Sen. Heitkamp Faces Backlash for 'Oil Over Indians' Posture
Staff | truthdig.com | 2018-05-27
North Dakota Democrat Heidi Heitkamp's failure to fight the Dakota Access pipeline shook her support among the Standing Rock Sioux tribe, which helped her win her first term by a narrow margin. | The post Sen. Heitkamp Faces Backlash for 'Oil Over Indians' Posture appeared first on Truthdig: Expert Reporting, Current News, Provocative Columnists.
truthdig.com/articles/senators-pipeline-stance-could-hurt-second-term-hopes/
We Must Consider How Climate Change Will Affect People With Disabilities
truth-out.org | truth-out.org | 2018-05-27
Mention "climate change and disability" and many are puzzled — but that lasts only a few sentences into further explanation. | Comprising a significant 10 percent to 15 percent of the global population, people with disabilities are uniquely affected by climate change. This population includes a wide array of mobility, sensory (visual, hearing), developmental, intellectual and emotional impairments, as well as chronic health conditions. | Many individuals have multiple disabilities and may experience social or medical factors differently depending on their race, gender, culture, language (including sign language for deaf people), nationality, geography and other factors. Each of these sub-populations are complexly impacted with respect to health and requirements for assistance for survival. | With greater vulnerability during storms, floods and extreme heat; susceptibility to invasive disease; and the complex disability-related challenges of relocation and forced migration (i.e. finding new housing or support…
www.truth-out.org/opinion/item/44601-we-must-consider-how-climate-change-will-affect-people-with-disabilities
Lakes Emitting More Methane as They Evaporate
Staff | truthdig.com | 2018-05-27
The amounts of a powerful greenhouse gas leaking into the atmosphere are set to rise as lakes emit more methane in reaction to climate change. | The vegetation decomposing in the lakes will change — and the northern lakes of Canada could send 73% more methane — a potent greenhouse gas — into the atmosphere to accelerate global warming at an ever greater rate | And a further cause for concern as the world warms is the most abundant greenhouse gas of them all. As the world warms, its 250,000 lakes will evaporate faster. By the century's end, they will be sending 16% more water into the atmosphere as vapour — to fall again as rain. | Both studies represent climate research at its most detailed: each is an attempt to understand the intricacies of environmental change on a small scale…
truthdig.com/articles/lakes-emit-more-methane-as-they-evaporate/
How I Was a Good Mormon Wife — Until My Husband Stopped Believing in God
Maren Stephenson, Salon | alternet.org | 2018-05-27
Sean and I had the perfect life. Then his faith started to crumble — and mine did, too. | "I don't believe in God," my husband whispered in the darkness of our bedroom. My breath caught, and I was afraid to look at him, this boy I met and married eight years ago. I was only 19 on the day we were sealed for eternity, the wet snow blowing into our faces as we exited the Portland, Ore. , temple. I imagined a life of Church service, my husband at my side as we finished our BYU degrees, raised our children, and served missions together in our old age. On the night we got engaged, we struck a deal. "I'll get you to heaven," I said. "But you have to keep me here on earth. "Now his confession hung over our nuptial bed. And though I'd. . .
www.alternet.org/how-i-was-good-mormon-wife-until-my-husband-stopped-believing-god
Big Pay Gaps Are Bad for Business
Anton Woronczuk | truth-out.org | 2018-05-26
Truthout doesn't take corporate money and we don't shy away from confronting the root causes of injustice. Can you help sustain our work with a tax-deductible donation? | Mattel is one of the largest toy-making companies on earth. Turns out it's one of the biggest manufacturers of income inequality, too. | Last year, the Barbie doll manufacturer paid its CEO nearly 5,000 times as much as its median worker. | This stunning revelation is the result of a new regulation that requires US publicly held corporations to report their CEO-worker pay ratios to the Securities and Exchange Commission. | Mattel's gap is the widest reported so far. But most other big US companies also have staggering divides. According to a new report by the staff of Minnesota Congressman Keith Ellison, the first 225 large corporations to release their numbers had pay…
www.truth-out.org/opinion/item/44600-big-pay-gaps-are-bad-for-business
Trump Set to Recognize Israel's Claim to Occupied Golan Heights and Its Sizable Oil Reserves
Whitney Webb | mintpressnews.com | 2018-05-26
Exporting Golan oil is problematic under international law but, were the U.S. to unilaterally recognize the Golan as Israel's, that oil could potentially be exported to the U.S. Major U.S. oil investors and lobbyists are therefore pushing hard for Trump to make that move. | The post Trump Set to Recognize Israel's Claim to Occupied Golan Heights and Its Sizable Oil Reserves appeared first on MintPress News.
