Environment and Health
Colorado’s Fracking Disaster
As the people of Colorado are presently learning, it's horrendous enough to suffer the ravages of a natural disaster, but it's doubly horrific to then be faced with a more devastating unnatural disaster. First came the epic floods that recently ripped through the...
Abusing Animals to Defend Tar Sands Oil
Both the old and new media agree on is this: If you need a story that's guaranteed to be popular, go with animals. Cute kittens, puppies, porpoises, penguins, and polar bears are all a good bet. Now, corporate shills are tapping this animal ploy to push some of their...
Naming the Names behind Extreme Weather
Environmental groups tend to be a bit grim-faced. That's understandable since they're constantly confronting industrial uglies that range somewhere between awful and apocalyptic. So it's a treat when one of them turns impishly playful, as a group of climate change...
Weather Extremists
California’s Smarter Stewards
Ten days before Christmas 2006, I moved to California, the Shake 'n Bake State. The first friend I met in my new home was a firefighter with the Forest Service. The first gift I received was a wind-up flashlight for use in the next major earthquake. That's our state....
The Nuclear Industry’s Meltdown
The first thing to remember about nuclear power is that it’s not safe. Just ask Japan. The second thing to remember is that nuclear power isn't cheap. Connecticut draws half its juice from nuclear reactors and has the second-highest rates in the country, after Hawaii....
Getting Mother Nature’s Drift
My father was an early member of a group now known disparagingly as "ultra-lawn people." "High," as everyone called him, was dedicated, body and soul, to the Sisyphean task of trying to maintain a lawn full of lush St. Augustine grass in hot, dry Texas. He planted,...
America the Wild and Beautiful
In late August, I was lucky enough to celebrate in person the fifth anniversary of the Wild Sky Wilderness area in Washington's Cascade Mountains. This 106,577-acre region is home to rugged mountains, beautiful stretches of pine forests, miles and miles of hiking...
Scott Walker’s Sick Leadership
To paraphrase an old bumper sticker: "When the people lead, leaders will follow. Or not." Not when the "leaders" are in the pocket of corporate interests that don't like where the people are leading. Take Gov. Scott Walker of Wisconsin, a conservative Republican who...
The Medical-Industrial Complex
Getting well Takes lots of pluck, With health guys out To make a buck. As the Obama administration struggles to keep rolling out its landmark Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act amid partisan squabbling, the shortcomings of American health care are more evident...
