tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-158474602008-07-03T23:55:01.699-04:00Beth Wellingtonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318537209567202826noreply@blogger.comBlogger191125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-15847460.post-1099671468346049522008-06-30T11:25:00.026-04:002008-06-30T18:34:32.071-04:00

Photo by Blue Ridge Earth First! For more, see coverage on Flickr. For more information, contact Hannah Morgan at 434-960-2080 or Hilary Lufkin at 804-357-4826. Twenty non-violent activists were protesting Dominion Energy's promotion of new coal and nuclear facilities as solutions to climate change this morning when Richmond police swept in at 7:30 am to roust them. Five Blue Ridge Earth

Beth Wellingtonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318537209567202826noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-15847460.post-89443950150036181132008-06-27T18:01:00.004-04:002008-06-30T17:14:33.156-04:00

Carroll Muffett, deputy campaigns director for Greenpeace USA, turned the tables on industry astroturf groups when his organization formed the benign sounding ""Tomorrow's Energy Today," in order to sponsor a table Coal USA 2007 June 26-7, 2008 with the the biggest wigs from 170 energy companies sitting in a single room and sharing their profit-fueled dreams for a coal-powered future.The name

Beth Wellingtonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318537209567202826noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-15847460.post-68867759576204897842008-06-22T13:57:00.006-04:002008-06-22T14:51:50.778-04:00

The graduation included accolades from faculty and their rendition of "Somewhere after Massage School" followed by diplomas an a pot luck lunch in the picnic shelter at Nellies Cave Park. Then I had to take my leave to go write my submission for llrx on FISA. Tomorrow, some folks from Mountian Justice are driving down to Wise County to attend the Citizen Air Pollution Control Board hearing on

Beth Wellingtonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318537209567202826noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-15847460.post-50897272028397889032008-06-21T17:11:00.002-04:002008-06-21T20:01:58.735-04:00

After opening April 4 in the UK, Son of Rambow started last night at the Lyric, and I'll go to the 7 o'clock show and then volunteer at the concession stand for the later show. The film is written and directed by Garth Jennings (who also directed the 2005 Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy) of the production company Hammer and Tongs. Jennings tells Andrea Hubert in an interview with him and

Beth Wellingtonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318537209567202826noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-15847460.post-69739832799084806872008-06-20T18:51:00.010-04:002008-06-22T18:59:53.941-04:00

For almost six years after Sept. 11, 2001, telecommunications companies allegedly helped the National Security Agency eavesdrop on American phone and computer lines without FISA Court warrants. The Electronic Frontier Foundation and the ACLU are coordinating the 47 remaining suits filed as a result. After unsuccessfully trying to get the matter thrown out of court, the companies have spent a

Beth Wellingtonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318537209567202826noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-15847460.post-60258202780069752522008-06-16T18:48:00.004-04:002008-06-17T14:32:04.841-04:00

Today, on the way into work, I was listening to Diane Rehm interview on the McClatchy series and thanks to Dwight Rousu at NewsTrust, I didn't even need to look up the link. The first installment is: "Many Gitmo detainees had flimsy ties to terror: Little or no threat, dozens or more men were imprisoned at the Guantánamo Bay detention camp on the basis of revenge, bounty payments, or fabricated

Beth Wellingtonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318537209567202826noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-15847460.post-82787081522805673622008-06-14T17:55:00.004-04:002008-06-14T19:00:43.738-04:00

Suzanne and I are heading out to Sun Music Hall for the last dance of the season until September. My fellow BURG member Shawn Brenneman plays piano with Jonathan Thielen on fiddle in 2/3's of House Red and caller George Segebade from Greensboro calling.

Beth Wellingtonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318537209567202826noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-15847460.post-92097397178634839542008-06-12T12:17:00.018-04:002008-06-12T18:27:22.759-04:00

Cartoon by Chicago Tribune's Dick Locher (email, bio), the 1983 Pulitzer Prize winner. What's causing the pain at the pumps? Like me, you may have read the oil companies, the Bush Administration and the Heritage Foundation's arguments that demand from China and India is responsible. You may have read Thomas Friedman, who suggest on April 30 that tax abatement on carbon fuel v.s

Beth Wellingtonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318537209567202826noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-15847460.post-41801907225526107622008-06-11T17:39:00.001-04:002008-06-14T18:00:51.033-04:00

