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.
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Hey! Good Evening!
This evening's music features fiddle and accordian master, the "Ragin' Cajun" Doug Kershaw. Enjoy!
Doug Kershaw - Diggy Liggy Lo
My reason teaches me that land cannot be sold. The Great Spirit gave it to his children to live upon. So long as they occupy and cultivate it, they have a right to the soil. Nothing can be sold but such things as can be carried away.
Black Hawk
News and Opinion
Drills for me but not for thee: NATO launches war games near Russian border
Despite being quick to condemn Russian military manoeuvers, NATO is conducting wide-scale war games in the Baltic states and creating a “line of troops” across Eastern Europe. The US denies a double standard, but records and transcripts suggest otherwise.
Thousands of US troops and hundreds of tanks have poured into Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania in the past two months as part of an operation dubbed “Atlantic Resolve.” In February, 140 NATO vehicles and 1400 troops swept through Narva, a mere 300 meters from the Russian border
“As you connect countries, there is almost a line of US troops,” Defense News quoted Col. Michael Foster of the 173rd Airborne Brigade on March 2 as saying. US forces have previously held joint war games with Baltic nations, with names such as “Saber Strike,” “Spring Storm” and “Flaming Sword.”
When asked why the US was condemning Russian exercises inside Russia, State Department press official Jeff Rathke told RT no such statement had ever been made.
Yemen at the breaking point
There's no quick fix for Yemen but it's still too early to give up on getting everyone to the negotiating table.
Following the meteoric rise to power of Yemen's Houthi rebels last September, there were two opposing schools of thought on what it really meant.
On one end of the spectrum, it was argued that the Houthis, who had legitimate, long term grievances of economic and political disenfranchisement by the government, might just provide the impetus needed for Yemen to finally address the widespread corruption, poor governance, poverty, lack of education, resource depletion and a host of other social and political injustices felt throughout the country. No one else seemed to be able to bring about positive change, so why not give the Houthis a chance?
On the other end of the spectrum, it was argued that too much Houthi influence - especially at the expense of other political entities with their own agendas - would further splinter the country and perhaps even put it on a trajectory towards civil war.
In light of recent events, that second school of thought appears to be the more accurate forecast at this point. For Yemen's sake, let's hope that doesn't happen.
US troops 'withdraw from Yemen'
The US is withdrawing its military personal from a base in Yemen because of increasing insecurity there, Yemeni sources say.
About 100 troops, including special forces commandos, are leaving al-Anad air base near the southern city of al-Houta, the officials said.
The city was stormed by al-Qaeda fighters on Friday, although they were later driven out by the Yemeni army.
The US military has not confirmed the evacuation.
Islamic State calls on backers to kill 100 U.S. military personnel
(Reuters) - Islamic State has posted online what it says are the names, U.S. addresses and photos of 100 American military service members, and called upon its "brothers residing in America" to kill them.
The Pentagon said after the information was posted on the Internet that it was investigating the matter. "I can't confirm the validity of the information, but we are looking into it," a U.S. defense official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said on Saturday.
"We always encourage our personnel to exercise appropriate OPSEC (operations security) and force protection procedures," the official added.
In the posting, a group referring to itself as the "Islamic State Hacking Division" wrote in English that it had hacked several military servers, databases and emails and made public the information on 100 members of the U.S. military so that "lone wolf" attackers can kill them.
US shoots down ISIS-operated drone for the first time
As the United States continues to bombard Islamic State militants from the air, US Central Command announced that the military bombed an unmanned drone being operated by the extremist group in Iraq.
CENTCOM made the
announcement Wednesday, marking the first time
the US-led coalition has taken aim at a drone that was being used
by the Islamic State (IS, also known as ISIS/ISIL). Eleven
airstrikes in total were conducted between March 17 and
18.
Details about the drone and the strike are slim, with CENTCOM saying only that the military destroyed a “remotely piloted aircraft and an ISIL vehicle.” The strike occurred near Fallujah, which remains controlled by militants.
