Rachel's Action Network

News Archives

2010

2009

2008

2007

2006

2005

2004

New Rules Issued for National Forests; Some Environmental Protections Eased
December 22, 2004
by The Washington Post

The Bush administration issued comprehensive new rules yesterday for managing the national forests, jettisoning some environmental protections that date to Ronald Reagan's administration and putting in place the biggest change in forest-use policies in nearly three decades.
[read more]

Bush Chooses EPA Chief To Lead HHS; In Wake of Kerik's Withdrawal, Administration Defends Screening
December 13, 2004
by Washington Post

President Bush tapped Mike Leavitt, chief of the Environmental Protection Agency, to be his next secretary of health and human services yesterday as the White House sought to put its Cabinet selection process back on track after the collapse of its Department of Homeland Security nomination.
[read more]

Bush names Johanns ag secretary
December 2, 2004
by Lincoln Journal Star

President Bush's surprise selection Thursday of Gov. Mike Johanns as secretary of agriculture flipped Nebraska's political landscape upside down.

When the dust settled, the state faced its first gubernatorial resignation in more than a century, elevation of Lt. Gov. Dave Heineman to the governorship and a totally restructured 2006 Senate race.
[read more]

Democratic Governors Take Lead; Under Richardson's Helm, They Discuss Rebuilding State Parties
December 2, 2004
by Washington Post

Democratic governors asserted their role in party politics yesterday, arguing that because they have shown how to win elections in all regions of the country they should now be in the forefront of efforts to revitalize their party.
[read more]

Automakers Tout Hybrids, but Power Rules Showrooms
November 28, 2004
by Washington Post

After years of pushing power and performance, the U.S. auto industry has begun to view conservation as a marketable quality. But the companies are stepping cautiously, and so far, the green marketing is far outpacing the manufacturing of energy-efficient vehicles.
[read more]

Women Lead the Startup Stats; A new study finds a boom in female entrepreneurship -- and a particularly healthy gains for minority women
November 28, 2004
by BusinessWeek Online

Female entrepreneurs may once have lagged behind their male counterparts, but now they're making up for lost time. Business ownership among women in general is growing at nearly twice the rate (17%) as all businesses (9%), according to a new report released this month by the Center for Women's Business Research.
[read more]

Afghan Women Building Lives Amid Rubble
November 11, 2004
by Women's eNews

Women, often uneducated, unemployed and still covered by the burqua, are heads of at least 30 percent of Afghan households. But with close to 70 percent unemployment, the stigma against hiring a woman remains widespread.
[read more]

Election Wrap-Up: How Did the Women Do?
November 4, 2004
by Rachel's Action Network

The good news is that this week’s election will bring more women to Congress for the 109th session. In the House of Representatives, there will be 68 women, up now from 62 women. Of those new members, 23 are Republicans and 45 are Democrats.
[read more]

Election Wrap-Up: How Did the Women Do?
November 4, 2004
by Rachel Tabakman

The good news is that this week’s election will bring more women to Congress for the 109th session. In the House of Representatives, there will be 68 women, up now from 62 women.
[read more]

U.S. Wants No Warming Proposal; Administration Aims to Prevent Arctic Council Suggestions
November 3, 2004
by The Washington Post

The Bush administration has been working for months to keep an upcoming eight-nation report from endorsing broad policies aimed at curbing global warming, according to domestic and foreign participants, despite the group's conclusion that Arctic latitudes are facing historic increases in temperature, glacial melting and abrupt weather changes.
[read more]

Castor Loses in Florida; Women Gain in House
November 1, 2004
by Women's eNews

Candidates that prioritized women's issues competed Tuesday for Senate and House seats and governorships across the country, with some hot races stretching all the way to Wednesday.
[read more]

Worries over rising carbon dioxide emissions
October 26, 2004
by The Guardian

Carbon dioxide emissions will be almost 40% higher by the end of the decade than they were in 1990 despite growing use of renewable energy, the International Energy Agency said yesterday.
[read more]

Fewer voting errors likely this November
October 24, 2004
by USA Today

The vote count in this year's presidential election should be far more accurate and comprehensive than the controversial election of 2000, a USA TODAY analysis found.

