Tag Archives: major

How Software Turns Low-Wage Work Into Constant Chaos

by MaybellFairfiel Posted on August 14, 2014

Mother Jones

<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC “-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional//EN” “http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-html40/loose.dtd”>

I’m glad to see Jodi Kantor of the New York Times write about the way low-wage workers are abused via scheduling software that turns their lives into an endless series of daily emergencies:

Ms. Navarro’s fluctuating hours, combined with her limited resources, had also turned their lives into a chronic crisis over the clock. She rarely learned her schedule more than three days before the start of a workweek, plunging her into urgent logistical puzzles over who would watch the boy….“You’re waiting on your job to control your life,” she said, with the scheduling software used by her employer dictating everything from “how much sleep Gavin will get to what groceries I’ll be able to buy this month.”

Last month, she was scheduled to work until 11 p.m. on Friday, July 4; report again just hours later, at 4 a.m. on Saturday; and start again at 5 a.m. on Sunday. She braced herself to ask her aunt, Karina Rivera, to watch Gavin, hoping she would not explode in annoyance, or worse, refuse.

….Along with virtually every major retail and restaurant chain, Starbucks relies on software that choreographs workers in precise, intricate ballets, using sales patterns and other data to determine which of its 130,000 baristas are needed in its thousands of locations and exactly when….Scheduling is now a powerful tool to bolster profits, allowing businesses to cut labor costs with a few keystrokes. “It’s like magic,” said Charles DeWitt, vice president for business development at Kronos, which supplies the software for Starbucks and many other chains.

I don’t know what the answer to this is, but it’s yet another way that the lives of low-income workers have become more and more stressful over time. There’s just no such thing as regular hours anymore, and for parents of small children this turns their lives into nonstop chaos. Read the whole thing to get a taste of what this means. Working a low-wage job at a national chain isn’t what it used to be even a couple of decades ago.

UPDATE: Starbucks has responded in an email from Cliff Burrows, the group president in charge of United States stores, to its workers:

Mr. Burrows told them the company would revise its software to allow more human input from managers into scheduling. It would banish the practice, much loathed by workers, of asking them to “clopen” — close the store late at night and return just a few hours later to reopen. He said all work hours must be posted at least one week in advance, a policy that has been only loosely followed in the past. And the company would try to move workers with more than an hour’s commute to more convenient locations, he said.

Good for Starbucks. This doesn’t address every scheduling issue their workers face, but it’s a good start. It would be nice if others big chains followed their example.

Link to article:

How Software Turns Low-Wage Work Into Constant Chaos

Posted in alo, FF, GE, LG, ONA, Uncategorized, Venta, Vintage | Tagged , , , , , , , , , | Comments Off on How Software Turns Low-Wage Work Into Constant Chaos

Is It Time for Obama to Change Course on Iraqi Kurdistan?

by Aileen5637 Posted on August 12, 2014

Mother Jones

<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC “-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional//EN” “http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-html40/loose.dtd”>

Jonathan Dworkin, who has spent quite a bit of time in Iraqi Kurdistan, thinks the Obama administration is pursuing a failed strategy in Iraq:

In Kurdistan examples are everywhere of the failure of American diplomacy. Refugees have been a problem for months, but only in the last few days has our government gotten serious about providing large scale material support to the Kurds….On the economic front the State Department has gone out of its way to be unhelpful. The Kurdish government is in a desperate economic situation due to the refugee crisis, the security crisis, and the central government’s refusal to share oil revenue.

….The Obama team has adopted Maliki’s line, in essence arguing that Kurdish oil undermines Iraqi unity. That’s an idea that has become increasingly ridiculous with each setback in Baghdad….But the idea of Kurds breaking away from Iraq was anathema to the Obama team….The result is ongoing economic strangulation at precisely the moment the Kurds are being attacked by ISIS. Government salaries haven’t been paid in months. One physician friend in Sulaimania wrote to me that the doctors are working for free. There have also been acute fuel shortages.

Security is the most obvious area where American soft power has failed. For months now the Kurds have been lobbying for a more coordinated approach against ISIS, and they have gotten the cold shoulder over and over. The Obama team was content to arm a disloyal and unreliable Iraqi Army, and they were perplexed when those heavy weapons ended up under ISIS control. But they refused to coordinate significant weapons procurement for the Peshmerga, despite increasingly desperate appeals, until the ISIS rampage forced them to change tack this past week.

