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This evening's music features r&b and soul singer Barbara Lynn. Enjoy!

"I believe that life on Earth is at an ever-increasing risk of being wiped out by a disaster, such as a sudden nuclear war, a genetically engineered virus, or other dangers. I think the human race has no future if it doesn’t go to space."

-- Stephen Hawking

News and Opinion

What To Do in Syria

Maybe half a million dead, half a country – 10 million people – displaced from their homes, jettisoned onto the mercy of the world.

Welcome to war. Welcome to Syria.

This is a conflict apparently too complex to understand. The U.S. brokered a ceasefire with Russia, then proceeded to lead a bombing strike that killed 62 Syrian troops, injured another hundred – and gave tactical aid to ISIS. Later it apologized . . . uh, sort of.

“Russia really needs to stop the cheap point scoring and the grandstanding and the stunts and focus on what matters, which is implementation of something we negotiated in good faith with them.”

These are the words of U.N. Ambassador Samantha Power, as reported by Reuters, who went on to point out, with exasperation, that the US, was investigating the air strikes and “if we determine that we did indeed strike Syrian military personnel, that was not our intention and we of course regret the loss of life.”

And. We. Of. Course. Regret. The. Loss. Of. Life.

Oh, the afterthought! I could almost hear the “yada, yada” hovering in the air. Come on, this is geopolitics. We implement policy and make crucial adjustments to the state of the world by dropping bombs – but the bombing isn’t the point (except maybe to those who get hit). The point is that we’re playing complex, multidimensional chess, with, of course, peace as our ultimate goal, unlike our enemies. Peace takes bombs.

This is an interesting article with far too much detail to excerpt fairly. Here's a teaser:

How Libyan ‘Regime Change’ Lies Echo in Syria

Earlier this month, a select committee of British parliamentarians released a report which condemned the U.K. government under David Cameron for its role in the 2011 NATO intervention in Libya. The report makes plain that the principal basis on which the intervention was predicated – that then-Libyan dictator Muammar Gaddafi was on the verge of committing a wholesale slaughter of the rebel stronghold Benghazi – was a lie propagated by Western and Gulf State media outlets.

It also shows the extent to which the crisis was driven by Libyan exiles who – perhaps quite understandably – had an axe to grind with the Gaddafi regime. In this – and in other ways, as we shall see – the Libyan crisis shares a number of similarities with the Syrian crisis. Indeed, it would be fair to view the debacle in Libya as a dress rehearsal for the war outside powers have been waging against the sovereign government of Syria for the past five years. ...

And then there is the role Western media has played in ginning up the twin crises. The U.K. report on Libya – citing Amnesty International – notes that, “Western media coverage has from the outset presented a very one-sided view of the logic of events, portraying the protest movement as entirely peaceful and repeatedly suggesting that the regime’s security forces were unaccountably massacring unarmed demonstrators who presented no security challenge.”

In fact, the opposite was the case: security forces in both Libya and Syria came under attack by Islamist radicals from the very start: these were hardly the “peaceful” protests as portrayed by the Western media. As the U.K. report points out, “It is now clear that militant Islamist militias played a critical role in the rebellion from February 2011 onwards.” ...

From the very start, the opposition to Assad included sectarian extremists who chanted: “Christians to Beirut, Alawis to the grave.” And the first documented incidents of violence in Daraa were against, not by, the Syrian security forces.

Syria believes it's on way to military victory

Syria's top diplomat told the world's nations Saturday that his country's belief in military victory is greater now because the army "is making great strides in its war against terrorism" with support from Russia, Iran and Lebanon's Hezbollah fighters.

Foreign Minister Walid al-Moallem said Syria is more determined than ever to eliminate "terrorism" from the country. The Syrian government refers to all those fighting to overthrow President Bashar Assad as "terrorists," including Western-backed opposition groups.

Al-Moallem accused the "moderate armed opposition" of committing crimes and massacres against Syrians "that are no less barbaric" than those of the Islamic State extremist group and al-Qaida. The Syrian government in turn has been accused by the U.S. and other Western nations of the indiscriminate killing of civilians, dropping bombs filled with chlorine gas as a chemical weapon, and torturing and killing opponents. ...

Al-Moallem accused Qatar and Saudi Arabia of spreading "terrorism" in Syria by sending in "mercenaries equipped with the most sophisticated weapons." He also accused Turkey of opening its border "to let in tens of thousands of terrorists from all over the world," and providing them with military and logistical support.

