Brad Blog

[This article now cross-published by Salon...]

During remarks at the White House yesterday evening, President Obama offered his opinions on the Treasury Department Inspector General's report [PDF] finding that the IRS used "inappropriate criteria to identify organizations applying for tax-exempt status," in order to review those groups "for indications of significant political campaign intervention."

He described "the misconduct that is uncovered" in the report as "inexcusable". He said that "Americans are right to be angry about it, and I am angry about it," adding that he "will not tolerate this kind of behavior in any agency, but especially in the IRS, given the power that it has and the reach that it has into all of our lives."

Obama then announced that his Treasury Secretary, Jack Lew, had requested and accepted the resignation of the Acting Commissioner of the IRS --- the man who wasn't even in that role during the period in question at the IRS --- "because given the controversy surrounding this audit, it’s important to institute new leadership that can help restore confidence going forward."

That all sounds very tough and decisive(!), but after having slogged through the full IG's report, I'm not sure what "misconduct" the President is actually referring to. That word would seem to imply that someone at the IRS was purposely or criminally misbehaving. They may have been, and further investigation may uncover such behavior, but if there was purposeful or criminal misconduct by anyone in the office, the IG's report doesn't seem to offer any actual evidence of it.

The IG's report offers evidence of much confusion, poor training, unclear directives and what seems to be pretty lousy, or, at least, extremely ineffective management at the department of the IRS tasked with approving or rejecting tax-exempt status for 501(c)(3) "charitable groups" and 501(c)(4) "social welfare organizations". Members of Congress, as well as government watchdog groups have long argued that many of those tax-payer subsidized organizations have abused the privilege and violated the legal restrictions on political activity by such groups. The abuse has been particularly widespread, they argue, in the wake of the Citizens United decision and the flood of largely unrestricted, often completely anonymous money funneled to those types of groups for often purely-political purposes.

Further investigation, including a criminal investigation promised by the Dept. of Justice, may uncover the type of "misconduct" the President claims to be outraged by, but the evidence for it is not found in the IG's report, no matter how much Republicans are currently suggesting the opposite.

Also NOT found in the IG's report:

• Any evidence that "Tea Party" related groups were identified during this process for nefarious reasons;
• Any type of identification, political or otherwise, for the groups whose applications were similarly flagged and delayed ("Tea Party" related groups made up only a minority, approximately 1/3 of the groups whose applications were delayed and held for further examination);
• Any indication or evidence whatsoever that the White House, or anybody outside of the IRS units handling these cases, had anything to do with what happened;
• Any response to the other question the IG's office was tasked by Congress to investigate, namely: "whether existing social welfare organizations are improperly engaged in a substantial, or even predominant, amount of campaign activity."

Allow me to offer some quick details in support of each of the bullet points above...

• No evidence that "Tea Party" groups were targeted for political reasons

The IG's report is unambiguous that words such as "Tea Party" and "Patriots" and "9/12 Project" in the names of groups seeking tax-exempt status were inappropriately used to identify some applicants that might have been inappropriately and illegally using taxpayer-subsidized tax-exempt status for political purposes in violation of the tax code. But there is no evidence offered in the report that those words were chosen to target or disadvantage such groups for political reasons.

For now, while the IG notes that it was inappropriate and unfair to use words in the titles of the organizations as a way of identifying groups that might be participating in illegal campaign activity, the report makes no charge that they were doing so for political reasons.

Again, it could very well end up being the case that those groups were, in fact, targeted for nefarious reasons. Once we learn more about what happened, and about the individuals who decided to use those words to identify groups for further review, we might learn that they really did have it out for those who identified themselves as part of the "Tea Party". But the IG's report doesn't speak to that, offers no evidence to support that very serious assertion, and doesn't even identify the individuals responsible for determining that inappropriate and unfair criteria.

The report does, however, note that as soon as the criteria being used came to the attention of upper-management, the lower-ranking staffers were ordered to use different, more fair criteria to flag groups for closer review. It took way too long to change the criteria, and the criteria was changed later again in a way that was also seen as inappropriate by upper management, but the IG's report offers no evidence that any of it was done in order to knowingly disadvantage "Tea Party" related groups in a political fashion.

