Monthly Archives: April 2021

2021-04-13: News Headlines

Phyllis Bennis (2021-04-13). This isn't a Border Crisis, It's a Poverty, Violence and Climate Crisis. counterpunch.org Thousands of desperate migrants, mostly from Central America, are stuck at the U.S.-Mexico border. Most are families and unaccompanied children. Despite their legal rights to apply for asylum, U.S. officials are turning away huge numbers, claiming pandemic restrictions. But thousands of children remain, held in crowded border detention facilities while awaiting transfer to Department of

Paul Driessen (2021-04-13). Saving Pollinators From An Imaginary Bee-Pocalypse — OpEd. eurasiareview.com Honeybees are doing OK, despite varroa mites, the Covid-driven economy and other problems.: | A torrent of media stories from 2013-2014 presented frightening tales of "unprecedented" colony collapse disorder (CCD) among honeybees, conjuring up visions of a "bee-pocalypse" and "a world without bees," a world in which flowers and agriculture would be decimated. | Many articles blamed neonicotinoid pesticides, while others added climate change and biotech (GMO) crops as likely culprits. Some mentioned Varroa destructor mites and various viruses and diseases as possible causes. Virtually none suggested tha…

The Conversation (2021-04-13). Technology innovation gives government leverage to drive down CO2 emissions fast — here's how. juancole.com By Jessika E. Trancik | — To avert the worst effects of climate change, global greenhouse gas emissions should fall at faster rates than they have risen for over a century. Economies must essentially turn on a dime and then move quickly toward a carbon-free future. In the U.S., the Biden-Harris administration has recommitted the …

Juan Cole (2021-04-13). "Unimaginable Amounts of Water": Human-Made Global Heating in Danger of "Uncorking" Massive Antarctic Glaciers, causing Sea Level Rise. juancole.com Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) — A new article in Geophysical Research Letters found that four times as much of the Antarctic ices shelves would melt under a scenario where we heat the earth by 7.2 degrees F. (4 degrees C.) as opposed to the current Paris Climate Treaty goals of 1.5 degrees C. or at …

F. William Engdahl (2021-04-13). Sweden Axes Gates's Mad Global Warming Scheme. globalresearch.ca For more than a decade Bill Gates has funneled millions of …

Andrea Germanos (2021-04-13). 'Only the beginning': Citing climate and investment risks, NY State pension fund to ditch tar sands. nationofchange.org "Kudos to Tom DiNapoli for making it clear that you can't build your retirement on tar sands."

Harold R. Wanless (2021-04-13). How Warming Oceans Are Accelerating the Climate Crisis. thenation.com How Warming Oceans Are Accelerating the Climate Crisis…

Al Carroll (2021-04-13). Remembering Ladonna Brave Bull Allard. indybay.org LaDonna Tamakawastewin Allard, also known as LaDonna Bravebull Allard, passed on. She was preceded by her husband Miles by two years. I'm proud to say I knew her for many years as part of NAFPS, or New Age Frauds Plastic Shamans. She was best known to most for her leading role in the NoDAPL movement.

ecns.cn (2021-04-13). People protest against the discharge of wastewater into the sea in Tokyo. ecns.cn The Japanese government is set to announce, as early as Tuesday, a plan to dilute radioactive Fukushima wastewater and release it into the ocean.

Ashley Curtin (2021-04-13). Biden refuses to shut down Dakota Access Pipeline. nationofchange.org We will do our very best to see this pipeline removed, our water protected, and our sacred lands healed."

April M. Short (2021-04-12). How Humanity Can Realistically Prevent New Wars: an Interview With Anthropologist Douglas P. Fry. counterpunch.org We live in a time in which we face many global challenges, including the climate disaster, dwindling biodiversity (due to international industrial practices), polluted oceans, nuclear proliferation and a worldwide pandemic, just for starters. Realistic solutions to the hurdles humanity faces will require international cooperation—which will require the adoption of viable alternatives to the predominant

Mark Hertsgaard (2021-04-12). Dear Media, Let's Treat the Climate Emergency Like the Pandemic Emergency. thenation.com Dear Media, Let's Treat the Climate Emergency Like the Pandemic Emergency…

