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 Louisiana singer and piano player Marcia Ball. Enjoy!
Marcia Ball - That's Enough Of That Stuff
The Great Spirit is in all things, he is in the air we breathe. The Great Spirit is our Father, but the Earth is our Mother. She nourishes us, that which we put into the ground she returns to us....
Big Thunder (Bedagi) - Wabanaki Alonquin
News and Opinion
Joe is on vacation this week, the Weekend Edition team will be filling in for the following: News, Greens and Hosting. Thanks for stopping by and reading.
Compiled by: Johnny the Conqueroo
Contributors:
janis b
enhydra lutris
Johnny the Conqueroo
'A Great Day for Corporate America': US Senate Passes Fast Track
'Shameful' vote all but ensures approval of mammoth trade deals like the TransPacific Partnership
Submitted by: JtC
In a win for multinational corporations and the global one percent, the U.S. Senate on Tuesday narrowly advanced Fast Track, or Trade Promotion Authority (TPA) —ensuring for all practical purposes the continued rubber-stamping of clandestine trade agreements like the Trans Pacific Partnership (TPP) and TransAtlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP).
The cloture motion to end debate needed 60 votes and it got just that, passing the chamber 60-37. The full roll call is here. A final vote will come on Wednesday. Having overcome the biggest hurdle, the legislation is expected to pass, and will then be sent to President Barack Obama's desk to become law.
Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), who campaigned vigorously against Fast Track, said the vote represented a win for corporate America. "The vote today—pushed by multi-national corporations, pharmaceutical companies and Wall Street—will mean a continuation of disastrous trade policies which have cost our country millions of decent-paying jobs," the presidential candidate said in a statement.
And Sen. Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio), another of the most vocal opponents of Fast Track, railed against TPA moments before the vote, accusing Congress of turning on its "moral" obligation to assist the working class.
Jill Stein announces 2016 Green Party presidential bid
Submitted by: JtC
The most successful female presidential candidate in US history is making another White House bid. Dr. Jill Stein announced she would seek the Green Party nomination, joining sixteen other contenders in the 2016 presidential race so far.
The third woman to join the campaign, Stein made the official announcement on Tuesday, at the National Press Club in Washington, DC. Her platform, dubbed “The Power to the People Plan,” seeks to answer the “economic, social, and ecological crises brought on by both corporate political parties,” and “empowers the American people to fix our broken political system and make real the promise of democracy,” Stein’s campaign said in a statement.
“The Power to the People Plan creates deep system change, moving from the greed and exploitation of corporate capitalism to a human-centered economy that puts people, planet and peace over profit,” said Stein, adding “The power to create this new world is not in our hopes, it’s not in our dreams - it’s in our hands.”
“The one percent is quaking in their boots, because we’re waking up to the fact that we have power, and we’re going to use it!” Stein is shown proclaiming at a rally.
Council of Europe Calls on U.S. to Let Snowden Have a Fair Trial
Submitted by: JtC
The Council of Europe, the self-proclaimed “democratic conscience of Greater Europe,” urged the United States on Tuesday to allow NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden to return home and make the case that his actions had positive effects.
The call for Snowden to be allowed a “public interest defense” — something not available to whistleblowers charged under the Espionage Act of 1917, as Snowden has been — was part of a resolution to improve international protections for whistleblowers passed overwhelmingly by the 47-nation council’s parliamentary assembly at its meeting in Strasbourg, France.
After the vote, Snowden spoke to the assembly by video from Moscow, where he has temporary asylum. “It would be committing a crime by discussing your defense,” Snowden said of his current legal prospects if he returned to the U.S.
“I think it’s incredibly strong,” he said of the council’s resolution. “It’s a major step forward. … If you can’t mount a full and effective defense — make the case that you are revealing information in the public interest — you can’t have a fair trial.”
Revealed: NSA pushed 9/11 as key 'sound bite' to justify surveillance
An internal document recommended that officials use fear of attack when pressed to explain agency's programs
Submitted by: JtC
The National Security Agency advised its officials to cite the 9/11 attacks as justification for its mass surveillance activities, according to a master list of NSA talking points.
The document, obtained by Al Jazeera through a Freedom of Information Act request, contains talking points and suggested statements for NSA officials (PDF) responding to the fallout from media revelations that originated with former NSA contractor Edward Snowden.
Invoking the events of 9/11 to justify the controversial NSA programs, which have caused major diplomatic fallout around the world, was the top item on the talking points that agency officials were encouraged to use.
Under the subheading “Sound Bites That Resonate,” the document suggests the statement “I much prefer to be here today explaining these programs, than explaining another 9/11 event that we were not able to prevent.”
