~Thick and fast they came at last, and more, and more, and more! Chuitna Coal Comment Period Extended The comment period for the petition to make the Chuit River and its tributaries declared unsuitable for coal strip mining has been extended! That means if you had all the best intentions of emailing and saying, “I [...]

[Photo by Nick Hall] Five million viewers (I’m choosing not to think of allof them as fans) tuned in to watch  “Sarah Palin’s Alaska” on The Learning Channel this month.  But as we know, there’s more to Alaska than harassing bears, and clubbing halibut between the eyes.  Many, I’m sure, were taken with Alaska’s spectacular [...]

Pebble Mine is a Trojan Horse from Renewable Resources Coalition on Vimeo. Here is a great video from Renewable Resources Coalition about the proposed Pebble Mine project that is threatening the largest wild salmon fishery on Earth, and some of Alaska’s most important pristine wilderness. When people think of environmental issues in Alaska, they tend [...]

~Boat harbor in Sitka, Alaska This is the second of three installments of my interview with Scott McAdams, the mayor of Sitka, Alaska and Democratic candidate for U.S. Senate. He’ll be running against either Lisa Murkowski, the incumbent Republican, or Joe Miller her much more conservative challenger from Fairbanks. Here, we discuss resource development, fisheries, [...]

Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has written a compelling piece for The Huffington Post that discusses the proposed Pebble Mine, a huge open-pit mine that would sit next to the world’s most pristine and productive salmon fishery. Pebble will mine gold, and copper. Copper, by the way, is highly toxic to fish. So, it’s basically a [...]

We’re #1! Why is it never good when I say that? Less than a year after then-Gov. Sarah Palin (R-Alaska) quit the government to pursue other projects, Alaska leads the way in its debt-to-GDP ratio when its unfunded pension obligations are taken into account, followed by Rhode Island, New Mexico, Ohio and Mississippi. And although [...]

  Thick and fast they came at last, and more and more and more!   The “Sarah Palin Effect” From The Catholic Register- A good education and a good job are no barrier to believing in a personal God, according to a University of Toronto sociologist.   But the American-born professor also warns that a close [...]

Ship Bright started his Fresh[water] ideas for a thirsty planet blog this past July and now has readers in over 113 countries and growing. Inspired and tutored by “Mudflats” herself, Fresh[water] ideas for a thirsty planet is devoted to educating and inspiring people from all walks of life around the world to understand the freshwater [...]

I’d been trying to find a copy of this ad, and finally did.  This is the ad that Tiffany & Co., put in the October issue of the trade magazine National Jeweler. The text reads: PLEASE ASK YOURSELF WHY WOULD TIFFANY & CO. WHOSE LIVELIHOOD DEPENDS ON MINING, BE CONCERNED ABOUT THE PEBBLE MINE AND [...]

The world’s most famous jeweler, Tiffany & Co. is leading the charge of jewelers against the Pebble Mine project in southwest Alaska, which threatens to put a huge open pit gold mine smack in the middle of the largest wild salmon fishery in the world.  Obviously Tiffany & Co. likes gold, and certainly isn’t opposed [...]

[This article is cross-posted at The Huffington Post] A lawsuit was filed today claiming that all Pebble Mine’s state permits violate the Alaska constitution.  Skulduggery surrounding Pebble Mine?  Imagine that. On the receiving end of these legal accusations is the State Department of Natural Resources.  The suit was filed today on behalf of eight communities in the [...]

The mystery of Prop 4 may finally be solved.  Remember Proposition 4?  That was the Clean Water Act that would have prohibited large mines from contaminating salmon fisheries with nasty chemical toxins. And then remember when some mystery reporter popped up at a press conference and said “So by the way Governor, what do you think [...]

Where to begin? Very fitting, considering it’s Muckraker Day, that we should be given what is the equivalent of two enormous entrees of ….. muck from two superior muckrakers.  They’re both so appetizing it’s hard to know which to choose first. (closes eyes, moves index finger in wide circles….and…..squish!)  OK, we’ll start with this one. One [...]