Environment
Business & Economics
Jerry Brown: older, not wiser
Now that California Attorney General Jerry Brown is an official candidate for governor, we’re getting to relive some California political history as pundits and reporters think back to Brown’s first stint as governor (1975-83) along with some of the entertaining facets of his long and bizarre political career. The basic ...
Climate Change
Unsettling the Settled Science
Problems with a California temperature monitoring station represent in microcosm why the supposedly settled issue of climate change has become so unsettled in the last few months. If you want to understand why the controversy over global warming won’t go away, forget combing through hundreds of hacked emails or trying ...
Environment
Governor Schwarzenegger Shifts Policy on AB32
In sharp contrast to a recent study from the Legislative Analyst’s Office (LAO) reporting implementation of AB32 would bring about a net job loss and raise state unemployment in the near future and stressing that long term effects are “uncertain”, CARB released their own report this week stating the bill ...
Agriculture
Enviros trade in human misery
SACRAMENTO – One of the most unusual vote-buying scams the Obama administration may have used to pass its health care socialization plan was an alleged promise to two Democratic congressmen to increase federal water supplies to the San Joaquin Valley. It’s the nation’s most fertile farm region, but a region ...
Business & Economics
Vallejo’s Painful Lessons in Municipal Bankruptcy
Two years after going broke, the California city still isn’t free of its crushing pension obligations. In 2008, Vallejo, Calif., was nearly broke. Faced with falling tax revenues, rising pension costs, and unmovable public-employee unions, the city was unable to pay its bills and declared bankruptcy. Now, as it prepares ...
Agriculture
Same Old Water Policy Won’t Get the Job Done for California
Snowpack estimates have experts predicting an average or higher amount of runoff water from the spring snowmelt in California this year. Shasta Lake, the states largest reservoir, is standing at an average fill level for this time of year, though several years of drought have taken their toll. Lake Oroville, ...
Business & Economics
The $2 Trillion Hole
Promised pensions benefits for public-sector employees represent a massive overhang that threatens the financial future of many cities and states. LIKE A CALIFORNIA WILDFIRE, populist rage burns over bloated executive compensation and unrepentant avarice on Wall Street. Deserving as these targets may or may not be, most Americans have ignored ...
Climate Change
In Denial
It is increasingly clear that the leak of the internal emails and documents of the Climate Research Unit at the University of East Anglia in November has done for the climate change debate what the Pentagon Papers did for the Vietnam war debate 40 years agochanged the narrative decisively. Additional ...
Climate Change
A changing political climate on climate change
Despite intense, sometimes contentious negotiations — most recently at a meeting of world leaders in Denmark — the likelihood of a binding deal on global carbon emissions appears remote. Virtually all nations agree about the potential severity of climate change, but tremendous apprehension remains about how best to fight global ...
Commentary
Obama wants to lower the bar at schools
Orange County Register, March 9, 2010 Despite the recent news that California wasn’t chosen by the Obama administration as a finalist state for the $4 billion Race to the Top education-funding program, with its required adherence to new national standards in English and math, the state will still be forced ...
Jerry Brown: older, not wiser
Now that California Attorney General Jerry Brown is an official candidate for governor, we’re getting to relive some California political history as pundits and reporters think back to Brown’s first stint as governor (1975-83) along with some of the entertaining facets of his long and bizarre political career. The basic ...
Unsettling the Settled Science
Problems with a California temperature monitoring station represent in microcosm why the supposedly settled issue of climate change has become so unsettled in the last few months. If you want to understand why the controversy over global warming won’t go away, forget combing through hundreds of hacked emails or trying ...
Governor Schwarzenegger Shifts Policy on AB32
In sharp contrast to a recent study from the Legislative Analyst’s Office (LAO) reporting implementation of AB32 would bring about a net job loss and raise state unemployment in the near future and stressing that long term effects are “uncertain”, CARB released their own report this week stating the bill ...
Enviros trade in human misery
SACRAMENTO – One of the most unusual vote-buying scams the Obama administration may have used to pass its health care socialization plan was an alleged promise to two Democratic congressmen to increase federal water supplies to the San Joaquin Valley. It’s the nation’s most fertile farm region, but a region ...
Vallejo’s Painful Lessons in Municipal Bankruptcy
Two years after going broke, the California city still isn’t free of its crushing pension obligations. In 2008, Vallejo, Calif., was nearly broke. Faced with falling tax revenues, rising pension costs, and unmovable public-employee unions, the city was unable to pay its bills and declared bankruptcy. Now, as it prepares ...
Same Old Water Policy Won’t Get the Job Done for California
Snowpack estimates have experts predicting an average or higher amount of runoff water from the spring snowmelt in California this year. Shasta Lake, the states largest reservoir, is standing at an average fill level for this time of year, though several years of drought have taken their toll. Lake Oroville, ...
The $2 Trillion Hole
Promised pensions benefits for public-sector employees represent a massive overhang that threatens the financial future of many cities and states. LIKE A CALIFORNIA WILDFIRE, populist rage burns over bloated executive compensation and unrepentant avarice on Wall Street. Deserving as these targets may or may not be, most Americans have ignored ...
In Denial
It is increasingly clear that the leak of the internal emails and documents of the Climate Research Unit at the University of East Anglia in November has done for the climate change debate what the Pentagon Papers did for the Vietnam war debate 40 years agochanged the narrative decisively. Additional ...
A changing political climate on climate change
Despite intense, sometimes contentious negotiations — most recently at a meeting of world leaders in Denmark — the likelihood of a binding deal on global carbon emissions appears remote. Virtually all nations agree about the potential severity of climate change, but tremendous apprehension remains about how best to fight global ...
Obama wants to lower the bar at schools
Orange County Register, March 9, 2010 Despite the recent news that California wasn’t chosen by the Obama administration as a finalist state for the $4 billion Race to the Top education-funding program, with its required adherence to new national standards in English and math, the state will still be forced ...