Drone strike on Islamic State in Iraq kills Benghazi suspect, US says
Al Awri al-Harzi, a Benghazi suspect described as a mid-level Islamic State operative, was killed in a drone strike June 15 while driving a car in Mosul, the Pentagon said.
Submitted by: enhydra lutris
The United States has killed an Islamic State militant suspected of taking part in the 2012 attack on the American diplomatic mission in Benghazi, Libya, the Pentagon said Monday.
Ali Awni al-Harzi, a mid-level IS operative, was killed in a US drone strike last week in Iraq, the Pentagon said.
He had reportedly provided an important link between the Islamic State and extremists in North Africa. Pentagon officials say his death will degrade the militant group’s ability to recruit new fighters from the region.
“We think his death is going to, at least temporarily, put a dent in their ability to get more of these North African foreign fighters,” a US defense official told The Wall Street Journal.
Islamic State conflict: Kurds 'capture Syrian town north of Raqqa'
Submitted by: enhydra lutris
Kurdish fighters in northern Syria say they have captured a key town from Islamic State, just 50km (30 miles) from the group's headquarters at Raqqa.
A spokesman for the the Popular Protection Units (YPG) said Ain Issa and its surrounding villages were now under the militia's "total control".
It follows the capture on Monday night of a military base outside the town.
The YPG captured the town of Tal Abyad on the Turkish border last week, cutting a major supply line for IS.
Pathologies of Power
Widespread tendency to defer to authority plays important role in the expansion of state power
Submitted by: janis b
“A tyranny,” Plato says in the Republic, “is the wretchedest form of government,” and “a tyrant grows worse from having power: he becomes and is of necessity more jealous, more faithless, more unjust, more friendless, more impious, than he was at first; he is the purveyor and cherisher of every sort of vice.”
This description of a tyranny and a tyrant may seem irrelevant to our situation in the United States today. After all, we live in a constitutional republic, in which the rights of the individual are protected by a written constitution and the rule of law. But how far are they actually protected in practice?
All around us we see the exercise of untrammeled power. SWAT teams in military gear break into people’s homes or businesses on the slightest suspicion. Police punch, kick, choke, arrest, strip search, and incarcerate citizens for minor infractions of the law—or no infractions at all. The very same behavior that by a citizen is a crime is seen as legitimate by a police officer, and our incarceration rate remains the highest in the developed world. As reported in Radley Balko’s 2013 book, Rise of the Warrior Cop, dozens of federal agencies—including the Departments of Education, Labor, and Agriculture—now have their own SWAT teams. Yet military equipment continues to flow to the police.
As the following examples show, what we have is not one tyrant but a many-headed beast that lives in the belly of the country, poised to strike at will, unconstrained by the rule of law.
Calling for Special Prosecutor, Groups Decry 'Get Out of Jail' Cards for Bush's Torture Team
Letter signed by over 110,000 people calls for new, independent investigation into 'horrific' abuses by US government
Submitted by: JtC
It's been six months since the Senate Intelligence Committee released its damning investigation into CIA torture, and still, no perpetrator has yet to be charged with a crime.
On Tuesday, a coalition of leading human rights groups and more than 110,000 people sent a lettercalling on U.S. Attorney General Loretta Lynch to launch a truly independent investigation to ensure that there is a measure of justice and accountability for the "horrific" acts done at the hands of the U.S. government.
The letter argues that the previous investigation into the CIA's use of waterboarding, launched in 2009 by Assistant U.S. Attorney John Durham, was insufficient on many counts and has failed to bring about any conviction.
Now, in light of the "significant new information" presented in the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence Committee (SSCI) report, the letter calls on Lynch "to appoint a career prosecutor as a special prosecutor to review it, along with the files from the Durham investigation, to ensure that there is a comprehensive criminal investigation into the conduct documented by the Senate torture report, as well as the authorization for that conduct."
Afghan UN envoy says extremists have united in new offensive
Submitted by: enhydra lutris
UNITED NATIONS (AP) — A new offensive against the Afghan government and people is being compounded by "an unprecedented convergence" of Taliban insurgents, more than 7,000 foreign fighters, and violent groups including the Islamic State, Afghanistan's U.N. ambassador said Monday.
Zahir Tanin told the U.N. Security Council that these groups not only target Afghan troops and civilians with suicide bombings, improvised explosive devices, hostage-taking and assassinations but they seek control of districts and provinces as bases for their activities in Afghanistan as well as south and central Asia.
Nicholas Haysom, the U.N. envoy for Afghanistan, said Afghan forces have been stretched, tested, and faced operational challenges since taking on full security responsibilities following an end to the U.S. and NATO combat mission.
