3/24/01
2:42:19 PM
ENVIRONMENT NEWS SERVICE
"We Cover the Earth For You"
EXXON VALDEZ ANNIVERSARY ENERGIZES OPPOSITION TO ARCTIC DRILLING
By Cat Lazaroff
WASHINGTON, DC, March 23, 2001 (ENS) - Twelve years after the Exxon Valdez oil spill in Alaska, oil drilling and transport still threaten to contaminate pristine Arctic ecosystems. This year, President George W. Bush will press to open a portion of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge to drilling, despite warnings that more drilling will lead to more air and water pollution.
For full text and graphics visit:
http://ens.lycos.com/ens/mar2001/2001L-03-23-06.html
CAR CRASH CLAIMS LIFE OF GREENPEACE INTERNATIONAL FOUNDER
AMSTERDAM, The Netherlands, March 23, 2001 (ENS) - One of the most influential figures in the environmental movement, the man widely credited with the first campaign to save whales and to end French nuclear testing, David McTaggart died in a head on car crash near his home in Umbria, Italy, this morning.
For full text and graphics, visit:
http://ens.lycos.com/ens/mar2001/2001L-03-23-12.html
FOOT AND MOUTH DISEASE GRIPS EUROPE
STOCKHOLM, Sweden, March 23, 2001 (ENS) - European leaders gathering in the Swedish capital for the European Union summit today put the official agenda on the backburner as foot and mouth spread to France, the Netherlands and Ireland this week.
For full text and graphics, visit:
http://ens.lycos.com/ens/mar2001/2001L-03-23-11.html
High Level Officials Link Environment and Trade
BERLIN, Germany, March 23, 2001 (ENS) - Ministers and officials from over 70 countries said here Thursday that environmental considerations need to be taken into account in the negotiation of new trade agreements.
For full text and graphics visit:
http://ens-news.com/ens/mar2001/2001L-03-23-01.html
REPORT LEAVES UK WASTE STRATEGY IN SHREDS
LONDON, United Kingdom, March 23, 2001 (ENS) - The UK government's targets for household recycling are "depressingly unambitious" and "leave the door open to a big expansion of large scale incineration," said a highly critical report this week.
For full text and graphics, visit:
http://ens.lycos.com/ens/mar2001/2001L-03-23-10.html
ENVIRONMENT NEWS SERVICE AMERISCAN: MARCH 23, 2001
Newfound Gene Could Revolutionize Agricultural Biotechnology
$125 Million will Curb Sprawl Outside Atlanta
Population, Poor Planning Lead to Sprawl
Experimental Gear Improves Salmon Survival
States Get $50 Million for At Risk Wildlife
Texas' Renewable Energy Policy Is Nation's Most Effective
PBS Expose on Chemical Industry to Air Monday
Editorial: Bush Budget Out of Balance
For full text and graphics visit:
http://ens.lycos.com/ens/mar2001/2001L-03-23-09.html
Healing Our World: Weekly Comment
By Jackie Alan Giuliano, Ph.D.
Killing the Future - Pesticide Spraying in Schools
As predicted, many critical environmental protections are falling, one by one, to the ultraconservative, industry backed administration of President George W. Bush. In the last couple of weeks, the plan to improve pollution controls for arsenic in our drinking water has been eliminated, worker health and safety has been compromised, and plans were put into place to suspend the rule that would hold mine owners responsible for the terrible toxic pollution they create.
3/24/01
2:32:17 PM
NATURAL LAW PARTY NEWS FLASH!
TELL THE FDA THAT GENETICALLY ENGINEERED PRODUCTS MUST BE LABELED AND TESTED FOR SAFETY!
The Food and Drug Administration is now accepting public comment on its proposed new rules on genetically engineered (GE) foods. Despite overwhelming consumer demand, the FDA has failed to require health and ecological safety testing or mandatory labeling, and thus puts your health and our environment at risk and deprives you of the right to know or choose what you are eating.
