Head of U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s Midwest Office Get Fired For Fighting Pollution – Mary Gade, the head of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s Midwest office, has been locked in a heated dispute with Dow about long-delayed plans to clean up dioxin-saturated soil and sediment that extends 50 miles beyond its Midland, Mich., plant into Saginaw Bay and Lake Huron. The company dumped the highly toxic and persistent chemical into local rivers for most of the last century. Gade told the Tribune she resigned after two aides to national EPA administrator Stephen Johnson took away her powers as regional administrator and told her to quit or be fired by June 1. The call came as the Chicago Tribune was preparing to publish a story about the dioxin issue and Gade’s crusade.
Low-Oxygen Zones in the Oceans Expanding with Global Warming – Low-oxygen zones where sea life is threatened or cannot survive are growing as the oceans are heated by global warming, researchers warn. Oxygen-depleted zones in the central and eastern equatorial Atlantic and equatorial Pacific oceans appear to have expanded over the last 50 years, researchers report in Friday’s edition of the journal Science. Low-oxygen zones in the Gulf of Mexico and other areas also have been studied in recent years, raising concerns about the threat to sea life. Continued expansion of these zones could have dramatic consequences for both sea life and coastal economies, said the team led by Lothar Stramma of the University of Kiel in Germany.
Loophole Allows US House Members To Drive, Maintain Expensive Cars, SUVs On Taxpayer Money – You may not realize it, but members of the House of Representatives can lease a car and have it paid for by you — the taxpayer. And it’s not just the car, but gas, registration, insurance … the works. And there’s no limit on how much they can spend. They’re mostly not gas savers or low-pollution models either. And it’s bipartisan!
New Rule for Toxic Trains is a Disaster Waiting to Happen – The Bush administration published new regulations that allow U.S. railroads to use dangerous routes through or around major cities for chemical railcars that federal agencies call “Weapons of Mass Destruction.”
Private industry can unilaterally analyze and select hazmat routes that are to be kept secret from the public. They also allow virtually no role for state and local officials to influence route selections and would preempt any state or local re-routing legislation. Mainline routes through major U.S. cities annually carry more than 110,000 shipments of poison gas railcars.
The Gas Tax Holiday is Bad Economics and Bad for the Environment – With gas prices at record highs and Americans feeling pain at the pump, Senators Clinton and McCain have responded with a proposal to lift the federal gas tax for the summer. As many economists and energy experts have pointed out, Big Oil would likely keep the lion’s share of this tax cut, and Americans would see little if any savings at the pump. It could negatively affect road and bridge improvements and cost highway construction jobs.
However, lifting the gas tax isn’t just bad economic policy — it’s bad environmental policy too. Eliminating the gas tax will encourage people to drive more, increasing greenhouse gases at a critical time in the fight against global warming. And depending on how it’s done, eliminating the gas tax could hamstring our ability to invest in energy-efficient, climate-friendly transportation alternatives.
See how much the gas-tax holiday would save for you. It was a whopping $12.50 for me.
Republican Sham Bill Pretends to Take Action on Global Warming – On Friday, Senator George Voinovich (R-OH) proposed legislation that would allow global warming pollution to increase for decades. The Voinovich bill is dressed up as a way to take action, but in fact is a detailed prescription for doing nothing. It would postpone meaningful action on global warming pollution for at least twenty years. It calls for weak, non-binding emissions reduction benchmarks – current levels in 2020 and 1990 levels in 2030 – while providing taxpayer-funded subsidies for favored technologies. The proposal would also take away state authority – confirmed by the U.S. Supreme Court in Massachusetts v. EPA – to control global warming pollution.
Who’s the Badder Bad Deeds Doer?
Remember the Pepsi-Coke Challenge? Here’s a new twist: Try the Bush-McCain Challenge—our new online quiz—and see if you can tell the difference between Bush and McCain!
We challenge you to tell them apart—it’s harder than you’d think.
Ready to get started? Just click one of the three buttons below to start this new 3-minute challenge:
Q: After Saddam Hussein was captured in 2003, who said “Mission Accomplished”?
Regards,
Jim
Andy Hailey