The environmental impact of owning multiple cars

Grist's "Ask Umbra" on the environmental impact of owning multiple cars... even if you don't drive them all regularly.

If you want to consider alternatives, consider public transportation and car sharing.

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YouTube: Stephen Colbert Mocks Senate Compromise

Stephen Colbert shames the rebel Republicans for their "compromise" with the Bush Administration over enemy combatants.

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AP: Rare bird causes logging frenzy

I am so glad that I could not make sense of this article at first... why, upon discovering an endangered species, would people intentionally cut down their habitat? For money, of course!

Rare Woodpecker Sends a Town Running for Its Chain Saws
(AP)
Landowners in a North Carolina town have been clear-cutting thousands of trees to keep them from becoming homes for the endangered red-cockaded woodpecker.

NYT: E.P.A. Chief Rejects Recommendations on Soot

E.P.A. Chief Rejects Recommendations on Soot
By FELICITY BARRINGER
Published: September 22, 2006

WASHINGTON, Sept. 21 — The Environmental Protection Agency’s administrator on Thursday rejected the recommendations of his staff — and an unusual public plea from independent science advisers — choosing instead to tighten only one of two standards regulating the amount of lethal particles of soot in the air.

The short-term daily standard, intended to control acute exposure to the minute particles, was cut nearly in half. But the annual standard, which affects chronic exposure, remains at its original 1997 level.

[Full story at http://www.nytimes.com/2006/09/22/us/22soot.html ]

NYT: Measures Seek to Restrict Detainees' Access to Courts

I am at a loss to explain why the concept of "innocent until proven guilty" has found so little voice in the conversation about military tribunals and Guantanamo detainees. Instead, we hear about the impact of civil right abrogations on OUR innocents should they be captured abroad!

Did we learn nothing from the internment of Japanese (both US citizens and foreigners) in WWII? Are we so frightened of terrorists that we are willing to risk having innocents detained indefinitely, or forced to defend themselves against secret evidence and hearsay?

Measures Seek to Restrict Detainees' Access to Courts: "WASHINGTON, Sept. 20 — Although the effort has been partly obscured by the highly publicized wrangling over military commissions for war crimes trials, the Bush administration and its allies in Congress are trying to use the same legislation to strip federal courts of their authority to review the detentions of almost all terrorism suspects."

NYT: Iran's Leader Relishes 2nd Chance to Make Waves

Ahmadinejad continues to call the bluffs of the "superpowers," as the full extent of their weakness and inability to cooperate is increasingly exposed.

Iran's Leader Relishes 2nd Chance to Make Waves: "Iran's president sparred with the Council on Foreign Relations, exasperating his questioners and angering the Bush administration and Jewish groups."

NYT: Activism Is in the Eye of the Ideologist

Good to see this coverage in the Times; I've long bemoaned the ignorance on display when partisans complain about judges doing their job -- that is, overturning unconstitutional and porrly-crafted legislation.

"Activism is not necessarily a bad thing. The Supreme Court is supposed to strike down laws that are unconstitutional or otherwise flawed. Clearly, all nine justices, from across the political spectrum, believe this, since they all regularly vote to strike down laws. What is wrong is for one side to pretend its judges are not activist, and turn judicial activism into a partisan talking point, when the numbers show a very different story."

[Full story: http://www.nytimes.com/2006/09/11/opinion/11mon2.html]

Nagin to citizens of New Orleans: Make it work, people!

"We chose to go forward with a market-driven recovery effort," Mr. Nagin said. "I believe citizens can make intelligent decisions about where to live. It is my position that government investment will follow citizen investment."

In practice, this means, as Mr. Nagin put it, that "for the most part the redevelopment of our city is going to be done by our citizens." With more than half the city's pre-hurricane population still elsewhere, including many of its poorest citizens, early indications are that it is mostly those with some resources who have been able to move back.

[Full story: http://www.nytimes.com/2006/09/13/us/politics/13orleans.html]

NYT: Osama's Spin Lessons

Tierney explains why, having already won the larger battle against Al Qaeda, the the U.S. proceeded to throw away its gains by setting impossible goals -- and contrasts it with bin Laden's canny spin which raised his prestige amongst jihadists (and would-be jihadists) even as his operation was decimated.

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NYT Editorial: President Bush's Reality

[A brief but outstanding analysis of last night's speech and the Bush administration's foreign policy.]

Editorial: President Bush's Reality: "If a strategy to end the violence in Iraq exists, it seems unlikely that President Bush could see it through the filter of his fantasies."

WMD or Not, Bush Would have Ordered an Invasion of Iraq, says VP Cheney

President Bush would have ordered an invasion of Iraq even if the CIA had told him that Saddam Hussein had no weapons of mass destruction, Vice President Dick Cheney said Sunday during an interview with Tim Russert on "Meet the Press"

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AP: Senate Approves $63 Billion More for War in Iraq

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/09/08/washington/08defense.html

September 8, 2006
Senate Approves $63 Billion More for War in Iraq
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

WASHINGTON, Sept. 7 (AP) — The Senate agreed on Thursday to spend an additional $63 billion for military operations in Iraq and Afghanistan as it passed a bill to finance military spending.

The measure was approved, 98 to 0, after senators added money to help track down Osama bin Laden and to fight the opium trade in Afghanistan, which is helping the Taliban’s resurgence. The overwhelming support came despite Democrats’ increasing criticism of the Bush administration’s handling of the war in Iraq.

The bill now totals $469.7 billion. It grew more than $16 billion during a debate that began in July and was suspended for the lawmakers’ four-week August recess.

Lawmakers expect $7 billion to be added during House-Senate talks on a compromise bill. The House passed its version of the Pentagon budget bill in June.

With the latest infusion of money, Congress will have approved about $500 billion for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and other antiterrorism efforts in the five years since the Sept. 11 attacks, according to the Congressional Research Service. The Pentagon spending bill, a domestic security measure and, perhaps, legislation with money for veterans’ programs will probably be the only appropriations bills to pass Congress by the Oct. 1 start of the new budget year.

The rest of the spending bills for government agencies will wait until a session after the Nov. 7 elections.

The military bill contains $99 billion for personnel, $126 billion for operations and maintenance, $81 billion for weapons procurement and $73 billion for research and development.

NYT: GAO reports minimal accounting of hurricane relief spending

A report by the Government Accountability Office reveals that no one knows exactly how much has been spent across agencies for disaster recovery from hurricanes Katrina, Rita, and Wilma. So there is no way to know how much has been spent, much less how much more might be needed now or in the future.

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How much less are you making?

A map showing how far median incomes have dropped over the past six (ahem) years. Of course the DC area is doing okay, thanks to "defense" work...

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NYT: USDA intervenes in horse torture

Horse Show Ends in Uproar Over U.S.D.A. Inspections

As pleased as I was to see the USDA enforcing the laws it has available, it is heartbreaking to read the practices (boots and ankle chains on the horses to force a peculiar gait for the benefit of horse show audiences) that are still permitted. I would love to have a conversation with the people who defend themselves by noting that the ankle chains (legal) can cause scarring similar the the outlawed practice of "soring" (burns, cuts, injected chemicals, and caustic or blistering agents applied to the horses' ankles).

Sickening and absolutely indefensible.

If you'd like to thank USDA secretary Johanns for their enforcement of the law (details are in the article linked above), you may do so here.