Welcome! "The Evening Blues - Weekend Edition" is a casual community diary (published Saturday & Sunday, 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.
|
Hey! Good Evening!
This evening's music is brought to you by guest VJ NCTim features singer/songwriter, guitar and harp player Eric Lindell. Enjoy!
Eric Lindell - The Way We Were
Note: We here at the Evening Blues Weekend Edition often step beyond the boundries of traditional blues music. Joe shikspack so adeptly covers the blues genre in his weekday series that we at the Weekend Edition would find most trad blues offerings we could serve up as being redundant. Therefore Joe, in magnanimous manner has allowed us to color outside of the lines and we appreciate and thank him for that. Almost all modern American music has it's roots in traditional blues music anyway, so ultimately we do not stray far from the mother language. As Muddy Waters sang:
The Blues Had a Baby and They Named It Rock and Roll, let us add to that list (jazz, country, bluegrass, ragtime, folk, gospel, soul, swing and rhythm and blues) and all subsets thereof. -- JtC
I have attended dinners among white people. Their ways are not ours.
We eat in silence, quietly smoke a pipe, and depart. Thus is our host honored.
This is not the way of the white man. After his food has been eaten, one is expected to say foolish things. Then the host feels honored.
Four Guns - Oglala Sioux
News and Opinion
The Evening Blues
We dig up what the MSM buries.
Compiled by: Johnny the Conqueroo
Contributors:
NCTim
enhydra lutris
JtC
Islamic State lays explosives in Syria's Palmyra ruins
Jihadi group is believed to have mined spectacular Greco-Roman ruins, a month after overrunning the central Syrian city
Islamic State jihadis have mined the spectacular ancient ruins in Syria’s Palmyra, according to an antiquities official and monitor, prompting fears for the Unesco world heritage site a month after the extremist group overran the central Syrian city.
Syria’s antiquities chief, Maamoun Abdulkarim, and the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights monitor said on Sunday that the group had placed mines and explosives in Palmyra’s Greco-Roman ruins. The observatory, which relies on a network of sources on the ground, said the explosives were laid on Saturday.
“It is not known if the purpose is to blow up the ruins or to prevent regime forces from advancing into the town,” said the observatory’s director Rami Abdel Rahman. He said regime forces had launched heavy air strikes against the residential part of Palmyra in the past three days, killing at least 11 people.
“The regime forces are to the west outside the city, and in recent days they have brought in reinforcements suggesting they may be planning an operation to retake Palmyra,” he added.
‘Revolution within revolution’: How and why Kurdish women are fighting ISIS
Growing up in a society where it was inconceivable for men and women to fight together, Kurdish YPJ female forces engaged in combat against the Islamic State, have been starting their own revolution. They told RT their previously undocumented stories.
RT filmed a unique documentary “Her War: Women Vs. ISIS” about young Kurdish women in Syria, who are defending their country against the Islamic State (IS formerly known as ISIS/ISIL) militants. For three weeks the RT Documentary team lived in a training camp run by the YPJ, on the border with Iraq, three kilometers from the frontline.
Gulan, 18, from the predominantly Kurdish town of Serekaniye, which borders territories controlled by IS, said that she took up arms to protect her family.
The Kurds are an ethnic group, culturally and linguistically related to Iran, which does not have its own state. The Kurdistan region spans adjacent parts of Iran, Iraq, Syria, and Turkey.
Britain to boost its military presence in E. Europe to ‘strengthen NATO’
British soldiers and fighter jets are going to do longer reassurance missions in Eastern Europe to send signals to President Putin on NATO member states’ commitment to collective defense, Britain's Defense Secretary Michael Fallon said Sunday.
“We have to continue to strengthen NATO,” Fallon said, speaking on the BBC's Andrew Marr Show on Sunday.
The reason for strengthening the alliance presence in new NATO member states was cited as “saber rattling” by Russian President Vladimir Putin.
“It is very important we keep sending Putin this message that we are determined in our commitment to the collective defense of NATO,” Fallon said.
Chaos in Libya paves way for Islamic State expansion
MISRATA, Libya — Benefiting from Libya’s political chaos, Islamic State militants are consolidating their base in the city of Sirte and grabbing new territory, pushing back fighters from Misrata.
Libya’s two dueling governments, one based in Tripoli and the other based in Beida and Tobruk in the country’s east, are running dangerously low of cash as they back armed groups against each other, allowing the Islamic State to exploit the rift to grab territory.
