Obsidian Wings
by Ugh One wonders if Saudi Arabia had just "oopsied" a JDAM on Khashoggi if there would have been any fuss. Whatever. It appears that my 3.5 month 7 month basement project is nearing completion such that the kids can finally go down there and annihilate one another with Nerf guns (wearing the appropriate eye protection, of course). The "big" cousins are coming so they are excited. Also the 7YO w
by Ugh I could not get enough. Donald Trump continues as President of the United States of America, having been nominated by the "Party of Lincoln" no less. Not that Micheal Pence could carry that banner with any more authenticity. OT
by liberal japonicus https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/video/2018/nov/12/stan-lees-best-marvel-cameos-video Excelsior!
by liberal japonicus Well, that was quick. . An open thread for that.
by liberal japonicus Well, Tuesday's here and the world hasn't ended, but unfortunately, my Tuesday is a US Monday... Anyway, an open thread to put your observations in.
by Ugh Vote Tuesday, he said, expecting the answer no. I'll be in Silicon Valley then, having turned in my absentee ballot in races so one sided that "some" might say maximizing utility would be better spent watching the Haunting of Hill House, which I had to turn off last night (I'm 45 years old, tho I loved that Henry Thomas was cast in that episode - he deserved an Oscar for E.T.). What other
Pesticide Action Network
On Halloween, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) made a truly scary announcement — the agency decided to continue its registration of Monsanto’s (now merged with Bayer) highly controversial dicamba-based herbicide, Xtendimax. The chemical has damaged millions of acres of farmland over the past two seasons of use, and with this decision, the devastation will continue. Farmers were outraged
In the food movement, people often talk about the importance of “voting” with your dollars. While it's true that smart consumer choices can help build a healthier food system, policies and politics matter too. And often much more. As these past two years have clearly shown, who’s in charge makes a difference. Next Tuesday’s election is hugely important in so many ways, including having very real
This is an edited version of a blog post by our partners at the National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition. See the full post here . With 435 House and 35 Senate races on the ballot last week, the 2018 midterms were closely watched across the nation – not least of all by advocates of sustainable agriculture. Before heading off to the campaign trail, Congress left two major ag agenda items danglin
EPA decides to continue its registration of Monsanto’s (now merged with Bayer) highly controversial dicamba-based herbicide, Xtendimax. Learn more Slideshow Category: Flex Slider
This year's Food Sovereignty Prize was awarded to Black Mesa Water Coalition and Organización Boricuá de Agricultura Ecológica de Puerto Rico for their commitment to food sovereignty. Learn more Slideshow Category: Flex Slider
This post is part of an ongoing project by PAN Farmer Justice Fellows who are working to uplift the many different voices of farmers in California. The mission of this work is to broaden the narrative of what it means to be a farmer participating in the state's agricultural system by sharing the wide spectrum of relationships that growers have with land. Rubie Simonsen is the 28 year old Filipino
Schools Matter
Submitted to the New York Times, Oct. 26, 2018 In “Why are we still teaching reading the wrong way?” (Oct 26) Emily Hanford says the research supports systematic intensive phonics, a method that teaches all the rules of phonics in a strict order to all children. Here are objections to this conclusion: (1) Researchers admit we have not discovered all the rules. (2) Even among those rules that have
Outside the billionaires' bubble that insulates Betsy DeVos from the real world, there are employees at the U.S. Department of Education who are depressed, pissed off or, otherwise, upset over the many ways Betsy has made life at ED worse under her misleadership. And remember, we're talking about worse than life under Arne Duncan! In fact, the positive vibe has dropped from 65% to 43%, which is n
Screw You Guys, I'm Going Home
We've reached a tipping point where a majority of states now have laws that protect employees of smaller employers. Most federal discrimination laws protect employees only if their employers have 15 employees or more (20 for age discrimination, all employers for Equal Pay Act, 4 - 14 for national origin/citizenship under the The Immigration Reform and Control Act of 1986). But a majority of states
Saudi Arabia, Shi’ism and the Illusion of Reform by Robert G. Rabil – @ robertgrabil October 30, 2019 The emergence of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia is inextricably associated with the Wahhabi school of Islam. The Saudi-Wahhabi pact goes back to the eighteenth century when Sheikh Muhammad ibn ‘Abd al-Wahhab (1703-1792), the founder of the Wahhabi-Salafi school of Islam traveled to Diriya, the stron
