I guess I should write something about my new job, or my new town, since the last time I wrote I was about to start work, and here I am three weeks into it. Also, it has recently come to my attention that I have old friends (who may or may not read this blog on the rare occasion that I write something) who weren't aware that I have moved and that I am again a productive member of society.

Anyway, I just watched the first ten minutes of Live With Dan Abrams not because I particularly enjoy Dan Abrams, but because I had just finished watching Keith Olbermann (who I often do enjoy quite a bit), and was too lazy to change the channel. Abrams’ entire first secment was a prediction that failing a total blowout by Hillary Clinton in tomorrow’s twenty-four state primary, the media will spin the day as a victory for Barack Obama. His claim was based on a claim that the media doesn’t like Clinton. Abrams based this claim on a number of things that I think are obvious and irrelevant to my central point, but his argument was largely predicated on a statistic: over 80% of the media coverage of Obama has been positive, while only about 50% of Clinton’s coverage has been positive.

Let’s assume for a second that this statistic is accurate – that we all agree on what constitutes “positive” and “negative” coverage, and that the numbers are based on an accurate sampling of “the media.” For ten minutes Abrams and a few other talking heads tossed around questions of media bias, whether the pursuit of “the story” frees media outlets from focusing on the raw voter tallies. What kills me is that at no point during this piece did Abrams or any of his guests question the obvious central assumption of these numbers: the difference in positive media coverage must represent a media bias because the candidates each deserve equal positive coverage.

But Chris, how could it be that they don’t deserve equal consideration? Do you hate women? Would you allow the liberal reverse discrimination that is affirmative action to influence even the presidency? I’m not saying there isn’t a media bias; in fact, I suspect that there are all kinds of media biases. But before I accept the proposition that this statistic is the result of media hatred for Clinton or love for Obama, I’d like to see the following statistic: what percentage of statements made by the candidates (and perhaps their surrogates) have been positive? I have a sneaking suspicion that we would see a startling parallel.

This is something that I’m writing more for myself than for anyone else, because it’s been on my mind as I follow the democratic primaries. I don’t mean to endorse any particular candidate, because I’d still call myself [kind of] undecided. Now that it’s quickly becoming clear that the California primary might actually influence whom the democratic candidate is, I feel obligated to consider my options seriously. But I’m not prepared (or even interested) in going over the details of each of their platforms here and now. What I’m trying to figure out tonight is whether a candidate even needs to have a point-by-point plan for dealing with every aspect of American foreign and domestic policy.

Everybody had his or her issue. Mine is the obviously the environment. In fact, I’m very nearly a single-issue voter, which I think distinguishes me somewhat from most of the American electorate. None of the candidates have what I would call I perfect environmental platform. But, perhaps surprisingly, I’m not that bothered. The way I see it, it’s more important to have a candidate with an appropriate attitude and worldview for the commander in chief. This is a lot more difficult to get wonkish over than whether so-and-so supports a carbon tax or a cap-and-trade system. I guess I just find it more illuminating to know about a candidate’s general views on regulation than the specifics of their regulatory policies.

Don’t get me wrong, nitty-gritty policy details can be hugely important when it comes to executing policy, and if you can’t get anything done then you can talk about hope and change all you want (if you get my drift). The thing is, I just don’t expect anyone to be an expert about everything. If presidents were supposed to know everything, they wouldn’t need to appoint a cabinet or expert advisors. But if I identify with a candidate’s zeitgeist, I’m inclined to trust him or her to select smart advisors, to ask them for advise when necessary (which should happen frequently), and to trust the advice they offer.

So what do you think? Do you lean toward the candidate who has pretty good policies with dotted ‘i’s and crossed ‘t’s, or the candidate who agrees with you 100% about the issues that need attention and is energized about finding solutions. What’s your risk/reward calculus?

Of course, most of the readers I used to have left for greener pastures when I vanished for two years, so I’ll be lucky to get any feedback on this one. But none of this is rhetorical. I’ve presented a view that I’m sympathetic to, but my certitude is – shall we say - limited. If you’re out there, dear readers, and you think I’m right, then validate my whimsy and say so. If you think I’m wrong you’re job is slightly (but not much) more complex: show me the error of my ways. Bring me to the light. If California is up for grabs, then so is this author’s vote. Hell, I could even be persuaded to make a donation to one campaign or the other. Or the other*. But don’t go all Dennis Kucinich on me – he’s got a great personality, but I just don’t think he’s my type.