Nonetheless, he said, "Afghanistan is meeting its security challenges" in the face of an intensifying conflict across the country,
US announces new tank and artillery deployment in Europe
Submitted by: enhydra lutris
The US is to deploy heavy weapons - including tanks, armoured vehicles and artillery - in a number of European nations, amid Nato concerns over Russia's role in Ukraine.
US Defence Secretary Ashton Carter said the equipment would be placed in Bulgaria, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland and Romania.
Nato has vowed to boost defences in the east as ties with Russia have soured.
Russia has condemned the new Nato and US moves.
Trade measures could shift U.S. policy on Israeli settlements
Submitted by: enhydra lutris
As trade legislation moves ahead in Congress, issues related to Israel have stayed below the radar. But an East Bay group and other advocates are trying to call attention to provisions that could change U.S. policy toward Israeli settlements in the West Bank.
Amendments were quietly added last month to the “fast-track” bill, now on the Senate floor, that would require Congress to take an up-or-down vote on the Obama administration’s trade agreements. The amendments would require U.S. trade negotiators to discourage actions by other countries that would “penalize” — that is, boycott — commercial relations with Israel or “territories controlled by Israel.”
Similar amendments have been tacked on to a House version of the bill. Their target is the movement known as Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions, initiated by Palestinian organizations in 2005 and endorsed by some U.S. advocates of Palestinian rights, including the Oakland-based Jewish Voice for Peace. Its goal is to put economic pressure on Israel to end its occupation of the West Bank and its blockade of the Gaza Strip.
“If you want to trade with the United States, you cannot participate in illegitimate sanctions or backdoor boycotts against Israel,” Sen. Ben Cardin, D-Md., lead sponsor of the Senate amendment, said in a statement. “Our government should not stand idle if our trading partners use BDS tactics to isolate one of our key allies.”
Greece debt crisis: Alexis Tsipras faces Athens backlash over concessions
Syriza leader faces dissent from within ruling coalition following compromises involving pension and VAT changes
Submitted by: JtC
The Greek government was under intense domestic political pressure on Tuesday night over concessions offered to creditors as eurozone finance ministers prepared to discuss a deal to stave off financial collapse in Athens.
Talks between Greece and its lenders are continuing ahead of Wednesday night’s ministerial gathering in Brussels, with Athens needing an agreement to make a €1.6bn (£1.1bn) payment to the International Monetary Fund due next Tuesday.
However, the Greek prime minister, Alexis Tsipras, faced criticism from within his coalition government over compromise proposals that will raise €8bn by increasing pensions contributions, phasing out early retirement, hiking corporation tax and raising some rates of VAT.
“Many MPs, be them on the left or not, are very sceptical about accepting such a programme,” said Costas Lapavitsas, an economics professor at the University of London who is now an MP for Tsipras’s ruling leftwing Syriza party. “How will they explain it to their voters? How will they return to their electoral constituencies and explain this agreement to them?”
Hopes for Greece bailout deal rise sharply as Athens gives ground
Creditors view new Greek proposals on pensions and VAT as the most positive move yet in five months of wrangling
Submitted by: enhydra lutris
Hopes of a deal that would spare Greece from a looming debt default and possible exit from the single currency rose sharply on Monday after the country’s European partners welcomed proposals from Athens to cut its pension bill and raise extra money from VAT.
In what was seen in Brussels as the most positive development since negotiations began five months ago, the leftwing government of prime minister Alexis Tsipras showed a willingness to give ground on the two issues that have left it at odds with its creditors.
An emergency summit of eurozone leaders ended on Monday night with high hopes of reaching a deal within 48 hours. Chancellor Angela Merkel of Germany said eurozone finance ministers would meet on Wednesday evening, the third time in a week, to finalise a deal to be put to a summit in Brussels on Thursday.
Jean-Claude Juncker, the president of the European commission, described the Greek offer of tax increases and spending cuts as “a major step forward”. He added: “We we will finalise the process this week.”
Greek debt crisis: Eurozone leaders hopeful of deal
Submitted by: enhydra lutris
Eurozone leaders have broadly welcomed new proposals for Greek reforms amid hopes a deal can be struck within days to stop Greece defaulting on its debt.
German Chancellor Angela Merkel said Greece's latest offer constituted "some progress". But she said more work was needed and "time is short".
Greece must repay €1.6bn (£1.1bn) to the International Monetary Fund (IMF) by the end of the month.
If it fails to do so, it risks crashing out of the euro and possibly the EU.
US 'spied on French presidents' - Wikileaks
Submitted by: JtC
The US National Security Agency (NSA) spied on French Presidents Jacques Chirac, Nicolas Sarkozy and Francois Hollande in 2006-12, WikiLeaks says.
The whistleblower website cites "top secret intelligence reports and technical documents" from the NSA.
US state department spokesman John Kirby said: "We do not comment on the veracity or content of leaked documents." France has made no comment.