The drone was a “small, unarmed hand-held type of the sort that can be purchased commercially,” CENTCOM spokesman Maj. Kim Michelsen told the Associated Press. He added that ISIS was using the drone for surveillance purposes and that’s why the US focused its sight on the aircraft.
NATO and the Upcoming Coup in Georgia
I started out to write a typical story about NATO and Georgia, but soon realised that, in the present climate, I would have to do more than simply research the usual sort of article and then put a spin on it for NEO’s discriminating audience. One thing you soon realise as a journalist, especially a muckraking one, is never to believe in coincidence, and too many things have been happening lately which are a bit too obviously timed to coincide with each other.
Samantha Power recently visited Brussels and told everyone to give more of their GDP to NATO. This happened because members such as Turkey are distancing themselves from any increase in contributions, as they are beginning to understand, at least publicly, that NATO has evolved into an instrument of one sided US foreign policy.
No longer is NATO a means of protecting the West from any enemy. The members themselves know this, and being an NATO ally has as much to do with choice of arms suppliers as the defence needs of individual members. The lack of trust within the organisation is obvious – it is merely a question of who will break ranks first, and who will have the nerve to do anything about it.
At the same time some members of the EU are calling for a European Army. This also is not by happenstance. As Russian Insider has asked: Is EU Army Intended to Reduce US Influence in Europe?
Tens of Thousands Flood Dublin Demanding Abolition of Austerity Tax On Water
'We refuse to be bullied and intimidated into acquiescence'
Tens of thousands of people took to the streets of the Irish capital on Saturday to demand the abolition of a controversial water tax—an austerity measure that protesters say violates the human right to this vital good.
The campaign Right2Water announced in a press statement on Saturday that over 80,000 people from across Ireland took part in the demonstration. The group, whose steering committee organized the rally, had insisted ahead of the event that a big turnout is vital to "send a clear message that we refuse to be bullied and intimidated into acquiescence."
The Dublin rally was the latest mass mobilization in a protracted fight to head off a top-down push to directly charge residents for water use, to satisfy European Union and International Monetary Fund demands.
Beyond declaring that they "won't pay," protesters also seek to take proactive steps to prevent the government from privatizing Ireland's water bureau, Irish Water
The counted: inside the search for the real number of police killings in the US
State by state, town by town, cop by cop, a lack of transparency is halting police reform. But part two of a Guardian investigation reveals that a quiet revolution in crime data may be under way – and justice may be next
If a police officer fatally shoots an unarmed citizen in the United States – and it was happening on average more than twice a day even before the killing of Michael Brown seven months ago in Ferguson, Missouri – most people find out about it not from law enforcement but from the 24-hour news cycle.
The best counts America currently has of killings by police are the work of activists and journalists – online databases like Fatal Encounters, Facebook compilations likeKilled By Police, orOperation Ghetto Storm, which estimates that one African American is killed by police, security guards or vigilantes at least “every 28 hours”.
Citizen activists keep the best national counts. But there are corners of the country where the police track use-of-force more closely than any outside activist could. For example if an officer intentionally fires a gun in Montgomery County, Maryland – even if no one is hit or hurt – the police department posts a detaileddescription of the circumstances on its home page, usually within 24 hours. It is policy.
But transparent police departments are by no means the norm: the United States has no uniform count of people killed by police officers. The problem of missing data stems from more than just police obstructionism or oversight. A national infrastructure for data collection has never been built. Instead a confusing mosaic of city, state and county reporting leaves too many cracks for data to fall through, without imposing consequences for local police failing to report when they kill those they are sworn to protect.
Police encounters kill hundreds of disabled Americans every year, ACLU argues
The American Civil Liberties Union filed an amicus brief arguing that hundreds of disabled Americans are killed in police encounters every year. It was filed in support of a mentally ill woman suing police for shooting her five times.
