Tuesday, November 25, 2014

Corporate Rip-Off



    Seven Candidates for Corporate Rip-Off of the Year


There are so many acts of corporate treachery that take money from the American people. We need to work together to stem corporate power.
Published: November 24, 2014             | Authors: Paul Buchheit | NationofChange | Op-Ed

There are so many to choose from. Every one of these selections is an act of corporate treachery that takes billions of dollars from the American people.

1. Selling Medication For Up To 100 Times More Than It’s Worth

Pharmaceutical companies reap billions of dollars in subsidies for research and development, but they’ve successfullylobbied Congress to keep Medicare from bargaining for lower drug prices. An extreme example is Gilead Sciences, the manufacturer of the drug Sovaldi, which charges about $10 a pill to its customers in Egypt, then comes home to charge $1,000 a pill to its American customers. Other outrageous examples are noted by Ralph Nader.

As a further insult, Americans are cheated when corporations pay off generic drug manufacturers to delay entry of their products into the market, thereby forcing consumers to pay the highest prices for medicine.

2. Paying Their Employees With Our Tax Money

Walmart made $19 billion in U.S. profits last year, and the four Walton siblings together made about $29 billion from their personal investments. That’s about $33,000 per U.S. employee in profits and family stock gains. Yet they pay their 1.4 million American employees so little that the average Walmart worker depends on about $4,000 per year in taxpayer assistance, for food stamps and other safety net programs.

3. Giving Money to Executives Rather Than Investing in the Future

Corporations are spending trillions of dollars on stock buybacks, which use potential research and development money topump up the prices of executive stock options. Apple alone is spending $90 billion to repurchase its own stock through 2015. Walmart doesn’t provide a living wage for its workers, but its company management spent $7.6 billion, or about $5,000 per U.S. employee, on stock buybacks, in order to further boost the value of their stock holdings.

The buyback surge is dramatic. In 1981, major corporations were spending less than 3 percent of their combined net income on buybacks, but by 2008-9 they were spending 75 percent of their profits on this greed-driven process.

4. Making Money on Dirty Air and Water

Charles Koch once said, “I want my legacy to be…a better way of life for…all Americans.”

Koch Industries dumps more pollutants into rivers and streams than General Electric and International Paper combined. One of Koch’s products is petcoke, which Rolling Stone notes is “denser, dirtier and cheaper than coal.” Too toxic to burn in U.S. coal plants, it’s sold instead to countries with weaker environmental regulations, like Mexico and China. But storage facilities are needed. So the besieged city of Detroit became the dumping ground for a three-story pile ofpetroleum coke covering an entire city block near the Detroit River. The mound of toxic matter spewed thick black “fugitive dust” over the homes of nearby residents. The ugliness was later repeated in Chicago.

5. Making the Highest Profit Margin in the Corporate World — And Demanding a Tax Cut

The trading volume on the Chicago Mercantile Exchange (CME) reached $1 quadrillion in notional value last year. That’s a thousand trillion dollars, about ten times greater than the world economy.

With the collection of transfer fees, contract fees, brokerage fees, Globex fees, clearing fees, and surcharges, the company achieved a profit margin (54%) higher than any of the top 100 companies in the nation from 2008 to 2010, and in the past three years it’s risen to nearly 60%.

Despite being the most profitable big firm, CME complained that its taxes were too high, and they demanded and received an $85 million tax break from the State of Illinois.

6. Skipping Out on the Country that Made Their Business Possible

Walgreens (which later backed down), Burger King, and Medtronic are the biggest names in the so-called inversions that allow companies to desert the country that made them successful. They don’t want to pay for decades of publicly funded research in technology and medicine; a legal system that protects patents and intellectual property; infrastructure, including roads and seaports and airports to ship their products; unprecedented amounts of local and national security, and a nationwide energy grid to power factories.

7. Group Ripoff: $74 Billion in Profits…and a Tax Refund

It seems incomprehensible that Boeing, Ford, Chevron, Citigroup, Verizon, JP Morgan, and General Motors, with a combined income last year of $74 billion, would pay no taxes, and in fact receive a combined refund of nearly $2 billion. The data comes from a new study called Fleecing Uncle Sam, which goes on to note that the unpaid taxes of almost $26 billion could pay for Pre-K education for every 4-year old in America.

Is there an answer to all this? Only if we victims work together toward the singular goal of stemming corporate power, especially in the financial industry. To do this, as Les Leopold says, “we will need something like an Occupy 2.0.”

Otherwise the ripoffs will continue.

Wednesday, November 12, 2014

A Bigger Threat to US Health than Ebola

Our home-grown medical catastrophe—the erosion of antibiotic effectiveness—are putting us at great risk. Yet doctors and hospitals aren't to blame, factory farms are.

Published: November 12, 2014 | Authors: Anna Meyer Nicole McCann | OtherWords | Op-Ed


Despite all the panic, Americans don’t face any great risk from Ebola right now. But we do need to worry about a home-grown medical catastrophe of our own that we’re failing to address: the erosion of antibiotic effectiveness.

Doctors prescribe antibiotics to treat a broad array of infections that can otherwise prove fatal. While the drugs are being grossly overused, diminishing their power to heal, hospitals aren’t to blame — factory farms are.

Most U.S. livestock are being raised today in concentrated animal feeding operations (CAFO). At these factory farms, antibiotics get routinely doled out to stave off the diseases that might otherwise quickly spread due to overcrowded, unnatural, and unsanitary living conditions.

This overuse is rendering these lifesaving drugs less effective by accelerating the evolution of bacteria that are resistant to antibiotics.

Now that they’ve infiltrated our food system, those bacteria are endangering human health and are taking a bite out of the national economy. Antibiotic-resistant bacteria cause prolonged infections in thousands of Americans each year, resulting in $20 billion in annual health care costs and over $35 billion in lost economic productivity, according to the Centers for Disease Control.

Nearly a quarter of these infections originate from food-borne pathogens.

It’s not like no one warned us this might happen. In 1945, Alexander Fleming — the biologist who won a Nobel Prize for discovering penicillin — cautioned that misusing antibiotics would spur the development of superbugs.

As U.S. agriculture became increasingly industrialized, its leaders ignored Fleming’s warning.

Agribusiness now uses antibiotics with abandon. Livestock and poultry consume an astounding 80 percent of the 29 million pounds of antibiotics used each year in the United States. Entire herds receive daily doses to stave off disease and promote growth — two things that would happen naturally if animals had better living conditions and weren’t crammed into factory farms.

Antibiotics abuse reflects the truly awful conditions farm animals endure today.

The extreme crowding of livestock increases animal stress, produces vast concentrations of manure, and makes good hygiene virtually impossible — all of which invite pathogens to multiply.

Throw in vast quantities of antibiotics, and it’s no surprise that factory farms are hotspots for antibiotic-resistant bacteria. Moreover, since manure from factory farms is often used to fertilize fruits and vegetables, these bacteria can be delivered straight to the mouths of consumers.

Antibiotic-resistant bacteria have become so prevalent that even animals raised without antibiotics may still be carriers. That’s why the Centers for Disease Control, along with many medical organizations, are calling for an end to the “non-therapeutic” use of antibiotics.

Many European nations have seen antibiotic-resistant bacteria decline since implementing such bans. The United States should follow their lead before we wind up facing an epidemic.

As a consumer, you can do your part by choosing to buy certified organic dairy products and meats, as the farmers who sell them don’t use non-therapeutic antibiotics. Everyone has the power to put stores, brands, and lawmakers on notice that we need to save antibiotics for treating illnesses.

Thursday, October 2, 2014

Buyer Beware -- Fracking

  Buyer Beware: Latest Documentary from the Tickells Promotes Natural Gas

     Pump Official Trailer 1 (2014) - Documentary


The documentary was funded by Fuel Freedom Foundation and serves as a piece of propaganda for the foundation’s true reason for getting us off foreign oil. Read on to find out more.

Published: October 1, 2014 | Authors: Lauren Steiner | AlterNet | News Analysis

Last weekend, “Pump,” the new film by Josh and Rebecca Tickell, directors of “Fuel” and “The Big Fix” premiered in New York and Los Angeles the same weekend as the largest climate rally in history. As four hundred thousand people marched to tell world leaders we have to get off fossil fuels or face human extinction, this film promoted the use of alternative transportation fuels including ethanol, methanol from natural gas and compressed natural gas (CNG), the latter two obtained through a noxious and greenhouse gas producing process known as fracking.

Funded by the Fuel Freedom Foundation, the film, while purporting to advocate for freedom of choice and low prices to benefit the American consumer, really serves as a piece of propaganda for the foundation’s true reason for getting us off foreign oil. From what I can deduce that is to enhance the security of Israel and/or to financially enrich the foundation’s co-founders.

In July of 2012, a film was posted on YouTube. Titled “Methanol Fuel, the Business Opportunity of the Future,” it was a presentation by Eyal Aronoff, co founder of the Fuel Freedom Foundation, to the 2012 Methanol Policy Forum.

