Politics & Globalization
International trade agreements force the U.S. and other participting countries to "harmonize" food and envrironmental safety standards to the lowest common denominator. Often these agreements are negotiated behind closed doors, shutting out Congress and the public, while granting corporations and trade associations a seat at the table. It's no surprise that these agreements give transnational corporations "special rights", allowing companies to challenge individual countries' environmental, worker and food safety laws and regulations.
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Rose and Ronnie· Joe volunteer© 2008
Hundreds of thousands of people took to the streets in downtown Los Angeles Saturday to demonstrate against a new anti-immigrant bill being considered by Congress. Crowd estimates range from 500,000 to 2 million. We speak with longtime immigrant rights activist Javier Rodriguez and United Farm Workers of America co-founder Dolores Huerta. [includes rush transcript]
Hundreds of thousands of people took to the streets in downtown Los Angeles Saturday to demonstrate against a new anti-immigrant bill being considered by Congress. Stretching for 26 blocks, the Read more
That lack of concern may have been just what big oil wanted.
It's not as if the information hasn't been out there: A new ad by the Environmental Defense Fund warns time is running out to combat climate change, adding, "Our future is up to you."
But Virginia's top climatologist doesn't buy it.
Read more
PARIS (AFP) - Cattle ranchers and soybean farmers will destroy four-tenths of Brazil's Amazonian forest by 2050 on present trends, threatening biodiversity and adding hugely to the global warming problem, a study says.
The paper, published on Thursday in Nature, the British weekly science journal, says that the Brazilian government's conservation strategies fall far short of what is needed to prevent escalating destruction.
"Expansion of the cattle and soy industries in the Amazon basin has increased deforestation rates and will soon push all-weather highways Read more
The Wall Street Journal revealed this week that a little-known watchdog group, largely subsidized by ExxonMobil, was responsible for getting the IRS to audit the environmental organization Greenpeace. We speak with the reporter who broke the story and the head of Greenpeace USA. [includes rush transcript] The Wall Street Journal revealed this week a little-known watchdog group was responsible for getting the IRS to audit the environmental organization Greenpeace. Two years ago, Public Interest Watch challenged Greenpeace's tax-exempt status and accused the group of money laundering and
Read moreAttention please, good people! Adjust your routines and come to the aid of your country, and your children with your thoughtful patriotism. Don't just hope for impeachment, demand the resignation now of the mad hatters in the White House--George W. Bush and Richard Cheney.
Already, a large majority of you do not consider this shifty duo trustworthy. By more than two to one you disapprove of Bush's war in Iraq. Similar majorities believe this is also a President whose administrative incompetence--note the post-Katrina debacles compared to his promises last September in that
Read moreCURITIBA, Brazil - Emotions and sensitivity are "the essence, the core dimension of the human being," said the Brazilian theologian Leonardo Boff at a panel on "ethics, biodiversity and sustainability". The panel formed part of the Global Civil Society Forum, held parallel to the Mar. 20-31 Eighth Conference of the Parties to the Convention on Biological Diversity (COP8).
It is not reason but feeling that is involved in our first contact with reality, and "today's great crisis is not economic, political or religious, but a crisis of affect, of the capacity to feel a connection with
Read moreA few blocks from the badly flooded and still-closed campus of Dillard University, a wind-bent street sign announces the intersection of Humanity and New Orleans. In the nighttime distance, the downtown skyscrapers on Poydras and Canal Streets are already ablaze with light, but a vast northern and eastern swath of the city, including the Gentilly neighborhood around Dillard, remains shrouded in darkness.
The lights have been out for six months now, and no one seems to know when, if ever, they will be turned back on. In greater New Orleans about 125,000 homes remain damaged and
Read moreTHE WEEKLY SPIN, March 22, 2006
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The Weekly Spin features selected news summaries with links to
further information about media, political spin and propaganda.
It is
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QUOTE: "Mountains are a barometer of global climate change," says
Douglas McGuire, head of the International Year of Mountains
coordination unit at FAO. "... many climatologists believe they are
an early indication of what may come to pass around the world."
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FOOD AND AGRICULTURE ORGANIZATION/UNITED NATIONS
ROME, 14 October 2002 -- The supply of freshwater, recognized on this
World Food Day as the source of food
In November 1972 Richard Nixon won 61 percent of the popular vote, carried 49 of 50 states and won the Electoral College 520-17. Yet only three months later the Senate voted 77-0 to hold hearings investigating the Watergate break-in and its coverup -- a bit of petty theft, a campaign dirty trick that could hardly have made the difference in one of the most lopsided elections in U.S. history. A year later the House voted 414-4 that the Judiciary Committee investigate whether there were grounds for impeachment. Three articles of impeachment were eventually approved by the committee, and in
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