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This evening's music features Memphis r&b band Booker T & The MG's. Enjoy!

“The arms race between [predators] and [prey] is asymmetric, in which success on either side is felt as failure by the other side, but the nature of the success and failure on the two sides is very different. The two sides are 'trying' to do very different things. [Predators] are trying to eat [prey]. [Prey] are not trying to eat [predators], they are trying to avoid being eaten by [predators].

From an evolutionary point of view asymmetric arms races are more [likely] to generate highly complex weapons systems.”

-- Richard Dawkins

News and Opinion

Putin Just Kicked the Nuclear Arms Race Up Another Notch

Russian President Vladimir Putin said Thursday that Russia will start churning out the kind of medium-range missiles that were previously banned under a Cold War-era treaty President Trump ditched in August.

“Of course we will produce such missiles,” Putin told an audience in the country’s far-eastern city of Vladivostok, adding he feels “quite sad” about reports that the U.S. might deploy those same weapons in nearby Japan and South Korea. ...

On Thursday, Putin promised Russia wouldn’t be the first to actually deploy such medium-range missiles — but would follow suit if the U.S. does.

“We understand that deploying them in Japan or South Korea would be done under the pretext of preventing the threat from North Korea,” Putin said. “But for us it’s a significant problem, a very serious one, because these missile systems are going to be able to cover a large part of the Russian territory.”

Embassy insider exposes CNN lies about Julian Assange

Heh, raise your hand if anything in this surprises you. There's plenty more that won't surprise you at the link.

When is America going to end its shadow war in Somalia?

In July, a crowd at a Trump rally chanted “send her back” about the Minnesota representative Ilhan Omar, parroting Trump’s suggestion that she “go back” to Somalia, from which she immigrated as a child. Shortly after, the Kentucky senator Rand Paul offered to buy Omar a plane ticket back to Somalia so that she would be more appreciative of her American home. What few commentators have mentioned is that, when it comes to Somalia, “send her back” is not just racist and offensive. It also completely ignores the critical role of US foreign policy over the past several decades in contributing to what Paul called “the disaster that is Somalia”.

Few Americans are aware that the US is conducting a rapidly rising number of drone strikes and even boots-on-the-ground combat operations against a group, al-Shabaab, that Washington labels “terrorists”. While the airstrikes are a response to US concerns about Islamist terrorists in Africa and foreign policy priorities evidenced in the so-called “war on terror”, they also are an extension of the long, sorry history of US military intervention in Somalia. This history has been characterized by blunders, errors, atrocities, impunity, collusion, corruption and a very high toll on Somali civilians.

A new report released today by the Costs of War project, which I co-direct, at Brown University’s Watson Institute for International and Public Affairs, looks at the past four decades of US military involvement in Somalia, including the shadow war being waged there today, and concludes that as long as US military policy in Somalia targets al-Shabaab as a terrorist group, confronting it with the counterinsurgency tactics of the US-led war on terrorism, it won’t work. According to the report, authored by the Colby College professor Catherine Besteman, US actions in Somalia are predicated on a misreading of the local context. Al-Shabaab is not just a terrorist group in the sense of a group that commits violence against civilians, it is also a local resistance movement against foreign interventionism.

The US has played a significant role in Somali politics for decades, starting in the 1970s supporting Somalia’s brutal dictator, Siad Barre, during the cold war, and later attempting ineffectually to rebuild the collapsed state. In 1993, when the infamous Black Hawk Down incident occurred, the US military withdrew from Somalia after a local militia group shot down an American helicopter that was going after its leaders. After 9/11, however, the US once more began conducting military operations in Somalia; as the report states: “US security panics identified Somalia’s ongoing statelessness as offering a potential opportunity for terrorists.” Al-Shabaab has been gaining strength and power ever since, fueled by Somali rage over now decades-long foreign interference in their country. Thus the growth of al-Shabaab has not only been fed by a long history of US operations in Somalia but also by the current US war against it.

