As the upcoming United Nations Climate Change Conference looms nearer, UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon is stepping up the pressure for drastic action in Copenhagen, and the United States and China appear poised to help lead the way.

As the upcoming UN Climate Change Conference draws nearer, almost every day brings a new headline from environmental alarmists threatening the imminent end of the world unless all nations submit to their agenda. Today’s threat? Overpopulation — with a Third World spin.

Member states of the European Union may soon find that the joys of environmental self-righteousness quickly fade when the bill comes due. According to a report from BBCNews, the European Commission is proposing that the EU provide billions annually to poor countries for climate-change adaptation. Yet the amounts proposed are a relatively small part of what the United Nations says poor nations will need and are considered insufficient by environmental alarmists:

Has it ever seemed to you that the media tend to move as a herd? That no matter how the number of news outlets multiply they all end up following the same stories from the same angles and that the same mistakes or biases get repeated over and over again?

Environmental alarmists are using a new report to increase the pressure on the U.S. Senate as that body considers passage of its own version of the “cap and trade” bill.

Confronted by a negotiation process that some are characterizing as “walking in wet sand,” UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon has decided to get things moving on the environment by shifting his rhetoric into “Chicken Little” mode. In an article that takes its title from Ban’s histrionics —  “We are heading toward an abyss” — the Associated Press has responded to the call to arms with a one-sided repetition of the secretary-general’s talking points.

With the Obama administration’s plans to collectivize healthcare threatened by a prairie fire of public outrage, the Left may be shifting targets once again. Global-warming hysteria is being moved back into the public square with a new series of television ads as the Senate considers passage of its version of the Clean Energy and Security Act (popularly known as “cap and trade” or “cap and tax”).

Does the dairy industry tagline “Got Milk?” leave you a little queasy? You’re not alone. A newly published study estimates that 60 percent of adults are lactose intolerant, and the problem is not a food allergy: it’s in your genes.

In a culture resounding with motifs of decay and collapse on so many levels, Wired.com is reporting that a breathtakingly large number of dams around the United States have become structurally unsound. Once conceived of as the symbol of man’s “power over nature,” nature is now apparently having the last word. As Alexis Madrigal wrote for Wired.com:

The success of the United States’ manned missions to the Moon have been the focus of strange conspiracy theories for decades, and a new movie, Apollo 18, feeds on such theories.

Apollo 18 walks the border between science fiction and horror; its implausible premise — that mankind abandoned the exploration of the Moon because of a fear of beings living there — is pursued with relatively competent writing, acting, and special effects. The film also catches elements of its purported historical context, which bring out a certain depth to the film which younger audience may have difficulty grasping.