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Shana Campbell Jones | March 12, 2009

Let the Truth Trickle Up: Attack Science, Perchlorate, and Babies

The truth hurts. Some of us accept the truth; some of us ignore it. All too often, industry-sponsored scientists take another approach to the truth: attack.   A recent spat over a study finding that perchlorate blocks iodine in breast milk is an object lesson in what CPR Member Scholar Tom McGarity calls “attack science.” […]

Matt Shudtz | March 11, 2009

Federal Science Policy, Obama-Style

Monday was a good day for our nation’s science policy.  At the same time he announced that the federal government will abandon misguided restrictions on stem cell research, President Obama unveiled an effort to promote a sea change in the way political appointees will treat the science that informs so many federal policies.   In […]

William Buzbee | March 10, 2009

The Supreme Court’s Decision on Standing in Summers vs. Earth Island Institute

On March 3rd, the Supreme Court issued its much awaited decision in Summers v. Earth Island Institute.  This was the latest in a series of cases dating to the early 1990s where the central question has concerned citizen standing: will the courts allow a citizen to stand before a court to argue that government or […]

Robert L. Glicksman | March 10, 2009

The Supreme Court’s Decision on Standing in Summers vs. Earth Island Institute, Part Two

(CPR Member Scholar Robert L. Glicksman replies below to CPR Member Scholar William Buzbee’s post on the Summers vs. Earth Island Institute decision.)   The decision in Summers represents the latest salvo in a continuing battle between those Supreme Court Justices who view the function of standing doctrine as ensuring that litigation before the federal […]

Matthew Freeman | March 9, 2009

McGarity columns on Wyeth vs. Levine Preemption Case

CPR Member Scholar Thomas McGarity had op-eds over the weekend in three Texas newspapers — the Dallas Morning News, Houston Chronicle and Austin American-Statesman.  His topic is Wyeth vs. Levine, last week’s blockbuster case from the Supreme Court, in which the Court rejected the Bush Administration’s multi-year effort to use the federal regulatory process as […]

Yee Huang | March 9, 2009

Stand by Your Tap

  In the decade between 1994 and 2004, the bottled water industry enjoyed a meteoric rise as consumers flocked to their product, paying more per gallon than gasoline and neglecting a virtually free source of water – the tap.  Bottled water drinkers formed fierce allegiances to their favorite brands, elevating bottled water beyond a beverage […]

Rena Steinzor | March 6, 2009

The People’s Agents: Rescuing the Occupational Safety and Health Administration

The Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) is the most maligned and least respected federal agency with responsibility for protecting people’s lives. Now that Hilda Solis has been confirmed as Secretary of the Department of Labor, we can only hope that a new OSHA administrator with a strong stomach, an iron will, and a “yes […]

Holly Doremus | March 5, 2009

Bad Endangered Species Act Rules Not Yet Undone

The following is cross-posted by permission from Legal Planet.   The Bush administration’s last-minute ESA (non)consultation rule is getting almost as much attention now as it did during the comment period. Then, the administration reportedly received more than 300,000 comments, the vast majority of them negative. Those objections were, of course, quickly swept under the […]

Matthew Freeman | March 4, 2009

Change on the Way for Superfund

After suffering years of neglect at the hands of the Bush Administration and conservatives in Congress, Superfund may be on the verge of springing back to life. That at least is the objective of a new proposal from President Obama, included in his recent budget outline, calling for the reinstatement of a tax on polluting […]