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Presents an interview with cognitive scientist George Lakoff about the relation of family life to environmental issues. Example of the concept of framing of Lakoff; Implications of the phrase protecting the environment for Lakoff; Ways by which environmental issues may be addressed and properly framed.

Assesses the role of U.S. Republicans in environmental protection in the U.S. History of the development of the Republicans for Environmental Protection in March 1995; Efforts taken by former U.S. Republican President Theodore Roosevelt regarding land conservation; Contributions of several Republican leaders to the protection of natural resources in the U.S.

The article reports about the city of Charlotte, North Carolina. Charlotte's population has nearly tripled over the past four decades, and the rate of development has raced along even faster. Charlotte is a lot like many other fast-growing cities in the United States. In many ways, it's an unlikely place for a green revolution. Mayor Pat McCrory, who heads the Environment Committee of the U.S. Conference of Mayors, is pushing to improve Charlotte's mass transit and clean its air. Under his leadership, the city has passed tree-protection and water-quality ordinances and is working to make isolated neighborhoods more pedestrian friendly by adding sidewalks, bridges and paths. The city is also a pioneer in brownfield redevelopment, cleaning up and refurbishing old industrial sites.

Presents news briefs related to environmental protection and policy in the U.S. as of July 2003. Health effects of traffic-generated pollution; Details of the citizen suit filed by environmental organizations against Georgia Power; Scenes in the video filmed by Ben Gregoria that persuaded a hog-slaughtering plant in east Alabama to shut down in the middle of a civil trial.

This article presents an interview with Robert Bullard, a sociology professor at Clark Atlanta University in Georgia. Bullard is the founder of the school's Environmental Justice Resource Center and the writer and editor of 12 books, from 1990's "Dumping in Dixie: Race, Class," and "Environmental Quality to the Quest for Environmental Justice: Human Rights," and "Politics of Pollution," an anthology published this fall by Sierra Club Books. His eyes were first opened to environmental discrimination in 1978, when he helped his attorney wife collect data for a lawsuit against a company that had sited a landfill in an African-American Houston community. He says that Hurricane Katrina supports what environmental-justice activists have been saying for more than three decades. When one connects the dots and look at the facts, it's irrefutable that all communities are not created equal. If a community happens to be poor, or a community of color, or located on the wrong side of the tracks, it gets unequal protection.

This article presents letters to the editor referencing articles and topics discussed previously in the journal "Sierra." The article "Can Technology Save the Planet?," published in the July-August issue of the journal, stated that the problems confronting humanity are fundamentally attitudinal. As the authors of the book "The Quantum and the Lotus," wrote that, science does not produce wisdom. While the insights of science can help people change the world, only human thought and concern can enlighten people about the path they should follow in life. The article "The Perfect Fix," on agricultural items was criticized. Most could have been written by agribusiness corporations. For example, while there are some advantages to no-till farming, it is a way of growing grains that is totally dependent on toxic chemicals. Moreover, nutrient contamination from no-till agriculture remains a significant problem. Jonathan Rowe's naive anti-market diatribe, "The Common Good" published in the July-August issue of the journal, blames markets for society's unwillingness to circumscribe not only the market but also political and corporate power with rules that protect basic social values.

The article claims that the U.S. administration is weakening the national environmental laws of the country. Industry-funded polemicists and politicians who deride national standards as inefficient command and control approaches argue that problems can be better solved at the local level. The federal government has slashed spending on clean water, even though the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency estimates that the nation's sewage-treatment facilities need $390 billion over the next 20 years. U.S. President George W. Bush and the U.S. Congress have tried to give responsibility to whatever level of government is least likely to do a good job. The Bush Administration and the radical right in the U.S. Congress are trying to destroy modern pollution control, while trying to strip citizens of their power to stop them. When California required that automakers to sell zero-emission vehicles in the state, the administration and auto companies sued. Some of the judges on the federal bench dispute the right of citizens to challenge the lax enforcement of environmental laws in court.

Presents an update on issues and events concerning environmental protection in the U.S. as of March 2005. Benefits of the rules on slant drilling implemented by the National Park Service for oil well operators in Texas in 2001; Parks affected by the rules; Launch of the conservation project of the Upper Columbia River Group of the Northern Rockies Chapter.

Features the contributions of several Republican leaders to environmental protection in the U.S. Establishment of the U.S. Forest Service by former U.S. President Theodore Roosevelt; Bills on the protection of the environment signed and encouraged into law by former U.S. President Richard Nixon; Contributions of Connecticut Representative Nancy Johnson to a bill that would designate the coastal plain of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge as wilderness.

Comments on the environmental protection policy of the government of U.S. President George W. Bush. Views on the State of the Union message of Bush for 2003; Opinion on the 1972 Clean Water Act; Proposal of the government to leave environmental decisions to the market and to individual states.

The article reports on the proposal to build a 824-acre training base by the Blackwater USA, near Potrero, California. The projects plans to build shooting ranges and other facilities that could impact critical wildlife habitat. The Sierra Club's San Diego Chapter and other environmentalist groups are concerned that the project could contaminate the local aquifer and are working up to respond to the environmental impact report. According to Jeanette Hartman, club member, the place is an enormous agricultural source.