The rate of voter error — about 2% of ballots — should be slashed drastically this year because of better ballot design, new voting machines and voter education, say election officials and political scientists who track voting habits.
[read more]

Florida's Castor Wages Fight of Her Career
October 23, 2004
by Women's eNews

When she was just 23, Betty Castor led a group of young women to the top of Mount Kilimanjaro. That struggle was nothing compared to this.

Castor, 63, is now in the fight of her political career, a bitter battle to become the first female Democrat--and only the second woman--elected to the U.S. Senate from Florida. She faces former U.S. Housing and Urban Development Secretary Mel Martinez for the seat being vacated by Sen. Bob Graham, a Democrat.
[read more]

Salvage Logging a Key Issue in Oregon; Bush Plan to Aid Forests After Wildfires Draws Criticism
October 14, 2004
by The Washington Post

SISKIYOU NATIONAL FOREST, Ore. -- The massive Biscuit fire that scorched this forest two summers ago has become a wedge issue in the presidential race in Oregon, a swing state where the contest remains too close to call.

President Bush used the Biscuit fire in 2002 as a smoldering launchpad for his Healthy Forests Initiative, a plan to fight future fires by logging burned trees, many of them in previously protected stands of old-growth timber. On an evening campaign stop in southern Oregon on Thursday, Bush criticized his Democratic opponent, Sen. John F. Kerry (Mass.), for voting to oppose the initiative.
[read more]

Arizona's shrinking lake provides a stark warning to America's thirsty west
October 10, 2004
by The Guardian

Lake Powell, the second largest reservoir in the US, which fills the canyons straddling the border between Utah and Arizona, is an important link in the chain of water supply drawn from the Colorado river. So the falling water levels are not just a story of a tourist attraction facing tough times, but an environmental problem that may have a fundamental impact on life in seven of the states of the western US, notably the thirsty states of California, Nevada, Arizona and New Mexico.
[read more]

W Stands for Women
October 10, 2004
by Rachel Tabakman

With the "W Stands for Women" campaign, President Bush and the Republican party are reaching out to women voters, a demographic that is proving to be a hot commodity in the November election.
[read more]

Boxer holds comfortable lead; Poll shows Jones still suffers from identity problem
October 6, 2004
by San Francisco Chronicle

Republican Bill Jones continues to be the invisible man in the race for the Senate seat held by Democrat Barbara Boxer, with nearly half the state's voters saying they don't know enough about the former secretary of state to gauge whether they like him or not, a Field Poll released today shows.
[read more]

Candidates Hit Campaign Trail After Debate; President Aggressively Hammers at Kerry's Positions
September 30, 2004
by The Washington Post

President Bush and Sen. John F. Kerry returned to the campaign trail today after their first presidential debate, holding rallies in key battleground states as their campaigns sought to put the best face on their performance and sharpen their differences on national security issues.
[read more]

Mount St. Helens eruption chances put at 70 percent
September 30, 2004
by The Seattle Times

The shaking under Mount St. Helens climbed another notch yesterday, and geologists quantified the odds that the Cascades' most active volcano would let loose again.

"We're saying there's a 70 percent chance of an eruption within the next few days to a few months," said volcanologist Cynthia Gardner of the U.S. Geological Survey's (USGS) Cascades Volcano Observatory.
[read more]

EPA Wording Found to Mirror Industry's; Influence on Mercury Proposal Probed
September 21, 2004
by The Washington Post

For the third time, environmental advocates have discovered passages in the Bush administration's proposal for regulating mercury pollution from power plants that mirror almost word for word portions of memos written by a law firm representing coal-fired power plants.
[read more]

Incumbents Prevail in Final Day Of Primaries
September 14, 2004
by Associated Press

Incumbent governors and senators nationwide easily turned back challenges yesterday as eight states held primaries, including a divisive contest for an open governor's seat in Washington state. Other states voting were Massachusetts, Minnesota, New Hampshire, New York, Rhode Island, Vermont and Wisconsin.
[read more]

The Bush Record: New Priorities in Environment
September 13, 2004
by The New York Times

From the start, Bush officials challenged the status quo and revised the traditional public-policy calculus on environmental decisions. They put an instant hold on many Clinton administration regulations, and the debates over those issues and others are intensely polarized.

