Author Archives: MayeskiLatouf679

How Donald Trump Could Spark a Trade War With Europe

by MayeskiLatouf679 Posted on November 14, 2016

Mother Jones

For all his talk of renegotiating trade deals and cracking down on China, Donald Trump probably didn’t bargain for a trade war with the United States’ closest allies in Europe. But it’s not out of the question.

On Sunday, former French President Nicholas Sarkozy suggested imposing a carbon tax on US goods if Trump walks away from the Paris climate agreement. Sarkozy is currently competing for the presidential nomination of France’s center-right Republican party.

Under the Paris agreement, which went into effect earlier this month, countries pledged to reduce their greenhouse gas emissions in an effort to limit global warming to 3.6 degrees Fahrenheit above pre-industrial levels. During the campaign, Trump pledged to “cancel” the deal.

Sarkozy said that if Trump abandons the agreement, European countries should impose a 1-3 percent tax on American goods, according to the French newspaper Le Monde. The goal would be to protect European businesses that will be abiding by the global climate agreement from being undercut by US industries that won’t be subject to emissions limits.

It’s a striking position for Sarkozy, who sparked controversy earlier this year when he reportedly suggested that humans aren’t to blame for climate change.

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How Donald Trump Could Spark a Trade War With Europe

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How Did America’s Police Get So Militarized?

by MayeskiLatouf679 Posted on August 14, 2014

Mother Jones

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This story first appeared on the TomDispatch website.

Jason Westcott was afraid.

One night last fall, he discovered via Facebook that a friend of a friend was planning with some co-conspirators to break in to his home. They were intent on stealing Wescott’s handgun and a couple of TV sets. According to the Facebook message, the suspect was planning on “burning” Westcott, who promptly called the Tampa Bay police and reported the plot.

According to the Tampa Bay Times, the investigating officers responding to Westcott’s call had a simple message for him: “If anyone breaks into this house, grab your gun and shoot to kill.”

Around 7:30 pm on May 27th, the intruders arrived. Westcott followed the officers’ advice, grabbed his gun to defend his home, and died pointing it at the intruders. They used a semiautomatic shotgun and handgun to shoot down the 29-year-old motorcycle mechanic. He was hit three times, once in the arm and twice in his side, and pronounced dead upon arrival at the hospital.

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How Did America’s Police Get So Militarized?

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BP claims mission accomplished in Gulf cleanup; Coast Guard begs to differ

by MayeskiLatouf679 Posted on April 18, 2014

BP claims mission accomplished in Gulf cleanup; Coast Guard begs to differ

By

Katherine Welles / Shutterstock

BP this week metaphorically hung a “mission accomplished” banner over the Gulf of Mexico ecosystems that it wrecked when the Deepwater Horizon oil well blew up and spewed 200 million gallons of oil in 2010. Funny thing, though: BP isn’t the commander of the cleanup operation. The Coast Guard is. And it’s calling bullshit.

Here’s what BP said in a press statement on Tuesday, nearly four years after the blowout: “The U.S. Coast Guard today ended patrols and operations on the final three shoreline miles in Louisiana, bringing to a close the extensive four-year active cleanup of the Gulf Coast following the Deepwater Horizon accident. These operations ended in Florida, Alabama and Mississippi in June 2013.”

Helpful though it may have seemed for BP to speak on behalf of the federal government, the Coast Guard took some umbrage. From The Washington Post:

Coast Guard Capt. Thomas Sparks, the federal on-scene coordinator of the Deepwater Horizon response, sought to stress that the switch to what he called a “middle response” process “does not end cleanup operations.”

“Our response posture has evolved to target re-oiling events on coastline segments that were previously cleaned,” said Sparks. “But let me be absolutely clear: This response is not over — not by a long shot.”

The Gulf Restoration Network tried to explain the semantics behind BP’s deceptive statement. “When oil washes up on shore, BP is no longer automatically obliged to go out there and clean up the mess,” spokesperson Raleigh Hoke said. “Now the onus is on the public, and state and federal governments to find the oil and then call BP in.”

We get why BP would wish that the cleanup were over. The efforts have already cost $14 billion — a fraction of the $42 billion that the company expects to pay out in fines, compensation claims, and other costs related to the Deepwater Horizon disaster. It’s a nightmare that we all wish were over — but wishes and rhetoric do not remove poisons from an ecosystem.