The proposed rules:
Do not require mandatory pre-market safety testing
Do not require pre-market environmental review
Do not require mandatory labeling of GE foods
Restrict voluntary labeling of non-GE foods
Require a mere letter of notification prior to the marketing of a GE food
Fail to ensure public access to adequate information for independent review
Are supported by industry and opposed by consumer groups
The FDA needs to hear from hundreds of thousands of Americans that:
* The FDA must require mandatory pre-market comprehensive environmental review. Unlike conventional pollutants, where a given amount of pollutant causes a limited amount of damage, a small number of mutant genes could have a population explosion and reproduce forever, causing unlimited and irreparable damage.
* The FDA must require mandatory pre-market long-term health testing. GE products could be toxic, cause allergic responses, have lower nutritional value, and compromise immune responses in consumers.
* The FDA must require mandatory labeling of GE products. Without mandatory labeling, neither consumers nor health professionals will know if an allergic or toxic reaction was the result of a genetically engineered food. Consumers would be deprived of the critical knowledge needed to hold food producers liable should any of these novel products be hazardous.
* The FDA must end its cozy relationship with the industries it purports to be regulating. People have been allowed to work for a biotech company, then work for the FDA writing the regulatory rules on that company's product, then go back to working for the company. Ninety-two percent of FDA advisory committee meetings had at least one conflict of interest.
PLEASE ACT TODAY. THE DEADLINE FOR COMMENTS IS TUESDAY, APRIL 3.
Email your comments to: fdadockets@oc.fda.gov with "Docket 00N-1396 & Docket 00D-1598" in the Subject line
Mail your comments to:
Docket 00N-1396 & Docket 00D-1598
Dockets Management Branch (HFA-305)
Food and Drug Administration
5630 Fishers Lane, Room 1061
Rockville, MD 20852
For more information: 218-226-4164
www.organicconsumers.org
3/24/01
2:24:46 PM
Wilderness
As if allowing higher concentrations of arsenic in America's drinking water and loosening restrictions on hard-rock mining were not enough for one week, on Wednesday the Bush administration essentially abdicated its responsibility to defend our national forests.
In a stealth move that signals tacit cooperation with the timber industry, the Bush administration offered an anemic defense to industry arguments that the Roadless Area Conservation Rule - the most significant national forest conservation measure of the past 100 years - should be overturned.
For more information, please go to:
http://www.wilderness.org/eyewash/forests.htm
BACKGROUND
The Roadless Area Conservation Rule would protect 58.5 million acres of unspoiled national forest land from commercial logging, road construction and other damaging activities. More than half of national forest land is already open to logging, mining and other extractive industries. The US Department of Agriculture (USDA) Forest Service issued the rule after a three-year administrative process that involved more than 600 public meetings and 1.6 million public comments.
Almost immediately following the inauguration, the Bush administration ordered that all recent Clinton administration rules and policies be suspended and subjected to review. Accordingly, in early February the administration announced that the Roadless Area Conservation Rule, scheduled to go into effect March 13, would be delayed until May 12.
But the rule could be further delayed - or even rescinded - depending on the outcome of several pending lawsuits.
WEAK RESPONSE BY ADMINISTRATION SIGNALS ROLLBACK
Earlier this year, the Boise Cascade Company, the State of Idaho and others filed two separate lawsuits against the federal government to overturn the Roadless Area Conservation Rule. Boise Cascade and the State of Idaho also asked that the court issue an injunction to prevent the rule from being implemented while the case is being tried.
On Wednesday, in response to the request for an injunction, and despite pledges by Attorney General John Ashcroft to the contrary, the Bush administration offered absolutely no defense of the Roadless Area Conservation Rule. In fact, the 5-page response did not attempt to address any of the legal claims raised by Boise Cascade and the State of Idaho, namely that the Roadless Area Conservation Rule lacked specific details, there was insufficient time for the State to respond and public participation was inadequate.