The Syrian minister reiterated the government's condemnation "in the strongest possible terms" of a U.S. attack on a Syrian army site near Deir El-Zour airport on Sept. 17, which he said allowed Islamic State fighters to gain control of the site.

"The Syrian government holds the United States fully responsible for this aggression, because facts show that it was an intentional attack, and not an error, even if the United States claims otherwise," he said.

Another Kerry Rush to Judgment on Syria

Secretary of State John Kerry has engaged in another rush to judgment blaming the Russians for an attack on a United Nations relief convoy in Syria before any thorough investigation could be conducted and thus prejudicing whatever might follow, as he did with the Syrian sarin case in 2013 and the shoot-down of Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 in 2014.

Eager to go on the propaganda offensive – especially after a U.S. military airstrike last Saturday killed scores of Syrian soldiers who were battling the Islamic State in eastern Syria – Kerry pounced on an initial report that the attack on the convoy on Monday was an airstrike and then insisted that the Russians must have been responsible because one of their jets was supposedly in the area.

But the United Nations – and I’m told CIA analysts – have not ruled out the possibility that the convoy was instead hit by a surface-to-surface missile. On Friday, a source briefed by U.S. intelligence said one fear is that the jihadist group, Ahrar al-Sham, which has fought alongside Al Qaeda’s Nusra Front but is deemed to be part of the “moderate” opposition, may have used a U.S.-supplied TOW missile in the attack. ...

On Tuesday, a day before Kerry’s outburst, the U.N. revised its initial statement citing an airstrike, with Jens Laerke, a humanitarian affairs representative for the U.N., saying: “We are not in a position to determine whether these were in fact airstrikes. We are in a position to say that the convoy was attacked.” He called the earlier reference to an airstrike a drafting error.

Nevertheless, on Wednesday, Kerry made his high-profile denunciation of the Russians at the U.N. Security Council, the same venue where Secretary of State Colin Powell in 2003 presented a false case against Iraq for possessing hidden stockpiles of WMD. In fiery comments, Kerry accused Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov of living “in a parallel universe” in denying Russian responsibility.

US and Russia trade blows over Syria

Russia accused of war crimes in Syria at UN security council session

Russia has been directly and repeatedly accused of war crimes at the UN security council in an unusually blunt session, as hopes of any form of ceasefire were flattened by the scale and ferocity of the Syrian regime’s assault on eastern Aleppo.

The war crimes accusations centred on the widespread use of bunker-busting and incendiary bombs on the 275,000 civilians living in the rebel-held east of the city, weapons that Moscow’s accusers say were dropped by Russian aircraft.

“Bunker-busting bombs, more suited to destroying military installations, are now destroying homes, decimating bomb shelters, crippling, maiming, killing dozens, if not hundreds,” Matthew Rycroft, the UK ambassador to the UN, said during the emergency security council session on Syria on Sunday. ...

In response, the Russian envoy, Vitaly Churkin, blamed the breakdown of a week-long, US-Russia-brokered ceasefire on rebels, including the “moderate opposition” backed by the west. Extremist groups in eastern Aleppo were holding its population hostage, Churkin claimed, stopping them from leaving and using them as human shields.

West still arming Al-Nusra in Syria, peace almost impossible – Russia’s UN envoy

Interesting and worth a full read. Teaser:

Todenhöfer: Interview With Al-Nusra Commander "The Americans stand on our side"

We conducted the interview ten days ago with a commander of the al-Qaida branch "Jabhat al-Nusra". Abu al-Ezz reported quite openly about his financiers Saudi-Arabia, Qatar and Kuwait. ...

Abu al-Ezz, commander, says about Jabhat al-Nusra (al-Qaeda): "We are one part of al-Qaeda. ... Our affairs and our way have changed. Israel, for example, is now supporting us, because Israel is at war with Syria and with Hizbullah.

America also changed its opinion about us. Originally "IS" and us were one group. But "IS" was used in the interests of big states like America, for political reasons, and was steered away from our principles. It became clear to us that most of their leaders work with secret security services." ...

Jürgen Todenhöfer: How is the relation between you and the United States? Does the U.S. support the rebels?