Source
Active Shoreline Cleanup Operations from Deepwater Horizon Accident End, BP
Is gulf cleanup over or not? BP and Coast Guard differ, The Washington Post

John Upton is a science fan and green news boffin who tweets, posts articles to Facebook, and blogs about ecology. He welcomes reader questions, tips, and incoherent rants: johnupton@gmail.com.

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Thousands of Californians are about to run out of water

by MayeskiLatouf679 Posted on January 30, 2014

Thousands of Californians are about to run out of water

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Shutterstock

All Californians are being asked to cut back on their water use to help the state survive its drought emergency. But for members of 17 communities across the state, such reductions might not be voluntary — they’re in danger of running completely dry in the next few months.

Officials in these communities are considering the very real possibility that they’ll need to truck in water or even install portable desalination equipment.

The 17 vulnerable water systems serve as many as 11,000 residents apiece, though the tiniest serves just 39 people. Here’s the San Jose Mercury News with more:

In some communities, wells are running dry. In others, reservoirs are nearly empty. Some have long-running problems that predate the drought. …

“As the drought goes on, there will be more [communities at risk of running out of water] that probably show up on the list,” said Dave Mazzera, acting drinking-water division chief for the state Department of Public Health. …

Lompico County Water District, in the Santa Cruz Mountains near Felton, has long-standing water supply issues and is exploring a possible merger, but so far has been stymied by nearly $3 million in needed upgrades — a hefty bill for the district’s 500 customers.

“We have been unable to take water out of the creek since August and well production is down, and we didn’t have that much water to begin with,” said Lois Henry, a Lompico water board member.

Meanwhile, the San Francisco Examiner reports that the San Francisco Public Utilities Commission, which provides water to 2.5 million people in the Bay Area, could be forced to delay water recycling and water desalinization projects — just when they are needed the most.

The agency pipes most of its water all the way from Hetch Hetchy Reservoir in Yosemite National Park — and a project to reinforce its nearly 200-mile network of water pipes and pumps is running over budget, forcing cuts to other projects.

The good news is that California is finally receiving some winter storms. The bad news is that they won’t be nearly enough to quench the state’s dire thirst for water.


Source
California drought: 17 communities could run out of water within 60 to 120 days, state says, San Jose Mercury News
Water supply project costs could halt plans for desalination, water recycling plants, San Francisco Examiner

John Upton is a science fan and green news boffin who tweets, posts articles to Facebook, and blogs about ecology. He welcomes reader questions, tips, and incoherent rants: johnupton@gmail.com.

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People Save More Energy When They Think Someone Is Watching Them

by MayeskiLatouf679 Posted on September 5, 2013

Mother Jones

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This story first appeared on the Grist website and is reproduced here as part of the Climate Desk collaboration.

How do you prevent someone from wasting electricity? The same way you prevent them from picking their nose—make them think they are being watched.

Carnegie Mellon University researchers wanted to see whether the Hawthorne effect could be used to change energy-use patterns. The Hawthorne effect refers to the way people tend to alter their behavior when they sense they are being observed. The effect can be a pain in the ass for scientists trying to study human behavior, but it can also be a powerful tool for influencing that behavior.

Read more about how psychology could help fix climate change in “The Thirteenth Tipping Point“

The researchers sent postcards to a group of utility customers notifying them that their electricity usage was being tracked for one month as part of an experiment. The series of postcards offered no incentives or instructions to reduce energy use—they just let the customers know that they were being, in effect, watched. A control group of utility customers got no postcards.

Sure enough, the Hawthorne effect arose to work its magic. According to results reported Tuesday in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, people who received the postcards reduced their electricity consumption by an average of 2.7 percent.

A follow-up survey of postcard recipients indicated that the experiment had heightened their awareness of their own energy habits. Here’s what they said they did to cut electricity use:

That all sounds good. But once the customers thought the month-long experiment had ended, they returned to their former energy-wasting ways.

