DINESH NARAYANAN – One big multinational is almost certain to be out of the race for nuclear energy business in India. On Wednesday I had met John Flannery, outgoing President and Chief Executive Officer of GE in India for a chat before he left for his new assignment: finding targets for the company to buy. Flannery said GE will rather give up business than play within India’s civil nuclear liability rules.
The Foodopoly: Too Big to Eat
DAVID SWANSON – We’ve come to understand that the banks are too big to fail, too big to take to trial, too big not to let them write our public policy, too big not to reward them for ruining our economy. Why have we come to understand that?
Newly Proposed Carbon Tax Will Fight Global Warming, Protect Low-Income Americans, Reduce Deficit
RICHARD CAPERTON – In the last two years, the biggest extreme weather events cost American families and businesses $188 billion. As we pump more and more greenhouse gas pollution into the atmosphere, these disasters are only going to become more common.
Bhutan Set to Plough Lone Furrow as World’s First Wholly Organic Country
John Vidal and Annie Kellly – Bhutan plans to become the first country in the world to turn its agriculture completely organic, banning the sales of pesticides and herbicides and relying on its own animals and farm waste for fertilizers.
35 Years in Prison for Embarrassing H-Bomb Guards?
JOHN LAFORGE – Risking your personal freedom for a worthy cause is as American as apple pie. But nonviolently putting your life at risk in defense of others is so rare that the actor is sometimes dismissed as crazy. Some people think the Transform Now Plowshares activists were crazy for sneaking into a nuclear weapons factory — the Y-12 National Security Complex in Oak Ridge, Tenn. — in order to make a direct, unequivocal and crystal clear demand for an end to the expensive, poisonous, criminal and delusional self-destructiveness of building nuclear bombs.
How Climate Change Affects Communities of Color
HILARY O. SHELTON – With the devastation from Hurricane Sandy fresh in our minds, it is time to deliberately address the menacing climate change concerns that are facing our planet and their disparate impacts on communities of color. With this in mind, we must also recognize and address the air pollutants contributing to issues of climate change. In 2005, many thought Hurricane Katrina would force politicians and decision-makers to pay attention to the buildup of harmful greenhouse gases in our atmosphere and to build momentum for change. Yet here we are again, seven years later, rebuilding after a catastrophic super-storm, which ravaged the Caribbean and U.S. Atlantic Coast. During the election season, the topic of climate change was barely broached. However, President Obama gave it some much needed attention in his victory speech. And, as many know, the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) and our allies in the environmental justice movement have been speaking with a sense of critical urgency on this issue for years.