Back-to-back killer storms in NW; Huge cache of 'rare earth' elements discovered in U.S.; Climate change worsened every hurricane; PLUS: NY revives congestion pricing...
Trump nominates fracking CEO and climate denier to head up Dept. of Energy; ; Winters warming quick in U.S.; PLUS: Biden heads to the Amazon Rainforest to offer hope...
THIS WEEK: Pyrrhic Victories ... Cabinet Clowns ... Blame Games ... Sharpie Shooters ... And more! In our latest collection of the week's sleaziest toons...
NY, NJ drought, wildfires; GOP wins House, power to overturn Biden climate action; PLUS: Very high stakes as United Nation climate summit kicks off in Baku, Azerbaijan...
Trump taps anti-environment Rep. Zelden to head EPA; U.N. finds 2024 hottest year ever recorded; PLUS: Good news for state climate initiatives on last week's ballots...
Callers ring in after Trump's re-election; Also: U.S. Senate result updates; Voting system concerns in several states; How nat'l media failed American democracy...
THIS WEEK: The Cancer Returns ... The Glass Ceilings ... The Consequences ... And too much more, in our latest collection of the week's best, very much-needed, toons...
Felony charges dropped against VA Republican caught trashing voter registrations before last year's election. Did GOP AG, Prosecutor conflicts of interest play role?...
State investigators widening criminal probe of man arrested destroying registration forms, said now looking at violations of law by Nathan Sproul's RNC-hired firm...
Arrest of RNC/Sproul man caught destroying registration forms brings official calls for wider criminal probe from compromised VA AG Cuccinelli and U.S. AG Holder...
'RNC official' charged on 13 counts, for allegely trashing voter registration forms in a dumpster, worked for Romney consultant, 'fired' GOP operative Nathan Sproul...
So much for the RNC's 'zero tolerance' policy, as discredited Republican registration fraud operative still hiring for dozens of GOP 'Get Out The Vote' campaigns...
The other companies of Romney's GOP operative Nathan Sproul, at center of Voter Registration Fraud Scandal, still at it; Congressional Dems seek answers...
The belated and begrudging coverage by Fox' Eric Shawn includes two different video reports featuring an interview with The BRAD BLOG's Brad Friedman...
FL Dept. of Law Enforcement confirms 'enough evidence to warrant full-blown investigation'; Election officials told fraudulent forms 'may become evidence in court'...
Rep. Ted Deutch (D-FL) sends blistering letter to Gov. Rick Scott (R) demanding bi-partisan reg fraud probe in FL; Slams 'shocking and hypocritical' silence, lack of action...
After FL & NC GOP fire Romney-tied group, RNC does same; Dead people found reg'd as new voters; RNC paid firm over $3m over 2 months in 5 battleground states...
After fraudulent registration forms from Romney-tied GOP firm found in Palm Beach, Election Supe says state's 'fraud'-obsessed top election official failed to return call...
IN TODAY'S RADIO REPORT: Another massive new wildfire forces evacuations for 80,000 in Southern California; Obama Administration issues new rules for heavy duty trucks; New report finds eliminating fossil fuel subsidies won't raise gas prices; PLUS: America gets its first-ever offshore wind farm... All that and more in today's Green News Report!
Got comments, tips, love letters, hate mail? Drop us a line at GreenNews@BradBlog.com or right here at the comments link below. All GNRs are always archived at GreenNews.BradBlog.com.
IN 'GREEN NEWS EXTRA' (see links below): Beyond Coal: Imagining Appalachia’s Future; Flooding Compounds Pain of Tragic Summer in Baton Rouge; Biomass Power Slumps as EPA, Industry Spar on Science; Climate Change and Housing: Will a Rising Tide Sink all Homes?; Oregon 50% RPS will barely raise customer rates thru 2028; Massachusetts court bars electric utilities from charging ratepayers for gas pipeline construction; The Steel Magnate Helping Trump Vilify Pollution Regulations... PLUS: Flooding in the South Looks a Lot Like Climate Change... and much, MUCH more! ...