In it, Aronoff recommends we convert our natural gas supply into methanol fuel. “So ladies and gentlemen, the profit margins are gigantic. If this was a company, its profit margins would be twice as big as Walmart… Within 10-15 years this will become a trillion dollar industry!” He acknowledges there are competing interests before he ends with the challenge at hand: “How we find ways to work together with the government agencies with industry with the auto companies and with the consumers to create awareness and to create this transition to happen.”

One way to sell it to the public is to find two willing filmmakers to make a powerful documentary. Couch it as a film about breaking the monopoly of Big Oil, freedom of choice and low price at the pump. But whatever you do, don’t tell the audience that the trillion dollar business opportunity of the future is based on the continued production of natural gas through fracking.

While the natural gas industry wants you to believe that natural gas is clean burning and does not contribute to climate change, the methane produced during the process of fracking is 84 times more potent a greenhouse gas than CO2 over a 20 year time frame, which is exactly the time frame it is being promoted as a transition or bridge fuel to renewables.

I was eager to see this film, because I had seen both of the Tickells’ previous films, and believed them to be passionate environmentalists. “The Big Fix” (2011) documents BP’s decision to use Corexit to disperse the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico, how many people got sick from it, and how the company and the government tried to cover it up. Rebecca Tickell herself had health consequences from her exposure, as did the child they ultimately conceived.

“Fuel” (2008) began in Josh’s home state of Louisiana, a state dominated by Big Oil to the detriment of the environment and the health of the residents, including Josh’s mother who had nine miscarriages. In the film Josh states, “I grew up hating oil companies, and that hatred is what fueled me.” Josh, who got his degree in sustainable living, discovers he could power his van with used vegetable oil, and he takes this Veggie Van across the US proselytizing for biofuels.

In “Fuel,” Tickell doesn’t advocate anything that is not sustainable or will harm the environment. In 2008 during the course of making the film, when two Science Magazine articles expose the fact that growing corn and soy based biofuels actually increases greenhouse gas emissions, Josh re-edited his film. “Was my entire life’s purpose, everything I had worked so hard for hurting the environment?” he asks in the film.

He discussed how much energy it takes to produce corn-based ethanol and soy based biodiesel. Both are monocrops, which use an incredible amount of chemical fertilizers and pesticides, which run off into rivers and streams and actually caused a huge dead zone in the Gulf of Mexico. They are produced by large agribusinesses with government subsidies. He shows how we dump our excess cheap corn on the world markets causing family farmers worldwide to go out of business.

Eight years later in “Pump,” when the Tickells recommend corn-based ethanol as way to get us off oil, none of these facts or consequences are mentioned. In fact, he dispatches the controversy of food versus fuel as propaganda advanced by Big Oil. Prior to the screening, Rebecca Tickell told me it was a campaign of the Grocery lobby.

So why did the Tickells change their tune about ethanol? And why are they recommending two alternative fuels that most commonly come from fracked natural gas? I followed the money to find out.

The sting

Last I’d heard of the Tickells, they had moved to Ojai and were making a movie about what fracking might do to the water in their town. In February of this year, the filmmakers were caught up in the latest sting operation by the notorious James O’Keefe, whose sting on ACORN was responsible for bringing that group down. This time O’Keefe set his sites against liberal documentarians.

The Tickells sat down with a plant pretending to work for someone with Middle East oil interests who wanted to make a film against fracking. The intent was to turn US audiences against fracking because it is moving the US away from dependence on Middle East oil. While secret recordings showed the Tickells to be interested in taking the money, before things could go any further, the scam was exposed by Josh Fox, director of the anti-fracking Gasland films, who was also approached by O’Keefe.

I asked Josh by email whether the idea for “Pump “ came from them or the foundation. He replied: “It was our idea to make PUMP as a kind of finale to our previous films FUEL and The Big Fix. We wanted to make a film that focused solely on how to break the oil monopoly and empower everyday people to walk out of the theater to do just that. We were honored to have the opportunity to work with the Fuel Freedom Foundation and it was a unique experience for us to find our common viewpoints and make a non-partisan film that would appeal to everyone.” When I asked Rebecca Tickell how much input the foundation had into the script and the experts interviewed, she replied, “There was a tremendous amount of collaboration.”

Rebecca told me they went to the Fuel Freedom Foundation for funding and began working with them in 2012. It should be noted that at the foundation’s November 2012 launch, the co-founders outlined their four point agenda for 2013. The first point was to: “Generate public support through media and communications, including a full-length documentary film illustrating the potential of alternative fuels.”

So one has to wonder who had the final cut, as they say in the business. As Tickell says at the end of “Fuel,” Dig beneath the headlines. Fact check, and do your own research. Don’t confuse the news with corporate and government PR.” So I took his advice when trying to figure out why the message changed. I looked into the funders. I wasn’t going to confuse the truth with foundation funded PR.

The funders

“Pump” was primarily funded by the California based Fuel Freedom Foundation,  founded by Joseph Hollander and Eyal Aronoff. Their mission statement says: Fuel Freedom Foundation is working to reduce the cost of driving your existing car or truck by opening the market to cheaper fuel choices at the pump. Our goal is to reduce the cost of transportation fuels in the US by $300 billion annually within ten years. In personal terms it means $2 a gallon at the pump, adding $2,500 per year to the pockets of the average American family. In national terms it means accelerated economic growth, greater energy security, reduced air pollution, lower greenhouse gas emissions and improved health. Fuel Freedom provides a big break for Americans without increasing government spending.”

Sounds good. All gain no pain. But when you delve further, you see that they are really advancing any fuel they think will get us off Middle East oil, including dirty coal and natural gas. Their website features articles like “Myth: Coal is the worst fossil fuel for the economy and the environment.” And “Myth: Biofuels are the cause of deforestation in emerging economies such as Indonesia and Brazil.”

I have no way of knowing whether Mr. Aronoff or Mr. Hollander has invested in methanol companies, because the filmmakers and the publicist would not answer this question, which I posed to them in two emails. But we do know that John Hofmeister, a board member of the Fuel Freedom Foundation, who is featured as one of the main experts in “Pump” and always identified as the former President of Shell Oil, still has current oil and gas interests.

It is a fair question since billionaires like the Koch Brothers have set up think tanks and astroturf groups and fund the climate denial junk science and legislation that advances their business interests. However, it is fairly evident from reading their bios that these two former software entrepreneurs also have ideological reasons for wanting us off Middle East oil.

    Pump Movie CLIP - Energy Sources (2014) - Documentary 


The Israel Connection

Joseph “Yossie” Hollander and Eyal Aronoff both have connections to organizations that support Israel. Hollander is on the board of the Weitzman Foundation of Science and is the founder and chairman of Our Energy Policy Foundation,  “which is dedicated to creating an open dialogue and agreement on the U.S. energy policy.”

Further examination of that second foundation shows a list of contributors who run the gamut of all the dirty energy sources including oil, coal, nuclear and natural gas as well as representatives from such organizations as ALEC and the American Jewish Committee, one of the most hawkish of the major Jewish organizations in America.

Eyal Aronoff, an Israeli-American, “traces his commitment to breaking America’s oil addiction to his Israeli roots. As a young boy, he lost his father in the 1967 Six Day War. Then, on Sept. 11, 2001, Aronoff’s stepbrother and his new wife were both killed in the World Trade Center attack. In the wake of 9/11, Aronoff began to turn his attention to answering the question of how to free the U.S. economy from its dependence on imported oil, which he believes would, in turn, help ensure America’s geopolitical security.” This bio conveniently leaves out that he served in the Israeli Defense Forces, a fact I found in an old Quest software bio of him.

In a Power Point presentation that Aronoff made in 2008 called “Oil: A Story About Addiction,” this slide speaks to how getting off Middle East oil helps Israel. “Oil and the Jihad Ideology” states 1.) Two-thirds of oil reserves are in the hands of Islamic countries. 2.) Petrodollar based countries have no need for employment taxation to finance their activities, have no need to invest in education and well being of the population, use the economic success of oil to propagate radical ideology throughout the globe, and 3.) to avert civil unrest the governments found far away enemies to blame for the daily hardship…Israel and the US. There are no better examples than Saudi Arabia and Iran.”

Also, listed in “Pump’s” credits as funders are Beverly Hills Israeli billionaire Haim Saban and his wife. Saban has repeatedly said, “I’m a one issue guy, and that issue is Israel.” In 2006, energy independence was one of the topics discussed at a “closed session” at Saban’s think tank, the Center for Middle East Policy at the Brookings Institution.

There are other foundations and think tanks founded and funded by wealthy Jewish Americans that link energy independence with national security, including the Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs, founded by oil and gas billionaire Robert Belfer.

The Council for a Secure America’s website, makes the connection between US energy independence to Israel. “Since 2006, the United States has decreased imports as a percentage of U.S. oil consumption from 60 percent to less than 45 percent, thus reducing the leverage that oil producing countries in the Middle East have on U.S. foreign policy and strengthening our ally Israel.” And it is elaborated on in this article.

Pump: the “problem”

The film “Pump” does not examine either of these ideas: the “trillion dollar business of the decade” or security for Israel. So how did the Tickells go about priming the pump, no pun intended, for the acceptance of these ideas? Through a great story.