The Tripoli-based government, known as Libya Dawn, and its rival, the Dignity coalition based in the east, have yet to come together to target the Islamic State’s growth, even as some commanders for Misrata’s militia, long considered the country’s most adept and a mainstay of Libya Dawn, worry that their city has become an Islamic State target.
“Daash are the biggest enemy,” said one Misratan intelligence official, using the Arabic acronym for the Islamic State. He declined to be identified because of the sensitivity of his work.
St. Petersburg in the heart of the action: Escobar
Submitted by: enhydra lutris
By Pepe Escobar
The dogs of western fear and sanctions bark, while the Eurasian caravan passes.
And no caravanserai could possibly compete with the 19th edition of the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum (SPIEF). Thousands of global business leaders – including Europeans, but not Americans; after all, President Putin is “the new Hitler” – representing over 1,000 international companies/corporations, including the CEOs of BP, Royal Dutch Shell and Total, hit town in style.
Fascinating panels all around – including discussions on the BRICs; the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO); the New Silk Road(s); the Eurasian Economic Union (EEU); and of course the theme of all themes, “The Making of the Asia-Pacific Century: Rebalancing East,” with former Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd.
Predictably, there’s been plenty of anticipation regarding the BRICs New Development Bank, with big news coming next month at the BRICs summit in Ufa. Brazilian Paulo Nogueira Batista, the new vice-president of the bank, looks forward to the first meeting of the governors.
Pentagon chief planning for longer-term rift with Russia
The United States and its NATO allies are preparing militarily for the prospect that their rift with Russia could outlast President Vladimir Putin, U.S. Defense Secretary Ash Carter said on Sunday.
Russia's intervention in Ukraine has put NATO allies in eastern Europe on edge and triggered a series of military moves by the alliance, including an acceleration of exercises and the creation of a NATO rapid response force.
Carter, speaking at the start of a week-long trip to Europe, said the United States hoped Russia would return to a forward- looking course and noted areas of diplomatic cooperation with Moscow, including talks over Iran's nuclear program.
But ongoing changes to NATO's military posture, which are meant in part to deter a Russian intervention, illustrate preparations for longer lasting tensions, he said.
McCain: US will supply gas to Ukraine, Europe in 2 yrs
The US will be able to supply natural gas to Ukraine and Europe within two years, Senator John McCain pledged in Kiev. The American politician believes that only gas reliance prevents European countries from hardening sanctions against Russia.
“The United States will supply natural gas to Ukraine and other parts of Europe in two years,” McCain said on Saturday, RIA Novosti reported.
McCain headed the Senate’s delegation to Ukraine, which he visited together with Senator Tom Cotton and Senator John Barras. The delegation met with Ukrainian president Petro Poroshenko and visited headquarters of Dnipro-1 territorial defense battalion in Dnepropetrovsk.
On Friday, McCain sent a message of encouragement to Kiev and sought to shame Washington's European allies for not providing the Ukrainian forces with sufficient help to defeat the rebels in the east of the country, AP reports.
Why Russia's state oil company is helping Venezuela
Low oil prices have left oil mega-producers like Russia and Venezuela reeling, writes Nick Cunningham. Now, Russia's state oil company is giving Venezuela's state oil company a loan to boost production.
Submitted by: enhydra lutris
Russia’s state-owned oil company may provide its Venezuelan counterpart a much needed loan of $5 billion.
Venezuela’s oil company, PDVSA, is in desperate need of capital in order to help boost oil and gas production. In exchange for the loan, Reuters reports that Rosneft could gain greater access to PDVSA’s oil and gas reserves.
As it stands, Rosneft often only takes in discounted revenues from the Petromonagas joint venture, which processes and sells heavy oil at reduced rates to the local Venezuelan market. Rosneft is seeking more control, plus the ability to export production, which will bring in much higher revenue.
The loan comes only a few weeks after Rosneft agreed to invest $14 billion to help boost Venezuelan oil and gas. President Nicolas Maduro, along with the head of PDVSA, met with Rosneft’s Igor Sechin at the end of May. Venezuela has stated that it hopes to double oil production to 6 million barrels per day, most of which it plans to source from the Orinoco Belt, a source of heavy crude.
The Dangers of Religious Primitivism
By stirring up the Middle East – from Western exploitation of oil to Zionist expulsion of Palestinians – Christians and Jews set in motion today’s “clash of civilizations” with Islam and launched all three religions on a path toward dangerous primitivism, a threat to humanity’s future, writes Lawrence Davidson.
Prior to the Eighteenth Century – that is prior to the Enlightenment – if you had asked a literate Westerner when he or she thought the most ideal of human societies did or would exist, most of them would have located that society in the past.
