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“The bankers and financiers are badly overplaying their hands, again, and people are starting to catch on to the scam.

Real wealth is tangible things produced with tangible effort. Loans made out of thin-air 'money' require no effort and are entirely ephemeral.

But if those loans are used to acquire real ownership of real assets, then something has been exchanged for nothing and one party is getting screwed.”

-- Chris Martenson

News and Opinion

Banks Assert Constitutional Right to Billions in Subsidies

A trade group for the nation’s largest banks has asserted a constitutional right to risk-free profit from the Federal Reserve.

Rob Nichols, the chief lobbyist for the American Bankers Association, argued in a comment letter Thursday that a recent federal law reducing the dividend on the stock that banks purchase as part of membership in the Federal Reserve system, violates the Fifth Amendment clause banning the uncompensated seizure of property. ...

“The Takings Clause of the Fifth Amendment provides that ‘private property’ shall not ‘be taken for public use, without just compensation,’” Nichols wrote in his comment letter to the Fed, which is preparing to implement the dividend cut. Nichols added that “The dividend rate remained unchanged for over 100 years, and it has long been considered fundamental to the Federal Reserve’s ability to attract member banks.”

Contrary to Nichols’s statement, nationally chartered banks are required by law to become members of the Federal Reserve system. ... Moreover, Fed membership offers many perks, from the ability to process payments to access to cheap borrowing, through the Fed’s discount window. So the dividend is just a vestigial sweetener that never went away, pumping billions of dollars in public money to the banks for no discernible reason. ...

The letter appears to be a prelude to a legal battle over the dividend cut.

Pentagon Denies War Crimes Allegations In Kunduz Hospital Killings

Nearly seven months after the first shots were fired, the Pentagon has released its full report detailing the night of chaos and horror that left 42 patients and staffers dead at a Doctors Without Borders hospital in Kunduz, Afghanistan. In publishing the highly anticipated account, the military concluded that its attack did not amount to a war crime because its effects were not intentional, a view at odds with certain interpretations of international law.

In the wake of the attack, Doctors Without Borders, also known by its French name, Médecins Sans Frontières, or MSF, described the October 3 raid as “abhorrent and a grave violation of international humanitarian law,” adding, a “war crime has been committed.”

In announcing the report today, Gen. Joseph Votel, the head of U.S. Central Command, argued that was not the case.

“The label ‘war crimes’ is typically reserved for intentional acts — intentional targeting [of] civilians or intentionally targeting protected objects or locations,” the general said. The Americans “had no idea,” they were targeting the hospital, Votel said, and once they recognized what was happening, they called off the attack. ...

According to the International Red Cross definition, “war crimes are violations that are committed willfully, i.e., either intentionally…or recklessly…The exact mental element varies depending on the crime concerned.” Following the release of the report, Patricia Gossman, Human Rights Watch’s senior researcher in Afghanistan, tweeted, “It is established principle of customary international law that war crimes can be committed through recklessness.”

What’s more, Votel’s claim appeared inconsistent with the military’s own law of war manual, which states, “In some cases, the term ‘war crime’ has been used as a technical expression for a violation of the law of war by any person; i.e., under this usage, any violation of the law of war is a war crime. This has been longstanding U.S. military doctrine.” According to the findings of their report, the investigators looking into the Kunduz attack noted violations of the rules of engagement, and also breaches of the laws of war.

'Unacceptable': Kunduz Survivors Lambaste Pentagon Claim of No War Crime

"Unacceptable."

That's the reaction from 27-year old Hamdullah to the Pentagon's announcement Friday that the U.S. military's deadly airstrike on a Doctors Without Borders hospital in Kunduz, Afghanistan did not amount to a war crime.

His uncle was among the 42 people killed in the October 3, 2015 strike.

"This was a deliberate bombardment by the American forces, and we are not satisfied that they have said this was not a war crime," Hamdullah told Agence France-Presse. Those responsible, he said, "should be publicly put on trial."

