Welcome! "The Evening Blues" is a casual community diary (published Monday - Friday, 8:00 PM Eastern) where we hang out, share and talk about news, music, photography and other things of interest to the community.
Just about anything goes, but attacks and pie fights are not welcome here. This is a community diary and a friendly, peaceful, supportive place for people to interact.
Everyone who wants to join in peaceful interaction is very welcome here.
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Hey! Good Evening!
This evening's music features Texas blues guitarist Phillip Walker. Enjoy!
Phillip Walker - Don't Be Afraid Of The Dark
“The only kinds of fights worth fighting are those you’re going to lose, because somebody has to fight them and lose and lose and lose until someday, somebody who believes as you do wins.”
-- I.F. Stone
News and Opinion
We might get a reprieve from the authoritarian surveillance state thanks to internecine fighting amongst republicans. Go to it fellas!
GOP infighting threatens NSA bill
Republicans are in a state of disarray on surveillance reform, with Congress barreling toward a May 31 deadline to extend or curtail some of the NSA’s key powers.
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell and Intelligence Committee Chairman Richard Burr want to reauthorize the bulk collection of phone records — the most controversial program revealed by Edward Snowden’s leaks. Presidential candidates Ted Cruz and Rand Paul want to effectively end it, as do many House Republicans. Senate Judiciary Chairman Chuck Grassley, who will be a key player in any legislation, hasn’t decided what to do.
The split highlights the persistent divisions between libertarian-leaning Republicans who see NSA spying as a threat to Americans’ privacy and GOP national security hawks who don’t want to tamper with the U.S. intelligence apparatus. Even with the ticking clock — which many lawmakers hoped would force a decision after a similar effort failed last year — GOP members are far apart on the issue. ...
It’s the second congressional effort to reform surveillance practices since Snowden’s leaks revealed the vast nature of the NSA’s operations. But if lawmakers don’t do anything this time, key parts of the PATRIOT Act will expire, including the provision the government has used to justify bulk data collection. Tech companies rattled by the disclosures about NSA surveillance via their Internet services have been pushing for changes and want more flexibility to disclose the government orders they receive. ...
One option for reform could come from Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.). The former Judiciary chairman introduced a bill last year that won a few Republican votes but ultimately failed in the upper chamber. Leahy is likely to reintroduce a similar measure this year, and reform advocates hope GOP members — faced with the prospect of sunsetting NSA authorities — will be forced to accept some changes.
Generation Snowden: On Why Surveillance Reform Is Inevitable
In late February, the American Civil Liberties Union commissioned a global poll surveying millennials (18- to 34-year-olds) in 10 countries, including the United States, about their opinions of Snowden and what the effect of his disclosures will mean for privacy. The results confirmed that surveillance reform, like marriage equality, will come about because of generational change.
The poll showed that in every country surveyed — Australia, Canada, France, Germany, Britain, Italy, New Zealand, the Netherlands, Spain and the U.S. — millennials have an overwhelmingly positive opinion of Snowden. In continental Europe, 78% to 86% has positive opinions of him. Even in the United States, where the Justice Department has charged Snowden with espionage, 56% view him favorably.
The poll also found that millennials believe Snowden's disclosures will benefit privacy rights. In Germany, Italy, Spain and the Netherlands, 54% to 59% said they thought Snowden's actions would lead to more privacy protection. ...
It might seem counterintuitive to think that Snowden's disclosures will lead to greater privacy protections when many of the governments in the countries polled are insistent on maintaining or enhancing their abilities to spy on their citizens. Canada, France and the Netherlands are considering expansive surveillance powers similar to the Patriot Act, and Australia already has enacted such a law.
Though surveillance reform may confront resistance in the near term, millennials have made it clear that they don't want government agencies tracking them online or collecting data about their phone calls. In the United States, millennials will surpass the baby boomer generation this year, and by 2020, they will represent 1 out of 3 adults. As they grow in influence, so too will the demand to rein in the surveillance state.
Facing threat in Congress, Pentagon races to resettle Guantanamo inmates
Facing a potential showdown with Congress, the Pentagon is racing to move dozens of detainees out of Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, in coming months before lawmakers can block future transfers and derail President Obama’s plan to shutter the U.S. military prison.