Erdogan: I'll let Syrian refugees leave Turkey for west unless safe zone set up

The Turkish president, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, is threatening to “open the gates” to allow Syrian refugees to leave Turkey for western countries unless a controversial “safe zone” inside Syria is established soon.

Erdogan’s comments come amid growing tension with Washington over delays in establishing the safe zone – first proposed by Donald Trump – not least over the fate of a key US-allied Kurdish militia, the YPG, which Ankara regards as a terrorist organisation. Ankara has been threatening to move its troops unilaterally into the safe zone unless progress is made.

With Turkey hosting some 3.6 million Syrian refugees, Erdogan’s threat raised the spectre of a surge of people into Europe that could dwarf even the recent migration crisis at its peak. ...

Erdogan has become increasingly angry with Washington and the EU over the issue of Syrian refugees, claiming that Turkey has spent $40bn supporting them, and criticising western countries, including the European Union, for failing to live up to their promises. Under a 2016 agreement, the EU promised Ankara €6bn in exchange for stronger controls on refugees leaving Turkish territory for Europe, but Erdogan said only €3bn had so far arrived.

CrossTalk: Quitting Afghanistan?

Empire America: Why Washington Can't Reduce Its Military Footprint

As negotiations between the United States and the Taliban continue, it is increasingly clear that even if an agreement emerges, any U.S. troop withdrawal from Afghanistan will be partial, not total. President Donald Trump recently confirmed that point. “Oh yeah, you have to keep a presence,” Trump said in an interview with Fox News radio. “We’re going to keep a presence there.” He did indicate that the current troop level of more than 14,000 was being reduced to 8,600. Further reductions might take place if a final accord could be reached, but a sizable contingent of Special Forces personnel, intelligence operatives, and military contractors would remain indefinitely.

Disappointed advocates of a complete withdrawal from America’s longest war believed that, once again, the president listened to military leaders and congenital hawks such as Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) and backed away from his intention to extricate the United States from the seemingly interminable conflict. A similar pattern had emerged in the summer of 2017, when National Security Adviser H. R. McMaster, Secretary of Defense James Mattis, and other advisers successfully prevailed on Trump to abandon the pledge he made during the 2016 presidential campaign to terminate the Afghanistan mission.

It is an oversimplification to blame the influence of nefarious hawks for Trump’s desire to keep a U.S. military footprint (albeit a smaller one) in Afghanistan. His move is consistent with more than seven decades of U.S. security policy around the world. Since the end of World War II, the United States has practiced its own version of the Cold War-era Brezhnev Doctrine. Moscow’s policy, named after Soviet leader Leonid Brezhnev, asserted that once a country became a member of the communist camp, it must always remain a member. The U.S. version has meant that once a nation becomes a security dependent of the United States, it forever remains a U.S. security dependent, and once Washington establishes a significant military footprint in a country, that footprint will endure.

It has been a strikingly consistent pattern. The United States still has troops stationed in Europe and Japan long after World War II ended. Even the collapse of the Warsaw Pact and the Soviet Union itself led only to a reduction, not the elimination, of the U.S. troop presence in Europe. Similarly, Washington continues to station nearly thirty thousand troops in South Korea, even though that country now has twice the population and an economy nearly fifty times larger than North Korea’s economy, and the bipolar Cold War context no longer has the slightest relevance. [See article for expanded listing of imperial outposts. - js] ...

The United States does not practice the old-style imperialism of conquest, the establishment of colonies, and the use of direct rule. Instead, U.S. imperialism consists of creating patron-client relationships with security dependents and enforcing that policy through a global network of military bases. Nevertheless, it is an imperial policy, and the U.S. military footprint in a client state becomes as permanent as if it were encased in concrete. Afghanistan is merely the latest arena in which that model is being used.

Should We Feed Hungry Children, or the War Machine?

