There will be no shortage of news from the vacuum of space tomorrow, and depending on where you live, you may even catch a show.

By far the most visible event will be tomorrow's lunar eclipse, the second such occurrence in less than six months, but the last one for more than two years. The eclipse will last nearly an hour and be visible across most of North America, beginning at 10 p.m. on the East Coast.

Also Wednesday, the space shuttle Atlantis is scheduled for an afternoon landing in Florida, ending a successful 13-day mission. The astronauts delivered a $2 billion laboratory to the International Space Station and swapped out one member of the station's three-person crew.

Why tomorrow afternoon? Probably because NASA would prefer the shuttle be out of orbit when the Navy shoots a missile at the Defense Department's super-secret spy satellite that turned out to be a very toxic lemon. The unprecedented missile launch is scheduled for 10:30 p.m. EST, right in the middle of the eclipse.

The satellite is called USA 193, and that's about all we know about it, other than that its central computer failed shortly after launch last year in what was undoubtedly a multi-billion dollar glitch.

Tonight is probably your last chance to get a look at the defunct satellite, which has been losing altitude and is currently about 160 miles above the earth. If you live in the right place, it is currently visible to the naked eye at night.

The Pentagon has an eight-day window to shoot down the 5,000-pound satellite before it is expected to fall out of orbit and crash to earth. That could have some bad environmental implications, given that there's about 1,000 pounds of unburned hydrazine fuel still on board. The chemical is capable of causing a bunch of nasty health problems, though much depends on the exposure level.

Many experts say DOD is overestimating the dangers posed by the satellite. One scientist says the chance that the satellite's debris would fall in an area with a population density of one or more persons per 1/4 hectare — about the size of the hydrazine contamination zone — to be no more than one-half of one percent.

Ranchers, traditionally, have not been among the most predator-friendly special-interest groups. Apex predators on the ranch tend to equal dead livestock, and the ones that don’t die are skittish and traumatized, lowering their reproductive rate.

Among the most frustrating predators of livestock are the mobile, stealthy, and deadly mountain lion, a perennial scourge that can do heavy damage to a herd. However, the big cats are also an integral part of mountain ecosystems and help maintain wild herbivore numbers.

Conflicts between humans and mountain lions are the driving force behind the ongoing state and federal effort to reduce their numbers through culling in the state of Oregon. The U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Wildlife Services, under contract with the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife plan, have begun a lion management plan that specifies the population should be reduced to about 3,000, from its 2003 high of 5,100.

However, the environmental impact associated with this undertaking is unknown; Wildlife Services did not make its plan public or submit it for scientific or public review. So several concerned parties filed a lawsuit against the state and federal agencies last month, seeking to force officials to submit an Environmental Impact Statement to account for the effects of its culling the cougar population by roughly 40 percent. The EIS would force the agency give the public and other government agencies the opportunity to weigh in on the particulars of the plan.

Among the plaintiffs, oddly enough, is a ranchers’ group, the Goat Ranchers of Oregon, who seek to maintain a healthy mountain lion population. Who ever said that lions wouldn’t lie down with lambs?

Speaking of suppressed research and political manipulation of science, there is a distressing story emerging today about a report on health hazards stemming from pollution in the Great Lakes. The report is so alarming that the federal government apparently thought it best that the public not be able to read it. So even though a division of the Centers for Disease Control finished the report last summer, it was never released.

Luckily, we can thank the Center for Public Integrity for discovering the suppressed study and reporting on the back story that kept the findings from public view for more than six months. The center has also published excerpts from the still un-released report.

Just how bad is it? The CPI sums it up nicely:

"[The report] warns that more than nine million people who live in the more than two dozen “areas of concern”—including such major metropolitan areas as Chicago, Cleveland, Detroit, and Milwaukee—may face elevated health risks from being exposed to dioxin, PCBs, pesticides, lead, mercury, or six other hazardous pollutants. In many of the geographic areas studied, researchers found low birth weights, elevated rates of infant mortality and premature births, and elevated death rates from breast cancer, colon cancer, and lung cancer."

