EcocentricPolitics
Tim DeChristopher is nothing if not committed. Back in December of 2008, in the waning days of the Bush Administration, then-27 year-old DeChristopher threw a monkey wrench into a planned Bureau of Land Management (BLM) auction of thousands of acres of public territory in Utah for oil and gas exploration. DeChristopher—a college …
EcocentricPolitics
I have a Going Green column on the Time.com mainpage about the similarities between the federal debt every politician in Washington claims to be worried about, and the debt to nature that almost no one is talking about. They’re remarkable similar. As a country, we’ve run up a massive federal debt in part because we’ve lived beyond our …
EcocentricPolitics
It’s Budget Day in Washington, when policy wonks break out the calculators that have the “trillions” button and decide whether we’ll have six more weeks of winter, or six decades more of crippling budget deficits. Actually, today is the day President Obama released his proposed budget for fiscal year 2012, which you can explore in …
EcocentricPolitics
I’ve written more than a few posts recently highlighting Republican opposition to action on climate change and the party’s efforts to dismantle environmental regulations. But while the GOP has been out front targeting the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), the Obama Administration hasn’t escaped blame from environmentalists for …
EcocentricPolitics
Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Administrator Lisa Jackson finally got to use her parking space on Capitol Hill this morning. Jackson was the star witness at the newly Republican-run House Energy and Commerce Committee’s Subcommittee on Energy and Power hearings on the proposed “Energy Tax Prevention Act.”
What’s that? You …
EcocentricPolitics
Tonight’s State of the Union may be remembered as the moment when the White House stopped working on climate—and started working on energy.
Of course, it’s not quite that simple. Whatever initiatives President Obama chooses to launch with his annual speech, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) will likely keep working on …
EcocentricEnergy
While American society has bickered on climate and energy, the White House has dithered and Congress has been deadlocked, the U.S. military has been busy going green. The Pentagon has spent some $300 million in economic stimulus financing and research money to improve the military’s energy efficiency and develop alternative fuels. The …
EcocentricPolitics
As Politico first reported last night, Carol Browner will be stepping down from her post as White House climate and energy czar. Browner, an Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) administrator in the Clinton Administration, was a key member of the “Green Dream Team” of cabinet appointees and White House aides who accompanied …
EcocentricPolitics
Over on the mainpage, I have a piece pegged to Chinese President Hu Jintao’s visit to the U.S.—and how Washington and Beijing can find valuable common ground on energy and climate, assuming short-term politics don’t get in the way. Check it out here.
EcocentricPolitics
A lot of attention has focused on how Arizona Representative Gabrielle Giffords’s support for health care reform might have helped made her a target. (On Monday Giffords was still in a medically induced coma after being shot in the head Saturday morning in Tucson.) Her office in Tucson was vandalized last March after she voted in …