• Tea Party groups comprised a minority of flagged organizations --- Who were the other ones?

"According to the Director, Rulings and Agreements," the IG's report explains, "the fact that the team of specialists worked applications that did not involve the Tea Party, Patriots, or 9/12 groups demonstrated that the IRS was not politically biased in its identification of applications for processing by the team of specialists."

While, even if true, that doesn't excuse the inappropriate and unfair use of those terms to identify which applications to flag, the IG's report bears out the general assertion. As you can see in the following chart [from page 8 of the IG's report, page 14 in the PDF], of the 298 cases flagged as "potential political cases" by the IRS during the period reviewed by the Inspector General from early 2010 through May 2012, just 96 of them (less than one-third) were flagged due to the inappropriate name criteria...

What sort of groups made up the majority two-thirds of flagged organizations? The IG's report doesn't tell us --- it wasn't in their mission to examine that particular aspect, it seems --- but I'd love to know.

The IG's report says only that, during the use of the inappropriate criteria being examined, the IRS Exempt Organizations unit searched "for applications with Tea Party, Patriots, or 9/12 in the organization’s name as well as other 'political-sounding' names." [Emphasis mine.] The report does not tell us what other "political-sounding" names were examined.

It should also be noted here that none of the flagged organizations --- Tea Party or non-Tea Party --- were eventually denied tax-exempt status. None of them. That is true, even if the applications were finally approved after an absurdly long time, and after inappropriate, unnecessary follow-up questions (such as the names of donors, etc.) were sent to the organizations by the IRS.

The only group known to have actually lost their tax exempt status during the period in question, according to Joan Walsh at Salon, was a progressive organization, "the Maine chapter of Emerge America, which trains Democratic women to run for office."

• No evidence of White House involvement

If Obama and his tyrannical henchmen were pulling the strings at the IRS in order to oppress the "Tea Party" groups, no one has yet to present any evidence to support that assertion, and none is found in the IG's report.

The IG says that during its interviews with IRS staffers, "All of these officials stated that the criteria were not influenced by any individual or organization outside the IRS. Instead, the Determinations Unit developed and implemented inappropriate criteria in part due to insufficient oversight provided by management. Specifically, only first-line management approved references to the Tea Party in the BOLO ["Be On the Look Out"] listing criteria before it was implemented."

Those officials, of course, could certainly be lying to protect themselves or others, and perhaps further investigation will demonstrate as much. But while folks on the Right, particularly at Fox "News" and the Republicans in Congress have been howling about this scandal to suggest impeachment of a sitting President may well be just around the corner once again for this outrage, it's important to note that there is zero known evidence that President Obama, the White House, or anyone who worked for him or his political organization --- or anyone at all, outside of the IRS unit in question --- was involved in developing the inappropriate IRS criteria for examining tax-exempt applications in any way, shape, or form at this time. Such evidence may emerge later, but anyone who claims that the IG's report supports that conclusion at this time is lying.

To be sure, the IG's report details an absolute mess at a number of levels within the IRS office tasked with handling the influx of applications for tax-exempt status. Very bad decisions were made by a number of people, and they should all be held accountable for those decisions. Moreover, there are many questions unanswered in the report that bear further investigation. If criminal activity is discovered --- at any level --- through that process, so be it. But as of now, there is no such criminal "misconduct" detailed in this report.

• The question the IG was supposed to look at, but didn't

Finally, examination of the question of whether "Tea Party"-related groups were inappropriately targeted by the IRS was only part of what the Treasury Department's Inspector General was tasked by Congress to do. The IG was also asked to look at whether or not existing 501(c)(4) groups were abusing their status and running political operations in violations of the law.

As explained in the IG's report [on page 3 of the report, page 9 of the PDF]: "During the 2012 election cycle, some members of Congress raised concerns to the IRS about selective enforcement and the duty to treat similarly situated organizations consistently. In addition, several organizations applying for I.R.C. § 501(c)(4) tax-exempt status made allegations that the IRS 1) targeted specific groups applying for tax-exempt status, 2) delayed the processing of targeted groups’ applications for tax-exempt status, and 3) requested unnecessary information from targeted organizations. Lastly, several members of Congress requested that the IRS investigate whether existing social welfare organizations are improperly engaged in a substantial, or even predominant, amount of campaign activity." [Emphasis added.]