In the case of San Francisco v. Sheehan, Teresa Sheehan argued that police shot her five times even though she was experiencing a “psychiatric emergency.” The US Supreme Court will hear oral arguments in the case on Monday.
Sheehan argued that when police came to her room in a group home in 2008 to take her to a hospital, they violated her Fourth Amendment rights and her rights under the American Disabilities Act (ADA). Sheehan's home aide called police to take her to a hospital for an evaluation after he noticed she had stopped taking her medication, stopped eating and hadn't changed her clothes in a few days.
During the police encounter, Sheehan threatened officers with a knife. The interaction escalated and police ended up shooting her five times. She survived and consequently sued the city. At issue for the nation's highest court is whether and how the ADA applies to interactions between police and people with disabilities.
Judge Orders US Government to Stop Suppressing Evidence of Torture and Abuse
Ruling on Friday is latest development in years-long legal battle, in which the ACLU has argued the photos 'are crucial to the public record'
A federal judge on Friday ordered the U.S. government to release more than 2,000 photographs showing abuse and torture of people detained by the American military in Iraq and Afghanistan.
The decision is the latest development in a more than 10-year-long legal battle, in which the American Civil Liberties Unions has argued that disclosure of the records is critical for public debate and government accountability.
Many of concealed photographs were taken by U.S. military service members and collected during more than 200 of military investigations in Iraq and Afghanistan. Some could be on par with, or worse than, those released from Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq.
U.S. district judge Alvin Hellerstein ruled (pdf) that the government "is required to disclose each and all of the photographs" in response to a Freedom of Information Act Request from the ACLU. In the order, Hellerstein argued that the government did not adequately prove that "disclosure would endanger Americans."
Judge Orders The Government To Release Over 2,000 Pictures Of Detainee Abuses
Submitted by: NCTim
U.S. District Judge Alvin Hellerstein from New York handed down a major decision on Friday in which he has given the federal government 60 days to release over 2,000 images of detainee abuses inflicted by members of the United States military. The case, which has been ongoing for 11 years, was filed by the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) who sued under the Freedom of Information Act when some of the images emerged in 2004.
According to the lawsuit, the pictures depict a wide range of human rights abuses which include but are not limited to:
*Piles of naked bodies
*A number of detainees being led around the Abu Ghraib prison on leashes
*A female soldier pretending to sodomize a naked detainee with a broom
*Guns being pointed at the heads and bodies of detainees
But, according to George W. Bush and Dick Cheney, we don’t torture or abuse anyone. That’s not what we do. If Bush and Cheney don’t think that is torture, I don’t even want to know what kind of sick stuff they’re into.
Obama administration unveils new fracking regulations
Rules apply only to federal lands, but Interior Department hopes they will serve as a model for state regulators
Submitted by: NCTim
WASHINGTON — The Obama administration on Friday made its most significant move yet toward regulating the recent U.S. energy renaissance, issuing its first safety regulations on hydraulic fracturing, or “fracking.”
Fracking has helped unleash a domestic energy boom, sending oil prices plummeting to a 20-year-low and allowing the United States to nearly double its oil production from 5 million barrels a day in 2008 to 9 million barrels a day in 2015. But it has raised concerns among environmentalists about contamination to groundwater, waste disposal, and the public’s exposure to toxic chemicals. Fracking, a drilling technique, pumps a toxic mix of sand, chemicals and water into the ground to extract oil and gas deposits deep underground.
The Department of Interior announced new rules Friday that would require companies to disclose the chemicals being put into the ground to the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) within 30 days of drilling as well as to submit detailed geological information about existing wells. The regulations would also allow government inspectors to validate the safety of the wells and impose new standards on chemical storage at a fracking site.
The Interior rules would apply only to tribal and federal lands, covering about 92,000 wells responsible for 11 percent of U.S. natural gas production and 5 percent of oil production. A patchwork of state and local regulations governs fracking elsewhere, but Interior Department officials said the new rules could potentially serve as a model for state regulators, who have jurisdiction over their own fracking sites.
