2021-12-19: News Headlines

Common Dreams Staff (2021-12-19). Manchin Rejects Build Back Better Bill, Likely Killing Social and Climate Agenda. truthout.org "I cannot vote to continue with this piece of legislation," Mr. Manchin said on "Fox News Sunday, "I've tried everything humanly possible. I can't get there. This is a no." | The comments from Mr. Manchin dealt a fatal blow to the legislation that is central to President Joe Biden's agenda. | "I think he's gonna have a lot of explaining to do to the people of West Virginia," Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) told CNN's Jake Tapper on "State of the Union." | Sanders said Manchin "doesn't have the…

Dmitri Trenin (2021-12-19). After COP26: Russia's Path to the Global Green Future. moderndiplomacy.eu Russia is certainly now taking climate-related issues seriously, but even though a latecomer in embracing the climate change agenda, it will not simply accept the West's or the EU's lead. Rather, it will act in accordance with its national interests. At the COP26 UN climate change summit that ended last week, Russia was noted mainly …

Eric Zuesse (2021-12-19). Why Russia vetoed at the U.N. the U.S.-proposed inclusion of climate-change as a 'National Security' issue. moderndiplomacy.eu The United States Government wants to persuade the gullible global public that that Government takes seriously the global-warming threat. The only way actually to stop global warming — if it still can be stopped — is to outlaw, even if in only one major country (such as the U.S.), purchases of stocks and bonds in …

_____ (2021-12-19). Wet'suwet'en Resistance And Solidarity: Evicting The Colonizers. popularresistance.org One month ago today, the RCMP violently raided unceded Gidimt'en territory (November 18-19, 2021), removing Indigenous people from their land at gunpoint on behalf of TC Energy's proposed Coastal GasLink pipeline. The Wet'suwet'en enforced our standing eviction of CGL by closing roads into the territory November 14-17. Following the raids, arrestees received cruel and violent treatment in prison. The conditions set forth by the court are human rights violations to Indigenous peoples. We're still here. We're still throwing down. We are more determined than ever to protect our traditional territories for future gen…

_____ (2021-12-18). The Climate Response Cliff. popularresistance.org Climate change is only one symptom of a broader ecological crisis; the rapid loss of wild life is equally critical. Most species other than humans and our livestock, (and pets and pests) have had horrifying drops in population within the last 70 years or so, even if they are not yet threatened with extinction. We and our livestock are now 96% of the mass of land vertebrates, leaving all wild creatures together to comprise a mere 4%. At this rate within another generation there may be virtually nothing left but us and our coterie—and we would not survive that, as we depend on a network of life more complex t…

Dominique McGee (2021-12-18). Climate Justice Campaign Director. peoplesaction.org About People's Action/Institute People's Action Institute (501c3) and sister organization People's Action (501c4) are national progressive organizations supporting the mobilization and leadership of the grassroots in support of an agenda that puts people before profits. People's Action/Institute builds the power of poor and working people, in rural, suburban, and urban areas to win change through …

Scientists for the Future (2021-12-18). Nuclear Energy Can ≠not Meaningfully Contribute to a Climate-Neutral Energy System. zcomm.org Nuclear energy is too dangerous, too expensive, and too sluggishly deploy ≠able to play a significant role in mitigating the climate crisis…

Florence CGTN (2021-12-18). West Virginia's power outages pushing some residents to solar panels. america.cgtn.com Power outages are becoming more of a problem in the United States, made worse by climate change and aging infrastructure. The average home went without power for 8 hours last year- double five years ago. West Virginia has one of the least reliable electricity …

Farhat Yaqub (2021-12-18). [World Report] 2021: a year in review. thelancet.com COVID-19, climate, conflict, and good news for malaria. Farhat Yaqub looks back at the major stories in health and medicine in 2021.

Matthew Druckenmiller (2021-12-18). 2021 Arctic Report Card Tells a Human Story of Cascading Climate Disruption. truthout.org The Arctic has long been portrayed as a distant end-of-the-Earth place, disconnected from everyday common experience. But as the planet rapidly warms, what happens in this icy region, where On Dec. 14, 2021, a team of 1…

Madaar (2021-12-18). Palestinian female prisoners prepare campaign to address abuse in Israeli prisons. peoplesdispatch.org Detainees in Israeli prisons have launched a protest to reject the decision by Israeli prison authorities to isolate two prisoners Shorouk Dwayat and Marah Bakir in the Damon Prison and the attack by the Nashon* forces on Nafoud Hammad according to the Palestinian Prisoner's Society. | The Prisoners Information Office confirmed that there has been a climate of high tension in the prisons in response to the systematic attacks launched by the Israeli prison authorities against Palestinian female prisoners, pointing out that "prisoners have refrained from leaving the rooms for security checks, and a state of alert i…

Jim McIlroy (2021-12-18). No new gas plants demands climate rally. greenleft.org.au Gomeroi man Raymond "Bubbly" Weatherall, on behalf of the custodians of the Narrabi-Pilliga region in NSW, has called for the fight against government and private gas plants to continue. Jim McIlroy reports.

Abi Deivanayagam (2021-12-18). There is no health justice without climate justice. peoplesdispatch.org The organizers of the People's Health Hearing at COP26 write about how celebrating the 'right to health' as an add-on to the Glasgow Climate Pact would be to ignore the co-option of health by perpetrators for greenwashing…

Jim Hightower (2021-12-18). The planet is not a dumping ground. nationofchange.org The real problem is not waste, but plastic itself.

WSWS (2021-12-18). Teamsters union shuts down Southern California sanitation workers strike. wsws.org In coastal Orange County, south of Los Angeles, 400 sanitation workers went on strike December 9 against Republic Services, the second-largest waste management firm in the US. The strike was abruptly ended by the Teamsters after seven days.

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