The article reports on the result of the survey conducted by "Seventeen" magazine on environmental issues in the U.S. The survey, which is titled "Do You Really Care About the Environment?," was targeted at teenagers. Accordingly, about 73% teen girls claimed that they care by turning off the water while brushing their teeth as well as by using cell phone instead of laptops or personal computers in sending messages. On the other hand, a group of high school boys affirmed that they established a charity that provides low-income families with compact fluorescent lightbulbs.

The author reflects on the growing number of magazines that feature environmental issues. He states that he was surprised by the act of several publications, noting that saving the planet was not really their primary concern. He further asserts that the growing concern of businesses on having a healthy planet has somehow helped in disseminating its importance.

The article presents information on the rise of public awareness about environmental protection in China. It informs that Chinese government official Peng Bin and seven other Chinese delegates visited the Sierra Club's headquarters in the summer of 2007 after completing month-long internships with U.S. environmental organizations, including the Sierra Club. It is stated that the trip was part of an exchange program that encourages the public's burgeoning role in shaping Chinese environmental policy. It is stated that fishermen sued paper mills and chemical factories that were fouling waterways in Hebei Province, China. It is stated that citizen activism also helped persuade the Chinese government to ban commercial logging in 140 million acres of forest.

The article presents the study on trout and other salmonids being contaminated by mercury. The pollution of mercury in more than 600 rivers and streams across 12 western states was established by the Environmental Protection Agency and Oregon State University's researchers. Their study tested 2,700 fish which showed detectable levels of the neurotoxin which were above the limit of what is safe to eat. Inadequate mercury pollution regulation of the Bush administration is blamed for the concern on health and environment.

The article reports on the progress of cases in favor of upholding environmental laws and regulations ignored or circumvented by the Bush administration. Two landmark outcomes involved the decision of the court to vote in favor of the ruling to classify greenhouse gases as pollutants and the need for power companies to secure Environmental Protection Agency permits for renovation work. The spring of 2007 also marked the decision to rule mountaintop removal mining as a violation of the Clean Water Act.

Several letters to the editor are presented in response to articles in previous issues including "Hall of Fame," "Green Streets" and "Leave No Child Inside," in the July/August 2006 issue.

The article focuses on the growing problem of electronic-waste in the U.S. Since computers and other electronics contain lots of heavy metals and chemicals, dumping them is a serious concern in moat countries. Monitors can contain four to eight pounds of lead each, and once one goes into a landfill, it can sink to the bottom and the lead can get into the water. Large electronics companies are now making new products with less metals. According to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, only about 10 percent of obsolete computers are currently recycled in the country.

The article comments on issues related to environmental protection in the U.S. According to a nationwide poll in August 2006, 56 percent of Americans think the U.S. government is doing too little to protect the environment. Growing awareness of global warming and rising energy prices appear to be driving the U.S. president's popularity down. The U.S. Department of Transportation said that it would craft tighter rules for petroleum pipelines following BP's 200,000-gallon oil spill on Alaska's North Slope in March 2005. In 2006, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration has dropped the phrase "to understand and protect our home planet" from the mission statement it uses in planning and budget documents.

The article discusses what U.S. Congressmen are doing about issues related to environmental protection. The popularity of the U.S. Congress has dipped below that of the U.S. president's because of the long and growing list of environmental crises needing urgent attention. However, doing something serious about such issues would discomfit the same corporate interests that put politicians in power. Senator Conrad Burns made it clear that nothing meaningful will be done to fund needed to keep the country's water pollution free. Representative Charles Taylor promised that U.S. Forest Service resources would not be redirected to protecting rural communities on his watch.

The article discusses a debate on the regularization of carbon dioxide (CO2) that contributes to global warming. The research institute, Competitive Enterprise Institute (CIE), of the United States has recently released TV ads built around the slogan "Carbon dioxide: they call it pollution, we call it life." Through the ads CIE has tried to derail the regularization of carbon dioxide. CIE has conveyed in their ads that CO2 is a gas that human beings breathe out and plants breathe in. Shortly after this debate the U.S. Supreme Court has agreed to hear a challenge brought by states to compel the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to regulate carbon dioxide as a harmful pollutant.

The article presents news briefs related to environmental protection. In a bid to protect environment, Bank of America Corp. has decided to give $3,000 checks to employees in Boston, Los Angeles, and Charlotte, North Carolina, who buy a hybrid car. The U.S. publishing company Random House Inc. has announced that by 2010, 30 percent of the paper in its books will be recycled. Michigan governor Jennifer Granholm has ordered new rules that will cut mercury emissions by 90 percent by 2015.

