EarthBeat Radio

Mountain Justice Summer is an effort to highlight the problems surrounding what's called "Mountaintop Removal Mining." Often called 'strip mining on steriods' this type of coal mining removes the entire top of mountains to get at coal reserves underneath. Joining co-host Daphne Wysham in the studio is Brian Bernhardt of Mountain Justice Summer, and on the phone is Vernon Halton from the Whitesville, West Virginia offices of Coal River Mountain Watch.
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Next week, the USDA will hold public hearings in Central Pennsylvania over the labeling of organic foods. Mark Kastel joins Daphne from the dairy state of Wisconsin to discuss the efforts of The Cornucopia Institute. It will lobby the USDA for stricter standards for organic milk -- and has rated organic milk marketers on a 'cow scale' measuring how much of their milk comes from small family farms.
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This time of year, the spring rains wash million of dollars of excess fertilizer down the Mississippi River -- creating a massive 'Dead Zone' in the Gulf of Mexico. Joining Daphne in the studio is Mary Booth, a senior scientist with the Washington, DC based Environmental Working Group. Booth says that most of the fertilizer pollution comes from only a few tax-subsidized farms. She says that limiting the amount of tax breaks and subsidies to these farms could help to greatly clean up the Gulf.
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Music for this week's show came from Falling Mountain Music and from Dana Lyons, the song "Cows with Guns." (Be sure to watch the flash animation version on Lyon's website here.)

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