by Glenn Hurowitz

In their bids for the Democratic presidential nomination, Sens. Hillary Rodham Clinton (N.Y.) and Barack Obama (Ill.) have touted their environmental credentials. Yet despite compiling generally pro-environment voting records, at key moments each one has succumbed to pressure from powerful home-state polluters — casting doubt on how much they will fight for the planet when special interests stand in the way.

Clinton’s moment of truth came in 2005, when executives at the International Paper mill in upstate Ticonderoga, N.Y., were pressing to cut costs by burning old tires to provide power for their operations. Tires are one of the most toxic fuels known to man, and people downwind from the plant (including Republican Vermont Gov. Jim Douglas) were organizing a campaign to stop IP from poisoning their air with mercury, benzene and other deadly chemicals.

To counter this effort, IP launched an aggressive effort to woo New York politicians, including Clinton, in part by resorting to an old polluter trick: threatening to shut down the plant if it wasn’t allowed to burn the tires.

Seen from outside a political lens, it should have been an easy choice for Clinton: Tires are so toxic that even limited exposure can cause permanent health damage, especially to children, whose developing brains and immune systems are hypersensitive to the pollutants tires produce. Tire pollutants can cut years off a child’s life and impair mental development, according to the American Lung Association. For someone who had once been chairwoman of the Children’s Defense Fund and who had forged her political identity around protecting kids’ well-being, it would seem like a no-brainer.

But in 2005, Clinton had things on her mind in addition to children: She was determined to boost her margin of victory in upstate New York in her 2006 Senate reelection campaign - even if it meant sacrificing children’s health for, at most, a few hundred votes from people who bought into IP’s empty threats.

And so, despite the pollution concerns, Clinton went along with IP and lobbied to allow it to go ahead with a two-week test tire burn. Although that may not sound like a lot of time, tires are so toxic that the acrid cloud they produce can cause damage after even just a few hours of exposure.

The tires turned out to be so polluting that the emissions exceeded even IP’s extremely lax permit. The company was forced to suspend the incineration three days after it started. It didn’t go out of business, but Clinton had provided her critics with more evidence that political calculation was her real first priority.

I wish I could report that Obama was offering a more principled energy policy. Unfortunately, even a cursory glance at his record shows a politician at least as willing to sacrifice his lofty principles for political expedience.

Exhibit A is Obama’s enthusiastic support for “coal to liquid” technology, which allows auto fuel to be squeezed out of coal. Obama touts it as a way to free America from reliance on Saudi oil fields and to tackle global warming. However, coal-to-liquid technology produces twice the amount of greenhouse gases that regular old oil does; additionally, it’s so expensive that it’s unlikely to displace one drop of cheap Saudi oil anytime soon.

So why would he support it? What’s more, why did he vote for other anti-environment policies, such as President Bush’s 2005 energy bill, which funnels more than $27 billion in taxpayer subsidies to big polluters?

A huge factor in Obama’s decisions was his desire to support Illinois agribusiness (Bush’s energy bill contained massive ethanol subsidies) and the southern Illinois coal industry. His votes mean that he’s willing — sometimes, at least — to put these kinds of parochial interests ahead of the global environment and Americans’ health (pollution from coal-fired power plants kills more than 30,000 people every year, according to EPA consultants Abt Associates).

Obama has explained his positions by saying that sometimes you need to “trim your sails” — by which he means cutting back on goals to avoid becoming marginalized.

But it’s exactly that kind of political calculation - special interests versus doing what’s right - that Obama is promising to reject. Obama’s energy policy shows that so far he is at least as much a creature of establishment influence-peddling as Clinton is.

So is there any hope for the Democrats’ energy policy, or will it just be a liberal version of Bush’s polluter bonanza?

The environmental and energy platforms of former North Carolina Sen. John Edwards and New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson provide some reason for optimism. While both Democratic presidential candidates have in the past surrendered to big polluters on key issues, lately they’ve been showing real grit when it comes to defending the planet.

Edwards has called for a ban on construction of coal-fired power plants that don’t capture all their greenhouse gases. He also has released an ambitious plan to cut global warming pollution by 80 percent by 2050. Richardson has one-upped Edwards by proposing the same cuts by 2040 and speedier conversion to clean electricity sources and dramatic cuts in oil consumption.

Edwards and Richardson seem to have learned that at least when it comes to energy policy, courage can trump calculation. For their sake and the planet’s, let’s hope that Sens. Clinton and Obama can learn the same lessons before they face the voters.

Glenn Hurowitz is the president of www.DemocraticCourage.com DemocraticCourage.Com , an organization dedicated to promoting progressive values in the Democratic Party. He is the author of the forthcoming book Fear and Courage in the Democratic Party.

A Code Red air quality alert has been issued for Wednesday, May 23, for Central Alabama, in part due to smoke plumes from Georgia and Florida being carried into the Birmingham area by winds out of the southeast.

The result is an unhealthy air quality level at all air quality monitors throughout Jefferson County.

People with heart or lung disease, older adults and children should avoid prolonged or heavy exertion. Everyone else should reduce prolonged or heavy exertion.

For more updates, check the Alabama Department of Environmental Management’s Website for Alabama Air Quality Conditions for Birmingham.

Bird watcher Lloyd Moon, 76, recently spotted the rare snail kite for the first time in South Carolina, sparking a debate among birders and scientists about what the bird was doing so far north.