The NSA was earlier accused of spying on German Chancellor Angela Merkel.
GCHQ's surveillance of two human rights groups ruled illegal by tribunal
Initial interceptions lawful but retention and examination of communications illegal, rules IPT in case brought following Edward Snowden revelations
Submitted by: enhydra lutris
GCHQ’s covert surveillance of two international human rights groups was illegal, the judicial tribunal responsible for handling complaints against the intelligence services has ruled.
The UK government monitoring agency retained emails for longer than it should have and violated its own internal procedures, according to a judgment by the investigatory powers tribunal (IPT). But it ruled that the initial interception was lawful in both cases.
The IPT upheld complaints by the Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights and the South African non-profit Legal Resources Centre that their communications had been illegally retained and examined. The tribunal made “no determination” on claims brought other NGOs – including Amnesty International, Liberty and Privacy International – implying that either their emails and phone calls were not intercepted or that they were intercepted but by legal means.
The IPT ruling said: “[We are] concerned that steps should be taken to ensure that neither of the breaches of procedure referred to in this determination occurs again. For the avoidance of doubt, the tribunal makes it clear that it will be making a closed report to the prime minister.”
Despite US sanctions, Shell partners up with Russian energy giant
Western sanctions on Russia haven't stopped Royal Dutch Shell from partnering with Russia's Gazprom on several projects, writes Charles Kennedy. Many of the projects will help Russian gas get to Europe.
Submitted by: enhydra lutris
Russian energy giant Gazprom is building up a global portfolio with a western oil major.
Gazprom and Royal Dutch Shell are teaming up on several energy projects that will benefit both. The two energy companies have agreed to build an expansion of the Nord Stream Pipeline, a major natural gas pipeline that travels beneath the Baltic Sea. The pipeline is a priority for Russia, which will allow it to expand its natural gas exports to Europe while also cutting out Ukraine from the mix.
Gazprom, Shell, along with E.ON and OMV – two gas importers in Western Europe – have agreed to build the $11 billion expansion of Nord Stream.
Separately, Gazprom and Shell may expand a massive LNG project on the island of Sakhalin, a $20 billion project. Sakhalin is Russia’s only LNG project, and the two sides have agreed to add a third train. Gazprom’s CEO Alexei Miller toldReuters that the two companies may even go further by agreeing to asset swaps. By expanding their cooperation, Miller says “we will be creating a global strategic partnership” with Shell.
This Map Shows Where the World's Water Is Drying Up
Submitted by: janis b
Groundwater loss isn't just a California problem: According to a recent study by researchers at NASA and the University of California-Irvine, humans are depleting more than half of the world's 37 largest aquifers at unsustainable rates, and there is virtually no accurate data showing how much water is left.
The study, published this week in the journal Water Resources Research, used 11 years of satellite data to measure water depletion. Eight aquifers, primarily in Asia and Africa, were qualified as "overstressed," meaning they had nearly no natural replenishment. The most stressed basin was the Arabian Aquifer System, beneath Saudi Arabia and Yemen. Other quickly disappearing aquifers were the Indus Basin aquifer, between India and Pakistan, and the Murzuk-Djado Basin, in northern Africa.
Five other aquifers, including California's Central Valley Aquifer, were "extremely" or "highly" stressed, with some natural replenishment but not enough to make up for growing demand.
The growing demand on water, exacerbated by overpopulation and climate change, has led to a situation that is "quite critical," says Jay Famiglietti, a senior water scientist at NASA.
Calais migrants seek to exploit port strike
Submitted by: enhydra lutris
A strike forced the suspension of services through the Channel Tunnel between the UK and France on Tuesday, as hundreds of migrants tried to board UK-bound lorries amid the chaos.
Eurotunnel, which runs the crossing, says protesters accessed the tracks.
Ferries and Eurotunnel train services carrying passenger vehicles later resumed, but Eurostar trains are not due to run again until Wednesday.
Migrants have been trying to board lorries caught in slow-moving traffic.
Senate overwhelmingly confirms new TSA administrator
Submitted by: enhydra lutris
WASHINGTON (AP) — The Senate voted on Monday to confirm a new leader for the Transportation Security Administration in the wake of reports of startling security gaps at U.S. airports.
Coast Guard Vice Adm. Peter Neffenger was confirmed as the agency's new administrator by a vote of 81-1. Neffenger was nominated by President Barack Obama in April, before revelations that auditors for the Homeland Security Department's inspector general were repeatedly able to sneak mock explosives and weapons through security checkpoints.
"Vice Adm. Neffenger will certainly have a tough job ahead of him. We're all aware of the recent inspector general report that questioned the TSA's ability to meet its security mission without change," Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., said on the Senate floor ahead of the vote.
