Kate Walsh on Offshore Oil Drilling

Kate Walsh, who plays Dr. Addison Montgomery on Private Practice and formerly Grey's Anatomy, is in DC this week boosting Oceana's anti-offshore-drilling campaign on the anniversary of the BP spill. Here she is in front of the Capitol, explaining her support of Oceana's campaign to end offshore drilling at yesterday's rally.

If I wasn't already a fan, then this interview would have convinced me:

Your Health Just Isn't Worth it :: new PSA from NRDC

So funny! This was definitely filmed in DC ... makes me smile:)



NRDC placed the ad on the Politico, Colbert Report & The Daily Show websites.

The PSA was created in reaction to the American Petroleum Institute's campaign against raising taxes on oil & gas companies.

You can participate in NRDC's campaign on this issue here, by sending an email to your Members of Congress.

be the one.

I saw this in Whitney's latest HeadCount Gulf Coast Restoration e-newsletter.



Sign the petition here.

From what I read on the website, this seems to be a project of the nonpartisan nonprofit Women of the Storm.

Seriously?

I finally read Rolling Stone's June 24th piece The Spill, the Scandal and the President today. I pulled a few sentences from the article, and added the bullet points and the graphics.

* Obama unveiled an aggressive push for new offshore drilling in the Arctic, the Southeastern seaboard and new waters in the Gulf, closer to Florida than ever before.



* Obama and Salazar appeared together at Andrews Air Force Base on March 31st to introduce the plan. The stagecraft was pure Rove in its technicolor militaristic patriotism.



* Two days later, Obama issued this statement:

"It turns out, by the way, that oil rigs today generally don't cause spills. They are technologically very advanced."

* Eighteen days later, on the eve of the 40th anniversary of Earth Day, the Deepwater Horizon rig went off like a bomb.



Hmm.

Offshore drilling? NOT THE ANSWER. It's time to speak up.

Adrian Greiner's new Bluefin Tuna PSA

Received this in an email from Oceana today. I don't watch Entourage, but still recognized actor Adrian Grenier's face:



Bluefin tuna are the most valuable fish in the world, coveted for their fatty belly meat, used in sushi as toro or maguro. With a single bluefin tuna fetching more than $100,000 in a Tokyo auction, the incentives are overwhelming for fishermen to overfish the population beyond recovery.

And now the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico — one of only two spawning sites for bluefin in the world — may push them even closer to the brink.

Answers?
* Use the Sustainable Seafood Guide, by the Monterey Bay Aquarium - print & put in your wallet, or check out the app.

* Do what you can in your personal life to lessen our demand for oil (drilling.)

NO ONE has been testing for dispersants in Florida's coastal waters - Until Now

This past Sunday beach goers in Northwest Florida (directly south of Alabama) saw a sheen on the water. People who entered the water reported health concerns including coughing up blood, shortness of breath, and skin and eye irritations.

No one has been testing these waters for traces of the dispersants that BP is using to clean up the spill. The agencies who are testing these waters for oil are not publishing the results of their tests.

The Chapter Chair (President) of Surfrider's Emerald Coast Chapter spoke with Surgeon General Regina Benjamin about this during a July 15 press conference in Pensacola, Florida. Here's a video of that conversation -



The Emerald Coast Chapter has decided not to wait any longer - they've decided to test the waters for oil and for traces of dispersants themselves. They will publish the results.

Due to the severity of the spill, the tests may need to be conducted for the next 5 - 10 years. The cost for testing dispersants is about $350/per test and has to be shipped to a lab in Washington State. Additionally, oil testing is about $80/per sample. The Emerald Coast Chapter is entirely volunteer-run and is self-financing the tests. You can make a contribution here:

Music from the Gulf

From Monday's meeting of the White House Oil Spill Commission. This public comment was given at the end of the meeting by Drew Landry, native of Lafayette, Louisiana.



Here's another song by New Orleans' Hot 8 Brass Band called "Sorry Ain't Enough No More."



Grabbed both from this Grist post.

UnF--k The Gulf

The longer I watched this video, the more I liked it. No idea if it's gone viral or not - I grabbed it from Grist.

Oil Spill Charity "F-Bomb-A-Thon" from UnF--kTheGulf.com on Vimeo.

More details here.

Laird Hamilton joins Surfrider's call - No More Drilling

Other sources of energy are out there. Whether the oil companies are gonna go find them is the question.

Anderson Cooper interviewed Jimmy Buffet the other day.

Part 1:



Part 2:

Recap of Yesterday's Live YouTube Chat with BP Exec

PBS promo spot for yesterday's chat that provides the scoop for how it worked:



The full transcript of the chat:



To read it in print, instead of the above video, go here.

BP trying to save $ (again) instead of cleaning up their mess

Animal Shelters @ 5x their Capacity in the Gulf

Coincidentally, this was the local news station that I sometimes watched when I lived in Washington, DC:)

Talk about it. Don't let this story go away.

I guess it's OK for Kids to Play in, but not Wildlife

Filmed during the afternoon of June 23rd on a Florida beach:



Grabbed it from this Fast Company June 24 article.

Join "Hands Across the Sand" - Worldwide, Sat June 26

Tens of thousands of people who support clean energy and oppose offshore drilling are expected to participate in more than 700 Hands Across the Sand events this Saturday, June 26.

The events are open to everyone - no RSVP required!

Events will take place in all 50 U.S. states, the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico, and more than 20 countries, beginning in Auckland, New Zealand and work its way across global time zones finishing on the North Shore of Kauai, Hawaii.

A complete list of events, all of which begin at 11 a.m. Saturday, can be found here.

Some of the groups supporting Hands Across the Sand:
350.org, 1Sky, Audubon, Alaska Wilderness League, Center for Biological Diversity, Clean Water Action, Defenders of Wildlife, Earth Day Network, Endangered Species Coalition, Energy Action Coalition, Environment America, Friends of the Earth, Greenpeace, MoveOn.org, Oceana, Ocean Conservancy, Rainforest Action Network, Sierra Club, Southern Alliance for Clean Energy, and Surfrider Foundation.

OK Oil Guys, talk your way out of This One

Thanks, Jon Stewart for picking up on this Mother Jones story that reached Facebook circulation yesterday.

Excerpt from Mother Jones:

BP's 583-page Gulf plan, last updated in June 2009, included references to how to protect walruses and sea lions, which, as US Rep Ed Markey noted, "have not called the Gulf home for 3 million years." The plan also included the phone number of a sea turtle expert who has been dead for 5 years.

Watch Jon Stewart's coverage here. HILARIOUS.

Like Dr. Atkins, you could still use his diet and cut down on carbs, but I wouldn't list him as your emergency contact. - Jon Stewart

BP CEO Tony Hayward : The Man Who Wasn't There. For Anything.

This video was created by Ben Craw. I grabbed it from this Huffington Post story.

Commedy Central will fork over cash to Gulf Restoration if you Tweet ...

Comedy Central is donating $1 to the Colbert Nation's Gulf of America Fund every time someone re-tweets @stephenathome's message "in honor of oil soaked birds tweets are now gurgles."

In order to do this, you must be registered on Twitter, and you must be a follower of @stephenathome. Then go here and re-tweet this message.

Check out Colbert discussing the campaign - hilarious - as always.

Member of the US House of Representatives apologizes to ... BP?

Republican US House Representative Joe Barton of Texas:



For more see this Huffington Post story.