The administration has sought to increase the harvesting of energy and other resources on public lands, to seek cooperative ways to reduce pollution, to free the military from environmental restrictions and to streamline - opponents say gut - regulatory and enforcement processes.
[read more]

Great Sand Dunes Become National Park; Business Threatened Unique Formation
September 13, 2004
by Washington Post

An enormous sea of shifting sand, an American Sahara deposited at the base of the Rocky Mountains by 12,000 years of southwesterly winds, became the nation's newest national park Monday as Interior Secretary Gail A. Norton guaranteed permanent protection for a unique geological phenomenon that had been threatened by commercial speculators.

The new park is the first one created under the Bush administration. The enabling legislation was passed under President Bill Clinton, but it took four years to resolve land-control issues in a park and adjacent wildlife refuge that cover nearly three times the land area of the District of Columbia.
[read more]

Stuck on The Fence; Weighing Acceptance Speeches by Bush & Kerry, Undecided Voters Reject Much of What They Hear
September 5, 2004
by The Washington Post

ERIE, Pa. -- A warning to the presidential candidates seeking to court swing voters: This election year, some swing voters are swinging back.

As evidence, consider 10 uncommitted voters who live in this battleground city in this battleground state. Pulled together in a focus group, they were in a decidedly contrary mood after hearing both President Bush and Sen. John Kerry accept their parties' presidential nominations.
[read more]

The RNC: A User's Manual
August 26, 2004
by CBSNews.com

Congratulations, Republicans! You are about to become the proud owners of a sparkling new 2004 convention — a four-day chance to make the case for the re-election of President Bush.

When you remove the convention from its package at Madison Square Garden on Monday, install the batteries and flick the "on" switch, you'll notice that RNC 2004 is a state-of-the-art machine with all the latest gadgets – from the jumbo video screen for biographical films to the innovative circular stage that The New York Times reports Mr. Bush will use for his convention address.
[read more]

Married? Single? Status affects how women vote
August 25, 2004
by USA TODAY

Want to know which candidate a woman is likely to support for president? Look at her ring finger.

It may sound like the start of a bad joke, but the fact is most married women say they'll vote for President Bush. By nearly 2-to-1, unmarried women say they support John Kerry.
[read more]

E.P.A. Says Mercury Taints Fish Across U.S.
August 24, 2004
by The New York Times

The head of the Environmental Protection Agency said on Tuesday that fish in virtually all of the nation's lakes and rivers were contaminated with mercury, a highly toxic metal that poses health risks for pregnant women and young children.

Michael O. Leavitt, the E.P.A. administrator, drew his conclusion from the agency's latest annual survey of fish advisories, which showed that 48 states - all but Wyoming and Alaska - issued warnings about mercury last year. That compared with 44 states in 1993, when the surveys were first conducted.
[read more]

Reaching to the Converted; Environmental Groups Canvass Environmentalist Voters
August 20, 2004
by The Washington Post

While environmental organizations have not delivered as much as they promised in past elections, they say this year will be different. In a closely divided election, these groups are focused on swaying voters in swing states that will help decide this year's race.
[read more]

FEC Votes to Curb Nonparty Donations; Stricter Rules Will Go Into Effect in January
August 19, 2004
by The Washington Post

The Federal Election Commission yesterday adopted new regulations that will make it significantly more difficult for independent political groups to continue to raise and spend millions of dollars in contributions after the 2004 election.
[read more]