The religious majority might have placed it in the biblical age of Solomon or the early Christian communities of the First Century after Christ. Both would have been considered divinely inspired times.
Now, come forward a hundred years, say to the beginning of the Nineteenth Century, and ask the same question. You would notice that the answer was beginning to change. Having passed through the Enlightenment and with the Industrial Revolution in process, the concept of continual progress had been invented, and with it some (but by no means all) people started to place that hypothetically ideal society in the future. For the futurists the question of divine guidance no longer mattered.
Today, many folks worldwide believe in progress and assume that tomorrow not only will be different from today, but will in some scientific-technological way be better. The question here is not whether they are correct, but why there isn’t a unanimous consensus in favor of progress – for clearly there is not.
How Lobbies, Intelligence Services and Advertisers Dictate Mainstream Media Content
Submitted by: NCTim
Former chief political commentator of the Telegraph, Peter Oborne, resigned from the newspaper because it would not publish articles on HSBC for fear of losing advertising revenues. The bank is known for money-laundering for the Mexican drug cartels as well as its involvement in tax evasion schemes.
In an opinion piece called “Why I resigned from the Telegraph” he wrote:
“The coverage of HSBC in Britain’s Telegraph is a fraud on its readers. If major newspapers allow corporations to influence their content for fear of losing advertising revenue, democracy itself is in peril…From the start of 2013 onwards stories critical of HSBC were discouraged. HSBC suspended its advertising with the Telegraph… HSBC, as one former Telegraph executive told me, is “the advertiser you literally cannot afford to offend” (Peter Oborne, Why I have resigned from the Telegraph, Open Democracy, February 17, 2015)
When it comes to powerful lobbies’ influence on media content, the Zionist lobby is very well known for accusing journalists and editors of anti-Semitism and imposing its own propaganda. Even so-called progressive newspapers such as The Guardian are subject to Zionist propaganda. David Cronin writes:
I submitted an exposé of how the pro-Israel lobby operates in Brussels. While waiting to find out if the piece would be used, I phoned Matt Seaton, who had taken over as comment editor. We had a pleasant conversation but Seaton stressed that he regarded the subject as sensitive.
I, then, modified the piece to make its tone less polemical. Still, it was not published…
The Trans-Pacific Partnership : A Free Trade Agreement?
The Trans-Pacific Partnership agreement (TPP) currently nearing its final stages of negotiation purports to be about increasing trade and economic co-operation among its twelve negotiating parties. These twelve countries include the United States, Australia, New Zealand and Japan. Significantly, it does not include China.
The agreement is being negotiated in conditions of extraordinary secrecy. Only recently have selected members of each countries legislatures been permitted to see the drafts. They have been taken to a secure room for that purpose. No copies can be taken. No notes may be made. They are sworn to secrecy about what they have seen, and to remain silent for a minimum of four years.
To describe this as “normal” in trade negotiations, as the Australian Trade Minister did, and other apologists persist in saying, is to create a whole new meaning for the word “normal”.
The overwhelming inference to be drawn from this secrecy is that it is clearly intended that the provisions of the TPP will not be brought before the parliament for debate and ratification. There is otherwise no rational point to a four-year gag order. Our parliament is purportedly comprised of representatives of the people. How they can reflect the views of the people they “represent” when the people are denied the most basic information is unclear. It is certainly not democratic.
Social Engineering and the Imposition of a “Free Market” Totalitarian Ideology
Submitted by: NCTim
The founders and practitioners of free-market ideology have finally succeeded in turning the individual intellect, and the collective that is Western civilization, into little more than value-objects. Now, all are witness to the reality that everything, everyone, every emotion and even every movement has a price and a cost. Western society and individual thought has, at long last, become totally materialistic; which is to say, completely economic according to practices decidedly informed by 18th and 19th Century philosophy (often misinformed).
All manner of life from the quanta of action to the intimacy of lovers is irretrievably locked into economic value functions. This has led to the ice cold calculus, and equally brutal callousness, now present in the minds of the rulers, and the ruled, which sees transgender and transracial issues; Greek financial woes; job liquidation and unemployment; private and public pension pillaging; cuts in social safety nets (austerity); head transplants; and; for example, US preparations for open war in/or with Syria, Iraq, Russia and China as natural and as expected as the sun’s presence during the day. No emotion of care or concern arises that would see even a finger lifted to change the system as it is as such.
What’s the Point?