The plight of the Druze hostages: Why Washington should change its approach in Syria By Talal el-Atrache – @ TalalElAtrache For Syria Comment – 8 Nov 2018 Throughout the Syrian war, the Southern Province of Sweida, in coordination with the Syrian army, had succeeded in protecting itself against the jihadist attacks on the province’s Western border with Deraa, and on the Eastern flank, adjacent to
By Michael Gerini Residing in the north of Lebanon, Mouin Merhebi is a member of Saad Hariri’s Future Movement. A staunch opponent of Hezbollah and the Assad government, he currently serves as Minister of Refugee Affairs (officially “Minister of State for Displaced Affairs”) in the Hariri government, a position he has held since December of 2016. Though coming into the position with little experi
The Duck of Minerva
America is reeling from the horrific attack on a synagogue in Pennsylvania, in which an anti-Semitic man killed 11 people. And we were already reeling from a series of attempted mail bomb attacks by a right-wing man targeting important liberal figures. Meanwhile, another right-wing attack this week in Kentucky was nearly overlooked. Those on the right tend to view these as horrible but isolated e
I’ve been watching the current debate over nationalism with some interest. Donald Trump identified himself as a nationalist in the run-up to the mid-term elections. He contrasted this with his foes, for whom he used the problematic term “globalist.” Many saw this as a concerning move, especially paired with Trump’s alarmist rhetoric over a caravan of Central American migrants. It also prompted a
I have had trouble blogging this past year. It’s a challenge to think about academically informed observations on contemporary global politics when the world is in some places literally on fire and democracy appears to be in retreat. From a normative standpoint, it’s been a hard thing to step back from with some sense of analytical detachment that blogging on this platform typically requires. In
To illustrate this post, I would love to put that cute stock photo of a woman dressed in a taupe formal suit holding an adorable baby in a diaper, but it is just wildly unrealistic. For starters, the baby is horribly underdressed and the suit would have been covered in drool/spit-up/mysterious orange food rests in mere seconds. FYI, stock photo editors, working on a computer with a baby on your l
Details continue to trickle out about the horrific assassination of Saudi dissident and writer Jamal Khashoggi. This has captured the attention of foreign policy experts, who have questioned the alliance’s importance and suggested ways to punish Saudi Arabia. Concern about this incidents has spread beyond experts, however. My students and I have frequently debated what will happen to the US-Saudi
I am at roadbloack in my book proposal. This is normal, insofar as most writing projects will hit roadblocks from time to time. But I wanted to take a quick moment and unpack what it is, and note that a roadblock is different than writer’s block. Writer’s block is a condition of not being able to think of what to write. We are all familiar with writer’s block, even the kind that is really just pr
The Straight Goods
Donald J Trump......Coward in Chief Written by grant G It's gone almost as predicted in a post I wrote November 8th, 2016..the night the US elected Donald J Trump president election here's the last few paragraphs in a post titled.... Donald Trump, King Lizard ______ I feel very sad for the 50% of Americans who voted for Hillary, I feel just as bad for the 50% that voted for Trump because they bel
Vagabond Scholar
(Click on the comic strip for a larger view.) In 1959, Pogo creator Walt Kelly wrote: The eleventh day of the eleventh month has always seemed to me to be special. Even if the reason for it fell apart as the years went on, it was a symbol of something close to the high part of the heart. Perhaps a life that stretches through two or three wars takes its first war rather seriously, but I still
Today, 11/11/18, marks the 100th anniversary of the end of World War I, the Great War, the supposed War to End All Wars that unfortunately didn't. I've always been struck by how eager nations were to go to war at the start and how horrific the reality often was. By the end, by most estimates, about 8.5 million soldiers were dead and the total casualty count was about 37.5 million. Add in a
Get out and vote on Tuesday, if you haven't already! This post will collate some California and Los Angeles County resources. California voters should already have received the official voter information guide in the mail, but it's also online and available in multiple languages. Unfortunately, some candidates don't include statements, but the guide is particularly useful for seeing who's
What Is Sustainable
[Note: This is the third sample from my rough draft of a far from finished new book, Wild Free & Happy . I don’t plan on reviewing more books for a while. My blog is home to reviews of 196 books, and you are very welcome to explore them. The Search field on the right side will find words in the full contents of all rants and reviews, if you are interested in specific authors, titles, or subjects.
