Environmentalists: Obama Administration Carbon Regulations Don’t Go Far Enough
Posted June 11, 2014
Interview with Mitch Jones, common resources director with Food & Water Watch, conducted by Scott Harris
On June 2, the Obama administration announced new Environmental Protection Agency standards to regulate power plant carbon emissions. The rules, which are being proposed to fight climate change, were designed to reduce carbon pollution from the nation’s power plant 30 percent from 2005 levels by the year 2030. The new regulations target greenhouse gas emissions produced by the nation’s 600 coal-fired power plants, the largest source of carbon dioxide in the U.S.
According to scientific observers, the new regulation would enable the U.S. to reach its goal – set during the 2009 UN Conference Framework Convention on Climate Change in Copenhagen – to reduce the nation’s carbon emissions by 17 percent from 2005 levels by the year 2020, and 83 percent by the year 2050.
The coal industry and their conservative allies in Congress hope to derail the new EPA rules through legislative and legal challenges. These opponents claim the new carbon regulations will raise electric rates, damage the economy and export jobs to China. But while environmental groups have welcomed the new rules, many complain that the president did not go far enough, given the scale of the planet’s climate emergency. Between The Lines’ Scott Harris spoke with Mitch Jones, Common Resources director with Food & Water Watch, who explains why many environmental activist groups are critical of the new regulations for not being as aggressive as they need to be.
For more information on Food & Water Watch, visit foodandwaterwatch.org.
Related Links:
- “Obama Administration’s Proposed Carbon Rule’s Emphasis On Natural Gas Undermines Climate Change Benefits,” Food and Water Watch, June 4, 2014
- “Obama’s proposed power plant rules fall slightly short of environmentalists’ hopes,” Grist, June 1, 2014
- “Obama’s EPA Plan vs. Climate Catastrophe: ‘Fighting a Wildfire with a Garden Hose’,” Common Dreams, June 2, 2014
- Hope for Sustainable Agriculture as a New Wave of Young Farmers Return to the Land
- Interview with Martin Ping, executive director of the Hawthorne Valley Association in New York’s Hudson Valley, conducted by Melinda TuhusThe fourth annual Slow Living Summit took place this year in Brattleboro, Vermont, June 4 through 6. Among the keynote speakers was Martin Ping, executive director of the Hawthorne Valley Association in Ghent, New York. In his talk titled, “Soil, Soul and Society: A Love Story in Three Movements,” he described how the residents of Hawthorne Valley – which includes a Waldorf School and a retail store in addition to a diverse farming operation – cultivate meaningful relationships in family, work and community, focused on learning from nature and a finding a sense of place.
Since 1972, Hawthorne Valley, a 400-acre working farm, has remained committed to social and cultural renewal through the integration of education, agriculture, and the arts. According to the group the initiative was a response to experiencing firsthand the immediate challenges of the loss of small family farms and the threat to childhood development posed by an increasingly materialistic, mechanistic, and technology based prevailing worldview.
Ping says Hawthorne Valley, located in Columbia County in New York’s Hudson Valley, has seen 65 new farmers come to work the land in recent years. In an interview with Between The Lines’ Melinda Tuhus, he explains the importance of new farmers coming back to cultivate the land, and describes some of the other work he’s been engaged with for more than 20 years.
For more information on Hawthorne Valley Association, visit hawthornevalleyassociation.org.
New Website Provides a Safe Harbor for Future Whistleblowers
Posted June 11, 2014
Interview with J. Kirk Wiebe, retired NSA whistleblower, conducted by Scott Harris
It’s been a year since former National Security Agency contractor Edward Snowden disclosed to the world the extent of America’s dragnet surveillance of international and domestic communications. Snowden, who has been granted temporary asylum in Russia, faces serious criminal charges in the U.S. for revealing classified information. But according to a recent poll nearly 25 percent of Americans reject the charge that Snowden is a traitor, believing instead that his disclosures launched an important and necessary debate on previously secret domestic government surveillance operations.
Now a new website, launched this month by the Institute for Public Accuracy, is providing future whistleblowers a safe harbor to reveal information regarding government and corporate wrongdoing, in order they say to foster an informed public debate on critical issues facing citizens in a democracy. The website, ExposeFacts.org lists author Barbara Ehrenreich as a member of a five-person editorial board and a 40+-member board of advisors that includes: Daniel Ellsberg best known for revealing the Nixon-era Pentagon Papers along with other prominent whistleblowers, journalists, activists and civil libertarians.
Among those serving on the new website’s board of advisors is J. Kirk Wiebe, who worked at the NSA 36 years before resigning and blowing the whistle on waste fraud and abuse related to the Agency’s “Trailblazer” communications surveillance program. Between The Lines’ Scott Harris spoke with Wiebe, who discusses why he’s participating in the launch of the ExposeFacts.org website that will support future whistleblowers intent on revealing government and corporate wrongdoing.
Related Links:
- “Daniel Ellsberg introduces ExposeFacts.org – Whistleblowers welcome,” Vimeo, June 4, 2014
- “New Organization Hangs Sign: ‘WhistleblowersWelcome’,” Common Dreams, June 4, 2014
- “New whistleblower group encourages more efforts to inform public,” McClatchy, June 5, 2014
This week’s summary of under-reported news
Compiled by Bob Nixon
- Two teenage girls, who were cousins, were raped and murdered in a small village in India. At dawn, the girls were discovered hanging from a mango tree, where they had been left for hours. (“Anger among Indians over killings of 2 girls,” New York Times, “” June 2, 2014; “Three confess to gang rape and murder of Indian girls,” Associated Press, “” June 1, 2014; “Behind India’s shocking rape lies a deep crisis among young men,” The Guardian, June 4, 2014)
- News reports disclosed that a top donor to New Jersey Governor Chris Christie, a potential Republican candidate for president in 2016, recently won a $106 million subsidy to build a hotel and office complex in Paterson, New Jersey. (“Chris Christie donor’s property venture given $106 million from state after law changed,” The Guardian, June 2, 2014)
- Richard Miles sat in a Texas prison for a decade after being convicted of murder before he got the Dallas District Attorney to reconsider his case. After re-examination of key evidence, Miles was exonerated of all charges in 2012. (“When the guilty aren’t,” Christian Science Monitor, May 25, 2014)
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