In the wake of this scandal, many good government and campaign reform advocates, including The BRAD BLOG, have decried the fact that serious concerns about the many well-known abuses by so-called non-partisan 501(c)(3) and (c)(4) groups, which use their tax-exempt status for blatant campaigning and politicking, might now go unexamined, as the IRS becomes skittish about holding such groups accountable for fear of political backlash.

A report from the IG, responding to the request for an investigation into "whether existing social welfare organizations are improperly engaged in a substantial, or even predominant, amount of campaign activity," is desperately needed.

The only word we currently have on that comes from a footnote on page 4 of the IG report [page 10 in the PDF], announcing vaguely that "A future audit is being considered to assess how the EO [Exempt Organizations] function monitors I.R.C. §§ 501(c)(4)–(6) organizations to ensure that political campaign intervention does not constitute their primary activity."

Yes, that's right. For now, it seems, Karl Rove, the Koch Brothers and even the Democratic-supporting 501(c)(4)'s who all paid millions for blatant campaign ads throughout the 2010 and 2012 campaign cycles, in violation of the tax code, are all off the hook, even if President Obama who --- as of now --- appears to have had absolutely nothing to do with the IRS failures, remains on the hot seat and feels a need to display outrage at "misconduct" that even the Treasury Department IG's report doesn't seem to have been able to identify.

But with Benghazi a pretend "scandal" from the jump, and the real scandal of Obama's Dept. of Justice secretly spying on journalists, in the way that Republicans and the Bush Administration had long supported, it looks like we're going to be stuck with this whole IRS thing for a while, whether there eventually turns out to be any actual criminal "misconduct" there or not.

• The Treasury Department Inspector General's Report (5/14/2013)

* * *

UPDATE 5/17/2013: Well, it's official, the "IRS 'Scandal' Appears Nearly as Phony as Shirley Sherrod, Van Jones, ACORN 'Scandals'", even if both Obama and the media seem to be falling for it --- yet again.

Apparently, we were wrong last March, when we interpreted Attorney General Eric Holder's Congressional testimony to mean that the big banks were just "too big to jail".

"I am concerned that the size of some of these institutions becomes so large that it does become difficult for us to prosecute them when we are hit with indications that if you do prosecute, if you do bring a criminal charge, it will have a negative impact on the national economy, perhaps even the world economy. And I think that is a function of the fact that some of these institutions have become too large," Holder testified at the time.

"It has an inhibiting influence --- impact --- on our ability to bring resolutions that I think would be more appropriate," he continued. "So, the concern that you raise is actually one that I share."

That's what he said in March. But apparently, despite that, he now says, banks are not too big to jail. That's what Holder "very, very, very" much wants us now to believe, according to his testimony in Congress today...

From Jason Sattler this afternoon at National Memo...

In March, Holder had told the Senate Judiciary Committee, "I am concerned that the size of some of these institutions becomes so large that it does become difficult for us to prosecute them." This comment has been interpreted to justify the findings of a PBS Frontline investigation that found that Holder and his department have resisted taking banks to court based on a fear of shocking financial markets.

Responding to a question from Rep. John Conyers (D-MI) about his comment from March, Holder conceded again on Wednesday that such prosecutions may be too difficult, but stressed that "there’s no bank, there’s no institution, there’s no individual that cannot be prosecuted by the U.S. Department of Justice."

"Let me be very, very, very clear… banks are not too big to jail," Holder added.

He then went on to --- immediately --- not jail any of them during the four years that he's been in office. As Sattler observes: "The DOJ has not brought any criminal charges against the big banks since the financial crisis of 2008 forced taxpayers to bail them out."

Sattler also cites the letter sent by Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) to the DoJ, SEC and Federal Reserve on Tuesday, in which she accurately charges: "If large financial institutions can break the law and accumulate millions in profits, and if they get caught, settle by paying out of those profits, they do not have much incentive to follow the law."