I think the highlighted sentence is key. From a diplomatic point of view, the United States either supports a unified Iraq controlled by a central government in Baghdad, or it supports a federal Iraq in which Kurdistan is largely independent. For better or worse, the US made the decision long ago to support a unified Iraq, and that’s not a decision that can be reversed lightly. Everything else flows from this.

Is this incompetent? I don’t think that’s fair. Countries simply can’t change tack on major issues like this when their allies are in trouble. And like it or not, Baghdad is our chosen ally. It may be that there’s more we could do to quietly help the Kurds behind the scenes, but it’s hard to imagine anything serious changing as long as we officially support the authority of the central government in Baghdad over all of Iraq.

In other words, all of the things Jonathan mentions are part of an entirely coherent strategy. Wrong, maybe, but coherent. Rather than commenting on them separately, then, we should be focusing on the bigger picture: Is it finally time for the US to end its opposition to an independent—or semi-independent—Kurdistan? Jonathan made the case for that a couple of months ago here, and I can’t say that I forcefully disagree with him. Certainly we ought to be giving this a more public airing. “When we’re dropping bombs on a place,” Jonathan told me via email, “it should force some conversation about the broader strategy.” It’s hard to argue with that.

Continue at source:

Is It Time for Obama to Change Course on Iraqi Kurdistan?

Posted in FF, GE, LAI, LG, ONA, PUR, Uncategorized, Venta | Tagged , , , , , , , | Comments Off on Is It Time for Obama to Change Course on Iraqi Kurdistan?

Tennessee Gubernatorial Nominee Explains Why He Wants to Send Governor to Electric Chair

by tobedzieto123 Posted on August 8, 2014

Mother Jones

<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC “-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional//EN” “http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-html40/loose.dtd”>
Charlie Brown for Governor

They did it again. On Thursday, Tennessee Democrats picked a statewide candidate with zero political experience. His campaign platform is based on sending incumbent Gov. Bill Haslam (R) to the electric chair. Charlie Brown, a retired engineer from Oakdale whose name is misspelled on his own Facebook page, may owe his victory in the gubernatorial primary to appearing as the first name on the ballot. But he gives full credit to God. “I got down on my knees and prayed about it,” he told Mother Jones, when asked about his campaign strategy. “That hit you pretty hard, huh? That took you for a loop, huh?”

In 2012, anti-gay activist Mark Clayton, who also had no political track record won the nod to take on GOP Sen. Bob Corker. His name was also the first name listed on the ballot. Clayton initially filed to run against Haslam this year but was rejected by the state party. The state party did not, however, unite behind a more experienced candidate to challenge the popular Haslam.

The 72-year-old Brown did not raise money or campaign actively for the seat. Instead, he sent two letters to the editor to every major newspaper in the state, outlining his plans for Tennessee, which included bringing back teacher tenure, restoring benefits for civil servants, spending his gubernatorial salary on large deer for hunters, and raising speed limits on the interstate highways to 80 mph “because everyone does anyway.” (Brown says he has been pulled over for speeding, but “not lately.”) “Let me give you something: My main interest is to put the Bible back in school,” he said on Friday. “You can write that down.”

“I’d still like to put his butt in that electric chair and turn it on about half throttle and let him smell a little bit,” Brown said of Haslam. “You can print that if you want to.”

Shortly before the election, he says a higher power intervened on his behalf. “I was sitting on the interstate waiting on a guy,” he said, “and something hit me just like that, and it said to get down on your knees to pray. I got down right there on the interstate. There’s a wide place, where there’s a pullout. There wasn’t anybody there. And I got down and asked the Lord to get me through this thing and he did. Now listen, I’m not no preacher, I’m just a Christian. I’m just a sinner saved by grace. I’m just like everybody else.”

Brown said he would update his Facebook after he got off the phone (it has since been taken down), and plans to campaign more actively in the fall, but downplays the uphill challenge he faces.

“I’m gonna campaign big time!” Brown said. “They said I was unknown—I’ve been in the newspaper for years under Peanuts!”