As a first step, officials plan to send up to 10 prisoners overseas, possibly in June. In all, the Pentagon hopes that 57 inmates who are approved for transfer will be resettled by the end of 2015. That would require “large muscle movements” by at least two countries, which officials hope will each agree to take in 10 to 20 Yemeni detainees who, because of security conditions in their war-torn homeland, cannot be repatriated. ...
Officials said that Defense Secretary Ashton Carter, who has not approved any transfers since he took office in February, will sign off in coming weeks on the repatriation of inmates to Morocco and Mauritania, and the transfer of six Yemeni prisoners to a third country.
Forty-eight of the prisoners approved for transfer out of Guantanamo Bay are Yemeni. The last transfer was in January, when the United States sent four Yemenis to Oman and one to Estonia.
In addition, another prisoner who may be resettled as early as this summer is Shaker Aamer, an alleged al-Qaeda plotter and former U.K. resident whom British officials have lobbied Washington to release.
American and Italian Hostages Killed in US Drone Strike, White House Reveals
A U.S. drone strike in January killed two hostages, an Italian and an American, being held by al Qaeda in Pakistan, the White House revealed on Thursday. ...
According to the statement, the failed counterterrorism operation targeted an al Qaeda-associated compound in the border region of Afghanistan and Pakistan, where authorities said they had "no reason to believe either hostage was present." ...
In a televised address on Thursday morning, President Barack Obama said he "takes full responsibility" for the deaths.
For years, the White House has rebuffed criticisms of its counterterrorism operations and refused to divulge information about civilians killed in U.S. drone attacks. The Bureau of Investigative Journalism estimates that between 2004 and 2015, as many as 960 civilians may have been killed by U.S. drone strikes in Pakistan, including up to 207 children.
Alka Pradhan, an attorney with the international human rights group Reprieve who represents other civilian victims of drone attacks, noted in a statement that Dr. Weinstein and Mr. Lo Porto "are far from the first innocents to die by our drones, and in no other case has the US apologized for its mistake."
U.S.-Backed Saudi War in Yemen Continues as Aid Groups Describe "Catastrophic" Humanitarian Crisis
White House says 'job is not done' in Yemen
Yemen remains unstable and much more work needs to be done in the region, despite a declared halt to the Saudi-led bombing campaign in the country, the White House said on Wednesday.
"Obviously, the job is not done," Jen Psaki, White House communications director, said on CNN.
Saudia Arabia's announcement on Tuesday that it would end air strikes against the Iranian-allied Houthis drew positive responses from the White House and Tehran, as well as fresh calls for peace talks and humanitarian aid.
Saudi Arabia said its month-old campaign against the Houthis, who had seized large areas in Yemen, had met its goals but rival forces fought on in Yemen on Wednesday.
"There is remaining instability in the region, in Yemen," Psaki said. "There's a lot of work that needs to be done and we're going to be doubling down and continuing to work on that with our partners around the world."
Yemen Crisis: Saudi Arabia's Air War Resumes
Yemenis are wondering if the 28-day Saudi bombing campaign is really over or whether the war has simply entered a new phase. Air strikes were still taking place in Aden, Taiz and other Yemeni cities hours after they were supposed to have ceased.
And nobody in Yemen supposes that the war the Saudis escalated when they started bombing on 26 March can be concluded just because the bombs have stopped falling.
The Houthis, the Shia militia whom the Saudis are supposedly trying to displace from power, overran an armoured brigade headquarters in Taiz after heavy fighting as the air war ended. Whatever else Saudi bombing has done, it has not broken the Houthi’s grip on power. ...
The crisis in Yemen has got a lot worse as a result of the Saudi air war. Yemen has always been only loosely controlled from the centre and many well-armed players have influence but the war has exacerbated and militarised divisions. Protagonists are not always what they seem. Fighters reported as being supporters of President Hadi in Aden appear rather to be south Yemeni separatists who want to reverse the unity with the north agreed in 1990. ...