Abu al-Ezz: Yes, the U.S. support the opposition, but not directly. They support the countries which support us. But we are not yet satisfied with this support. They should support us with highly developed weapons. We have won battles thanks to the "TOW" missiles. We reached a balance with the regime through these missiles. We received the tanks from Libya through Turkey. Also the "BMs" - multiple rocket launchers. The regime excels us only with their fighter jets, missiles and missile launchers. We captured a share of its missile launchers and a large share came from abroad. But it is through the American "TOW" that we have the situation in some regions under control.

To whom did the U.S. hand those missiles before they were brought to you? Were those missiles first given to the Free Syrian Army by the U.S. and from there to you?

No, the missiles were give directly to us. They were delivered to a certain group. When the "road" was closed and we were besieged we had officers here from Turkey, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Israel and the United States.

An excellent article worth a full read:

The Hillary Clinton Presidency has Already Begun as Lame Ducks Promote Her War

If the British Empire was built on the playing fields of Eton, United States world hegemony gets its training in Hollywood studios and advertising agencies. Selling your product, or yourself, by looking sincere is a cultivated American art. Current top U.S. leaders are expert practitioners.

In the space of a few days, Samantha Power, John Kerry, and Barack Obama all turned in war-winning performances.

Last August 8, on that serious think tank the Charlie Rose show, former acting CIA director Michael Morell said that U.S. policy in Syria should be to make Iran and Russia “pay a price”. Russians and Iranians should be killed “covertly, so you don’t tell the world about it”, he said. Morell proposed that U.S. forces begin bombing Syrian government installations, in order to “scare Assad”. ...

Then, on Saturday, September 17, the U.S. Air Force did exactly what that CIA insider had called for. In sustained air strikes, four U.S. jets bombed a key Syrian Army position that had been defending the town of Deir ez-Zor from ISIS/Daech fighters. More than sixty Syrian soldiers were killed and over a hundred wounded. Daech forces immediately took advantage of the strikes to overrun the government position. In effect, the U.S. Air Force acted as air cover for the Islamic fanatics U.S. to advance against the legitimate army of Syria. ...

The Russians immediately called an emergency session of the United Nations Security Council to respond to this deadly violation of the truce supposedly intended to facilitate peace negotiations and humanitarian aid. When Russian ambassador Vitaly Churkin took the floor to speak, his American counterpart, Samantha Power, draped in her long red mane, walked out to give a press conference that clearly illustrated the difference between Russian and U.S. diplomacy.

Churkin, like Lavrov a few days later, cited facts and analysed the situation rationally. Samantha Power put on a show of evasion and insults.

Airstrikes in Aleppo are killing dozens of children

Hundreds of civilians were killed Sunday night as Syrian and Russian warplanes continued to bomb rebel-held areas, the day after Russia told the United Nations Security Council that the chances of bringing peace to Syria is now "an almost impossible task."

The eastern parts of the northern Syrian city of Aleppo were hit with another night of bombing with dozens of airstrikes hitting areas held by rebels in the city. The airstrikes are part of a renewed effort by the Syrian government to cripple the opposition, with its fresh campaign beginning last Thursday effectively ending a fragile ceasefire which had been in place since September 9. ...

The latest wave of air strikes came hours after the UN Security Council met at the request of the US, France and Britain to address the escalation in fighting in Aleppo.

Speaking before the council, Russia's UN ambassador Vitaly Churkin responded to strong criticism from the US and UK, saying: "In Syria hundreds of armed groups are being armed, the territory of the country is being bombed indiscriminately, and bringing a peace is almost an impossible task now because of this."

International Investigators Find Little Interest in Anti-ISIS Tribunal

As the war against ISIS continues to escalate, there has been an ever-growing elephant in the room: what will happen to the massive number of ISIS members if the group is militarily defeated, and by what mechanism will they be charged?

International legal investigators have been pushing the idea of a tribunal for ISIS detainees, but are finding a lot of ambivalence, and in some cases downright opposition, to the idea of setting up a mechanism to deal with what could conservatively be tens of thousands of detainees.

The US in particular is seen to be averse to this plan, with officials saying they are concerned that the focus on trials for ISIS detainees would “distract” from the war effort.

UK Warplanes Attacked by ISIS Surface-to-Air Missiles Over Iraq

Speculation about ISIS having surface-to-air missiles appears to be answered this weekend, with British Lt. Gen. Mark Carleton-Smith saying that British warplanes over Iraq have been fired at by such missiles coming from ISIS targets recently.

