As was expected, during his farewell tour of bases in Afghanistan Secretary of Defense Robert Gates argued for maintaining the maximum number of combat troops feasible in Afghanistan well past the July drawdown. Just today, in Kandahar Province, Secretary Gates said that he’d advise the Obama administration to keep as many battle ready boots on […]
I’m an old New Yorker man from way back. I’ve noted any number of terrific New Yorker stories here, from George Packer and Ryan Lizza on the failures of the Senate on climate and energy legislation, to the authoritative Betsy Kolbert on nearly anything and everything relative to sustainability and the environment. Hendrik Hertzberg is […]
After Faheem poignantly detailed President Karzai’s disapproval of the Wikileaks document leak, we now have Secretary of Defense Robert Gates’ strong reaction from the incident: “I’m not sure anger is the right word. I just — I think mortified, appalled,” Gates said. “And if I’m angry, it is because I believe that this information puts those in Afghanistan […]
After some reflection, I can think of nothing good to say about the Alberta tar sands. The best thing that most people say here is that Canada is not Saudi Arabia or Venezuela and therefore if the US is importing billions of barrels a year (4.28 in 2009), then we’re getting more (900 million) from […]
*U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton argues that achieving women’s equality is central to global security in an op-ed for The Times of London: Women are still the majority of the world’s poor, uneducated, unhealthy and unfed. They are the majority of the world’s farmers, but are often forbidden to own the land they cultivate […]
Okay, the Obama Administration is gathering up the laurel wreaths for its landmark victory on health care reform. Nancy Pelosi, my all-time personal favorite Speaker of the House, deserves a lioness’s share of the credit as well. Here’s a happy picture at the bill signing today. Nancy looks pretty darn jazzed! But this blog is […]
I had a good time the other night talking about climate change policy and politics with Amanda Little on The Hyperbole Hour. We’re on the same wavelength. (You can download the show as an mp3 file and listen in from around 29 minutes.) One of the points we made was that we really need to […]
As you know, there has been a tremendous amount of activity on climate change and energy on The Hill over the past year. The House of Representatives got going fast, even before the 111th Congress got underway. A leading progressive, hardball-playing Congressman from Los Angeles, Henry Waxman, assumed the chairmanship of the critical Energy and […]
House Floor Vote – The word from Capitol Hill is that the crucial vote on the Waxman-Markey package of energy and climate change titles is going to happen this week. The timing as Steny Hoyer indicated previously was to be sometime on either side of the July 4th recess. The word yesterday was that it […]
We’ve been seeing a lot of activity in the past few months in the House of Representatives on climate and energy – see a number of blog items here on the Waxman-Markey bill. The Senate hasn’t been idle, certainly, but they’ve been flying a bit below the radar. Senator Boxer, chair of the Environment & […]
If you hadn’t guessed, I love looking at the arcane world of politics inside the Beltway and elsewhere. There’s a really readable article in this week’s “NY Times” magazine by the perspicacious Matt Bai. It’s about the politics of health care reform but you could transpose energy and climate change into what’s being said. There’s […]
A deal has been done between the Democrats in the House driving for a strong, aggressive, meaningful climate change and energy bill and those who are fearful for and/or protective of the special interests of the big utilities, the oil & gas industry, the auto manufacturers and some other heavy industries. The “discussion draft” of […]
Dingell v Pelosi – This is from the Center for American Progress today: “Two senior House Democrats — facing opposition from their party’s top leader, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi — have abandoned their legislative effort to block California and a dozen other states from regulating greenhouse gases from cars and trucks.” Energy in the Senate […]