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Federal Court Rules North Dakota’s Extreme Abortion Ban Unconstitutional

by LatonyaEALL Posted on April 16, 2014

Mother Jones

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On Wednesday, a federal judge blocked a North Dakota law that would have banned all abortions after a heartbeat is detectable in the fetus, which can happen as early as six weeks into a pregnancy. The judge, Daniel Hovland, called the ban—which passed last year and was immediately challenged by the Red River Women’s Clinic, the only abortion provider in the state—”invalid and unconstitutional,” and said it would impose an “undue burden on women seeking to obtain an abortion.”

The North Dakota law is one of the most far-reaching abortion bans in the country. Many women aren’t aware that they are pregnant until well after six weeks into a pregnancy. Under the North Dakota law, those women wouldn’t be able to seek abortions at all.

North Dakota is one of several states that have pushed laws banning abortions after a fetal heartbeat can be detected. In March, a federal judge struck down a similar ban Arkansas had passed last year. But losses in the courts haven’t stopped these efforts from spreading—the Alabama House passed a fetal heartbeat bill last month, and state legislatures in Wyoming, Mississippi, and Ohio have considered similar legislation in the past year.

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Federal Court Rules North Dakota’s Extreme Abortion Ban Unconstitutional

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The Hottest Conservative Campaign Gimmick of 2014: Free Guns

by LeonieOMeara Posted on April 16, 2014

Mother Jones

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Ron Paul announced recently that he is giving away a gun because “there can be no liberty without the ability to defend it.” As part of its “Defend Liberty Gun Giveaway,” one lucky donor to the former Texas congressman’s organization, Campaign for Liberty, will receive a DDM4 AR-15. But Paul isn’t alone. More than a dozen candidates for national and local office have offered up free firearms to their supporters during the 2014 election cycle, with gifts ranging from pistols to shotguns to an AR-15 customized by the gubernatorial candidate himself. It’s the year’s hottest conservative campaign gimmick.

More Mother Jones reporting on the role of guns in American society.

While candidates may be exploiting right-wing fears of an impending Obama firearm confiscation, the phenomenon isn’t new. The tactic traces back to at least 1994—not coincidentally the last time fears of a gun-grabbing Democratic president reached a fever pitch. Surprise: All the gun-giving candidates are Republicans. Historically, these gun giveaways haven’t been terribly successful. With the exception of three incumbent politicians, none of the candidates who have tried to entice voters with firearms have ever gone on to win their races.

Here’s a quick history:

Rep. Paul Broun (R-Ga.), 2014: The US Senate candidate gave away a Colt AR-15 and a Colt Marine Corps 1911 Rail Pistol to two members of his email list.

South Carolina state Sen. Lee Bright, 2014: Bright, who is challenging Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), is handing out an AR-15 from Palmetto State armory to a member of his email list.

Tennessee state Rep. Joe Carr, 2014: Sen. Lamar Alexander’s tea party challenger enticed voters to sign up for his email list by gifting a Beretta 92A1.

Steve Wagner, 2014: The Hendricks County, Indiana, sheriff candidate is raffling off four shotguns.

Former Rep. Tom Tancredo (R-Colo.), 2014: The former presidential candidate and current Colorado gubernatorial contender is teaming up with Ted Nugent—who once told his rivals to “suck on my machine gun”—to hand out an AR-15 to one supporter (no donations necessary).

Tancredo for Governor

Colorado state Sen. Greg Brophy, 2014: Not to be outdone by Tancredo, his rival for the gubernatorial nomination is offering a Smith & Wesson M&P15—personally modified by the candidate, to one lucky member of his email list. “I tricked this baby out with all the MagPul stuff you can add!” he explains.

Steve French, 2014: The Alabama Republican state rep candidate offered a Remington 870 shotgun to a randomly selected supporter. Said French: “I hope the winner brings home a nice gobbler.”

Conrad Reynolds, 2014: Reynolds, a retired Army colonel who is a seeking a congressional seat in Arkansas, is giving supporters wooden nickels that enter them in a lottery to win an AR-15.

Timothy Delasandro, 2014: The Texas Republican candidate for state representative gave away a Sig Sauer SIGM400 AR-15.

Mike Boudreaux, 2014: A $20 raffle ticket gave supporters of Boudreaux, a candidate for sheriff in California’s Tulare County, a chance to win pistols and shotguns.