Doctors Without Borders, also known by its French acronym, MSF, along with other human rights groups criticized the U.S. military's assessment of the strike, and the fact that 16 individuals involved face no criminal charges for their roles in the attack.

"The threshold that must be crossed for this deadly incident to amount to a grave breach of international humanitarian law is not whether it was intentional or not," said Meinie Nicolai, MSF President, in reference to CENTCOM head General Joseph Votel's statement that it was not a war crime because it was not intentional. Donna McKay, executive director of Physicians for Human Rights, said that the mere administrative punishments represent "an affront to the families of the more than 40 men, women, and children who died that night, punished merely for being in a hospital, a supposed safe haven in a time of war." ...

A press statement from MSF Friday referred to the punishment of the personnel—which included "suspension and removal from command, letters of reprimand, formal counseling and extensive retraining"—as "out of proportion to the destruction of a protected medical facility, the deaths of 42 people, the wounding of dozens of others, and the total loss of vital medical services to hundreds of thousands of people."

D.C. Elite Hated Larry Wilmore’s Drone Joke Last Night, But Loved Obama’s in 2010

Last night at the annual White House Correspondents’ Association Dinner, Nightly Show host Larry Wilmore compared President Barack Obama to Golden State Warriors point guard Stephen Curry because they both “like raining down bombs on people from long distances.”

The audience of Washington, D.C. journalists, politicians and celebrities reacted with pained “oooooooh’s,” as did Obama himself (before grinning widely).

By contrast, the audience laughed with delight at the same dinner in 2010 when Obama warned the Jonas Brothers to stay away from his daughters or he would kill them with a predator drone.

Iraqi Protesters Storm Parliament, Break Through Green Zone

Iraq's political unrest continued on Saturday as hundreds of protesters waving Iraqi flags breached the fortified Green Zone in Baghdad and stormed the parliament.

Iraqi military announced a state of emergency in Baghdad, though, according to reporting by BBC News, "there has been no serious violence so far."

The protesters were described in various media reports as being followers of Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr.

MSNBC reports that protesters have been "demonstrating for weeks at the gates of the Green Zone," with calls for the government to take on reforms and tackle corruption.

Iraqi Protestors Withdraw From Unprecedented Occupation of Baghdad's Green Zone

The organizers behind a march on Baghdad's Green Zone called on protesters to leave the heavily-fortified government area on Sunday — just 24 hours after hundreds of Shiites aligned with cleric Muqtada al-Sadr carried out an unprecedented occupation the country's parliament.

Once they had breeched the zone's perimeter yesterday and entered the Iraqi parliament building, protesters jubilantly waved flags, took photographs, and condemned endemic corruption within Iraqi politics. ...

The Green Zone once housed Saddam Hussein's palace and parade grounds, and later served as the base for US-occupying forces. Now, it represents what Sadr has described as a "bastion of corruption" — where political deal making happens behind a buttress of barbed wire and security checkpoints, far from the public eye. ...

Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi is scrambling to regain control over his government, and has ordered the arrest of protesters who damaged government property and who attacked one lawmaker. Abadi has called on the interior ministry to pursue those demonstrators.

Abadi came to power in 2014 on promises to stamp out corruption. But those promises have not come to fruition — and skepticism toward Iraq's central government is widespread. Transparency International found that Iraqis overwhelmingly suspected graft within their own government.

After Green Zone Protests, Iraq’s Govt Weaker Than Ever

Iraqi Prime Minister Hayder Abadi’s position has been growing ever more tenuous in recent weeks, and his final capitulation to nominate a technocrat cabinet long demanded by reformists did little to improve his chances, as he’s been unable to get that cabinet confirmed by parliament, and indeed has had more water bottles thrown at him by MPs than parliament has had votes in the last two weeks.

Anger over the lack of progress on the cabinet led to protesters storming the heavily-fortified Green Zone, further punctuating how little control Abadi, or indeed anyone in the government, has over the situation anymore, leaving open the question of what comes next.

