2020-07-06: News Headlines

commondreams (2020-07-06). To 'Build Back Better,' We Must Ditch Public Financing of Fossil Fuels. commondreams.org Hindou Oumarou Ibrahim, Sandrine Dixson-Decl—êve, and Bas Eickhout | An Extinction Rebellion protester holds up a placard saying "Divest from climate change" on October 14, 2019 in London, England. (Photo: John Keeble/Getty Images) | www.commondreams.org/sites/default/files/styles/cd_special_coverage/public/views-article/thumbs/gettyimages-11809997791_0.jpg

Paul Buchheit (2020-07-06). The Protests We Should Be Having to Make the Super-Rich Very Afraid. commondreams.org "As the climate crisis worsens and the surging global population overruns our depleted living spaces," writes Buchheit, "the world's super-rich will increasingly become the targets of undervalued and desperate human beings." (Photo: Unsplash/Pixabay/CC0) | www.commondreams.org/sites/default/files/styles/cd_special_coverage/public/views-article/thumbs/the_rich_are_winning_on_entitlements_0.jpg

Sierra Club Loma Prieta (2020-07-06). Wednesday 7/8: Why Radical Interventions are Needed Now to Stop the Climate Apocalypse. indybay.org Online…

Kate Aronoff (2020-07-05). The Democrats' New Climate Plan: Improved But Weirdly Isolationist. zcomm.org Shaped by mass demand, Congressional Democrats' June 30th report on the climate crisis is a welcome improvement. But, in addition to its weak response to fossil fuel expansion, the report adopts an America First strategy to solve a global problem.

_____ (2020-07-05). The Democrats' Disastrous, Militarist Climate Plan. popularresistance.org Don't believe for a minute that the Democrats climate plan even means what it says. Its solutions include disastrous scams like "biofuels" and nuclear energy. It proposes no fundamental change in lifestyle, no reduction in personal consumption, and no halt or reduction in eating meat (but renewable energy production on land used for livestock, so that the same land can mitigate the unacknowledged damage it is doing). It offers no proposed federal budget with any major moving of the money to where it's needed, and no plan to extract any resources from billionaires and corporate giants. | This plan has been critici…

Elana Sulakshana (2020-07-04). Who's Insuring the Trans Mountain Pipeline? commondreams.org NO PIPELINES ON STOLEN NATIVE LAND: Climate campaigners and Indigenous peoples across Canada have spent the past several years protesting the Trans Mountain pipeline. (Photo: Mark Klotz/flickr/cc) | www.commondreams.org/sites/default/files/styles/cd_special_coverage/public/views-article/thumbs/kinder-morgan-protest-955px.jpg

Richard Horton (2020-07-04). [Comment] Offline: It's time to convene nations to end this pandemic. thelancet.com A historic and calamitous milestone was reached this week. WHO reported more than 10 million cases of COVID-19 and over 500‚Äà000 COVID-19 deaths. The world's political leaders have been tested and they have been found wanting. It's hard to recall a more lamentable response to a global emergency. Even the climate crisis had its Kyoto and Paris agreements. But despite the urgency of this continuing human catastrophe, despite the immediacy of the economic collapse we are witnessing, there has still been no moment when nations have been convened to reflect on lessons to be learned, to coordinate ac…

Andrew Harmer, Anja Leetz, Ben Eder, Remco van de Pas, Sophie Gepp (2020-07-04). [Correspondence] Time for WHO to declare climate breakdown a PHEIC? thelancet.com At the opening plenary of the World Health Assembly in May, 2019, Richard Horton urged member states and the Secretariat of WHO to recognise climate change as a planetary emergency. A few days later, during a side event on air pollution, climate change, oceans, and health sponsored by the Government of Sweden, the Minister of Health for the Seychelles Jean Paul Adam argued that climate change has to be recognised as a public health emergency at the international level. Johan Giesecke1 once stressed that as public health emergencies of international concern (PHEICs) evolve into more complex forms, it becomes neces…

