DAVID SWANSON – When the Occupy Movement lost its presence on television and therefore in real spaces that are never quite as real as television, it left a positive lasting impact, difficult as yet to measure fully, but observable in many areas.
Category: September 2013
Climate, Keystone and the Problem of Fossil Fuel Demand
KURT COBB – If reducing consumption of fossil fuels is the goal, what we actually need to do is strike at demand. The simplest and most effective way to do this is to levy high and rising taxes on fossil-fuel-based energy. The Europeans have done this for a long time, and their per capita energy consumption is half that of Americans.
Justice Department Mounts New Attack on Press Freedom
NORMAN SOLOMON – There’s something profoundly despicable about a Justice Department that would brazenly violate the First and Fourth Amendments while spying on journalists, then claim to be reassessing such policies after an avalanche of criticism — and then proceed, as it did this week, to gloat that those policies made possible a long prison sentence for a journalistic source.
Private Gain to the Few Trumps Public Good for the Many
ROBERT REICH – Why the decline of public institutions? The slide . . . started more than three decades ago with so-called “tax revolts” by a middle class whose earnings had stopped advancing even though the economy continued to grow. Most families still wanted good public services and institutions but could no longer afford the tab. Since the late 1970s, almost all the gains from growth have gone to the top. But as the upper-middle class and the rich began shifting to private institutions, they withdrew political support for public ones.
Poll: Small Business Owners Support Progressive Policies
STEPHEN MICHAEL – On August 19, 2013, the Main Street Alliance of Oregon released their most recent report, Voices of Main Street, which challenges conventional perceptions of rural small business owners’ thoughts on key policy issues. It details responding business owners’ views on economic, tax, immigration and health care issues facing Oregon and the nation.
U.S. Plans Nuclear Missile Tests Around International Day of Peace and UN High-Level Meeting on Nuclear Disarmament
NUCLEAR AGE PEACE FOUNDATION – Two dates this month have special significance to those who want to achieve a world free of nuclear weapons: the International Day of Peace (September 21) and the UN High-Level Meeting on Nuclear Disarmament (September 26). Instead of honoring the significance of these dates and working in good faith to achieve nuclear disarmament, the United States has chosen to schedule two tests of its Minuteman III Intercontinental Ballistic Missile on September 22 and September 26.
Something in the Air: Lead Poisoning from Aircraft Fuel
MICHAEL BEHAR – The health risks of leaded gasoline are a thing of the past, right? Wrong. While jets and turboprops run on kerosene-based fuels, the majority of general aviation aircraft are piston-powered and consume aviation gasoline, or avgas. Populations close to “general aviation†airports (a term that covers nearly all types of flight activity except scheduled commercial passenger service) suffer the consequences of exposure to the lead in avgas.
Health Co-Ops Pave the Way for Change in Oregon
CHRIS THOMAS – In less than two months, Oregonians who need to shop for health coverage will be able to find and compare plans in the new health insurance marketplace, called Cover Oregon.
New Waste Slashing Energy Legislation Promises Savings, Jobs
AMERICAN COUNCIL FOR AN ENERGY-EFFICIENT ECONOMY (ACEEE) – Proposed bipartisan energy efficiency legislation has the potential to save the nation billions while creating domestic jobs and reducing energy waste, according to a new analysis released today by ACEEE.
The Real Culprit in Syria: Climate Change
WILLIAM R. POLK – Underlying the political situation in Syria is an economic and ecological disaster resulting from climate change. As more and more people competed for scarce jobs, food and other resources, they became desperate and their desperation led inexorably to war. Military support for neither side of the conflict will address its root causes.
Obama Has Many Options For Dealing with the Syrian Situation
PATRICK T. HILLER – The red line was crossed; let’s fire a shot across the bow. It sounds so easy, so clean, so surgical. Splash! A harmless shot landing in the water to make the enemy compliant. Since the American public – and for that matter the entire world – is rightfully doubtful of yet another U.S. military adventure, the administration is trying to play down what indeed are the preparations for going to war with another country.
Israeli Activists Replace Threatening Military Signs with Messages of Peace and Resistance
HAGGAI MATAR – For several years now, all roads branching off of major Israeli-controlled West Bank highways and taking drivers towards Palestinian villages and cities, have been dominated by the presence of red trilingual warning signs. . . . On Saturday, July 13, 2013, a group of Israeli women went on a road trip to replace these threatening signs with more inviting texts.
New Poll Suggests Climate Change Action Strategy
A report from ecoAmerica outlines how public opinion trends around climate change in the U.S. have moved from being a niche issue to the mainstream.
New Material May Make Solar Power “Dirt Cheapâ€
KEVIN BULLIS – A new type of solar cell, made from a material that is dramatically cheaper to obtain and use than silicon, could generate as much power as today’s commodity solar cells.
Opposition to Iraq War May Save Syria
DAVID SWANSON – Evidence of “weapons of mass destruction” is “no slam dunk,” U.S. officials are saying this time around, reversing the claim made about Iraq by then-CIA director George Tenet. Opposition to a U.S.-led attack on Syria is growing rapidly in Europe and the United States, drawing its strength from public awareness that the case made for attacking Iraq had holes in it.