"The American people will be counting on Mr. Neffenger to validate the trust their elected representatives place in him tonight by pursuing every necessary reform in the wake of such troubling findings."
A History of Hate Rock From Johnny Rebel to Dylann Roof
Submitted by: janis b
What makes a young man a racist killer? Dylann Roof, the 21-year-old charged for the murder of nine people at a historic black church in Charleston last week, was “normal,” his cousin told a reporter, “until he started listening to that white power music stuff.” It’s not clear exactly what Roof was listening to or how it influenced him. But it wouldn’t be surprising if music were one of the channels through which his racism crystallized; hate rock is one of the most powerful tools white-power groups have to spread their ideology to young people.
Christian Picciolini was a middle-class teenager from the suburbs of Chicago who loved punk rock. In the late 1980s he started listening to Skrewdriver, a British band formed in the regular punk sphere that morphed into a notorious neo-Nazi group. “When I heard the white-power lyrics I felt like they spoke to me,” Picciolini recalled. “My neighborhood was rapidly changing, I knew people whose parents were out of work because of minorities taking their jobs—at least, that’s what I thought at the time.” He was attracted to the aggressiveness of the music, to the way it channeled his angst. Yet he perceived its message to be a positive one. “It seemed like they were asking people to stand up and protect their neighborhoods and families. I realized later they were calling for violence.”
Picciolini says that music was the “primary” reason he became a skinhead; he didn’t come for the racism, but he absorbed it and in turn used music to bring other kids in the Rust Belt into the fold. “Music for us was the most powerful tool—definitely the most effective recruiting method,” he says. Within a few years Picciolini was the front man for the first American white power band to play in Europe. “There’s white pride all across America/White pride all across the world/White pride flowing through the streets/White pride will never face defeat!” he sang to 3,000 skinheads in Weimar, Germany, when he was 18. After selling hate rock out of his backpack for a while, Piccionlini opened a record store, where he kept the white-power music behind the counter. He estimates that it accounted for 75 percent of his revenue.
The scene that Picciolini was a part of has been associated with various acts of racial violence. Michael Wayne Page, who murdered six people at a Sikh temple in Wisconsin in 2012, was a member of several bands, including Youngland, a popular group that performed around Orange County. Youngland was known mainly for its song “Thank God I’m a White Boy,” a worked-over version of John Denver’s “Thank God I’m a Country Boy.” Page sang vocals on “Activist or Terrorist,” a track on Youngland’s 2003 album Winter Wind that concluded: “Activist or terrorist depends which side you’re on/Defend against the invader this war will greet your son/Hey you gotta go not your home anymore/If you don’t move quietly you’ll be forced to war.”
Republicans return donations from white supremacist
Submitted by: enhydra lutris
WASHINGTON (AP) — Republican presidential candidates, GOP lawmakers and the lone black Republican in the House are returning donations from the leader of a white supremacist group cited by Charleston church murder suspect Dylann Roof or giving the money to charity.
Rep. Mia Love of Utah, an African-American Republican woman who was elected to the House last year, said through a spokesman that she had returned $1,000 in donations from Earl Holt, leader of the Council of Conservative Citizens.
The presidential campaigns of Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., and Rick Santorum said they would donate the money received from Holt to a fund set up by Charleston's mayor to assist the victims' families.
"I abhor the sentiments Mr. Holt has expressed," Santorum said in a statement. "These statements and sentiments are unacceptable. Period. End of sentence."
Hellraiser Preview
Sherman, set the time machine for tomorrow's Hellraisers Journal, which will feature an update on the Chicago Teamsters Strike.
Tune in at 2pm!
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Marijuana Research Just Got a Green Light From the Obama White House
Submitted by: janis b
The White House today lifted a longstanding restriction on medical marijuana research, giving a green light to a growing group of mainstream scientists who are interested in investigating the potential health benefits of pot. Such research will no longer have to undergo review by the Public Health Service, a process that is ostensibly meant to ensure the use of scientifically valid clinical trials, but in practice has served as a barrier to launching studies. A bipartisan group of lawmakers, and even opponents of legalization, had called for the requirement to be lifted.
"This announcement is a pretty big deal," says Christopher Brown, a spokesperson for Americans for Safe Access, a group that advocates for access to pot for medical research. "You have a lot of interest in experimental research on medical cannabis and this shows that you are starting to see policies aligned with that."
The announcement comes a few months after US Surgeon General Vivek Murthy signaled the federal government's shifting thinking on medical pot, telling CBS This Morning that preliminary data shows that "marijuana can be helpful" for some medical conditions.
Millions of smokers may have undiagnosed lung disease
Submitted by: enhydra lutris
More than half of current and former smokers who can pass basic lung function tests may suffer from lung diseases that have gone undiagnosed, researchers said Monday.