The GOP Is Trying To Stop Obama Admin’s New Fracking Regulations
Submitted by: NCTim
Last Friday, the White House Department of Interior released their finalized list of new regulations for fracking. The rules are intended to minimize risk of water contamination, require disclosure of the chemicals used in fracking wells, and new stricter containment standards for fracking waste. Politico reports on the new rules:
“The new rules are the federal government’s most comprehensive foray to date toward regulating the technology at the heart of the U.S. oil and gas boom, addressing worries such as potential dangers to drinking water. They also offered oil and gas supporters new room to accuse President Barack Obama of seeking to throttle fossil-fuel production, despite his repeated boasts about the nation’s booming energy supplies.
At the same time, the rules fall short of environmentalists’ biggest demands for oversight of fracking operations — let alone some groups’ calls for an all-out ban.”
Perhaps unsurprisingly, Republicans are freaking out about the new regulations. A bill has been introduced into the House that would negate the new rules. It is sponsored by Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell and Environment and Public Works Committee Chairman Senator Jim “Snowball” Inhofe, along with 25 other Republican Senators.
Obama says Republican budget just helps the rich. Is he right?
While the House and Senate GOP budget plans are short on details, it's clear that spending cuts will be steep, probably including lower spending on education and the social safety net.
Submitted by: NCTim
Washington — Even as congressional Republicans pursue deficit-cutting budget plans, President Obama has been quick to dismiss the new proposals as failing to meet the crucial goal of shoring up America’s middle class.
“Their budget doles out even more to those who already have the most, makes massive cuts to investments that benefit all of us, asks middle-class families to foot the bill,” Mr. Obama said in a Cleveland speech on Wednesday.
The Republicans in charge of Congress clearly disagree. Their budget plans passed out of House and Senate committees Thursday on straight party-line votes.
So, when Obama says the proposals in Congress would merely pave “a path to prosperity for those who have already prospered,” is he on the mark?
UK Police Deem Snowden Leak Investigation a State Secret
British police claim a criminal investigation they launched into journalists who have reported on leaked documents from Edward Snowden has to be kept a secret due to a “possibility of increased threat of terrorist activity.”
Following Snowden’s disclosures from the National Security Agency in 2013, London’s Metropolitan Police and a lawyer for the United Kingdom government separately confirmed a criminal probe had been opened into the leaks. One of the Metropolitan Police’s most senior officers publicly acknowledged during a parliamentary hearing that the investigation was focusing on whether reporters at the Guardian had committed criminal offenses for their role in revealing British government mass surveillance operations exposed in Snowden’s documents.
But now, the Metropolitan Police, known as the Met, says everything about the investigation’s existence is a secret and too dangerous to disclose. In response to a Freedom of Information Act request from this reporter, the force has repeatedly refused to release any information about the status of the investigation, how many officers are working on it, or how much taxpayer money has been spent on it. The Met wrote in its response:
to confirm or deny whether we hold any information concerning any current or previous investigations into the alleged actions of Edward Snowden could potentially be misused proving detrimental to national security.
In this current environment, where there is a possibility of increased threat of terrorist activity, providing any details even to confirm or deny that any information exists could assist any group or persons who wish to cause harm to the people of the nation which would undermine the safeguarding of national security.
Police at New Orleans international airport shoot man brandishing machete
Richard White, 63, has been hospitalized following shooting after he sprayed TSA official with wasp spray and approached police officer with knife
A police officer shot a machete-wielding man at the New Orleans international airport on Friday night, after the man sprayed several airport security agents with wasp spray.
Police officials said Richard White, 63, was carrying six molotov cocktails in a bag when he walked into an airport security checkpoint, where he was confronted by a Transportation Security Administration (TSA) official who wanted to see his boarding pass. White then used the wasp spray on the official before pulling a machete from his waistband and wielding it toward officers in Concourse B of the Louis Armstrong New Orleans International Airport.
