Friends of the Earth’s blog is a staff-run blog that provides policy analysis, insight and commentary about the environment and other progressive issues, advances our campaigns, and builds momentum for a healthy and just world.
Jan. 23, 2013 / Posted by: Erich Pica / Categories: Blog, Economics for the Earth
It's time to reform Senate rules. Throughout my career at Friends of the Earth, I have urged senators and their staff to use the parliamentary tools at their disposal -- threats or actual use of filibusters, anonymous holds, etc. -- in instances ...
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Jan. 16, 2013 / Posted by: Michelle Chan / Categories: Blog, Economics for the Earth / Tags: Michelle chan, Money in politics
From climate change to clean water, from healthy forests to safer food, progress on our most important environmental priorities is being crippled by the outsized role of money in politics. It’s an old story by now: big polluters, with their ...
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Jan. 10, 2013 / Posted by: Eric Hoffman / Categories: Advocacy, Blog, Food and Technology / Tags: Eric hoffman
Right before the holidays, while most of us were spending time with our families and friends, the Food and Drug Administration was busy giving the biotechnology industry a big, fat, genetically engineered gift. On December 21, the FDA quietly rele...
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Jan. 2, 2013 / Posted by: Erich Pica / Categories: Advocacy, Blog, Climate and Energy, Oceans and Forests / Tags: Climate change, Erich pica
Often, I am asked to assess the environmental movement. Will we win the fight against the fossil fuel industry? Can we prevent the worst impacts of climate disruption? Who’s out there fighting the good fight for a healthy and just world? My...
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Jan. 2, 2013 / Posted by: Adam Russell / Categories: Blog, Oceans and Forests / Tags: Adam russell, Arctic shipping
Update: As of late in the evening of January 6th, the Kulluk has been attached to a tow line and pulled away from the shore of Sitkalidak Island, where it had previously been grounded. The salvage efforts were aided in part by a late high tide and...
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Dec. 28, 2012 / Posted by: Ben Schreiber / Categories: Blog, Economics for the Earth / Tags: Ben schreiber, Earth budget, Green scissors
Negotiations are coming down to the wire on the fiscal cliff. Friends of the Earth warned about the dangers of a bad deal and we are still concerned. That is why Friends of the Earth President Erich Pica wrote President Obama and urged him to pres...
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Dec. 21, 2012 / Posted by: Karen Orenstein / Categories: Blog, Economics for the Earth / Tags: Climate change, Climate finance, Earth budget, Karen orenstein, Tax, Wall street
Robin Hood, a champion of ordinary people, made a stop in Washington, D.C. this week -- to put his hat in the ring to replace outgoing U.S. Treasury Sectary Tim Geithner, a champion of Wall Street. Mr. Hood is running on a platform of taxing Wall ...
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Dec. 17, 2012 / Posted by: Erich Pica / Categories: Blog, Economics for the Earth / Tags: Earth budget, Erich pica, Tax
Call it the fiscal cliff, the fiscal slope or an “austerity crisis,” but no matter the nomenclature, a battle is underway over the role of government in the U.S.: Should we take care of our own or should people be left to fend for them...
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Dec. 14, 2012 / Posted by: John Kaltenstein / Categories: Blog, Oceans and Forests / Tags: Arctic shipping, John kaltenstein
Two recent articles outline well some of the harms that Arctic shipping, and shipping more generally, poses to the environment. Rick Steiner, a former professor at the University of Alaska, writes, in particular, about shipping through the Unimak ...
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Dec. 13, 2012 / Posted by: Adam Russell / Categories: Blog, Climate and Energy / Tags: Adam russell, Climate change
At the height of Superstorm Sandy there was a five-foot surge of water rushing down Don's street. Then, in the middle of the storm, a fire sparked in a neighbor’s house and, by the next day, most of his block was in ashes. “The fire s...
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