Today’s comic by Ruben Bolling is When mild-mannered Donald J. Trump becomes Tariff Man!
• Study: Ocean could lose 17% of marine life if trends continue: Every degree Celsius of warming that the world’s seas undergo means a drop of 5% in the biomass of ocean creatures, the study published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences states. An international team of marine biologists analyzed six computer models to arrive at their conclusion. By the year 2100, they concluded, if greenhouse gas emissions are not reduced, it will mean a 17% loss of biomass, which is the total weight of all the marine animal life. "We will see a large decrease in the biomass of the oceans" if the world doesn't slow climate change, said study co-author William Cheung, a marine ecologist. "There are already changes that have been observed." Warming is having the greatest effect, but Cheung said oceans are also being harmed because they are more acidic from absorbing added loads of greenhouse gases dumped into the atmosphere from burning fossil fuels and agriculture. The losses could be curtailed to about 5% if vigorous efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions are undertaken.
• India is suffering one of its longest heat waves in decades: Temperatures have reached 123° Fahrenheit and at least 36 people have died as a result. The government has warned that this could continue because the monsoon rains have not arrived on schedule. The heat waves have gotten worse over the past 10 years and spread to more Indian states, with a death toll in the thousands. Anup Kumar Srivastava, an expert at India’s National Disaster Management Authority, told The New York Times that the heatwaves affected nine state in 2015, 19 in 2018, and is expected to rise to 23 this year. He said, “This year, the number of heat wave days have also increased — and it’s not just day temperature, night temperatures have also been high.”
• Over the five years since Colorado became the first state to legalize recreational marijuana, the state treasury has collected $1.02 billion in pot tax revenue: In Colorado there are 2,917 licensed marijuana businesses and 41,076 licensed individuals working in the industry. The tax revenue funds a range of youth and public health programs, including mental health services, youth literacy initiatives, and anti-bullying programs in schools. “This industry is helping grow our economy by creating jobs and generating valuable revenue that is going towards preventing youth consumption, protecting public health and safety, and investing in public school construction,” Democratic Gov. Jared Polis said in a statement.
MIDDAY TWEET
• Scientists think people smoked cannabis 2,500 years ago at a high-altitude cemetery in Central Asia: Their speculation is that the weed was smoked as part of funeral rituals. The discovery is one of the earliest pieces of evidence in the archaeological record of the plant’s use.
• California cops fired 55 bullets when they killed rapper Willie McCoy in February: The 20-year-old McCoy had been sleeping in his car in the drive-through lane of a Taco Bell in Vallejo, California, when employees called the cops and said he was unresponsive. In a 51-page report, a retired police officer concluded that the shooting was “in line with contemporary training and police practices associated with use of deadly force” and “the 55 rounds fired by 6 officers in ~3.5 seconds is reasonable based upon my training and experience as a range instructor as well as through applied human factors psychology.” The shooting set off outrage locally and across the nation and has spotlighted the Vallejo police department’s frequent use of deadly force and history of misconduct and abuse cases. McCoy’s family had previously called the shooting “execution by firing squad.” Of the report, Willie’s older brother Marc McCoy said, “What it says is there was never any real intention of trying to work out this situation to where my brother’s life would still be intact.”
On
today’s Kagro in the Morning show:
Everyone's talking about Trump's taped confession, one way or another. Well, that and the "Prince of Whales." Greg Dworkin still found time for a polling update. And those wacky Chinese! Spying at Perv-a-Lago and turning free trade on its head.