Eds. (2021-04-12). Rosa Luxemburg and postcolonial criticism. mronline.org Her understanding of oppression was bolstered by personal circumstances: female in an overwhelmingly male public sphere, Jewish in a climate of vicious antisemitism, Polish at a time when Poles suffered national oppression, and an individual who lived with a disability. | April 12, 2021 | Newswire…

Richard Smith (2021-04-12). China and climate change: an exchange. mronline.org In the Notes from the Editors to the March 2021 issue of Monthly Review, the MR editors questioned some of the arguments in Richard Smith's book, China's Engine of Environmental Collapse, as well as replied to Simon Pirani's related criticisms (writing under his pseudonym of Gabriel Levy) of MR editor John Bellamy Foster on China […] | April 12, 2021 | Exchange…

Eurasia Review (2021-04-12). Tracking Pervasive Microplastics Across The Globe. eurasiareview.com Really big systems, like ocean currents and weather, work on really big scales. And so too does your plastic waste, according to new research from Janice Brahney from the Department of Watershed Sciences. The plastic straw you discarded in 1980 hasn't disappeared; it has fragmented into pieces too small to see, and is cycling through the atmosphere, infiltrating soil, ocean waters and air. Microplastics are so pervasive that they now affect how plants grow, waft through the air we breathe, and permeate distant ecosystems. They can be found in places as varied as the human bloodstream to the guts of insects in…

Eurasia Review (2021-04-12). Shift In Diet Allowed Gray Wolves To Survive Ice-Age Extinction. eurasiareview.com Gray wolves are among the largest predators to have survived the extinction at the end of the last ice age around11,700 years ago. Today, they can be found roaming Yukon's boreal forest and tundra, with caribou and moose as their main sources of food. | A new study led by the Canadian Museum of Nature shows that wolves may have survived by adapting their diet over thousands of years—from a primary reliance on horses during the Pleistocene, to caribou and moose today. The results are published in the journal Palaeogeography, Palaeoclimatology, Palaeoecology. | The research team, led by museum palaeontologist…

Staff (2021-04-12). Rainforests Could Turn Into Savannas as Climate Warms, New Study Warns. truthout.org This story originally appeared in As the planet warms, it isn't just humans who are feeling the heat — trees are too. Rising temperatures are disrupting a primary engine of life on Earth: photosynthesis. | A recent study…

Staff (2021-04-12). Why I Cut Ties With Insurance Giant Liberty Mutual. truthout.org This story is part of Covering Climate Now, a global journalism collaboration strengthening coverage of the climate story. | After decades as a loyal customer, I recently dropped my insurance policies with Liberty Mutual. I had not realized that the company I had thought was protecting me was, in fact, one of the world's biggest fossil fuel insurers and is supporting violations of Indigenous rights worldwide. | Liberty, in other words, is one of the world's worst climate criminals. | On Liberty Mutual's website, I rea…

RT (2021-04-12). Japanese government says it WILL release irradiated water from Fukushima nuclear plant into the sea. rt.com Contaminated wastewater at the Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear plant will be released into the ocean "in around two years," the Japanese government has announced, despite calls from China and South Korea urging against the move. | Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga announced the move in Tokyo on Tuesday morning local time. He had previously called the release "unavoidable," given the amount of accumulated water over the past decade. | The Dai-ichi Nuclear Power Plant in the Fukushima prefecture suffered a meltdown after being struck by a 9.0 magnitude earthquake and a 15-meter tsunami in March 2011. It was the worst nuc…

webdev (2021-04-12). Remembering LaDonna Brave Bull Allard: Standing Rock Elder Helped Lead 2016 Anti-DAPL Uprising. democracynow.org LaDonna Brave Bull Allard, Standing Rock Sioux tribal historian, has died of cancer at the age of 64, and we look back on her work, through interviews on her land and in the Democracy Now! studio. Allard co-founded the Sacred Stone Camp on Standing Rock Sioux land in April 2016 to resist the Dakota Access pipeline, to which people from around the world traveled, making it one of the largest gatherings of Indigenous peoples in a century. "We say mni wiconi, water of life. Every time we drink water, we say mni wiconi, water of life. We cannot live without water," LaDonna Brave Bull Allard said in a September 2016 i…