The efforts of journalists and academics are nearly intellectually bankrupt save for the “effort” of trying to report on the world not as it appears, but as it is as designed and managed by a willful economic totalitarianism that provides for a “free” life in terms demanded by economic doctrine, even as it tortures that life daily, providing no escape from the daily routine. Even dreams are polluted.
The intellectual limits of the unenhanced human mind have now been reached. Is it any wonder that technological, bioengineering and chemical enhancements are rapidly being called for by all?
America’s ‘Exceptional’ Negotiations
America has a strange idea about international negotiations: It makes demands and the other side must capitulate or face crushing penalties if not violent “regime change.” This strange attitude is threatening the Iran-nuclear talks and endangering real U.S. national interests, writes ex-CIA analyst Paul R. Pillar.
One of the unfortunate corollaries of American exceptionalism is a warped and highly asymmetric conception of negotiation. This conception can become a major impediment to the effective exercise of U.S. diplomacy.
Although the attitudes that are part of this view of negotiation are not altogether unique to the United States, they are especially associated with American exceptionalist thinking about the supposed intrinsic superiority of U.S. positions and about how the sole superpower ought always to get its way.
The corollary about negotiation is, stated in its simplest and bluntest terms, that negotiation is an encounter between diplomats in which the United States makes its demands — sometimes expressed as “red lines” — and the other side accepts those demands, with the task of the diplomats being to work out the details of implementation. Or, if the other side is not going along with that script and acceding to U.S. demands, then the United States has to exert more pressure on the other side until it does accede.
This is markedly different from the rest of the world’s conception of negotiation, in which each side begins with positions that neither side will get or expects to get entirely, followed by a process of give-and-take and mutual concession to arrive at a compromise that meets the needs of each side enough that it is better for each than no agreement at all.
Greece debt crisis: Bank boss says 'insane' not to reach deal
Submitted by: enhydra lutris
The head of Greece's biggest bank has said it would be "insane" not to reach an agreement at emergency talks on Monday on the country's debt crisis.
Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras will meet the leaders of the 18 other eurozone nations at a Brussels summit.
Louka Katseli, chair of the National Bank of Greece, told the BBC that banks were not under immediate threat of running out of money.
But she said the situation was serious, and without a deal would become severe.
Clinton Campaign Fundraises With Pro-TPP Lobby Firm As Congress Reschedules Trade Vote
Submitted by: NCTim
While Hillary Clinton continues to hedge her position on the Trans-Pacific Partnership and the related issue of trade promotion authority, her campaign is partnering with a pro-TPP/TPA law and lobby firm to raise cash.
The House Rules Committee held an “emergency meeting” at 4:40 p.m. on Wednesday to plan how to move forward with TPA.
At 5:00 p.m., the Clinton campaign was holding a Washington, D.C. fundraiser with the McGuireWoods law firm’s PAC. According to lobby registration documents, the firm’s McGuireWoods Consulting subsidiary is lobbying on behalf of Smithfield Foods to help pass both the TPP and TPA.
Despite mounting pressure to take a position, Clinton has only provided non-commital answers regarding her stance on both TPP and TPA. On Sunday, at a rally in Iowa, Clinton said there should be better protections for American workers and called for the president to work with Democrats in Congress — hardly a clarifying statement. Earlier that day, her chief pollster dismissed a call from ABC News’ George Stephanopoulos to provide a clear stance on TPA, casting the issue as simply “Washington inside baseball.”
Insurance Giant's Proposed Merger Could Devastate Access to Health Care
Industry giant Anthem proposed Saturday to buy rival Cigna for $47 billion
Submitted by: NCTim
One of the largest health insurance giants in the country, Anthem, on Saturday proposed a $47 billion merger with its competitor Cigna, part of an industry-wide merger bonanza that analysts warn could have a devastating impact on health care cost and access nationwide.
The public proposal comes as the top five U.S. insurance companies—UnitedHealth Group Inc., Anthem Inc., Aetna Inc., Cigna Corp. and Humana Inc.—race to consolidate in what Bloomberg recently called a "five-way dating drama" and the Wall Street Journal referred to as an "oligopoly wave."
In a letter to the the Federal Trade Commission earlier this month, the American Association of Family Physicians expressed deep concerns "about the potential merger of any of the nation's largest health insurance companies and the impact such actions would have on access and affordability of health care for consumers across the nation."
"Bigger insurance companies mean increased leverage and unfair power over negotiating rates with hospitals and physicians," the organization continued. "More often than not, consolidation increases costs and reduces options for consumers and we believe this would hold true in the health insurance market."
