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Living within a living, loving planet
Archive for November, 2012
The last words spoken to Jean Huston by Teilhard de Chardin in 1955
Nov 29th
“Jean, the people of your time, toward the end of this century, will be taking the tiller of the world. Remain always true to yourself, but move ever-upward toward greater consciousness and greater love.”
from the book Evolutionaries by Carter Phipps
A race to see who gets to the Apocalypse first
Nov 29th
By Michael T. Klare
This article was published at NationofChange at: http://www.nationofchange.org/world-energy-report-2012-1354118005. All rights are reserved.
No Hope for Averting Catastrophic Climate Change
“Of all the findings in the 2012 edition of the World Energy Outlook, the one that merits the greatest international attention is the one that received the least. Even if governments take vigorous steps to curb greenhouse gas emissions, the report concluded, the continuing increase in fossil fuel consumption will result in “a long-term average global temperature increase of 3.6 degrees C.”
This should stop everyone in their tracks. Most scientists believe that an increase of 2 degrees Celsius is about all the planet can accommodate without unimaginably catastrophic consequences: sea-level increases that will wipe out many coastal cities, persistent droughts that will destroy farmland on which hundreds of millions of people depend for their survival, the collapse of vital ecosystems, and far more. An increase of 3.6 degrees C essentially suggests the end of human civilization as we know it.
To put this in context, human activity has already warmed the planet by about 0.8 degrees C — enough to produce severe droughts around the world, trigger or intensify intense storms like Hurricane Sandy, and drastically reduce the Arctic ice cap. “Given those impacts,” writes noted environmental author and activist Bill McKibben, “many scientists have come to think that two degrees is far too lenient a target.” Among those cited by McKibben is Kerry Emanuel of MIT, a leading authority on hurricanes. “Any number much above one degree involves a gamble,” Emanuel writes, “and the odds become less and less favorable as the temperature goes up.” Thomas Lovejoy, once the World Bank’s chief biodiversity adviser, puts it this way: “If we’re seeing what we’re seeing today at 0.8 degrees Celsius, two degrees is simply too much.”
“In a report that leads with the “good news” of impending U.S. oil supremacy, to calmly suggest that the world is headed for that 3.6 degree C mark is like placing a thermonuclear bomb in a gaudily-wrapped Christmas present. In fact, the “good news” is really the bad news: the energy industry’s ability to boost production of oil, coal, and natural gas in North America is feeding a global surge in demand for these commodities, ensuring ever higher levels of carbon emissions. As long as these trends persist — and the IEA report provides no evidence that they will be reversed in the coming years — we are all in a race to see who gets to the Apocalypse first.”
“ A new World Bank report indicates that a rise of 4 degrees Celsius is possible by century’s end, a prospect that bank president Jim Yong Kim termed a “doomsday scenario.”
In the meantime, the most comprehensive study to date of how humans have affected the amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere predicts that the planet’s temperature could rise by an unimaginable 6 degrees Celsius by 2100. These days, it increasingly looks like we’ve entered the lottery from hell when it comes to Earth’s ultimate temperature — especially now that a recent report from the United Nations Environment Program suggests carbon in the atmosphere has increased by 20% since 2000 and that “there are few signs of global emissions falling.”
Tom Engelhardt http://www.tomdispatch.com/blog/175621/tomgram%3A_michael_klare%2C_a_thermonuclear_energy_bomb_in_christmas_wrappings/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+tomdispatch%2FesUU+%28TomDispatch%3A+The+latest+Tomgram%29
This is the first instance in recorded history that so few are responsible for such misery for so many. We so desperately need a world government that nourishes the welfare of the governed. We have a uniting principle before us and so obvious. We are first and foremost Earthlings. An eco-centric worldview that loves and cares for the sustaining factor in all beings is not outrageous. Perhaps we all need to look deeply into just what is causing the greed and disdain for the beautiful and intelligent world around us and within us.
How much more evidence do you need?
Nov 28th
Nation of Change
28/11/2012
Chris Hedges
http://www.nationofchange.org/stand-still-apocalypse-1354008355
“Humans must immediately implement a series of radical measures to halt carbon emissions or prepare for the collapse of entire ecosystems and the displacement, suffering and death of hundreds of millions of the globe’s inhabitants, according to a report commissioned by the World Bank. The continued failure to respond aggressively to climate change, the report warns, will mean that the planet will inevitably warm by at least 4 degrees Celsius (7.2 degrees Fahrenheit) by the end of the century, ushering in an apocalypse.