An agent blocked the machete with a piece of luggage, then White ran through the metal detector, according to the Jefferson Parish Sheriff’s Office.
The on-duty police officer stationed at the checkpoint, sheriff’s office lieutenant Heather Slyve, drew her weapon at White, who continued to come toward her with the machete. She shot him three times, hitting his left chest area, left facial area and left thigh.
Attacker in New Orleans airport had homemade bombs in bag
(Reuters) - The man who attacked security agents at a New Orleans airport on Friday night had six homemade bombs in a bag, officials said at a news conference on Saturday.
The man, 62-year-old Richard White, was shot three times by a Sheriff's deputy as he brandished a machete and chased a Transportation Security Administration agent. Earlier he sprayed other agents at an airport security checkpoint with wasp repellent.
White, who is unconscious and in critical condition in a local hospital, dropped a bag that contained six half-pint mason jars with cloth wicks in gasoline, commonly known as a molotov cocktails, Jefferson Parish Sheriff Newell Normand said at a news conference.
The bag also contained a barbecue lighter, he said.
Switzerland, Luxembourg apply for China-led infrastructure bank
Despite negative noises from the US, Switzerland and Luxembourg have become the latest European nations to apply to join the Beijing-led Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB), the Chinese Finance Ministry announced.
Earlier in March, the EU’s leading economies – the UK, France and Germany –announced plans to participate in the new international financial institution.
China's Finance Ministry released a statement on Friday saying it welcomes the Swiss decision to apply.
Switzerland is to become the bank’s founding member later this month if other nation members involved approve its candidacy.
Rep. Aaron Schock under federal investigation for expenses
WASHINGTON — Rep. Aaron Schock's world travels have been well chronicled by him on Instagram, and to his dismay, more recently by news reporters.
There are photos of the Illinois Republican dancing the tango with a long-legged woman in Buenos Aires, parasailing in the Andes and surfing the waves off Hawaii.
But what is less known about Schock, and less publicly chronicled, is the number of miles supposedly racked up in the mundane task of driving his Chevrolet Tahoe, much of it presumably around his Central Illinois district.
An analysis of government documents and Schock campaign finance records shows that from Jan. 1, 2010, through June 30, 2014, Schock was reimbursed by taxpayers and his political funds roughly $90,000 for putting about 171,000 miles on his personal vehicle.
Hellraiser Preview
Sherman, set the time machine for tomorrow's Hellraisers Journal, which will feature a report from the Appeal to Reason from a reporter who visited Pat Quinlan who is now serving a sentence of two to seven years in a New Jersey penitentiary in connection with his duties as an organizer for the Industrial Workers of the World during in the Paterson Silk Strike.
Tune in at 2pm!
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Pot clubs help pay for city gun buyback
Submitted by: enhydra lutris
An only-in-San Francisco alliance of police, community groups and medical marijuana dispensaries held a gun buyback in the city’s Western Addition Saturday that took an AR-15 assault rifle and more than 90 other weapons off the streets.
The unusual joint effort came as funding for previous buybacks — usually cobbled together with leftover city community assistance money and more recently, crowdfunding via the Internet — had been sporadic.
San Francisco’s medical marijuana dispensaries — long maligned as magnets for street crime and repeatedly targeted by federal raids in recent years — offered to step in last year.
On Saturday, San Francisco police showed off an AR-15 military style assault rifle — worth more than $1,000 — that they bought back for $200 as part of the haul of 92 weapons purchased with pot club cash.
Violent arrest at UVA: Should alcohol officers act like cops?
UVA student Martese Johnson was bloodied during an arrest by Virginia alcohol-enforcement officers. Studies suggest such officers can play a key role in reducing illegal drinking, but critics say they need better training.