But, never fear! Sattler also notes...

"Anybody who has broken the law will be held accountable," Holder said.

As long as they're not bankers. Or Republicans.

Government officials and employees responsible for the allegedly inappropriate scrutiny of Rightwing groups applying for non-profit, tax-exempt status as "social welfare organizations" (tax-payer subsidized, supposedly non-partisan 501(c)(3) and (c)(4) groups) should be investigated and, if appropriate, disciplined, fired and/or charged under criminal statutes.

Government officials and employees responsible for secretly subpoenaing the phone records of AP reporters ought to similarly be investigated and, if appropriate, disciplined, fired and/or charged under criminal statutes --- though it is likely that the government has already given itself legal dispensation to carry out that sort of invasive, seemingly extra-Constitutional, certainly un-American intimidation of whistleblowers and journalists alike.

That said, it's been predictably amusing over the past 24 hours or so, witnessing the outrage --- outrage! --- of Rightwingers over the very things that they not only didn't give a rat's ass about when the same, and often much worse, was carried out by the Bush Administration, but that they actively supported at the time.

"They say two wrongs don’t make a right, but ignoring one of those wrongs while vilifying the other is intellectually dishonest and violently hypocritical, among other things," writes Bob Cesca at The Daily Banter, noting that "Democrats have almost universally condemned the actions of the IRS, as they’ve done when the congressional Republicans and, naturally, the Bush administration used the nearly unlimited might of the government to engage in similar investigations — or worse."

"Republicans," he writes, "spent eight years defending, applauding and enabling Bush abuses on this front, while subsequently cheerleading the congressional Republicans as they carry forward the politics of intimidation and government overreach into the Obama era."

Cesca goes on to list "10 Examples of Bush and the Republicans Using Government Power to Target Critics", beginning with the Republican-supported Big Government assaults on Planned Parenthood, ACORN (which succeeded in putting a four-decade old community organization out of business), and on even the ability of perfectly legal American voters to simply cast a vote in their own elections. He also reminds us of the abuse of the Bush Dept. of Justice which, specifically, targeted Democrats for prosecution, and for the firing of U.S. Attorneys without cause, other than they were not partisan enough for the tastes of the Bush White House.

But while the Obama Administration deserves appropriate scrutiny and investigation and accountability for whatever its part in both the developing IRS and DoJ/AP scandals, let us not forget some of these certainly-as-bad, arguably-worse scandals related to both the IRS and the DoJ --- from during the Bush Administration --- that Republicans not only didn't give a damn about, but often applauded for most of the past decade...

7. The Bush IRS Collected Political Affiliation Data on Taxpayers. In 2006, a contractor hired by the IRS collected party affiliation via a search of voter registration roles in a laundry list of states: Alaska, Arkansas, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Florida, Louisiana, Massachusetts, Michigan, Nevada, New Jersey, New York, North Carolina, Ohio, Oklahoma, Rhode Island, South Carolina, Texas, Utah and Wisconsin. This begs the obvious question: why? Why would the IRS need voter registration and party affiliation information?

8. The Bush FBI and Joint Terrorism Task Force Targeted Civil Rights / Anti-war Activists. In 2005, an ACLU investigation revealed that both the FBI and the JTTF surveilled and gathered intelligence about a variety of liberal groups including PETA and the Catholic Workers, along with other groups that it hyperbolically referred to as having "semi-communistic ideology."

9. The Bush Pentagon Spied on Dozens of Anti-war Meetings. Also in 2005, the Department of Defense tracked 1,500 "suspicious incidents" and spied on four-dozen meetings involving, for example, anti-war Quaker groups and the like. Yes, really. The Bush administration actually kept track of who was attending these meetings down to descriptions of the vehicles used by the attendees, calling to mind the pre-Watergate era when the government investigated 100,000 Americans during the Vietnam War.