ISIS forces in Syria are believed to have acquired some surface-to-air missiles that were provided as part of the CIA effort to arm Syrian rebel groups, as such weapons quickly ended up distributed around to several different groups.

Myriad Forces to Join Invasion of Iraq’s Mosul, But With Different Agendas

An unlikely array of forces is converging on the city of Mosul, lining up for a battle on the historic plains of northern Iraq that is likely to be decisive in the war against the Islamic State group. ...

The battle, expected near the end of the year, threatens to be long and grueling. If IS fighters dig in against an assault, they have hundreds of thousands of residents in the city as potential human shields. And as residents flee, they fuel the humanitarian crisis in Iraq's Kurdish region around Mosul, where camps are already overcrowded with more than 1.6 million people displaced over the past two years. Humanitarian groups are rushing to prepare for potentially 1 million more who could be displaced by a Mosul assault. ...

The rivalries within the alliance are already starting to show and are likely to come to a head once IS falls.

The Kurds, who seized large swaths of territory during the fight against the militants, want to keep it. Iranian-backed Shiite militias demand recognition for the political and military strength they have garnered during the war. The Sunni minority is deeply worried about Shiite domination and discrimination, and those fears are likely only to grow as the community tries to recover from Islamic State rule and return to their homes.

The Shiite-led government in Baghdad will have to balance among these factions.

The most immediate question will be whether Shiite militias and Kurdish forces will join the assault into mainly Sunni Arab Mosul. It's a sensitive issue. Shiite militias have been accused of abuses against Sunnis in other areas they have retaken from the Islamic State group. If Kurds capture parts of the city, it gives them a strong card in future negotiations over the territory they hold.

Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi has said all forces will participate in the Mosul operation, a nod to Kurdish and Shiite militia demands.

Lawmakers Vow Override of Obama’s 9/11 Victims Bill Veto

Throughout Obama’s presidency, his vetoes have always survived Congressional challenges. That his first might be a bill about Saudi Arabia reflects waning Saudi influence in lobbying Congress to get their way, and what would likely have once been a very safe veto is now at serious risk.

Obama’s Friday veto of the Justice Against Sponsors of Terrorism Act (JASTA) aims to block a bill that would allow family members of 9/11 victims to sue Saudi Arabia in American courts. The House and Senate both passed JASTA unanimously, and many in both parties are expressing confidence they have the votes for an override of the veto.

The House was widely expected to override easily, but Sen. Chuck Schumer (D – NY) insisted that the Senate too would “quickly” override Obama’s veto, insisting that the Saudis must be held accountable if the courts find they were culpable in 9/11.

‘It’s betrayal of Yemeni people’: Outcry as Britain blocks UN inquiry into Yemen war crimes

A Disgusting, Child-Murdering Vote – On The $1.15 billion Saudi Arms Sale

In a craven act of genocidal depravity, the US Senate voted Wednesday to approve yet another tranche of weapons sales to the far-right Wahhabist theocracy of Saudi Arabia, bringing the total to over $20 billion in sales since the Saudi war began in March 2015. Those weapons will be used in the Saudis’ campaign of extermination against the civilian supporters of the Houthis, a postcolonial-nationalist militia aligned with Tehran.

Because of Saudi Arabia’s indiscriminate bombing of civilians, 14.4 million people in Yemen, out of 25.4 million, are food insecure, according to the World Food Program. On September 21 the BBC released a harrowing documentary on malnutrition among children in Yemen, all a direct result of the Saudi bombing campaign. ...

Here's the Senate roll call and the House roll call from the cluster vote in June is here.

France to close Calais refugee camp and tells UK it must play its part

The UK must make an effort to solve the refugee problem at Calais and across Europe, the French president, François Hollande, has said during a visit to the port town.

Hollande said he wanted the town’s notorious refugee camp – home to up to 10,000 people including 1,000 lone children – to be “completely and definitively dismantled”.

Closing down the camp would be an “exceptional operation prompted by exceptional circumstances” and the UK had to take some responsibility, he said. ...

“Just because the United Kingdom has taken a sovereign decision, [that] does not absolve it of its obligations towards France,” he added, referring to the Brexit vote and the Le Touquet bilateral agreement signed in 2003, which in effect established Britain’s border controls at Calais.

However, the British government said “the dismantling of the camp in Calais [was] a matter for the French government”.