Desperate to show his authority, Abadi is ordering mass arrests of protesters, but faces serious risk if he tries to follow through on that, as while the protesters left voluntarily, they also made it very clear they’ll be back if their demands aren’t met.

US planning dubious game in Syria, that has a devastating impact on Syrian people

John Kerry says several proposals on table for partial Syria truce

John Kerry has said several proposals aimed at finding a way to restore at least a partial truce in Syria are being discussed, as attacks on the city of Aleppo continue.

The US secretary of state met Saudi Arabia’s foreign minister, Adel al-Jubeir, and the UN envoy for Syria, Staffan de Mistura, on Monday. He said progress was being made towards an understanding on how to reduce the violence in Aleppo, but that more work was needed.

“There are several proposals that are now going back to key players to sign off,” Kerry said after meeting De Mistura. We are hopeful but we are not there yet … we are going to work very hard in the next 24 hours, 48 hours to get there.”

He did not say what the proposals were, adding that he would phone Russia’s foreign minister, Sergei Lavrov, later on Monday and that De Mistura would go to Moscow on Tuesday for talks.

He said the US and Russia have agreed that there would be additional personnel dedicated to making sure there was more accountability and ability to enforce the cessation of hostilities on a day-to-day basis.

ISIS Ambushes British, Italian Troops in Libya

Details are extremely scant, mostly because both nations continue to deny having ground troops in Libya, but a group of British and Italian special forces inside Libya were said to have been ambushed by ISIS forces in an incident on Wednesday.

The ambush included suicide bombers, and Italian troops were said to have been “killed or wounded” in the incident, while some reports also suggested some of the British special forces may have been captured in the attack, which began with vehicle bombers.

Britain is believed to have had troops in Libya for months, as have the US, Italy, and France.

NATO to Send Four Battalions of Troops to Russia Border

According to Deputy Defense Secretary Robert Work, NATO intends to send four battalions worth of ground troops to the Russian border along the Baltic, with the troops to be deployed in Poland as well as around the former Soviet states of Lithuania, Latvia, and Estonia.

Work claimed the deployments are a response to recent Russian military exercises inside Russia, saying they are “extraordinarily provocative” from NATO’s perspective. Russia in turn says the exercises are a response to repeated NATO buildups on their border.

China Is Reportedly Training a 'Maritime Militia' to Patrol the Disputed South China Sea

Chinese officials are reportedly training fishermen to moonlight as a "maritime militia" — patrolling the disputed waters of the South China Sea and making note of any foreign vessels.

The training, according to information gleaned by Reuters, includes lessons on "safeguarding Chinese sovereignty," search and rescue operations, and dealing with disasters at sea.

"The maritime militia is expanding because of the country's need for it, and because of the desire of the fishermen to engage in national service, protecting our country's interests," said an advisor to the government of Hainan, the southern Chinese province which encompasses Baimajing, a port town.

The Chinese government has reportedly allotted subsidies for the fishermen to obtain vessels with steel, rather than wooden hulls. They have also provided Global Positioning Satellite equipment for at least 50,000 boats — which makes it possible for them to contact the Chinese Coast Guard in the event of an emergency at sea, or an encounter with a foreign ship. Some fisherman and diplomats told Reuters that some boats had been furnished with small arms.

Allegations of Anti-Semitism Fired up Ahead of Pivotal UK Local Elections

FBI Chooses Secrecy Over Locking Up Criminals

The Federal Bureau of Investigation’s refusal to discuss even the broad strokes of some of its secret investigative methods, such as implanting malware and tracking cellphones with Stingrays, is backfiring — if the goal is to actually enforce the law.

In the most recent example, the FBI may be forced to drop its case against a Washington State school administrator charged with possessing child porn because it doesn’t want to tell the court or the defense how it got its evidence—even in the judge’s chambers.