*And for real, if you can’t figure out how these views correspond to particular candidates, then you’re probably not following the race closely enough to persuade me either way. But feel free to go ahead and try**.

**Michael Shellenberger, if you're still out there, please note item 1 on the first of those three links!

Since I started blogging again, I've tried to revive Organic Matter without the wonkiness that used to characterize the site. So far, if success were salsa, mine would best be described as 'mild.' I even forgot to include a photo in my last post, not that I have one to illustrate any of the ideas I was writing about. If YouTube, philosophy, and climate change have one thing in common, it's that they aren't very photogenic. Anyway, I've created a whole new category to describe the deepest fathoms of my failure. And I intend to plumb these depths with fervor.

This all happened because of a letter which I was compelled to write in response to an op-ed in my parents' hometown newspaper, the Redding Record Searchlight. In his piece, Keith Ritter cites Ted Nordhaus and Michael Shellenberger's new book, Breakthrough, to restate and reargue the tired canard that "technology will save us." His argument could very well be a corruption of Nordhaus and Shellenberger's these - I haven't read the book myself, and I'm hesitant to let Ritter put words in their mouths. Like most of his ilk, he ignores economic realities, including entrenched subsidies for carbon-based fuels, and an utter lack of public funding for renewable energy development. The point is, his piece so infuriated me that I couldn't keep myself from writing to the paper. And having been published, I likewise cannot keep myself from tooting my own horn on the Internet. The text of my letter is after the fold, which is after a completely unrelated photograph.

It would be trite of me to try to adequately address anything surrounding hurricane Katrina in the short time I have to slap together a post, but I did want to 1) draw attention to a couple things and 2) get a post up here, since I haven’t posted anything in several days. Hopefully I’ll have a chance to deal with Katrina more properly soon. Instead, I’m going to point to two non-related things on the ‘net, each of which I would like to say more about, but for neither of which I have adequate time to do so.

The first is a recent editorial from the New York Times, dealing with potential changes to National Park policy. This is something that I with I had an actual news piece or other press release on, just to verify the substance of the editorial, but alas I do not. Even so, it sounds pretty bad:

Within national park circles, this rewrite of park rules has been met with profound dismay, for it essentially undermines the protected status of the national parks. The document makes it perfectly clear that this rewrite was not prompted by a compelling change in the park system's circumstances. It was prompted by a change in political circumstances - the opportunity to craft a vision of the national parks that suits the Bush administration.

Some of Mr. Hoffman's changes are trivial, although even apparently subtle changes in wording - from "protect" to "conserve," for instance - soften the standard used to judge the environmental effects of park policy.

But there is nothing subtle about the main thrust of this rewrite. It is a frontal attack on the idea of "impairment." According to the act that established the national parks, preventing impairment of park resources - including the landscape, wildlife and such intangibles as the soundscape of Yellowstone, for instance - is the "fundamental purpose." In Mr. Hoffman's world, it is now merely one of the purposes.

The second is something I’ve been meaning to post on for a long time, but about which I haven’t really been able to come up with anything novel to say other than “whoops!” The fact is that the number I cited for Portland, Oregon’s alleged progress with climate change was apparently dead wrong. I guess somebody forgot to carry the one, or some other “trivial” error. I intended to say more, but it’s been a bit since I looked at the press release, and the website is apparently undergoing some server issues. I’ll try to say more later today if the site is back on line.

In order to offer credit/a disclaimer, this was brought to my attention by Rich Page, who works with the Cascade Policy Institute (I’ve included a link even though the site is down as of this posting), the same organization that I believe discovered and published the error.

This isn’t really the type of recreation for which the National Parks were intended:

Famed for the biggest trees in the world, Sequoia National Park is now No. 1 in another flora department: marijuana growing, with more land carved up by pot growers than any other park.

