September 2002

Via Welch, Laura Crane takes

Via Welch, Laura Crane takes environmental groups to task here and is correct.

One of the more amusing stories I’ve heard from some Earth Scientist types is Al Gore going out and overreaching on global warming. After he finished James Hansen came on and essentially corrected most of the speech. Hansen is an example of a real scientist and environmentalist who is serious and offers the information up in a manner that allows one to calculate the risk. Most of the environmental groups have resorted to screeds unfortunately. I pretty turn off anything from the NRDC and even treat claims from groups like the EDF with some skepticism.

The traditionally moderate groups have started to become more partisan in recent years. Audobon, a traditional bastion of Republican conservationists, has started to really take on harder issues and become less pliant. EDF actually links to an article that I think is unfair to the administration here.

The administration seems to be changing policy because the Court has forced it too. While I don’t trust this administration, I don’t know that they have a choice in this case.

What does this mean? Lowry and Shippan, in a recent paper, argue that the parties have diverged on the environment normed across time. It seems logical then that the environmental groups become more rabid as well. If the distance widens, keeping control of policy becomes more important and doing that requires scaring people in elections.

They no longer have influence in both parties and so there is no incentive to moderate themselves. The EDF still talks about market incentives, but it largely treats everything the administration says as suspect. This is a natural consequence of having the Republican Party becoming terribly hostile to any environmental initiatives. Boehlert may still be around, but so what–he is marginalized in his own party.

The challenge for environmental groups is to remain relevant in such an environment and to remain relevant, they must rely on solid science. The Skeptical Environmentalist isn’t taken too seriously except by those who want to believe it. That will change if environmental advocates trade in their trustworthiness for short-term political gains. James Hansen should be the model.

Gephardt takes a swing and

Gephardt takes a swing and gets a base hit. Some highlights:

“A lot of his verbiage is loose, unhelpful and not appropriate,” Gephardt said in an hourlong session with Post-Dispatch editorial writers and reporters.”

“It is sensible for the president to give the speech he gave at the U.N. the other day,” the congressman said. “I frankly wish he’d made it six months ago.”

My reactions are:
1) Thanks Dick, where were you 6 months ago? Holding his feet to the fire? Not well enough.

2) He seems to have read the New Republic article on the Dems needing to get their act together. He makes a coherent policy statement supporting action while differentiating himself from the Bumbler in Chief.

3) This man cannot be the nominee–he won’t win. I like him and he is one of the most honest men in government. He isn’t going to capture enough swing votes and for me, he is too protectionist.

For those outside of the

For those outside of the St. Louis region, Hoosier has a different definition here. I’ve seen people try and explain the meaning of Hoosier to people from Mexico and China with no luck. I now have a solution to explain what Hoosier means.

Hoosiers

There may be a St. Louis connection as well. The kid is apparently from Blue Island, which pretty much explained everything to me when I heard it. Blue Island is a pretty rough refinery town–or it was until Premcor shut down its refinery. And everything is pretty much toxic in Blue Island because of the refinery (most of the damage before Premcor bought it). So on top of meth, there is a good reason these guys are morons.

A great take on the clowns is here at ESPN