IN TODAY'S RADIO REPORT: Donald Trump's 'new' energy plan, same as the old plan; Hillary Clinton calls for helping coal country transition to new industries; Out-of-work coal miners now working to clean up abandoned coal mines; Industrial chemicals found in drinking water of 6 million Americans; PLUS: Federal court ruling sets major precedent for climate change accountability... All that and more in today's Green News Report!
Got comments, tips, love letters, hate mail? Drop us a line at GreenNews@BradBlog.com or right here at the comments link below. All GNRs are always archived at GreenNews.BradBlog.com.
IN 'GREEN NEWS EXTRA' (see links below): California utility guilty of obstructing investigators; Seeking water wars accord, Deal quietly meets with Alabama governor; Seas aren't just rising. They're speeding up; A surge in avocado consumption is driving Mexican deforestation; China’s $15 Billion Energy Ambitions Crushed Within Two Weeks; The waters of this huge African lake aren’t mixing — and the consequences could be devastating... PLUS: Fish-farm escapees are weakening Norwegian wild salmon genetics... and much, MUCH more! ...
IN TODAY'S RADIO REPORT: New criminal charges for MI state employees in the Flint Water Crisis; $170 million fine for Kalamazoo River tar sands pipeline spill; Many young voters don't see a difference between Clinton and Trump on climate change; PLUS: Donald Trump pushes (recycles?) tired old myths about renewable energy... All that and more in today's Green News Report!
Got comments, tips, love letters, hate mail? Drop us a line at GreenNews@BradBlog.com or right here at the comments link below. All GNRs are always archived at GreenNews.BradBlog.com.
IN 'GREEN NEWS EXTRA' (see links below): Environmental records shattered as climate change 'plays out before us'; Hurricane Drought Hits a New Record; Government Agencies Must Consider The Climate; Israel Proves the Desalination Era Is Here; Disasters linked to climate can increase risk of armed conflict; "Zombie" Anthrax Goes on a Killing Spree in Siberia--How?; Chernobyl’s Atomic Wasteland May Be Reborn With Solar; Australia Orders Climate Change U-Turn... PLUS: Poll finds Californians back climate change efforts despite cost... and much, MUCH more! ...
On today's BradCast, once-friendly GOPers turn on the FBI Director, and internal DuPont documents reveal more of what the chemical company knew (and when they knew it) concerning a toxic chemical used in cookware and leaked for years into West Virginia's water supply. [Audio link posted below.]
First up: Longtime Republican James Comey, the FBI Director previously beloved by Republicans and Democrats alike, finds himself under fire by GOPers after declaring that his agency's year-long investigation into Hillary Clinton's use of a private email server would not result in criminal prosecution. We cover details from today's four-hour long "emergency" hearing convened by the U.S. House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, following Comey's announcement on Tuesday that while the former Sec. of State's treatment of classified information in her email was "extremely careless", the FBI probe did not find the knowing intent that might have triggered a criminal indictment.
We try to separate real concerns about the scandal (some of which remain unanswered), as based on Comey's testimony at today's Congressional inquiry, from the fictional ones that Republicans are already spinning in hopes of tarring the presumptive Democratic nominee.
Then we're joined by Farron Cousins of DeSmogBlog and Ring of Fire Radio to discuss new disclosures revealed by a recent corporate document dump by the DuPont chemical company, detailing a decades long cover up of the deadly toxic dangers of C8, a chemical used in Teflon.
"C8 exposure through drinking water develops into cancer in the body," Cousins explains. "It has what they call 'bio-persistence' --- it builds up over time and does not get flushed out of the body. We have 99% of Americans with this C8 chemical [now] detectable in their bodies."
The documents, unearthed in a current civil lawsuit (one of hundreds now pending) against the chemical giant, reveal that the company was aware of C8's toxicity for decades, failed to inform their own employees for years, and continued poisoning untold millions for years, particularly those who relied on drinking water from the Ohio River near the company's Parkersburg, West Virginia plant.
"One of the sickest parts of this story, to me," Cousins says, "is the fact that DuPont was fined by the EPA in 2005" related to all of this, "and then they allowed them to continue dumping for another nine years after they were fined by Bush's EPA."
