For the first time ever, the head of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency will speak at a gathering of activists, politicians and scientists who deny human activity influences climate change. EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin will open the 16th International Conference on…
EPA says greenhouse gasses don’t harm environment or health
The once-bipartisan effort to reduce the greenhouse gasses that harm human health, cause heat waves and increase the intensity of storms ended when the Environmental Protection Agency, established by President Nixon in 1970, reversed course and dismissed the science of…
Trump administration wages war on inconvenient facts
Facts can be stubborn things, but the Trump administration has declared war on those facts that don’t support its narrative. When confronted by inconvenient facts, it fires the messengers and sues the fact-checkers. On Aug. 1, the Bureau of Labor…
Earth Day: Trump’s EPA promotes evangelical myth that environmentalism is a false religion
Today’s Earth Day commemoration is the first since the United States officially adopted the falsehood that conservative evangelicals have embraced for decades: That people concerned about the environment and climate change are motivated by anti-Christian religion. Lee Zeldin, President Donald…
Trump administration accuses Habitat for Humanity of fraud
Habitat for Humanity is among nonprofits the Trump administration claims benefited from “programmatic fraud, waste and abuse” through a climate action fund authorized by Congress. Not only has Trump shut down the Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund, the Environmental Protection Agency…
Humpty Dumpty has fallen off the wall
The meaning of the 19th-century nursery rhyme “Humpty Dumpty” has been clouded in mystery since it first became popularized in Lewis Caroll’s book Through the Looking Glass published in 1871. Caroll depicted Humpty Dumpty as an anthropomorphic egg, fragile and…
Koch-backed lawyers want Supreme Court to upend ‘administrative state’ and some religious groups are cheering them on
On the surface, the case argued before the Supreme Court Jan. 17 is about two Atlantic fisheries upset about the federal regulations that restrict them. But dive a little deeper and you’ll see the bigger issue: Decades-old battles over how…
Citing ‘God’s providence,’ Scott Pruitt resigns as head of EPA
With a letter referencing divine providence, Scott Pruitt, a Southern Baptist layman serving as administrator of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, resigned July 5 amid a series of controversies over spending and alleged self-dealing. Pruitt, a member of First Baptist…
God wants humans to use natural gas and oil, not ‘keep it in the ground,’ says EPA chief
The Southern Baptist head of the Environmental Protection Agency says he opposes regulations restricting the mining of non-renewable energy resources because the Bible tells him so.
Lawsuit describes war on science at EPA
Environmental Protection Agency head Scott Pruitt is mounting “an attack on science” with a directive disqualifying scientists who receive federal grants for studies from serving on EPA boards, a group of scientists says in a federal lawsuit filed Jan. 23….
Psychologists have a name for the emotional impact of a Trump presidency. Pastors offer a cure.
Pastors are seeing a surge in church members, colleagues and friends emotionally battered from months of relentless dread generated by national politics. Psychologists have even coined a term for it: Trump anxiety. Julie Pennington-Russell has seen plenty of it. Recently,…
Under Trump, expect ranks of faith-based environmental protesters to swell
Some leaders of creation-care causes say anticipated rollbacks in anti-global warming policies and treaties, boosts in pipeline construction and fossil fuels use will generate sharp reactions by dedicated activists and inspire others to join the movement.