The Saudis appear to have chosen Yemen as another arena in the confrontation between Iran and the Gulf monarchies and Sunni against Shia. This may be a distorted interpretation of a conflict in which local factors are more significant, but it may force Yemen into the same mould as the sectarian conflicts in Iraq and Syria. One ominous development is that al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) has greatly benefited from the dissolution of central authority and may present themselves as the shock troops of the Sunnis.
US Claims Russian Military Buildup Along Ukraine Border
Offers Neither Evidence Nor Details on Deployments
With their prototypical lack of evidence and a conspicuous lack of any details, the US State Department is once again accusing Russia of a military buildup along the Ukrainian border. ...
The allegations also included claims that Russia had put some of the air defense systems inside Ukrainian territory, though they did not offer details on this, and it’s unclear from the allegations if this deployment was purported to have occurred in rebel Donetsk or in Crimea, the later of which Russia annexed last year but which the US regularly refers to as “Ukrainian territory” for the sake of such allegations.
Obama: US Could Penetrate S-300 System to Attack Iran
Speaking on MSNBC, President Obama downplayed Russia’s decision to allow Iran to buy S-300 air defense systems from them, saying the systems would not stop an American attack on Iran.
“Even if they’ve got some air defense systems, we could penetrate them,” Obama insisted, noting the US spends $600 billion on its military compared to Iran’s $17 billion. ...
The reports Iran might be able to buy them riled Israel, who noted it would make their own threatened attack on Iran considerably less convenient. The US, with its seemingly endless supply of warplanes and missiles, appears confident it can throw enough force at pretty much anywhere or anything to thwart the defenses.
Why Didn't Bush/Cheney Prevent 9/11? - John Kiriakou
Hillary the Hawk
Announcing her latest campaign for the presidency, Hillary Clinton declared she was entering the race to be the champion for “everyday Americans.” As a lawmaker and diplomat, however, Clinton has long championed military campaigns that have killed scores of “everyday” people abroad, from Iraq to Yemen. As commander-in-chief, there’s no reason to believe she’d be any less a hawk than she was as the senator who backed George W. Bush’s war in Iraq, or the Secretary of State who encouraged Barack Obama to escalate the war in Afghanistan. If her nomination is as sure a thing as people say, then antiwar organizing needs to start right away.
Hillary has already won the support of those who continually agitate for war. “I feel comfortable with her on foreign policy,” Robert Kagan, a co-founder of the neoconservative Project for the New American Century, told The New York Times last summer. “If she pursues a policy which we think she will pursue,” he said, “it’s something that might have been called neocon, but clearly her supporters are not going to call it that; they are going to call it something else.”
We’re going to call it what it is: More of the same sort of murderous policies that destroyed Iraq, destabilized Libya, killed women and children with cluster bombs and drones in Yemen, and legitimized the undermining of democracy in Honduras. There’s little chance the Republicans will nominate someone better, but given Clinton’s record as a senator and Secretary of State – the latter giving us a very good idea of how she would approach foreign affairs once in office – it will be hard for them to find anyone much worse. ...
When Barack Obama became president, the antiwar movement became his first casualty – followed by a group of Pakistanis droned to death three days after his inauguration. We should never lose hope that we can bring about positive change, but actually changing the world for the better requires being aware that whoever sits in the White House come January 2017 is not going to be our friend.
David Petraeus to be sentenced for giving classified information to mistress
The former CIA director David Petraeus, whose career was destroyed by an extramarital affair with his biographer, was expected to be sentenced on Thursday in federal court in North Carolina, for giving her classified material while she was working on the book. ...
The plea agreement carries a possible sentence of up to a year in prison. In court papers, prosecutors recommended two years of probation and a $40,000 fine. But the judge is not bound by that and could still impose a prison sentence. The agreement was filed in Charlotte, where Paula Broadwell, the general’s biographer and former lover, lives with her husband and children. ...
Prosecutors said that while Broadwell was writing her book in 2011, Petraeus gave her eight binders of classified material he had improperly kept from his time as the top military commander in Afghanistan. Days later, he took the binders back to his house.
Among the secret information contained in the “black books” were the names of covert operatives, the coalition war strategy and notes about Petraeus’s discussions with Barack Obama and the National Security Council, prosecutors said.
