Freyne Land

Nice to see a little snow. Been a while, eh?

In fact, Vermont's newest U.S. senator held a morning presser on global warming at his Church Street office that coincided with the white stuff.

Not "news" really - everyone already knew - but U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders will reintroduce former Sen. Jim Jeffords' global warming bill this week. It went nowhere last time with the Bush Republicans in charge.  Let's see what happens this time. Bernie was flanked by three environmental activists including  Bill McKibben, a guy who's everywhere lately.

"The power of Big Energy and the money of Big Energy is enormous," said Sanders. "There's no question about that. And we're going to have to work very hard to get legislation like this passed."

But change is in the air, said the brand new senator from Vermont.

"All that I can say is the good news is that from the grassroots to the halls of Congress, there is no question there has been a sea change in the understanding of the global warming problem," said Ol'Bernardo.  Awareness is rising rapidly, he said,  "that society must deal with it in an extraordinarily bold way if we are going to save the planet for our kids and out grandchildren."

Sanders, an Independent aligned with the majority Democrats, holds seats on both the Energy and the Environment Committees.

Nice position.

"For years," said Sen. Sanders, "the Bush Administration has turned a deaf ear as the scientific community warned us of the problem of global warming and the disastrous impact it will have on our planet. Sadly, many of these predictions are now becoming a reality."

Stay tuned.