Tag Archives: year

Surprise: This Republican governor now wants his state to ban fracking.

by Mike Herman Posted on March 20, 2017

U.S. cities are packed with about 5 million medium-sized buildings — schools, churches, community centers, apartment buildings. Most use way more energy than they should. Many also have poor airflow and dirty, out-of-date heating and electrical systems. Those conditions contribute to high inner-city asthma rates and other health concerns.

“These buildings are actually making children sick,” says Donnel Baird, who grew up in such a place. His parents, immigrants from Guyana, raised their kids in a one-bedroom Brooklyn apartment, relying on a cooking stove for heat. Baird eventually moved to the South and then attended Duke University, before returning to New York as a community organizer in 2008.

In 2013, Baird launched BlocPower, which provides engineering and financial know-how to retrofit city buildings. The technical part is cool: Engineers survey structures with sensors and smartphone apps, figuring out the best ways to reduce energy use, like replacing oil boilers with solar hot water. But the financing is critical; BlocPower builds the case for each project and connects owners with lenders. It has already retrofitted more than 500 buildings in New York and is expanding into Chicago, Philadelphia, and Atlanta.

“The biggest way for us to reduce carbon emissions right now,” Baird says, “is efficiency.”

Meet all the fixers on this year’s Grist 50.

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Surprise: This Republican governor now wants his state to ban fracking.

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Trump Finally Admits He Has No Health Care Plan

by Maryjo97I0205 Posted on March 4, 2017

Mother Jones

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President Trump has been promising a health care plan for months now. But when will we have it? Let’s roll the tape:

January 15: “It’s very much formulated down to the final strokes. We haven’t put it in quite yet but we’re going to be doing it soon.”

February 5: “I would like to say by the end of the year at least the rudiments but we should have something within the year and the following year.”

February 16: “We’re doing Obamacare, we’re in the final stages. So, we will be submitting sometime in early March, mid-March.“

February 27: “We have come up with a solution that’s really, really, I think, very good.”

So we’ve gone from immediately to 2018 to mid-March to all done. Today, however, Politico reports that in reality, Trump has no plan at all: “His team has signaled to House Speaker Paul Ryan that they will embrace his health care bill next week, and aides hoped to get a marked-up bill ready.”

Since the House bill is apparently what we’re going to get, it’s worth repeating something I wrote a few months ago. After describing both Obamacare and Ryancare in broad strokes, I noted that their foundations were basically the same:

If you haven’t yet noticed what this all means, let me spell it out. The key parts of Obamacare and Ryan’s plan are the same. They both (a) rely on private insurance, (b) require insurance companies to cover people with preexisting conditions, (c) encourage people to buy insurance continuously by penalizing them if they don’t, (d) provide billions of dollars in federal subsidies to make insurance affordable for low-income households, and (e) rely on Medicaid for the very poorest.

As liberals have been pointing out forever, any kind of health care plan has to have three parts:

Protection for pre-existing conditions at a reasonable price, so everyone has access to insurance.
Some kind of incentive for everyone to buy insurance, so insurance companies have plenty of healthy people to balance out the sick people.
Subsidies so that poor people can afford coverage.

Sure enough, Ryancare has all those things, just like Obamacare. There are differences in the details, but those don’t matter very much. What does matter is the difference in cost. Obamacare provides subsidies of about $100 billion per year, while Ryancare provides…something much less. We don’t know exactly how much less yet, but certainly less than half of Obamacare, maybe as little as a quarter. This is what makes Ryancare useless, not its overall structure, which is fairly workable. The working poor and the working class can only barely afford insurance even with Obamacare’s subsidies. They won’t come close with Ryancare’s.

But the rich will get a big tax cut, and the middle class will get a nice break on their health insurance. In short order, however, interstate deregulation will almost certainly lead to individual insurance becoming all but useless, and the individual insurance market will probably collapse fairly soon after that. Alternatively, it might collapse even before Ryancare goes into effect, as insurers bail out on Obamacare (why bother with it if it’s just going away soon?) and conclude that they can’t make money on Ryancare either.

See? It’s not so complicated after all. I imagine this is what Paul Ryan has wanted all along.

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Trump Finally Admits He Has No Health Care Plan

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25+ Beneficial Plants That Ward Off Pests and Protect Your Garden

by Vicky0634cc Posted on March 4, 2017

Everybody agrees that good neighbors are so much better than bad ones. This is true not only at home and at work, but also in the garden.

There are good plants — companion plants — that do a lot for their plant neighbors and your garden overall. They help each other grow, they can increase the yield that each neighbor produces, and some even provide added nutrients to the soil.

One of the things that make companion plants great neighbors is that they offer pest control benefits. They mask or hide a crop from pests, produce odors that confuse pests, and act like trap crops that draw pests away from other plants.