This article is from: 

Tennessee Gubernatorial Nominee Explains Why He Wants to Send Governor to Electric Chair

Posted in Anchor, Crown, Everyone, FF, GE, LAI, LG, Mop, ONA, PUR, Radius, Uncategorized, Venta | Tagged , , , , , , , , , | Comments Off on Tennessee Gubernatorial Nominee Explains Why He Wants to Send Governor to Electric Chair

Obama Authorizes Air Strikes in Iraq: Will Americans be Evacuated?

by CathleeGarrido Posted on August 8, 2014

Mother Jones

<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC “-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional//EN” “http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-html40/loose.dtd”>

On Thursday, as Islamic militants closed in on the Kurdish capital of Irbil, President Obama authorized targeted air strikes in Iraq if necessary to prevent the capture of the city, which is a base for US officials and foreign workers. “When the lives of American citizens are at risk, we will take action,” said Obama. He also pledged to provide humanitarian aid and to take steps to protect about 40,000 members of the Yazidi sect, who have fled their homes and have been trapped on nearby mountains.

The announcements came after fighters associated with the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) took control of at least one town within twenty miles of the city and reportedly seized a massive dam, which if breached could flood Mosul, a city of 1.5 million residents.

Throughout the decade following the US-led invasion of Iraq, the Kurdish north has avoided much of the violence and chaos common in the south. As recently as June, the State Department noted that the region has been “more stable relative to the rest of Iraq in recent years.” That relative tranquility has not only drawn diplomats, oil workers, and US military personnel to Irbil: just last year, the New York Times called the city a “tourist boom town.” Should ISIS take Irbil, any foreigners left there would be at considerable risk.

US companies began pulling employees from Iraq before ISIS’s recent advances. According to the leader of Iraq’s state-run South Oil Company, ExxonMobil staged a “major evacuation” in mid-June and BP reportedly withdrew 20 percent of its staff. But over the last few days, companies have ramped up extractions from Kurdistan: on Thursday, Reuters reported that ExxonMobil is pulling its staff, and a Chevron spokeswomen told the Wall Street Journal the company had reduced its number of foreign workers in the region.

Even as ISIS made dramatic gains across Iraq in June and July, Irbil remained a safe haven. Refugees from elsewhere in northern Iraq streamed in, as did foreigners. Employees of Siemens Energy were evacuated to Irbil in mid-June amid a bloody battle for control of Baiji’s oil infrastructure. Earlier that month, the State Department relocated staffers from the embassy in Baghdad to consulates outside the capital, including the one in Irbil. But now, the situation has reversed: according to the New York Times, civilians are swamping Irbil’s airport, hoping to snag seats on flights to Baghdad. Meanwhile, Abu Dhabi-based Etihad Airways has canceled all flights to Irbil.

Aki Peritz, a former CIA counterterrorism analyst, says that when US citizens are under threat, the State Department works quickly. And when it comes to the safety of diplomatic staff, “If they felt like the US consulate could fall, they would have evacuated,” he says. “They have an itchy finger especially after Benghazi, they’re not going to let Americans get chopped up and put on the Internet.”

While Obama said on Thursday night that protecting US military personnel, diplomats, and civilians living in Irbil is a priority, it’s unclear just how many Americans and other foreigners are present in the city, and what plans may be in place to evacuate them. A senior administration official told reporters late on Thursday that there was an “ongoing conversation” in the administration about evacuating its diplomats, but “given that we will make sure ISIS cannot approach Irbil, we’re very confident our consulate is safe.”

A Defense Department spokesman, Commander Bill Speaks, says that there is a Joint Operations Center in Irbil, with about 40 military personnel. He would not discuss contingency planning for any potential evacuation of US or non-US foreign citizens. Katherine Pfaff, a spokesperson for the US State Department, declined to provide the number of staff based in the Irbil consulate. “We have nothing to announce on possible evacuations,” she says.

According to Steven Cook, a senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations who was in Irbil in June, there’s not a huge American presence in the city, but it is home to some foreign diplomats and oil workers, with a couple of expat hotspots. He says that Kurdish officials “knew the fight was coming, they just didn’t know it was coming so quickly.”

David Phillips, director of the Program on Peace-building and Rights at Columbia University’s Institute for the Study of Human Rights, is on his way to Irbil on Sunday for a pre-planned research trip. He told Mother Jones from his hotel in Turkey that he has meetings scheduled with government officials and “as far as I know, everything is on track.”

“It’s a fast-moving, volatile situation,” he adds. “Unless something really unexpected happens, I think the Islamic State is going to be on the run.” He says he promised his daughters that he wouldn’t “do anything foolish.”

Continue reading – 

Obama Authorizes Air Strikes in Iraq: Will Americans be Evacuated?

Posted in Anchor, Citizen, FF, GE, LAI, LG, ONA, Oster, PUR, Radius, Uncategorized, Venta | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , | Comments Off on Obama Authorizes Air Strikes in Iraq: Will Americans be Evacuated?

