Daily Briefing - 11/22/06 Happy Thanksgiving!

While we see hope in atmospheric methane stabilizing, we wonder if the Democrats will pass climate change legislation. Speaker Pelosi will have them working hard from the get go... and probably with nice, new digs. The British Government is hiring nannies to take care of it's kids... well, American conservationists are employing cartoonists... so there! The blogs are already piping hot over the 2008 Senate elections, patience is not a virtue in the virtual world... I guess. With that and much more I leave you with the Briefing and hope that you will enjoy your Thanksgiving and remember what you are truly thankful for.

MW

O Lord that lends me life, Lend me a heart replete with thankfulness! ~William Shakespeare

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Daily Briefing – 11/22/06
Thanksgiving Edition
712 days until the NEXT election… and global warming is an integral part of our nation’s agenda!

Key Issues in the News
Global Warming
- Tom Friedman thinks Speaker Pelosi and President Hu Jintao should form a partnership based on energy and climate change
- LA Times: Global Warming – It’s Personal
- Will the Democrats pass climate change legislation?
o Also from Grist
- Growth of atmospheric methane stabilizes, may slow warming
- No longer a warning
- The next 100 million Americans
- Warming to a global theme
- Aww, a warm Al Gore… there’s a nice thought for your holiday
- Sharp aims for “zero impact”
Washington/Legislation/Politics/People/etc.
- It pays to be in power… you get nice offices
- GOP leaves a stinking present at the doorstep for Democrats… unfinished and massive spending bills
- In Midwest, election ads were 3x more frequent than election news
- No Taxation without Representation!
- Speaker Pelosi will have them starting early and continue working.
- A parting shot from George Allen: Concealed Weapons in National Parks
- Mean Jean Schmidt returns to Congress
- Sen. Lieberman hires former McCain communications director
- The Role of Energy in the 2006 Election
Other News from the Media
- NYT Editorial: Weighing in on Wages
- Mining firms eyeing Navajo land
- Dead Plagiarists Society
- Um, this is where British government has gone… its now employing nannies
- Up to 100 million acres needed for cellulosic ethanol crops
- Gary Larson, “Far Side” cartoonist, is drawn to the wild side
…and the Blogosphere
- At DailyKos they’re watching for GOP defections
- Hotline looks at the ’08 Senate races
o So does RedState
- Chris Bowers from MYDD explains why he’s thankful the American commercial enterprise has forgotten about Thanksgiving
- TomPaine: End Big Oil Aid to Africa
- From Grist:
o Reclaiming Thanksgiving
§ By serving fermented grape juice?
o Jay-Z pimps clean water and Green Day fights fossil fuels
- Rothenberg Report: Worst Self Inflicted Wound of ’06 and a Ballot Measure Wrap-Up
- RCP: House Updates
- The Caucus: 2008 like it’s tomorrow
Miscellaneous… or just plain weird
- Rosie O’Donnell and Kelly Ripa fight over Clay Aiken!
- That darn far left hidden agenda strikes again!
o And so does the “radical homosexual agenda”
- First Daughter robbed in Argentina
- Kazakh leader: Let’s laugh at Borat
Quotes O’ the Day
As we express our gratitude, we must never forget that the highest appreciation is not to utter words, but to live by them. ~John Fitzgerald Kennedy

He who thanks but with the lipsThanks but in part;The full, the true ThanksgivingComes from the heart.~J.A. Shedd

For flowers that bloom about our feet;For tender grass, so fresh, so sweet;For song of bird, and hum of bee;For all things fair we hear or see,Father in heaven, we thank Thee!~Ralph Waldo Emerson

Daily Briefing - 11/21/06

Hush money, Celebrity Jeopardy, and polygamy! Oh and An Inconvenient Truth comes out today. All that and lots more in the Briefing...

MW

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Daily Briefing – 11/21/06
713 days until the NEXT election… and global warming is an integral part of our nation’s agenda!

Key Issues in the News
Global Warming
- An Inconvenient Truth will be released today
o The Competitive Enterprise Institute has a response
- A hill priority?
- Australians look to go nuclear to stop warming
o But then again, maybe its not the answer
- Gov. Corzine (D-NJ) gets some prodding from activists
- VPIRG calls for home efficiency
o More from the Rutland Herald
- Study: Warming speeds species die off
- Editorial from Malaysia New Straits Times: Warming to Climate Change
- Chalk one up for the environmentalists
- Pasadena Star News: Global warming action needed
- A near zero-growth in methane levels?
Washington/Legislation/Politics/People/etc.
- Is there room on the right, Sen. Brownback thinks there is
- That whole business about the draft… yea that was shot down quick (ahem, pardon the tasteless pub)
- A series of votes on ethics reform
- What might be the Democrat’s energy agenda?
- “Hippies still trying to ruin the country”
Other News from the Media
- Polygamists fight back
- On coastlines and lighthouses
- Seeing trouble in the microscopic realm of the Antarctic ecosystem
- Sen. Boxer wants the Salton Sea restored
- The Long Now Foundation
…and the Blogosphere
- DailyKos: CA Supreme Court protects bloggers
- MYDD: They’re still fighting for the FL-13 and still defending Dean
- Arianna Huffington advises ’08 hopefuls to avoid consultants
- From Grist:
o The state of the cotton industry
o Avoid the corporate, go microbrew! (This blogger agrees)
o Tommy Thompson: The Ethanol Candidate
o Extreme grocery shopping
o Inhofenfreude
o Freight trains, a 21st century revival?
- New blog from the NYT subscription required TimesSelect: Urban Planet
Miscellaneous… or just plain weird
- Fox News offered hush money to families of Nicole Brown Simpson and Ronald Goldman
- “Who’s hungry?” “Not me, I have ‘very low food security’”
- Secretary of Education to go on Jeopardy?
Quotes O’ the Day
"I have long been a friend of John Warner; however, I think he has misunderstood the rules. I intend to retain my leadership position in the 110th Congress, returning as the Ranking Member of the EPW Committee," Senator Inhofe