Not all plant visitors are bad. In fact, some are so good that we actually want to encourage them to come into our gardens. Unfortunately, we tend to think that any bug we see is bad; when we focus so much on removing any and all pests, we can wind up killing off the “good” guys in the process.

That’s why companion plants are so great.

While they discourage “bad” garden pests, companion plants also help to attract beneficial insects by providing them with breeding grounds and creating a habitat for them.

Some beneficial insects feed on weeds, some feed on insects and mites like aphids, and some attack insect pests by sterilizing or debilitating them. Good pests you want to invite to your garden include: lacewings, parasitic wasps, lady beetles, spiders and predatory mites. And, of course,bees andbutterflies are considered good guys, and we need to attract them to our gardens for pollination.

One of the best ways to attract beneficial insects is to provide a diversity of plants that takes into account seasonality and the different feeding requirements they have at the different stages of development. Make sure to use plants that are rich in pollen and nectar at different times of the year.

To get you started, here are some of the most common beneficial companion plants:

In general, plants with many small flowers work better than those with a large single flower because small insects may drown in large blooms with too much nectar. Small flowers include:

asters
alyssum
lobelia
small sunflowers and
yarrow.

Umbelliferae plants also make great beneficial plants. These include:

angelica
clovers
coriander (cilantro)
dill
fennel
parsley
Queen Anne’s Lace and
rue.

Herbs help repel certain pests like the cabbage moth and the carrot fly. These include:

basil
borage
chamomile
lavender
mints (spearmint, peppermint)
rosemary
thyme and
sage (Salvia) family plants.

Annuals or perennials in the sunflower/aster family (many small flowers/petals around a central disk) also make great companion plants. These include:

cosmos
zinnia
daisy and
coneflower.

Do you have favorite companion plants you’d like to recommend? Share them in the comments section.

Related:
DIY Pesticide Recipe is Safe Enough to Eat
5 Ways to Save Water in the Garden

Disclaimer: The views expressed above are solely those of the author and may not reflect those of Care2, Inc., its employees or advertisers.

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25+ Beneficial Plants That Ward Off Pests and Protect Your Garden

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It looks like Scott Pruitt has a damn email problem, too.

by AnnetteA71 Posted on March 3, 2017

In some parts of the country, the season just breezed in three weeks ahead of schedule. Balmy weather may seem like more good news after an already unseasonably warm winter, but pause a beat before you reach for your flip-flops.

According to the “spring index,” a long-term data set which tracks the start of the season from year-to-year, spring is showing up earlier and earlier across the United States.

The culprit behind the trend? Climate change. And it’s bringing a batch of nasty consequences. Early warmth means early pests, like ticks and mosquitoes, and a longer, rougher allergy season. Agriculture and tourism can be thrown off, too. Washington D.C.’s cherry blossoms usually draw crowds in April, for instance, but they’re projected to peak three weeks early this year.

Spring isn’t shifting smoothly, either. It’s changing in fits and starts. Eggs are hatching and trees are losing their leaves, but temperatures could easily plunge again, with disastrous consequences for new baby animals and plants.

Play this out another 80 years, and it’s easy to imagine a world out of sync. Sure, your picnic in December sounds nice. But bees could lose their wildflowers, and groundhogs may never see their shadows again.

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It looks like Scott Pruitt has a damn email problem, too.

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Insurers Have Remained Mysteriously Quiet About Obamacare Repeal

by ShawnaKinsela Posted on March 3, 2017

Mother Jones

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A reader emails with a question:

The repeal-Obamacare mania has been on for years, but I have NEVER read anything about what the insurance industry is thinking or doing about it.

Neither have I! And it’s damn mysterious. Obviously the insurance industry was heavily involved in lobbying for Obamacare back in 2009, and just as obviously there are parts of Obamacare they don’t like. The patient pools have turned out to be sicker than they projected and insurance companies have struggled to make money on Obamacare policies. This year, however, they’re finally there—or close to it. The market has shaken out, premiums have risen to CBO-projected levels, and Obamacare is probably a break-even or better prospect for the insurers who have gutted through the first three years.

What’s more, like it or not, they’ve spent years adapting the way they do business. Everything from computer systems to physician compensation now follows Obamacare’s rules. This has cost tens of millions of dollars, but now it’s done. The last thing they need is to rip it all out and start from scratch.

And yet insurance companies have been surprisingly silent about the Republican plan to kill Obamacare. Do they prefer getting rid of it even if there’s an upfront cost? Have they given up, and assume that repeal is a foregone conclusion that’s not worth fighting? Is all their lobbying behind the scenes? It’s not clear. Insurers are pretty unanimous about wanting some certainty in the rules, but aside from that, this eight-week-old story from the New York Times still describes things pretty well:

Far from reflecting the magnitude of the moment, the most prominent message from lobbyists that lawmakers saw in their first week back at work was a narrowly focused advertisement from the U.S. Chamber of Commerce….Health care professionals are not totally silent, but industries that were integral to the creation of the Affordable Care Act in 2010 are keeping their voices down as Republicans rush to dismantle it.