In August 21, the Humanitarian Coordinator for Yemen, Lise Grande, put out a heartbreaking call for nations to make good on their pledges to send humanitarian aid to feed destitute families in war-torn Yemen. Unless the funds promised are received soon, she warned, food rations for 12 million people would be reduced and at least 2.5 million malnourished children would be cut-off from the services that keep them alive. “When money doesn’t come,” Grande said bluntly, “people die.”

The total UN appeal is $4 billion. While this is the largest country appeal the UN has ever put out, the entire bill represents only two days of the 2019 US military budget of almost $700 billion. Lacking generosity, the US offered a mere $300 million—less than four hours of Pentagon spending. Meanwhile, US companies rake in billions of dollars selling the weapons to Saudi Arabia that are in large part responsible for this humanitarian crisis.

The wild disparity between money for feeding people and money for arming the military is reflected here at home. In 2018, the federal government spent $68 billion on the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), which provided food to 40 million people. It would take only ten days of the Pentagon budget to cover that tab, but this administration says it’s too expensive and is trying to cut eligibility for food to the poor. ...

Columbia University’s Jeffrey Sachs, one of the world’s leading experts on economic development, has estimated that the cost to end world poverty is $195 billion per year. With the upcoming 2020 military budget proposed at $750 billion, the US could feed the world’s hungry and still spend twice as much on its military than the number two spender: China. It would also serve our national interests. Feeding the poor would certainly win us more friends around the world than deploying another aircraft carrier. ...

The trend of military spending outpacing the cost of even our most ambitious social programs continues for just about every cause you can name. We could house every homeless person in the country, give the Department of Transportation a budget nine times as large as its current one, or vastly expand programs like Medicare and Medicaid. Every dollar of public money that goes to finance US militarism abroad is a dollar that could go to fighting hunger, homelessness, or climate change.

Our elected officials have chosen to prioritize the pursuit of military hegemony over the wellbeing of our people. What’s more, they treat military spending as an inevitability while programs that might improve the lives of students in crippling education debt or the sick in crippling medical debt are portrayed as luxuries. Advocates for Medicare for All and the Green New Deal must constantly justify their high price tags for saving lives and our planet, while the military receives an ever-growing check to destroy them.

Robert Mugabe, Ousted Zimbabwean President & Liberation Leader, Dies at 95

Federal Judge Rules US Terror Watchlist Unconstitutional

A federal judge on Wednesday ruled that the government's terror watchlist violates the civil rights of Americans placed on it, opening the door for a major piece of legislation from the global war on terror being overturned.

"This is a really important ruling, long overdue," said Jameel Jaffer, director of the Knight First Amendment Institute at Columbia University. "The watchlist is overbroad, opaque, and arbitrary—a civil liberties train wreck."

The ruling (pdf) stemmed from a lawsuit brought by 19 Americans on the list represented by the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR).

"Today's opinion is a victory for the more than one hundred American Muslims we represent and for the thousands of American Muslims who are currently stigmatized by the watchlist," CAIR national litigation director Lena Masri said in a statment.

Many of the early domestic liberty assaults from the War on Terror - including the Terror Watch List & No-Fly list (aimed, needless to say, overwhelmingly at US Muslims) - were constitutional atrocities from the start. Good to see courts finally acting: https://t.co/b2JnPK7ymr

— Glenn Greenwald (@ggreenwald) September 5, 2019

Edward Snowden’s guardian angels

Kushner's Middle East peace plan drifts further astray as envoy resigns

Jason Greenblatt, the Trump administration’s special envoy for Middle East peace, tasked with working on the “ultimate deal” for resolving the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, is to leave the post, it has been announced.

Greenblatt may stay in the role until the publication of the long-delayed plan, which is now due to come out some time after Israeli elections on 17 September. However, if those elections bring about the fall of Donald Trump’s close ally, Benjamin Netanyahu, the plan could be shelved indefinitely.

