Environment

As of 2010, the number of licensed drivers in the United States is 210 million and rising. Every year, about 1 in 10,000 will die in car crashes. While the majority of these fatal accidents are the result of negligence by at least one of the drivers, there are a multitude of other factors in play. Rain, potholes, ice and snow are all amongst the most common causes for car accidents. In fact, these hindrances are so common that most people view them as unavoidable. However, many of the resultant accidents would be precluded with better roads. Scarily, this is only the tip of the iceberg in a nationwide infrastructure issue. America’s G.P.A for infrastructure is a startling D+, with roads at a D being far from the worst aspect. In order to remain in a functional state, let alone...
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Dear Mr. Gates, I have repeatedly read about your viewpoint that the world’s economic superpowers must develop solutions for saving Earth from overheating. You are absolutely right. Most certainly, this is the only practicable approach. Nevertheless, I am amazed about two other remarks, which you have made in a recent interview with a reporter from the Atlantic Magazine. They are on the mark, too. You say that private efforts will not be capable of coming up with a solution for preventing overheating of Earth. Again you are right. Free, capitalistic markets must show fast capital recovery. Rescuing Earth from Overheating is a very slow and costly process. Markets, which are based on capitalistic principles, cannot respond by design. The only alternative seems to be that either...
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Dear Sir/Madam I think Chris Filardi should be fired for the killing of a rare bird on Guadalcanal. In case this is not possible, you, as a scientific and leading institution in biodiversity, should apologize for his actions, and amend your policy, publicly, to disclude the killing of animals, in the name of science. If you want to study animals in the wild, that is one thing, but killing them and reducing their population, even by one, is anathema to their conservation - and certainly no way to behave as peers and educators of the next generation of scientists. You should be ashamed! I have traveled all over the world, and visited many museums who have, on display, lots of taxidermy. In fact, it is difficult to see some animals left in the wild (e.g. The Wattled Umbrellabird), when...
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An open letter to Chair Felicia Marcus: California is now moving into its fifth year of a mega drought. Governor Brown has imposed mandatory water usage reductions on the citizens of California. Yet, a water agency, under the auspices of your department, continues to waste billions of gallons of water on outdated mitigation measures that have zero value according to our own governor. We ask that you and your board act immediately to stop this absurd waste. In 2003, the Quantification Settlement Agreement (QSA) was signed and the QSA Joint Powers Authority (JPA) was established to oversee and manage its implementation. This landmark water transfer agreement provided Colorado River water to the urban Southern California cities, via the Imperial Irrigation District’s (IID) scheme of...
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“Talking with you is no different than talking with someone that denies God even exists!” This was the comment somebody who claims to share my faith said to me regarding my condemnation of, and refusal to embrace, the politically charged right wing tendencies of many in the Christian culture who, quite gleefully it seems, cast about judgment and condemnation on the gay community. Contrary to them I believe the message of the Gospel (Which translated literally means Good News) is one of love, and happen to believe Jesus actually meant it when he said, John 13:34-35 NIV “A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.” See, I just happen to disagree...
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Today, the world’s top scientists published a devastating report on the impacts of climate change. Climate change is already making it harder for millions to feed their families. Wild weather and unpredictable seasons are causing chaos for farmers. Food prices are going up. Food quality is going down. Oxfam calculates climate change could put the fight against hunger back by decades. If we continue to let greenhouse gas emissions and temperatures rise we will hit a threshold – in our own lifetimes - beyond which the chance of ending hunger worldwide may be lost forever. We will not stand by and watch this happen. People all over the world are doing their bit to tackle climate change. Now governments and big business need to step up and play their part: reducing harmful...
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Dear Mr. Jelinek, I’m writing on behalf of my friends at Farm Sanctuary and animal protection supporters across the country to ask that you stop selling eggs from hens confined in tiny cages. I join Ryan Gosling, Bill Maher, and countless others in urging Costco to sell exclusively cage-free eggs. Nearly a decade ago, Costco indicated that its next step on this issue would be creating a timeline for getting those cages out of your egg supply, and yet today, you appear to have made no progress at all—even as you have set timelines for getting pigs and calves out of cages. As you know, these birds producing eggs for your shelves are crammed five or more into cages that are not large enough for even one hen to spread her wings. In these cruel cages, the animals’ muscles and bones...
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Dear George, I am a long-standing fan and an admirer of the stances you have adopted on many key environmental issues, so I hope you won't mind if I take public issue with you on some of the points that you made in your recent Guardian article about Allan Savory and his advocacy of holistic grazing management systems. I should first declare my various interests: I am a farmer of ruminants myself, with 85 Ayrshire milking cows, plus their various offspring on my mainly, but not exclusively, grassland farm in West Wales, (which you visited very briefly back in 2007); I have a long-standing interest and engagement with developing improved systems of pasture management, although none of these experiments have been monitored; and, while you were in...
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Dear Mr. Gore and Mr. Wall, I'm writing to ask you to do the one thing that will do the most good for the planet and the majority of its inhabitants: not serve meat or dairy products at Live Earth 2015. I don't mean offering a vegan option, I mean not serving animal products at all. Otherwise, the event will make no sense – it'll be "greenwashing." Serving meat and dairy products at an event to combat Climate Change is like selling pistols at a gun-control rally. Your responsibility is to alert people to a crisis, not sell out to the vendors responsible for it. Not only is it possible for venues to provide a 100 percent meat-free menu – as is done now at every concert venue in which I perform, including Madison Square Garden, where I have a show at the end of June – it's...
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Dear President Dunn, My coccyx hurts. Normally this isn’t how you begin a letter, complaining about a pain in the rear, but it is because of this pain that I feel compelled to write this to you. The controversy surrounding the student consensus of “we should have had a snow day,” on Tuesday Jan. 28 is in the past. Nevertheless, it is an experience that transcends to today’s incident involving my coccyx. Yesterday, WMU News issued a cold weather warning advising students to take appropriate precautions (such as wearing suitable clothing) and to use the Bronco Transit and Kalamazoo Metro Transit system. Taking this advice I wore two pairs of gloves, and several other layers as I made the four block walk to the bus stop. There, I waited for over half an hour while wind and blowing snow...
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