….Some lobbyists have tacitly accepted the likelihood that major provisions of the health law will be repealed, setting their sights instead on shaping its replacement. They fear that if they come out strongly in opposition to repealing the law, they will lose their seats at the table as congressional Republicans and the Trump administration negotiate a replacement.

Insurers spent $150 million lobbying in support of Obamacare in 2009. So far they’ve spent virtually nothing in 2017. I continue to be mystified by this.

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Insurers Have Remained Mysteriously Quiet About Obamacare Repeal

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A Travel Query for the Hive Mind

by HassanJDVefvwac Posted on February 19, 2017

Mother Jones

Ben Cawthra/Rex Shutterstock via ZUMA

OK, hive mind, I have a question for you. My sister is heading to London later this year, and this time she has a shiny new iPhone to take with her. She’s on T-Mobile, so allegedly she’ll have access to calling, texting, and low-speed data without doing anything. So here’s one plan:

Download the maps she needs before she leaves.
Rely on T-Mobile for calling and texting.
Use WiFi whenever she’s at the hotel, in a coffee shop, etc.
Register for The Cloud, and use that when she’s out and about.
When all else fails, use T-Mobile’s low-speed data.

Alternatively:

Buy a SIM when she gets there and use local calling, texting, and high-speed internet.

Do I have any T-Mobile readers who have been to London lately? What’s the dope? What do you think her best alternative is?

UPDATE: Thanks everyone! It sounds like T-Mobile’s native service works pretty well.

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A Travel Query for the Hive Mind

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Trump Repeatedly Ducks Questions About Alleged Campaign Contacts With Russia

by ClaudioMoffat38 Posted on February 16, 2017

Mother Jones

In a wide-ranging and at-times erratic press conference that lasted more than an hour Thursday afternoon, President Donald Trump said he had “nothing to do” with any possible contacts between his campaign associates and Russia during last year’s election. But he repeatedly declined to assure reporters that no such contacts took place.

“Well I had nothing to do with it,” Trump said when pressed on whether his campaign aides had conversations with Russian intelligence. “I have nothing to do with Russia. I have no deals there.”

At another point during the press conference, he said “nobody that I know of” from his campaign had contacts with Russia during the election.

The press conference took place two days after the New York Times reported that according to current and former US officials, intercepted phone calls showed that “members of Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign and other Trump associates had repeated contacts with senior Russian intelligence officials in the year before the election.” On Thursday, Trump referred to that story as “a joke.” He decried “fake news put out by the media,” which he claimed was spread by “people, probably from the Obama administration, because they’re there, because we have our new people going in place, right now.”

On Monday night, Lt. General Mike Flynn resigned as Trump’s national security adviser following a Washington Post story revealing that Flynn had discussed US sanctions against Russia with the Russian ambassador after the election but before Trump took office—despite denials to Vice President Mike Pence, among others.

Trump said Thursday that Flynn’s talks with the Russian ambassador weren’t the problem; rather he fired Flynn for lying to Pence: “He didn’t tell the vice president of the United States the facts, and then he didn’t remember, and that just wasn’t acceptable to me,” Trump said.

Trump denied ordering Flynn to discuss sanctions with the Russian ambassador, adding that Flynn was “doing his job.”

“Flynn was calling other countries and his counterparts,” said Trump. “So it certainly would have been okay with me if he did it. I would have directed him to do it if I thought he wasn’t doing it. I didn’t direct him, but I would have directed him because that’s his job.”

Trump characterized the various stories about Russia as “ruse” used to distract from Hillary Clinton’s election loss. “You can talk all you want about Russia, which was all a fake news fabricated deal to try and make up for the loss of the Democrats, and the press plays right into it,” he said.

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Trump Repeatedly Ducks Questions About Alleged Campaign Contacts With Russia

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NYT: Trump Team Had "Repeated Contacts" With Russian Intelligence During the Presidential Campaign

by KathieZxckyniu Posted on February 15, 2017

Mother Jones

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ZOMG!

Phone records and intercepted calls show that members of Donald J. Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign and other Trump associates had repeated contacts with senior Russian intelligence officials in the year before the election, according to four current and former American officials.

American law enforcement and intelligence agencies intercepted the communications around the same time that they were discovering evidence that Russia was trying to disrupt the presidential election by hacking into the Democratic National Committee….The intercepts alarmed American intelligence and law enforcement agencies, in part because of the amount of contact that was occurring while Mr. Trump was speaking glowingly about the Russian president, Vladimir V. Putin….The officials said the intercepted communications were not limited to Trump campaign officials, and included other associates of Mr. Trump.