Chuck Maricle, 2014: This handgun instructor and GOP candidate for state rep gave an AR-15 to one rally attendee.

Alan Wilkins, 2014: This police sergeant’s campaign to be Platte County, Nebraska, sheriff hit a snag when his gun raffle was deemed illegal.

Chris Fiora, 2014: A Maryland sheriff candidate, Fiora gave away a DPMS/Panther Arms AR-10 at a fundraiser in which he also roasted a cow.

Maryland Del. Don Dwyer, 2013: He raffled off an AR-15 and an AK-47 at “Delegate Dwyer’s Gun Rights and Liberty BBQ Gun Raffle, Auction & Strategy Meeting.”

Rep. Steve Stockman (R-Texas), 2013: Stockman, who advocated using liberals’ tears as a gun lubricant, gave away an AR-15 on the Fourth of July to entice people to sign up for his email list.

Curtis Coleman, 2013: The Arkansas gubernatorial candidate offered up a Palmetto PA-15 from Don’s Weaponry in North Little Rock to a lucky supporter.

Missouri state Sen. Brian Nieves, 2013: He gave a Sig Sauer 516 Patrol to an attendee at a $100-a-ticket fundraiser to benefit his campaign committee.

Missouri state Rep. John McCaherty, 2012: During his reelection campaign, McCaherty raffled off an AR-15 provided by the National Rifle Association. He had just one simple request of his supporters: “Do not answer any questions about the event at all.”

Illinois state Rep. Josh Harms, 2012: Harms, who bragged to a local newspaper that he once shot a bear in Canada, sold $5 raffle tickets for a chance to win a revolver, shotgun, or rifle.

Dean Allen, 2009: The candidate for South Carolina adjutant general, which manages the state national guard, gave away an AK-47 at a “machine gun social” fundraiser. “I like to tell people I’m not the country club conservative,” Allen told the Greenville News. “I’m the machine gun one.”

Peter James, 2007: The Maryland GOP congressional candidate announced his intent to give away 100 pistols and a few machine guns. Reporters who showed up for the big event were disappointed to discover the weapons were in fact water guns.

Mike Curtiss, 2000: Supporters of the downstate Illinois congressional candidate who bought $5 raffle tickets got a chance to bring home an AR-50 dubbed the “Rod Blagojevich Special,” in honor of the then-Chicago congressman, who was pushing to have the gun outlawed. “I see the humor in this,” Blagojevich told the Chicago Sun-Times. “God love the guy. It’s OK. With all due respect to Curtiss, he is nuts about guns.” Curtiss also gave away a $400 box of cigars.

Michael Concannon, 2000: The North Carolina state Senate candidate raffled off a gun to fund his campaign.

Mark Detro, 2000: This Oklahoma Republican congressional candidate scrapped plans to offer guns in exchange for campaign donations—and a planned raffle—after discovering it violated state gambling laws.

C. Ronald Franks, 1994: The Maryland Senate candidate sold $5 raffle tickets for a chance to win an AR-15.

Randy Linkmeyer, 1994: The California state Senate candidate held a “Family Firearm Safety Day” to give guns and ammunition to a select few supporters. Kids were welcome.

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The Hottest Conservative Campaign Gimmick of 2014: Free Guns

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Iowa Wants Its Poor to Give Up Smoking and Drinking to Qualify for Medicaid

by Adalberto7975 Posted on December 10, 2013

Mother Jones

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The Obama administration gave Iowa a waiver today to expand Medicaid along lines similar to what Arkansas did earlier this year, in which Medicaid dollars will be used to buy insurance in the private marketplace. I’m OK with this as an experiment, and curious to see how it turns out. But there was another wrinkle to Iowa’s waiver application:

Iowa wanted to do something different. Gov. Terry Branstad (R) wanted to charge a small premium for Medicaid enrollees who earn between 50 percent and 133 percent of the poverty line. In the Arkansas plan, there were no premiums at all.

Health and Human Services essentially split the difference with the state here: They’re allowing premiums for those who earn between 100 percent and 133 percent of the federal poverty line, but not for those who earn below that. The premiums are limited at 2 percent of income (for someone at the poverty line, this is about $19 a month), and enrollees have the chance to reduce their payment by participating in a wellness program.