Parts of Sequoia, including the Kaweah River drainage and areas off Mineral King Road, are no-go zones for visitors and park rangers during the April-to-October growing season, when drug lords cultivate pot on an agribusiness-scale fit for the Central Valley.

I got a few chuckles at the beginning of the article – at first glance the situation seems terrifically humorous – but as you read on the seriousness of the problem becomes more apparent. These farms – which, if I might reiterate, are springing up in National Parks – utterly destroy the local environment, not to mention the effluent effects of pesticide use, garbage dumping, and water diversions.

Public safety is also a concern – as you can imagine, these farms are protected not by law but by force, and any parkgoer or Park Service official who approaches is putting themselves in a pretty threatening situation. As someone who prefers the backcountry to more traveled routes, I find the fact that the farms don’t tend to be in popular or easily accessible areas to be of little comfort. All of these problems were attested to by a personal friend who worked in Sequoia National Park and had to cope with the situation as a park of her job. The following is from an email that she sent to me today regarding the Times piece:

The woman quoted in the article, [Sequoia restoration ecologist Athena] Demetry, was my boss for the two seasons I worked up there, so the folks I worked with were involved in the restoration end of things. I didn't ever go to one of the sites, but I heard lots about them, and apparently the whole area just gets trashed. We had to watch out when we went hunting for weeds (as in, non-native species, not marijuana) in that area, because we were always going way off-trail into areas where there weren't any visitors. They said you have to watch out because aside from being heavily armed, these guys booby-trap the camp, by doing things like hanging fish hooks up at eye level where you might walk into them.

Unfortunately it seems to be the drug-related piece of the issue that gets the press, rather than the effect that crop growing has on our publicly preserved lands. Sequoia Kings Canyon spokesperson Alexandra Picavet says it best:

"People get blinded by the marijuana issue…. We don't want people planting asparagus on the land, either. This is agricultural assault on a national park, no matter what they're growing."

At the same time, the reason that the agriculture in question is encroaching on protected land is that it’s illegal, and the public safety concerns would not likely be a problem if the conflict weren’t over drugs (can you imagine having a gun pointed at you for accidentally stumbling on someone’s super-secret asparagus farm?). The point remains, as my friend so astutely pointed out, that environmentalists need to be concerned over the consequences of the products they consume, whether it’s gasoline, excessively-packaged food, or even pot.

There’s been a big hubbub this week on the science blogs about Bush’s recent remark suggesting that ‘intelligent design’ ought to be taught in public schools alongside evolution. What caught me most off-guard about the quote is that other people were so shocked by it. I think it’s my zealous following of any news regarding climate change that has made me so jaded about this administration’s willingness to utterly ignore scientific evidence, even widely acknowledged facts, in favor of political pressure, religious fundamentalism, or good old money.

From a policy perspective I’m not even convinced yet that this is as big of a deal as Bush’s willful ignorance of climate change. Hear me out.

My rudimentary understanding of education policy is that curricula requirements are developed primarily at a state level. I think a major part of this perception is due to the recent state-level controversy about the teaching of ‘intelligent design’ in Kansas. Conversely, Bush has the power to abrogate any international treaty that Congress deigns to make regarding restrictions to carbon emissions specifically or climate change in general.

If I’m right, then while Bush’s opinion about ID is an unpleasant reminder of the current administration’s ideology, it has little weight as far as the direction of education policy in America, especially in light of the fact that Bush’s belief puts him at odds with his own science advisor:

None of the coverage that I could find, however, made a very simple contrast between Bush's remark and prior statements on "intelligent design" by presidential science adviser John Marburger. As I have previously reported, Marburger told a group of science reporters earlier this year that "Intelligent Design is not a scientific theory." Thus, my follow-up question to Bush would have been, "Mr. President, are you aware that your very own science adviser says 'intelligent design' doesn’t qualify as science? Don't you consult with him about these things?"

Anyway, for better informed commentary than mine, as well as a list of the multitudinous other blogs that have dealt with this issue, check out PZ’s coverage at Pharyngula.

I’m glad someone took the initiative of doing research on Bush’s SCOTUS nominee for me, because it saved me a lot of time and effort. And to turn up what? Not much.