June 10, as part of its Communicating with Congress project, the Congressional Management Foundation (CMF) released a report, How the Internet Has Changed Citizen Engagement. finding that Almost half of all voting-age Americans contacted a Member of Congress in the last five years – often at the urging of a third party – to support, oppose or learn more about issues of interest to them. However,

Beth Wellingtonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318537209567202826noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-15847460.post-49480018864715549992008-06-10T16:28:00.000-04:002008-06-14T17:36:21.484-04:00

Hat tip to OMB Watch, which informed readers of its participation in a coalition of groups "committed to both civil liberties and effective intelligence-gathering," that sent a letter June 9 to members of Congress setting out problems in the FISA Legislation proposed by Senator Bond. (R-MO), which may be Jay Rockefeller (D-WV) "solution, too. I'll need to check. You may remember Bond from his

Beth Wellingtonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318537209567202826noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-15847460.post-5049229458871653532008-06-08T23:39:00.002-04:002008-07-03T23:55:01.766-04:00

John Passacantando, Executive Director of of Greenpeace: Nuclear power is a dirty and dangerous distraction from real global warming solutions. See: http://www.greenpeace.org/raw/content/international/press/reports/briefing-nuclear-not-answer-apr07.pdf

Beth Wellingtonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318537209567202826noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-15847460.post-82693468015099643552008-06-07T18:59:00.000-04:002008-06-11T12:15:13.556-04:00

The film has gotten mixed reviews. Am going to see it at the Lyric tommorrow after selling popcorn last night. Will let you know what I think. Chiwetel Ejiofor won the 2000 London Evening Standard Theatre Award for Outstanding Newcomer for his performance in British playwright Joe Penhall's Blue/Orange which was reviewed by Philip Fisher, who interestingly tied the performance back to Mamet:

Beth Wellingtonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318537209567202826noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-15847460.post-12742918153970750892008-06-06T23:30:00.003-04:002008-07-03T23:38:35.115-04:00

"Bush Inflated Threat From Iraq's Banned Weapons, Report Says" by Joby Warrick and Walter Pincus (WaPo, 6/6/08, p. A3) President Bush and top administration officials repeatedly exaggerated what they knew about Iraq's weapons and its ties to terrorist groups as the White House pressed its case for war against Iraq, the Senate intelligence committee said yesterday in a long-awaited report.

Beth Wellingtonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318537209567202826noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-15847460.post-1718196937348291362008-06-05T11:59:00.000-04:002008-06-11T12:16:15.002-04:00

Cartoon of July , 2004 by Tim Dolighan (site, email, bio) Currently, the National Academy of Sciences is looking at the health repercussions of lacking health insurance coverage, but back in 2004, it noted, Although America leads the world in spending on health care, it is the only wealthy, industrialized nation that does not ensure that all citizens have coverage. So on June 2, I was

Beth Wellingtonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318537209567202826noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-15847460.post-75012850714934149572008-06-04T18:59:00.000-04:002008-06-11T12:14:23.799-04:00

Does the Bush Administration distrust labor unions more than employers? Unions report their financial information directly to the Office of Labor Management Standards(OLMS), while employers keep their records on site, which means that the Wage and Hour Division has to visit each indivual employer in order to enforce the laws it administers. And yet, the regulatory budgets for the two

Beth Wellingtonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318537209567202826noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-15847460.post-61940402840136874012008-06-03T23:05:00.002-04:002008-07-03T23:26:47.213-04:00

According to Juliet Eilperin, writing in "Climate Findings Were Distorted, Probe Finds Appointees in NASA Press Office Blamed" (WaPo, 6/3/08, p. A2) James E. Hansen, who directs NASA's Goddard Institute for Space Studies and has campaigned publicly for more stringent limits on greenhouse gases that contribute to global warming, told The Post and the New York Times in September 2006 that he had

Beth Wellingtonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318537209567202826noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-15847460.post-59437362134747734902008-06-02T18:59:00.000-04:002008-06-11T12:12:48.041-04:00

SEJ's 18th annual conference, hosted by Virginia Tech will take place Wednesday-Sunday, October 15-19, 2008 at the Hotel Roanoke. Here's the agenda and the link for updates. Pre-conference boot camp: Michigan State University's Knight Center for Environmental Journalism will include sessions on computer-assisted reporting, investigative techniques, writing, ethics, and topical issues. It

Beth Wellingtonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318537209567202826noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-15847460.post-76995198052263959822008-06-01T14:30:00.006-04:002008-06-27T18:36:50.060-04:00