The 84-page document, “Turn Down the Heat: Why a 4°C Warmer World Must Be Avoided,” was written for the World Bank by the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research and Climate Analytics and published last week. The picture it paints of a world convulsed by rising temperatures is a mixture of mass chaos, systems collapse and medical suffering like that of the worst of the Black Plague, which in the 14th century killed 30 to 60 percent of Europe’s population. The report comes as the annual United Nations Conference on Climate Change begins this Monday [Nov. 26] in Doha, Qatar.”
“The political and corporate elites in the industrialized world continue, in spite of overwhelming scientific data, to place short-term corporate profit and expediency before the protection of human life and the ecosystem. The fossil fuel industry is permitted to determine our relationship to the natural world, dooming future generations. Carbon dioxide (CO2), the main greenhouse gas, increased from its pre-industrial concentration of about 278 parts per million (ppm) to more than 391 ppm in September 2012, with the rate of rise now at 1.8 ppm per year. We have already passed the tipping point of 350 ppm; above that level, life as we have known it cannot be sustained. The CO2 concentration is higher now than at any time in the last 15 million years. The emissions of CO2, currently about 35 billion metric tons per year, are projected to climb to 41 billion metric tons per year by 2020.”
Stop and think about what you are doing.
Nov 22nd
Stop and think about what you are doing
On Thanksgiving, Americans will consume around 45 million turkeys. Wild turkeys were abundant around the Plymouth Colony in when they arrived on the East coast of North America. So, serving turkey for the first thanksgiving meant eating nutritious, local fare. Not so today. 96% of the turkeys eaten today were raised in abdominal conditions in facilities crowded with over 30,000 birds. Over the last 50 years, there are 150,000 fewer farms raising turkeys for the market. You may think, So what? Well, my choice of words is factory farming. Animals are treated as “things;” machines so to speak. Many of these turkeys are bred such that their breasts are so large that they can hardly stand. They hold each other up from lack of room. Their weight causes many to develop damaged feet and legs making for a painfully, albeit short, life.
And what about their manure? Across the industry, the 248 million turkeys generate about a billion tons of manure each year. Spread it on the land you say, as fertilizer. Sounds good, but in most cases, there is just too much of it in too small an area. The price of hauling it too far away is high and so it is most often spread too thickly resulting in huge un-absorbed amounts which run off into the streams and rivers; causing death and putrefaction. Excess nitrogen and phosphorous, for instance from factory animal farms along the Mississippi River have caused “dead zones” of over 8,000 square miles. “Because the waste is untreated, it can also contain bacteria and viruses that are harmful to human health, as well as toxic metals and even antibiotics.” *
Why antibiotics? If you just think about how humans, for instance, could stay healthy enough to survive you would realize that these turkeys are fed prophylactic doses of antibiotics that in turn end up in the manure, which goes into the soil, which is picked up by the crops and which we eat. So then our bacteria develop immunity making the antibiotic useless for our possible treatment. “In 2009, drug makers sold about seven million pounds of antibiotics to treat sick people, but they sold about four times that amount—29 million pounds—to aid in the production of meat and poultry.” * You can check the sources in the article cited below to discover that most of the regulatory and well recognised organisations dedicated to public health agree that we are threatened.
Obviously we can vote against factory farms with our pocketbooks and wallets. Good idea. Unfortunately, if everyone did so, it would take a few years for the supply of clean fowl to be made available and many would not be able to buy a suitable turkey. Meanwhile, the price of a clean bird would skyrocket due to the principle of supply and demand. With so much land and farming industry, in the hands of huge multinationals, not to mention the lobbying power of the pharmaceuticals, I don’t see it happening soon.
At least, they don’t have to feed antibiotics to vegetables: not yet.
“The White House turkey deserves a presidential pardon. Industrial animal agriculture does not.”