Extinction Rebellion (2020-07-04). The Rebellion Returns, September 1. zcomm.org 10 years ago, scientists identified 16 potential tipping points in the earth system that could spell disaster. Today, there is evidence that 9 of these are already active…

yenisafak (2020-07-04). Tunisia MPs reject motion to blacklist Brotherhood. yenisafak.com The Bureau of Tunisia's House of Representatives (parliament) has rejected a petition to blacklist the Muslim Brotherhood group.The opposition Free Constitutional Party (PDL), which holds 10 seats in the 217-member parliament, had submitted the petition to classify the Brotherhood as a "terrorist" organization.The petition, however, was turned down by the parliament's bureau, which is consisted of the parliament speaker, his deputies and 10 lawmakers representing all parties in parliament.Ennahda party, which holds 54 seats in parliament, earlier described the PDL draft as a "waste of time".Ennahda lawmaker Sayyi…

Eds. (2020-07-03). Green structural adjustment in the World Bank's resilient cities. mronline.org Cities across the world are facing a double-barreled existential problem: how to adapt to climate change and how to pay for it.

Lau Kin Chi (2020-07-03). Tokyo olympics and Fukushima 'revival'. mronline.org At the 1964 Tokyo Olympics a young man born on the day of Hiroshima nuclear bombing was selected to be the last torch bearer on the relay, to signify that Japan had stood up from nuclear ruin. In an attempt to replicate the 1964 Olympic theme, the Abe government has constructed the idea of a …

Alison Bodine (2020-07-03). The U.S. Military Is the World's Biggest Climate Destroyer. No to War and Occupation! No to Environmental Degradation. globalresearch.ca Talk by Alison Bodine at the United National Antiwar Coalition National Conference held from February 21—23, 2020, at the People's Forum in New York City. | *** | To begin, I hope everyone has been able to see actions across Canada in …

Fire Drill Fridays, Greenpeace, others (2020-07-02). Friday 7/3: Virtual Independence Day Rally: Climate Change & Systemic Racism in America. indybay.org Online via livestream: www.facebook.com/firedrillfriday/

Binoy Kampmark (2020-07-02). Killing Koalas: The Promise of Extinction Down Under. dissidentvoice.org The British conservationist Gerald Durrell once remarked that the koala was "the most boring of animals". Its brain size, proportionally the smallest of any mammal, evolved to cope with its slow metabolism. But the spectacle of these singed, toasted animals was a terrifyingly cruel one to behold. As good stretches of Australia burned over the …

The Canary (2020-07-02). Beavers born in Essex 'for first time since Middle Ages'. thecanary.co Beavers have been born in Essex for the first time since the Middle Ages, conservationists have said.The mammals had been hunted to extinction for their meat, fur and scent glands in the UK by the beginning of the 16th Century but have since been reintroduced. | A pair of Eurasian beavers were brought to the Spains Hall Estate in Finchingfield last year as part of a project to help reduce flood risk.They were the first to be brought to Essex in 400 years, and now they have had two babies — known as kits.Darren Tansley, river catchment coordinator at Essex Wildlife Trust, said: "We always hoped that having be…

Mark Hertsgaard, Kyle Pope (2020-07-02). The Climate Emergency Won't Wait for the Press to Play Catch-up. commondreams.org The public sees the urgency and actually wants more climate news. (Photo: Dinendra Haria/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images) | www.commondreams.org/sites/default/files/styles/cd_special_coverage/public/views-article/thumbs/labor_climate_strike.jpg

_____ (2020-07-02). The Fed Is Bailing Out Polluters While Cities Struggle. popularresistance.org Ever since bailout talk began this spring, climate campaigners have worried funds would be funneled to Big Oil and other polluting giants. Now it seems that fear was more than justified. While economic recovery money is being disbursed through multiple channels, including the Main Street Lending Program and various tax breaks, on Sunday the Federal Reserve released the list of bonds it has purchased so far through its BlackRock-managed Secondary Market Corporate Credit Facility, in its attempt to prop up the investment-grade corporate bond market. | The Fed's disclosures show the institution is making it easier f…

The Climate Reality Project (2020-07-02). Tuesday 7/7: Environmental Racism: People of Color & Indigenous on Front Lines of Climate Change. indybay.org Online via Zoom…