10. The Bush FBI Targeted Journalists with the New York Times and the Washington Post. Yesterday, it was learned that a U.S. attorney, Ronald Machen, subpoenaed and confiscated phone records from the Associated Press as part of a leak investigation regarding an article about a CIA operation that took place in Yemen to thwart a terrorist attack on the anniversary of Bin Laden's death. Well, this story pales in comparison with the Bush administration's inquisition against the reporters who broke the story about the NSA wiretapping program. In fact, the Justice Department considered invoking the Espionage Act of 1917, the archaic sequel to the John Adams-era Alien and Sedition Acts. The Bush FBI seized phone records - without subpoena - from four American journalists, including Raymond Bonner and Jane Perlez. How do we know this for sure? Former FBI Director Robert Mueller apologized to the New York Times and the Washington Post.

I'm delighted, personally, that the Republican Party and its adherents have finally decided to be outraged about actual governmental abuses of power. I'm even more delighted that they may now be focusing some of that outrage on actual abuses (as opposed to all of the pretend "scandals" they've been pretending to be outraged about over the past four years). But it will be all too convenient if the only such abuses they ultimately concern themselves with are the ones which affected their own special interest groups, rather than those which have illegally and/or unconstitutionally affected the interests of all Americans for at least the past decade and more.

It will be a shame if the result of all of this is that the 501(c)(4) and (c)(3) racket which exploded in the wake of the U.S. Supreme Court's Citizens United atrocity goes unexamined and un-overturned. As is, the IRS was doing a dreadful job in cracking down on that particularly obvious scam, and its almost certain that all of this will only make the appalling tax-payer subsidized abuse by purely political groups masquerading as non-partisan "social welfare organizations" even worse.

But it will be even more of a shame if the Big Government abuses of power under the Obama Administration are dealt with as special cases that occurred in a vacuum. They did not. They have been happening for years, under the Bush Administration and now under the Obama Administration. (For that matter, the IRS abuses now in question happened while the agency was headed up by George W. Bush's appointee.) All of those grotesque Big Government abuses deserve oversight and governmental action and legislation to ensure that none of them can ever happen again in the future.

Unfortunately, that is unlikely to happen in a political atmosphere where one party (the Republicans) and its supporters have chosen "victimhood" as a personal political philosophy and a wartime footing against their perceived enemy (the Democratic Party) as a point of personal pride, rather than displaying any interest whatsoever in actually governing on behalf of the American people or in ending the opportunities for the very Big Government abuses they decry --- but only when it affects them.

IN TODAY'S RADIO REPORT: Sequester budget cuts hit federal firefighting response during an early wildfire season; More good news for Tesla Motors, bad news for loser Mitt Romney; Scientists accidentally discover new way to make cleaner steel; Another city votes for solar on all new construction; PLUS: Sec. of State John Kerry bluntly criticizes the US for climate change inaction ... All that and more in today's Green News Report!

Got comments, tips, love letters, hate mail? Drop us a line at GreenNews@BradBlog.com or right here at the comments link below. All GNRs are always archived at GreenNews.BradBlog.com.

IN 'GREEN NEWS EXTRA' (see links below): Idiocracy: WSJ's 'CO2 Is What Plants Crave'; Chile offers to export fresh water to Qatar; US shale oil supply shock shifts global power balance; Oil companies turn to shipping by rail; Supreme Court rules for Monsanto; Plans to export U.S. natural gas stir debate; Turning CO2 emissions into algae, fuel & animal feed; Panasonic to give away 100k solar lanterns to developing countries; Cutting down rain forests mean less hydropower for developing nations: study ... PLUS: America's first climate refugees: Newtok, Alaska is losing ground to the sea at a dangerous rate and for its residents, exile is inevitable ... and much, MUCH more! ...

STORIES DISCUSSED IN TODAY'S 'GREEN NEWS REPORT'...