Trump Set to Recognize Israel’s Claim to Occupied Golan Heights and Its Sizable Oil Reserves
Media Quote Frank on Rolling Back Dodd/Frank–Not Disclosing He's Now a Bank Director
Justin Anderson | fair.org | 2018-05-25
The House of Representatives voted on Tuesday to roll back key provisions of the landmark Dodd/Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act, a 2010 law that increased regulatory scrutiny of banks following the 2008 financial crisis. | One of the many provisions of the original Dodd/Frank law subjected banks with over $50 billion in assets to annual economic "stress tests" to gauge their potential for collapse in the event of an economic crisis. The rollback bill raises that threshold to $250 billion, which would exempt at least two dozen "small" banks, including SunTrust, BB&T, Charles Schwab and American Express. By comparison, in 2008, key failed bank Countryside had only $172 billion in assets, and so would have avoided stress testing, while other financial dominos like Washington Mutual ($264 billion) and Bear Stearns ($289 billion) were close to the lower limit.
fair.org/home/media-quote-frank-on-rolling-back-dodd-frank-not-disclosing-hes-now-a-bank-director/
The NFL Moves to Silence Voices of Dissent
George Payne | counterpunch.org | 2018-05-25
Would women have the right to vote today if they were told by men to only protest inside their homes? Would African-Americans have equal protection under the law if the Civil Rights movement was confined to the churches? Would farmers and migrant workers have just working conditions in the fields if they were forced to…
counterpunch.org/2018/05/25/the-nfl-moves-to-silence-voices-of-dissent/
When CEO's Earn 5,000 Times as Much as a Company's Workers
Sarah Anderson | counterpunch.org | 2018-05-25
Mattel is one of the largest toy-making companies on earth. Turns out it's one of the biggest manufacturers of income inequality, too. Last year, the Barbie doll manufacturer paid its CEO nearly 5,000 times as much as its median worker. This stunning revelation is the result of a new regulation that requires U.S. publicly held…
counterpunch.org/2018/05/25/when-ceos-earn-5000-times-as-much-as-a-companys-workers/
Australia's China Syndrome
Binoy Kampmark | counterpunch.org | 2018-05-25
Syndromes can make for cringe worthy, nervous laughter. To see the Australian Prime Minister, Malcolm Turnbull, struggle with reconciling China the bully of influence with China the resource hungry friend supplied the press with one such spectacle on Tuesday morning. Larded with suffocating clichés, Turnbull could speak of the greatest multicultural society on earth (forget the…
counterpunch.org/2018/05/25/australias-china-syndrome/
Workers Are Prepared to Shut Down Entire Las Vegas Strip
Mark Gruenberg | mintpressnews.com | 2018-05-25
If 50,000 workers, who toil at 34 big hotels on the Las Vegas strip and downtown, must walk out, it would be the union's largest strike in decades. | The post Workers Are Prepared to Shut Down Entire Las Vegas Strip appeared first on MintPress News.
Ireland Asks Voters to Lift the Nation's Strict Ban on Abortion
Robert Mackey | theintercept.com | 2018-05-25
Ireland has changed quite dramatically since 1983, when two-thirds of the electorate approved a constitutional amendment that imposed a near total ban on abortion by recognizing "the right to life of the unborn," which promised equal protection under the law to fetuses and pregnant women. | The contours of Ireland's gradual transformation into a more liberal country in the decades since can be traced in the results of a series of subsequent referendums that defied the teachings of the once-dominant Catholic Church. Divorce was legalized, narrowly, in 1995; same-sex marriage, overwhelmingly, in 2015. | On Friday, Irish voters go to the polls once again, this time to cast ballots in a referendum on their government's proposal to repeal the abortion ban enshrined in the Eighth Amendment to the constitution 35 years ago.Manifestation on O'Connell St. A few minutes ago.