Democratic ticket has green thumb
August 4, 2004
by Raisa Scriabine

RAN member Raisa Scriabine attended the Democratic National Convention in Boston and found much of relevance to report back on. She witnessed how the Kerry Edwards ticket is embracing the environmental movement with open arms.
[read more]

Women need to "revolutionize" the political arena
August 4, 2004
by Rachel Tabakman

RAN staff member Rachel Tabakman attended the Democratic National Convention in Boston and found that mobilizing more women and increasing their political participation was very much on the Democratic Party’s agenda.
[read more]

Most Fish From Lakes Is Too High In Mercury
August 3, 2004
by The Washington Post

The Environmental Protection Agency has determined that more than half of all freshwater fish it sampled from America's lakes could be unsafe for women of childbearing age to eat twice a week, according to data disclosed by environmental groups.

More than three-quarters of the fish sampled also had mercury levels that may be unhealthy for children younger than 3. The data, collected between 1999 and 2001 on 2,547 fish from 260 lakes, are part of the first-ever nationwide study the EPA has conducted on freshwater fish in an ongoing four-year project.
[read more]

Solar chic becomes fashionable in New York
August 1, 2004
by Reuters

For whatever reason, the typical solar consumer isnt a backwoods environmentalist anymore. A small but growing number of homeowners in the metropolis, an area not known for year-round blistering sunlight, are converting solar rays into electricity. And in times of low demand and strong sun, they can even sell the electricity back to the grid.
[read more]

Kerry: 'America Can Do Better'; Senator Accepts the Democratic Nomination
July 29, 2004
by The Washington Post

John Forbes Kerry accepted the Democratic presidential nomination Thursday night, offering himself to Americans as a decorated Vietnam War veteran who saw the horrors of war firsthand as a young man, and who nearly four decades later is ready to defend the country with more vigilance and better judgment than President Bush.

With the presidential election 95 days away, Kerry's hour before a nationally televised audience was dominated by national security, with even the Democratic Party's traditional emphasis on domestic issues harnessed to his larger argument about the war on terrorism.
[read more]

CAMPAIGN 2004: Female Candidates Work the Convention Hall
July 29, 2004
by Women's eNews

As John Kerry and John Edwards, the Democratic nominees for president and vice president, used their party's convention to shift their campaigns into high gear, four female Democrats did the same.

Democrats Betty Castor of Florida, Nancy Farmer of Missouri--both vying for Senate seats--and Allyson Schwartz of Philadelphia and Diane Farrell of Westport, Conn.,--both going for House seats--were out in force at the flurry of women's rallies, breakfasts and luncheons held here over the past four days.
[read more]

Tenenbaum campaign chief quits
July 29, 2004
by The State

Carol Butler has resigned as manager of Inez Tenenbaum’s U.S. Senate campaign. Butler’s last day will be Monday. Aides cited irreconcilable differences between the Democratic candidate and her campaign manager.

In Charleston, where she was campaigning, Tenenbaum said, “In the last 100 days of a campaign, there are different issues and management styles that one needs.” Tenenbaum didn’t elaborate but praised Butler, saying she did a “wonderful job.”
[read more]

2 sides of Elizabeth Edwards
July 11, 2004
by USA Today

Elizabeth Edwards' intellect, termed "a weapon of mass destruction" by a former courtroom rival, is one side of what she brings to the 2004 campaign as wife of North Carolina Sen. John Edwards, the Democratic vice presidential candidate.

The other side is what Teresa Heinz Kerry, the wife of presidential candidate John Kerry, calls Edwards' "mother earth" quality. That is, her grounding in a life familiar to most Americans: raising kids, coaching soccer, volunteering at school, struggling with her weight, juggling work and family.
[read more]

The Art of Being A Drama Queen; In Washington Workshops, Divas are Made, Not Born
July 9, 2004
by The Washington Post

For two hours and five dollars, you can live a modest fairy tale in downtown Washington.