• VIDEO: Fox News Gushes Over Tesla With No Mention Of Federal Support (Media Matters.org)
• VIDEO: In 2012 campaign debate, Romney attacks Obama Admin support for clean energy companies (Media Matters.org)
  In 2012, the network declared the company "failed," feeding then-presidential nominee Mitt Romney's narrative that President Obama doesn't "just pick the winners and losers, [he] pick[s] the losers" by lumping the company in with Solyndra and Fisker.
• More Good News for Tesla's All-Electric Model S:
• Does Tesla Already Outsell Audi, BMW, Lexus & Mercedes-Benz? (Green Car Reports)
• Tesla Motors posts first quarterly profit in its 10-year history (LA Times)
• Video: The Tesla Model S is our top-scoring car (Consumer Reports)
• MIT Accidentally Discovers Method for Cleaner Steel:
• NASA moon experiment uncovers ‘green steel’ (RTCC):
  The technique was discovered accidentally during a NASA commission experiment to produce oxygen on the Moon for future lunar bases. The plan was to unlock the oxygen from iron oxides but Professor Donald Sadoway, senior author of the paper published in Nature, discovered steel was produced as a by-product.
• Moon Base Work Yields Clean Steel Process (Scientific American): A new method to make steel using electricity rather than flame could produce virtually no carbon emissions.
• Sequester Budget Cuts Hit Federal Firefighting Capability:
• Feds: Budget cuts to make wildfire season tougher (AP) [emphasis added]:
  "We are going to be faced with a difficult fire season," Vilsack said. "The bottom line is we're going to do everything we can to be prepared. But folks need to understand ... our resources are limited and our budgets are obviously constrained. We will do the best job we possibly can with the resources we have." Congress cut the current budgets for the Forest Service and Agriculture Department 5% under the mandated spending reductions, then added another 2.5% cut for fiscal 2013.
• Wildfire risk runs high, but budget cuts mean fewer firefighters (LA Times):
  California is expected to be the most imperiled of the dry Western states. The state this year has received only 25% of the rainfall that it received in the same period for 2012, National Interagency Fire Center fire analyst Jeremy Sullens said. Other states expected to be hit hard are Arizona, New Mexico, Oregon and Idaho, along with portions of other states.
• Sec. of State Kerry's Blunt Criticism of U.S. on Climate Change Inaction:
• VIDEO: Sec. Kerry's Remarks in Sweden on Climate Change, Arctic Challenges (US Dept. of State):






• Transcript: Sec. Kerry's Remarks With Swedish Prime Minister Fredrik Reinfeldt (US Dept. of State):
• Sec. of State John Kerry: Climate Change and the Future of the Arctic (Huffington Post) [emphasis added]:
  Last September, the extent of sea ice covering the Arctic Ocean reached record lows, threatening marine mammal life and local populations dependent upon them. Receding sea ice might also bring new commerce and industry to the region, including exploration of offshore oil and gas, as well as minerals. New Arctic shipping routes could significantly decrease transit times between Pacific and Atlantic ports.
• Visiting Sweden, Kerry offers ‘regret’ that US hasn’t done more on climate (The Hill's e2 Wire):
  “I have to say that I regret that my own country — and President Obama knows this and is committed to changing it — needs to do more and we are committed to doing more...”
• Arctic Council: John Kerry steps into Arctic diplomacy (BBC):
  Three and half a months into his tenure as US secretary of state, John Kerry is grappling with war in Syria, tensions on the Korean peninsula and other crises. But on Tuesday, he takes a short break to dive into an issue in which he has long been interested - climate change.
• As Arctic Council Gathers, Kerry Has Opportunity to Push for Ocean Conservation (NRDC)
• New emissions plan could energise global climate talks, says US envoy (Guardian UK): The proposal for a climate deal by 2015 based on national 'contributions' gained traction UN talks in Germany last week
• 10 Key Findings From a Rapidly Acidifying Arctic Ocean (Mother Jones)
• How Far Can Climate Change Go?: (Scientific American)
• Sebastopol, CA Votes To Go Solar On All New Construction:
• Sebastopol is second Californian city requiring solar on new homes (Mother Nature News): Following in the Republican-led footsteps of Lancaster, the super-liberal town of Sebastopol becomes the second city in California requiring all newly built homes to be photovoltaic-ready.

'GREEN NEWS EXTRA' (Stuff we didn't have time for in today's audio report)...

