TomInReston | August 23, 2007
Tomorrow the federal Office of Surface Mining (OSM) will publish regulations that, in effect, legalize the coal-mining practice of mountaintop removal.
Over at DailyKos, Devilstower does a fine job of expressing the outrage we all should feel about this development. I won’t repeat those points. But I do want to add a little.
I grew up in [...]
TomInReston | August 22, 2007
You have to hand it to ‘em. Bush, Cheney & Co. really want to stay in Iraq, no matter what. The desperation is palpable.
It’s not bad enough we have a parade of Republican (and blue-dog Democratic) lawmakers running over to Iraq for anywhere from 14 hours to a couple of days, only to return with [...]
TomInReston | August 20, 2007
In an op-ed in the LA Times, Michael Skube, a journalism professor at Elon University took a rather inept swipe at bloggers and the blogosphere. Josh Marshall at TPM and Kagro X at DailyKos took Skube to task for his lack of practicing what we was preaching, so I can skip that part.
Instead, I’d like [...]
TomInReston | August 19, 2007
Senator James Webb
United States Senate
Washington, DC
About two weeks ago, I asked what you were thinking when you voted for the FISA fixup requested by the White House at the last minute before your current recess. In your statement explaining your vote, you said:
This distinction and the threats to national security were stated clearly by Admiral [...]
TomInReston | August 19, 2007
After the tragic deaths and injuries among the rescue workers at the Crandall Canyon mine in Utah compounded the tragedy of the six miners buried in the original mine collapse, I spent some time this weekend thinking about what I know about the coal mining industry and miners.
As the Sago mine disaster did not so [...]
I know of no safe depository of the ultimate powers of the society but the people themselves; and if we think them not enlightened enough to exercise their control with a wholesome discretion, the remedy is not to take it from them but to inform their discretion.