Cousins co-hosts Ring of Fire with our friend Mike Papantonio, whose law firm is currently representing one of the plaintiffs in their suit against DuPont. "This is the only justice that the victims will ever get, and this is the only time that DuPont is actually going to have to pay for their crimes," he tells me. "I defy people to look at these documents and accuse any of [the lawyers] of being ambulance chasers. People have died. People are dying. People will die. All because DuPont didn't want to face the music back in the 1960s. So they kept putting it off. And all throughout this 53 years that they were dumping this chemical into the river --- that's now detectable in the drinking water in 27 states --- they were making money. They're going to be just fine. Those people in West Virginia and Ohio and all over this country that have been poisoned? They are not."
Finally today, Desi Doyen joins us with the latest Green News Report, including very bad news for FL and VT, and very good news for Oakland and NASA...
While we post The BradCast here every day, and you can hear it across all of our great affiliate stations and websites, to automagically get new episodes as soon as they're available sent right to your computer or personal device, subscribe for free at iTunes, Stitcher, TuneIn or our native RSS feed!
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IN TODAY'S RADIO REPORT: US, Canada and Mexico sign major clean energy pact; New report finds millions of Americans may be exposed to lead in drinking water; Germany bans fracking; PLUS: LED streetlights are keeping the American Medical Association up at night... All that and more in today's Green News Report!
Got comments, tips, love letters, hate mail? Drop us a line at GreenNews@BradBlog.com or right here at the comments link below. All GNRs are always archived at GreenNews.BradBlog.com.
IN 'GREEN NEWS EXTRA' (see links below): Florida's coral reef system in rapid decay; Conservative to Fund Republicans Who Back Climate Change Action; Stinging Lionfish Are Invading The Mediterranean; Arsenic, Other Toxins Found At Three Georgia Power Plants; Coal Ash Bedevils Oklahoma Town, Revealing Weakness Of EPA Rule; Should Pacific Bluefin Tuna Be Listed As An Endangered Species?; U.S. Virgin Islands To Withdraw Subpoena In Climate Probe Into Exxon; In California, Study Finds Drilling and Fracking into Freshwater Formations... PLUS: Fossil Fuel Industry Ramps Up Anti-Divestment Strategy... and much, MUCH more! ...
IN TODAY'S RADIO REPORT: Lights out for the last nuclear power plant in California; Federal judge strikes down new rules for fracking on public lands; Study finds high level of toxic chemicals in residents who live near fracking sites; PLUS: Researchers in Iceland figure out how to turn carbon emissions into stone... All that and more in today's Green News Report!
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Got comments, tips, love letters, hate mail? Drop us a line at GreenNews@BradBlog.com or right here at the comments link below. All GNRs are always archived at GreenNews.BradBlog.com.
IN 'GREEN NEWS EXTRA' (see links below): How The Battery Revolution Will Change How You Fly; Chinese State Media Say 51 Killed by Powerful Tornado; Raging Wildfires in the Southwest Stretch Resources; Cities Forge World's Largest Alliance To Curb Climate Change; Obama Signs TSCA Reform Into Law; Cancer Is Contagious Among Clams. What About Us?;
Op-Ed: "The World’s Disappearing Sand"; Great Lakes Governors Approve Waukesha Water Request... PLUS: Solar Plane Lands In Spain After Historic Atlantic Crossing... and much, MUCH more! ...
IN TODAY'S RADIO REPORT: House Republicans' new agenda calls for rolling back pollution standards; The streak continues: May 2016 was the hottest May on record; Power plants no longer the nation's largest contributor to greenhouse gas emissions; New report finds Obama's Clean Power Plan will save Americans $38 billion a year; PLUS: Turns out, Donald Trump was for climate action before he was against it... All that and more in today's Green News Report!
Got comments, tips, love letters, hate mail? Drop us a line at GreenNews@BradBlog.com or right here at the comments link below. All GNRs are always archived at GreenNews.BradBlog.com.