Republicans Maybe Not as Inept as We Think

by MarilynColburn Posted on July 25, 2014

Mother Jones

<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC “-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional//EN” “http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-html40/loose.dtd”>

Paul Waldman thinks Republicans have become a bunch of bumblers and idiots:

Think about it this way: Has there been a single instance in the last few years when you said, “Wow, the Republicans really played that one brilliantly”?

In fact, before you’ll find evidence of the ruthless Republican skillfulness so many of us had come to accept as the norm in a previous era, you’ll need to go back an entire decade to the 2004 election. George W. Bush’s second term was a disaster, Republicans lost both houses of Congress in 2006, they lost the White House in 2008, they decided to oppose health-care reform with everything they had and lost, they lost the 2012 election—and around it all they worked as hard as they could to alienate the fastest growing minority group in the country and make themselves seem utterly unfit to govern.

In fact, in the last ten years they’ve only had one major victory, the 2010 midterm election.

Hmmm. It’s true that the GOP has had a rough decade in a lot of ways. The number of self-IDed Republicans has plummeted since 2004; their standing among the fast-growing Hispanic population has cratered; and their intellectual core is now centered in a wing of the party that believes we should return to the gold standard. This isn’t a promising starting point for a conservative renaissance.

Still, let’s not kid ourselves. If Republicans were really as woefully inept as Waldman says, then Democrats should be kicking some serious ass these days. I haven’t especially noticed this. They won in the sixth year of Bush’s presidency, when out parties always win, and then won in 2008, when an economic collapse pretty much guaranteed a victory for anyone with a D after their name. Then they had a single fairly good year—followed by an epic blunder that lost them a sure seat in Massachusetts, and with it control of the Senate. They got crushed in 2010. They won a squeaker in 2012 against an opponent who made a wedding cake figurine look good by comparison. For the last four years, they’ve basically gotten nothing done at all.

And what about those Republicans? Well, they have a hammerlock on the House, and they might very well control the Senate after the 2014 election. They’ve won several notable Supreme Court victories (Heller, Citizens United, Hobby Lobby, etc.). They control a large majority of the states, and have passed a ton of conservative legislation in areas like voter ID and abortion restrictions. Their “Just Say No” strategy toward President Obama has tied Democrats in knots. They won an all but total victory on spending and deficits.

Nor is it really true that today’s GOP is notably more bumbling than it used to be. The myth of “ruthless Republican skillfulness” in the past is just that: a myth. George H.W. Bush screwed up on Supreme Court picks and tax hikes. Newt Gingrich—ahem—sure didn’t turn out to be the world historical strategic genius everyone thought he was in 1994. George W. Bush—with the eager backing of every Republican in the country—figured that a war in Iraq would be just the ticket to party dominance for a decade. Ditto for Social Security reform. Republicans were just sure that would be a winner. By contrast, their simpleminded Obama-era strategy of obstructing Democrats at all times and on all things has actually worked out pretty well for them given the hand they were dealt.

Make no mistake: It’s not as if Republicans have been strategic geniuses. There’s no question that they have some long-term issues that they’re unable to address thanks to their capitulation to tea party madness. But if they’re really so inept, how is it that in the past 15 years Democrats haven’t managed to cobble together anything more than about 18 months of modest success between 2009-10?

I dunno. Republicans keep getting crazier and crazier and more and more conservative, and liberals keep thinking that this time they’ve finally gone too far. I’ve thought this from time to time myself. And yet, moving steadily to the right has paid off pretty well for them over the past three decades, hasn’t it?

Maybe it will all come to tears in the near future as the lunatic wing of the party becomes even more lunatic, but we liberals have been thinking this for a long time. We haven’t been right yet.

Jump to original:  

Republicans Maybe Not as Inept as We Think

Posted in Citizen, FF, GE, LG, ONA, Uncategorized, Venta, Vintage | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , | Comments Off on Republicans Maybe Not as Inept as We Think

Chart of the Day: Oil Is Getting Harder and Harder to Find

by JulianaWillifor Posted on July 23, 2014

Mother Jones

<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC “-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional//EN” “http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-html40/loose.dtd”>

Oil expert James Hamilton has an interesting summary of the current world oil market up today, and it’s worth a read. His bottom line, however, is that $100-per-barrel oil is here to stay:

The run-up of oil prices over the last decade resulted from strong growth of demand from emerging economies confronting limited physical potential to increase production from conventional sources. Certainly a change in those fundamentals could shift the equation dramatically. If China were to face a financial crisis, or if peace and stability were suddenly to break out in the Middle East and North Africa, a sharp drop in oil prices would be expected. But even if such events were to occur, the emerging economies would surely subsequently resume their growth, in which case any gains in production from Libya or Iraq would only buy a few more years.