George Marshall, founder of the Climate Information Network, says that people are motivated to act by stories not data. And every good story needs a villain. In “Pump,” the entire first half of the film tells us stories of how Big Oil is responsible for the destruction of mass transit, Prohibition, all wars, the killing of methanol as a viable fuel, the killing of the renewable energy standards, the financial collapse of 2008 and the bankruptcy of Detroit. It also states that the booming economy of Brazil is due to their getting off petroleum and onto sugar cane based ethanol. As an activist fighting fracking, no one hates Big Oil more than me. But these accusations are reductionist at best and mendacious at worst.

In making Big Oil the bad guy, the film advances an oft repeated theory that in order to ensure Americans’ reliance on oil, Standard Oil, Mack Truck, Phillips Petroleum and Firestone Tires conspired to destroy the excellent public trolley system in LA and across the country and replace it with oil consuming motor buses. According to Guy Spahn, “Clearly, GM waged a war on electric traction. It was indeed an all out assault, but by no means the single reason for the failure of rapid transit.”

The filmmakers correctly attribute the OPEC oil embargo to the 1973 Arab Israeli war and the animosity of the Arab oil producing countries for Israel. Amy Meyers Jaffe, Executive Director of Energy and Sustainability at the University of California, discusses the devastating effects the oil embargo had on our economy in the 70s. Images of people stuck on long gas lines during the period of gas rationing are shown. In one masterful use of imagery, Tickell shows a photo of a man standing at the gas line with a gun. The message is that if we lose access to fuel, anarchy will ensue. The question is posed: “How can we solve the problem where OPEC controls the destiny of the average American?” Our entire destiny? Really?

It should be noted that Myers Jaffe’s research focuses on “oil and natural gas geopolitics, strategic energy policy, corporate investment strategies in the energy sector, and energy economics.” Last year at a Union of Concerned Scientists forum on fracking at UCLA , I heard her make a case for the benefits of fracking while minimizing its risks. Her book Natural Gas and Geopolitics: From 1970 to 2040 advocates for the global development of natural gas as a solution to our energy and geopolitical problems.

In addressing how we attempted to solve the problem of reliance on OPEC oil, the film lists the other countries where we get oil and the military bases we installed to protect it. One of the film’s experts says “If we can get away from sending our soldiers to die for oil, you can’t put a price on that.” The filmmakers want you to believe the simplistic solution to stopping wars is getting off of foreign oil. There is no mention of the other causes of war: other geopolitical interests, the military industrial complex or terrorism.

There is one scene which shows the Bakken oil fields of North Dakota where they frack for tight oil. The first of only two comments on the negative effects of fracking comes in this one line that says people are “concerned about the effects on water and air. But as the debate continues, fracking is growing at a record pace.”

There is no real “debate” about the effects of fracking on water and air. Study after study has shown that fracking pollutes both the groundwater and the air, causes earthquakes, increases climate change, causes the industrialization of suburban and rural landscapes and uses too much water in states like California and Texas that are plagued by chronic droughts. Describing these “concerns” as a “debate” is like saying there is a debate over whether climate change exists or whether it is caused by human behavior.

The film states that we have gone from being the ninth largest producer of oil in the world to the second. Since this film was completed, we have become the first, surpassing Saudi Arabia. This comes directly as a result of Obama’s all-of-the-above energy strategy where we are drilling in many US states, in public lands, offshore and in the Arctic. As every climate scientist will tell you, we need to keep 80% of fossil fuels in the ground in order to prevent a two-degree Celsius increase in temperature to avoid the most serious effects of global warming.

The film says we went from drilling 5000 wells a year in 2000 to 25,000 now, but wells produce the most oil when new. The question is then asked, “Where is the benefit to American drivers of increased fracking?” The former Shell oil executive says, “If we rely on our own production of crude, we will die trying.” This is actually the argument we fractivists have been making, which is that there is not enough oil in the ground to meet our energy needs. But the way we will “die trying” is from the poisoning of our water and air and climate change not from running out of oil. While the film makes this negative comment specifically about oil fracking, the same comments can be applied to natural gas fracking.

The film fast-forwards to 2008. “When oil hit $120 a barrel, there were food riots. When it hit $147, everything hit the roof. Sixty days later the stock market fell 770 points in a single day.” Economic and social theorist Jeremy Rifkin calls the financial collapse “an aftershock.” To lead the audience to believe that the financial collapse of 2008 was a result of increased oil prices as opposed to the result of the financial deregulation at the end of the Clinton administration and the monetary policies of Alan Greenspan, which led to a housing bubble and bust, is really appalling.

They continue by saying the price of oil going up led to the recession, which led to unemployment, which led to people wanting smaller cars, which led to the GM bankruptcy, completely ignoring the competition from foreign cars and the terrible mismanagement of the auto companies. Then they demonstrate the power of imagery by showing the beautiful homes that used to exist in Detroit contrasted with pictures of the dilapidated housing today. “The industry that built Detroit,” says one of their experts, “is the same one that destroyed it.”

While their expert concedes, “Detroit went bust for a number of reasons,” there is no discussion about how the decline of the rust belt states track the decline in the labor movement and our free trade policies as auto factories moved south to non-union states and there was increased competition from foreign cars. Nor is their any mention that Detroit’s bankruptcy was due in large part to a corrupt local government and predatory Wall Street banks.

That would have been inconvenient to their simplistic narrative, which sums up the evils of oil in one sweeping sentence: “War, environmental crises, climate change, political instability, weakened nation, profits robbed, all due to oil addiction. Until there is a will, there will be no way. The people who control the resource control us. They have us just where they want us,” says the narrator conspiratorially. I was surprised they didn’t have a shot of Monopoly Man twirling his moustache with evil music in the background.

Pump: the “solution”

In the second half of the film, the Tickells offer a solution, which happens to be a free market, libertarian one. “The way to break up a monopoly is with competition. We need choices including a car that doesn’t use oil at all.” The film talks about electric cars, but says batteries are too expensive now; most electricity comes from coal, natural gas and wind; and it will take three decades to switch to electric cars. They ask “What about the 1.3 trillion internal combustion engines that are on the road now?”

Now comes the next falsehood in the film. “Brazil is booming because of choice at the pump.” The film states that Brazil’s decision to replace oil with ethanol from sugarcane in the ‘70s led “their economy to grow by trillions. Millions of people who were starving are now fed. Their debt is completely paid off. And they are completely and totally independent of oil.” Then they say, “As far as food versus fuel, nothing is being displaced to make ethanol.” Tell that to the tens of thousands of indigenous peoples whose land was stolen to grow sugar cane. They went from being able to produce their own food and sustain their own way of life to being wage slaves on what was once their own land.

The film states this “took 40 million Brazilians into the middle class.” The growth of the Brazilian economy comes from many factors. What is probably more causative to the rise of the middle class in Brazil were the Plano Real reforms introduced in 1994. Also, the film makes no mention that in Brazil, inequality is worsening. And the farming of both sugarcane and soybeans has led to the wholesale destruction of the Brazilian rainforest and the exacerbation of climate change.

The film says alcohol was the first fuel that Henry Ford used in the automobile. But then John D. Rockefeller saw that as a threat and ensured that Prohibition was passed, prohibiting the sale of all alcohol. Pretty big whopper! There is no mention that the American temperance movement, dating back to the 1830s and 40s, was responsible for Prohibition and that the anti-Saloon League was the most powerful single issue lobby group of the day. Rockefeller was just one of many disparate groups including the Democrats and the Republicans, the Ku Klux Klan and the NAACP that worked to pass Prohibition.

While alcohol can come from many sources, ethanol from corn is what is used in this country making up 10% of all fuel. “The only thing standing in its way is Big Oil,” says the film. Addressing the common argument that ethanol drives up food prices, the narrator says, conspiratorially, “That’s exactly what some people want you to believe. The same industry that fought it 100 years ago is fighting it today.” At this point in the film, the oil industry has been so demonized that the audience will believe anything.

To dispel the belief that growing land to produce corn based ethanol takes land away from growing food, they show that ethanol is a natural by-product of distilling cattle feed from corn. So it is being made anyway. They don’t show that that is only one source of the ethanol. In another Aronoff video on YouTube, he says 40% of our corn grown is grown for ethanol. There is no examination in “Pump” of whether we should be feeding cattle corn, which is unnatural to their diet, whether we should even be using land to raise cattle instead of raising grain, a more energy efficient use of land, or whether over the entire lifecycle of ethanol, it uses more energy than it creates, all ideas they gave credence to in their film “Fuel.” But in this film, they have funders to please.

The next fuel they tout is methanol, which they show to be cleaner burning and less explosive. They state that when California was instituting air quality rules in the ‘70s, Ford and Volkswagen experimented with methanol cars. But then in 1981, thanks to the lobbying of – guess who, the EPA implemented amendments to the Clean Air Act, which led to a reformulation of gas to make it cleaner, so they didn’t have to use methanol. In comes our ubiquitous narrator driving home the main theme of the movie: “Oil companies won and methanol lost.”

In fact, the EPA forced these amendments on car companies because of the newly invented three-way catalyst. This was an improvement to the catalytic converter, because it reduced more pollutants. So methanol was no longer needed to meet the California clean air standards.

