Obama Chooses Climate Specialist as Science Adviser

President-elect Obama has chosen an energy and climate specialist as the new White House science adviser. John Holdren is a Harvard University physicist whose work has focused on the causes and consequences of climate change. Holdren has also advocated policies aimed at sustainable development and has done extensive research on the dangers of nuclear weapons.

From Yahoo News:

Obama pledged to put a priority on encouraging scientific breakthroughs in areas such as alternative energy solutions and finding cures to diseases, as he announced the pick of Holdren and other top science advisers in the Democratic weekly radio and video address.

“Today, more than ever before, science holds the key to our survival as a planet and our security and prosperity as a nation,” Obama said. “It’s time we once again put science at the top of our agenda and worked to restore America’s place as the world leader in science and technology.”

Science is back in the White House!  What a relief. We were really sliding into an abyss of ignorance and religious dogma, two things that have absolutely no place in American government.  We now have the opportunity to move forward once again, to be leaders in renewable energy, the fight against global warming, and so many other areas of science in which we’ve fallen behind these long eight years.

Link [Yahoo News]
Photo credit: AAAS

Obama Fills Energy and Environmental Protection Agency Posts

We’ve finally got answers as to who’s going to be filling important energy and environmental posts in the Obama administration. Sources say the nominees are as follows (from The Daily Green):

Steven Chu, Energy Secretary

The Department of Energy is mostly about nuclear weapons and nuclear power, along with a bunch of energy industry analysts, but it also holds the biggest grouping in the world of renewable energy researchers. Chu — unlike Al Gore, that other Nobel Prize winner — doesn’t believe that the world has all the technology it needs to solve the global warming crisis … which means he’s likely to push for increased research. That’s a good thing. Also a good thing: He believes there’s a global warming crisis.

Lisa Jackson, EPA Administrator

A former Clinton EPA official and more recently the head of New Jersey’s Department of Environmental Protection, Jackson has a mixed record in the most densely populated U.S. state, if local environmental groups are to be believed.

The New Jersey chapter of the Sierra Club had kind words about Jackson, according to the Associated Press, but a coalition of smaller groups expressed concerns about the agency’s allegedly lax enforcement of environmental laws, like the cleanup of hazardous waste sites.

“While I like her personally, I have found her leadership of the NJDEP to be remarkable in its failures, and shudder at the thought of her leading our nation’s environmental protector,” Bob Spiegel, the executive director of the Edison Wetlands Association, wrote to the Obama Administration recently.

Carol Browner, Energy Czar

Browner is a well-respected environmental advocate, having led Florida’s Department of Environmental Protection, advised Gore as a senator, led Clinton’s EPA, chaired the National Audubon Society, and most recently acted as a private attorney and investment adviser on issues related to climate, energy and the environment.

The only question is exactly what she’ll do, since her title and responsibilities aren’t clearly outlined.

Nancy Sutley, Chair, Council on Environmental Quality

Sutley, the Los Angeles Deputy Mayor for energy and environment, has been involved in that city’s significant greening efforts, such as its goal of drawing 10% of its power from the sun, its requirement that public buildings meet LEED green building standards, its effort to improve carpooling and public transportation in the notoriously freeway-based region and its plan to plant 1 million trees.

We reported on the possibility of Lisa Jackson becoming EPA administrator back in early November just after the elections, and opinions about her are mixed. She did spend 16 years in the EPA in Washington and New York before becoming New Jersey’s Department of Environmental Protection Commissioner.  Granted, she has had to deal with a lot in New Jersey in the two short years she held that position.

“In New Jersey, you’re working on contaminated sites, you’re working on open space, endangered species, clean water. New Jersey is the laboratory for environmental protection. Whatever bad happens in the environment, it happens in New Jersey first. It is a good proving ground,” said Jeff Tittel, executive director of the New Jersey Chapter of the Sierra Club.

Still, we would have felt much more at ease with Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who was said to be a potential candidate. Kennedy has a long and storied record of fighting passionately for the environment, while Jackson’s accomplishments are a bit hazy. Time will tell.

So, this group doesn’t include Al Gore (you should all have seen that coming), but the bottom line is, it’s a vast improvement over the Bush appointees.

Link [The Daily Green]

FBI on the Trail of Dangerous Vegan Potluck Dinner Attendees

Dayum! So apparently we’re not the only ones who think militant vegans can get a little crazazy – the FBI is on their trail, too. Those wily wilesters are looking for a few good moles who aren’t afraid of stepping into those infamous dens of dissent – vegan potluck dinners.