Submitted by: NCTim
The arrest and injury of University of Virginia student Martese Johnson sparked more of the “black lives matter” protests that have become familiar in the wake of police actions against unarmed black men in Ferguson, Mo., and beyond. In the wake of protests that drew more than 1,000 students, Virginia's Gov. Terry McAuliffe has asked state police to launch an independent investigation into what happened outside an Irish pub during St. Patrick's Day celebrations.
But whether racial bias was at play is just one of the questions raised by the actions of the Virginia Department of Alcoholic Beverage and Control (ABC) agents who arrested Mr. Johnson outside a Charlottesville bar early Wednesday morning.
Another key question is: How well trained are these enforcement agents – who in Virginia and a number of other states have the power to arrest and carry firearms – particularly when it comes to interacting with young adults?
Alcohol is a fraught issue on college campuses, from alcohol poisoning to its role in sexual assault and other crimes. Studies show that enforcement is an effective tool for cutting down on such abuses, and dedicated enforcement officers are one way to ensure that alcohol-related violations are policed.
The secret to saving the world: How ordinary people actually can prevent global disaster
"Sometimes the most powerful changes are well within the reach of ordinary citizens," says Paul Steinberg
Let’s face it: you’re not going to save the planet by recycling. Or by riding your bike, or by bringing reusable bags to the grocery store. “Scientists tell us that one out of every five mammal species is threatened with extinction,” is how Paul Steinberg puts it, “and we react by switching coffee brands.”
To which you might add, if even that.
The realization that individual action has little to no impact on major environmental problems — to say nothing of the existential threat of climate change — can prompt despair, Steinberg, a professor of political science and environmental policy at Harvey Mudd College, says. But it doesn’t have to. We could try, instead, consulting social scientists, who have spent a lot of time thinking about just this problem: How can a single individual can act in a way that effects large-scale change?
The answer, Steinberg says, requires understanding and taking advantage of social rules: those institutions, laws and norms that organize and regulate society. In his book, “Who Rules the Earth? How Social Rules Shape Our Planet and Our Lives,” Steinberg distills insights from the social sciences and presents them to would-be activists. Because despite all the evidence to the contrary, he told Salon, “sometimes the most powerful changes are well within the reach of ordinary citizens.”
US Propaganda Op in Korea Exposes American TV as Social Engineering Tool
If American TV is used to brainwash North Koreans, wouldn't that suggest it was used to brainwash Americans too?
March 20, 2015 (Tony Cartalucci - NEO) - When Wired published its article, "The Plot to Free North Korea with Smuggled Episodes of 'Friends,'" it probably hoped that its impressionable, politically ignorant audience would not pick up on the underlying facts and their implications, and simply see a "cute" anecdote poking fun at the besieged East Asian country while inflating their own sense of unwarranted cultural superiority.
What they missed, of course, is the fact that the program peddled by Wired as the work of "the North Korea Strategy Center and its 46-year-old founder, Kang Chol-hwan," is in fact funded and organized instead by the US State Department.
Indeed, the North Korea Strategy Center is partnered directly with the Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights and Labor of the US Department of State, the US State Department's Radio Free Asia propaganda network, and the US State Department's National Endowment for Democracy (NED), a defacto "department of regime change" backed by Wall Street's Fortune 500, solely for the interests of Wall Street's Fortune 500.
Readers of Wired's latest, long-winded spin on US-backed sedition abroad also most likely missed the fact that if TV shows from America are considered a tool for social engineering in North Korea, they are most likely being used as a tool of social engineering in the United States as well. The degradation of American culture, the family, and weakening of local communities, versus the growing centralized dominance of corporate-financier monopolies and their increasingly draconian police and surveillance state is a direct result of this.
Flying fryer: China completes first flight powered by ‘gutter oil’
“As a fast-growing domestic and international carrier, Hainan Airlines is demonstrating our environmental commitment by showing that aviation biofuel can play a safe and effective role in China's air transport system,” said Pu Ming, vice president of Hainan Airlines, who personally piloted the plane, which carried more than 100 passengers from Shanghai to Beijing.