Revealed: How DOJ Gagged Google over Surveillance of WikiLeaks Volunteer
The Obama administration fought a legal battle against Google to secretly obtain the email records of a security researcher and journalist associated with WikiLeaks.
Newly unsealed court documents obtained by The Intercept reveal the Justice Department won an order forcing Google to turn over more than one year’s worth of data from the Gmail account of Jacob Appelbaum (pictured above), a developer for the Tor online anonymity project who has worked with WikiLeaks as a volunteer. The order also gagged Google, preventing it from notifying Appelbaum that his records had been provided to the government.
The surveillance of Appelbaum’s Gmail account was tied to the Justice Department’s long-running criminal investigation of WikiLeaks, which began in 2010 following the transparency group’s publication of a large cache of U.S. government diplomatic cables.
According to the unsealed documents, the Justice Department first sought details from Google about a Gmail account operated by Appelbaum in January 2011, triggering a three-month dispute between the government and the tech giant. Government investigators demanded metadata records from the account showing email addresses of those with whom Appelbaum had corresponded between the period of November 2009 and early 2011; they also wanted to obtain information showing the unique IP addresses of the computers he had used to log in to the account.
Chad bans full veil after deadly Boko Haram attacks
Submitted by: enhydra lutris
N'Djamena (AFP) - Chad on Wednesday banned the full-face Muslim veil and ordered security forces to seize burqas from markets and burn them after 33 people were killed in suicide bombings blamed on Nigerian Islamist group Boko Haram this week.
"Wearing the burqa must stop immediately from today, not only in public places and schools but throughout the whole of the country," Prime Minister Kalzeube Pahimi Deubet said in a speech to religious leaders the day before the start of the holy Muslim festival of Ramadan.
Any type of clothing that leaves only the eyes visible is a form of "camouflage" and is now banned, he added, asking the religious leaders to spread the message in their mosques, churches and holy places.
Prime Minister Deubet said instructions had been given to security forces to "go into the markets and to seize all the burqas on sale and burn them".
Top Ten Fruits Of The Right-Wing ‘Christian’ Spirit
Submitted by: NCTim
According to the Bible (Galatians 5:22 and 23), the fruit of the Christian Spirit is supposed to be “love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control.” Since Republicans are constantly representing themselves as God’s one and only true political allies, it seems to me that they ought to possess some of the traits described in this verse.
Of course the Bible makes it clear that not everyone who claims to be God’s earthly political spokesperson is really speaking for God. In the book of Matthew Chapter 7, Jesus warns his followers about false prophets, whom he described as “wolves in sheep’s clothing.” He said “you will know them by their fruits.” He clarified the point by saying “a good tree bares good fruit, and a bad tree bares bad fruit.” Seems simple enough.
When we look at the “fruits” of the right-wing Christian spirit, do we see “love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness gentleness and self-control?”
You could search day and night for examples of conservatives demonstrating those qualities. No matter how long and hard you look, you’re going to come up empty.
While you might not find any of the characteristics mentioned in Galatians, you will consistently find some that aren’t.
New Data Proves 'Good Guy With A Gun' Self Defense Claims Don't Fly
Submitted by: NCTim
A study of U.S. violent crime data, released this week by the non-profit Violence Policy Center (VPC), shows that Americans very-rarely use guns in self defense. That and more stats that surfaced in their studies show that this nation's "well-regulated militia" clearly isn't well, nor is it regulated.
'Militia' Neither Well, Nor Regulated
Using publicly-available data, VPC found that guns were used to commit 38 criminal homicides for every justifiable homicide (self-defense) over a recent five year period.
America's gun lobbies claim that guns prevent more than 2.5 million crimes each year, but that seems little more than a frightful sales pitch to sell guns.
"The NRA has staked its entire agenda on the claim that guns are necessary for self-defense, but this gun industry propaganda has no basis in fact,” VPC's director, Josh Sugarmann, said in a statement announcing the study. “Guns are far more likely to be used in a homicide than in a justifiable homicide by a private citizen."
Tensions build as Supreme Court readies blockbuster rulings
Tensions are building inside and outside the white marble facade of the U.S. Supreme Court building as the nine justices prepare to issue major rulings on gay marriage and President Barack Obama's healthcare law by the end of the month.
Of the 11 cases left to decide, the biggest are a challenge by gay couples to state laws banning same-sex marriage and a conservative challenge to subsidies provided under the Obamacare law to help low- and middle-income people buy health insurance that could lead to millions of people losing medical coverage.