The lead author of the 400-page study -- Chris De Rosa of the Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry -- has criticized the agency for withholding the findings. He's also been demoted by the ATSDR.

Michael Gilbertson, a Canadian biologist who peer-reviewed the report, told the Washington Post that he agrees with De Rosa: "This information, which really should have been distributed more than a year ago, is inconvenient to the administration."

Federal officials say the report has has been delayed because of "significant questions and concerns" about the quality of the study. The Center for Public Integrity has tried to speak with De Rosa, but ATSDR’s public affairs office has declined to make him available for comment.

Happy Presidents Day. Unless you're a federal employee or you're at a shopping mall, you probably had no idea today was a holiday.

In case you missed it over the weekend -- and since it wasn't broadcast on television, you almost certainly did -- Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama sent proxies to Boston for a debate on science policy and technology.

Saturday's debate, organized by the American Association for the Advancement of Science, touched upon topics ranging from the future of manned missions to the Moon and Mars to federal investment in nuclear energy and green technologies to combat climate change. The Clinton campaign sent science, technology and innovation adviser Thomas Kalil to do their debating, while the Obama camp sent technology, media and telecommunications adviser Alex Ross.

Since John McCain's science adviser cited scheduling conflicts and neither the Huckabee nor Paul campaigns responded to the AAAS invitation, the debate wasn't exactly contentious, given that Clinton and Obama share many of the same views on this issue.

Both Kalil and Ross stressed the need to need to restore scientific integrity to federal agencies following nearly eight years of suppressed research and political manipulation of science. Ross said Obama would be the first president to appoint a chief technology officer to ensure the safety of the government's information networks.

It sounds like debate attendees also heard much of the same rhetoric on green technologies that we've been hearing on the campaign trail. Kalil said Clinton would devote significantly more funding to Earth Sciences, while Ross spoke more about biofuels, a topic that suddenly is a bit more controversial.

We can't decide whether this event will help or hurt the chances for the proposed science debate in Philadelphia that we wrote about last week. Organizers are attempting to convince the major presidential contenders to show up for themselves and debate similar science issues on April 18, just four days before the Pennsylvania primary. According to CQ, no candidate has accepted the offer and Ross and Kalil were noncommittal about the prospect of the debate.

Has global warming eclipsed evolution as this years polarizing school curriculum subject? It looks that way in California, where the state senate has approved a bill that would mandate all new science textbooks in the public schools include details about climate change.

"You can't have a science curriculum that is relevant and current if it doesn't deal with the science behind climate change," said Democratic state Sen. Joe Simitian, who drafted the legislation. The measure still must pass in the state assembly before it heads to Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's desk. Schwarzenegger has yet to say whether he supports the measure.

The bill has attracted a growing group of critics, and the rhetoric sounds strangely similar to what we heard in Kansas and other states over the past few years over removing references to evolution from school textbooks. Take, for example, the following two quotes from politicians, and guess which one correlates to which controversy:

"Some wouldn't view them as skeptics. Some would view them as the right side of the issue ... We don't have complete factual information yet."

"I think that part of education is to expose people to different schools of thought ... You're asking me whether or not people ought to be exposed to different ideas, the answer is yes."

The first quote comes from California state Sen. Jeff Denham, who opposes teaching climate change in the schools.

The second one is from President Bush, in support of a 2005 decision by the Kansas Board of Education to include greater criticism of evolution in its school science standards.

Our guess is that while the California bill won't stir up as much controversy as the evolution proposals in Kansas, we'll still be hearing a lot more about it if and when it winds up on Schwarzengeer's desk. It will certainly be a good test how green the Governator really is.

Thanks to Groovy Green for the heads up on this story.

Note to candidates: If you're going to accuse your opposition of cutting back room deals with a nuclear power company, you probably should make sure no one on your own staff is taking home six-figure paychecks from that same company.

At this point, both Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama probably wish they had never heard of the Exelon Corporation, because new disclosures of money changing hands isn't helping either one of them in the battle for higher ground.