The Boeing 737 Next Generation was propelled by 50 percent biofuel and 50 percent conventional jet fuel. Biofuel produces up to an 80 percent reduction in carbon emissions than traditional kerosene used to power airplanes.
“We thank and congratulate our partners, whose teamwork, vision and commitment to sustainable aviation are helping to improve our industry and our environment for the long term,” said Ian Thomas, president, Boeing China.
China is already the world’s second biggest air travel market, behind the US, and is expected to grow rapidly in the coming years, with Boeing estimating that the country will need more than 6,000 new planes – at a cost of more than $800 billion – in the next two decades.
California staves off water crisis with $1bn emergency drought relief
The Golden State will get a $1 billion package to provide immediate relief to try and stem future water problems. Officials assure the population that they will not run out of water completely as the state enters its fourth year of drought.
On Thursday state governor Jerry Brown and a bipartisan group of state lawmakers announced a one billion dollar package to provide immediate relief to try and stem future problems.
“This is a struggle, something we’re going to have to live with. For how long we’re not sure,” said Brown during a press conference.
Of the $1 billion in emergency aid, $660 million of that is for flood prevention, which Brown explained is linked, as they are both related to climate change.
The Evening Greens
The Evening Greens Weekend Editor: enhydra lutris
Why record low Arctic sea ice only tells half the story
A series of new studies from scientists around the world have revealed just how threatened the Earth's polar regions are to warming ocean waters.
Over the past week, new studies have shown that ice melt in the Arctic and Antarctica is proceeding at a record pace, with potentially disastrous consequences for global sea level rise and its attendant threats, which could include stronger storm surges and extreme weather events around the world.
While headlines have focused on the Arctic sea ice reaching a record low this winter, of the two polar regions, climate scientists are most concerned about melting ice sheets in Antarctica. Unlike sea ice in the Arctic – which melts and freezes seasonally, having a minor effect on global sea levels – melting ice sheets in Antarctica have the potential to melt enough fresh water to raise global sea levels by more than 10 feet.
A study released on Tuesday has challenged a central assumption about Antarctic ice sheet melt: Namely, whether the famously fragile western edge of the continent is in fact the most most vulnerable to warming waters. The new study, published by the International Collaboration for Exploration of the Cryosphere Through Aerogeophysical Profiling (ICECAP) research team in the journal Nature Geoscience, contends that the continent's eastern ice sheets are actually in much more danger than previously believed.
Can new federal rules make fracking safer?
For the first time in three decades, the US is updating its federal oil and gas regulations on fracking. But will measures on chemical disclosure, waste water disposal, and well integrity make fracking safer?
Washington — Years into a fracking-fueled oil and gas boom, the Department of the Interior today announced long-awaited rules regulating the controversial extraction technique on US public and tribal lands.
Fracking isn’t new, but, until recently, the process – which injects wells with water, sand, and chemicals to release oil and gas – wasn’t widely practiced. Today, fracking is commonplace: 90 percent of new land-based wells in the US are fracked, according to government data, and federal lands produce 11 percent of the natural gas and 5 percent of the oil the US uses.
While many states and municipalities have rules governing the practice, modern fracking has gone largely unregulated at the federal level since it started to spread across the US roughly seven years ago. For critics of the technique, the gap in federal regulations is a major oversight that puts local waterways and air quality at risk. Meanwhile, the oil and gas industry says the federal rules are “duplicative" of state regulations, and will only crimp a domestic boom that has driven down consumer costs and buoyed the US economy.
For the Obama administration, it’s simply a matter of policy catching up with a dramatic oil-and-gas boom that continues to surprise industry watchers.