Those binders were seized by the FBI in an April 2013 search of Petraeus’s home in Arlington, Virginia, where he had kept them in the unlocked drawer of a desk in a ground-floor study.
NSA Chief Acknowledges Need for “Broad Discussion” About Cyberwarfare
A whole new and very dangerous field of warfare has been developed by the Obama administration, in secret, using untested legal justifications, and without even the faintest whiff of oversight.
So kudos to Patrick Tucker, technology editor for Defense One, who took advantage of a recent moment with National Security Agency chief Michael Rogers to ask him: Is there a way to discuss publicly what the future of cyberwar operations will look like?
Rogers said, dismissively, that the public should trust that the U.S. will follow the international laws of conflict and that its use of cyberwarfare would “be proportional” and “in line with the broader set of norms that we’ve created over time.”
But he also acknowledged the need, at some point, for the public to have some sort of a say.
Sony Once Again Ridiculously Warns The Media Not To Report On Leaked Emails
Back in December, when the Sony emails first leaked, we wrote about how Sony hired super-high-powered lawyer David Boies to send off ridiculously misinformed letters to media outlets warning them that they should not write anything based on information in the leaks. Boies took it a ridiculous step further, threatening to sue Twitter for not blocking screenshots of the emails. Both threats had no real legal basis.
Of course, now that the emails are in the news again, thanks to Wikileaks posting the archive online and making it searchable, Sony is apparently shelling out more big bucks to Boies to send around another version of the letter. You can see the letter here. ... The really ridiculous part is arguing that the media should not publish this information to support the First Amendment. Really.
This is a rather confused understanding of the First Amendment, and the rights of the press to look at and publish newsworthy information, even if it's obtained through more questionable means. Hell, it seems worth mentioning right about now that Sony Pictures Entertainment just happens to be making a movie about Ed Snowden. Apparently, it's fine and dandy for Sony to make a movie detailing how the press was able to report on a bunch of "stolen information," but if anyone in the media does that about Sony, then it's magically illegal? Is Sony really going to try to push that argument in court? Because it's going to get a massive First Amendment smackdown if it tries.
Sony should not be able to tell journalists what to print
Sony, which spent weeks holding itself out as a free speech martyr after North Korea allegedly hacked its emails, is now trying to do more damage to the spirit of the First Amendment than North Korea ever did. The corporation is using high-powered lawyers and lobbyists in an attempt to stifle the rights of media organizations to publish newsworthy information already in the public domain. Ironically, some of those emails include Sony and the MPAA’s attempts to censor the Internet on a much larger scale.
Sony’s lawyer, David Boies, has spent the week sending out a hyperbolic letter to various news organizations, pressuring them to avert their eyes from the hacked email trove that WikiLeaks published on its site last week. Boies, while misleadingly claiming that journalists could be breaking US law by even looking at the emails, also said if media organizations refused to write stories about them, they would somehow be “protecting the First Amendment.” ...
The head of the MPAA and former Democratic Senator Chis Dodd went a step further yesterday, outrageously suggesting the US government should go after WikiLeaks in some fashion for re-publishing the emails. ...
David Boies, one of the nation’s most experienced Supreme Court lawyers, should probably remind Dodd (and himself) that America’s highest court made clear well over a decade ago that news organizations have a First Amendment right to publish newsworthy information that they know was stolen, as long as they did not participate in the underlying crime.
"Running While Black": Protests Swell over Death of Freddie Gray in Baltimore Police Custody
Freddie Gray death: police clash with protesters for second night in Baltimore
Tensions continued to simmer in West Baltimore on Wednesday night as hundreds of protesters once again congregated at the western district police station, briefly tussling with officers and attempting to cross police lines whilst calling for justice in the wake of 25 year-old Freddie Gray’s death in custody.
The assembled crowds, whilst smaller than protests at the same location last night, were notably more combative. Baltimore police officers, who were stood behind metal barriers and concrete road blocks erected at the intersection before the station, were occasionally pelted with plastic bottles and regularly goaded by protesters.
Protesters have congregated in West Baltimore since Gray’s death, with over 1,000 taking to the streets on Tuesday.