Hmmm. Iowa’s waiver application doesn’t describe this wellness program (a draft protocol will be submitted next March), but it does provide a hint about its goals:

The state shall submit for approval a draft section of the protocol related to year 1 Healthy Behavior Incentives including, at a minimum….the health risk assessment used to identify unhealthy behaviors such as alcohol abuse, substance use disorders, tobacco use, obesity, and deficiencies in immunization status.

A single person at 50 percent of the poverty line makes less than $500 per month. That’s obviously not someone who can afford even a nickel in extra expenses. But that was the income level in Iowa’s initial application, which means that for all practical purposes the original goal of this program was to (a) deny government benefits to poor people who are smokers, drinkers, drug users, or overweight, but (b) provide the benefits if these poor people agree to fairly intrusive government monitoring that ensures they improve these behaviors.

So here’s a question: what’s the liberal party line on this kind of thing? Are we opposed because conservatives are once again trying to deny benefits to the “undeserving” poor? Or are we in favor of this because using incentives to improve destructive lifestyles among the most vulnerable is a worthy effort? Does it matter whether the motivation for these incentives is something we approve of? If a lefty foundation launched a program that helped out poor families via a tough-love style approach that insisted on modifying destructive behavior, would it be OK? How much difference does it make that one is a public program and the other is private?

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Iowa Wants Its Poor to Give Up Smoking and Drinking to Qualify for Medicaid

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Colorado Cities’ Rejection of Fracking Poses Political Test for Natural Gas Industry

by Myrna Posted on November 7, 2013

Anti-drilling measures approved in the state, which has long been a major oil and gas producer, reflect growing concerns about the effect on the environment, experts said. Visit source:  Colorado Cities’ Rejection of Fracking Poses Political Test for Natural Gas Industry ; ;Related ArticlesNational Briefing | South: Arkansas: ExxonMobil Fines Proposed After Oil SpillChevron and Ukraine Set Shale Gas DealWorld Briefing | Asia: The Philippines: Strong Typhoon Lands ;

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Colorado Cities’ Rejection of Fracking Poses Political Test for Natural Gas Industry

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Energy companies say releasing CO2 data would jeopardize trade secrets

by Charlie Smith Posted on July 2, 2013

Energy companies say releasing CO2 data would jeopardize trade secrets

By John Upton

Shutterstock

“Shhhh … don’t tell anybody how much we’re wrecking the climate … that’s a trade secret.”

Energy and chemical companies are urging the Obama administration to dump a proposal on greenhouse gas emissions reporting. They say new reporting requirements could put their trade secrets at risk. From The Hill:

The White House is currently reviewing a proposal from the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) that could require companies to publicly release the information they use to calculate the emissions, like the volume of production or raw materials that are used.

Companies and market regulators worry that that data can be “reverse-engineered and reverse-calculated to basically give away trade secrets,” according to Lorraine Gershman, director of the environmental, regulatory and technical affairs office of the American Chemistry Council.

“We pretty much are reiterating our concern that the data be protected and not divulged,” she said. “Our members’ concerns are release of information, both domestically and internationally as well.”

The energy industry uses the “trade secrets” cry a lot. Frackers use it to prevent the public from knowing which chemicals they’re pumping underground, for example. And ExxonMobil has been using it to argue that it should be allowed keep secret its inspection reports on the tar-sands oil pipeline that ruptured in Mayflower, Ark., earlier this year. From EnergyWire:

Federal regulators at the Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration are set to decide as soon as this week whether Exxon can claim a trade secret exemption that would let it withhold inspection data for the ruptured Pegasus pipeline from Arkansas officials seeking it, including two GOP members of Congress. The immediate dispute hinges on a request from the local water utility to relocate the 96,000-barrel-per-day Pegasus following the spill, but the Arkansas conflict over Exxon’s confidentiality rights echoes warnings from [Keystone XL] opponents that pipeline operators are too loosely overseen to ensure safe oil transportation.

It seems that wrecking the environment is just part of the trade for fossil fuel companies, and they don’t want anybody to know how exceedingly good at it they are.

John Upton is a science fan and green news boffin who tweets, posts articles to Facebook, and blogs about ecology. He welcomes reader questions, tips, and incoherent rants: johnupton@gmail.com.

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Feds, Arkansas sue Exxon over tar-sands spill

by h55kqsw Posted on June 14, 2013

Feds, Arkansas sue Exxon over tar-sands spill

By John Upton

Office of Attorney General Dustin McDaniel

Mopping up after Exxon in Arkansas.