The FBI reportedly used a bug in an older version of the free anonymity software Tor to insert malware on the computers of people who accessed a child-porn website it had seized. The malware gave agents the ability to see visitors’ real Internet addresses and track them down.

Defense lawyers for Jay Michaud of Vancouver, Wash., argued they had the right to review the malware in order to pursue their argument that the government compromised the security of Michaud’s computer, leading to the illicit material ending up there unintentionally.

U.S. District Court Judge Robert Bryan in Tacoma agreed.

“The consequences are straightforward: the prosecution must now choose between complying with the Court’s discovery order and dismissing the case,” Michaud’s defense attorneys wrote in a brief filed last week.

Historian Peter Linebaugh on "The Incomplete, True, Authentic & Wonderful History of May Day

'Today Marks the End of TTIP': Greenpeace Leak Exposes Corporate Takeover

Confirming that the TransAtlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) amounts to "a huge transfer of power from people to big business," Greenpeace Netherlands on Monday leaked 248 secret pages of the controversial trade deal between the U.S. and EU, exposing how environmental regulations, climate protections, and consumer rights are being "bartered away behind closed doors."

The documents represent roughly two-thirds of the latest negotiating text, according to Greenpeace, and on some topics offer for the first time the position of the United States. ...

Greenpeace Netherlands zeroes in on four aspects of serious concern in the obtained texts, including:

• the apparent omission of the so-called "General Exceptions rule," which allows nations to regulate trade "to protect human, animal and plant life or health" or for "the conservation of exhaustible natural resources;"
• the absence of language about climate protection, plus provisions that would "stimulate imports and exports of fossil fuels—like shale gas from fracking or oil from tar sands—while clean energy production for local communities and associations would be considered unfair competition and a barrier to trade."
• a clear threat to the "precautionary principle," which requires regulatory caution where there is scientific doubt, shifting the burden of proof on whether a product is safe to public authorities, not on those who seek to sell it;
• the heretofore shrouded "high degree" of corporate influence over the talks.

According to the Guardian, which saw the original documents (retyped by Greenpeace and available here):

U.S. proposals include an obligation on the EU to inform its industries of any planned regulations in advance, and to allow them the same input into EU regulatory processes as European firms.

American firms could influence the content of EU laws at several points along the regulatory line, including through a plethora of proposed technical working groups and committees.

"These leaks confirm what millions of people across Europe have suspected all along—that this toxic trade deal is essentially an enormous corporate power grab," said Global Justice Now trade campaigner Guy Taylor on Monday.

Puerto Rico will not make $370m payment as debt crisis continues

Governor Alejandro Garcia Padilla announced that Puerto Rico’s government will not make nearly $370m in bond payments due Monday after a failure to restructure or find a political solution to the US territory’s spiralling public debt crisis.

Garcia said Sunday that he had issued an executive order suspending payments on debt owed by the island’s Government Development Bank, a default that will likely prompt lawsuits from creditors and could be a prelude to a deadline to a much larger payment due 1 July.

The governor said Puerto Rico can’t pay the bonds without cutting essential services.

Island officials spent the weekend trying to negotiate a settlement that would have avoided the default but apparently came up short. The development comes as Congress has so far been unable to pass a debt restructuring bill for Puerto Rico. ...

The governor had been warning since last year that the island’s overall public debt of more than $70bn is unpayable.

Vulture Funds Circle, Puerto Rico Set to Default on Debt

The commonwealth is expected to miss its upcoming $422 million bond payment for its Government Development Bank. The default comes after U.S. Congress failed to act to help the island territory last week, in a decision that followed a concerted lobbying push by hedge funds angling to profit off its debt crisis.

As International Business Times reports:

Over the last few years, hedge funds and mutual funds have bought up large tranches of Puerto Rico’s bonds at cut-rate prices, hoping the island will pay back its debts in full, thereby giving those financial interests a big payout. That gamble, however, has relied in part on the bet that the island will make draconian cuts to social services and worker pensions and use the savings to pay back 100 cents on the dollar to its Wall Street creditors — a bet, in other words, that Congress will prevent the island from simply erasing some of its debt through the kind of bankruptcy protections that are afforded U.S. cities.