The Rise of Homo Sapiens , by Frederick Coolidge (psychologist) and Thomas Wynn (anthropologist), is a book about the evolution of human cognition. It describes the seven million year voyage that resulted in the magnificent mind that’s throbbing between your ears right now. This voyage began with the first hominins — bipedal (two legged) apes who were either our direct ancestors, or our long lost
WWF - Latest News
Alongside the all-too-visible deforestation, the Amazon is facing an invisible but increasing threat from mercury pollution according to a new WWF report released today at the 2 nd Conference of the Parties to the Minamata Convention on Mercury in Geneva, Switzerland. Healthy Rivers, Healthy People highlights the dangers mercury pollution poses across the Amazon and calls for urgent action to red
Sharm-El-Sheikh, 15 November, 2018 : The High Level Segment for the UN Convention on Biological Diversity Conference (CBD CoP14) concluded today with the adoption of the Sharm-El-Sheikh declaration by the 196 Parties. However, it is clear we are failing to address nature loss; WWF's recent Living Planet Report showed that biodiversity continues to decline, having devastating consequences for peop
A Very Public Sociologist
Call me perverse, call me morbid. For years I've looked forward to attending a funeral. This isn't to mark the death of some hated acquaintance or public figure. No, the dream is the demise of an institution, the entirely welcome expiration of the Conservative Party. I want to be there when it is lowered into the ground, to make sure the earth is heaped upon its blasted coffin and check, check, a
Any deal is better than a bad deal. That about summed up the mood at the Confederation of British Industry annual conference earlier today. Theresa May will have accepted that as an endorsement of her plan , after the worst week a sitting Prime Minister Westminster has seen for about 60 years. She will take the sideswipe at Jeremy Corbyn by chief exec Carolyn Fairburn as a jolly consolation. But
Brexit is in crisis. Arguably, it has been since 52% of the voting public returned a Leave verdict in June 2016. Yet what we have had up until, well, a couple of weeks ago is something of a phony war. Now, the politics has played out so every position - no deal/hard, May's deal , and soft/remain sit poised upon a mountain of gunpowder. At any moment, a spark could fall that blows up one position.
Jeremy Corbyn saved the Labour Party. This feat was accomplished by winning the leadership election in 2015, recruiting hundreds of thousands of new members, registered and affiliated supporters, and building a new coalition of voters uniting the comparatively better off with those at the sharp end . In so doing, Labour in England and Wales avoided the fates of the Socialists in France, Labour in
Imagine shooting someone for a packet of cheese and onion crisps in the blasted ruins of Sheffield. With the announcement of Theresa May's withdrawal deal, it appears, for now, that a Threads Brexit is off the table. But what smörgåsbord of culinary goodies can we look forward to instead? The 600 pages of the withdrawal agreement looks like a meaty affair, but almost two-and-a-half years on from
One should avoid making time for the Johnson family wherever possible. But due to their prominence, sometimes it's unavoidable. On this occasion at least it isn't the usual Johnson making the running. The resignation of Jo Johnson from the government was a shocker for two reasons. One, he has spent his parliamentary career thus far (relatively) quietly beavering away in the shadows and cutting an
Adrienne's Corner
no - not politics. The "holidays." Yesterday I hit our Costco at 10 minutes after opening and the parking lot was already jammed. Living in a relatively small town vs a Los Angeles, Manhattan, or Houston, everyone was polite, chatty, and generally having an okay time of it. We veterans of the store even managed to not smack the shoppers up side the head who were navigating the dairy and produce r
if you're a fan of Freddie Mercury you will love the movie. I saw the movie over a week ago and was faintly aware that it had received many bad reviews. I enjoyed the movie immensely and was glad to see that they mainly got the history right. When I returned home I decided to look up some reviews to see exactly what the movie reviewers (a bunch of useless eaters) found objectionable about the mov