Then we come to the point in the film where they say that methanol can be made from natural gas. At this point, the filmmakers cannot ignore the vast public outcry that has been directed against the process of fracking for natural gas. So they set it up this way. There is such a glut of natural gas that gas companies are flaring it into the air. So if it is being produced anyway, we might as well use it for fuel. “Clearly industry can improve its practices. But love it or hate it, natural gas is here to stay.”

The reason the gas industry is flaring is that there are not enough pipelines to get it to market. And the high cost of pipelines and low price of natural gas makes it uneconomical to build them. But Obama and his Energy Secretary, whose research at MIT was funded by the natural gas industry, are trying their hardest to build more pipelines, refineries to liquefy natural gas (LNG) and export terminals to ship both LNG and coal overseas. If you’ve read anything about all the leaks and explosions over the past few years since the shale oil and gas boom began, you know that pipeline expansion does not bode well for human health or the environment.

Furthermore, if LNG export terminals are approved, this country will see an explosion of fracking even worse than what we’ve seen already. And with it more groundwater and air pollution, more earthquakes, billions more gallons of water wasted and increased climate change. And ironically, if they do succeed with their plan to export LNG and lift the 40 year oil export ban, both of which Obama and his industry captured Energy Secretary are trying to do, the cost of both fuels will go up, because the price is set on the world market. We will send most of it to China where they will pay more. So we will frack up the country and not even end up with low prices, energy independence or that trillion-dollar methanol industry Eyal Aronoff is touting.

The filmmakers respond

While Rebecca Tickell insists that the film does not promote fracking, to say that the “industry can improve its practices” is to imply that fracking can be done safely and cleanly. Further, to proclaim “natural gas is here to stay” implies resignation to this state of affairs, hardly motivating if you really want your audience to hate and fight fracking. No filmmakers can seriously call themselves environmentalists if they produce a film that advocates for anything less than the banning of this horrific practice.

Rebecca wrote: “The movie does not “advocate fracking,” but instead it actually shows with onscreen graphics and clear math – that we can create all of the natural gas and methanol we would need to replace America’s liquid energy needs – sustainably – with sewage, trash, animal waste, landfill gas and CO2 pulled from the atmosphere. Also natural gas (CH4) or “methane” created from sewage and landfills is by far the cheapest form of CH4 that can be produced, and CO2 from the atmosphere for free.”

However, according to Jack Eidt, Wilder Utopia Publisher and Board Director of the LA Biodiesel Coop, “The concept of scaling up production of methanol to rival fossil fuels would require a massive transition. The most economical feedstock for methanol is the fossil fuel natural gas, and the most common source is from fracking. While it is true that sewage, animal waste, and landfill gas exist as decent feedstocks, we are a long way from making that transition on a large scale. Anaerobic digesters are illegal in many places, and their significant future potential would require political and economic factors to be overcome.

Landfill gas is already being collected and put into use local to those landfills. The burning of trash will never be a sustainable and clean way of producing energy, and though pyrolysis (gasification, plasma arc) of certain biomass may have some limited applications, it is dirty and dangerous when used for waste like tires, medical wastes, plastics, etc.

Also, turning waste streams into fuel will have the unenviable consequence of requiring our waste streams to compound at a time when the zero waste movement is making gains. To wait to scale up waste streams to compete with fossil fuels would take way longer than improving the battery technology for EVs as well as redesigning cars with fiber composites and scaling up wind and solar, which are already happening.”

While the Tickells might not have intended to make a film advocating fracking, the funders and the experts of the film have been touting it in articles and in public appearances. When I asked what she thought of that, Rebecca said, “anything not in the movie we cannot vouch for.”

She said that when they showed the shots of fracking in the Bakken Shale, they intentionally used eerie music and a clip where John Hofmeister said, “It’s a dirty fuel.” Well, he said that because they frack for oil in the Bakken Shale, not natural gas. And oil is the villain in this film.

Furthermore, while she told me “nowhere do we promote natural gas in the film,” she must have forgotten the scene in the film that includes a man extolling the virtues of natural gas. “It’s cleaner. It’s abundant right here in America. It’s AMERICAN!” That scene is actually in the trailer, which they are using extensively to promote the film, which is slated to be released in 20 cities nationwide.

Last week, Sean Hannity touted the film on Fox News. When he asked John Hofmeister whether fracking poisons our water, “What does the EPA say, John?” —surely a set-up question—Hofmeister replied, “EPA head Gina McCarthy has said there is not a single documented case of polluted water from hydrofracking,” which is a total lie. Three EPA investigations into contaminated groundwater were halted by the Obama administration after proof was uncovered.

Hofmeister then goes on to say fracking is not without risks, but that with regulation, it can be done right. In fact, due to the Halliburton loophole, fracking is exempt from the Safe Drinking Water Act and several other federal regulations. Also, regulators are totally captured by industry in every state. The Center for Biological Diversity just reported that the industry is ignoring the disclosure laws mandated by SB 4, last year’s weak fracking regulatory bill in California, and the state agency is doing nothing about it.

When I shared Hofmeister’s comments with Rebecca, she said that she and Josh “didn’t share all the same viewpoints as the people in the film.” So then I asked her if she could see how the film could be used to promote the use of natural gas, she said she “could definitely see that…but this movie is not going to make people drill more.”

She said it was good that people like Hannity were promoting the film, because “you don’t have people from that side talking about how you have to get off oil…We have to start a conversation with someone other than the Green choir.” Well, actually the right has been talking about energy independence for years.

What she seemed to miss was that Sean Hannity was talking only about getting off foreign oil not oil in general. The title of the segment was: “New documentary seeks to end US dependence on foreign oil.” And the graphic behind Hannity said “Drill Baby Drill.”

In another video interview, Gal Luft, another Fuel Freedom Foundation board member and expert featured in “Pump,” says that oil companies are becoming natural gas companies. “John Hofmeister, former president of Shell, told me that Shell last year became a de facto natural gas company.  So if you — half of your portfolio is natural gas, you — it is in your interest to shift some of the effort to creating demand for natural gas, you make more money on your natural gas even if it means less money on your oil, whereas a country like Saudi Arabia cannot afford to accept a deal like this.”

When I asked Rebecca how she felt about the fact that the very oil monopoly she vilified in all three of her films was moving into natural gas, something her film promoted, she said it was “very scary.”

Chapter Three of Luft’s book “Petropoly: The Collapse of America’s Energy Pardigm” is called “Hope and Change: America’s Natural Gas.” A promo for the book on Amazon reads “On the bright side, a revolution in extraction technologies has opened the door to unconventional natural gas.”

As Josh Tickell said to the Daily Beast writer, “There was a moment at the end of the meeting when we looked at each other and knew in our gut we should get up and leave, but we made the wrong choice. I didn’t look into my gut, and I regret that.” I wonder if someday he might feel the same way about whom he had to get into bed with to make this film.

What is most alarming about “Pump,” which I hope will not last long in theaters, is what Tickell said at the screening I attended. He wants to “put it into the iPad, laptop, Note and Twitter feed of every student…What would it be like,” he asked, “if the best parts of this movie were taught in every school?” My answer: it would be just as horrific as if the Koch Brothers climate change denial junk science was taught in every school. It could set back the movement to get us off fossil fuels and onto renewables. And I have no doubt the Fuel Freedom Foundation is planning to fund this endeavor as well.

The film’s and my conclusion

To advance their agenda, the FFF needs cars converted to run on biofuels and legislation to advance the Open Fuel standard. The rest of the film shows that many cars on the road are already flex fuel vehicles but many owners don’t know it. They show how one can install a kit or hack the car’s computer to convert any car to flex fuel. The film talks about how we need to increase the infrastructure of flex fuel gas stations and pass the Open Fuel Standard.

“Pump” closes by restating its theme: freedom of choice. “Americans have been hearing about energy independence since 1974. But nothing has been done. It’s time to give Americans choice. We cannot rely on government. We cannot rely on corporations. Americans have to rely on themselves.” Bashing government and corporations! This is an argument that both Tea Partiers and Occupiers can love. They go on to say “It is as American as American can be. Everybody has a chance for a better future. And a better future begins at the pump

There is nothing inherently objectionable about freedom of choice. But when it is used as a buzzword to cover up agendas like those of the Fuel Freedom Foundation and the libertarian Koch Brothers’ Freedom Partners, let the buyer beware. It is unrealistic to expect that people exercising free choice will solve the problem of climate change. Individuals and corporations pursuing their free market interests have gotten us into the mess we are in today.

It will require massive government action to solve the climate crisis. The Tickells understood this when they made “Fuel.” In that film, one of Tickell’s experts says, “It’s going to take everyone. It’s going to take every corporate entity. It’s going to take every government power to create the world that we have to create in order to survive.”

The danger of this is that “Pump” is really persuasive as a piece of propaganda. A lot of liberal friends who are against fracking did not make the connection after seeing this film. If people are just sucked into the story of the big bad oil companies thwarting Americans’ freedom of choice, they are going to walk away from this movie not thinking about the hard choices they and all of us have to make to get off fossil fuels. Instead they will think about how they can reconfigure their cars to get cheaper gas and feel smug about it because they are sticking it to Big Oil.