* http://www.nationofchange.org/mr-president-pardon-turkey-not-factory-farming-1353513959
Why Organics are Still Healthier
Nov 22nd
Why Organics are Still Healthier
Corporate attacks on the Organic Sector
“And then, the mainstream media essentially fell for this hook, line, and sinker. By and large, the media coverage parroted the press release and the attention-grabbing headlines. Granted, most reporters are overworked these days. But we shouldn’t let any of these folks off the hook.
These may seem like two minor studies—but the intent seems to be to change not just how we think about organic food but also our purchasing. As the Stanford press release says in its opening paragraph, the next time you find yourself reaching for an organic plum in a store because you thought it “the healthier decision… new findings from Stanford University [might] cast some doubt on your thinking.”
Huh?
Please join us—and others, including Francis Moore Lappé and Mark Bittman—in our outrage. Not letting these ludicrous studies change our voice or our purchasing is the way to ensure that Rachel Carson lives on. Buying organic is good for the long-term health of the planet and its inhabitants. So, please do reach for that organic plum.
And please do join us in making it known that we consumers cannot be fooled this easily. If you eat organics, tell your friends why you do so. Write a letter to the editor telling your local newspaper why you choose organic.
Shame on you, Stanford University researchers. And you too, American Association of Pediatrics. At a minimum, you’ve been used by corporate power.
John Cavanagh and Robin Broad wrote this article for YES! Magazine, a national, nonprofit media organization that fuses powerful ideas with practical actions.
This article was published at NationofChange at: http://www.nationofchange.org/more-nutritious-why-organics-are-still-healthier-1353507841. All rights are reserved.”
Ten Numbers the Rich would like Fudged
Nov 21st
4. Corporations stopped paying HALF OF THEIR TAXES after the recession.
Ten Numbers the Rich would like Fudged
Nation of Change
http://www.nationofchange.org/ten-numbers-rich-would-fudged-1353335225
“After paying an average of 22.5% from 1987 to 2008, corporations have paid an annual rate of 10% since. This represents a sudden $250 billion annual loss in taxes.
U.S. corporations have shown a pattern of tax reluctance for more than 50 years, despite building their businesses with American research and infrastructure. They’ve passed the responsibility on to their workers. For every dollar of workers’ payroll tax paid in the 1950s, corporations paid three dollars. Now it’s 22 cents.”
http://www.taxpolicycenter.org/taxfacts/displayafact.cfm?Docid=203
Leave Social Security alone. Social Security is not the problem. If you are not aware of Ronnie’s blog, you may well find it interesting. Time Goes By.
“Our commitment as Democrats is that we believe Social Security and Medicare are pillars of economic and health security for America’s seniors. They should not have cuts made to them in order to give tax cuts to the rich. Any adjustments we would make in them would be to make them stronger, as we did in the Affordable Care Act.”
House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi
Both myself and my employers have contributed to Social Security since I was 16 years old.
If that money, along with hundred’s of thousands of similar payments had been invested: even just a bit of it, think what a huge sum would be available. I’m tired of being accused of causing a money problem. Casting MY money as revenue rather than investment source was not my decision.
Thought for any day
Nov 20th
Thought for any day
“The world will not be destroyed by those who do evil, but by those
who watch them without doing anything.” Albert Einstein
Be persuasive. Be brave.
Nov 17th
Be persuasive. Be brave
Financiar Jeremy Grantham
http://www.nature.com/polopoly_fs/1.11796!/menu/main/topColumns/topLeftColumn/pdf/491303a.pdf
“I have yet to meet a climate scientist who does not believe that global warming is a worse problem than they thought a few years ago. The seriousness of this change is not appreciated by politicians and the public. The scientific world carefully measures the speed with which we approach the cliff and will, no doubt, carefully measure our rate of fall. But it is not doing enough to stop it. I am a specialist in investment bubbles, not climate science. But the effects of climate change can only exacerbate the ecological trouble I see reflected in the financial markets — soaring commodity prices and impending shortages.”
“It is crucial that scientists take more career risks and sound a more realistic, more desperate, note on the global-warming problem. Younger scientists are obsessed by thoughts of tenure, so it is probably up to older, senior and retired scientists to do the heavy lifting. Be arrested if necessary. This is not only the crisis of your lives — it is also the crisis of our species’ existence. I implore you to be brave.”
Invest in Trees
We need more establishment people with the courage to speak out.
The migrants ‘worth less than cattle’
Nov 17th
17 November 2012 Last updated at 01:51
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Calais after Sangatte: The migrants ‘worth less than cattle’
By Emma Jane Kirby
BBC News, Calais
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-20356446
Herein lies the key to big profits for corporate farming not to mention huge supermarket profits and why you can’t buy a local pippin apple in the supermarket.
A global food market is a disaster for all but those who manage and support multi-national business.
Support local food.
Will China and Japan soon own the US?
Nov 14th
Will China and Japan soon own the US? This not impossible since they hold 48% of the country’s debt burden. I’ve always understood that when you own a company and others own over 1/2 of the debt, then you no longer own the company. Is that not right?
14 November 2012 Last updated at 00:09
US government deficit rises sharply in October
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-20320862
“The US deficit came to $1.1tn dollars in the year to September 2012, or about 7% of economic output
The US government’s budget deficit rose sharply in October, highlighting the financial challenge President Barack Obama faces following his re-election.
The deficit increased 22% from a year earlier to $120bn (£75bn) as government spending outpaced tax revenues.
The deficit is the amount by which government spending exceeds its tax revenues, with the government needing to borrow the difference.”
“Public debt increases or decreases as a result of the annual unified budget deficit or surplus.[2] The federal government budget deficit or surplus is the difference between government receipts and spending, ignoring intra-governmental transfers. However, some spending that is excluded from the deficit (supplemental appropriations) also adds to the debt.”
“According to the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office, if the White House and Congress can reach a budget deal that extends the tax cuts and avoids reductions in spending, the deficit will be about $1 trillion for this budget year.”
Sky: Here’s where I utterly fail to understand what’s going on. The Congressional Budget Office wants to [1] continue the taxcuts [2] refuse to cut spending, and this will result in a decreased deficit? They say it will be $1 trillion. But it was already $1.1 trillion in September, 2012 and rose 22% in October with no indication that it will decrease in the near future. Now as far as the trade deficit decreasing in September -*see below- that will cease as people start buying up Christmas presents from goods made overseas.
Also, looking at corporate tax and corporate tax incentives, it is doubtful if the increased tax revenues as a result of a better balance of trade will seriously decrease the budget deficit. Of course, when banks and other corporates pay obscene salaries and incentives, even when their companies are on their knees; this is an expense to the company and will decrease profits thus decrease taxable income.
“Federal debt held by the public will reach 73 percent of GDP [gross domestic product] by the end of this fiscal year—the highest level since 1950 and about twice the share that it measured at the end of 2007, before the financial crisis and recent recession.” http://www.cbo.gov/publication/43539
Sky: It is obvious to me that it is time to pay the piper. But the question is, who will pay? The political party that controls the House says the government cannot increase taxes for the 1% yet the 1% have increased their wealth by somewhere between double and triple since 2008. So who do you think is going to pay? Yep, those with the least political power. If you look at Greece for instance, the cuts mainly affected the lower income brackets. Sure, the wealthy invest in industry that creates jobs etc. But on the other hand, the increase in wealth and corporate pay has not been ignored by the have-nots and perhaps a little more should filter down to them. I don’t believe I am alone with my belief that whilst it was the well to do who broke the law and acted foolishly and greedily, the pay back is ending up on the shoulders of the poor. We need to bring back the credo of the radio program – The FBI in Peace and War – crime doesn’t pay!!
Well, I am nauseated by the whole financial picture and will end this rave.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:CBO_-_Revenues_and_Outlays_as_percent_GDP.png
U.S. debt from 1940 to 2011. Red lines indicate the debt held by the public (net public debt) and black lines indicate the total public debt outstanding (gross public debt), the difference being that the gross debt includes that held by the federal government itself. The second panel shows the two debt figures as a percentage of U.S. GDP (dollar value of U.S. economic production for that year). The top panel is deflated so every year is in 2010 dollars.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_public_debt
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8 November 2012 Last updated at 14:50
US trade deficit falls to near two-year low
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-20254604
Exports and imports both rose during September
The US trade deficit has fallen to its lowest level in almost two years, as exports reached an all-time high, official figures have shown.
The deficit in goods and services narrowed to $41.5bn (£26bn) in September, raising hopes of increased strength in the US economy.