The origins of this spat go back to late 2005, when Exelon disclosed that it's Braidwood nuclear plant in northern Illinois had leaked tritium, a radioactive byproduct of nuclear power, into nearby drinking water wells. The levels did not exceed federal standards, but the incident prompted Obama to introduce legislation that would force nuclear plants to immediately disclose any accidental release of radioactive material.

The bill was revised several time over the objections of environmental groups, who said Obama had replaced mandates with guidance over the reporting of leaks. While the revised legislation made it out of committee, it was shelved before ever coming up for a full Senate vote in 2006.

The issue has re-surfaced in recent weeks in the form of criticism of Obama by Clinton for what she says were suspicious concessions during the rewrite of the bill. "Senator Obama has some questions to answer about his dealings with one of his largest contributors, Exelon, a big nuclear power company," Clinton said last week. "Apparently, he cut some deals behind closed doors to protect them from full disclosure in the nuclear industry."

Why the suspicions? Because Obama senior adviser David Axelrod once worked as a consultant to Exelon, whose employees and executives have donated about $227,000 to various Obama campaigns.

However, as Huffington Post disclosed yesterday, the consulting firm of Clinton chief strategist Mark Penn received a check from Exelon from $230,000 just last week. That payment, for assistance in renewing a nuclear energy license in New Jersey, was invoiced by Penn's firm in December.

So, to recap, that's $227,000 to the Obama campaign and $230,000 to a Clinton big shot. Both sides might want to call this one a wash and keep their mouths shut about who's receiving preferential treatment from whom.

Don't expect Kansas to be joining that multi-state lawsuit against the EPA over emissions standards anytime soon.

Yesterday, Kansas state senators crushed a proposal to impose the state's first limits on carbon dioxide emissions. And then, just for good measure, they gave preliminary approval for the construction of two new coal-fired power plants in the Southwest corner of the state that are expected to emit 11 million tons of CO2 per year.

According to the AP, the "vote was 32-3 against the CO2 rules proposed by Sen. Chris Steineger, a Kansas City Democrat. His proposal included not only emissions limits for new power plants but a carbon tax of $3 on each ton of excess emissions for utilities that failed to comply."

The votes came in response to a decision last fall by the Kansas secretary of health and environment to deny an air-quality permit for Sunflower Electric Power Corp., which is trying to build the new plants. Yesterday's bill effectively limits the secretary's authority to do this anymore, stipulating that any attempt to impose emissions rules must receive legislative approval.

Democratic Governor Kathleen Sebelius is expected to veto the bills, but proponents of the measures say they have the necessary two-thirds majority in both the state senate and house to overrule a veto.

We find that politicians in general are an oily lot. Indeed the vast majority of national politicians have significant funding from the oil industry. A cool new online application by OilChange International takes this data and forms a pleasant graphical representation to help citizens view exactly how much money their favorite and (most loathed) presidential candidates have received from oil lobbies.

OilChange has been hard at work providing an interface that’s easy to understand on a glance, but also contains links to detailed data. Users can click on each oil company to see how much money they gave to whom, in dollar figures. Candidates can also be clicked on for a detailed list of how much money they received from whom.

So you’re probably itching to know who the oiliest of the 2008 candidates is. The oiliest is (or should we say was) Rudolph Guiliani who received $550,608 from oil companies. Most of this came from Stewart and Stevenson. Close behind is former front runner Mitt Romney, who received $336,783 in contributions. McCain is fourth among candidates, while Huckabee is last, behind even the Democrats.

Hilary Clinton is top among the democrats, with $223,350. Love Clinton? Well maybe you can take minor comfort in the fact that despite coming in a healthy sixth with $106,112, current democratic front-runner Barack Obama received Exxon's top contribution ($15,150).

While the graph is timely and useful, after a while you might get bored. OilChange calculated this and in their eagerness to keep you please has thus also provided similar graphs for the 2000 and 2004 elections – just in case you didn’t realize how oily President Bush really was.

Will the graph help to weaken oil lobbyists’ sway over presidential candidates? Perhaps, but it may only serve to show that we have a very oily president now and will have a new -- but only slightly less oily -- president in 2008.

Cross Posted at EcoGeek