Environmental Politics

"Federal agents interviewed new witnesses this week in an ongoing investigation of government scientists that's been called 'polar bear-gate,' according to the scientists' lawyer."

"The controversial probe, now entering its third year, is looking into allegations of scientific misconduct related to a 2006 report by wildlife researchers Charles Monnett and Jeffrey Gleason, who described seeing dead polar bears floating in Arctic waters.

"Republicans for Environmental Protection is dropping the 'Republican' — after 17 years of trying to demonstrate that a group can comfortably exist in today’s GOP while championing causes like global warming and opposition to drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge."

"The group’s new name is ConservAmerica, a name that’s supposed to represent 'the inherent connection between conservation and conservatism' while appealing to an audience that has grown less party-affiliated.

"SYDNEY, Australia -- Earth Hour 2012 organizers are jubilant today after a satisfyingly successful global event on March 31. Lights went out at 8:30 pm local time as Earth Hour circled the world through a record 150 countries and territories, with 6,494 towns and cities participating."

The Food and Drug Administration is supposed to make its regulatory decisions on the basis of science and for the health and well-being of the public. But the White House often intervenes, trying to influence FDA decisions to achieve political goals. Often the White House pressure comes in response to fear of demagogic attacks from the GOP. So it was with movie popcorn.

Gardiner Harris reports for the New York Times April 2, 2012.

"Citing its corporate stance that climate change is real, General Motors announced Wednesday that its General Motors Foundation would no longer be funding the Heartland Institute, a free-market think tank that has attacked human-caused global warming as 'junk science.'"

"The Environmental Protection Agency has dropped its claim that an energy company contaminated drinking water in Texas, the third time in recent months that the agency has backtracked on high-profile local allegations linking natural-gas drilling and water pollution."

"A senior Republican appropriator confessed today that if the Obama administration applied inappropriate political pressure on the Department of Energy to approve the ill-fated Solyndra loan, then he and other members of Congress are guilty of the same sin."

"A last minute entreaty by President Obama wasn’t enough to convince senators to strip the oil and gas industry of billions in tax incentives."

"The search for the killer of America's bees is a little bit like an Agatha Christie novel. Suspicion has turned toward one shady character and then another: declining habitat; parasites; diseases; pesticides.

Or did they all conspire in the recent mass murder of the country's bees?