You gotta feel for ExxonMobil.

Mere months after the oil giant was mildly stung by a $1.7 million fine for its 2011 spill in Yellowstone River, federal and Arkansas prosecutors have filed a lawsuit against the company seeking compensation and cleanup costs related to this year’s tar-sands oil pipeline rupture in Mayflower, Ark.

From the L.A. Times:

The Justice Department and the state of Arkansas filed suit against the oil giant ExxonMobil over a March 29 pipeline rupture that spilled 210,000 gallons of oil into a residential neighborhood and waterways in the small town of Mayflower.

The spill prompted evacuations, killed wildlife, polluted wetlands and a lake, and stirred health complaints from people living near the rupture site, north of Little Rock.

In the suit filed in federal district court, the Justice Department seeks civil penalties for violations of the Clean Water Act. The Arkansas attorney general is also pursuing civil penalties for violations of the Arkansas Hazardous Waste Management Act and the Arkansas Water and Air Pollution Control Act. The state also seeks to have ExxonMobil pay for all cleanup and removal costs under the federal Oil Pollution Act. …

The cleanup continues in Mayflower, where none of the 22 families evacuated on North Starlite Drive has returned home. The neighborhood is a “sea of ‘For sale’ signs,” said Glen Hooks, senior campaign representative for the Sierra Club in Arkansas.

From Al Jazeera:

The lawsuit said the Pegasus pipeline was buried less than a meter below the ground in the Mayflower neighbourhood, which is about 40 km from Little Rock, the state capital.

Federal pipeline regulators this month gave Exxon time to conduct a second round of testing on Pegasus after the company said an initial investigation into why the nearly 70-year-old line failed was inconclusive. The pipeline runs from Illinois to Texas.

Exxon installed a new section of the pipeline in April after it removed a 15.8 meter damaged section, but it has yet to file a restart plan with federal regulators.

Yeah, you gotta feel something for Exxon. This might put a teeny-tiny dent in its profits, which reached $44.8 billion last year.

John Upton is a science fan and green news boffin who tweets, posts articles to Facebook, and blogs about ecology. He welcomes reader questions, tips, and incoherent rants: johnupton@gmail.com.

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Joe Biden kinda sorta maybe opposes Keystone XL pipeline

by Michalak876 Posted on May 8, 2013

Joe Biden kinda sorta maybe opposes Keystone XL pipeline

By Lisa Hymas

Sierra Club

Sierra Club activist Elaine Cooper with Joe Biden.

Vice President Joe Biden told an activist on Friday that he doesn’t support the proposed Keystone XL pipeline, according to a post on the Sierra Club website.

While the veep was working the crowd at an event in South Carolina, Elaine Cooper got a moment with him:

I asked him about the administration’s commitment to making progress on climate and whether the president would reject the pipeline. He looked at the Sierra Club hat on my head, and he said “yes, I do — I share your views — but I am in the minority,” and he smiled. …

I know that this vice president is a man who isn’t afraid to speak from his heart, and who sometimes gets out in front of the rest of the administration on moral issues. It was nearly a year before, on May 6, 2012, that Biden said that he was “absolutely comfortable” with marriage equality. What the vice president said to me on Friday was equally brave and equally right.

Environmental leaders seized on the news, BuzzFeed reports:

[Friends of the Earth President Erich] Pica released a statement commending the vice president for “his blunt talk”; and Gene Karpinski, president of the League of Conservation Voters, issued a press release calling the remarks “a big deal” and a “game changer that should encourage Secretary Kerry and President Obama to reject the Keystone XL tar sands pipeline.”

But did Biden really mean it? More from BuzzFeed:

Biden’s public position on the pipeline has been more reticent. Asked last year about Keystone, he deferred to the State Department’s ongoing review. “It’s going to go through the process and it will be made on an environmentally sound basis,” Biden said at the time.

What’s more, the vice president’s office told BuzzFeed Tuesday night that Biden’s views “haven’t changed” on the pipeline. “Any impression to the contrary would be mistaken,” an official said.

But activists cast the incident in South Carolina as a moment of candor from the often loose-lipped vice president. “I felt it was sincere at the time,” said Cooper.

The anti-Keystone “All Risk No Reward” coalition has already put together an ad referencing the incident, which will run on Beltway news site Politico, The Washington Post reports.