“Greenblatt’s leaving may have to do with the dim prospects of the so-called peace plan,” said Khaled Elgindy, a fellow at the Brookings Institution, and author of a book on US policy towards the Palestinians, Blind Spot. “What I do know is that it won’t make any difference to what is not really a plan – let’s call it a vision – because there is no chance of it going anywhere.”

Greenblatt, a real estate lawyer with no experience in diplomacy, began working on the would-be plan in 2017 with Trump’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner, in what the president has said would be the “ultimate deal”.

t was reported on Thursday that a 30 year-old Kushner aide, Avi Berkowitz – who graduated from law school in 2016 and has no Middle East experience, would take over some of Greenblatt’s role, while the state department’s special envoy for Iran, Brian Hook, would broaden his responsibilities to include Israel and the Palestinian territories.

Boris Johnson says he would 'rather be dead in a ditch' than delay Brexit

Jo Johnson quits as MP and minister, citing 'national interest'

Boris Johnson’s premiership has been dealt an extraordinary blow after his brother, Jo Johnson, announced he was quitting the cabinet, citing an “unresolvable tension” between his family loyalty and the national interest. The dramatic move by the younger Johnson, who had only recently returned to government, sent shockwaves through the Conservative party and appeared to severely rattle the prime minister as he visited a police training academy.

The speech by the prime minister in West Yorkshire was to have marked the start of a Conservative general election campaign – a schedule scuppered by Labour overnight. Johnson pledged he would rather “die in a ditch” than bow to the demands of the no-deal bill passed by the House of Commons and request a Brexit extension.

However, Downing Street appeared to be increasingly losing control of the timetable, with Johnson unable to articulate how he would react should Labour fail to back an election again on Monday, in a rambling and occasionally incoherent speech, delivered almost an hour late. ...

Johnson’s resignation looks set to become a major attack line for Labour. “Boris Johnson poses such a threat that even his own brother doesn’t trust him,” the party’s shadow education secretary Angela Rayner said.

His departure also came amid a number of resignations from Conservative MPs who cited the divisions in the party. Caroline Spelman, the former party chair who rebelled against the government to back the bill on Wednesday, said she would leave parliament because “I can’t be pro no-deal when I’ve seen the predictions about what will happen to jobs.”

Nick Hurd, the Northern Ireland minister, also said he would not stand again, saying politics “is now dominated by the ongoing division over Brexit.”

'Hell No,' Say Progressives, After GOP Sen. Joni Ernst Suggests Cutting Social Security 'Behind Closed Doors'

Republican Sen. Joni Ernst of Iowa is under fire after telling a town hall audience last weekend that members of Congress should negotiate changes to Social Security "behind closed doors" in order to dodge scrutiny from the media and advocacy groups. Ernst, who is running for reelection in 2020, complained to the crowd gathered in Estherville, Iowa that "the minute you say we need to address Social Security, the media is hammering you, the opposing party is hammering you—there goes granny over a cliff." Lawmakers should therefore meet in secret to avoid "being scrutinized by this group or the other," said the Iowa Republican.

Ernst did not recommend specific changes to Social Security during her town hall appearance, but the senator has in the past suggested privatization of the widely popular program as "one solution."

Nancy Altman, president of progressive advocacy group Social Security Works, wrote Friday that Ernst "said out loud what Republican politicians usually only talk about in secret meetings with their billionaire donors: the GOP wants to cut our earned Social Security benefits—and they want to do it behind closed doors so that they don't have to pay the political price." ...

Ernst's comments came as President Donald Trump is reportedly considering cuts to Social Security and Medicare as a possible "second-term project." As the Washington Post reported in July, Trump ordered his aides to "prepare for sweeping budget cuts if he wins a second term in the White House."

Unaffordable Health and Child Care Alongside Flimsy Safety Net Leaves US Among Most Unlivable Nations: Global Survey

A new global survey finds that expats living in the U.S. aren't able to enjoy life in the world's wealthiest country because of many of the same factors that cause anxiety among Americans: high healthcare and child care costs and a general lack of social welfare programs.