No glass slippers and no prince, but for the duration of rush hour and the cost of a cab ride, you can be a diva: a woman who wouldn't stand for a numbingly workaday life in the District, the sort of lady you see looking glossy and dramatic in Vogue centerfolds, having electric-blue cocktails in Carrie Bradshaw's New York.

Here, at a diva-training workshop on a Thursday in June, you can learn to be extraordinary.
[read more]

Rachel's Action Network Launches Website!
July 7, 2004
by Rachel Tabakman

Rachel's Action Network launched its website today to rally everyday women to take an active role in protecting the health and environment of their families, communities and the earth. The site will offer many resources including updated environmental and political news, information on women candidates striving to make their mark in November, and insights into issues that influence women’s empowerment on the national and global stage.
[read more]

Female Troops in Iraq Redefine Combat Rules
July 4, 2004
by Women's eNews

Female soldiers who fought in Iraq provide a snapshot of just how close they were to combat areas at the opening stages of the war. Often, combat decisions on their duties were made on the battlefield, not by the book. Many experts say that the war in Iraq has become yet another major milestone for women in the military as they entered into more leadership positions in many of the most volatile areas.
[read more]

Laura Bush Raises Her Voice (A Bit)
June 29, 2004
by USA Today

Laura Bush's values, image and opinions are not just fodder for fashion magazines or Beltway buzz about whether she supports abortion rights or disagrees with her husband's opposition to embryonic stem-cell research.
[read more]

Laura Bush raises her voice (a bit)
June 28, 2004
by USA Today

Laura Bush never really was just a demure librarian.

In private, she has always been more independent and opinionated than the docile public persona she perfected for her husband's first presidential campaign. But a more confident, glamorous and outspoken first lady is now on display for what she wistfully notes will be her final campaign.

Laura Bush's values, image and opinions are not just fodder for fashion magazines or Beltway buzz about whether she supports abortion rights or disagrees with her husband's opposition to embryonic stem-cell research. They could become an important part of the campaign as voters compare the wives of the two candidates.
[read more]

Olympic bid cities going for green
May 16, 2004
by BBC News Online

After the success of Sydney's "Green Games" in 2000, environmental issues are high on the agenda for the cities hoping to host the 2012 Summer Olympics.

The International Olympic Committee (IOC) will announce on Tuesday which of the nine applicant cities bidding to stage the event will go forward to the final run-off and become "candidate cities".

As Athens continues its race against time to get things ready for this August's global get-together, many environmentalists worry that the benchmark set by Sydney will be allowed to slip dramatically.

The cities in the running to host the 2012 Games can expect all aspects of their bids, including their environmental credentials, to come under close scrutiny from the IOC. Committee chiefs will be loathed to lose the environmental gains made four years ago.
[read more]

Vote-Hunters' Elusive Prey
May 10, 2004
by The Washington Post

ORLANDO -- Orlando Man rests a head of premature white on a calloused hand. His sleeves are frayed. He looks tired. Shhh. Listen. He is about to tell us something important.

He hasn't had a raise in three years, he says. All the jobs go to "China," or get "taken by the Mexicans," and his is probably next. He feels "sold out" by Bush, he says. An observer can almost imagine John Kerry nodding gravely, cameras recording the moment for a future commercial.

Then CUT! CUT! Suddenly Orlando Man is veering wildly off script. Bush "is a strong leader," he says. Yeah, the war's going badly but "nobody could have predicted that." Kerry is "a waffler. Says one thing one day and then flips it two months later."

Huh?

Who is Orlando Man? And which side is he on?
[read more]

Spain's New Leader Appoints 8 Women to Cabinet
May 8, 2004
by Women's eNews

Spain's new prime minister has made history by assigning half of his cabinet seats to women and backing legislation to fight domestic violence and legalize abortion.
[read more]

Hot Women's Races!
May 5, 2004
by Clare M. Dowling

As the 2004 elections rapidly approach, Rachel’s Action Network is paying close attention to some Congressional races around the country where women candidates are showing real promise. These candidates face decisive contests against tough opponents in the coming months.
[read more]

[back to latest news]