As a companion piece to Tim Dickinson’s piece in the current issue on the Bush administration’s policy of denial on global warming, RollingStone.com put together a multimedia slide show detailing the major points, narrated by Tim himself. Check it out!

Who is taking the science of our climate crisis more seriously?

The Bush administration, or China?

“Greenhouse gases released due to human activity are leading to ever more serious problems in terms of climate change.”

–The Chinese Ministry of Science and Technology this week

“We do not know how much effect natural fluctuations in climate may have had on warming. We do not know how much our climate could, or will change in the future. We do not know how fast change will occur, or even how some of our actions could impact it.”

Dick Pombo, the anti-environmentalist zealot, a man who worked to dismantle the endangered species act, sell off national parks, and crusaded to open ANWR to drilling, has been replaced by wind-energy consultant Jerry McNerny.

We touched on Curt “We Found the WMD” Weldon’s fate last night. This conspiracy spouting nutjob, under federal investigation for corruption as well, has been replaced by Joe Sestak, a man whom if the Democrats have the sense god gave geese will give a national platform.

“Dollar” Bill Jefferson is imperiled — headed toward a runnoff in Louisiana.

The others, alas, have escaped the cleansing waters of the wave: Marilyn Musgrave was made to sweat. Denny Hastert looked awfully relieved to be returning to the House. But the others we profiled cruised to reelection. Though they’ve escaped the voters’ wrath, here’s hoping several of them are not so lucky with their Grand Juries.

Now things get interesting.

Linc Chafee, the most liberal Republican in the universe, and a good and honest man — a true environmentalist and the reason ANWR isn’t pitted with oil derricks — has, according to CNN, lost his race to Democratic challenger Sheldon Whitehouse in Rhode Island.

A floating armada of fabulous people — headed by Pierce Brosnan and including Halle Berry, Cindy Crawford, Sting, Cher, Barbra Streisand, Charlize Theron and dozens of other A-listers — converged on a Malibu beach on Sunday to protest a proposed natural gas terminal. The action featured a gourmet pancake breakfast, sand-castle contest and what appears in this video to be several hundred kayakers attempting a “not allowed here” symbol, which ends up looking more like a squashed plum. Don’t miss an irate Daryl Hannah in cool shades and a super-articulate Ted Danson square his jaw against potential gas explosions. Not in their super-famous backyards!

The Independent is reporting that President Bush is preparing an about face on his position on global warming. As Ahnold has shown, confronting global warming now makes for good centrist politics. I won’t prejudge Bush’s proposal, but something tells me it falls well short of Al Gore’s carbon freeze policy.
(Incidentally, Gore’s habit of telling tall tales seems to be resurfacing. In a speech yesterday he said:

“For the last fourteen years. I have advocated the elimination of all payroll taxes — including those for social security and unemployment compensation — and the replacement of that revenue in the form of pollution taxes, principally on CO2.”

The last 14 years? Really!? Somehow I missed that in the 2000 presidential debates. Maybe the proposal was squirrelled away in Gore’s lockbox…)

I know there’s a lot of Ahnold hatas out there. But I tip my hat again today to a Republican politician who is living up to the legacy of Teddy Roosevelt.

Thanks to honest negotiation among industry and environmental groups California now has its own Kyoto accord. The state has committed to reducing its CO2 emissions to 1990 levels by 2025. As the 12th largest producer of greenhouse gases, California has taken an action whose impact rivals that of any European country joining Kyoto.

The program is market based, with the legislature set to implement a carbon emisions trading system and even has a safetey valve, that lets the governor make a temporary rollback in the event of an earthquake, geological or financial. Not only is this Global Warming pact right thing to do, but I predict it’s going to goose California’s tech sector as the demand for clean energy solutions rises.

I don’t know why it took a Republican governor to get this done (how about it Bill Richardson? Tim Kaine? Janet Napolitano?) but I’m proud my state is the first to pull its head out of the sand and meet this crisis head on.

What do you think, Californians? Did the Governator earn your vote today?

Who is the most effective progressive politician in America? I’ve got news for you, he’s not a Democrat.

Who else can trump this record:

• Negotiated an informal climate accord with Great Britian — after comparing those who doubt global warming to members of the flat-earth society — committing the world’s 12th largest greenhouse polluter to Kyoto-like cuts by 2010, all while echoing Al Gore: “You can build a great economy and you can take care of the environment at the same time.“
• Signed a landmark bill to put solar panels on one-million roof tops statewide, forcing utilities to buy back excess power, and mandating that developers offer solar on all new homes by 2011.
• Worked accross the aisle to negotiate a hike in the state’s minimum wage to a highest-in-the-nation $8 an hour.

And that’s just the last month. From a politician who brought the state back from the brink of bankruptcy, is now overseeing the strongest economic expansion since the dot-com boom, and has taken the lead in the push to rebuild the state’s levies and other degraded infrastructure. Oh yeah, and a commander-in-chief who told Bush to shove it when asked to deploy even more National Guard troops to the border to shore up the president’s support with his xenophobic base.

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