The annual Expat Insider Survey, released Thursday by the expat community network InterNations, finds that the U.S. is only the 47th best country to live in out of 64 countries. The country's ranking is unchanged since the group's last survey in 2018.

The survey asked more than 20,000 expats in 187 countries to rank their experiences in their adopted or temporary homes based on several factors, including quality of life, family life and the ability to raise children, personal finances, and medical care. Out of the 187 countries where InterNations conducted the poll, 64 had large enough sample sizes to be included in the survey's official rankings.

Compared to the highest-ranking countries, including Taiwan, Vietnam, and Portugal, the U.S. was found to be less safe, less affordable, and less politically stable.

Many expats in the U.S. described a living experience marked by financial precariousness, fears for safety, and the knowledge that the U.S. government would do little to support them in the event of an emergency.

While 57 percent of expats in the U.S. ranked the quality of healthcare positively, 71 percent said it was not affordable for them and their families. The survey labeled the United States "the most expensive country for expat health."

SF Board of Supervisors declare National Rifle Association a domestic terrorist organization

The San Francisco Board of Supervisors passed a resolution on Tuesday declaring that the National Rifle Association is a domestic terrorist organization. The officials also urged other cities, states and the federal government to follow suit. ...

[T]he NRA is blamed for causing gun violence. "The National Rifle Association musters its considerable wealth and organizational strength to promote gun ownership and incite gun owners to acts of violence," the resolution reads.

The resolution also claims that the NRA "spreads propaganda," "promotes extremist positions," and has "through its advocacy has armed those individuals who would and have committed acts of terrorism."

In addition to calling the NRA a domestic terrorist organization, the Board of Supervisors called on the city and county of San Francisco to "take every reasonable step to limit ... entities who do business with the City and County of San Francisco from doing business" with the NRA.

Never Again Action Protesters Shut Down Amazon Offices in Boston

Demonstrators with the Jewish activist group Never Again Action on Thursday shut down a Cambridge, Massachusetts Amazon office in protest of the tech giant's coordination and cooperation with President Donald Trump's war on immigrants. ...

Amazon's work with the White House on immigration detention has been a controversial flashpoint for the world's largest online retailer. As Common Dreams reported in July, the company's work with Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) has drawn protests from both the company's opponents and workers. 

The group occupied the Amazon office until 12 of the demonstrators were arrested.

Protesters at the Cambridge offices reminded Amazon that their cooperation with ICE was not unique; after all, "technology companies have been enabling racist state violence for centuries," as the group's Twitter account pointed out in a tweet featuring a video of a demonstrator laying out the connections between the Nazis and IBM.

Amazon did not provide comment to reporters about the demonstration—but, as The Boston Globe reported, Amazon has been a target for anti-ICE protests for over a year:

The activists chose to march to the Amazon office because, they say, the company makes it easier for ICE to detain and deport immigrants. In June 2018, Amazon employees wrote a letter to company executives detailing their own concerns about the company's relationship with ICE. The employees specifically asked Amazon to cut ties with the data-mining company Palantir, which provides much of the technological backbone for ICE's detention and deportations; Palantir runs on Amazon Web Services, according to the employees.

Protest actions against the Trump administration's war on immigrants can be dangerous. On August 14, Captain Thomas Woodworth of the Wyatt Detention Facility in Central Falls, Rhode Island used his truck as a battering ram, driving into a group of Never Again protesters.

2020 elections: Anti-war candidates are pushed off 3rd democratic debates

Kamala Harris is the Face of the Democratic Party’s Protest Campaign against Bernie Sanders

Thirteen presidential hopefuls spoke to a crowd of committed Democrats at the Democratic National Convention’s (DNC) summer meeting on August 22nd. Kamala Harris concluded her speech with a fiery declaration of “love” for her country.” When Harris stepped off the stage, her campaign staff walked out of the convention hall just as Bernie Sanders entered the stage. A modest crowd of Harris volunteers chanted “she’s smart, she’s strong, with Kamala you can’t go wrong” through much of Sanders’ speech. The Harris-aligned tabloid press s meared the journalist who took the original video even as her Twitter-hive rejoiced in the act of protesting Sanders on social media.