As Jon Owen from the Washington Wilderness Coalition told NPR Radio, "Our natural heritage is on trial and our defense attorney just walked out of the courtroom and started oiling up the chainsaws of the prosecution."
"The Bush administration showed its cards," said Tim Preso, attorney for the Earthjustice Legal Defense Fund, which is representing the eight environmental groups arguing in favor of the road ban. "This appears to be a calculated first step by the administration to avoid offering any defense of the [Roadless Area Conservation Rule]."
Rather than the anemic response given by the Bush administration, the court should have been told the simple truth: that the injunction should not be granted because the Roadless Area Conservation Rule complies with all legal requirements.
"By pulling its punches at this point, the administration is indicating that it may simply throw in the towel," said Mike Anderson of The Wilderness Society. "Their strategy seems to be either to use the lawsuits as an excuse to delay implementation of the rule or, by mounting so weak a defense as to lose the case, allow the rule to be rescinded."
The Judge will likely determine whether the injunction should be granted sometime in early April, following a March 30 hearing. If he grants the injunction, the implementation of the Roadless Area Conservation Rule will be again delayed.
The Wilderness Society, along with a coalition of organizations, has been granted standing in the lawsuit. Through the efforts of lawyers at Earthjustice Legal Defense Fund and National Resources Defense Council, the conservation community is working to uphold the Roadless Area Conservation Rule and protect our national forests.
3/24/01
2:17:14 PM
Peace All,
The Peace Conspiracy is hosting a Peace Festival Benefit Concert June 15th ~ 16th ~ 17th, 2001
Bird Island Amphitheater in central Missouri has graciously offered to help and host this wonderful event by providing their amphitheater.
http://www.peaceconspiracy.org/events.html
http://www.peaceconspiracy.org/birdisland.html
We are looking for kind bands with a Spirit of community and peace to help with the benefit. The benefit is to help support and fund the Peace Conspiracy land trust project. The Peace Conspiracy is a non-denominational Spiritual network founded in 1998 by a counsel of energetic light warriors. The Ideology of the conspiracy is to promote peace, harmony and goodwill by being proactive in networking causes that uplift the human condition.
http://www.peaceconspiracy.org/frame.html
The land trust project will be an egalitarian intentional community offering a host of educational classes, workshops and learning opportunities, with a goal to set aside land so that it has no private or government ownership and would thus be set free for all to use peacefully and cooperatively. A commUnity organization owned, operated and governed by its member body, everyone, you!
http://www.peaceconspiracy.org/501.html
The Land Trust will be scheduling entertainment venues in the future, on the land, for which we will be sharing the gate proceeds, offering printing, promotion and access to an email data base that is gathered and maintained from around the United States and local regions. We want to support your group in any way we can, keep an active Spirit alive and well through commUnity, and share our collective talents and hearts to create peace. Your band has been add to the Peace Conspiracy Network. Many folks look here to see what's going on in their area, I'm sure you will see some kind new face now that we got you linked up.
http://www.peaceconspiracy.org/bands.html
But what is really important is this opportunity to pro-create a peace movement that is full life learning, in a way that uplifts and supports, teaches and heals. If you would like to share your gift and time to build something really good and with the help of many other hearts, Were looking for you! Please contact us and let us know if you will be able to help support this venue by performing or just by coming on down and relaxing for awhile. The Peace Conspiracy web server belongs to everyone, so if you need hosting, some pages built,or some help spreading the word just let us know. We will do what we can. Peaceconspiracy@peaceconspiracy.org We have scheduled many workshop host, vendors and activism groups to join us.If you know of anyone who would like to help out have them contact us. May peace prevail on Earth and in your circle.
The Peace Conspiracy
3/24/01
2:13:50 PM
TomPaine.com
PROMOTING PROPAGANDISTS
by Jennifer Bauduy, Associate Editor, TomPaine.com
Otto Reich and John Negroponte deceived and manipulated Congress, the media, and the American public in the Iran-Contra era. