(David Sirota, AlterNet, July 21, 2010)
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Over the last few days, Connecticut Senator Chris Dodd and Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner have made the case that Harvard professor and Congressional Oversight Panel chairwoman Elizabeth Warren is too controversial a figure to head the new Consumer Financial Protection Agency. This, then, raises the revealing question of how Washington defines “controversial”? . . . » Continue reading “The new meaning of ‘controversial””

(Ellen Cantarow, Tomdispatch.com, July 18, 2010)
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Think of oil civilization in its late stages as a form of global terrorism.

If you live on the Gulf Coast, welcome to the real world of oil — and just know that you’re not alone.  In the Niger Delta and the Ecuadorian Amazon, among other places, your emerging hell has been the living hell of local populations for decades. . . . Three federal appeals court judges with financial and other ties to big oil were rejecting the Obama administration’s proposed drilling moratorium in the Gulf of Mexico.  Pollution from the BP spill there was seeping into Lake Pontchartrain, north of New Orleans. Clean-up crews were discovering that a once-over of beaches isn’t nearly enough: somehow, the oil just keeps reappearing. Endangered sea turtles and other creatures were being burnt alive in swaths of ocean (“burn fields”) ignited by BP to “contain” its catastrophe.  The lives and livelihoods of fishermen and oyster-shuckers were being destroyed. » Continue reading “It’s not only in the Gulf: Big Oil Makes War on the Planet”

(Jon Boone, The Guardian, 18 July 2010)
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The US military build-up in Kandahar is likely to further strengthen the hold of the Taliban over the vital southern Afghanistan city, a highly respected security organisation said today in a bleak report warning of record Taliban violence and rising civilian deaths across the country. . . . The report by the Afghanistan NGO Security Office, which monitors trends in violence on behalf of aid organisations, said Nato‘s counter-insurgency strategy was not showing any signs of succeeding amid rising violence, the unchecked establishment of local militias and a huge increase in attacks on private development workers across the country. . . . It revealed that June marked a record for Taliban attacks – up 51% on the previous year to 1,319 operations. » Continue reading “US military build-up in Kandahar will bolster Taliban, warns security monitor”

(Marion Nestle, Food Politics, July 18, 2010)
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So says a report from the Government Accountability Office (GAO): GAO identified a variety of products that currently incorporate nanomaterials already available in commerce … [in] food and agriculture …The extent to which nanomaterials present a risk to human health and the environment depends on a combination of the toxicity of specific nanomaterials and the route and level of exposure to these materials. Although the body of research related to nanomaterials is growing, the current understanding of the risks posed by these materials is limited. . . . In the meantime, the European Food Safety Authority is preoccupied with issues related to the safety of food nanotechnology: The risk assessment framework for nanotechnology in Europe—like so much else connected to the technology—appears to be in its infancy but developing at a rapid pace … Nano knowledge gaps have led some to call for a ban on the use of nanomaterials in food products until their safety has been fully established. One area of concern is whether nanoparticles can migrate from packaging materials into foods. . . . In seeking to assess nanomaterials, the food safety body repeatedly used phrases such as “specific uncertainties”, “limited knowledge” and…”difficult to characterise, detect and measure” in relation to toxicokinetics and toxicology in food. Likely usage and exposure levels are also largely a mystery.  . . . The European Food Safety Authority says that lack of knowledge means that risk assessment of risk assessments must be done on a “cautious case-by-case approach.” . . . Last April, the European Parliament’s environment committee said nanotech products should be withdrawn from the market until more is known about their safety. In June, that committee added that nanotech foods should be assessed for safety before they are approved for use and labeled. . . . Doesn’t that sound reasonable? Let’s hope it’s not too late to put such constraints in place, and in the U.S., too.

The images above were found at:
BP Gulf Oil Spill Photos Show What BP Doesn’t Want You To See, The Real Reason Constitution Has Been Suspended

(dazebao.org, July 13, 2010)
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The huge oil slick could, in all probability, cause irreparable damage to the activity of thermal regulation of the Gulf Stream, with a domino effect on global climate of the planet. . . . This is what says a study published on the website of the Italian Geophysics by the Institute of Atmospheric Sciences Climate ISAC-CNR. The summary of the study, is signed by Gianlugi Zangari, a theoretical physicist, is born by the National Laboratories of Frascati, after careful observation, satellite in real time, the large area of concern. . . . According to the Italian scientist, Gianlugi Zangari, maps of sea surface velocity and height, indicating that the Loop Current is broken for the first time May 18, creating a reel clockwise. . . . » Continue reading “Italian Scientists Fear BP Gusher Damaged Gulf Stream”

(Mira Luna, YES! Magazine, July 15, 2010)
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[COMMENT by Lorenzo: Here is the best idea I have seen in many years. It is perhaps the only way us Working Class People can break the chains of debt and feudalism imposed by the U.S. Central Bank, whose Federal Reserve Notes are merely a reminder that anyone who uses dollars is funding a massive war machine and enslaving their descendants.  ]

Unemployed poor folks got together to create time dollar stores and cooperative mills, farms, health care systems, foundries, repair and recycling facilities, distribution warehouses, and a myriad of other service exchanges. . . . Many of these were based on the hour as a unit of account, and often everyone’s hour was equal and could either be exchanged for another hour of service or its equivalent in goods.  . . . Modern forms of time exchange, called Timebanks and LETS (Local Employment Trading Systems), have been around since the 1980s. Now, with one in ten Americans unemployed (likely twice that, given recording problems), time exchanges are making a comeback. . . . Timebanks USA, a system of over 120 timebanks in the U.S. and a few other countries, was developed by activist lawyer Edgar Cahn as a way to help the underprivileged and underserved help each other through an organized system of reciprocity. In the following interview, Cahn explains the basic principles behind timebanks:
» Continue reading “Forget Money TimeBanking is the New Economy”

(John Hooper, The Guardian, 15 July 2010)
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[T]he Vatican stoked the anger of liberal Catholics and women’s groups by including a provision in its revised decree that made the “attempted ordination” of women one of the gravest crimes in ecclesiastical law. . . . The change put the “offence” on a par with the sex abuse of minors. . . . » Continue reading “Catholics Equate Women Priests with Sex Abuse of Children”

July 15, 2010