Spain's regional elections boost Rajoy but political deadlock unlikely to end

The results of regional elections in Galicia and the Basque country look unlikely to yield a solution to the political paralysis that has left Spain in the hands of a caretaker government for the past nine months.

But Sunday’s polls have bolstered the position of the acting prime minister, Mariano Rajoy, after his People’s party (PP) cruised to an absolute majority in his home region of Galicia.

They have also inflicted severe damage on Pedro Sánchez, the leader of the socialist PSOE party, whom many blame for the enduring deadlock that has beset Spain following two inconclusive general elections.

Sánchez’s refusal to allow Rajoy to form a minority government – which is causing tensions within the PSOE as it prepares for a high-level meeting next Saturday – appears to have angered voters in Galicia and the Basque country.
The socialists took a drubbing in the regions, finishing third in Galicia and fourth in the Basque country. They were overtaken in both polls by the anti-austerity party Podemos, which is also suffering from internal squabbles.

Spain’s political leaders now have just over a month to try to form a government before King Felipe dissolves parliament on 31 October and calls for new elections to be held at Christmas.

Brazil’s President Michel Temer Says Rousseff was Impeached for Refusing His Economic Agenda

Brazilian President Michael Temer let an open secret become explicitly clear during a speech to business and foreign policy leaders yesterday in New York. The country’s elected and now-removed President, Dilma Rousseff, was impeached because of her position on economic policy, rather than any alleged wrongdoing on her part, her installed successor admitted. Temer’s stunning, and seemingly unscripted, acknowledgement will surely bolster the view of impeachment opponents that Dilma’s removal was a “parliamentary coup d’etat.”

In his remarks, Temer clearly stated what impeachment opponents have long maintained: that he and his party began to agitate for Rousseff’s impeachment when she refused to implement the pro-business economic plan of Temer’s party. That economic plan which Rousseff refused to implement called for widespread cuts to social programs and privatization, an agenda radically different from the one approved by Brazilians through the ballot box in 2014, when Dilma’s Workers’ Party won its fourth straight presidential election. The comments were delivered on Wednesday to an audience at the New York headquarters of the Americas Society/Council of the Americas (AS/COA).

The AS/COA groups which Temer addressed is composed of members of multinational corporations and the U.S. foreign policy establishment focused on Latin America. Both were founded by the American industrialist David Rockefeller and have as its President Emeritus John Negroponte: the former Reagan and Bush administration ambassador and neoconservative hawk influential in the CIA’s dirty war in Honduras and the 2003 invasion of Iraq who is now a prominent supporter of Hillary Clinton.

Brazil’s Big Media Ignores Temer’s Confession — Except Estadão Columnist Who Falsely Claimed Video Was Altered

The Intercept Brazil's Inacio Vieira yesterday reported one of the most significant pieces of evidence yet about the real reason for the impeachment of Brazil’s elected president, Dilma Rousseff. Speaking to a group of U.S. business and foreign policy elites, the country’s installed president, Michel Temer, admitted that what triggered the impeachment process was not any supposed “budgetary crimes,” but rather Dilma’s opposition to the neoliberal platform of social program cuts and privatization demanded by Temer’s party and the big-business interests that fund it.

But what’s as revealing as Temer’s casual acknowledgement of coup-type motives is how Brazil’s large media — which is united in favor of impeachment — has completely ignored his comments. Literally not one of Globo’s countless media properties, nor the nation’s largest newspaper, Folha, nor any of the nation’s large political magazines have even mentioned these stunning and incriminating remarks from the country’s president. They’ve imposed a total blackout. While numerous independent journalists and websites have reported Temer’s admission, none of Brazil’s major media outlets have uttered a word about it.

The only exception to this wall of silence was a columnist from the right-wing newspaper Estadão, Lúcia Guimarães, who spent several hours on Twitter yesterday completely humiliating herself in a spirited attempt to deny that Temer actually said this.

Corbyn Wins Leadership, But Can He Unite the Labour Party?

Jeremy Corbyn Easily Re-Elected Labour Party Leader

Jeremy Corbyn scored a "monumental victory" on Saturday, easily being reelected leader of Britain's Labour Party.

Corbyn got 61.8 percent of the vote to opponent Owen Smith's 38.2. The Guardian reports that the 67-year-old "won a majority over Smith in every category—members, registered supporters, and trades union affiliates. He won the support of 59 percent of voting members, 70 percent of registered supporters, and 60 percent of affiliated supporters."