don't be that person. Once again we witness people camping out in front of evil corporations stores for days and then knocking each other down to grab a "discounted" TV, all in the name of saving a few bucks. The very fact that they would do that tells me they shouldn't be spending the money at all. Please notice how many ads tout "special buys." Let me translate that for you: it refers to super
and it only cost us $1500.00 Arrrrrrrrgh! My doggie, Frankie, erupted in screams of pain yesterday about 5pm. He'd been acting off for a few days, and I had been watching him closely. He was rushed to the vet, x-rayed, and it was determined that somehow he swallowed a rock. Frankie is a 12 lb dog and after emergency surgery, the vets office was surprised he could have even swallowed such a large
a battle between good and evil. I know that many of you have already voted. On November 6th I will head to our local polling place and cast my ballot for the Republican party. Hanging with my red state peeps, marking my ballot (paper), sliding it into a locked box, and having the elderly poll worker call out, "Adrienne Streeter has voted", is very important to me. Never mind this crap about votin
but hey, like, you know, it's like okay 'cause like borders are stupid and like no one is "illegal" like we shouldn't have borders, like - you know? These born again socialists are as ugly in their personal appearance and behavior (like let's lie around on the filthy floor 'cause it's cool - or something) as their virtue signalling warped little anti-American, a nti-constitution, anti-capitalism,
ArmsControlWonk
A quick post before the Thanksgiving holiday here in the U.S. In my professional life, I am especially grateful for high frequency satellite imagery. This week Planet Lab’s SkySat sensor allowed us to make two very interesting observations about China’s SSBN program. Jeffrey Lewis and I both gave a few comments to Defense One, but …
Quotes of the week: “You use a small one, then you go to a bigger one. I think nuclear weapons are nuclear weapons and we need to draw the line there.” — George Shultz “I don’t think there’s any such thing as a tactical nuclear weapon. Any nuclear weapon used at any time is a strategic …
Last year, cameras in Japan noticed an object streaking the night sky — possibly the reentry vehicle from one of North Korea’s July 28 missile test. Did it burn up? Survive? If if it did, or did not, what does that mean for North Korea’s ability to deliver a nuclear weapon to targets throughout the …
On this Veterans/Armistice Day, I’m reprinting a post from August 24, 2010, “The Least Abhorrent Choice.” The military cemetery at Nettuno, thirty miles south of Rome, is serene and immaculately kept. Almost as many GIs are buried there – 7,861 – as at Normandy, painful testimony of how botched the Italian campaign was. I’m named …
A guest post by my colleague Cameron Trainer: Russia takes its commitment to enforcing United Nations sanctions on North Korea seriously. So seriously, in fact, that when Russian businesswoman Irina Tyan was listed in a NPR article as operating a banned joint venture with DPRK consulate Vladivostok, the government immediately took action to close the …
Quotes of the week: “Atomic energy seems to present choices that defy wide popular understanding and control. So far, the control of such decisions is a kind of indigestible element in the operation of democratic politics.” — Robert A. Dahl, “Atomic Energy and the Democratic Process,” 1953. “The death of democracy is not likely to be …
Dear Friends and Family, It has been hectic here at the National Office, and I want to bring you all up to date on our needs for financial help. We n Dear Friends and Family, It has been hectic here at the National Office, and I want to bring you all up to date on our needs for financial help. We need help on paying Leonard's legal
Saturday, today, at AIM WestPhoto by Tony Gonzalez By Tony Gonzalez AIM West Censored News Location 2969 Mission Street San Francisco . Welcome all my American Indian Movement-West (AIM-WEST), an inter-tribal non-profit human rights organization based in San Francisco is pleased to welcome everyone to its annual AIM-West Coast Conference/Summit in San Francisco beginning