At the end of my investigation, I have come to believe that the Tickells are well-intentioned people who were hamstrung by their funders. As Rebecca said to the Daily Beast writer about the fake anti-fracking film, “As documentary filmmakers, the biggest challenge we have is raising money for films. When that call came along, we were really grateful to have funding for this film that we thought was very important.”

If the Tickells really wanted to make a movie about how to get off oil and power the world, including transportation fuel, with alternative sources, they could have made a movie about Mark Jacobson, the Stanford professor who has developed a plan to power our economy on 100% renewable sources, mostly solar, wind and water, by 2030. Rebecca told me she never heard of him or his website. Maybe that can be the subject of their next film. Any billionaires out there who support renewables? Tom Steyer, are you game?

Saturday, August 9, 2014

UROKO: The True History of the Banking Cartels and the Federal Reserve



Uroko is the Japanese word for 'scale', as in the scale of a fish or serpent. The Japanese expression "uroko ga me kara ochiru", or, "scales fall from one's eyes" is the English equivalent of "waking up to the truth". Uroko is an attempt to strip away the fairy tales we have been told since birth, exposing the true nature of the world we live in.

In part 1: 'Bank Wars', the history of the establishment of the Federal Reserve system, starting with the American Revolution, the war of 1812 and the rise of the Rothschild banking dynasty.

In part 2, 'Bank Wars' continues as we learn about stockholders of the 2nd National Bank of the US such as John Jacob Astor, how Andrew Jackson killed the bank, the rise of National City Bank and the power of the bankers culminating in the assassination of Lincoln. The story continues with 'The Robber Barons', touching on the roots of the Morgan banking dynasty.

Part 3 delves into alliances between European bankers and the American industrialists they supported such as J.D. Rockefeller and E. H. Harriman, ending with a brief history of the Spanish American war.

Part 4 deals with the events leading up to passage of the Federal Reserve Act in 1913 including Roosevelt's trust-busting, the panic of 1907 and the meeting of banking house representatives at Jeckyll Island.

Part 5 looks at WWI and its true causes.

Part 6 presents excerpts from G. Edward Griffin's interview with Norman Dodd, where Dodd reveals the true nature of the tax-exempt foundations.

Part 7 deals firstly with the Council on Foreign Relations and its part in the forming of the Central Intelligence Agency, and secondly with the money trust's role in the Bolshevik Revolution and the militarization of Japan.

In Part 8 the story of the Bolsheviks concludes with the fall of Czarist Russia, followed by a foray into the true roots of the ruling elite. Topics addressed include the Dutch and British East India Companies, Freemasonry and the Templar Knights.

Part 9 continues to explore the significance of the Templar Knights and their relationship to the modern ruling elite, as well as the partnership between the hiers and descendants of the Templars and Jewish financiers in Spain and Portugal up until the Spanish Inquisition and a mirror of that relationship in Holland and England beginning in the 17th century.

Part 10 briefly addresses the Khazarian roots which connect the Jewish financiers of Europe to various ruling houses, including the Stewarts, the Hohens and the Drummond clan of Scotland. This section ends by tying the Templars to the Russells and the Skull and Bones fraternity at Yale University.

Part 11 picks up with the Skull and Bones fraternity, the Bush-Harriman-Rockefeller connection and the Brown Brothers Harriman merger. From there Brown Brothers Harriman and the Dulles Brothers' involvement in Nazi funding is touched on and the 3rd architect of the Defense Act of 1947 is named. Finally, the CIA's true reason d'etre is explained and a brief history of its involvement in coups and interventions around the world is told.

Alan Grayson: "Which Foreigners Got the Fed's $500,000,000,000?" Bernan...



This is Congressman Alan Grayson questioning Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke on $550B of loans to foreigners (or 'central liquidity swaps' in Federal Reserve-ese').

Which financial institutions received this money? Bernanke's answer: I don't know.

As the Fed was lending this money, the dollar increased by 30% in value. Grayson asks, was this a coincidence? Bernanke's answer: yes.

$9,000,000,000,000 MISSING From The Federal Reserve SHOCKING FOOTAGE



Rep. Alan Grayson questions the FED inspector General where $9 TRillion dollars went... and Inspector General Elizabeth Coleman hasn't a clue...Dunno whether to laugh or cry - I am still getting over the shock and have watched 4 times - LISTEN carefully to what she says - THEY HAVE NO JURISTRICTION to investigate the fed!!! Only their programs?? OK the world has been fooled long enough ENOUGH ENOUGH!!!

Money, Banking and the Federal Reserve



Thomas Jefferson and Andrew Jackson understood "The Monster". But to most Americans today, "Federal Reserve" is just a name on the dollar bill. They have no idea of what the central bank does to the economy, or to their own economic lives; of how and why it was founded and operates; or of the sound money and banking that could end the statism, inflation, and business cycles that the Fed generates.

Dedicated to Murray N. Rothbard, steeped in American history and Austrian economics, and featuring Ron Paul, Joseph Salerno, Hans Hoppe, and Lew Rockwell, this extraordinary documentary is the clearest, most compelling explanation ever offered of the Fed, and why curbing it must be our first priority.

Alan Greenspan was not, we're told, happy about this 1996 blockbuster. Watch it, and you'll understand why. This is economics and history as they are meant to be: fascinating, informative, and motivating. This movie is changing America.

Saturday, August 2, 2014

Jimmy Carter unveils truth about Israel



Former President Jimmy Carter, author of a new book, Palestine: Peace Not Apartheid,
is interviewed from his home in Plains, Georgia. He responds to a caller who asks questions concerning pressure put on the US political system and the resulting support of Israel.

Monday, May 12, 2014

Bring Back Our Girls





Mrs Laila St Matthew-Daniel is one of the voices fighting against abuse of women in Nigeria. She is a Life Transformation Strategist and founder of ACTS Generation, an NGO against domestic violence.She is championing the ‘Bring back the abducted Chibok girls’ campaign held in Lagos. In this interview, she speaks on the abduction.
The abduction of the Chibok girls happened in a state under emergency rule while another eight were kidnapped. What is your take on the situation?
How could this happen in a state under emergency rule? Terrorists had four hours operation and carted away the girls without help from anybody after which they journeyed into the forest. Remember the principal was said to be there; and the next minute, they said she was at her daughter’s place. There is discrepancy about the number of the kidnapped students. At times you wonder if we have leaders.
The hatch tag, “Bring Back Our Girls”, was initiated by a South African activist on social media. She was just wondering how, in the 21st century, people could go into schools and cart away students. So she said everybody should begin to say it and, when we had our rally, we decided to use it, and before we knew it, it went viral.
My take is that this is beyond Nigeria. Everybody must work together to bring back the girls and I am happy that the international community including the non-English speaking countries are ready to work with us to bring back the girls
President Jonathan said while inaugurating the Chibok girls rescue committee that, “we must bring back our daughters”. I think he is optimistic that the girls will be rescued.
 INTERVIEW: How ‘Bring Back Our Girls’ Campaign Went Viral— Matthew Daniel

One is happy to hear that but saying that we are not prepared for this type of terrorist attack shows how unserious we are as a nation. Remember they said they want to turn this country to an Islamic state. We should note that they attack in different ways. Most times they attack the soft targets and as you face the soft targets, they launch another terrible attack. I am happy that government instead of allowing pride to take the better part of them accepted help from outside.

The US anti-terror experts are here already but some northern leaders say they should stay away promising to negotiate with Boko Haram to bring back the girls.
It is too late to do that. What have they been doing going to four weeks? So, they can negotiotiate and hundreds of lives are lost everytime? The US officials are here and many will come. The incessant killings must stop. I know US is not only going to ameliorate what has happened but will also find out what is on ground. It is sad that leaders like them could come out at this time to stop help that can end the insurgency in the North. All we want is peace.
What can you say about the boldness of the Boko Haram leader, Shekau, saying he will sell the Christian girls and the Muslims among them, he will marry them out?

That is why we need international help because it is beyond Nigeria. If there is an international market where human beings are sold, then it should be exposed.
We need to continue to pray and also put pressure on our government because we don’t have arms and ammunition but our voices. We are the voice for those who do not have voices. Some people said the parents of the kidnapped children should be more inspired, How? You know their culture about women. They have been facing this problem for years and nothing has been done. Trust has broken down totally. We don’t know who to trust again. We don’t know who to believe. The parents said they went to Sambisa forest and they didn’t see any soldier on their way? There are so many questions to be asked. We have gotten to the point that nobody should be afraid because people want answers to the challenges posed by terrorism. Our leaders should begin to respect the people and the people themselves should begin to demand for explanation. Why should a protest march be stopped in Kogi State by the police?
Our President too said he cannot negotiate with the people he doesn’t know because nobody has come out to take responsibility for kidnapping the children; shortly after, Shekau released a video. I was thinking Madam Jonathan will mobilize women on the streets and carry placards but instead she said they should not protest.
Shekau got that confidence because he could see that we are toothless bull dogs. He can see that we are busy fighting ourselves as Christians and Muslims. No respect for women. What they think women are for is to make babies. They don’t want them to have education because they know if they do, they will refuse the demonic power the men have over them. They don’t even want their boys to go to school. They don’t want Western education, yet the guns they use, the armoured tank in the video he released are the products of the West; what about their means of communication? Are they not from Western education? It is just more than that
We are celebrating Children’s Day on May 27. We do hope the children will be back before then.
It has never happened in the history of Nigeria that our girls will not be celebrating. So we are hopeful they will be back with everybody working together including the international community. Our girls must come back. The position of Nigeria women is that all these girls should be brought back alive. That is when Nigerians will believe that our government is serious and will gain our confidence again.