The study in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) Internal Medicine included nearly 9,000 people, aged 45-80, who had smoked at least a pack of cigarettes a day for 10 years.
About half of those in the study "were considered disease-free based on their lung-function tests," said the JAMA article.
But when researchers looked at other criteria, including respiratory symptoms, CT scans, medications use and quality of life issues, they found that "55 percent of the 'disease-free' study participants had some form of respiratory related impairment."
Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan says he has cancer of lymph nodes
Submitted by: enhydra lutris
ANNAPOLIS, Md. (AP) — Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan said Monday he has "very advanced" and "very aggressive" cancer of the lymph nodes, but he said he will fight for a full recovery and continue to work as the state's chief elected official.
Hogan spoke candidly, choking up at times while also managing to keep a sense of humor, as family, friends and his staff filled the governor's reception room for the announcement. The governor, who has been in office for five months, said the cancer is B-cell non-Hodgkin lymphoma.
"Over the coming months, I'll be receiving multiple very aggressive chemotherapy treatments," Hogan said. "Most likely, I'm going to lose my hair. You won't have these beautiful gray locks. I may trim down a little bit, but I won't stop working to change Maryland for the better."
The Republican, who won an upset victory in November in a heavily Democratic state, said he had noticed a painless lump along his jaw earlier this month. He also felt some back pain, which he said was caused by a tumor pressing on his spinal column.
See the Flowers that Bloom All At Once, One Night a Year
The mysterious night-blooming cereus just dazzled a garden in Tucson. Scientists still aren’t sure exactly how they bloom at the same time
Submitted by: janis b
On Friday, June 12, the world’s largest private collection of night-blooming cereus plants burst open. The flowers are a bit of a scientific mystery: They usually bloom on just one night a year, and en masse. Staff at the Tohono Chul garden, a non-profit botanical garden and nature preserve in Tucson, Arizona, often can’t tell when their record-setting collection of Cereus greggii flowers will unfurl their long, fragrant petals until a few hours before they do. And so, last Friday, the garden sent out an email with the subject line: “Bloom Night is Tonight!”
The night-blooming cereus is known for its ethereal, star-like blossoms, as well its tendency to bloom all at once. Plant-lovers often gather to celebrate its unfurling, and such gatherings are not a new idea. As the Washington Post writes, “Informal gatherings to witness the annual affair were commonplace in small-town America before World War II.” Local newspapers announced when the cereus buds were swelling and the bloom imminent, and “neighbors and strangers alike arrived for the show.”
Tohono Chul says that about 1,500 people came to the garden on Friday night, where they got to see the Cereus greggii go from a small bud to a palm-sized flower right before their eyes. In general, the blooming process happens so quickly that, as a 1934 piece in the New York Times puts it, “Those who watch the unfolding of the petals often hope to detect an evidence of motion, but the development is so smoothly uniform that the little bud suddenly appears more widely open than the second before, without a perceptible movement.” After giving off their famously hypnotic scent, the flowers wilt just a few hours later.
The flowers, sometimes called Arizona’s Queen of the Night, tend to pop open between late May and late July. Cereus greggii (or Peniocereus greggii) are found in the dry soils of the Southwest, including southern New Mexico, southeastern Arizona and western Texas, as well as in parts of Mexico, including eastern Chihuahua, northeastern Durango, northern Zacatecas and Coahuila. Other flowers that also go by the common name night-blooming cereus grow in tropical Central and South American jungles.
Google Accused of “Abusive” Conduct in Privacy App Case
Submitted by: JtC
An award-winning company founded by former Google engineers is taking legal action against the search engine giant over claims it has engaged in a “pattern of abusive behavior” and is violating privacy rights on a “massive scale.”
Disconnect, a U.S. firm that designs privacy-enhancing technology, has filed a complaint with European antitrust regulators after its Android app was banned from the Google Play Store. The app was designed to protect smartphone users from invisible tracking and malware distributed through online advertisements.
The complaint was submitted earlier this month, but the full allegations were not made public at the time. The Intercept has obtained a copy of the 104-page complaint, which attacks Google over its claimed commitment to privacy and accuses the tech titan of trying to stop people from using the Disconnect app because it poses an “existential threat” to its revenue sources.
Google’s business, the complaint claims, “consists almost entirely of gathering data about the preferences, locations, and behavior of ordinary people and monetizing that data through the sale of targeted advertisements on the Internet.” Because of this, it alleges, Google is “using the full weight of its market power to deny users control over tracking, particularly mobile tracking.”