. Friday, November, 16, 2018 Contact: protectpeaks@gmail.com www.protectthepeaks.org Indigenous Peoples Denied Access to Sacred Site as Ski Area Opens with Sewage Snow By Indigenous Action Censored News Flagstaff, Ariz. — Continuing years of ecological destruction, threats to public health, and desecration and assault on Indigenous Peoples’ ways of life, Arizona Snowbowl
Military vehicles like this one swarmed the Tohono O'odham region today, because of the racist hysteria of the U.S. President. U.S. soldiers are now used as pawns in psychotic breakdown -- as U S. government bottoms out By Brenda Norrell Censored News LUKEVILLE, Arizona-- Lukeville is just beyond the western edge of the Tohono O'odham Nation. It is a small border crossing vital to locals
. Indigen.ous Organizers Face Political Attack by Flagstaff Police for Anti-Columbus Day Demonstration By Indigenous Action Censored News OCCUPIED FLAGSTAFF, Ariz. — Flagstaff police stalked and cited an Indigenous organizer in so-called Flagstaff, Arizona last night for their alleged role in a demonstration that took to the streets the previous month on what is now recognized as "
GOLD MINE, STRUGGLE FOR IDENTITY AND FOR MOTHER EARTH: YOUNG WOMEN FROM FRENCH GUÏANA SPEAK AGAINST THE GOLD COMPANY 'MONTAGNE D'OR', THE DENIAL OF THEIR IDENTITY, AND THE STRUGGLE FOR MOTHER EARTH: YOUNG WOMEN FROM FRENCH GUÏANA SPOKE, ON OCTOBER 13, 2018, DURING THE 'SOLIDARITY DAY' OF THE CSIA Recorded on October 13th, 2018 Article and translation by Christine Prat
Centauri Dreams
The outer system object called Chariklo doesn’t get into the news all that much, so I’m glad that this morning I have the chance to give it its place in the Sun. 10199 Chariklo is a Centaur, moving between the orbits of Saturn and Uranus. With an estimated diameter of 250 kilometers, it’s the largest Centaur known, and as far as I know, the first one known to have a ring system. Another Centaur,
It makes sense that planets in other stellar systems would have moons, but so far it has been difficult to find them. That’s why Kepler-1625b, about 8,000 light years out in the direction of Cygnus, is so interesting. As we noted last month, David Kipping and graduate student Alex Teachey have compiled interesting evidence of a moon around this gas giant, which is itself either close to or within
The interstellar object called ‘Oumuamua continues to inspire analysis and speculation. And no wonder. We had limited time to observe it and were unable to obtain a resolved image to find out exactly what it looks like. This morning I want to go through a new paper from Shmuel Bialy and Abraham Loeb (Harvard University) considering the role radiation pressure from the Sun could play on this deep
The detection of a planet around Barnard’s Star really hits home for me. No, this isn’t a habitable world, but the whole topic of planets around this star has resonance for those of us who remember the earliest days of exoplanet study, which could be extended back to Peter van de Kamp’s work at Swarthmore’s Sproul Observatory in Pennsylvania. The astronomer thought he had found evidence for a 1.6
The Kepler spacecraft has been with us long enough (it launched in 2009) and has revealed so much about the stars in our galaxy that its retirement — Kepler lacks the fuel for further science operations — is cause for reflection. The end of great missions always gives us pause as we consider their goals and their accomplishments, and offer up our gratitude to the many people who made the mission
The first interstellar object detected in our own Solar System, ‘Oumuamua has a pleasing name, translating from the Hawaiian as something like ‘far visitor first to arrive,’ or words to that effect. It’s also proven a frustrating catch ever since detected by the University of Hawaii’s Pan-STARRS 1 telescope on Haleakala, Hawaii during a search for near-Earth asteroids. We’ve put telescope resourc
David Climenhaga's Alberta Diary
Carl von Clausewitz, the Prussian aphorist and theoretician of war, famously observed that “war is the continuation of politics by other means.” Something like the opposite – that politics is the prosecution of war by other means, or darn close anyway – is likely true as well. I hope I offend no gentle readers by describing politics in warlike terms. I do so because the metaphor helps explain the