theintercept.com/2018/05/24/irelands-sex-marriage-vote-easy-win-ending-abortion-ban-might-not/
The GDPR Comes Into Force Today
Human Rights Watch | hrw.org | 2018-05-25
Today marks the entry into force of the European Union's General Data Privacy Regulation, a law that will advance your rights and improve privacy protections online. Human Rights Watch has a new privacy policy that you can read here.
www.hrw.org/news/2018/05/25/gdpr-comes-force-today
Qatar Joins Core Human Rights Treaties
Human Rights Watch | hrw.org | 2018-05-25
| (Beirut) — Qatar submitted documents to the United Nations on May 21, 2018, to join two core human rights treaties, following cabinet approval on March 14, Human Rights Watch said today. But Qatar's accession to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights includes formal reservations that will deprive women and migrant workers of the treaties' protections. | Qatar rejected gender equality provisions in marriage, divorce, and child custody on grounds that they contravene Sharia, or Islamic law. It also declared it would interpret several provisions in line with Sharia, including on defining cruel, inhuman, or degrading punishment — avoiding bans on capital and corporal punishment — minimum marriage ages, and freedom of religion. And it said it would interpret the term "trade unions" in accordance…
www.hrw.org/news/2018/05/25/qatar-joins-core-human-rights-treaties
House Bill Would Let Airports Stop Using Toxic Firefighting Foam
Sharon Lerner | theintercept.com | 2018-05-25
While the controversy over the Environmental Protection Agency's recent " leadership summit" on PFAS chemicals held in Washington earlier this week brought attention to the cancer-causing contaminants in the drinking water of millions of Americans, Congress has quietly made an important step toward getting rid of one of the products responsible for this widespread water pollution. On April 27, the House of Representatives passed legislation that would free the Federal Aviation Administration from longstanding requirements that commercial airports use firefighting foam that contains the chemicals. | For decades, FAA policy has been to require airports to use firefighting foam that meets specifications developed by the Navy. Those standards mandate the use of fluorinated chemicals, a term that includes PFAS, all of which persist indefinitely in nature. While most of the thousands of chemicals in this class have yet to be…
theintercept.com/2018/05/25/airport-firefighting-foam/
Focus on Pruitt's Scandals Obscures Environmental Degradation Under Trump
Justin Anderson | fair.org | 2018-05-23
Focusing on a $43,000 phone booth (Washington Post, 4/16/18), not on the $60 trillion that unchecked climate change is projected to cost (Nature, 7/25/13). | Scott Pruitt sure is busy these days. The climate change-denying head of the Environmental Protection Agency has been renting out a DC condo on the cheap from an energy lobbyist; installing a $43,000 soundproof booth for his telephone calls; passing out improper pay raises to aides; jet-setting around the world on first-class flights; hitting up Disneyland and the Rose Bowl with his oversized $3 million, 20-person security detail; receiving police escorts to trendy DC restaurant Le Diplomate; and even having a fancy dinner in Rome with Vatican treasurer, climate denier and recently charged child sexual abuser George Pell. | What's more, Pruitt's staffers at the EPA have continued to…
fair.org/home/focus-on-pruitts-scandals-obscures-environmental-degradation-under-trump/
Scientists reveal global warming's impact on Great Barrier Reef
wsws.org | wsws.org | 2018-05-23
Warming events are becoming more frequent, giving coral insufficient time to recover.
www.wsws.org/en/articles/2018/05/23/bbrd-m23.html
Work of Satan? Sinkhole opens on White House lawn, Twitter in turmoil over its meaning (PHOTOS)
RT | rt.com | 2018-05-23
A sinkhole has opened up near the White House press briefing room on the north lawn, prompting a wave of derision online as social media users revelled in the unique karma of the event. …
www.rt.com/usa/427493-white-house-sinkhole-photos/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=RSS
Venezuela Slams New US Sanctions as Washington Hints at Oil Embargo
Cira Pascual Marquina | venezuelanalysis.com | 2018-05-22
The latest measures fly in the face of international concern about the living conditions of Venezuelans.