Many legal experts predict the court will legalize gay marriage nationwide by finding that the U.S. Constitution's guarantees of equal treatment under the law and due process prohibit states from banning same-sex nuptials.
The four liberal justices are expected to support same-sex marriage, and conservative Justice Anthony Kennedy, the expected swing vote, has a history of backing gay rights.
Hellraiser Preview
Sherman, set the time machine for tomorrow's Hellraisers Journal, which will feature from the Appeal to Reason: an interview with General Carranza by John Kenneth Turner.
Tune in at 2pm!
|
Texas abortion law teed up for Supreme Court review
Submitted by: enhydra lutris
WASHINGTON (AP) — Abortion is back before the Supreme Court, and the justices could signal by the end of June whether they are likely to take up the biggest case on the hot-button subject in nearly a quarter-century.
If the court steps in, the hearing and the eventual ruling would come amid the 2016 presidential campaign.
The court is considering an emergency appeal from abortion providers in Texas, who want the justices to block two provisions of a state law that already has forced the closure of roughly half the licensed abortion clinics in the state. Ten of the remaining 19 clinics will have to shut their doors by July 1, without an order from the Supreme Court.
The Texas law is among a wave of state measures in recent years that have placed restrictions on when in a pregnancy abortions may be performed, imposed limits on abortions using drugs instead of surgery and increased standards for clinics and the doctors who work in them.
Minnesota sex offender program declared unconstitutional. Now what?
A federal court ruled Wednesday that a Minnesota program which commits dangerous sexual criminals to a mental health facility indefinitely after their prison sentence ends violates the rights of offenders. How is the way sex offenders are treated changing?
Submitted by: enhydra lutris
A federal judge on Wednesday ruled the Minnesota Sex Offender Program unconstitutional, saying that it violates the "fundamental rights" of convicted offenders.
The program allows the state to commit sex offenders to a treatment facility indefinitely, after the completion of their prison sentences. A lawsuit was filed on behalf of the approximately 700 confined offenders; since the program's creation in 1994, no offenders have been fully discharged.
Minnesota is one of several states with a continued confinement program. These programs date back to the early '90s, after a string of sexual attacks on children led US citizens to demand stricter preventative laws, according to the New York Times.
Today, we are starting to see a shift away from the dominant punishment-based approach as researchers learn more about what causes people to sexually offend.
Water reveals two sides of Myanmar's economic boom
Submitted by: enhydra lutris
Yangon (AFP) - Every morning on his way to work in Yangon, builder Zaw Min Tun takes a swig of water at a Buddhist temple, a vital place to quench a thirst for the many ordinary citizens left behind by Myanmar's economic boom.
Bottled water is among the plethora of consumer industries set to take off as the country emerges from decades of isolated junta rule, putting more money in the pockets of the country's rich and a growing middle class.
But, at around 300 kyats (25-30 US cents) a litre, it remains too pricey for the majority of people in a country where the average annual per capita income of $1,105 remains one of the lowest in Asia.
Decades of weak investment under junta rule means the vast majority of people -- eight in 10 -- are forced to drink from unsafe supplies such as wells, boreholes, springs and streams while only nine percent have access to tap or piped water.
How California's drought could spur an ecological rebirth
As water-hungry turf turns brown in the state’s fourth year of severe drought, many homeowners find the time ripe to revegetate with native plants such as cacti, buckwheat and sage scrub: ‘It’s helping sustain biodiversity’
Jennifer and Lawrence Kesteloot like to begin the day with breakfast in their San Francisco backyard garden. For the last several months, they’ve had guests: iridescent green-and-red Anna’s hummingbirds, drawn by wildflowers planted to replace what had been dead brown turf grass and concrete.
The Kesteloots hadn’t considered hummingbirds when imagining their garden. Mostly they were concerned about not using much water amidst the deprivations and uncertainties of California’s drought.
The ecologically rich plantings, the beds of California poppies and wild lilacs, were the idea of a local garden company, which is part of a burgeoning industry that offers landscaping that is both water-efficient and biodiverse.
“Most people still look at their backyards as an aesthetic. They don’t think so much about the science of it, the activity and the life,” said Elisa Baier, owner of Small Spot Gardens, which designed and installed Kesteloot’s garden.
