In his State of the Union address last night, President Bush stressed the importance of renewable energy and clean, alternative fuels. So why am I still so skeptical?

President Bush has selected his nominee to head the Department of Interior, which manages about one-fifth of all the land in the United States and determines which portions of it should be available for resource extraction. As promised, he “looked to the West” and plucked Republican governor of Idaho and former Senator Dirk Kempthorne. The nominee is somewhat less controversial than others who were in the running for this position, and widely expected to be swiftly confirmed. But greens are hardly jumping for joy: Kempthorne is also widely expected to stay the course of the agency's industry-friendly policies under Bush.

Our fondness for fatty foods is widening our waists, shortening our lives, and ballooning our health care costs. Doesn't that qualify as a crisis worthy of a presidential counter-offensive? and

“America is addicted to oil,” President Bush pronounced in his State of the Union address last night. He went on to propose an Advanced Energy Initiative that would require a big boost in funding