City councilman Nick Mosby, who represents West Baltimore’s district seven has been present at each protest. On Wednesday evening he said that dissatisfaction and anger among residents continued to grow.
“Day by day there is more,” he told the Guardian. “At this point people are tired and angry.”
Police Officer 'Bill of Rights' Blamed for Baltimore’s Information Blackout in Case of Freddie Gray’s Severed Spine
Ten days after Baltimore cops crammed Freddie Gray into the back of a paddy wagon, there's still an information blackout about how exactly the 25-year-old black man ended up with a severed spine while in police custody. Initial attempts at transparency have been thwarted, leaving several gaping holes in the series of events that occurred after Gray's April 12 arrest. ...
"The officers who were directly involved because of our Law Enforcement Officer's Bill of Rights we have yet to fully engage those officers, and we will get to the bottom of it," Baltimore Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake said. "I am determined to make sure that we have as full investigation and we follow all of the rules and procedures so if there is a finding of wrongdoing that we have done everything possible to protect policy and procedures so we can hold those individual accountable." ...
Under Maryland's Law Enforcement Officer's Bill of Rights (LEOBOR), officers are obliged to speak with supervisors if asked about a particular arrest or incident, but their statements are exempt from inclusion in any criminal investigation. Officers then have 10 days to hire an attorney before being required to make any more statements.
"It gives law enforcement time to hide certain information and construct a story that is palatable to the public and allow them to preserve people's jobs and so on," Dayvon Love, the director of public policy for Leaders of a Beautiful Struggle (LBS), a Baltimore-based grassroots think tank, said.
There are still many blanks in the story of precisely how Gray, who, according to a police report, had a switchblade knife on him when he was arrested, sustained his injuries. Police say he "fled unprovoked upon noticing police presence," and was critically injured in the van while being taken to the local station. Baltimore Police Commissioner Anthony W. Batts later revealed that Gray, who is asthmatic, repeatedly asked for medical attention and an inhaler, which he did not receive.
Michael Brown's family to file wrongful death suit against city of Ferguson
The family of Michael Brown, the unarmed black 18-year-old whose fatal
shooting by police led to months of unrest last year, are suing the city of Ferguson, Missouri, their lawyers said on Wednesday evening.
Relatives of Brown will announce their filing of a civil lawsuit against the St Louis suburb at a press conference on Thursday morning, attorneys Benjamin Crump and Daryl Parks said in a statement.
The lawsuit will accuse city authorities of liability for “the wrongful death of Michael Brown Jr”, the statement said. A city spokeswoman did not respond to a request for comment.
Their civil action, which will almost certainly seek financial damages, is likely to be the Brown family’s final opportunity to hold authorities responsible for the death of their son.
It follows decisions by state and federal authorities not to bring criminal charges against Darren Wilson, the former Ferguson police officer who killed Brown last year, prompting protests and intense clashes between demonstrators and police.
'Right to Work' Debunked: Economists Find Anti-Worker Laws Lead to Lower Wages
Workers in Right to Work states earn an average of $1,558 less per year than their counterparts in states without anti-labor laws
Contradicting arguments typically used to advance so-called Right to Work legislation, new research from the Economic Policy Institute (EPI) shows that wages and benefits are actually lower in states with such anti-worker laws on the books.
The paper, released as part of EPI's Raising America's Pay project, finds that the negative impact of Right to Work (RTW) laws—which undercut unions by allowing workers to benefit from collective bargaining without having to pay dues—translates to $1,558 less a year in earnings for a typical full-time worker.
Wages in RTW states are 3.1 percent lower than those in non-RTW states, after controlling for individual demographic and socioeconomic factors as well as state macroeconomic indicators, according to EPI senior economist Elise Gould and research assistant Will Kimball.
Hellraiser Preview
Sherman, set the time machine for tomorrow's Hellraisers Journal which will feature from the Chicago Day Book: the trial of John Lawson with photo of his wife and daughter. "Upon the result of this trial hinges the question of whether citizens have a right to organize, to gather on ground legally their own, and defend their property and their lives against the attacks of oppressors."