IN 'GREEN NEWS EXTRA' (see links below): Small-Town America Has a Serious Drinking-Water Problem; Millions of American Children Missing Early Lead Tests, Reuters Finds; DuPont May Dodge Toxic Lawsuits By Pulling a Disappearing Act; Lawsuit Accuses Range Resources And Lab Of Doctoring Water Test Results; Exxon Asks U.S. Court To Throw Out Subpoena In Climate Change Inquiry; Rules On GMO Crops In Hawaii Heads To US Appeals Court; Big Coal Funded This Prominent Climate Change Denier, Docs Reveal; Wall Street Journal Accepts Environmentalist Ad But Charges Extra... PLUS: France Ratifies Paris Climate Agreement... and much, MUCH more! ...
IN TODAY'S RADIO REPORT: San Francisco adopts a climate change adaptation tax; Alberta, Canada, home of tar sands oil, adopts a carbon tax; U.S. Congress updates toxic chemical regulations for first time in 40 years; Britain's solar crushes coal; PLUS: A breakthrough in the quest to create an artificial leaf...All that and more in today's Green News Report!
Got comments, tips, love letters, hate mail? Drop us a line at GreenNews@BradBlog.com or right here at the comments link below. All GNRs are always archived at GreenNews.BradBlog.com.
IN 'GREEN NEWS EXTRA' (see links below): How the Great Barrier Reef got polluted – from farms and fossil fuels to filthy propaganda; Drought Sparks Larger Wildfires Throughout California; Another Oil Company Ends Arctic Drilling Hopes; U.S. solar market to nearly double in 2016, led by utilities; Britain's Royal Navy warships are breaking down because sea is too hot; What if climate change emptied India?; Scientists Seek a New Measure for Methane...PLUS: US and India just made progress on a little-known (but potent) climate problem... and much, MUCH more! ...
IN TODAY'S RADIO REPORT: Global protests for action on climate change receive no coverage in corporate media; New evacuations for Fort McMurray fire in Canada's oil sands country; Obama's EPA issues new rules to cut the methane; Shell Oil gives the Gulf of Mexico another spill; A win for whales; PLUS: Here we go again: April 2016 was the hottest April ever recorded... All that and more in today's Green News Report!
Got comments, tips, love letters, hate mail? Drop us a line at GreenNews@BradBlog.com or right here at the comments link below. All GNRs are always archived at GreenNews.BradBlog.com.
IN 'GREEN NEWS EXTRA' (see links below): "You Have Been Fooled": AGU Reopens Exxon Sponsorship Review; Nissan unveils a home battery to take on Tesla's Powerwall; D.C. Circuit Shifts Plans for Obama Climate Cases; Red tuna crabs carpet Southern California beaches again; U.S. top court rejects Exxon appeal in groundwater contamination case; Nebraska Utility Head Recommends Closing Nuclear Power Plant; Trump's son woos sportsmen, covets top job at Interior... PLUS: In India's Drought Crisis, Suicides Increase Among Farmers Deep In Debt... and much, MUCH more! ...
Is there still a realistic path for Bernie Sanders to secure the Democratic Party's Presidential nomination? My guest today on The BradCast says "Yes!" and explains how it would, could and, in his opinion, should happen. [Audio link for show is at end of article.]
But first, some breaking news as the state of Maryland decertifies the results of the April 26th primary election in Baltimore, due to a number of troubling and currently unexplained "irregularities" brought to their attention by Election Integrity advocates; The Obama Administration issues historic new regulations concerning the release of methane which, our own Desi Doyen describes as "a very big deal"; And Donald Trump and Paul Ryan meet to smooth over disagreements as the GOP continues to coalesce behind their presumptive Republican nominee.
Then, I'm joined by Huffington Post columnist, attorney, author and University of New Hampshire Asst. Professor Seth Abramson to discuss his latest column headlined: "Bernie Sanders Could Still Win the Democratic Nomination --- No, Seriously".