To that end, federal lobbying records show that major banks, bond insurers and hedge funds spent millions last year to try to shape bankruptcy proposals for the island. Two so-called dark money groups linked to the billionaire Koch brothers and Republican strategist Karl Rove are also working to influence the debate over Puerto Rico’s debt.

"Faced with the inability to meet the demands of our creditors and the needs of our people, I had to make a choice," Puerto Rico Governor Alejandro Garcia Padilla said during a televised speech on Sunday. "I decided that essential services for the 3.5 million American citizens in Puerto Rico came first."

May Day Mayhem: Protesters Bite Cops, Throw Molotov Cocktails in Seattle

What began as a peaceful demonstration in support of immigrant and workers' rights in Seattle on Sunday morphed into a riot as hundreds of black-clad "anticapitalist" protesters stormed through the city's downtown area, smashing windows and clashing with police.

Five police officers were injured in the May Day mayhem, including one who was hit with a Molotov cocktail, another who was bitten, and a third who sustained a cut on the head from a rock thrown by protesters. Authorities said nine people were arrested on charges of assault, property destruction, and obstruction.

downtown Seattle sounds like a war zone #maydaysea #Q13fox pic.twitter.com/VQobU2jH1p

— Hana Kim (@hanamkim) May 2, 2016

Violent protests by anarchists have become an annual occurrence in Seattle on May Day, where several businesses, including Starbucks and Urban Outfitters, boarded up their windows on Sunday to avoid having them broken, according to the Seattle Times.

After a peaceful pro-labor and pro-immigrant gathering that was permitted by the city early in the day, a group of so-called "black bloc" protesters began to gather in Westlake Park in the heart of downtown Seattle. ... At around 6:30pm local time, the crowd began marching through downtown, flanked by a large contingent of bike cops in riot gear. Some in the crowd threw rocks, and police responded by showering them with pepper spray and launching "blast balls," a weapon similar to a flash-bang grenade that emits bright light, deafening sound, and pepper spray

RIP Father Daniel Berrigan: Remembering the Life and Legacy of the Antiwar Priest & Poet

Daniel Berrigan, priest and anti-Vietnam war peace activist, dies

Daniel Berrigan, a Roman Catholic priest and peace activist who was imprisoned for burning draft files in a protest against the Vietnam war, has died aged 94.

Berrigan died at Murray-Weigel Hall, a Jesuit health care community in New York City after a “long illness,” according to Michael Benigno, a Jesuits spokesman.

“He died peacefully,” Benigno said.

Berrigan and his younger brother, Philip, emerged as leaders of the radical anti-war movement in the 1960s.

The Berrigan brothers entered a draft board in Catonsville, Maryland, in May 1968 with seven other activists and removed records of young men about to be shipped off to Vietnam. The group took the files outside and burned them in garbage cans. ...

Berrigan credited Dorothy Day, founder of The Catholic Worker newspaper, with introducing him to the pacifist movement and influencing his thinking about war.

Much later, while visiting Paris in 1963 on a teaching sabbatical from LeMoyne College, Berrigan met French Jesuits who spoke of the dire situation in Indochina. Soon after that, he and his brother founded the Catholic Peace Fellowship, which helped organize protests against US involvement in Vietnam. ...

The Berrigan brothers continued to be active in the peace movement long after Catonsville. Together, they began the Plowshares Movement, an anti-nuclear weapons campaign in 1980. Both were arrested that year after entering a General Electric nuclear missile facility in King of Prussia, Pennsylvania, and damaging nuclear warhead nose cones.

Clinton Camp says She's Been Forced to the Left Enough Already

Clinton ally tells The Hill, "I don't know what's left to extract."