When Alberta Advanced Education Minister Marlin Schmidt was tossed out of the Legislature Wednesday morning for supposedly insulting an Opposition MLA, the kerfuffle that resulted obviously came as welcome relief to United Conservative Party Leader Jason Kenney. In recent weeks, Mr. Kenney has often been on the run, sometimes almost literally, from questions by journalists about the views some of
Want to know how to deal with the irresponsible refusal by the organizers of the so-called Munk Debate to cancel their invitation to former Trump election strategist Steve Bannon to come to Canada and spew his racist dreck around our country? Follow the example of Jason Kenney! In most circumstances, the last thing a sane commentator would do would be to advise Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and h
In what was probably the first speech of the 2019 Alberta provincial election campaign, if not quite officially, Premier Rachel Notley was comfortable, confident, funny, hopeful, energized, charismatic, fiery and, yes, inspiring. She sounded, in other words, like a winner. By any measure, it was a terrific speech. And the racket from the packed ballroom at Edmonton’s Westin Hotel – which yesterda
While Albertans have been in flap over the state of the province’s oilsands industry, the Big Five Oilsands extraction corporations have been raking in billions. “Despite the 2014 oil price crash and the ongoing hand-wringing over pipelines and the price differential, the reality is the Big Five oilsands producers have remained incredibly profitable corporations,” says one of the authors of a new
For what was supposed to be a fresh news story, an old report from the Beaverton circulating on social media yesterday actually came closest to accurately describing what went on in the so-called debate last night between alt-right U.S. political agitator Stephen Bannon and the neoliberal propagandist David Frum. The Beaverton is Canadian a news-satire website. But what’s funny about two powerful
From the Wilderness' Peak Oil Blog
From Jenna Orkin NYC purged 200,000 voters in 2016. It wasn’t a mistake. Bolton to meet with Brazil’s far-right elected leader next week. Mission? To confront Cuba 911 Hijackers Possibly Connected To Saudi Gov; Khashogghi Had Intel On Saudi Links To Al Qaeda Pre-911; Saudi Gov Rented Trump World Tower Floor Months Before 911 Attack; Bin Laden Brother Once Lived in Trump Tower Read more here: https
From Jenna Orkin Trump names hand-picked panel to supervise, investigate intelligence community Why Cities Are Fighting the FCC's 5G Internet Rules - CityLab Retail Investor Demand For Italian Bonds Drop To Lowest On Record Trudeau Quietly Approves $10.5 Billion Corporate Tax Cut To Compete With Trump One person was killed and 2 were injured during a Black Friday shooting at an Alabama mall Two Ki
From Jenna Orkin Amazon Indigenous Groups Propose Mexico Sized "Corridor of Life" Gabbard Eviscerates Trump as Saudi Arabia's Bitch White House Authorizes Lethal Force At The Border Comment: And now everyone say what he or she is thankful for. The death toll from California's fires has risen to 84 — and nearly 1,000 people are still missing Khashoggi: How US Media Is Losing Its Moral Compass by F
From Jenna Orkin A Hidden Radioactive Heat Source Seems To Be Melting Antarctica from Below Insidious Movie of the Year Award(?) Saudi Arabia Accused of Torturing Women's Rights Activists in Crackdown on Dissent - WSJ Gov. Jerry Brown proposes easing logging rules to thin forests Who Killed Robert Kennedy - Al Jazeera The Green Book - Triple A Guide for those traveling while black Hungary's Const
From Jenna Orkin Climate Change Will Bring Multiple Disasters All at Once - CBS Shocking Doomsday Maps and Billionaire Escape Plans - Forbes Iraqi Dinar May Replace Dollar And Euro In Iran's 2nd Largest Export Market Weather Models Forecast Coldest Thanksgiving On Record In Northeast 2 Dead, 1 Officer Critically Wounded In Shooting At Chicago Hospital; Gunman Killed Ray Dalio: Losing 'Reserve Sta
From Jenna Orkin It's Now Cheaper to Build a New Wind Farm Than to Keep a Coal Plant Running More than 14,000 Children in Custody, a Record Wildfires in Lapland, Finland Zero Energy AC China sparks outrage for sentencing an author who wrote about gay love to 10 years — longer than some rapists get "It Will Be A Cold War": APEC Summit Ends In Unprecedented Chaos After Dramatic US-China Showdown U.
GlobaLove Think Tank
You've felt it your entire life Are you living a Rat Race ? What if money didn't matter ?
Rare Space Being Abduction Testimonies