Andrea Germanos, staff writer (2021-04-12). 'Only the Beginning': Citing Climate and Investment Risks, NY State Pension Fund to Ditch Tar Sands. commondreams.org "Kudos to Tom DiNapoli for making it clear that you can't build your retirement on tar sands." | www.commondreams.org/sites/default/files/styles/cd_special_coverage/public/headline/thumbs/divest-ny-tar-sands.jpg

teleSUR (2021-04-12). Melting Glaciers Will Cause Half of Sea Level Rise. telesurenglish.net The Polytechnic University of Madrid (UPM) published a study that claims that sea-level rise will continue to increase considerably as a result of climate change. Approximately half of that rise will come from melting glaciers. | RELATED: | "By the end of the 21st century, sea level is projected to be between 43 and 84 cm, depending on the greenhouse gas emissions scenario considered. Between 47 and 56 percent of this increase will come from gla…

_____ (2021-04-12). Global Citizens' Assembly Planned To Address Climate Crisis. popularresistance.org London – People around the world will have a chance to deliberate about responses to climate change under plans to convene a "Global Citizens' Assembly" to inform U.N. talks in Glasgow next year, organisers said on Thursday. | The project aims to build on similar initiatives in countries such as Ireland, France and Canada, where citizens' assemblies have given politicians space to act by generating ambitious proposals on divisive issues. | "Young people are not just frustrated by rising temperatures and declining ecosystems. We're also frustrated by the constant recycling of outdated political solutions," said Su…

Cynthia Kaufman, Miriam Eide (2021-04-12). Investing in Destruction: California Teachers Pension Money Should Not Be Funding Line 3. commondreams.org For years organizations have been calling on pension funds to divest from fossil fuels due to environmental racism and the climate impact of these investments. | www.commondreams.org/sites/default/files/styles/cd_special_coverage/public/views-article/thumbs/stopline3.jpg

commondreams (2021-04-12). New Poll: Americans Support Climate Financial Reforms. commondreams.org ______________________________…

Jessica Corbett, staff writer (2021-04-12). Media Coalition Declares That Journalism Should Reflect 'Climate Emergency Is Here'. commondreams.org "Why 'emergency'? Because words matter. To preserve a livable planet, humanity must take action immediately." | www.commondreams.org/sites/default/files/styles/cd_special_coverage/public/headline/thumbs/gettyimages-12299345251.jpg

Kenny Stancil, staff writer (2021-04-12). Majority of Voters Want Government to Rein In Wall Street's Climate Destruction: Poll. commondreams.org "It's time that the U.S. government take the reins back from Wall Street so we can assure the rapid, justice-centered decarbonization necessary for a livable planet." | www.commondreams.org/sites/default/files/styles/cd_special_coverage/public/headline/thumbs/chase_climate.jpg

commondreams (2021-04-12). US Voters Support Strong Government and Corporate Action to Curb Wall Street's Climate Impacts. commondreams.org ______________________________…

Levi Rickert (2021-04-12). U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Allows Dakota Access Pipeline to Continue Operation. globalresearch.ca The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (Corps) on Friday said they …

Carla Gomez, Hena Mansori, Sophia Gurulé (2021-04-12). Biden Has a Chance to End the Jail-to-Deportation Pipeline. thenation.com Carla Gomez, Hena Mansori, Sophia Gurulé Biden Has a Chance to End the Jail-to-Deportation Pipeline…

Updated: 2021-04-13 19:21 | 15:21 EST | 30 | 0 | 21 | 10 | 0

2021-04-12: News Headlines

Andrea Germanos, staff writer (2021-04-12). 'Only the Beginning': Citing Climate and Investment Risks, NY State Pension Fund to Ditch Tar Sands. commondreams.org "Kudos to Tom DiNapoli for making it clear that you can't build your retirement on tar sands." | www.commondreams.org/sites/default/files/styles/cd_special_coverage/public/headline/thumbs/divest-ny-tar-sands.jpg

April M. Short (2021-04-12). How Humanity Can Realistically Prevent New Wars: an Interview With Anthropologist Douglas P. Fry. counterpunch.org We live in a time in which we face many global challenges, including the climate disaster, dwindling biodiversity (due to international industrial practices), polluted oceans, nuclear proliferation and a worldwide pandemic, just for starters. Realistic solutions to the hurdles humanity faces will require international cooperation—which will require the adoption of viable alternatives to the predominant