So all we need now are surveillance cameras installed in everybody’s homes, watching their every appliance. Right? Oh, wait…

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People Save More Energy When They Think Someone Is Watching Them

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Coal company accidentally turns a creek into concrete

by MayeskiLatouf679 Posted on September 4, 2013

Coal company accidentally turns a creek into concrete

By

Global mining giant Xstrata sent contractors with truckloads of grout to repair gaping cracks and chasms it created on a hilly ridge in an Australian conservation area while mining for coal.

You’re probably wondering to yourself, “How could this possibly go wrong?”

When the contractors got there, they made a blunder that would be hilarious were it not so devastating.

Darren PatemanSugarloaf’s concrete creek. Reproduced with permission of The Newcastle Herald © Copyright 2013

As grout was being poured into a crack at the top of the cliff, it was gushing out of another crack at the bottom. An estimated 200 tons of grout — enough to fill 12 cement trucks — flowed into a creek. There it hardened, turning what had been a tranquil waterway in the Sugarloaf State Conservation Area into a 370-yard concrete pathway. From the Newcastle Herald:

To make its descent [the grout] had swamped smaller trees, flooding around rocks and logs along its path.

Cascading down the hill like a miniature glacier, the set overflow looks pretty similar to a thick coating of marzipan on the forest floor.

It’s impossible to know how many plants, holes, gaps and even animals may lay beneath the stony substance. …

In places, it’s barely the width of a narrow garden path.

At others, it could pass for a single-car garage slab that nobody bothered to level.

Being a coal company, Switzerland-based Xstrata decided to keep its little accident a secret from the public. Nearly three months later, after the debacle was exposed by the Herald, the state government ordered a cleanup. But how do you remove hundreds of yards of grout from a creek? The company has until September to come up with a plan, but it won’t be easy.

“I have no idea how it can be cleaned up,” said an unnamed worker involved in the restoration effort. “The problem is just too massive.”

John Upton is a science fan and green news boffin who tweets, posts articles to Facebook, and blogs about ecology. He welcomes reader questions, tips, and incoherent rants: johnupton@gmail.com.Find this article interesting? Donate now to support our work.Read more: Business & Technology

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Coal company accidentally turns a creek into concrete

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Watch How America’s Lands Changed From Forests to Fields

by MayeskiLatouf679 Posted on August 19, 2013

From 1700 to 2000, the evolution of American anthromes. Photo: Erle Ellis

In the maps above, Erle Ellis, a professor of geography at University of Maryland, Baltimore County, has mapped the “anthromes”—the concept is similar to a biome, but based on humanity’s effect on the landscape—of the United States. Cities are red, woodlands are green, wild land is gray, croplands are yellow, and rangelands are orange. While biomes are used to classify the world’s various ecosystems, as an acknowledgement of the human influence some researchers, including Ellis, have turned to thinking about anthropogenic biomes—”a matrix of human-altered croplands, pastures, towns and cities…’anthromes’ for short,” explains Ensia magazine.

The U.S. spans a huge range of biomes, from temperate humid to Mediterranean, with deserts hot and cold and a cap of boreal forest (both humid and semi-arid). But humans have amassed a huge amount of control over our environments. Here, we’ve used Ellis’ images to showcase how land use in the U.S. has evolved over the past 300 years. You can see woodlands turn to croplands, wild lands turned to expanding rangeland, and cities sprout where none existed.

More from Smithsonian.com:

How The Fukushima Exclusion Zone Shows Us What Comes After The Anthropocene
What is the Anthropocene and Are We in It?

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Watch How America’s Lands Changed From Forests to Fields

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The Song Cycles of (Possible Genius) Van Dyke Parks

by MayeskiLatouf679 Posted on July 22, 2013

Mother Jones

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Van Dyke Parks
Songs Cycled
Bella Union

Boasting a lengthy résumé spanning nearly a half-century, Van Dyke Parks has written and recorded with Brian Wilson; played, produced, or arranged for everyone from The Byrds and Harry Nilsson to Rufus Wainwright and Joanna Newsom; and written music for film and TV. But his greatest achievement may be his determinedly noncommercial solo albums.

Even in the anything-goes 1960s, when he released his first LP, Song Cycle, the Mississippi-born Parks was too out-there to command a large following, thanks to his eccentric stew of old-timey parlor music, classical strains (Aaron Copland et al.), Caribbean spice and all-around genial oddness.