The Lancet: Fossil Fuels Are Killing Us... Quitting Them Can Save Us
Comparing coal, oil, and gas addiction to the last generation's effort to kick the tobacco habit, doctors say that quitting would be the best thing humanity can do for its long-term health
Submitted by: JtC
The bad news is very bad, indeed. But first, the good news: "Responding to climate change could be the biggest global health opportunity of this century."
That message is the silver lining contained in a comprehensive newly published report by The Lancet, the UK-based medical journal, which explores the complex intersection between global human health and climate change.
The wide-ranging and peer-reviewed report—titled Health and climate change: policy responses to protect public health—declares that the negative impacts of human-caused global warming have put at risk some of the world's most impressive health gains over the last half century. What's more, it says, continued use of fossil fuels is leading humanity to a future in which infectious disease patterns, air pollution, food insecurity and malnutrition, involuntary migration, displacement, and violent conflict will all be made made worse.
"Climate change," said commission co-chairman Dr. Anthony Costello, a pediatrician and director of the Global Health Institute at the University College of London, "has the potential to reverse the health gains from economic development that have been made in recent decades – not just through the direct effects on health from a changing and more unstable climate, but through indirect means such as increased migration and reduced social stability. Our analysis clearly shows that by tackling climate change we can also benefit health. Tackling climate change represents one of the greatest opportunities to benefit human health for generations to come."
Google eavesdropping tool installed on computers without permission
Privacy advocates claim always-listening component was involuntarily activated within Chromium, potentially exposing private conversations
Submitted by: JtC
Privacy campaigners and open source developers are up in arms over the secret installing of Google software which is capable of listening in on conversations held in front of a computer.
First spotted by open source developers, the Chromium browser – the open source basis for Google’s Chrome – began remotely installing audio-snooping code that was capable of listening to users.
It was designed to support Chrome’s new “OK, Google” hotword detection – which makes the computer respond when you talk to it – but was installed, and, some users have claimed, it is activated on computers without their permission.
“Without consent, Google’s code had downloaded a black box of code that – according to itself – had turned on the microphone and was actively listening to your room,” said Rick Falkvinge, the Pirate party founder, in a blog post. “Which means that your computer had been stealth configured to send what was being said in your room to somebody else, to a private company in another country, without your consent or knowledge, an audio transmission triggered by … an unknown and unverifiable set of conditions.”
The Evening Greens
Tonights Greens submitted by: enhydra lutris
Illinois battered by string of tornadoes amid changing climate patterns
The Midwestern state was hit by at least five tornadoes in the last week.
At least five tornadoes touched down in north central Illinois this week, the National Weather Service confirmed, a sign of things to come as the total number of yearly tornadoes continues to climb. Initial damage surveys indicate at least seven possible tornado tracks south and west of Chicago.
On Monday, five people had to be rescued from buildings after a tornado hit Portland, Illinois. Later that evening the weather service also received reports of a tornado near Millington in Tuscola County. A few people were treated for minor injuries, local fire department officials told the Siginaw News.
Lt. Nick Doerfler of the Coal City Fire Protection District said that while there have not been any reports of serious injuries or fatalities, four people were taken to nearby hospitals for minor injuries sustained during the storm.
A new climate model suggests that the total number of yearly tornados will climb by 2080, but that the number of twisters will vary widely each year, Becky Oskin reported for the Live Science blog.
High carcinogen levels found in some Sacramento County wells
RIO LINDA, Calif. (AP) — A search for new sources of water by Sacramento County's Rio Linda-Elverta Community Water District has found that wells closest to a former Air Force base have high levels of hexavalent chromium, or chromium-6, a known carcinogen.
Water in six of the 11 wells in the district tested above the state's maximum contaminant level for chromium-6, according to the Sacramento Bee (http://bit.ly/...). All the wells above the state standard are near the former McClellan Air Force Base just northeast of Sacramento.
"Looking at the broader picture, and the data from the well siting study, suggests that the chromium levels are coming from the contamination from the Air Force base to the southeast," said Larry Ernst, a hydrogeologist with Wood Rodgers and author of the report.
Ernst's research found that chromium levels decrease the farther wells are from the base.
Huge undertaking, dredging of Hudson for PCBs, nears its end
WATERFORD, N.Y. (AP) — Long after the last barge dredging toxins from the bottom of the upper Hudson River moves on, scientists will track the slow fade in contamination levels.
General Electric Co. expects this year to finish removing some 2.7 million cubic yards of contaminated river sediment — enough to fill two Empire State Buildings — under a Superfund agreement with the federal Environmental Protection Agency. After six years of digging, crews will have removed most of the PCBs on the river bottom discharged decades ago from two GE plants upriver.
EPA officials say it's too early to tell how quickly PCB levels in the water and fish will drop in the coming decades. And they don't know precisely when it will be safe to eat fish caught along the 200-mile stretch down to New York City, a primary reason for the cleanup. But as calls intensify for additional dredging — which could speed the river's recovery — the agency says it is already seeing early signs of success.