venezuelanalysis.com/news/13833
Media Ignore Government Influence on Facebook's Plan to Fight Government Influence
Adam Johnson | fair.org | 2018-05-21
Medium ( 5/17/18) | Facebook announced Thursday it was partnering with DC think tank the Atlantic Council to "monitor for misinformation and foreign interference." The details of the plan are vague, but Atlantic Council's Digital Forensic Research Lab wrote in a non-bylined Medium post ( 5/17/18) that the goal was to design tools "to bring us closer together" instead of "driving us further apart." Whatever that means, exactly. | Behind its generic-sounding name and "nonpartisan" label, the Atlantic Council is associated with very particular interests. It's funded by the US Department of State and the US Navy, Army and Air Force, along with NATO, various foreign powers and major Western corporations, including weapons contractors and oil companies. The Atlantic Council is dead center in what former President Obama's deputy national security advisor Ben Rhodes called "the blob"–Washington's bipartisan foreign-policy…
fair.org/home/media-ignore-government-influence-on-facebooks-plan-to-fight-government-influence/
NASA's new exoplanet hunter TESS snaps 200,000+ stars in its 1st PHOTO
RT | rt.com | 2018-05-20
After passing the moon's orbit, NASA's planet-hunting satellite has snapped its first picture from one of four cameras on board, relaying the footage of some 200,000 stars back to astronomers on Earth. …
www.rt.com/usa/427222-tess-first-image-nasa/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=RSS
Trump's EPA Doesn't Want You to Know Chemicals in Teflon Are Poisoning Waterways & Firefighters
Democracy Now! | democracynow.org | 2018-05-18
The Environmental Protection Agency is facing a major new scandal after it worked with the White House to bury an alarming federal study detailing widespread chemical contamination of the nation's water supply. One Trump administration official warned release of the study would create a "public relations nightmare." The study found chemicals commonly present in Teflon and firefighting foam are a threat to human health at levels the EPA had previously called safe. We speak with Robert Bilott, the attorney The New York Times calls the "worst nightmare of DuPont," the manufacturer of Teflon. He successfully won compensation for his clients whose drinking water had been contaminated by toxic chemicals used to make Teflon. He is a recipient of the 2017 Right Livelihood Award.
www.democracynow.org/2018/5/18/trumps_epa_doesnt_want_you_to
Norman Finkelstein: Palestinians Have the Right to Break Free of the "Unlivable" Cage That Is Gaza
Democracy Now! | democracynow.org | 2018-05-16
This spring's mass nonviolent protests in Gaza come as the human rights conditions in the "open-air prison" have even further deteriorated. Last year, the United Nations issued a report warning Gaza is already "unlivable." The majority of its water is contaminated, and electricity is limited to only a few hours a day. About half the population is children. Almost all are refugees who are prevented from ever leaving the tiny Gaza Strip, one of the most densely populated places on Earth. For more, we speak with Norman Finkelstein, author and scholar whose most recent book is titled "Gaza: An Inquest into Its Martyrdom."
www.democracynow.org/2018/5/16/norman_finkelstein_palestinians_have_the_right
ConocoPhillips Moves to Seize Venezuelan Oil Assets as PDVSA Maneuvers to Safeguard Tankers
Paul Dobson | venezuelanalysis.com | 2018-05-09
In response to the threat, PDVSA has allegedly ordered its fleet of tankers stationed in the Caribbean to return to Venezuelan waters.
venezuelanalysis.com/news/13803
Venezuela: Zulia Governor Blames Illegal Crypto Mining for Continuing Regional Power Shortages
Paul Dobson | venezuelanalysis.com | 2018-05-07
Sabotage, lack of maintenance, and climate change have also been offered to explain the crippling blackouts.
venezuelanalysis.com/news/13796
Venezuela Offers Petro-Based Oil Discount, Denounces "Kidnapping" of Funds
Paul Dobson | venezuelanalysis.com | 2018-05-03
Maduro has accused Euroclear of withholding USD$1.2bn as part of international financial sanctions against Caracas.
venezuelanalysis.com/news/13791
ConocoPhillips Awarded US$2bn for 2007 Oil Field Expropriation, Venezuela Claims Victory
Paul Dobson | venezuelanalysis.com | 2018-04-26
Venezuela claims the award ordered by the ICC is lower than the amount originally offered by Chavez as compensation and is only 10% of what the oil giant filed for.
venezuelanalysis.com/News/13785