Harris’ candidacy has since day one operated as a protest campaign against Bernie Sanders. The current U.S. Senator and former Attorney General of California initially marketed herself as a “progressive” candidate by lending rhetorical support to Medicare for All. During the two Democratic Party debates, Harris came out with her own plan for “Medicare for All” which included a ten-year phase in period and a large role for corporate Medicare Advantage plans in administering coverage. She also attacked Joe Biden’s position on busing. Not too long after the debates, Harris was neither for Medicare for All nor able to muster a consistent position on desegregation.

Kamala Harris’ distasteful post-speech protest of Sanders reflects her function in this election cycle. Former Vice President Joe Biden is increasingly becoming a political liability. Not only does Biden possess an unsavory political record of service to the rich, but his campaign speeches also indicate a lapse in mental functioning and political tact that renders him vulnerable in a contest against Trump. The corporate oligarchs in charge of the Democratic Party have elicited the assistance of several corporate candidates to provide insurance for Biden’s almost inevitable collapse. Harris appears to be the elite’s most favored insurance policy. This is evident in the fact that Harris has expressed the most direct opposition to Bernie Sanders’ proposals for a 21stcentury New Deal. Harris recently promised wealthy donors in the Hamptons that she “believed in capitalism.” There will be no single-payer healthcare or any other policy that disrupts the unmitigated plunder of the planet by a small group of oligarch under a Harris administration. Harris’ “discomfort” with Sanders’ healthcare plan is an obvious signal to the elites that the fortunes they have amassed from the insurance and pharmaceutical industries are safe with her. To Harris’ staffers, being “smart” and “strong” means opposing a policy that currently garners support from eighty percent of Democrats. ...

Kamala Harris and the older, more accomplished imperialist pig, Joe Biden, are not seeking to win the Democratic nomination through popular support but rather by the good graces and dollars of the corporate elite that controls the DNC. Elizabeth Warren doesn’t veer too far from Harris or Biden in this regard and has demonstrated that she is more than willing to play the game. According to the New York Times , Warren has promised prominent Democratic Party elites that her principle goal is to rejuvenate the corporate-owned party, not inspire a Sanders-like “political revolution.” ... DNC elites are beginning to hedge their bets on the “progressive” sounding Warren, who considers rejecting corporate donors in the general election as “unilateral disarmament.” Warren received praise from Clinton and Cuomo advisors for her “inside-outside” game at the DNC’s summer session. This is a clear sign that the elites believe that Warren is valued for her potential to defeat Sanders’ New Deal.

Krystal Ball: Why the media scorns Yang, Tulsi, Bernie, Marianne

'No Fossil Fuel Money!': Protests Outside Big-Money Fundraiser for Biden Co-Hosted by Natural Gas Executive

Dozens of environmentalists gathered outside the New York home of investment banker David Solomon on Thursday to protest former Vice President Joe Biden's decision to attend a fundraiser there, despite calls for the 2020 candidate to cancel the event following news of the co-host's deep ties to the fossil fuel industry.

"Biden can't expect to convince Americans that he's a leader on climate if he's also cozying up to fossil fuel power players," said Laura Shindell, an organizer with Food & Water Action who participated in Thursday's demonstration.

Ahead of the $2,800-per-ticket fundraiser, protesters led chants of "No fossil fuel money!" and "Biden, Biden, you can't hide, we can see your greedy side!"

The high-dollar fundraiser came just 24 hours after Biden participated in a CNN presidential forum on the climate crisis, during which an activist directly confronted the former vice president over the event with Andrew Goldman, co-founder of natural gas company Western LNG. ... Journalists and observers have challenged the Biden campaign's efforts to downplay Goldman's role in the fossil fuel industry, pointing to documents that describe him as a current member of the Western LNG leadership team and "a long-term investor in the liquefied natural gas sector."

