Pelosi firm: No vote on offshore drilling

WASHINGTON — House Speaker Nancy Pelosi on Sunday ruled out a vote on new offshore oil drilling even as Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama said he might be open to a compromise that included it.

This is a major major victory. Al Gore has told us that we have 10 years to change from carbon based fuels to renewable energy. Pelosi seems to have taken him seriously. She is our firewall between influence peddlers and the destruction of our planet. Could we say thank you?

Via Marc Ambinder, Gore will lay out “an unprecedented challenge” on energy and climate change and will set a national goal for a “clean energy future.”

Who: Former Vice President Al Gore

What: A discussion on the future of America’s energy needs

Where: D.A.R. Constitution Hall ­ 1776 D St., NW, Washington, DC

When: Thursday, July 17 at 12:00 p.m. EDT

I won’t be able to go, which is a shame. I went to Gore’s last speech at DAR, the atmosphere was electrifying.

THIS WEEK in Eugene, Oregon and the surrounding areas, there has been a lot of talk about the weather. But not in a mundane fashion, such as when you are having your gas pumped (remember that ‘round here, you cannot pump your own gas, it is all full serve!) and offhandedly offer the station worker an observation about the local and eternal wintry curtain of rain.

No, the talk has been more along the lines of "what is going on with this weather?" Because the past couple of winters have brought an atypical amount of snow to this city west of the Cascade Mountains. In fact, 2008 has seen the most snowfall to hit Eugene, Oregon, since 1996.

Here’s your faithful Street Team 08 Oregon rep with a short visual presentation of the latest strange winter to visit us.  Read more 

From, of all the unlikely places, Taegan Goddard’s offshoot called Political Insider. From anybody else I would just say this is nuts…but wasn’t Robert B. Reich, Secretary of Labor during the first Clinton administration, given a great deal of the credit for fixing the US budget after the last time the Republicans looted the place?

He’s got an idea. Not a “carbon tax,” which would workd but would not get passed until about the time the sun expanded to the orbit of Venus…but a carbon auction:

The best idea I’ve heard so far to deal with global warming is not a carbon tax. I can’t imagine any politician calling for higher taxes affecting the middle class, or for that matter the middle class — already squeezed by high energy prices and stagnant wages — putting up with it.

The winning idea isn’t a cap-and-trade system, either. That system would allow companies to continue polluting, just require them to buy the right to pollute more from companies that keep their dirtying to a minimum. Today’s biggest polluters — those who’ve done least to reduce their emissions — would be the biggest winners because they’d get the highest caps.

The best idea I’ve heard is described as a carbon auction. Companies would have to bid for the right to pollute. And, most ingeniously, the money raised in the auction would be shared equally by all citizens in the form of yearly dividend checks — just like the residents of Alaska now get yearly dividends for their share of the state’s oil revenues.

I mean, it’s our atmosphere, right? Think of a national park or a national forest. No company is simply allowed to take what they want from it, free of charge. Why should the atmosphere be any different?  Read more 

“To the east there is the Resistance in Iraq, to the west there is the Resistance in Lebanon and to the south there is the Resistance of the Palestinian people. We, in Syria, are at the heart of all these events!” -Basher Al-Assad, 10th President of Syria (April 30, 2007) Full

I won’t write much just thought I’d get everyone ready for the Syrian conflict.  Read more 

The government of the Marshall Islands dispatched a ship to supply drinking water to outlying islands Wednesday after declaring a state of emergency amid a prolonged drought.  Read more 

I never dropped off the Edwards email list, mostly because they don’t abuse it with either size or frequency. And it’s a large part of what’s kept me committed, to the extent I am, to Edwards 08 as my first choice. Nice one came out today:

We cannot wait until the next president is elected to begin to take action on global warming. We all must take responsibility and do our part to stop global warming today—even if the current government refuses to act.

That’s why today I’m announcing my commitment to make my campaign “carbon neutral”—meaning we will offset the impact of all our energy use to ensure that our campaign does not contribute to global warming.

[snip]…Presidential campaigns by their nature use an enormous amount of energy for travel and operations. Which is why today I have also directed the campaign to purchase carbon offsets that support alternative energy production to neutralize the global warming impact from our travel and office energy use.

Carbon offsets are an expensive proposition for a national campaign—but I believe it is an investment for our planet that we simply must make.

Global warming is bigger than any political party, any election—and certainly any one campaign—and good ideas for achieving carbon neutrality should be shared freely.

Nice touch there, don’t ya think? And here’s another. This is the sort of note I just don’t think you’d see out of too many presidential contenders: a pat on the back for a fellow, albeit ex, contender:

We weren’t the first campaign to declare our efforts to become carbon neutral. Former Iowa Governor Tom Vilsack had announced carbon neutrality for his campaign shortly before he withdrew a few weeks ago.  Read more 

It’s about the time of year that Burpee and everybody else sends out their plant and seed catalogs, and people who garden or like to think about it sit around and dream through the dark cold days. Only they’re not as cold as they used to be, are they?

Before ordering your plants, go look at this. The Arbor Day Foundation hardiness zone map. Chances are very good you’re not in the one you think you are any more.  Read more 

It’s simple. All life on earth begins and ends with the seas. When the seas die, we all die. The food chains and biospheres that exist today literally will not survive dead oceans. Without the little critters at the bottom of the ocean food chain, the whole ocean biosphere goes. That’s what’s happening.

There are times when I really grok Al Gore. “Run for President? Love to, but I’ve got more important things to do. Like, this last ditch attempt to save life on earth, n shit.”