China's Communist-Capitalist Ecological Apocalypse
This article seeks to explain why China's environmental crisis is so horrific, so much worse than "normal" capitalism most everywhere else, and why the government is incapable of suppressing pollution even from its own industries. I begin with an overview of the current state of China's environment: its polluted air, waters, farmland and the proximate causes, including overproduction, overdevelopment, profligate resource consumption, uncontrolled dumping and venting of pollutants. I then discuss the political-economic drivers and enablers of this destruction, the dynamics and contradictions of China's hybrid economy, noting how market reforms have compounded the irrationalities of the old bureaucratic collectivist system with the irrationalities of capitalism resulting in a diabolically ruinous "miracle" economy. I conclude with a précis of the emergency steps the country will have to take to take to brake the drive to socio-ecological collapse, with dire implications for us all.
The first time Li Gengxuan saw the dump trucks from the nearby factory pull into his village, he could not believe his eyes. Stopping between the cornfields and the primary school playground, the workers dumped buckets of bubbling white liquid onto the ground. Then they turned around and drove right back through the gates of their factory compound without a word.
In March 2008, Li and other farmers in Gaolong, a village in the central plains of Henan Province near the Yellow River, told a Washington Post reporter that workers from the nearby Luoyang Zhonggui High-Technology Company had been dumping this industrial waste in fields around their village every day for nine months. The liquid, silicon tetrachloride, was the byproduct of polysilicon production and it is a highly toxic substance. When exposed to humid air, silicon tetrachloride turns into acids and poisonous hydrogen chloride gas, which can make people dizzy and cause breathing difficulties.
Ren Bingyan, a professor of material sciences at Hebei Industrial University, contacted by the Post, told the paper that "the land where you dump or bury it will be infertile. No grass or trees will grow in its place ... It is ... poisonous, it is polluting. Human beings can never touch it."
NASA publishes 1st 'near-true color' images of Pluto
The US National Space Agency has published the first ever images of the remote dwarf planet Pluto and its largest satellite. The picture quality leaves much to be desired, but NASA promises the best is yet to come.
NASA has compiled a number of photographs from its New Horizons mission on the approach to the icy dwarf planet. The series pictures were taken over the course of five days in three colors: blue, red and near-infrared. They were then put together to make two looped movies, showing Pluto and its largest satellite, Charon.
Pluto is a dwarf planet, only about one-sixth of Earth’s size, which is why it was excluded from the list of Solar System's "proper" planets in 2006, when the definition of "planet" was reviewed. It does orbit the sun, though, and is one of the largest bodies in the Kuiper belt - a ring of space debris left over from the Solar System's formation, beyond the orbit of Neptune.
It has five known moons, the largest of which, Charon, is sometimes dubbed Pluto's "twin planet": the two appear to orbit each other around a common center of gravity. One of the videos NASA released shows that rotation, with the center of gravity marked with an X. The center is much closer to Pluto due to the planet's larger mass compared to Charon.
The Evening Greens
The Evening Greens Weekend Editor: enhydra lutris
US has more oil spills than you think
The US has more oil spills than we thought and the number doubled after production increased six years ago.
8,000 “Significant” Incidents
Richard Stover, PhD, and the Center for Biological Diversity counted nearly 8,000 significant incidents, between 1986 and 2014, in records of the pipeline safety administration. By “significant” they mean causing injury, death, damages exceeding $50,000 in value, a loss of 5 barrels of highly volatile substances, 50 barrels of other liquids or there was an explosion. There have been more than 500 human deaths and 2,300 injuries through-out that period. The number of plant and animal casualties is much higher.
Though most pipeline failures occur where there is a long history of development, they occur through-out the Lower 48. Texas is the worst offender, with 1657 incidents. California had 621 and 48 deaths.
Oil spills from Petrobras pipeline into Brazil coastal area
Oil spilled from a pipeline linking a main Atlantic Ocean terminal with a refinery near Rio de Janeiro on Friday, Brazil's state-run oil company Petroleo Brasileiro SA said.
The spill contaminated a coastal wetland area and leaked into the ocean, a spokesman for the union representing employees at the refinery said.
The narrow coastal region where the spill occurred is in Rio de Janeiro's Costa Verde or "Green Coast" - one of Brazil's most beloved tourist regions and home to one of the last stands of the endangered Atlantic-Forest ecosystem.
Petrobras, as the company is known, said 600 liters (3.77 barrels) of oil leaked from the pipeline, 50 liters of which reached the ocean.
Workers clean up oil spill on California beaches by hand
GOLETA, Calif. (AP) — Along a stretch of beach heavily marred by a crude oil spill, workers in hard hats and white protective suits use wire brushes and putty knives to scrape the black liquid off cobblestones and cliff faces.