Abramson offers a persuasive, if provocative scenario, for how the Democratic Party may end up nominating Bernie Sanders at their convention this July in Philadelphia, particularly if he keeps winning primaries between now and mid-June and more bad polls --- like recent ones from Reuters and from Quinnipiac --- show her tied with or losing to Trump in head-to-head matchups both nationally and in key swing-states like Ohio, Pennsylvania and Florida.
To understand his argument, you must also understand why the Democrats instituted their system of unpledged "Super Delegates" consisting of party insiders and elected officials in the first place. He offers the history of how that system came about following the party's contested 1980 convention, and explains why the Party may come to decide this year that it's the right time to invoke that system for the purpose for which it was originally created.
"The only time that Super Delegates are activated," Abramson explains, "the only time that they really matter, and they're actually doing something other than just showing up to the convention and validating what's already happened, is when they are in fact contradicting the will of the popular vote and the delegate count, and are voting down a presumptive nominee. The reason they would do that is the same reason they would have wanted to do that in 1980, and that's if they think that the presumed nominee cannot win the fall election."
Abramson, a long-time Sanders supporter, details the specific, if plausible scenario he says would need to unfold over the next several weeks of remaining Primaries and how, as he argues, "I don't think it at that point it becomes a question of whether the Super Delegates would change their [support for Clinton]...The only question is how many of them would." In his scenario, he says, party insiders will be forced to ask themselves what needs to be done to avoid electing Trump to the White House, who he describes as "one of the most dangerous politicians ever to run for office in American history."
But what about rejecting the collective popular will of Democratic Party primary and caucus voters in such a scenario? What of the early states that initially supported Clinton in such huge numbers? And what of the arguments that the Sanders campaign has made in the past concerning the undemocratic nature of so-called Super Delegates? Tune in for Abramson's responses to all of those questions and more!
Finally today, we close out once again with another explosive edition of the Green News Report...
While we post The BradCast here every day, and you can hear it across all of our great affiliate stations and websites, to automagically get new episodes as soon as they're available sent right to your computer or personal device, subscribe for free at iTunes, Stitcher, TuneIn or our native RSS feed!
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(Snail mail support to "Brad Friedman, 7095 Hollywood Blvd., #594 Los Angeles, CA 90028" always welcome too!)
IN TODAY'S RADIO REPORT: 'Presumptive' GOP Presidential nominee Donald Trump goes nuclear over climate; CNN airs more ads for the fossil fuel industry than news stories on climate change; Volkswagen documents reveal scheme to defraud emissions tests; Mitsubishi admits cheating on fuel economy tests; PLUS: One major U.S. city is the first to mandate solar panels on all new buildings... All that and more in today's Green News Report!
Got comments, tips, love letters, hate mail? Drop us a line at GreenNews@BradBlog.com or right here at the comments link below. All GNRs are always archived at GreenNews.BradBlog.com.
IN 'GREEN NEWS EXTRA' (see links below): The story behind Prince’s low-profile generosity to green causes; Punishing heat wave sets records across Asia; EPA launching new water infrastructure effort after Flint; Water Wars: GA Gov. Nathan Deal to Marco Rubio: ‘Maybe senators ought to have gag orders as well’; Exxon Mobil loses top credit rating it held since depression; Indian villagers have found a way to bottle the fragrance of monsoons; CO struggles with marijuana's huge carbon footprint... PLUS: “There is no doubt”: Exxon knew CO2 pollution was a global threat by late 1970s... and much, MUCH more! ...
IN TODAY'S RADIO REPORT: Criminal charges for officials in Flint lead poisoning crisis; Louisiana residents protest new offshore drilling leases on anniversary of BP Oil Spill; Deadly oil facility explosion kills 3 in Mexico; More than half the nation lives with dangerous air pollution; PLUS: This Earth Day, world leaders gather to sign historic Paris Agreement... All that and more in today's Green News Report!
Got comments, tips, love letters, hate mail? Drop us a line at GreenNews@BradBlog.com or right here at the comments link below. All GNRs are always archived at GreenNews.BradBlog.com.