Poster of CNN Democratic Debate from Coal is Dirty article of May 31, Clean Coal = Greenwash by Kate Rooth, who is active on Greenpeace's Stop Greenwashing project. DeSmog Project, Rainforest Action Network and Greenpeace USA have teamed up to shed light on the coal industry's attempts to shape public opinion through their website, Coal is Dirty. The May 31 entry, while not aspiring for balance,

Beth Wellingtonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318537209567202826noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-15847460.post-15446701864092060452008-05-31T23:59:00.040-04:002008-06-11T12:13:24.973-04:00

What's Behind Bush's Short Notice on Deadline for ...The VisitorMcClellan: I Became What I Wanted to ChangeWeisberg Posits McCain Does Best as UnderdogSidney Pollack Gone Too Soon at 73McCain: Webb's GI Educational Benefits Bill will ...Memorial Day at Poplar ForestU.S. Digital Divide ReduxPost Global on the Internet in the Middle EastStanford Prof B.J. Fogg Promotes Peace through Soc...Prison

Beth Wellingtonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318537209567202826noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-15847460.post-28623534817541928382008-05-31T17:14:00.003-04:002008-06-11T12:09:46.585-04:00

Charlie Savage and Robert Pear in today's NYT "Administration Moves to Avert a Late Rules Rush," report that on May 9, Joshua B. Bolten, the White House chief of staff, issued a memorandum to agency heads without public announcement that they must propose any new regulations by June 1 and finish final regulations by November 1. Mr. Bolten’s order will affect only potential rules controlled by

Beth Wellingtonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318537209567202826noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-15847460.post-16095700104966042702008-05-30T18:47:00.004-04:002008-05-31T17:14:02.440-04:00

Photo by JoJo Whildon, Overture Films, of Richard Jenkins (maybe most famous for playing the dead father in HBO's Six Feet Under) left, and Haaz Sleiman as his houseguest in The Visitor, written and directed by Tom McCarthy. Tonight at the Lyric, I'll be selling popcorn (and drama/comedy masks from the Chocolate Spike--who orders the Reese's Cups, anyway?) I'll let you know what I think

Beth Wellingtonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318537209567202826noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-15847460.post-50281324334623531152008-05-29T18:49:00.006-04:002008-05-29T19:04:47.972-04:00

ABC News has posted the transcript of White House Correspondent Martha Raddatz's interview with former White House Press Secretary and George Bush aide Scott McClellan about his book, What Happened: Inside the Bush White House and What's Wrong with Washington, (PublicAffairs, May 2008) which has attracted a firestorm of protests from his fellows in the Bush Administration. (I've deleted out

Beth Wellingtonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318537209567202826noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-15847460.post-80073544140164919392008-05-28T18:45:00.003-04:002008-05-28T19:06:12.733-04:00

Slate Editor and Financial Times columnist Jacob Weisberg's "McCain at Rock Bottom : When his campaign was a mess last summer, he was at his best," in Slate May 27 is adapted from the forward to David Foster Wallace's new book, McCain's Promise: Aboard the Straight Talk Express With John McCain and a Whole Bunch of Actual Reporters, Thinking About Hope (Back Bay Books) due out June 1.

Beth Wellingtonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318537209567202826noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-15847460.post-36618969089929882292008-05-27T18:45:00.007-04:002008-05-27T19:50:36.814-04:00

Photo byTiziana Fabi/Agence France-Presse via Getty Images show Pollack in Rome after a press conference for the last film he directed, Sketches of Frank Gehry (2005). A. O. Scott's New York Times tribute, "Sydney Pollack, Filmmaker New and Old," which is set to run tomorrow, might not have caught my attention, if Google had not listed it as, "A Master of the Mainstream, When It Still Aimed

Beth Wellingtonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318537209567202826noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-15847460.post-19709521743864504032008-05-26T15:43:00.003-04:002008-06-01T16:56:35.886-04:00

I wrote about Jim Webb's (D-VA) Post-9/11 Veterans Educational Assistance Act of 2007 (S. 22) introduced January 4, 2007 in a Veteran's Day entry on November 12, 2007 . Since that time the bill finally had a hearing in the Veterans' Affairs Committee on May 7. Today's Washington Post campaign blog carried an entry about McCain's speech today in honor of Memorial Day in New Mexico which

Beth Wellingtonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13318537209567202826noreply@blogger.com