Welcome! "The Evening Blues" is a casual community diary (published Monday - Friday, 7:00 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!
Tonight's music features a couple of younger fellows, Corey Harris and Alvin Youngblood Hart who are carrying on the blues tradition.
Corey Harris - Special Rider Blues
"A guy will promise you the world and give you nothin', and that's the blues."
-- Otis Rush
Photos From Joe on the Road
We got a note from joe last night. He was in Billings, Montana and sent some pictures for us to enjoy. Next stop, Yellowstone National Park.
Theodore Roosevelt National Park (Photo by joe shikspack, 7/5/12)
Theodore Roosevelt National Park (Photo by joe shikspack, 7/5/12)
A coneflower in North Dakota (Photo by joe shikspack, 7/5/12)
A flower in North Dakota. Coreopsis? (Photo by joe shikspack, 7/5/12)
A rest stop in Montana. Coreopsis? (Photo by joe shikspack, 7/5/12)
"North Dakota pothole (it's what they call depressions that fill up with water, North Dakota has a surprising amount of wetlands)" (Photo by joe shikspack, 7/5/12)
Rosebud River (Photo by joe shikspack, 7/5/12)
[ Editor's Note: joanneleon and KBO will be holding down the Evening Blues fort while joe shikspack is on his roadtrip vacation. When we can, we'll post photos and messages that he sends in and put them in this section of the diary. He'll be checking in regularly when he has connectivity, so feel free to leave him some greetings in the comments. Also, we would love to have your help with ideas for Evening Blues topics while he is gone, so feel free to lend your Blues and Roots music expertise and ideas in the comments! ]
News
Commission Calls Fukushima Nuclear Crisis a Man-Made Disaster
TOKYO — The nuclear accident at Fukushima was a preventable disaster rooted in government-industry collusion and the worst conformist conventions of Japanese culture, a parliamentary inquiry concluded on Thursday.
The report, released by the Fukushima Nuclear Accident Independent Investigation Commission, also warned that the plant may have been damaged by the earthquake on March 11, 2011, even before the arrival of a tsunami — a worrying assertion as the quake-prone country starts to bring its reactor fleet back online.
Oh Canada: the government's broad assault on the environment
Outsiders have long viewed Canada as a pristine wilderness destination replete with moose, mountains, and Mounties who always got their man. Recognizing the tourism value of that somewhat dull but wholesome image, successive Canadian governments — both Liberal and Conservative — were content to promote the stereotype in brochures, magazine advertisements, and TV commercials.
The lie of that was evident in the rampant clear-cutting of forests in British Columbia, the gargantuan oil sands developments in Alberta, the toxic mining practices in the Arctic, and the factory fishing that literally wiped out the Canadian cod industry by the 1990s. But this wholesome image endured because progress was made on several environmental fronts, such as creation of many new national parks, and because Canada remains sparsely populated with large swaths of unspoiled boreal forest and tundra.
But Canada's pristine image — and more importantly its environment — is not likely to recover from what critics across the political spectrum say is an unprecedented assault by the Conservative government of Prime Minister Stephen Harper on environmental regulation, oversight, and scientific research.
China's controversial Three Gorges dam completed
"The complete operation of all the generators makes the Three Gorges dam the world's largest hydropower project, and the largest base for clean energy," Zhang Cheng, general manager of the project's operator, China Yangtze Power, told a ceremony.
But the project, located on the middle reaches of the Yangtze river, cost 254bn yuan (£26bn), four times the original estimate, and another 123.8bn yuan (£12bn) has been spent on "follow-up work".
An early Scientific American report on the real cost of the Three Gorges Dam
China's Three Gorges Dam: An Environmental Catastrophe?
That biodiversity is threatened as the dam floods some habitats, reduces water flow to others, and alters weather patterns. Economic development has spurred deforestation and pollution in surrounding provinces in central China, endangering at least 57 plant species, including the Chinese dove tree and the dawn redwood. The reservoir created by Three Gorges dam threatens to flood the habitats of those species along with over 400 others, says Jianguo Liu, an ecologist at Michigan State University and guest professor at the Chinese Academy of Sciences who has done extensive work on biodiversity in China.
South Korea unveils 'scientific' whaling proposal
"Scientific whaling is an obsolete and sad consequence of a document drafted 60 years ago," said Monaco's IWC commissioner, Frederic Briand.
Wikileaks Publishes the 'Syrian Files'
The Syria Files include over 2 million emails from Syrian political figures, ministries and associated companies, dating from August 2006 to March 2012.
WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange said: "The material is embarrassing to Syria, but it is also embarrassing to Syria’s opponents. It helps us not merely to criticise one group or another, but to understand their interests, actions and thoughts. It is only through understanding this conflict that we can hope to resolve it."
Blog Posts of Interest
Here are diaries and selected blog posts of interest on DailyKos and other blogs.
What's Happenin'? 7.6.2012 on DailyKos by Agathena
More than one million Floridians disenfranchised because of felony convictions on DailyKos by Joan McCarter
Daily Kos Radio - July 6, 2012 highlights on DailyKos by David Waldman
Organized LIbor: Banksters Rip Off The World on DailyKos by DSWright
The Incidental Anti-Drug Spying on a White SUV on emptywheel.net by emptywheel
Over 100,000 Teacher Jobs Lost in Last 12 Months on FDL News by David Dayen
Shocking Health Effects of Commonly Used Pesticide: Brain Problems, Sexual Deformities and Paralysis on alternet by Martha Rosenberg
Occupy National Gathering Brings Together Occupiers From Far and Wide on alternet by Jake Blumgart
A Little Night Music
Alvin Youngblood Hart - Gallows Pole
Corey Harris - Fish Ain't Biting
Alvin Youngblood Hart - If Blues Was Money
Taj Mahal & Corey Harris - Sittin' On Top Of The World
Alvin Youngblood Hart - Gonna Call up Joe Friday
Corey Harris & Henry Butler - If I Was Your Man
Alvin Youngblood Hart - Pony Blues
Corey Harris - Keep Your Lamp Trimmed and Burning
Alvin Youngblood Hart 's Muscle Theory - Big Mama's Door
Alvin Youngblood Hart - Living in a Strain