In perhaps the opening salvo in what promises to be a systematic weakening of endangered species protections in the United States, the White House last week proposed cutting back river miles protected to facilitate Pacific salmon recovery by 80 percent, while simultaneously rejecting any possibility of removing hydropower dams that have decimated the fish’s reproductive capacity.
For the last decade Republican legislators have been crying foul regarding the sweeping powers of the Endangered Species Act, especially in regard to what landowners can and cannot do on their own private property. But now that Republicans have an increased majority in Congress, they are poised to make major changes weakening the ability of the federal government to protect endangered species through restrictions on development and resource extraction on privately owned wildlife habitat.
Environmentalists are bracing for stepped-up efforts by a re-elected Bush administration to dramatically increase logging of old-growth trees and other forestlands in the Pacific Northwest over the next four years.
Marine conservation activists were dismayed to learn last week that the Bush administration is unlikely to institute recommended policy changes regarding the way it handles ocean pollution, coastal development, fisheries management and other marine environmental issues. The White House is mandated to officially "respond" by December 20 to recommendations set forth by the U.S. Commission on Ocean Policy last year.
An investigative report in Cleveland’s <I>Plain Dealer</I> November 27 makes it plain why large corporate animal farms are terrible neighbors—and why communities that welcomed them in often regret their decision.
A recently released study of commuters in Shanghai, China shows that walking or bicycling to work may do more than minimize pollution and improve cardiovascular health. Researchers from the Maryland-based National Cancer Institute found that moderate day-to-day physical activity significantly reduced Shanghai residents’ chances of getting colon cancer.
Doctors from the University of California and the Boston Medical Center have released findings linking common chemical pollutants to at least 200 different human diseases. The study, which compiled data from hundreds of previous studies, shows strong correlations between various common pollutants and a wide range of diseases, including asthma, testicular atrophy, cerebral palsy, kidney disease, heart disease, hypertension, diabetes, dermatitis bronchitis, hyperactivity, deafness, sperm damage and Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s diseases. Pollutants also were linked to 37 different types of cancers.
New York’s Republican governor, George Pataki, is really tall, and he towered over the compact Honda FCX fuel-cell car he was admiring. While the busy Pataki passed up the chance to take a ride in one of the two cars that had just been presented to the state, I didn"t.
The results of a recent national tally by the Trust for Public Land (TPL) buoyed the spirits of environmentalists disheartened by the recent re-election of George W. Bush: voters in 111 communities across 25 states, it turns out, passed ballot measures funding $11 billion for conservation, including $2.4 billion for protecting land for parks and open space.
Much to the delight of environmentalists, the Bush administration has withdrawn a contentious proposal to drill for oil in Alaska’s Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR) from its omnibus energy bill, which it hopes to push through Congress this session. The White House hopes to leverage the increased Republican majority in Congress for passage of the $31 billion bill, originally introduced three years ago.