The snail kite is an endangered species seldom seen north of central Florida, experts say, and is included on the endangered species list in part because of the shrinking habitat of its main food source, the apple snail.

Moon first spotted the bird last week at a crawfish farm near Rimini, about 35 miles southeast of Columbia.

The bird’s taste for crawfish surprised scientists, and it could lead to experiments with crawfish ponds in Florida.

The Associated Press picked up the story Tuesday.

But birders on the ALBIRDS listserv and other online communities have been talking about the rare sighting since last Friday.

The first fuzzy photographs were published on the Carolina Bird Club site here.

That was followed up by better photos from the Cape Romain Bird Observatory.

The League of Conservation Voters has published a scorecard rating members of Congress on how they voted on such issues as offshore oil drilling, protecting the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, permitting logging in old-growth forests and other environmental issues.

Here’s how some of the potential presidential candidates rank according to the percentage of time they voted in Congress for the position favored by the League of Conservation Voters. Only those candidates who have compiled a congressional voting record are included. Candidates with higher scores are the ones who most favor measures to protect the environment and bird habitat.

Is it any wonder people who favor pro-environmental policies in Washington tend to vote for Democrats?

For more information on the records of presidential candidates of both parties on issues relating to birds and their habitats, see the Birders United 2008 Election page.

One of our favorite independent investigative and analytical reporters has been busy the past few days, covering topics like the mainstream media can’t seem to figure out.

Robert Parry has been writing about how Washington politicians are dealing with the debacle in Iraq and how disgraced former House Speaker Newt Gingrich is trying to spin his way back into the race for the White House.

“One mother sits on her son’s grave at Arlington Cemetery and reads from Corduroy, his favorite baby book. Another mom spent cold winter afternoons in a sleeping bag stretched across her son’s grave,” he writes. “Meanwhile, George W. Bush reportedly plots a new combat escalation in Iraq and some members of Congress look to give the President another blank check so they can head home for the Memorial Day recess and say they’re supporting the troops.”

Then, he writes about the Chatham House, a well-respected British think tank, which has thrown down a challenge to leaders in Washington and London to begin “accepting realities in Iraq.” The new report paints a grim picture of an Iraqi society coming apart and warns that George W. Bush’s military “surge” will fail to achieve any lasting security improvements.

“But the idea that Bush must accept reality goes against his longstanding confidence that he and his friends can shape how many Americans perceive reality,” he writes.

And, he says, former House Speaker Newt Gingrich was known as a worldly and even hedonistic guy.

“But he appears to have spotted a political opening for his planned comeback, convincing right-wing Christians that they are being persecuted by ‘radical secularists.’

In what sounds like a year-round version of the “war on Christmas” complaint, Gingrich wants the fundamentalist Christian base of the Republican Party to view themselves as the victims and him as their defender.

How utterly ridiculous, right?

For the full story of the contrasting interests of grieving moms and Washington pols, the real story of how Bush’s cult-like followers reject reality in Iraq and for the full story of Gingrich’s up-is-down world, go to the independent ConsortiumNews.Com.

When Your Nuthatch Mama Needs Something Different to Eat

There is something that happens to nuthatch mamas at certain points in life. Something that has everything to do with food, that most basic of all life needs.

How many times have you had to listen to some version of: “I want something different to eat!”

It must happen at least 295 million times a day in the U.S. - probably more.

Come on now. Be honest. You’ve heard it…

So let me ask you.

What do you do if you are stuck in the exurbs surrounded by Arby’s and Applebee’s, Bubba’s Barbecue and Hooters, and the growing number of strip mall versions of Ranchero’s Mexicano and China Garden?

In many Southern cities, when you get tired of cooking it right yourself, you have to go looking for it, but - a sleeper restaurant occasionally sneaks through the Kudzu and surprises you, and it’s just down the street from Everytown’s version of Velma’s red neck beer joint.

John’s City Diner is such a place near here, on old Highway 11, where you can almost taste New Orleans in the Fried Green Tomatoes, the Southern Greens and Cornbread, and the Homestyle Meatloaf topped with mushroom demi glaze and served over smashed potatoes.

The roasted red pepper drizzle on the Fried Green Tomatoes reminded me of the mushroom sauce at the Orange Fest in Plaquemine Parish, Louisiana, although not quite as scrumptious.

At one point with my eyes closed, I could visualize the scene and taste the Mustard Greens already cooked in andouille sausage and pepper sauce, no need to ask the waitress for a bottle on the table, at Dunbar’s soul food restaurant on Freret Street. A certain famous writer friend of mine liked the Fried Chicken there.

While the old John’s Restaurant is still famous in downtown Birmingham, the new outlet in Trussville is suffering from an almost disserted bar, perhaps because the food comes out so fast…

Locally stylish retirees seem to have found the place, but rest assured you can please any nuthatch mama of any age with a trip down this memory lane - with a nod to 1950s Americana Art Deco.

If only the place was built in an old house with some old trees for shade along the old highway, the experience would be better. There is an attractive patio of outdoor seating. Unfortunately, it is built in a concrete jungle and by this time in May, maybe through September, it is too hot to handle by day…

Someone should try the Martinis on Friday and Saturday night. I suspect they might be worth the risk - of DUI that is. It’s kind of hard to find a designated driver when you’re single - in a land bereft of taxi cabs.

With any luck, you could get picked up by a teetoteller.

If you don’t make it home, at least your last meal would have been the best you could get anywhere around here…