Cory Doctorow writes at BoingBoing that his reelection came despite sabotage from his own party and the UK press's efforts to "to sideline, belittle and dismiss him." As such, Doctorow argues, "it is nothing short of a miracle that Corbyn has won the leadership race, and that, moreover, he has increased his lead, beyond last year's landslide, with a higher voter turnout than ever."

In fact the Bristol Post writes, it was "one of the most one-sided contests in the history of the party."

Corbyn urged unity of his party following the win, saying, "We have much more in common than that which divides us," as he vowed to "do everything I can to repay trust and the support, to bring our party together" and to "win power to deliver real change."

Activism Works: Charlotte Police Release Dashboard & Body Camera Video in Keith Lamont Scott Killing

Charlotte Police Video of Keith Scott’s Killing Released

Bowing to demands for greater transparency into the circumstances surrounding a fatal shooting that sparked protests in Charlotte, North Carolina this week, the city’s police department on Saturday released video of the deadly encounter recorded by its officers.

Kerr Putney, chief of the Charlotte-Mecklenburg police, told reporters that the video was recored on two police cameras — one mounted on the dashboard of a police car and another on the uniform of an officer — after an undercover unit observed Keith Lamont Scott sitting in his car on Tuesday afternoon with marijuana and a gun.
“When you are in possession of marijuana and then you have a gun, that’s a public safety issue that our officers were going to address,” Putney said.

Neither of the video clips makes it clear if Scott was, in fact, holding a gun when he was shot, but it does appear to cast doubt on previous statements from the police that he posed an imminent threat to their safety, since he appears to have been backing slowly away from his vehicle, with his arms still at his sides when he was shot.

Activists noted that North Carolina is an open-carry state, so even if Scott did have a handgun, there was no reason for officers to presume he was breaking the law, unless his race was a factor.

Students Are Pulling a Kaepernick All Over America — and Being Threatened for It

Since NFL 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick sat during the national anthem in August to protest oppression of people of color, many Americans, particularly professional athletes and students, have followed suit. But their constitutional right to engage in such gestures of dissent is not always being respected.

Threats from school administrators and teachers have put free speech advocates like the ACLU on high alert. At Lely High School, a public school in Naples, Florida, the principal told students that they would be removed from athletic events if they refused to stand during the national anthem — though he said the quote was misunderstood when the ACLU of Florida reached out. ...

In Worcester, Massachusetts, a high school football player was told that he would be forced to sit out a game for kneeling during the national anthem — since then, his suspension was terminated. ...

Some students, like Kaepernick himself, have received death threats. Eleven-year-old Jaelun Parkerson of Beaumont, Texas, received threats after he led his football team in kneeling during the national anthem. “It just makes me sad and scared,” he told ABC13.

Local police and the NAACP are investigating lynching threats in Brunswick, Ohio, where a high school football player named Rodney Axon Jr. was targeted after kneeling during the national anthem, according to Fox 8.

Clinton camp says Trump in 'sewer' as debate looms and fight gets dirty

The US presidential election turned into an increasingly dirty fight on Sunday, as polls showed the gap between Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump tightening ahead of their first televised debate.

Trump’s campaign manager did not rule out the prospect of the nominee getting personal onstage at Hofstra University in New York by summoning the ghosts of Bill Clinton’s sex life, insisting that the Republican candidate had “a right to defend himself”.

The two camps traded threats over who would be in the debate audience. After Clinton’s team confirmed that it had offered a front row seat to billionaire Trump critic Mark Cuban, Trump responded that he might invite Gennifer Flowers, a former model who had an extramarital encounter with Bill Clinton in the 1980s.

The shadow boxing came as a Washington Post/ABC poll put Clinton just two points ahead among likely voters, 46% to 44%. A survey by the Morning Consult website gave Trump an edge of one point.

Lessons from the environmental frontline

The campsites, Sacred Stone and Red Warrior, have swelled to well over 2,000 people. A seedling camp has sprung up on the road close to where construction on the pipeline is taking place about an hour south of Bismarck. Together, they constitute a sustainable community, complete with kitchens, donation centers, schools and legal counseling. The scope of the gathering is unprecedented, with over 280 tribes represented at the camps.