The chart on the right shows the situation dramatically. In just the past ten years, capital spending by major oil companies on exploration and extraction has tripled. And the result? Those same companies are producing less oil than they were in 2004. There’s still new oil out there, but it’s increasingly both expensive to get and expensive to refine.

(And all the hype to the contrary, the fracking revolution hasn’t changed that. There’s oil in those formations in Texas and North Dakota, but the wells only produce for a few years each and production costs are sky high compared to conventional oil.)

In a hypertechnical sense, the peak oil optimists were right: New technology has been able to keep global oil production growing longer than the pessimists thought. But, it turns out, not by much. Global oil production is growing very slowly; the cost of new oil is skyrocketing; the quality of new oil is mostly lousy; and we continue to bump up right against the edge of global demand, which means that even a small disruption in supply can send the world into an economic tailspin. So details aside, the pessimists continue to be right in practice even if they didn’t predict the exact date we’d hit peak oil. It’s long past time to get dead serious about finding renewable replacements on a very large scale.

View post:

Chart of the Day: Oil Is Getting Harder and Harder to Find

Posted in FF, G & F, GE, LG, ONA, Uncategorized, Venta, Vintage | Tagged , , , , , , , , , | Comments Off on Chart of the Day: Oil Is Getting Harder and Harder to Find

Will Republicans Finally Find a Tax Cut They Hate?

by KieranMetcalfe Posted on July 23, 2014

Mother Jones

<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC “-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional//EN” “http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-html40/loose.dtd”>

Charles Gaba makes an interesting point about today’s Halbig decision: if upheld, it would amount to a tax increase. Everyone who buys insurance through a federal exchange would lose the tax credits they’re currently entitled to, and losing tax credits is the same as a tax increase. This in turn means that if Democrats introduce a bill to fix the language in Obamacare to keep the tax credits in place, it will basically be a tax cut.

This leaves Republicans in a tough spot, doesn’t it? Taken as a whole, Obamacare represents a tax increase, which makes it easy for Republicans to oppose it. But if the Halbig challenge is upheld, all the major Obamacare taxes are unaffected. They stay in force no matter what. The only thing that’s affected is the tax credits. Thus, an amendment to reinstate the credits is a net tax cut by the rules that Grover Norquist laid out long ago. And no Republican is allowed to vote against a net tax cut.

I’m curious what Norquist has to say about this. Not because I think he’d agree that Republicans have to vote to restore the tax credits. He wouldn’t. He’s a smart guy, and he’d invent some kind of loophole for everyone to shimmy through. Mainly, I just want to know what loophole he’d come up with. I’m always impressed with the kind of sophistries guys like him are able to spin. It’s usually very educational.

See the original article here:  

Will Republicans Finally Find a Tax Cut They Hate?

Posted in FF, GE, LAI, LG, ONA, Uncategorized, Venta, Vintage | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , | Comments Off on Will Republicans Finally Find a Tax Cut They Hate?

The EPA Dithers While a Popular Pesticide Threatens Ecosystems

by TWTKamwbbsdhe Posted on July 18, 2014

Mother Jones

<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC “-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional//EN” “http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-html40/loose.dtd”>

Ah, summer—the season when trillions of corn and soybean plants tower horizon-to-horizon in the Midwest. All told, US farmers planted more than 170 million acres in these two crops this year—a combined landmass roughly equal in size to the state of Texas. That’s great news for the companies that turn corn and soy into livestock feed, sweeteners, and food additives; but not so great for honeybees, wild pollinating insects like bumblebees, and birds.

That’s because these crops—along with other major ones like alfalfa and sunflower—are widely treated with pesticides called neonicotinoids. Made by European chemical giants Bayer and Syngenta, these chemicals generate a staggering $2.6 billion in annual revenue worldwide—and have come under heavy suspicion as a trigger of colony collapse disorder and other, less visible, ecological calamities.