[The ad] first show[s] images of the recent oil spill in Arkansas, and then Biden and Secretary of State John Kerry holding hands as they confer.

“Psst … You should oppose Keystone XL too,” the ad reads. “Tell President Obama and Secretary Kerry: Joe Biden is Right.”

Biden seems to be laying the groundwork for a 2016 presidential campaign, so he might be more eager to please green voters than the rest of the administration.

Lisa Hymas is senior editor at Grist. You can follow her on

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Weird wintry weather and the climate-change link

by neogrom Posted on May 3, 2013

Weird wintry weather and the climate-change link

By John Upton

Kara Brugman

May snow in Boulder, Colo.

It was high time to pass around a few cold ones in the shade of an awning in Amarillo, Texas, just a few days ago. Now it’s time to hunker inside, drink whiskey neat, and play charades.

The city broke a heat record on April 30, reaching a scorching hot 97 degrees. Then it got hit by unseasonably cold weather that has swept through the nation’s heartland. A couple days after reaching 97, the temperature bottomed out at 33 degrees, with the cold snap bringing some snow.

The topsy-turvy weather in Amarillo is emblematic of the climatic incoherence reigning across the country. The coasts are basking in spring weather while the Rockies, Great Plains, and Midwest are being smacked by snow storms.

The unseasonably late chill appears to be one of many symptoms of the changing climate. But before we dive into that, let’s take a look at the extraordinary weather pummeling the Midwest. From The Weather Channel:

Winter Storm Achilles may have set the record for the biggest May snowstorm at any single location in four different states! That said, these potential records are based on preliminary data and will have to be verified.

Wisconsin — We’ve seen snowfall reports of 18 inches near Hayward and 17 inches in Rice Lake. …

Minnesota — 18 inches of snow was measured in Blooming Prairie, between Albert Lea and Rochester. …

Iowa — 13 inches of snow has been measured by an observer in Osage. …

Arkansas — Up to 3.5 inches reported in Gravette.

The notion that global warming could trigger cold weather is enough to make a conservative pundit’s head explode. Science is hard!

But Minnesota Public Radio asked a meteorologist about possible links between the late-season snowstorms and climate change. While issuing the standard caveats about how climate change doesn’t “cause” any particular weather events, he explained some likely connections. Here’s a partial transcript of the the exchange during the radio station’s weekly Climate Cast program:

[Host Kerri] Miller: I think this late spring snow is a good opportunity to ask again as we have during our Climate Cast — weather or climate? How do we answer that?

[Meteorologist Paul] Huttner: What’s happening today is weather, there’s no doubt about it. This is a very out-of-season event. All weather in a way seems to be colored or flavored by the climate changes we’re seeing. If you’re going to tie a link to today’s weather to climate change you would have to cite Arctic amplification. We’ve touched on that before. That’s where this slower jet stream gets stuck. It slows down and these blocking patterns set up and our weather patterns get stuck. That’s what’s been happening a lot in Minnesota and the Upper Midwest this spring. Some links that this may be tied to the warmer Arctic Ocean that we saw last summer. It’s not a slam dunk, but the clues all seem to be pointing in the same direction. …

We’re seeing a trend where the atmosphere overall holds about four to five percent more water vapor than it did a decade ago, and that injects these storms with more moisture.

The other thing about this storm and drawing a parallel with Hurricane Sandy late last fall, it’s a little bit out of season. In fact, this is well out of season for Minnesota. It’s unprecedented, the amount of snowfall we’ve had today in Minnesota. Mark Seeley tells me that Dodge Center, with 15.4 inches of snow, broke the all-time state snowfall record for May 2 today. This is definitely an unprecedented out-of-season event. When you get these events in May, when we’ve still got cold enough air for snow but we’ve got so much warmth and moisture to the south, it just supercharges these storms and that can tend to produce more precipitation than an atmosphere with less water in it.

Schoolkids in Minnesota and Wisconsin got a rare May snow day on Thursday, while lucky students at one school in the Seattle area got a “sun day” on Friday to celebrate unusually warm and sunny weather.

John Upton is a science aficionado and green news junkie who

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ExxonMobil spills chemicals in Louisiana while cleaning spilled oil in Arkansas

by ker3roa Posted on April 5, 2013

ExxonMobil spills chemicals in Louisiana while cleaning spilled oil in Arkansas

By John Upton

skooksie

The Chalmette refinery.