Tune in at 2pm!
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Sen. Warren to Those Promising TPP Would Be So Great: 'Prove It.'
Senator explains that real reason TPP remains so secret, even as Congress begins voting on measures to ram it through, is because 'if the American people saw what was in it, they would be opposed to it.'
Prove it. Let the American voters, the press, and the global public see and read the fine print of this so-called "free trade" deal.
That's the basic message contained in a new statement released by Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) after President Obama said earlier this week that she and other opponents of the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) were "wrong" when it came to their objections to the pending 12-nation agreement.
"The Administration says I'm wrong – that there’s nothing to worry about," Warren wrote in a blog post addressed to constituents and the general public on Wednesday. "They say the deal is nearly done, and they are making a lot of promises about how the deal will affect workers, the environment, and human rights. Promises – but people like you can't see the actual deal."
While Fire over TPP is Red Hot, Demand Grows for Clinton to Speak Up
With the fight over Fast Track authority in full swing and the battle lines drawn between progressive voices opposing the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) and corporate-backed forces rallying in its favor, a growing chorus of voices want Hillary Clinton—who recently made her presidential bid for 2016 official—to take a definitive stance on the controversial trade pact that so clearly represents the power struggle between the interests of big business on one hand, and transparency, democracy, and an economic system that protects workers, the planet, and the public good on the other.
On Tuesday, Clinton made what were widely regarding as milquetoast statements on the pending agreement, saying: "Any trade deal has to produce jobs and raise wages and increase prosperity and protect our security." ...
With more progressive members of Congress—including large numbers of House Democrats and a group of senators led by Sens. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.), and Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio)—scrambling to resist the tide of support the agreement has received from corporate interests, critics say that while Clinton's decision to stand on the sidelines might be smart campaigning in the age of $5 billion election cycles, it shouldn't go unnoticed.
Horse Race Comedy Extra:
Hillary Clinton Calls For 'Toppling' The 1 Percent
Hillary Clinton believes that strengthening the middle class and alleviating income inequality will require "toppling" the wealthiest 1 percent of Americans, according to a New York Times profile published on Tuesday.
The Times article quoted a host of Clinton confidants characterizing Clinton's economic policy record as a populist agenda akin to that of Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.). That includes a view that the ongoing accumulation of massive wealth at the top of the spectrum is holding back the broader economy.
In a meeting with economists this year, Mrs. Clinton intensely studied a chart that showed income inequality in the United States. The graph charted how real wages, adjusted for inflation, had increased exponentially for the wealthiest Americans, making the bar so steep it hardly fit on the chart.
Mrs. Clinton pointed at the top category and said the economy required a “toppling” of the wealthiest 1 percent, according to several people who were briefed on Mrs. Clinton’s policy discussions but could not discuss private conversations for attribution.
The Clinton campaign told HuffPost they could not confirm the precise language of the quote, but did not distance themselves from its populist essence.
The Evening Greens
Remember Mayflower? Exxon Slapped with Paltry Fine for Tar Sands Pipeline Spill
Arkansas suit against oil giant ends with $5 million agreement
Two years after a ruptured pipeline poured 134,000 gallons of tar sands oil into the suburban streets of Mayflower, Arkansas, creating a toxic mess that devastated both the community and the environment, ExxonMobil has been ordered to pay a $5 million fine for its role in the disaster, the state announced on Wednesday. ...
"ExxonMobil will pay $1 million in State civil penalties, $600,000 toward water quality-based Supplemental Environmental Projects and $280,000 to the Attorney General’s Office for litigation costs. ExxonMobil will also pay $3.19 million in federal civil penalties and perform measures to improve pipeline safety and spill response," reads the statement from the Attorney General's office.
As Mollie Matteson, senior scientist with the Center for Biological Diversity, told Common Dreams, "When you look at the fine and consider that Exxon makes a profit of close to $9 million every day, this fine is about half a day's worth of profits.
"I think the real question here," Matteson continued, "is this fine sufficient to actually change Exxon's behavior or any oil company's behavior? And I think the answer is a pretty strong 'no.' Half a day's profit lost is not going to be anything but a blip on their operations."