Phosphate fertiliser 'crisis' threatens world food supply

The world faces an “imminent crisis” in the supply of phosphate, a critical fertiliser that underpins the world’s food supply, scientists have warned. Phosphate is an essential mineral for all life on Earth and is added to farmers’ fields in huge quantities. But rock phosphate is a finite resource and the biggest supplies are mined in politically unstable places, posing risks to the many countries that have little or no reserves.

Phosphate use has quadrupled in the last 50 years as the global population has grown and the date when it is estimated to run out gets closer with each new analysis of demand, with some scientists projecting that moment could come as soon as a few decades’ time. Researchers say humanity could only produce half the food it does without phosphate and nitrogen, though the latter is essentially limitless as it makes up almost 80% of the atmosphere.

“Phosphate supply is potentially a very big problem,” said Martin Blackwell, at Rothamsted Research, an agricultural research centre in the UK, and lead author of a new study. “The population is growing and we are going to need more food.”

At current rates of use, a lot of countries are set to run out of their domestic supply in the next generation, including the US, China and India, he said. Morocco and the Moroccan-occupied territory of Western Sahara host by far the largest reserve, with China, Algeria and Syria the next biggest, together representing more than 80% of global rock phosphate.

“In a few years’ time, it could be a political issue with some countries effectively controlling the production of food by having control of rock phosphate supplies,” Blackwell said. “There should be a lot more effort being put in so we are ready to deal with it. It is time to wake up. It is one of the most important issues in the world today.”

Shut It Down: Veteran Organizer Lisa Fithian Offers a Guide to Resistance in Era of Climate Crisis

Democratic 2020 hopefuls split over tackling climate crisis

Democrats vying for president revealed a fundamental split over how aggressively the US should tackle climate change in a seven-hour town hall meeting on Wednesday.

Bernie Sanders painted an apocalyptic future wreaked by the climate crisis and pledged to wage war on the fossil fuel industry. A high-energy Elizabeth Warren urged optimism for building a better America and the former vice-president Joe Biden, who has a pitched a more moderate proposal, said he would push other nations to recommit to stronger action. Sanders said without radical change the world will be uninhabitable. “The damage to the world will be irreparable,” the Vermont senator said, adding that he is proposing “the largest, most comprehensive climate plan presented by any presidential candidate in the history of the United States”.

With many questions focused on what candidates would ask Americans to sacrifice, Elizabeth Warren pushed back on the framing. Asked if the government should tell people what kind of lightbulbs they can have, the Massachusetts senator quipped: “Oh come on, give me a break!”

“There are a lot of ways that we try to change our energy consumption and our pollution,” she said. “Some of it is with lightbulbs, some of it is on straws, some of it – dang – is on cheeseburgers.” But most of the responsibility lies with industry, not individuals, she said, adding “this is exactly what the fossil fuel industry wants us to talk about”.

Biden meanwhile pitched himself as the candidate who could lead negotiations with the diplomatic might of the US. He said his first step as president would be to call an international meeting to strengthen the Paris climate agreement. “We should be organizing the world, demanding change, we need a diplomat-in-chief,” Biden said. “Look what’s happening now in the Amazon, what’s going on? Nothing.”

The Democrats faced questions on whether their proposals would ban fracking for natural gas, prohibit exports of oil, gas and coal, change nutritional guidelines to limit meat consumption and transition to all electric vehicles. Their answers – and reactions to them – foreshadowed the fight ahead with conservatives and industry regardless of who becomes the next president.

Literal Sh*t Storm: Warnings of Major Manure Threat as Hurricane Dorian Barrels Toward North Carolina Factory Farms

As Hurricane Dorian pummeled the Carolinas Thursday, environmentalists warned the powerful storm could unleash millions of tons of manure and other animal waste if it floods the factory farms situated on the North Carolina coast.