College student Paul Carroll was called into a meeting at a coffee house with the campus police sergeant and a female FBI special agent. Carroll had previously been charged with a misdemeanor for spray-painting the inside of a campus elevator, and knew the police officer from when he turned himself in. What they had to say once he got there wasn’t exactly what he was expecting.

From City Pages:

“She told me that I had the perfect ‘look,’” recalls Carroll. “And that I had the perfect personality—they kept saying I was friendly and personable—for what they were looking for.”

What they were looking for, Carroll says, was an informant—someone to show up at “vegan potlucks” throughout the Twin Cities and rub shoulders with RNC protestors, schmoozing his way into their inner circles, then reporting back to the FBI’s Joint Terrorism Task Force, a partnership between multiple federal agencies and state and local law enforcement. The effort’s primary mission, according to the Minneapolis division’s website, is to “investigate terrorist acts carried out by groups or organizations which fall within the definition of terrorist groups as set forth in the current United States Attorney General Guidelines.”

Carroll would be compensated for his efforts, but only if his involvement yielded an arrest. No exact dollar figure was offered.

“I’ll pass,” said Carroll.

Those vegans. You gotta watch out for them, seriously, what with their non-leather accessories, tofu and almond milk. They are some dangerous mofos who won’t hesitate to cut you if you dare to pledge your support for meat eating in their presence. As we speak, they’re covering their tracks so the FBI doesn’t find their secret vegan activist hideaways complete with seed bombs, trays of dairy-free bakery treats and posters of famous vegans Alicia Silverstone and Woody Harrelson. They are armed with PETA brochures and planning a terrorist infiltration of the Republican National Convention complete with dangerous ‘Go Vegan’ stickers and peacemongering propaganda.

Link [City Pages] via [BoingBoing]
Photo credit: Flickr user Joi

Big Shocker: EPA Chairman is Just a White House Puppet

Wow, this is so totally shocking. I mean, who knew that the White House pressures and at times, completely overrides the heads of various government agencies in favor of their own twisted agendas? Who would have thought that the United States government isn’t as democratic as it claims to be? I just fell out of my chair in shock.

From MSNBC:

The head of the Environmental Protection Agency [Stephen Johnson] came under sharp attack at a House hearing Tuesday, with Democratic lawmakers accusing him of repeatedly caving in to White House pressure on environmental issues such as global warming and a recently enacted health standard for smog.

Rep. Henry Waxman, D-Calif., the committee chairman, said depositions provided by senior EPA staff members suggest that Johnson had been overruled or heavily influenced by the White House on recent EPA decisions on the smog standard, its rejected of a waiver for California on global warming regulations, and the EPA ongoing deliberations on whether to regulate carbon dioxide.

“You have essentially become a figurehead,” Waxman told Johnson. “… In each case, you backed down.”

Crazy, man. What are we going to learn next – that our leaders take money from corporations to enact legislation that works in their favor? That they give large government contracts to companies they’re personally associated with, for their own financial gain? My confidence in the dedication of our government to protect and further the interests of the people is truly shaken.

Link [MSNBC]
Photo credit: Wikimedia Commons & Wikimedia Commons

Libertarian Ocean City-States: The Wave of the Future?

Sick of the government? Uninterested in moving to another country? Well, if certain Silicon Valley millionaires have their way, you may have another choice! PayPal founder Peter Thiel has invested $500,000 into an organization that aims to create an experimental ‘seastead’: a permanent, quasi-sovereign nation floating in international waters.

From Wired:

It might sound like the setting for the videogame Bioshock, but the institute isn’t playing around: It plans to splash a prototype into the San Francisco Bay within the next two years, the first step toward establishing deep-water city-states, or what it calls “seasteads” — homesteads on the high seas.

Instead of starting with a grand scheme worthy of a James Bond villain, the Institute is bringing an entrepreneurial, DIY mentality to creating oceanic city-states.

“There’s a history of a lot of crazy people trying this sort of thing, and the idea is to do it in a way that’s not crazy,” said Joe Lonsdale, the institute’s chairman and a principal at Clarium Capital Management, a multibillion-dollar hedge fund.

In essence, the seastead would consist of a reinforced concrete tube with external ballasts at the bottom that could be filled with air or water to raise or lower the living platform on top.

The primary living space would be inside the tube, with the top platform reserved for gardens, buildings, solar panels, wind turbines and satellites. They plan to fly a ‘flag of convenience’ to protect them against governments that want to force their jurisdiction on them.

It does sound like a sci-fi movie! It’s a fascinating idea, to be sure. Starting small would certainly be the way to do it. I think a lot of environmentalists will be concerned about waste disposal and disturbing sea life, so it will be interesting to see how the ‘seasteaders’ aim to deal with those issues along with the many other obstacles they face.

Link [Wired]
Illustration by Valdemar Duran