The painstaking task at Refugio State Beach marks a new front in the cleanup after an underground pipeline leaked last month and released up to 101,000 gallons of oil, about 21,000 gallons of which flowed into a storm drain, sullied the beach and washed out to sea. Because the region is home to threatened shorebirds and cultural resources, a decision was made early on to clean oil-stained beaches the old-fashioned way by using hand tools instead of heavy equipment or chemicals.
The environmental toll from the largest coastal spill in California in 25 years is still being tallied. Progress has been made in corralling the slick in the ocean and removing flecks of oil on sandy beaches.
Scrubbing rocks by hand will take time, however. "It's a very labor-intensive process, but that's where we're at now," Carl Childs of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, one of several agencies involved in the cleanup, said recently.
Renewable energy from evaporating water
An immensely powerful yet invisible force pulls water from Earth to the top of the tallest redwood and delivers snow to the tops of the Himalayas. Yet despite the power of evaporating water, its potential to propel self-sufficient devices or produce electricity has remained largely untapped -- until now.
In the June 16 online issue of Nature Communications, Columbia University scientists report the development of two novel devices that derive power directly from evaporation -- a floating, piston-driven engine that generates electricity causing a light to flash, and a rotary engine that drives a miniature car.
When evaporation energy is scaled up, the researchers predict, it could one day produce electricity from giant floating power generators that sit on bays or reservoirs, or from huge rotating machines akin to wind turbines that sit above water, said Ozgur Sahin, Ph.D., an associate professor of biological sciences and physics at Columbia University and the paper's lead author.
"Evaporation is a fundamental force of nature," Sahin said. "It's everywhere, and it's more powerful than other forces like wind and waves."
ADB: Asia needs more green investments
The Asian Development Bank said Wednesday renewable energy is a “low hanging fruit” that has yet to be harvested fully by Asian economies.
“Renewables are becoming more competitive as technology progresses,” Bindu Lohani, an ADB vice president in charge of sustainable development, said at an Asian clean energy forum. However, the technology is “the low hanging fruit of energy efficiency is not being well picked in Asia.”
Developing Asian economies are expected to outperform most others on the global stage. In its latest assessment, the International Monetary Fund said China’s economy should continue to outpace the rest of the world, though its trajectory is slowing. Labor markets are resilient and inflation is in check, however.
Last week, the U.N. Industrial Development Organization said China’s growth agenda needs a sustainable direction. Energy efficiency programs, modernization of the industrial sector, coupled with pollution reduction schemes, are necessary for sustainable growth, it said.
Judge demands explanation for lengthy delay on energy lease
BILLINGS, Mont. (AP) — A federal judge is pressing U.S. officials to explain why it's taken three decades to decide on a proposal to drill for natural gas just outside Glacier National Park in an area considered sacred by some Indian tribes in Montana and Canada.
A frustrated U.S. District Judge Richard Leon called the delay "troubling" and a "nightmare" during a recent court hearing. He ordered the Interior and Agriculture departments to report back to him with any other example of where they have "dragged their feet" for so long.
"This is no way to run a government. No way to run a government," Leon told government attorney Ruth Ann Storey, according to a transcript of the June 10 hearing in Washington, D.C.
At issue in the case is a 6,200-acre energy lease in northwest Montana's Badger-Two Medicine area immediately south of Glacier. Owned by Solenex LLC of Baton Rouge, Louisiana, the lease has been suspended since the 1990s.
Blog Posts of Interest
Here are diaries and selected blog posts of interest on DailyKos and other blogs.
City Has To Shell Out $1.975 Million After Seattle Cops Shoot Man in the Face
Orwell, Huxley and America’s Plunge Into Authoritarianism
Citizens United: Supreme Court Justice Anthony M. Kennedy’s Gift to Moneyed Interests
Resistance Is Needed to End Corporate Toxic Zones
And Navy makes three?
Krugman and Greece's Moment of Truth
Hellraisers Journal: New York Times Reports on Charges Made Against Rockefeller by Socialist Writers
A Little Night Music
Eric Lindell - Lay Back Down
Eric Lindell - Casanova
Eric Lindell - I Can Get Off On You
Eric Lindell - I Don't Mind
Eric Lindell - Crying Time
Eric Lindell performs - Josephine
Eric Lindell - Try to Understand
Eric Lindell - I Got A Girl
Eric Lindell - Low On Cash
Eric Lindell - Lets Live for Ourselves
Eric Lindell - Sunny Daze
Eric Lindell - Shag Nasty
Eric Lindell - It's My Pleasure
Eric Lindell - It's So Hard To Believe
Eric Lindell - That's Why I'm Crying
Eric Lindell - Sentimental Lover
Eric Lindell - Tried and True