of how global warming is destroying their way of life and to accuse the Bush administration of undermining their human rights.

The delegation, representing Inuit peoples from the US, Canada, Russia and Greenland, will argue that the US's energy policies and its position as the world's biggest emitter of greenhouse gases is having a devastating effect on their communities. Melting sea ice, rising seas and the impact on the animals they rely on for food threatens their existence.

The Inuit's efforts to force the US to act are part of an unprecedented attempt to link climate change to international human rights laws. They will argue before the InterAmerican Commission on Human Rights (ICHR) that the US's behaviour puts it in breach of its obligations. "The impacts of climate change, caused by acts and omissions by the US, violate the Inuit's fundamental human rights protected by the American Declaration of the Rights and Duties of Man and other international instruments," the Inuit argued in a letter to the ICHR. "Because Inuit culture is inseparable from the condition of their physical surroundings, the widespread environmental upheaval resulting from climate change violates the Inuit's right to practice and enjoy the benefits of their culture."

more power to 'em...

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