Mark Hertsgaard (2021-04-12). Dear Media, Let's Treat the Climate Emergency Like the Pandemic Emergency. thenation.com Dear Media, Let's Treat the Climate Emergency Like the Pandemic Emergency…

Eds. (2021-04-12). Rosa Luxemburg and postcolonial criticism. mronline.org Her understanding of oppression was bolstered by personal circumstances: female in an overwhelmingly male public sphere, Jewish in a climate of vicious antisemitism, Polish at a time when Poles suffered national oppression, and an individual who lived with a disability. | April 12, 2021 | Newswire…

Richard Smith (2021-04-12). China and climate change: an exchange. mronline.org In the Notes from the Editors to the March 2021 issue of Monthly Review, the MR editors questioned some of the arguments in Richard Smith's book, China's Engine of Environmental Collapse, as well as replied to Simon Pirani's related criticisms (writing under his pseudonym of Gabriel Levy) of MR editor John Bellamy Foster on China […] | April 12, 2021 | Exchange…

webdev (2021-04-12). Remembering LaDonna Brave Bull Allard: Standing Rock Elder Helped Lead 2016 Anti-DAPL Uprising. democracynow.org LaDonna Brave Bull Allard, Standing Rock Sioux tribal historian, has died of cancer at the age of 64, and we look back on her work, through interviews on her land and in the Democracy Now! studio. Allard co-founded the Sacred Stone Camp on Standing Rock Sioux land in April 2016 to resist the Dakota Access pipeline, to which people from around the world traveled, making it one of the largest gatherings of Indigenous peoples in a century. "We say mni wiconi, water of life. Every time we drink water, we say mni wiconi, water of life. We cannot live without water," LaDonna Brave Bull Allard said in a September 2016 i…

_____ (2021-04-12). Global Citizens' Assembly Planned To Address Climate Crisis. popularresistance.org London – People around the world will have a chance to deliberate about responses to climate change under plans to convene a "Global Citizens' Assembly" to inform U.N. talks in Glasgow next year, organisers said on Thursday. | The project aims to build on similar initiatives in countries such as Ireland, France and Canada, where citizens' assemblies have given politicians space to act by generating ambitious proposals on divisive issues. | "Young people are not just frustrated by rising temperatures and declining ecosystems. We're also frustrated by the constant recycling of outdated political solutions," said Su…

Cynthia Kaufman, Miriam Eide (2021-04-12). Investing in Destruction: California Teachers Pension Money Should Not Be Funding Line 3. commondreams.org For years organizations have been calling on pension funds to divest from fossil fuels due to environmental racism and the climate impact of these investments. | www.commondreams.org/sites/default/files/styles/cd_special_coverage/public/views-article/thumbs/stopline3.jpg

commondreams (2021-04-12). New Poll: Americans Support Climate Financial Reforms. commondreams.org ______________________________…

commondreams (2021-04-12). US Voters Support Strong Government and Corporate Action to Curb Wall Street's Climate Impacts. commondreams.org ______________________________…

Jessica Corbett, staff writer (2021-04-12). Media Coalition Declares That Journalism Should Reflect 'Climate Emergency Is Here'. commondreams.org "Why 'emergency'? Because words matter. To preserve a livable planet, humanity must take action immediately." | www.commondreams.org/sites/default/files/styles/cd_special_coverage/public/headline/thumbs/gettyimages-12299345251.jpg

Al Carroll (2021-04-12). Remembering Ladonna Brave Bull Allard. indybay.org LaDonna Tamakawastewin Allard, also known as LaDonna Bravebull Allard, passed on. She was preceded by her husband Miles by two years. I'm proud to say I knew her for many years as part of NAFPS, or New Age Frauds Plastic Shamans. She was best known to most for her leading role in the NoDAPL movement.

ecns.cn (2021-04-12). People protest against the discharge of wastewater into the sea in Tokyo. ecns.cn The Japanese government is set to announce, as early as Tuesday, a plan to dilute radioactive Fukushima wastewater and release it into the ocean.