In the local Hausa language, Boko Haram means "Western education is forbidden". So the abductions show the group's visceral hatred for Western education. Moreover, the group promotes the puritanical Islamic view that a woman's place is in the home.

The militants have attacked schools before. The school in Chibok, which was hosting final year exams for Christian and Muslim schoolgirls, was one of the only ones still open in this remote area of Borno state and had no security protection that night.

Nigerian students living in fear
When it attacked a rural boarding school in Yobe in March, Boko Haram killed at least 29 males - but spared the lives of girls, ordering them to go home and get married. Some analysts believe that Boko Haram felt its order had been defied, and it has retaliated with the Chibok abductions in order to impose its will.

However, there is a precedent for abductions - in May 2013, Boko Haram released a video, saying it had taken women and children - including teenage girls - hostage in response to the arrest of its members' wives and children. At the time, the group said it would treat the women as slaves - something it has also said about the Chibok girls. This has fuelled speculation that it is adhering to the ancient Islamic belief that women captured in conflict are part of the "war booty".

Who are Nigeria's Boko Haram Islamists?


How Kidnapped Chibok Girls Were Moved From Sambisa Forest To Ashaka Forest

The kidnapped Chibok girls have been moved from the Sambisa forest towards the forest around Ashaka in Gombe State, a top security official has told PREMIUM TIMES.
The security official, who sought anonymity as he was not authorised to speak, also denied the rumor that some of the girls were rescued on Saturday.
He, however, said there were high hopes for the quick rescue of the girls based on the ongoing cooperation between Nigerian officials and their counterparts from the U.S. and U.K. on the rescue efforts.
“It is not true that they have been rescued yet, but we noticed and observed movement of some of the girls from the Sambisa region towards Ashaka forest in Gombe state”, said the security personnel.
The officer added that efforts are being put in place to “carefully track” the abductors and get the girls freed.
“We have not, even for once, lost hope that these girls would be freed. This is a delicate matter which must be handled with all professionalism and absolute care”, the source added.
For almost a month that the over 250 girls were kidnapped from the Government Secondary School, Chibok, the Nigerian military has decided not to provide information on details of its rescue efforts.
The military has, however, said it is doing its best to free the girls.
In a response to PREMIUM TIMES enquiry on the reported sightings of the girls at the Gombe forest, military spokesperson, Chris Olukolade, said “this will have to be verified as no such information has been received. However, every information gets acted upon somehow.”

Fifty-eight children have escaped, some of them by jumping off trucks in which they were being transported after some 200 gunmen captured them at the school. "We ran into the bush and waited until daybreak before we went back home," one girl told the BBC.

Associated Press news agency reported that an intermediary is in contact with the abductors. It reported that two children had died of snakebites and 11 were ill. But just how many are still in captivity is unclear. Children from neighbouring areas had been at the school to write their exams when Boko Haram carried out its offensive. School records were burnt during the attack, making it difficult to establish, officials say, how many were taken away. Officials also say more children may have escaped, with their families failing to report their return to the authorities.

 http://www.osundefender.org/?p=164199

With outrage. Nigeria is heavily split along religious and ethnic lines, but all the main groups have united to put pressure on the government to secure their release. Protests have been organised over social media using the hashtag #BringBackOurGirls. President Goodluck Jonathan's critics says the government has handled the crisis badly, and he should step down rather than run for another term in elections next year. His allies respond that the abductions took place in an opposition-controlled state, and the abductions reflect more badly on the opposition than the federal government.

Nigeria leader under pressure over abducted schoolgirls

Nigeria school abduction sparks social media campaign

President Jonathan imposed a state of emergency in the three insurgency-hit states, Borno, Yobe and Adamawa, in May 2013, but Boko Haram has retaliated by stepping up attacks and the insurgency has entered its bloodiest phase. More than 1,500 have died this year alone in the violence. Government troops say they are poorly resourced and do not have the firepower to rival Boko Haram.

Not only does the group operate like a guerrilla movement, but it also resembles an army with ground forces. Hundreds of its fighters have marched into villages, backed by pick-up trucks and armoured vehicles mounted with machine guns. So it has a military arsenal usually found in a national army.
It is not clear where Boko Haram gets its weapons or financing - it may have made money from its recent kidnapping of foreigners. The government suspects it is backed by certain politicians and disloyal security officers - and it has forged ties with jihadi groups such as al-Shabab in Somalia and al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb.

Although some dispute this, the increasingly sophisticated nature of its attacks - including bombings and assassinations - suggest that it has received foreign training. There are also unconfirmed reports that it recruits poor people from neighbouring states, including Chad and Niger, and pays them to fight.


          Bring Back Our Girls Rally in Chicago


By Peter Bella, Saturday at 4:44 pm
On Saturday afternoon several hundred people gathered in Daley Plaza to support the Bring Back Our Girls movement. Bring Back Our Girls is a world wide movement protesting the kidnapping of Nigerian girls from their school by the terrorist group, Boko Haram in April.
There are approximately 50, 000 people from Nigeria living in Chicago and the suburbs.

Reverend Jesse Jackson and United States Congressman Danny Davis spoke to the crowd and participated in a march around the downtown area.
Several people and children had the names of the kidnapped girls written on their shirts.
After the rally in Daley Plaza, the supporters marched to Michigan Avenue and back.

Tomorrow is Mother's Day. Let us remember those mothers in Nigeria who lost their daughters
                 Bring Back Our Girls Says Michelle Obama

               
                 Boko Haram leader: 'I abducted your girls'


                 Chibok Girls: First Lady Meets Stakeholders

As efforts continue towards rescuing the abducted school girls from the Government Girls Secondary School Chibok in Borno State, First Lady Dame Patience Jonathan was on Friday Night briefed that 530 students were enrolled for the West African Examination Council when the abduction took place. The revelation by the head of WAEC National Office Mr. Charles Eguridu appears to be a major lead in the resolution of conflicting information about the number of girls abducted by the insurgents.

Tuesday, March 18, 2014

Arctic Death Spiral and the Methane Time Bomb



                          Catastrophic  Methane  Danger    
by Nafeez Ahmed
    Debate over the plausibility of a catastrophic release of methane in coming decades due to thawing Arctic permafrost has escalated after a new Nature paper warned that exactly this scenario could trigger costs equivalent to the annual GDP of the global economy.

Scientists of different persuasions remain fundamentally divided over whether such a scenario is even plausible. Carolyn Rupple of the US Geological Survey (USGS) Gas Hydrates Project told NBC News  the scenario is "nearly impossible." Ed Dlugokencky, a research scientist at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's (NOAA) said there has been "no detectable change in Arctic methane emissions over the past two decades." NASA's Gavin Schmidt said that ice core records from previously warm Arctic periods show no indication of such a scenario having ever occurred. Methane hydrate expert Prof David Archer reiterated that "the mechanisms for release operate on time scales of centuries and longer." These arguments were finally distilled in a lengthy, seemingly compelling essay posted on Skeptical Science  last Thursday, concluding with utter finality:

"There is no evidence that methane will run out of control and initiate any sudden, catastrophic effects."

But none of the scientists rejecting the plausibility of the scenario are experts in the Arctic, specifically the East Siberia Arctic Shelf (ESAS). In contrast, an emerging consensus among ESAS specialists based on continuing fieldwork is highlighting a real danger of unprecedented quantities of methane venting due to thawing permafrost.

So who's right? What are these Arctic specialists saying? Are their claims of a potentially catastrophic methane release plausible at all? I took a dive into the scientific literature to find out.

What I discovered was that Skeptical Science's unusually skewered analysis was extremely selective, and focused almost exclusively on the narrow arguments of scientists out of touch with cutting edge developments in the Arctic. Here's what you need to know.



1. The 50 Gigatonne decadal methane pulse scenario was posited by four Arctic specialists, and is considered plausible by Met Office scientists

The authors of the controversial new Nature paper on costs of Arctic warming  didn't just pull their decadal methane catastrophe scenario out of thin air. The scenario was first postulated in 2008  by Dr Natalie Shakhova of the University of Alaska Fairbanks, Dr Igor Semiletov from the Pacific Oceanological Institute at the Russian Academy of Sciences, and two other Russian experts.

Their paper noted that while seabed permafrost underlaying most of the ESAS was previously believed to act as an "impermeable lid preventing methane escape," new data showing "extreme methane supersaturation of surface water, implying high sea-to-air fluxes" challenged this assumption. Data showed:

"Extremely high concentrations of methane (up to 8 ppm) in the atmospheric layer above the sea surface along with anomalously high concentrations of dissolved methane in the water column (up to 560 nM, or 12000% of super saturation)."

