Kate Sheppard

NECESSARY CAVEAT TO THE TEDIOUSNESS OF SPEECHIFICATING. Evo Morales was the noted exception to this morning’s rather mundane mitigation discussion. The Bolivian president uniformly condemned capitalism as “the worst enemy of humanity,” one that will never allow for actual solutions to our climate change problem. The basic idea behind his five-minute speech was that as […]

MORE TALKING ABOUT TALKING. I’m back in the press room waiting for Al Gore’s lunchtime speech to the delegates to be broadcast on the big ole’ teevee (we weren’t invited to this event). So here’s what gets me about today’s goings on. I just spent two hours listening to leaders make passionate speeches about the […]

TALKING ABOUT TALKING. Matt, Ezra, and Brian Beutler have expressed some cynicism about today’s events, and I can’t say I blame them. Last night the assorted bloggers gathered to take in today’s spectacle met with some important folks-who-know-and-do-stuff at various divisions of the UN, and all of us were clearly bringing with us a certain […]

BAN LEADER. UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon started off Monday’s summit on climate change – the first of its kind for the UN — by attempting to reaffirm the importance of the UN in crafting a post-Kyoto plan. In his opening remarks, he made not-so-subtle jabs at the Bush administration’s attempts to undermine today’s meeting with […]

STARTING THE GLOBAL CONVERSATION. Ezra and I are blogging live from the U.N. this morning, where there will be high-level meetings today to start the global conversation on a post-Kyoto plan. This comes on the eve of the official kick-off to the 62nd General Assembly, and at the head of a week one could rightfully […]

“MY OPINIONS ON THIS HAVE EVOLVED SIGNIFICANTLY.” Via Feministing, San Diego’s Republican mayor, Jerry Sanders, was expected to veto legislation supporting gay marriage this week. Yesterday, he decided he couldn’t go through with it: My opinions on this have evolved significantly, as I think the opinions of millions of Americans from all walks of life […]

DINNER DATE I WISH I’D BEEN INVITED TO. In which Bill O’Reilly learns that black people eat in restaurants, too. Via Media Matters, we learn that O’Reilly recently dined with Al Sharpton at Sylvia’s in Harlem, and reported back: “I couldn’t get over the fact that there was no difference between Sylvia’s restaurant and any […]

CANDIDATES ON JENA 6. An illustration of the point I was trying to make last night that I failed to include was a comparison of statements from presidential candidates about the Jena 6 case. You don’t have to look much further than these to see the different standard to which Obama would be held if […]

IT IS BLACK AND WHITE. As Dana noted, mainstream press coverage of the Jena 6 was pitiful at best, until it finally hit the major-media radar this week . And recent coverage seems to have disproportionately focused on Jesse Jackson‘s (possible) accusation that Barack Obama has been “acting like he’s white” by not coming out […]

WAXMAN GETS HYPE, SENDS LETTERS. Brian Beutler reported yesterday on Rep. Henry Waxman’s letter to the EPA calling them out for ignoring the Supreme Court’s ruling in Massachusetts v. EPA. Yesterday he also sent a letter to Condoleezza Rice, in his capacity as chairman of the Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, demanding that the […]