Fresh after Bernie Sanders' call for a "a fifty-state strategy... to plant the flag of progressive politics" nationwide, new reporting on Friday suggests that Hillary Clinton's campaign won't be budged any further to the left. ...

Steps forward on issues that would constitute such a platform can already be seen in the race, observers say. As Max Ehrenfreund writes at Washington Post's Wonkblog Friday,

In the course of fending off Sanders's challenge, Clinton appears to have conceded to him on a couple of major economic policy issues. The former U.S. senator and secretary of state has abandoned the centrist positions she previously held on trade and Social Security and taken stances closer to Sanders's views.

But Amie Parnes writes at The Hill, "Clinton supporters argue the former secretary of State has already been forced to the left by Sanders, and can't risk moving further ahead of a general election."

And while political talk show host Bill Press told The Hill that it would be the wrong move for Clinton to "move back to the center," Rep. Emanuel Cleaver (D-Mo.), told the political website that her campaign couldn't make any more leftward concessions, saying, "I don't know what's left to extract."

Cleaver added that "[Sanders has] already impacted this election probably more than anyone else including Donald Trump," and then suggested it was time for Sanders to help gather support for his rival.

Parnes also cites an anonymous Clinton ally who said, "We can't do it," regarding meeting some of Sanders' policy demands. ...

Speaking to thousands at a rally in Eugene, Ore., Sanders said, "The Democratic Party has to reach a fundamental conclusion: Are we on the side working people or big money interests? Do we stand with the elderly, the children, and the sick and the poor, or do we stand with Wall Street speculators and the drug companies and the insurance companies?"

Sanders Supporters on Road to Insurrection in Democratic Party?

Bernie Sanders vows a contested convention despite 'tough road' ahead

In a press conference to mark the one-year anniversary of an insurgent campaign that few ever imagined, Bernie Sanders revealed plans for a new series of mega-rallies in California and renewed calls on the party’s handpicked superdelegates to change their allegiances before this summer’s national convention. ...

“It is virtually impossible for Hillary Clinton to reach a majority of convention delegates by June 14, which is the last day a primary will be held, with pledged delegates alone,” he added. “She will need superdelegates to take her over the top at the convention in Philadelphia.

“In other words the convention will be a contested contest.”

The defiant mood of the remarks at the National Press Club in Washington follow a strong weekend for Sanders. ... Clinton, in contrast, appears increasingly relaxed about her path to the nomination after a series of strong election wins in Connecticut, Maryland, Pennsylvania and Delaware on Tuesday, and a blowout win in New York, which all but guarantee she will go to Philadelphia with a majority of delegates.

But she was on the receiving end of a number of surprisingly barbed jokes from Obama at Saturday’s dinner and some supporters may be dismayed to see that Sanders is not ready to rally around her yet either. Earlier Sunday, she told CNN: “I certainly look forward to working with Senator Sanders,” and promised “a progressive platform”.

Bernie Sanders acknowledges 'uphill' struggle but believes win is possible

Bernie Sanders is not ready to discuss his campaign in the past tense.

“I am not into legacy,” he told the Guardian on Sunday when asked to sum up his lasting achievements after a year of insurgency. “I hope my legacy will be that I was a very good president of the United States.” ...

But with $200m raised from 7.4 million individual donations, the real legacy has arguably already been secured. “We have shown that you can run a political campaign without the benefit of Super Pacs and big money interests,” explains Sanders.

Then there are the 1.1 million supporters who have turned up to rallies in the last year, a total Sanders hopes to add to “significantly” with a few blow-out final rallies in California before it votes.

These may not have been enough to overcome structural obstacles in key states like New York, where independents were not allowed to vote in the Democratic primary, but they point to enthusiasm that Sanders clearly believes will long outlast him.

“We have won, in a state after state, a strong majority of the votes of younger people, voters under 45 years of age,” said the 74-year-old senator. “In other words, the ideas that we are fighting for are the future of the Democratic party and in fact the future of this country. The reason for that is that the issues that we are talking about are the issues that are on the minds of the American people.”