• America's first climate refugees: Newtok, Alaska is losing ground to the sea at a dangerous rate and for its residents, exile is inevitable (Guardian UK):
  These villages, whose residents are nearly all native Alaskans, are already experiencing the flooding and erosion that are the signature effects of climate change in Alaska. The residents of a number of villages – including Newtok – are now actively working to leave their homes and the lands they have occupied for centuries and move to safer locations.
• US shale oil supply shock shifts global power balance (BBC):
  A steeper-than-expected rise in US shale oil reserves is about to change the global balance of power between new and existing producers, a report says.
• Wall Street Journal's Idiocracy: CO2 Is What Plants Crave (Media Matters.org)
• U.S. Supreme Court Rules for Monsanto in Patent Fight (Reuters)
• "Pipelines on wheels" start to ferry fracked ND oil to the PacNW (Oregon Live)
• Plans to Export U.S. Natural Gas Stir Debate: (AP):
  A domestic natural gas boom already has lowered U.S. energy prices while stoking fears of environmental disaster. Now U.S. producers are poised to ship vast quantities of gas overseas as energy companies seek permits for proposed export projects that could set off a renewed frenzy of fracking.
• CNRL hopes to turn CO2 emissions into algae (Calgary Herald) [emphasis added]:
  As it blooms, the algae develops fat - in other words, oil, said Joy Romero, vice-president of technology development at Canadian Natural. That oil can be blended with heavy bitumen to make it flow more easily through pipelines, or sold to refiners, who can turn it into diesel or gasoline. The material left behind once the oil has been stripped out can be used as a fertilizer, which CNRL could use in reclaiming oilsands mines. John Parr, Canadian Natural's vice-president of thermal projects, said the biomass is high in protein and carbohydrates, making it a "perfect" animal feed.
• FDA Sued for Concealing Records on Arsenic in Poultry Feed (EcoWatch)
• Chile Offers to Export Fresh Water To Qatar: (Gulf Times):
  A trial project by a private company to export fresh water to the UAE is underway and the first shipment is expected to arrive in the next two or three months.
  ...
  The rate of glacial thinning has increased by about half over the last dozen years in the Southern Patagonian Ice Field, compared to the 30 years prior to 2000. This means more water has been flowing into the sea.
• Panasonic to distribute 100,000 solar lantern/chargers to the developing world (Gizmag):
  Despite the developed world's reliance on electricity, there are still 1.32 billion people on the planet without what most have come to see as a basic necessity. To mark its 100th anniversary, Panasonic plans to give rather than receive and distribute 100,000 solar lanterns that the company has developed that can not only provide light, but also charge mobile phones and other small devices.
• Fewer Rain Forests Mean Less Energy for Developing Nations, Study Finds (NY Times) [emphasis added]:
  For years, scientists and engineers have noted an increase in river flows when the trees along streams are removed. The water in the soil, which would otherwise have been taken up by the tree roots and sent into the atmosphere, instead moves directly into streams and rivers. At the same time, large areas of tropical forest actually create rain clouds as moisture from their leaves evaporates. So the elimination of swaths of these forests decreases rainfall. Cut down enough trees, the scientists argue, and the indirect impact of lost rainfall outweighs the direct impact of removing trees.
• VIDEO: Sen. Whitehouse destroys colleague who said God won’t allow climate change (Raw Story) [emphasis added]:
  Whitehouse concluded that ignoring climate change was not only bad public policy, it was also immoral. He said God would not grant humanity amnesty from its own folly.
• Warning: Even in the best-case scenario, climate change will kick our asses (Grist)
• Conventional Wisdom About Clean Energy Is Still Way Out of Date (GreenTech Media): "We're fifteen to twenty years out of date in how we think about renewables," said Dr. Eric Martinot to an audience at the first Pathways to 100% Renewables Conference held April 16 in San Francisco. "It's not 1990 anymore."
• Unburnable fuel: Either governments are not serious about climate change or fossil-fuel firms are overvalued (The Economist) [emphasis added]:
  But what if some of those [fossil fuel] reserves can never be dug up and burned? ... If governments were determined to implement their climate policies, a lot of that carbon would have to be left in the ground...