Soren Rundquist, who studies the expansion of factory farms for the Environmental Working Group (EWG), said "the most important thing right now is that people stay safe" as the hurricane bears down on the southeast U.S.

"But we're also watching the thousands of North Carolina factory farms that sit directly in Dorian's projected path," said Rundquist. "The heavy rainfall could flood poorly located factory farms, spreading untold tons of hog, chicken, and turkey waste along the coastal plain."

Green groups and North Carolina residents have good reason to worry that a powerful storm like Dorian could flood factory farms and release tons of manure into the state's rivers and creeks.

Last September, according to EWG, Hurricane Florence flooded or breached more than 130 pig manure lagoons and dozens of poultry operations. EWG said the possible spread of factory farm manure could pose a severe public health hazard, as life-threatening bacteria could contaminate sources of public drinking water.

“Staggering” Death Toll Feared in Bahamas as Thousands Remain Missing After Hurricane Dorian

Germany Announces Plan to Ban Glyphosate

The German government announced Wednesday it had agreed on a plan to phase out the use of glyphosate—the key chemical in the weedkiller Roundup—with a total ban set to begin by the end of 2023. ...

Chancellor Angela Merkel's cabinet agreed to the plan Wednesday. The proposal, reported Bloomberg, also says that the "government intends to oppose any request for the E.U. to renew the license to produce the weedkiller, according to a release by the environment ministry."

The European Commission, the E.U.'s rules and regulations body, in 2017 renewed the license for glyphosate in the bloc through the end of 2022.

Germany's environment Minister, Svenja Schulze, framed the new move as necessary to protect biodiversity, and said that "a world without insects is not worth living in".

Trump turns lights off on Obama-era rules for energy efficient bulbs

The Trump administration has come up with its latest bright idea – scrapping rules that require energy efficiency standards in lightbulbs.

The Department of Energy is eliminating stricter efficiency standards on about half of bulbs sold in the US. The repealed rule, enacted during Barack Obama’s presidency, was aimed at phasing out older-style inefficient incandescent and halogen lightbulbs by 2020.

As a result, billions of lightbulbs used in bathrooms, vanities and chandeliers will be allowed to remain far more inefficient than their main alternative – light-emitting diodes, or LEDs.

The DoE said the repeal, backed by a handful of lighting companies that rely upon the older technology, was because the Obama-era rule was “not consistent” with the law. The department said the new regime will give consumers more choice.

Also of Interest

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

Trump Bombs New Silk Road with Tariffs

Putin Trolls Trump

Why Is JPMorgan Chase Always in the Middle of Scandalous News? Fake Gold Anyone?

How Economic Decisions Are Made

Larry Summers and the Road to Damascus

Reality Check: Bank of England Governor Criticizes the Petrodollar!

Meditations On Twitter’s Silencing Of Daniel McAdams

From mind control to murder? How a deadly fall revealed the CIA’s darkest secrets

Progressives Can't Play Nice With Democrats Anymore

Bernie Wants to Seize the Means of Electricity Production

As Brazil Burns, Northern Media Deploy a Strategy of Deflection

Washington Supreme Court Establishes 'Very Important Precedent' for Climate Necessity Defense in Case of Valve-Turner Ken Ward

Viktor Orbán trumpets Hungary's 'procreation, not immigration' policy

Hurricane Dorian: here's the storm's expected path

Dead Sea scrolls study raises new questions over texts' origins

A Little Night Music

Booker T & The MG's - Time Is Tight

Booker T & The MGs - Over Easy

Booker T. and the MG's - Soul Clap '69

Booker T. & The MG's - Soul Limbo

Booker T and the MGs - Can't Be Still

Booker T and the MGs - Hip Hug-Her

Booker T. & The MG's - Boot-Leg

Booker T. & The MGs - Raunchy

Booker T & the MG's - Red Beans and Rice