"The river is open for recreation. The challenge now is to assess the fish over time," said Gary Klawinski, the EPA's project director. "Once we get a better idea of at what rate ... fish are recovering, we'll be able to lift those advisories with New York state."
What is the value of bees?
What are bees worth to our economy? A group of researchers have attempted to do the math, and the result shows exactly why we need to protect our pollinating bees but also why we can’t rely on economic worth alone to make our arguments for saving threatened species.
It may sound slightly abhorrent to put a price on a living creature–and, to an extent, it is. But calculating the monetary worth of wildlife and, in particular, their place in the overall economy has become a useful way for researchers to communicate to governments and even businesses that they need to take a closer look at preventing species die-out. When it comes to bees however, researchers have found an interesting fact that they say shows the worth and the shortcomings of this approach.
Publishing in the journal Nature Communications, researchers detail how they set about this task by following data from nearly 74,000 bees across 780 bee species that was collected as part of over 90 research projects that are investigating the way bees pollinate and interact with crop fields.
What they found was that the bulk of pollination was actually done by just two percent of bee species in the study, and that they contributed up to around 80 percent of the overall pollinating activity.
Aircrafts may be lessening carbon footprint, but what about airports?
Today’s passenger aircraft are becoming ever more efficient, driven by regulations like the EU’s emissions trading scheme and airlines looking to squeeze profit out of every drop of fuel saved.
Yet on the ground, airports operate in a different class. New findings from a European Union-funded research project show that commercial airports use as much energy as a small city, and up to one-fifth of that may be wasted.
Aircraft operating within the EU, along with energy and industrial sectors, fall under the Emissions Trading System that aims to cut emissions. While an EU law (Regulation 598) on regulating airport noise is due to take effect in a year, there is no similar EU legislation on emissions, and some political leaders want to change that.
Sergi Alegre Calero, the vice-mayor of El Prat de Llobregat, home to Barcelona’s airport, is one of them. Alluding to the ETS and other pollution laws, he says: “It has happened in the car industry, it’s going to happen in the shipping industry, it’s happening in building and construction, so [airports] cannot get out of that.”
The dangers of indoor air pollution
Household air pollution may have caused around 4.3 million premature deaths from respiratory diseases in 2012, mainly in developing countries, according to a medical paper.
Such pollution dramatically increases the risk of both children and adults contracting chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), says the paper, published online last month in Seminars in Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine.
The conclusions are based on an analysis of medical studies about the respiratory effects on people exposed to household air pollution.
“A low lung function value at an early age seems to be a risk factor for developing chronic obstructive pulmonary disease later in life.”
Pakistan heatwave: Emergency measures as toll nears 700
Pakistan's PM Nawaz Sharif has called for emergency measures as the death toll from a heatwave in southern Sindh province reached nearly 700.
The army is now being deployed to help set up heat stroke centres, with temperatures reaching 45C (113F).
Officials have been criticised for not doing enough to tackle the crisis.
There is anger among local residents at the authorities because power cuts have restricted the use of air-conditioning units and fans, correspondents say.
Blog Posts of Interest
Here are diaries and selected blog posts of interest on DailyKos and other blogs.
What's Happenin' Is On Hiatus
Jeb Bush Is Polling at 73% -- Among the World's Richest Bankers and CEOs
15 Ways Bill Clinton’s White House Failed America and the World
ACLU: Black Homeowners Preyed Upon by Banks Before the Great Recession
Emergency Measures Imposed in Pakistan as Heat Wave Death Toll Approaches 700
America’s Slave Empire
How USA Freedom Impacts Ongoing NSA Litigation
Athens gets crushed by the bankers
Hellraisers Journal: Jack Reed and Boardman Robinson, Held Under Arrest by Russian Military
Bicycles to the Rescue! Maybe ...
'Love ya later'
A Little Night Music
Marcia Ball - Play with your Poodle
Marcia Ball & Angela Strehli - A Fool In Love
Marcia Ball - Tattooed Lady and the Alligator Man
Marcia Ball - That's How It Goes
Marcia Ball - Hot Tamale Baby
Marcia Ball - I'm Coming Down With the Blues
Irma Thomas & Marcia Ball - Same Old Blues
Marcia Ball - Sugar Boogie
Marcia Ball - Louella
Marcia Ball & Pat Boyack - Give It Up
Marcia Ball - Red Hot
Marcia Ball - Louisiana 1927
Marcia Ball - Mobile
Marcia Ball & Cindy Cashdollar
Marcia Ball - Shake A Leg
Marcia Ball w/Paul Thorn - That's Alright Mama