The article presents information on various cost-effective and environmental friendly initiatives being taken by different companies. Sunny California will soon institute the largest solar-energy program in the U.S., providing $2.9 billion of incentives for homeowners and businesses to install solar-electric systems. The California Solar Initiative could reduce the cost of solar arrays by up to $7,000 per home, and 10 percent of its money will be earmarked for low-income and affordable housing. The program could also add 3,000 megawatts of power to the state's grid in the next 11 years. The nation's largest drugstore chain has a prescription for clean energy. Partnering with a Denver-based solar firm, Walgreens Co. will install solar-electric systems in 112 stores and two distribution centers in California and New Jersey over the next two years. This year, 7-Eleven Japan Co. will save about 220 million sheets of paper by switching to paperless accounting. Using electronic data for most invoices, packing slips, and accounting records is expected to save the company nearly $12 million.

This article reports that Sierra Club owes its success to honest, open, accountable government. Without which, it is just a handful of activists demonstrating on street corners a few steps ahead of the police, which is the current state of the environmental movement in much of the world. It's no accident that one of the cornerstones of modern environmentalism is a law that promotes open government, the U.S. National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA). NEPA requires that major projects on federal land, like dams, construction, logging, and oil drilling, be disclosed in advance, that their potential environmental impacts be tallied, and that the public have an opportunity to respond in hearings or, if necessary, in court. The law has never been particularly controversial, but even so the right wing of the Republican Party has targeted it for elimination. This campaign is being led by U.S. Representative Richard Pombo. As head of the House Resources Committee, Pombo put together a congressional task force, chaired by Representative Cathy McMorris, to hold field hearings on improving NEPA. The first session was held last spring in Spokane, Washington.

This article presents news briefs related to environmental issues in the U.S. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA)'s draft strategic plan on environmental justice has seemingly found a way to make the problems of poor communities vanish, Environmental justice, the agency says, means applying environmental policies fairly, regardless of race, color, national origin, or income. It sounds great, but the revision ignores the fact that the poor and people of color are disproportionately affected by issues like air pollution and hazardous waste, which was acknowledged in an executive order issued by former U.S. President Bill Clinton in 1994. The EPA denies that the new plan violates the order. Two years ago, scientists at the U.S. Bureau of Land Management and the Fish and Wildlife Service found that a new set of proposed rules would make it harder to limit grazing on overused land, harming wildlife, vegetation, and endangered species. But after higher-ups finished with the report, the warnings disappeared. An environmental impact statement released this summer concludes that the rules might even be beneficial for wildlife.

The article focuses on the efforts of a U.S. based organization named Sierra Club working for environmental protection and awareness. It reports that the members of the Tehipite and Kern-Kaweah Chapters of the Sierra Club have been tireless in defending 328,000 acre Giant Sequoia National Monument. The Club and other groups sued the Forest Service, charging that the federation's management plan allows extensive logging in previously protected old-growth habitat in the name of wildfire prevention. According to Carla Cloer, chair of the Club's Sequoia Task Force and a Tulare County resident who has championed sequoia preservation for 25 years, this plan specifically targets trees big enough to sell, undermining the whole purpose of the monument.

The article informs that in U.S. President George W. Bush's first term, more than a third of his nominees for federal appeals courts and the Court of Federal Claims had worked as energy-industry lawyers and lobbyists. This time around, the National Association of Manufacturers has launched a multi-million-dollar campaign to boost the president's picks--seven of whom, including William Myers, were rejected last term as too extreme. Vermont Law School professor Patrick Parenteau foresees "very bleak times" ahead. Without a judicial commitment to environmental law, he says, deadlines don't get met, species don't get listed, environmental impact statements don't get written, wetlands don't get saved. The nonpartisan Environmental Law Institute found that, in cases dealing with the National Environmental Policy Act, Bush's first-term appointments to federal courts ruled against environmental challenges 83 percent of the time. It is reported that some Bush appointees and nominees espouse an extreme philosophy known as New Federalism, which rejects the U.S. Constitution's Commerce Clause as the basis of federal environmental law.

Presents an update on environmental conservation efforts in Brazil and Mexico as of March 2005. Launch of an environmental police training camp in Brazil in November 2004; Budget set by the Mexican government for the purchase of acres of tropical forest from private landholder; Contributions of the U.S.-based environmental group Nature Conservancy to the project of the Mexican government.

Examines the environmental policies of U.S. President George W. Bush. Issues concerning the reports of the Environmental Protection Agency on air-pollution reduction; Consequences of the partnership between the government and the American Chemistry Council for a study on the impact of pesticides on children; Status of the protection for northwest salmon and steel-head habitat.

Reports on the new laws for luxury liners that would protect the coastal waters of the U.S. as of July 2004. Law which would expand the scope of the no discharge zones in the coastal waters of the U.S.; Adoption of a mandatory dumping-disclosure law in Alaska in 2001; Acceptance of a voluntary cleanup agreement by Washington state in April 2004.

Presents updates on environmental protection in the U.S. as of March 2003. Withdrawal of BP from Arctic Power; Move of the Ninth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals to overrule the decision to open the Idaho wildlands to logging; Details of the proposed Mammoth Yosemite Airport in Mammoth Lakes, California.

Reports on the plan in Ontario, Canada that will increase protected lands. Comments from Canadian Premier Mike Harris; System that permits mineral exploration; Plans in exchange for losing access to the protected parks.