After Contributing to the Destruction of the World's Forests, McDonald's Says It Will Stop Cutting Down Trees
On Tuesday, the fast food giant announced that it planned to eliminate any links to deforestation in its products. Though the announcement covers all of the goods in its restaurants, McDonald's will place the greatest emphasis on cleaning up its sources of beef, poultry, coffee, packaging, and palm oil.
"Making this pledge is the right thing to do for our company, the planet, and the communities in which our supply chain operates," McDonald's vice president of supply chain and sustainability Francesca DeBiase said in a statement. "We're excited to continue collaborating with our supplier partners to achieve our goals."
The company is the first in the fast food industry to make a deforestation pledge that addresses not only palm oil but also its entire product line. They're expected to roll out specifics on each item later this year, said Lael Goodman, a tropical forests analyst with the Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS). And, according to McDonald's, its products will be free of any links to deforestation by 2030. ...
But even if it halts its forest destruction, McDonald's remains a large contributor to climate change just by producing so much beef and poultry. According to the UK think tank Chatham House, emissions from livestock, mostly methane from the waste produced by cows, makes up almost 15 percent of global emissions. Sixty-five percent of livestock emissions come just from beef and dairy production.
Oceans are world's seventh largest economy worth $24tn, says WWF report
The monetary value of the world’s oceans has been estimated at US$24tn in a new report that warns that overfishing, pollution and climate change are putting an unprecedented strain upon marine ecosystems.
The report, commissioned by WWF, states the asset value of oceans is $24tn and values the annual “goods and services” it provides, such as food, at $2.5tn. ...
However, the oceans are facing mounting pressures. They soak up around half of the carbon dioxide pumped into the atmosphere by human activity, a process that is warming the water and increasing the acidification of the ocean.
The report warns that nearly two-thirds of the world’s fisheries are “fully exploited” with most of the rest overexploited. The biological diversity of the oceans slumped by 39% between 1970 and 2010, while half of the world’s corals and nearly a third of its seagrasses have disappeared in this time. ...
“The changes we are making will take 10,000 years at least to turnaround, so we don’t want to go down this pathway,” Professor Ove Hoegh-Guldberg, lead author of the report and director of the Australia-based Global Change Institute said. “This generation of humans is defining the future of 300 generations of humans. We are conducting these experiments with our world despite the consequences for people.”
Blog Posts of Interest
Here are diaries and selected blog posts of interest on DailyKos and other blogs.
What's Happenin' Is On Hiatus
Recommended:
Reading I.F. Stone on Earth Day: Why We Still Won’t Get Anywhere Unless We Connect the Dots
Counterterrorism Conference Kicks Out Intercept Journalist
Inside Morocco’s Campaign To Influence Hillary Clinton and Other U.S. Leaders
'You can find nothing in the city now': Yemen reels after month-long air strikes
HRC Goes OWS? 1% Requires Toppling
Persistence, Consistence and Insistence
A Little Night Music
Phillip Walker - The Blues And My Guitar
Phillip Walker Band - Hello My Darling
Phillip Walker - I Got A Sweet Tooth
Phillip Walker - The Bottom of The Top
Phillip Walker - The Train
Phillip Walker - Linda Lu
Phillip Walker - Hello Central
Phillip Walker & Otis Grand - Big Blues From Texas
Phillip Walker - Port Arthur Blues
Phillip Walker - Big Rear Window
Phillip Walker & Otis Grand - Dressin' Trashy
Phillip Walker - Think
Lonnie Brooks, Phillip Walker, Long John Hunter - Two Trains Running
Phillip Walker - Trouble In My Home
Beatrice Beatrice - Philip Walker
Phillip Walker Big Band - Reconsider baby
It's National Pie Day!
The election is over, it's a new year and it's time to work on real change in new ways... and it's National Pie Day. This seemed like the perfect opportunity to tell you a little more about our new site and to start getting people signed up.
Come on over and sign up so that we can send you announcements about the site, the launch, and information about participating in our public beta testing.
Why is National Pie Day the perfect opportunity to tell you more about us? Well you'll see why very soon. So what are you waiting for?! Head on over now and be one of the first!
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