One source of these emissions "may be highly potential and extremely mobile shallow methane hydrates, whose stability zone is seabed permafrost-related and could be disturbed upon permafrost development, degradation, and thawing." Even if the methane hydrates are deep, fissures, taliks and other soft spots create heat pathways  from the seabed which warms quickly due to shallow depths. Various mechanisms  for such processes have been elaborated in detail.

The paper then posits the plausibility of a 50 Gigatonne (Gt) methane release occurring abruptly "at any time." Noting that the total quantity of carbon in the ESAS is "not less than 1,400 Gt", the authors wrote:

"Since the area of geological disjunctives (fault zones, tectonically and seismically active areas) within the Siberian Arctic shelf composes not less than 1-2% of the total area and area of open taliks (area of melt through permafrost), acting as a pathway for methane escape within the Siberian Arctic shelf reaches up to 5-10% of the total area, we consider release of up to 50 Gt of predicted amount of hydrate storage as highly possible for abrupt release at any time. That may cause ∼12-times increase of modern atmospheric methane burden with consequent catastrophic greenhouse warming."

So the 50 Gt scenario used by the new Nature paper does not postulate the total release of the ESAS methane hydrate reservoir, but only a tiny fraction of it.

The scale of this scenario is roughly corroborated elsewhere. A 2010 scientific analysis led by the UK's Met Office  in Review of Geophysics recognised the plausibility of catastrophic carbon releases from Arctic permafrost thawing of between 50-100 Gt this century, with a 40 Gt carbon release from the Siberian Yedoma region possible over four decades.

Shakhova and her team have developed these findings from data derived from over 20 field expeditions from 1999 to 2011 . In 2010, Shakhova et. al published a paper in Science  based on their annual research trips which highlighted  that the ESAS was a key reservoir of methane "more than three times as large as the nearby Siberian wetland... considered the primary Northern Hemisphere source of atmospheric methane." Current average methane concentrations in the Arctic are:

"about 1.85 parts per million, the highest in 400,000 years" and "on par with previous estimates of methane venting from the entire World Ocean."

As the ESAS is shallow at only 50 metres, most of the methane being released is escaping into the atmosphere  rather than being absorbed into water.

The existence of such shallow methane hydrates in permafrost  - at depths as small as 20m - was confirmed by Shakhova in the Journal of Geophysical Research . There has been direct observation  and sampling  of these hydrates  by Russian geologists  in recent decades  until now; this has also been confirmed by US government scientists .

    2. Arctic methane hydrates are becoming increasingly unstable in the context of anthropogenic climate change and it's impact on diminishing sea ice

The instability of Arctic methane hydrates in relation to sea ice retreat  - not predicted by conventional models - has been increasingly recognised by experts. In 2007, a study in Eos, Transactions  found that:

"Large volumes of methane in gas hydrate form can be stored within or below the subsea permafrost, and the stability of this gas hydrate zone is sustained by the existence of permafrost. Degradation of subsea permafrost and the consequent destabilization of gas hydrates could significantly if not dramatically increase the flux of methane, a potent greenhouse gas, to the atmosphere."

In 2009, a research team of 19 scientists wrote a paper in Geophysical Research Letters  documenting how the past thirty years of a warming Arctic current due to contemporary climate change was triggering unprecedented emissions of methane from gas hydrate in submarine sediments beneath the seabed in the West Spitsbergen continental margin. Prior to the new warming, these methane hydrates had been stable  at water depths as shallow as 360m. Over 250 plumes of methane gas bubbles were found rising from the seabed due to the 1C temperature increase in the current:

"... causing the liberation of methane from decomposing hydrate... If this process becomes widespread along Arctic continental margins, tens of Teragrams of methane per year could be released into the ocean."

The Russian scientists investigating the ESAS also confirmed that the levels of methane release they discovered were new . As Steve Connor reported in the Independent, since 1994 Igor Semilitov:

"... has led about 10 expeditions in the Laptev Sea but during the 1990s he did not detect any elevated levels of methane. However, since 2003 he reported a rising number of methane 'hotspots', which have now been confirmed using more sensitive instruments."

In 2012, a Nature study  mapping over 150,000 Arctic methane seeps concluded that:

"... in a warming climate, disintegration of permafrost, glaciers and parts of the polar ice sheets could facilitate the transient expulsion of 14C-depleted methane trapped by the cryosphere cap."

    3. Multiple scientific reviews, including one by over 20 Arctic specialists, confirm decadal catastrophic Arctic methane release is plausible

A widely cited 2011 Nature review  dismissed such a catastrophic scenario as implausible because methane "gas hydrates occur at low saturations and in sediments at such great depths below the seafloor or onshore permafrost that they will barely be affected by [contemporary levels of] warming over even [1,000] yr."

But this study and others like it completely ignore the new empirical evidence on permafrost-associated shallow water methane hydrates on the Arctic shelf. Scientific reviews that have accounted for the empirically-observed dynamics of permafrost-associated methane come to the opposite conclusion.

In 2007, scientists Matthew Reagan and George Moridis at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory published a paper in Geophysical Research Letters  exploring the vulnerability of methane gas hydrates. They concluded based on simulations of different types of oceanic gas hydrate responding to seafloor temperature changes:

"... while many deep hydrate deposits are indeed stable under the influence of rapid seafloor temperature variations, shallow deposits, such as those found in arctic regions or in the Gulf of Mexico, can undergo rapid dissociation and produce significant carbon fluxes over a period of decades."

A 2010 scientific analysis led by the UK's Met Office in Review of Geophysics  found:

"The time scales for destabilization of marine hydrates are not well understood and are likely to be very long for hydrates found in deep sediments but much shorter for hydrates below shallow waters, such as in the Arctic Ocean... Overall, uncertainties are large, and it is difficult to be conclusive about the time scales and magnitudes of methane feedbacks, but significant increases in methane emissions are likely, and catastrophic emissions cannot be ruled out... The risk of a rapid increase in [methane] emissions is real but remains largely unquantified."

Another extensive scientific review of data from the ESAS gathered between 1995 and 2011 by over twenty Arctic specialists published in the Proceedings of the Russian Academy of Sciences  similarly concluded that:

"The [ESAS] is a powerful supplier of methane to the atmosphere owing to the continued degradation of the submarine permafrost, which causes the destruction of gas hydrates. The emission of methane in several areas of the [ESAS] is massive to the extent that growth in the methane concentrations in the atmosphere to values capable of causing a considerable and even catastrophic warning on the Earth is possible."

Other recent scientific  reviews  corroborate these findings.

    4. Current Arctic methane levels are unprecedented

A 2011 Nature paper  found that ten times more carbon than thought is escaping via thawing coastal permafrost at the ESAS. Although it is not yet clear whether or how the quantities of Arctic methane are impacting on total atmospheric methane emissions, a number of scientists argue that the increasing spikes in methane detected in the Arctic in recent years is indeed unprecedented.

Despite NOAA scientist Dr Dlugokencky 's reassurances that current Arctic methane emission levels are nothing to be "alarmed" about, his own data shows that Arctic methane levels were 1850 ppb in yr 2000, rising up to 1890 ppb in 2012.

Indeed, Dr Leonid Yurganov, Senior Research Scientist at the NASA/UMBC Joint Centre for Earth Systems Technology, and his co-scientists from NOAA and Harvard (Shawn Xiong and Steven Wofsy) disagree with Dlugokencky. In a paper for the American Geophysical Union  last December they charted a worrying "global increase of methane" since 2007-8, with particular spikes in 2009 and 2011-12 in the northern hemisphere, with maximum methane concentrations in the Arctic :

"IASI data for the autumn months (October-November) clearly indicate Eurasian shelf areas of the Arctic Ocean as a significant methane emitter. The maximal methane concentrations were found over Kara and Laptev Seas. According to IASI data, during the last three years in autumn time, methane over Eurasian shelf has been increased by 25 ppb, over the N. American shelf, by 23 ppb, and over the land between 50 N and 70 N for both Eastern and Western hemispheres, by 20 ppb."

Yurganov et. al point out that between January 2009 and 2013, Arctic methane levels ramped steadily higher by about 10-20 ppb on average each year. They also note that maximum Arctic methane emissions occur annually between September and October - coinciding with the Arctic sea ice minimum.

     5. The tipping point for continuous Siberian permafrost thaw could be as low as 1.5C

New research led by Prof Antony Vaks published this year in Science  analysing a 500,000 year history of Siberian permafrost found that "global climates only slightly warmer than today are sufficient to thaw significant regions of permafrost." The study by eight experts found that there is a tipping point for continuous thawing of permafrost at 1.5C which "can potentially lead to substantial release of carbon trapped in the permafrost into the atmosphere."