Daily Briefing - 11/20/06

Global warming is worse than cooties! But will that revelation keep the UN deal from falling apart? Either way, the Bush administration is still unlikely to join the pact, or abide by its regulations. DC is trying to do its part. So are a couple of Nobel Laureates, and The Economist examines where we go after Kyoto.

In Washington, a very prominent member of the Democratic party looks to renew the draft, while his compatriots push issues that hit our wallets and cut the pork. Ron Brownstein looks at the ever changing electoral map and the venerable William Safire dissects the "netroots." The blogs are focusing on '08 and analyzing '06, endlessly.

Like the guests at TomKat's wedding, I'm sure readers are begging me to "stop, stop" and get to the Briefing...

MW
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Daily Briefing – 11/20/06
714 days until the NEXT election… and global warming is an integral part of our nation’s agenda!

Key Issues in the News
Global Warming
- The Economist: Son of Kyoto?
- Building Green: D.C.’s efforts to curb greenhouse gas emissions
- U.K.’s Environmental Secretary David Miliband says fight need more momentum
o The Independent reports that the climate deal could be “in tatters” otherwise
- “Imagine the world knew global warming was about to destroy 43 nations - " but not which 43"
- Japan Times: A Viable Post-Kyoto Approach
- UN climate pact unlikely under Bush, analysts say
- Wall Street Journal: Global Warming on Trial
o And we’ve got Nobel Laureates helping our cause
- A cool calculus
- Migratory species threatened
- Individual actions to help stop global warming
- Carbon credits, an environmental investment
- How to talk to a skeptic: “Climate Models are unproven” and they don’t consider clouds
- Grist report from UN Climate Conference
- Global Warming: Worse than Cooties
Washington/Legislation/Politics/People/etc.
- The “Mommy Party” is pushing the “pocketbook issues”
- Shutting down the “favor factory.” Earmark-laden appropriation bills were halted by anti-pork Senators last week, drawing ire from some of their pork-lovin’ compadres
- The morphing of the electoral college map
- How Iraq will affect ’08 race
- “Should we be very ethical or only kinda ethical?”
- No bad blood or so he says
- In the corridors of power, reverberations of change
Other News from the Media
- Reinstituting a draft?
- Failing grades from the OMB for the State, Defense, Energy, and Homeland Security Departments, as well as NASA
- William Safire on "Netroots"
- What will be the biggest breakthrough of the next 50 years?
…and the Blogosphere
- Tom McIntyre at RCP liked what he saw from Webb and Tester on Meet the Press
- Dick Morris is frightened by the prospect of “ultra-liberals” rising on the wings of moderates
- Conservative Democrats? Not so, says Nathan Gonzalez at the Rothenberg Report
- TPM: FL-13 recount rambles on
- MYDD on 2008 metrics and the sorry slate of Republican candidates
- From Grist:
o How green will the 110th Congress be?
o Fast Food Damnation
o Dispatch from an eco-showroom
o Out-hofe… Warner in?
o Bike-Friendly Reps in charge again
- Huffington Post: Is Fox flat lining
Miscellaneous… or just plain weird
- Season Shot – Ammo with flavor
- Hollywood makes a comeback
- Landing on an asteroid traveling at more than 30,000 mph? Piece of cake.
- Say it ain’t so, Kramer. Say it ain’t so!
- Fox News tries its hand at its own version of the Daily Show
- “The kiss lasted so long it caused guest to shout ‘stop, stop.’” I guess people could only take the revulsion for so long?
Quotes O’ the Day
“[D]id you ever talk to these computer geeks? I mean, can you carry on a conversation with them? …I really fear for the United States because, believe me, the jihadists? They’re not playing the video games. They’re killing real people over there.” – Bill O’Reilly, on how my iPod makes me a geek and indirectly makes jidahists kill people.

Another Way?... An Example of Sustainbale Living

In the Washington Post this morning, there is an article that describes an "ecovillage" in eastern North Carolina. In this commune, or "intentional village" as it's inhabitants refer to it, the people are off the grid. There are no power lines or water mains. People make do without running water and most appliances that require any significant use of energy. They are a completely sustainable community.

Such a lifestyle is not palatable to everyone (your dear blogger included), but it is a lesson and allegory for those of us who care about global warming, energy usage, and sustainable living. Moral issues aside, it givse us ideas for how we can make changes in our own lifestyles to reduce energy usage, carbon emissions, and live more sustainably. These changes will be necessary if we are to reverse the effects of global warming and protect our habitat as well as the habitats of wildlife.

MW