Dave Roberts at the Gristmill did some digging, and turned up this analysis by law professor Robert Gordon:

All the indications are that he will become another vote to expand presidential power in national-security affairs, to limit the federal government's authority to regulate business and the environment and protect civil rights, to make it harder for women, minorities, labor and the disabled to pursue practical remedies in the courts, and to favor a larger role for religion in public life and as object of public subsidy. He is most likely to do this incrementally, case-by-case, rather than by sweeping new doctrines.

Of course, the idea of “limiting the federal government’s authority to regulate [...] the environment” doesn’t sound that terrible, until we refer to this choice quote from a People for the American Way report on Judge Roberts:

Judge Roberts issued a troubling dissent from the decision by the full D.C. Circuit not to reconsider the important ruling by the three-judge panel in this case upholding the constitutionality of the Endangered Species Act as applied in this matter. [...]

Roberts’s dissent in Rancho Viejo strongly suggested that he thought it would be unconstitutional to apply the Endangered Species Act in this case. By his vote to rehear the case and thus potentially reverse the district court, Roberts indicated that he may well be ready to join the ranks of such right-wing officials as Judge Michael Luttig (who dissented in Gibbs) and Alabama Attorney General William Pryor — nominated by President Bush to the Eleventh Circuit and unilaterally placed on that court by the President through a recess appointment — in their efforts to severely limit the authority of Congress to protect environmental quality as well as the rights and interests of ordinary Americans.

As a point of reference I offer a link to a piece I wrote a few months ago detailing the place of the commerce clause as the cornerstone of American environmental legislation, and the view of some conservative jurists that the scope of the commerce clause ought to be more limited.

Of course, it’s hard to say what Judge Roberts will be like when he becomes Justice Roberts (as he no doubt will), since he only has a couple years of judicial history to look back on. Roberts is predominantly a lawyer, which leads me to believe that poot might have been wrong in his belief that Bush would appoint a party-line “yes man” rather than a relatively independent, possibly even roguish, lawyer. I’m no legal scholar, but I hope he’s right when he says that “win or lose a particular court battle, you'll always do better with a real lawyer on the bench.”

I’m sure everyone has had enough of the doom and gloom over the retirement of Sanda Day O’Connor, but I can’t help but point to Chris Mooney’s post about the possible ramifications for the teaching of evolution in public schools. Check it out.

The instant I read that Justice Sandra Day O’Connor will be retiring I began mentally composing a post explaining why this could be such dire news for American environmental law. The keystone portion of my post would be a list of important environmental rulings by the Supreme Court in recent years. After emphasizing the unbelievable import of the decision now facing George W. Bush and his cohort, I would offer suggestions for the steps that readers can take to possibly have some small influence on whether the nominee is an ultraconservative, anti-government and anti-environment hack, or possibly a consensus nominee. Thank the gods that BushGreenwatch, Daily Kos, and the Gristmill have already done all of these things for me. Because it’s so important that you read each of these posts I’m quoting whole sections from them in the extended entry.

Before the fold though, I want to add one more thing that I haven’t seen addressed yet this morning – the three blogs I mention above do an amazing job of talking about the past and the present, but humor me for a second while I talk about the future. Specifically I’d like to talk about the future of the commerce clause:

I’ll spare you the technical details since I’ve talked about them before. Instead I’ll boil it down to two points:

1. Practically all environmental legislation relies on the commerce clause to be considered constitutional.

2. Individuals, and especially judges, who agree ideologically with the Bush administration tend to feel that the application of the commerce clause has historically been too broad.

A single ruling from the high Court suggesting that the application of the commerce clause to any environmental legilation is unconstitutional could have the fallout effect of dismantling other such laws as the Endangered Species Act, the Clean Air Act, the Clean Water Act, the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act, and the Safe Drinking Water Act. None of these laws are perfect, being crafted by politicians in a gauntlet of interest groups, concessions, favors, and compromise as they are, but each of them represents an essential piece of federal environmental protection in areas that the free market has failed to properly value or defend.

About two weeks ago I wrote about EPA's decision to promulgate mercury rules similar to those in the Clear Skies initiative despite the failure of that measure in committee. Apparently a lot of people agreed, since nine states are now suing EPA over the new rules.