“The idea of making the industry live up to its legal responsibility is not going to die.” —John M. Barry Yesterday, Sunday, Oct. 6, The New York Times Magazine published a cover story titled “Waterworld: The Most Ambitious Environmental Lawsuit Ever.” Aside from the...
Natural Resources
Louisiana’s Vanishing Wetlands and “Most Ambitious” Enviro Lawsuit Featured in New York Times Magazine
This weekend you’ll want to go to your nearest newsstand and buy a copy of the Sunday New York Times and go straight to the Magazine for an article of major importance. The cover shows an oil industry “shortcut” canal sliced through Louisiana’s Barataria-Terrebonne...
The People’s Climate March Is This Sunday, Sept. 21
* If Greenland melts, seas will rise 23 feet. Greenland + Antarctica = 38 feet. Or more. “We are the first generation to feel the sting of climate change, and we are the last generation that can do something about it.” —Jay Inslee, Governor of Washington “The door is...
BP Found Grossly Negligent in Deepwater Horizon Spill
Could Be Fined $18 Billion The fire you see here may be BP’s capital reserves going up in flame. A federal judge has ruled that BP was “reckless,” grossly negligent, and primarily to blame for the April 2010 blowout of the Deepwater Horizon oil rig that killed 11...
John Kerry: Climate Change Is ‘World’s Most Fearsome’ Weapon of Mass Destruction
* “When 97 percent of scientists agree on anything, we need to listen, and we need to respond. . . . And the results of our human activity are clear. If you ranked all the years in recorded history by average temperature, . . . you’d see that all 10 of the hottest...
Honoré Speaks for La. Flood Protection Authority Lawsuit Against Big Oil
“Put our coast back like you found it” Lt. Gen. Russel L. Honoré, the keynote speaker for this coming weekend’s Rising Tide conference in New Orleans, has added a further distinction to his already impressive curriculum vitae: He adds his voice to a full-page advertisement published in the Times-Picayune, paid for by Levees.org and the […]
Louisiana Flood Protection Agency Sues Big Oil to Repair Wetlands
Historic case is compared to 1990s litigation against Big Tobacco About 100 oil and gas companies must pay to repair the Louisiana wetlands damaged by a century of oil exploration and extraction, according to a lawsuit filed July 24 in civil district court in Orleans...
World Survives to Be Raptured by CO2 Poisoning and Believers’ Negligence
“Many Christian fundamentalists feel that concern for the future of our planet is irrelevant, because it has no future. They believe we are living in the End Time, when the son of God will return, the righteous will enter heaven, and sinners will be condemned to...
9/11 “Battle of New Orleans” Joins Victims of BP Oil Spill, Exxon Valdez, Hurricanes, and 9/11 First Responders
[ The following press release is presented as a public service announcement ] NEW ORLEANS — In a historic gathering, Gulf Coast residents devastated by the BP oil spill will join 9/11 first responders, victims of the Exxon Valdez oil spill, and survivors of hurricanes...
New Oil Explosion, Fire, off Louisiana Coast
Long, Hot Summer [ Update: Think Progress’s Ben Armbruster reports, “One day before its gulf oil rig exploded, Mariner Energy said ‘Obama is trying to break us’ with the deepwater drilling moratorium,” even though the platform that exploded today was not affected by...
Drew Landry Sings “BP Blues” to Presidential Commission
httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=52am1DN_svA&feature=player_embedded * “Just Do the Right Damn Thing” Some of the most sensible and melodious testimony we’ve heard in a long time was given yesterday in New Orleans by crawfisherman and singer Drew Landry before the...
What Happens When You Call OSHA, White House
Before we tell about the fun we had today phoning OSHA, sweet OSHA, we wanted to mention our recent and more enjoyable phone experience with Adam Green, co-founder of the Progressive Change Campaign Committee, a 400,000-member grassroots organization that is behind...
Stop BP from Hurting Cleanup Workers:
Join the “BP Makes Me Sick” Coalition
“We cannot let the denial of protective gear that hurt so many 9/11 cleanup workers happen again with the Gulf cleanup workers.” BP Refuses Respirator Masks for Cleanup Workers Levees Not War has joined the “BP Makes Me Sick” Coalition of Gulf Coast fishermen,...
Martha Serpas: Our Life, Between Sea and Oil
In today’s New York Times, Louisiana poet Martha Serpas gives a rich and sensitive account of Louisiana’s environmental predicament by focusing on Bayou Lafourche where she was raised and the Cajun people who have survived through generations of “persecution,...
Jim Bohlen, a Greenpeace Founder, Dies
* Navy Veteran, Peace Activist, Born on 4th of July A quick note of appreciation for the life of James Calvin Bohlen (at left in photo above), a cofounder of the environmental and peace action group Greenpeace, who died Monday in British Columbia. He was 84. We did...
Smoke on the Water: Alabama Conservationist’s Gripping Video of Death at Sea
httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pxDf-KkMCKQ&feature=player_embedded * On MSNBC’s Countdown on June 30 Keith Olbermann spoke to John L. Wathen, an Alabama conservationist with Hurricane Creekkeeper (Waterkeeper Alliance) who has flown over the Gulf of Mexico to...
Gulf Coast Benefit Concerts on July 1, Coast to Coast
* In the spirit of Independence Day, nationwide concerts will be hosted by music venues on July 1st, 2010 to benefit those directly impacted by the Gulf Coast Oil Spill. The organizers have created an ambitious goal: Gather music venues around the country to donate...
FDR, Treehugger-in-Chief, Inspires Hopes for Coastal Conservation Corps
This past weekend we went to the 7th annual Roosevelt Reading Festival at the Franklin D. Roosevelt Presidential Library and Museum in Hyde Park, New York, that featured 21 authors of such works as FDR’s Alphabet Soup: New Deal America 1932–1939 (Tonya Bolden), Beyond...
“Happy Days Are Here Again”
Uplifted by the happy oyster video (below), we’re off to Hyde Park, New York, on Saturday 6/19 (taking a train, naturally!) for the seventh annual Roosevelt Reading Festival at the FDR Presidential Library—free and open to the public. The keynote address will be given...
“The Oysters Never Had It So Good.”
* For anyone who might be concerned about the effects of BP oil on Louisiana seafood and needs reassurance that “oil will be well,” you just need to sit back, relax, and watch this 1960 newsreel of “progress at work” titled Lifeline to an Oyster, “presented as a...