Obama Admin. Releases Toothless Fracking Rules; Give-Away to Oil and Gas Industry
WASHINGTON, D.C. – Today the Department of Interior’s Bureau of Land Management (BLM) finalized rules regulating the practice of hydraulic fracturing – commonly called fracking – on public lands. As the BLM itselfadmits, this rule advances the Obama Administration’s all-of-the-above energy policy, which aims to expand domestic oil and gas production. Even though BLM has failed to take serious action, Representatives Mark Pocan (D – Wisc.) and Jan Schakowsky (D – Ill.) have heeded this call by introducing legislation in the previous Congress to ban fracking on all federal lands, with plans to reintroduce this session.
“We owe it to our future generations to protect the land that was put aside for the public good,” saidCongressman Mark Pocan. “Regulating fracking still risks accidental spills, water contamination, methane leaks, earthquakes and habitat destruction. The only way to mediate these risks is to not allow fracking in the first place.”
“Our Public Lands are too precious to spoil with fracking, said Congresswoman Jan Schakowsky. “The BLM regulations are a step in the right direction, but more must be done to ensure that public lands are protected and preserved for future generations. We will continue to work to completely ban fracking on public lands.”
Americans Against Fracking represents more than 250 organizations from across the country who support banning fracking. The group delivered 650,000 public comments to the BLM last year in response to the proposed rule, urging the BLM to protect public lands from drilling and fracking.
NASA using space radar to track groundwater pollution risks
Water is our most precious natural resource. Without clean water to drink human populations cannot exist. But our water supplies are under constant assault from anthropogenic pollution.
When pollutants get into groundwater, they can stay there for decades. Cleanup efforts are difficult, expensive and not always successful. It would be better to protect groundwater from contamination in the first place, but risks to groundwater are moving targets. Although unchanging factors such as porous soil or shallow aquifer depth play a role, the greatest risk comes from the source of the pollutants: people. And people are always moving. A growing city, in particular, usually means a growing threat to groundwater quality. To lock on to the moving target of groundwater risk, planners worldwide need up-to-date information on how people are changing the land surface.
Son Nghiem, a research scientist at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California, has devised a new technique to use satellite observations of changes in land use to assess the threat of groundwater pollution by a common group of polluting compounds called nitrates. "To test the method, we successfully conducted the Po Plain Experiment [POPLEX] in northern Italy," said POPLEX leader Marco Masetti, a professor at the University of Milan, Italy. Combining data from the experiment with satellite data and two other data sets on population and land use, they discovered that in this region, groundwater is more vulnerable in urban than in agricultural areas. The satellite data produced a more accurate map of groundwater risks than either of the other data sets.
Nghiem's new technique uses data from NASA's QuikScat scatterometer, a satellite managed by JPL. The method improves the "focus" of the QuikScat image from a pixel size of about 15 miles (25 kilometers) per side to 0.6 mile (1 kilometer) per side, capturing far more detail on how the landscape has changed. Nghiem explained his technique takes advantage of the fact that human-made structures bounce back more of the radar signal than does soil or vegetation. Since large buildings with steel frames are concentrated in cities, the strength of the return signals is a good measure of urbanization.
Canadian Grocer to Sell "Ugly" Fruit
If you have traveled to regions such as the Balkans, India or rural Latin America, the appearance of misshapen fruit and vegetables everywhere would have hardly surprised you; and of course, they are delicious. But shopping trends on both side of the Atlantic have led consumers to believe fruit should be uniform in color and shape.
One reason why food waste in the United States, Canada and the United Kingdom hovers around 40 percent is because misshapen or “ugly” fruit is tossed into the refuse bin. Some retailers have tried to stop this trend, but consumer habits and marketing strategies die hard. Now a Canadian grocer, Loblaw, is selling misshapen produce at some of its outlets in Ontario and Quebec.
The company will sell the produce, starting with apples and potatoes, under its generic “no name” moniker.
Like many food companies, Loblaw first tried to deal with misshapen fruit by processing it into juice, sauces or soups. But those tactics can only go so far, and if you’ve watched any supermarket employee in action at a produce section, those oddly shaped fruits or vegetables often get tossed aside.
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