Songs Cycled, his first solo release in 15 years, finds Parks’ magic undimmed. His sprightly voice suggesting a loopy Southern aristocrat, Parks ponders injustice (“Money Is King”), revisits a shimmering gem from his debut (“The All Golden”) and offers a hallucinatory steel drum interlude that could be “The Nutcracker” by way of Trinidad. However strange he may seem at first, Parks’ uniquely offbeat sounds quickly cast their own satisfying spell. Don’t miss out on this true original, who may just be a genius.

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The Song Cycles of (Possible Genius) Van Dyke Parks

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Medicare’s Future Looks a Little Better This Year

by MayeskiLatouf679 Posted on May 31, 2013

Mother Jones

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Today we get new reports on the health of Social Security and Medicare. Here’s the bottom line on Medicare:

For the 75-year projection period, the HI actuarial deficit has decreased from 1.35 percent of taxable payroll, as shown in last year’s report, to 1.11 percent of taxable payroll. The more favorable outlook is primarily due to (i) lower projected spending….(ii) lower projected Medicare Advantage program costs….and (iii) a refinement in projection methods that reduces assumed per beneficiary cost growth.

I wouldn’t make too much of this, since year-to-year changes are pretty sensitive to economic assumptions and to current law, which can change. In fact, the chart on the right shows just how much future projections rely on planned reductions in the Sustainable Growth Rate formula for payments to doctors, as well as other cost savings mandated by Obamacare. If we stick to our guns on these things, Medicare spending looks fairly restrained in the future. If we don’t, it doesn’t.

Link – 

Medicare’s Future Looks a Little Better This Year

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We Seem to be Losing the Race Against Superbugs

by MayeskiLatouf679 Posted on March 12, 2013

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There have been a spate of headlines recently—and not for the first time—about outbreaks of diseases that are completely resistant to all known antibiotics. The basic reason for this, of course, is that we’ve used antibiotics with abandon ever since they were discovered, and diseases have mutated to resist them. We’re now at the point where there are a few diseases that have mutated enough that pretty much no antibiotic known will kill them.

So why not develop new antibiotics? Partly because there’s not a lot of money in it. But Megan McArdle points us to medicinal chemist Derek Lowe, who points out that although killing bacteria is hard, it’s not that hard. The problem is killing bacteria without killing everything else at the same time. The virtue of penicillin wasn’t that it was the first antibiotic ever discovered, but that it was the first nontoxic antibiotic. Put it in a human being, and it killed bacteria without killing the human too. Lowe says that this, more than money, is what makes it so hard to figure out how to kill the new strains of superbugs:

I realised after my first exposure to antibiotic drug discovery that I’d never had any problem generating cytotoxic compounds against mammalian cells. Happened all the time — not that I wanted it to, of course. But killing bacteria, especially fully armed wild-type bacteria? That was a major event. And even then, most of the compounds you find that can accomplish that will do the same thing to your own cells, which is definitely not the idea.

And that brings up another question about those bacterial targets, the ones that are so orthogonal to human cellular pathways. A disturbing number of them have already been the subject of screening efforts and optimisation attempts — without success. They also seem to be a bit orthogonal to the kinds of structures that medicinal chemists make. There are antibiotics with reasonable-looking structures, but they’re outnumbered by natural-product-derived beasts, complex structures no one would have gotten around to synthetically for another few hundred years otherwise. Perhaps these kinds of things are needed to get in through the bacterial membranes, or needed to avoid being pumped right back out, but it does complicate one’s research.

This all means, it’s sad to say, that the limiting factor in antibiotic drug discovery probably isn’t the amount of money to be made at it. That’s too bad. Money’s a factor that could be adjusted by regulatory agencies, governments, and foundations. But no amount of cash will keep resistant bacteria from being the hard targets they are.

More money would probably still help, of course. Too bad about all those sequester cutbacks at NIH, isn’t it? It also might help if we didn’t medicate every farm animal in the world to within an inch of its life. Drug-resistant diseases are going to develop no matter what we do, but they’ll develop faster the more drugs we use. So maybe we should cut back a bit?

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We Seem to be Losing the Race Against Superbugs

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