National (U.S.)

Congress and the White House seem to be doing an about-face after promising the American public aggressive action on food safety two years ago.

"As one of the Marx brothers famously said: who do you believe, me or your own eyes?  Climate sceptics, it turns out, are much more likely to believe direct evidence of a changing climate in the form of extreme weather events than they do scientists, when it comes to global warming."

"The Mississippi as seen from Ed Drager's tug boat is a river in retreat: a giant beached barge is stranded where the water dropped, with sand bars springing into view. The floating barge office where the tugboat captain reports for duty is tilted like a funhouse. One side now rests on the exposed shore. 'I've never seen the river this low,' Drager said. 'It's weird.'"

"The Environmental Protection Agency announced a new standard for soot pollution on Friday that will force industry, utilities and local governments to find ways to reduce emissions of particles that are linked to thousands of cases of disease and death each year."

"MORGANTOWN, W.Va. -- It didn't take long for the new associate professor at West Virginia University to give the state's most powerful industry a bad case of heartburn."

"Reviving a 20-year debate over illnesses of veterans of the 1991 Persian Gulf war, a new scientific paper presents evidence that nerve agents released by the bombing of Iraqi chemical weapons depots just before the ground war began could have carried downwind and fallen on American troops staged in Saudi Arabia."

"Nuclear power giant Exelon is telling its employees to lobby Congress to end the production tax credit for wind power, which will expire at month’s end unless lawmakers vote to extend it."

"More than 100 physicians urged the Obama administration on Thursday not to approve the construction of liquefied natural gas export terminals until more is known about the health effects of hydraulic fracturing, the drilling process that has opened the way for a big increase in domestic gas production."

"SEATTLE -- More than 2,000 opponents and supporters of a plan to ship coal through a northwest Washington terminal turned out Thursday for a final public meeting on the controversial proposal."

"When a government deadline for new safety management programs at offshore drilling rigs and wells approached in November 2011, oil and gas industry leaders were bracing for tough scrutiny and plenty of penalties. But that scrutiny never materialized."