Even as ExxonMobil was mopping up after its disgusting tar-sands oil spill in Arkansas on Wednesday, it spilled an unknown amount of unknown chemicals — possibly hydrogen sulfide and cancer-causing benzene — during an accident at a riverfront refinery in Louisiana.

The Chalmette refinery chemical spill might have gone unnoticed, except that it stank out the city of New Orleans and several nearby parishes, leading to state and federal investigations (we told you about that mysterious odor yesterday). Frankly, ExxonMobil’s track record here sucks: The same refinery spilled 360 barels of crude oil in January.

From The Times-Picayune:

ExxonMobil first reported releasing 100 pounds of hydrogen sulfide and 10 pounds of benzene, a volatile organic carbon compound known to cause cancer, because those amounts are the minimum required for reporting, [Coast Guard Petty Officer Jason] Screws said. But the company has since said it is unsure exactly what chemicals were involved or how much may have been released, he said.

The spill occurred as a result of a break in a pipeline connecting a drum used to store “liquid flare condensate,” with a flare on the refinery site, Screws said. He said the company measured 160 parts per million of hydrogen sulfide and 2 parts per million of benzene in the air at the site of the spill, but has not seen similar readings at the plant’s fence line or in the neighboring community.

Residents from the region inhaled chemicals caused by the spill for more than a day, leading to reports of breathing difficulties and other ailments. But the Coast Guard rushed to soothe folks, assuring them not to worry their chemical-infused heads about it. From Reuters:

“We haven’t told the refinery to shut down because we haven’t any cause for a shutdown,” [Lieutenant Lily] Zeteza said. “We’ve no indication that this is dangerous.”

Well, if you say so.

John Upton is a science aficionado and green news junkie who

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All those fracking jobs come with an increased risk of lung cancer

by siteforme Posted on April 2, 2013

All those fracking jobs come with an increased risk of lung cancer

By Susie Cagle

chriswaits

While all the damage hydraulic fracturing could do to the Earth is pretty well-covered, we mostly overlook the risks it poses to fracking workers. Each well requires thousands of tons of fracking sand full of fine silica, which can penetrate lungs and lead to incurable silicosis and even lung cancer.

To find out how much those frackers were at risk, Eric Esswein, a workplace safety and exposure expert with the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH), strapped on a face mask and dug in. NPR reports:

He and his colleagues visited 11 fracking sites in five states: Arkansas, Colorado, North Dakota, Pennsylvania and Texas. At every site, the researchers found high levels of silica in the air. It turned out that 79 percent of the collected samples exceeded the recommended exposure limit set by Esswein’s agency.

There were some controls in place, says Esswein, who notes that “at every site that we went to, workers wore respirators.”

But about one-third of the air samples they collected had such high levels of silica, the type of respirators typically worn wouldn’t offer enough protection. …

Workplace inspectors with the Occupational Safety and Health Administration wouldn’t have been aware of this potential risk for fracking workers before this recent study because, unless they receive a complaint or there’s an accident, they generally don’t see the process of hydraulic fracturing. That part of setting up a well happens quickly — and once a well is up and running, contractors move on to the next one.

Government officials and the fracking industry say they’re now working together to reduce workers’ exposures. They started with quick fixes, like putting up warning signs and simply closing hatches on sand-moving machines.

Not only did most of the airborne silica samples exceed NIOSH’s recommended levels, but almost half exceeded the maximum levels set by OSHA, and a third exceeded NIOSH’s recommended level by a factor of 10 or more. Gee, thanks Mister Fracking Industry! All this cancer will go great with my firewater!

Workplace safety experts say the Occupational Safety and Health Administration rules for silica should allow about half of what they do now, but OSHA’s updated regulations have been stuck in review for more than two years.

The New York Times took OSHA to task in a scathing longread about the watchdog agency’s failures when it comes to long-term health threats: “Partly out of pragmatism, the agency created by President Richard M. Nixon to give greater attention to health issues has largely done the opposite. OSHA devotes most of its budget and attention to responding to here-and-now dangers rather than preventing the silent, slow killers that, in the end, take far more lives.”

Just another dirty cost of all that “clean” natural gas.

Susie Cagle writes and draws news for Grist. She also writes and draws tweets for

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