In First, Trump Ekes Ahead of Clinton in New National Poll

In a hypothetical matchup, the New York billionaire would defeat the former secretary of state 41 to 39 percent, according to the new Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey, which was released on Monday.

According to the survey, which was conducted from April 27 to 28 among 1,000 likely voters:

Trump now has the support of 73% of Republicans, while 77% of Democrats back Clinton. But Trump picks up 15% of Democrats, while just eight percent (8%) of GOP voters prefer Clinton, given this matchup. Republicans are twice as likely to prefer another candidate. 

Among voters not affiliated with either major party, Trump leads 37% to 31%, but 23% like another candidate. Nine percent (9%) are undecided.

The results mark the first time since October that Trump has led Clinton in the Rasmussen poll while the latest RealClearPolitics average shows Clinton ahead of Trump by 7.3 percent. ...

Underscoring both candidates' consistently low favorability ratings, Rasmussen also reported that nearly a quarter of voters said they would "opt out" of a Clinton-Trump race, either by voting for another candidate (16 percent) or staying home (6 percent).

'Slap in the Face': Top Court Overrules Local Fracking Bans in Colorado

The Colorado Supreme Court ruled on Monday that state law trumps two cities' attempts to stem the domestic fracking boom, issuing "a severe slap in the face" to Coloradans and local democracy alike.

The court heard cases from Longmont, where voters banned the oil and gas drilling practice in 2012, and Fort Collins, where voters approved a 5-year moratorium in 2013. The Colorado Oil and Gas Association, an industry trade group that brought the suits against both cities, argued that the fossil fuel-friendly state clearly regulates fracking, and the cities can't forbid a practice that the state allows.

According to the Denver Post:

The court ruled that Fort Collins' five-year moratorium within the city limits is "a matter of mixed state and local concern and, therefore, is subject to preemption by state law. Applying well-established preemption principles, the court further concludes that Fort Collins's moratorium operationally conflicts with the effectuation of state law."

It said the same in Longmont's 2012 ban on fracking.

"The Oil and Gas Conservation Act and the Commission's pervasive rules and regulations ... convince us that the state's interest in the efficient and responsible development of oil and gas resources includes a strong interest in the uniform regulation of fracking," the court wrote in the Longmont ruling.

In other words, said Sierra Club executive director Michael Brune, "The Colorado Supreme Court has now ruled that corporate polluters' profits outweigh the will of Coloradans who have said 'no' to fracking and 'yes' to a safe environment for their communities."

Peabody coal's contrarian scientist witnesses lose their court case

In Minnesota, an administrative hearing resulted in a judicial recommendation that will have impacts across the country. It was a case argued mainly between environmental groups (such as Minnesota Center for Environmental Advocacy, and their clients Fresh Energy and the Sierra Club) and energy producers (such as the now-bankrupt coal company Peabody Energy) regarding what a reasonable social cost of carbon should be. ...

On April 15^th, the Administrative Law Judge decided that the estimated cost of carbon pollution currently used in Minnesota is too low. New knowledge about how fast the climate is changing, how much it will change, and how it will affect societies and economies would be reflected in a larger carbon cost. This leads to a large increase in the estimated cost, from $0.44-4.53 per ton to $11-57 per ton. A summary of the ruling can be found here and the full report is available here. ...

Peabody’s scientists made errors that were easy to identify and point out to the Judge. Furthermore, the Judge was smart, quickly able to see through nonsense non-science.

For those of you that read the report, you’ll notice that the Peabody side made claims about the natural variability of Earth’s climate, about Earth temperature changes, and about extreme weather events. The environmental group’s side rebutted these viewpoints (see pages 15-19).

We also showed that the experts for Peabody relied extensively on non-peer-reviewed reports, blog sites, and think tanks to support their conclusions (paragraph 359 in the report). The peer-reviewed scientific literature is the best source for accurate climate science information. In other areas, the Peabody experts used scientific papers that we showed were incorrect (paragraph 360 in the report, for example).