….Officials would not disclose many details, including what was discussed on the calls, which Russian intelligence officials were on the calls, and how many of Mr. Trump’s advisers were talking to the Russians.

This is from Michael Schmidt, Mark Mazzetti, and Matt Apuzzo at the New York Times. If Trump thought that firing Michael Flynn was going to stop the recent bloodletting, he thought wrong.

Just to make this clear: At the same time that Russian intelligence was hacking various email accounts in order to sabotage Hillary Clinton, multiple members of the Trump team had repeated phone calls with senior Russian intelligence officials. And during this entire time, Trump himself was endorsing a foreign policy that appeared almost as if it had been dictated to him by Vladimir Putin.

As a number of people have pointed out, the American intelligence community has all but declared war on Trump since his inauguration. I hardly need to spell out why this is dangerous. At the same time, it’s sure becoming a lot clearer why they’re so alarmed by the guy.

And by the way, I shouldn’t miss this chance to flog my favorite hobbyhorse again: FBI Director James Comey, who knew all about this, pushed hard not to make it public during the campaign. Instead he considered it more important to inform Congress that he had discovered additional copies of Hillary Clinton’s emails on Anthony Weiner’s laptop. Priorities.

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NYT: Trump Team Had "Repeated Contacts" With Russian Intelligence During the Presidential Campaign

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Raw Data: Deportation of Criminal Aliens, 2000-2016

by Brian68819245134 Posted on February 14, 2017

Mother Jones

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Last week, ICE coordinated a set of raids in several cities that ended with the arrest of nearly 700 undocumented immigrants. ICE claims this was business as usual. President Trump says it was all part of keeping his campaign promise to get tough on criminals who are in the country illegally. “Gang members, drug dealers & others are being removed!” he tweeted. Who’s right?

One set of raids isn’t enough to tell. In terms of raw numbers, there doesn’t seem to be anything unusual going on. However, ICE doesn’t generally conduct raids in multiple cities over the course of just a few days. That suggests that maybe there was something unusual going on.

My guess: the arrests themselves were fairly routine. However, they were deliberately conducted in a way to maximize publicity. This would certainly gibe with Trump’s usual way of doing business.

We won’t get a real answer about this until the end of the year, when ICE releases total removal numbers for FY2017, which ends September 30. That will tell us whether ICE is deporting more people, and in particular, whether they’re targeting criminals more vigorously than in the past. For comparison, here are total removal numbers for criminal aliens since 2000:

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Raw Data: Deportation of Criminal Aliens, 2000-2016

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Mother Jones Wins “Best Picture Award for the Magazine Industry”

by MerissaPresler7 Posted on February 7, 2017

Mother Jones

It’s been an extraordinary few months for Mother Jones—from publishing a massive investigation on private prisons to breaking the story of a veteran spy’s allegations that Russia had sought to compromise Donald Trump, to launching a new model for investigative reporting on a foundation of reader support. Today, those breakthroughs and more were honored with the most prestigious award in the magazine industry, the 2017 Magazine of the Year award from the American Society of Magazine Editors (ASME). MoJo also took home the award for Best Reporting for Shane Bauer’s “My Four Months as a Private Prison Guard,” and we were a finalist in the General Excellence category.

This was the first year Mother Jones was nominated for Magazine of the Year—our industry’s equivalent of the Best Picture Oscar—alongside The New Yorker, New York, Cosmopolitan, and California Sunday. Judges recognized our work on the most important political stories of the year, including Trump’s conflicts of interest, his ties to white nationalism, and the Russia memos, along with myriad investigative and immersive narratives, dramatically increased traffic and visibility, and a widely acclaimed redesign of our website and print magazine.

“Holy shit,” as our editor-in-chief, Clara Jeffery, put it in accepting the award, adding that she was “super proud of our entire team.” The recognition comes at an especially important time, she said, when “the media is under attack. Whether we are magazines that specialize in news and politics, or whether we are magazines that delight and distract, we are going to need both. I really hope we all stick together in the time to come.”

(Needless to say, at MoJo we plan to double down against attacks on freedom of the press and democracy as a whole. If you’d like to help support unrelenting investigative reporting, subscribe here or donate here.) And if you already do—or if you’re part of the MoJo community in other ways, as a frequent reader, sharer, or cheerleader, or as someone who uses our journalism to change the world: THANK YOU. MoJo is unique because we rely on users, not advertisers or deep-pocketed interests, to make our work possible. This award belongs to you.

Here’s what it looked like when Clara and the MoJo delegation learned the news at the awards ceremony:

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Mother Jones Wins “Best Picture Award for the Magazine Industry”

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