     6. Arctic conditions during the Eemian interglacial lasting from 130,000 to 115,000 years ago are a terrible analogy for today's Arctic

Two recent studies challenge the relevance of Arctic conditions in the Eemian interglacial. A 2012 Geophysical Research Letters study rejects the idea that the Arctic experienced ice free summers in the Eemian, noting that Arctic temperatures were cooler than previously thought , with evidence that ice sheets were more resistant - partly due to vastly different Arctic ocean currents. Similarly, a new Nature study  found that the Greenland ice sheets experienced only modest melting in the Eemian, such that the extensive sea level rise at the time could only be explained by melting in Antarctica . Both studies suggest that the Arctic sea ice simply had not retreated enough to expose permafrost.

According to Prof Paul Beckwith of the University of Ottawa Laboratory for Paleoclimatology and Climatology, this can be explained by a number of factors:

"... the key distinction is that the warming today is from Greenhouse gases being higher and occurs 'twenty-four seven', namely the cooling at night is much less (diurnal variation smaller); in the Eemian the tilt of the Earth was much greater so there was much more seasonality, thus winters were much colder so the sea ice extent, thickness, and thus volume could build up much more, and the summers were warmer in the daytime, however the cooling at night was much greater than now (less greenhouse gas [GHG], more diurnal variation); net result is that the ice was much more durable in the Eemian. Greenland temps were higher during the daytime, but cooled off much more during the nighttime in the lower GHG concentration world."

    7. Paleoclimate records will not necessarily capture a large, abrupt methane pulse

Prof Beckwith also poured (ice cold) water on the claim that we know an abrupt methane release cannot occur, because it has never occurred before - purportedly proven as such an event is not detected in the ice cores:

"The length of time for the methane pulse is very important here. If most of the methane came out in a decade, for example then within a subsequent decade or so most of the methane will have been broken down to CO2 and H20 and also been dispersed/distributed around the planet, away from the pulse source area in the Arctic. The CO2 produced would have been small (CO2 stayed within 180-280 ppm range). It takes about 50 years or even more (depending on the snowfall rate and surface melt rates) for snow at the surface to be compacted into firn that closes off the air spaces creating the bubbles in the ice that are reservoirs of the methane and other atmospheric gases. Because of that 50 year bubble closure time, the large pulse of methane that was burped out of the marine sediments and terrestrial permafrost would be long gone and not result in a detectable signal in the ice core record. Just because the record does not capture it does not mean that it was not produced."

These comments are confirmed by an in-depth American Geophysical Union study  which notes that it "remains unclear if the full magnitude of atmospheric [methane] changes are recorded in ice cores because of diffusional smoothing of the [methane] while in the firn" as well as "signal smoothing" caused by "atmospheric effects."

But studies do indicate past precedent. A 2009 Science paper  argues that abrupt, catastrophic emissions from Arctic methane clathrates including from thawing permafrost played a key role 11,600 years ago at the end of the Younger Dryas cold period in driving wetland emissions, generating sudden massive warming.

So what?

All this proves that the $60 trillion price-tag for Arctic warming estimated by the latest Nature commentary should be taken seriously, prompting further urgent research and action on mitigation - rather than denounced on the basis of outdated, ostrich-like objections based on literature unacquainted with the ESAS.
                Arctic Methane: Why The Sea Ice Matters



Tuesday, February 18, 2014

The Trans-Pacific Partnership



The Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) is a massive new international trade pact being pushed by the U.S. government at the behest of transnational corporations. The TPP is already being negotiated between the United States, Australia, Brunei Darussalam, Canada, Chile, Malaysia, Mexico, New Zealand, Peru, Singapore, Vietnam, and most recently, Japan — which together cover approximately 40% of the global economy.  But it is also specifically intended as a “docking agreement” that other Pacific Rim countries would join over time, with the Philippines, Thailand, Colombia and others already expressing interest.  It is poised to become the largest Free Trade Agreement in the world.

The Trans-Pacific Partnership Would Empower Corporations to Attack U.S. Policies in Foreign Tribunals and Demand Taxpayer Compensation for Our Environmental, Health and Other Laws

The Trans-Pacific Partnership would include and even expand the controversial system of extreme corporate privileges called the "investor-state" regime. Under this system, the TPP would elevate individual foreign corporations to equal status with the sovereign governments signing the deal - allowing them to privately enforce this public treaty. The rules empower foreign corporations to skirt domestic laws and courts and directly challenge governments' health, environmental and other public interest policies before extrajudicial tribunals authorized to order unlimited amounts of compensation with taxpayer dollars.

The World Bank and UN tribunals that decide such cases are comprised of three corporate lawyers, unaccountable to any electorate, who rotate between suing governments for corporations and acting as the "judges." Tribunals are not bound by precedent and there is no appeal mechanism.

When an investor-state tribunal rules in favor of the foreign investor, the government must hand the corporation an amount of taxpayer money decided by the tribunal. Tribunals have already ordered governments to pay over $3.5 billion in investor-state cases under existing U.S. agreements. This includes payments over toxic bans, land-use policies, forestry rules and more. More than $14.7 billion remain in pending claims under U.S. agreements alone. Even when governments win, they often must pay for the tribunal's costs and legal fees, which average $8 million per case. The TPP would expand the scope of policies that could be attacked.

The proposed TPP foreign investor privileges would provide foreign firms greater "rights" than those afforded to domestic firms. This includes a "right" to not have expectations frustrated by a change in government policy. Claiming such radical privileges, foreign corporations have launched investor-state cases against a broad array of environmental, energy, consumer health, toxics, water, mining and other non-trade domestic policies that they allege undermine their "expected future profits."

                   TPP: Back-room Deal for the 1%



​  ​The Trans-Pacific Partnership Would Promote Off-Shoring of American Jobs

Nearly five million American manufacturing jobs – one out of every four – have been lost since implementation of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) and the World Trade Organization (WTO). Since NAFTA, over 60,000 American manufacturing facilities have closed. The TPP would replicate and expand on the NAFTA model.

A leaked text revealed that TPP is slated to include the extreme foreign investor privileges that help corporations offshore more U.S. jobs to low-wage countries. These NAFTA-style terms provide special benefits to firms that relocate abroad and eliminate many of the usual risks that make firms think twice about moving to low-wage countries.

Under the NAFTA model, U.S. manufacturing imports have soared while growth of U.S. manufacturing exports has slowed.

TPP includes Vietnam, a new favorite for corporations’ job offshoring, because
wages there are even lower than China.

Already, the growth of the U.S. trade deficit with China, since China entered the WTO in 2001, has had a devastating effect on U.S. workers and the U.S. economy. Between 2001 and 2011, 2.7 million U.S. jobs were lost or displaced.

Devastation of U.S. manufacturing drives down wages, erodes the tax base and heightens inequality. Despite major gains in American worker productivity, real median wages hover at 1979 levels. Government data shows that two out of every five displaced manufacturing workers who were rehired in 2012 experienced wage reductions of more than 20 percent. With the loss of manufacturing, tax revenue that could have funded social services or local infrastructure projects has declined, while displaced workers have turned to ever-shrinking welfare programs. This has resulted in the virtual collapse of some local governments in areas hardest hit.

               Trans-Pacific Partnership: Corporate Global Domination        
       The Trans-Pacific Partnership Would Ban "Buy American" and "Buy Local" Procurement Preferences

The TPP's procurement chapter would require that all firms operating in any signatory country be provided equal access as domestic firms to U.S. government procurement contracts over a certain dollar threshold. The United States would agree to waive "Buy American" and "Buy Local" procurement policies for all such foreign firms, eliminating an important policy tool to use U.S. tax dollars for U.S. job creation.

Some corporate TPP proponents argue that these rules would be good for the United States because they would ban domestic preferences in all signatory countries, allowing U.S. firms to bid on procurement contracts in other countries on equal footing with domestic firms. It is a ridiculous notion that new access for some U.S. companies to bid on contracts in TPP countries is a good trade-off for waiving "Buy American" preferences on U.S. procurement: Taking even the most favorable cut on other countries' markets, the total U.S. procurement market is more than five times the size of the combined procurement market of the current TPP negotiating parties: Australia, Brunei, Canada, Chile, Japan, Malaysia, Mexico, New Zealand, Peru, Singapore and Vietnam.

Even with Japan in the TPP, the U.S. procurement market is over twice as large as the new TPP procurement market would be. Plus, Japan and the United States are already party to the WTO's Government Procurement Agreement - which covers most procurement that the TPP would likely cover. Accordingly, there will be few, if any, new procurement opportunities in Japan for the United States.


                           No Back Room Deals for the 1%

            Labor rights: Will the Trans-Pacific Partnership FTA include labor standards based on International Labor Organization conventions, and if included, how will they be enforced?
            Investment Provisions: Will the Trans-Pacific Partnership FTA include so-called “investor-state” provisions that allow individual corporations to challenge environmental, consumer and other public interest policies as barriers to trade?
            Public Procurement: Will the Trans-Pacific Partnership FTA respect nations’ and communities’ right to set purchasing preferences that keep taxpayer dollars re-circulating in local economies?
            Access to Medicines: Will the Trans-Pacific Partnership FTA allow governments to produce and/or obtain affordable, generic medications for sick people?
            Agriculture: Will the Trans-Pacific Partnership FTA allow countries to ensure that farmers and farm workers are fairly compensated, while also preventing the agricultural dumping that has forced so many family farmers off their land?