This combining of forces has been spurred on by the urgent nature of the crisis. For indigenous people, climate change and pollution aren’t the battles of tomorrow. They are very real, very present issues that have already dramatically impacted everyday life. The Inuit residents of Shishmaref, Alaska, are voting to relocate their village due to rising sea levels. The Navajo Nation is suing the EPA over a toxic mine spill that contaminated the San Juan River, which the Navajo depend on to water their crops and livestock. Last March, the Lenka people in Honduras lost civil rights leader and environmentalist Berta Cáceres, an ardent opponent of the privatization of the river Río Gualcarqueque, to assassination. ...

The indigenous way of life is more immediately dependent on the natural world, and when nature is damaged, indigenous people are damaged. When the rivers are poisoned, indigenous people are poisoned. This immediacy is what has drawn so many indigenous people together to fight. But it’s time for non-indigenous people to understand that this is their fight too. Their livelihoods also depend on the success of the battle indigenous people are fighting right now.

This was the hottest summer on record, and global temperatures continue to rise. Earth’s biodiversity is under threat and so long as corporate profits continue to be prioritized over the planet, we will continue to slide into conditions that are increasingly inhospitable to life.

At White House Conference, Tribes Push President to Act on Dakota Access

As the final session of the annual Tribal Nations Conference first instituted by President Barack Obama begins Monday, the question of the controversial Dakota Access Pipeline will take center stage.

North Dakota's Standing Rock Sioux Tribe, which has been battling the pipeline's construction for fear that it will contaminate their supply of fresh drinking water and damage tribal sacred sites and cultural artifacts, is "pushing for a much more thorough review process for this pipeline, including a full Environmental Impact Statement and meaningful tribal consultation," the tribe declared before the conference began.

The White House meeting will be the "eighth and final conference for tribal leaders from the 567 federally recognized tribes [and] the last opportunity for tribal leaders to express their concerns and issues with the Obama administration," notes the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe. "More than 300 Native Nations officially stand with Standing Rock, [issuing] tribal resolutions, letters of support, or [sending] tribal delegations [to join]the camp."

While the Department of the Interior, Department of Justice, and Army Corps of Engineers responded to the growing protests by requesting earlier this month that the corporation behind Dakota Access halt construction to allow for further consultation with the Standing Rock Sioux, the corporation has vowed to press ahead with the pipeline regardless.

Meanwhile, Indigenous people have been pushing President Obama to take further action and issue a definitive statement against the pipeline, though he has not yet done so.

African elephant numbers plummet during 'worst decline in 25 years’

The number of African elephants dropped by about 111,000 in the past decade as a result of poaching, a report released at the Johannesburg conference on the wildlife trade has found.

News of the worst drop in elephant numbers in 25 years came amid disagreement on the second day of the global meeting over the best way to improve the plight of the animals, which are targeted for their tusks. ...

Namibia and Zimbabwe want to be allowed to sell their ivory stockpiles accrued from natural deaths to fund community elephant conservation initiatives.

Zimbabwe’s environment minister Oppah Muchinguri rejected the “imperialistic policies” of countries that oppose the plan, branding them a “clear infringement on the sovereign rights of nations”. ...

Sue Lieberman, vice president of the Wildlife Conservation Society, said the IUCN report was “yet another set of data clearly indicating that governments must take all necessary actions to address the crisis, including closing their domestic elephant ivory markets”.

“It is now up to the Cities parties to carry that momentum forward (and) support the majority of African elephant range countries who are calling for closure of domestic markets,” she said.

“Closing domestic markets will close off opportunities to launder illegal ivory.”

Also of Interest

Here are some articles of interest, some which defied fair-use abstraction.

How US Propaganda Plays in Syrian War

Parking While Black: When Police Shoot as First Resort

Animal trafficking: the $23bn criminal industry policed by a toothless regulator

FBI and DOJ Vow to Continue Using Junk Science Rejected by White House Report

Who Decides When a Protest Becomes a Facebook “Disaster”?

A Walking Tour of New York’s Massive Surveillance Network

A Little Night Music

Barbara Lynn - Oh! Baby We Got A Good Thing Goin' London

Barbara Lynn - It's Better To Have It

Barbara Lynn - (Until Then) I'll Suffer

Barbara Lynn - Nice & Easy

Barbara Lynn - Misty Blue

Barbara Lynn - Letter To Mommy And Daddy

Barbara Lynn - You're Losing Me

Barbara Lynn - You make me so hot

Barbara Lynn - Money