Levi Rickert (2021-04-12). U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Allows Dakota Access Pipeline to Continue Operation. globalresearch.ca The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (Corps) on Friday said they …

Carla Gomez, Hena Mansori, Sophia Gurulé (2021-04-12). Biden Has a Chance to End the Jail-to-Deportation Pipeline. thenation.com Carla Gomez, Hena Mansori, Sophia Gurulé Biden Has a Chance to End the Jail-to-Deportation Pipeline…

The Conversation (2021-04-11). Climate Change: Ocean Layer Mixing has slowed 6 times Faster than Scientists Feared, Endangering Sea Life. juancole.com By Phil Hosegood | — If you've ever been seasick, "stable" may be the last word you associate with the ocean. But as global temperatures rise, the world's oceans are technically becoming more stable. When scientists talk about ocean stability, they refer to how much the different layers of the sea mix with each other. …

Eve Ottenberg (2021-04-11). Ending Fracking by 2035. counterpunch.org Fracking was an issue in the last election, with Republicans accusing Biden of planning to end it and Biden defending himself by asserting he had no such plans. This is unfortunate. The planet-destroying reactionaries steered the conversation onto their turf and away from the brutal reality that if we want to survive as a species,

Eurasia Review (2021-04-11). Mars Didn't Dry Up All At Once. eurasiareview.com While attention has been focused on the Perseverance rover that landed on Mars last month, its predecessor Curiosity continues to explore the base of Mount Sharp on the red planet and is still making discoveries. Research published n the journal Geology shows that Mars had drier and wetter eras before drying up completely about 3 billion years ago. | "A primary goal of the Curiosity mission was to study the transition between the habitable environment of the past, to the dry and cold climate that Mars has now. These rock layers recorded that change in great detail," said Roger Wiens, a coauthor on the paper an…

Eurasia Review (2021-04-11). How Will Climate Change Affect Hailstorms? eurasiareview.com Hail severity may increase in most regions of the world while Australia and Europe are expected to experience more hailstorms as a result of climate change, an international review led by a UNSW Sydney researcher has found. | The review study, published in Nature Reviews Earth & Environment, examined the effects climate change will have on hail in the future. | It shows a global summary of hail trends from past observations and projected future trends from simulations and models. | The review led to the general expectation that hailstorm frequency will decrease in East Asia and North America, while increasing…

Eurasia Review (2021-04-11). Colorado River Basin Due For More Frequent, Intense Hydroclimate Events. eurasiareview.com In the vast Colorado River basin, climate change is driving extreme, interconnected events among earth-system elements such as weather and water. These events are becoming both more frequent and more intense and are best studied together, rather than in isolation, according to new research. | "We found that concurrent extreme hydroclimate events, such as high temperatures and unseasonable rain that quickly melt mountain snowpack to cause downstream floods, are projected to increase and intensify within several critical regions of the Colorado River basin," said Katrina Bennett, a hydrologist at Los Alamos Nati…

Eurasia Review (2021-04-11). Lightning Strikes To More Than Double In Arctic As Climate Warms. eurasiareview.com In 2019, the National Weather Service in Alaska reported spotting the first-known lightning strikes within 300 miles of the North Pole. Lightning strikes are almost unheard of above the Arctic Circle, but scientists led by researchers at the University of California, Irvine have published new research in the journal Nature Climate Change detailing how Arctic lightning strikes stand to increase by about 100 percent over northern lands by the end of the century as the climate continues warming. | "We projected how lightning in high-latitude boreal forests and Arctic tundra regions will change across North Americ…

_____ (2021-04-11). Biden Administration Allows Oil To Continue Flowing Through Dakota Access Pipeline. popularresistance.org Washington, DC – Speaking before a federal judge today, representatives from the Biden administration's U.S. Army Corps of Engineers indicated that the agency will not shutter the Dakota Access Pipeline (DAPL), despite the ongoing threats it poses to the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe and the fact that it is operating without a federal permit. Although President Joe Biden recently announced intentions to improve Tribal consultation and initiate long-term action to tackle climate change, his administration took a stance today that was identical to that of former President Trump. | Earlier this year, Standing Rock Sioux…

Updated: 2021-04-12 23:31 | 19:31 EST | 22 | 0 | 7 | 16 | 0