Continue Reading »

See the original post:

The EPA Dithers While a Popular Pesticide Threatens Ecosystems

Posted in alo, Anchor, FF, GE, LAI, LG, ONA, Radius, Uncategorized, Wiley | Tagged , , , , , , , | Comments Off on The EPA Dithers While a Popular Pesticide Threatens Ecosystems

Now Google Street View is mapping gas pipeline leaks

by MariettSorrells Posted on July 16, 2014

what’s that smell?

Now Google Street View is mapping gas pipeline leaks

By

Emmadukew

Some of those Google cars that drive around photographing streetscapes and embarrassing moments have captured something extra — something that should embarrass major utilities. The cars were kitted out by University of Colorado scientists with sensors that sniff out natural gas leaking from underground pipelines. These methane-heavy leaks contribute to global warming, waste money, and can fuel explosions.

The sensor-equipped cars cruised the streets of Boston, New York’s Staten Island, and Indianapolis. They returned to sites where methane spikes were detected to confirm the presence of a leak. The results were released Wednesday by the Environmental Defense Fund, which coordinated the project, revealing just how leaky old and metallic pipelines can be, such as those used in the East Coast cities studied, particularly when compared with noncorrosive pipes like those beneath Indianapolis.

About one leak was discovered for each mile driven in Boston, Mass.:

EDF

The findings were similar in Staten Island, N.Y.:

EDF

In Indianapolis, Ind., by contrast, about one leak was found for every 200 miles that the cars covered:

EDF


Source
Natural gas: Local leaks impact global climate, Environmental Defense Fund

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: Climate & Energy

View original – 

Now Google Street View is mapping gas pipeline leaks

Posted in ALPHA, Anchor, FF, G & F, GE, ONA, solar, Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , | Comments Off on Now Google Street View is mapping gas pipeline leaks

"Cosmos" Just Got Nominated for 12 Emmys

by UlrikeC65cfdksx Posted on July 10, 2014

Mother Jones

<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC “-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional//EN” “http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-html40/loose.dtd”>

It was a truly groundbreaking moment in television. Educationally driven science content was once anathema on primetime television, but earlier this year, Seth Macfarlane, Neil deGrasse Tyson and company set out to prove that wrong with Cosmos: A Spacetime Odyssey, a remake of the classic Carl Sagan-hosted show from 1980.

And if today’s Emmy nominations mean anything, the result is a major triumph. Cosmos has received 12 of them.

That’s not quite as good as the 19 for Game of Thrones, or 16 for Breaking Bad, but it’s a very significant number, and it includes nominations for “Outstanding Documentary Or Nonfiction Series,” “Outstanding Writing for Nonfiction Programming” (for writers Ann Druyan and Steven Soter), “Outstanding Direction for Nonfiction Programming” (for director Brannon Braga).

In fact, that’s actually a tie with HBO’s True Detective, which also got 12 nominations.

Recently, I interviewed Neil DeGrasse Tyson, the face of the new show, who remarked on how to interpret its success. “You had entertainment writers putting The Walking Dead in the same sentence as Cosmos,” said Tyson. “Game of Thrones in the same sentence of Cosmos. ‘How’s Cosmos doing against Game of Thrones?’ That is an extraordinary fact, no matter what ratings it earned.”

The Emmy nominations will certainly give entertainment writers another such opportunity. In fact, it’s already happening. And when a science television show is celebrated by the deacons of popular culture, that can only be good news for the place of science in American society. (Note: the Showtime climate change documentary Years of Living Dangerously also received 2 Emmy nominations.)

The Cosmos nominations are for:

Outstanding Documentary Or Nonfiction Series

Outstanding Writing for Nonfiction Programming

Outstanding Direction for Nonfiction Programming

Outstanding Art Direction for Variety, Nonfiction, Reality or Reality Competition Program

Outstanding Cinematography for Nonfiction Programming

Outstanding Picture Editing for Nonfiction Programming

Outstanding Main Title Design

Outstanding Musical Composition for a Series (Original Dramatic Score)

Outstanding Original Main Title Theme Music

Outstanding Sound Editing for Nonfiction Programming (Single or Multi-Camera)

Outstanding Sound Mixing for Nonfiction Programming and

Outstanding Special and Visual Effects.

The full list of Emmy nominations can be found here.

To listen to our Inquiring Minds podcast interview with Neil deGrasse Tyson, you can stream below:

View article – 

"Cosmos" Just Got Nominated for 12 Emmys

Posted in Anchor, FF, GE, LAI, LG, ONA, Radius, Uncategorized, Venta, Vintage | Tagged , , , , , , , | Comments Off on "Cosmos" Just Got Nominated for 12 Emmys