IN 'GREEN NEWS EXTRA' (see links below): How Earth itself has upped the stakes for the Paris climate accord; How Earth itself has upped the stakes for the Paris climate accord; 'And then we wept': Scientists say 93 percent of the Great Barrier Reef now bleached; VW, Justice Department reach diesel emissions deal; Ecuadoreans jostle for food and water in earthquake zone; San Francisco is requiring solar panels on all new buildings. But here's a much greener idea; Caution: New Sea Level Story May be a Step too Far; Study reveals greater climate impacts of 2C temperature rise... PLUS: Solar Impulse 2 sun-powered airplane takes off for the first time in 9 months... and much, MUCH more! ...
IN TODAY'S RADIO REPORT: World's largest coal company declares bankruptcy; Utility CEO foresees an end to coal entirely; U.S. Government Accountability Office dings the EPA; Sardine fishing banned off West Coast --- again; PLUS: Pesticide company ends use of bee-killing pesticide... All that and more in today's Green News Report!
Got comments, tips, love letters, hate mail? Drop us a line at GreenNews@BradBlog.com or right here at the comments link below. All GNRs are always archived at GreenNews.BradBlog.com.
IN 'GREEN NEWS EXTRA' (see links below): CO2's Role in Global Warming Has Been on the Oil Industry's Radar Since the 1960s; Are southern resident killer whales too screwed up to survive?; True: Barack Obama says wind power cheaper in Texas than power from 'dirty fossil fuels'; Wildfires, Once Confined to a Season, Burn Earlier and Longer; If You Eat Fast Food You’re Getting a Big Helping of Toxic Chemicals; Chicago's Upgrades To Aging Water Lines May Disturb Lead Pipes; Great Lakes Oil Pipeline in Violation of Operating Agreement... PLUS: How much do Western state budgets rely on extractive industries?... and much, MUCH more! ...
IN TODAY'S RADIO REPORT: State Attorneys General unite to investigate ExxonMobil for climate change fraud; Debunking another Republican EPA lie that won't die; 7 million Americans at risk of fracking earthquakes; Sea levels could rise six feet by 2100 because...Antarctica; PLUS: Scotland closes its last coal plant... All that and more in today's Green News Report!
Got comments, tips, love letters, hate mail? Drop us a line at GreenNews@BradBlog.com or right here at the comments link below. All GNRs are always archived at GreenNews.BradBlog.com.
IN 'GREEN NEWS EXTRA' (see links below): Choking to Death in Detroit: Flint Isn't Michigan's Only Disaster; Flint Official: State Overruled Plan For Corrosion Control; Exxon Must Hold Shareholder Vote on Climate Change Resolutions, SEC Says; Program Will Make Cutting Carbon Emissions Lucrative For Farmers; Climate Policy’s Advocates Take Page From Same-Sex Marriage Playbook; Toxic Chemical Still in Can Linings of Popular Foods; Trump Finds Common Ground With Cruz in Opposition to Carbon Tax... PLUS: “Epidemic” of Premature Births is Increasingly Linked to Air Pollution... and much, MUCH more! ...
IN TODAY'S RADIO REPORT: Sea World vows to end captive orca breeding program; Great Barrier Reef in distress amid worldwide coral bleaching event; Americans' concern about global warming rises to new levels; Severe drought shuts down Venezuela; PLUS: Not just Flint --- towns across America have a lead contamination problem... All that and more in today's Green News Report!
Got comments, tips, love letters, hate mail? Drop us a line at GreenNews@BradBlog.com or right here at the comments link below. All GNRs are always archived at GreenNews.BradBlog.com.
IN 'GREEN NEWS EXTRA' (see links below): Carbon emissions highest in 66 million years, since dinosaur age; How Water Shortages Threaten Jobs And Growth Across The World; Baltimore Struggles To Protect Children From Lead Paint; Panama Canal Sets Depth Limit On Ships Due To Drought; Michigan Outlines Flint Recovery Plan; Sasol’s huge petrochemical project dissolves environmental justice community; As Coal’s Future Grows Murkier, Banks Pull Financing; Feds Propose 5-Year Water Bottling Permit For Nestle In California... PLUS: New Galápagos Sanctuary Has World’s Highest Abundance of Sharks... and much, MUCH more! ...
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