Speaking of the social costs of carbon...

Armed guards at India's dams as drought grips country

As young boys plunge into a murky dam to escape the blistering afternoon sun, armed guards stand vigil at one of the few remaining water bodies in a state hit hard by India’s crippling drought.

Desperate farmers from a neighbouring state regularly attempt to steal water from the Barighat dam, forcing authorities in central Madhya Pradesh to protect it with armed guards to ensure supplies. ...

“Water is more precious than gold in this area,” Purshotam Sirohi, who was hired by the local municipality to protect the dam, in Tikamgarh district, told AFP. ...

But the security measures cannot stop the drought from ravaging the dam, with officials saying it holds just one month of reserves.

Four reservoirs in Madhya Pradesh have already dried up, leaving more than a million people with inadequate water and forcing authorities to bring in supplies using trucks.

Almost a 100,000 residents in Tikamgarh get piped water for just two hours every fourth day, while municipal authorities have ordered new bore wells to be dug to meet demand.

But it may not be enough, with officials saying the groundwater level has receded more than 100 feet (30 metres) owing to less than half the average annual rainfall in the past few years.

India heatwave: 360 million people hit by drought as temperatures soar

Opponents of Massachusetts Ballot Measure Say Cage-Free Eggs Are War on the Poor

Massachusetts has become the latest battleground between animal rights activists and their rivals over "cage-free" labeled eggs and meat products — a fight that pits proponents of animal welfare against consumers who could pay more for groceries.

Opponents of a proposed November ballot question that would mandate that eggs sold in the Bay State come from cage-free hens by 2022 argue that the proposal would cause egg prices to skyrocket. The measure would also apply to pork and calves raised for veal.

"Right now Massachusetts families are asking themselves a question: Do I pay my rent or feed my family?" Diane Sullivan, a mother of five who lives in the Boston suburb of Medford said. "You want a cage-free egg? Go for it. But don't take away the only affordable option for people."

Sullivan is a plaintiff in a suit against Massachusetts Attorney General Maura Healy for approving the ballot question's language, which it alleges violates the state constitution. Formerly homeless, she is a registered lobbyist who advocates on behalf of low-income families. Sullivan's now working at a pizza parlor to make ends meet, she said, and is on food stamps.

She didn't file the lawsuit on her own. Protect the Harvest, a Missouri-based nonprofit that has ties to the agriculture industry, according to the Center for Public Integrity, is bankrolling her case. The automotive oil tycoon Forrest Lucas founded the organization to combat "animal rights groups and anti-farming extremists." ...

Paul Shapiro, the Humane Society's vice president of farm animal protection, said that voters have passed cage-free referendums because they overwhelmingly oppose the cruel conditions that animals suffer on factory farms. ... "The prevention of cruelty to animals is a near-universal value," said Shapiro. "They have crammed animals into smaller spaces to the point now where the standard practices in the industry are out of step with the standard American values of how animals should be treated."

Also of Interest

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

Google and Microsoft have made a pact to protect surveillance capitalism

Why a British Fight Over Israel and Anti-Semitism Matters to the Rest of Us

Hillary Clinton’s Damning Emails

U.S. Chamber Works Behind the Scenes to Gut Whistleblower Protections

Chelsea E Manning: Solitary confinement is 'no touch' torture, and it must be abolished

Texas Prisons Assert Right to Censor Inmates’ Families on Social Media

May Day parades around the world – in pictures

A Little Night Music

Sonny Terry - Ride and Roll

Sonny Terry - Harmonica Hop

Sonny Terry & Brownie McGee - Bring it on home to me

Sonny Terry & Brownie McGhee - Trouble in Mind

Sonny Terry - Diggin' My Potatoes

Sonny Terry - Hooray, Hooray, These Women Is Killin' Me

Sonny Terry & Brownie McGhee - BBC (1974)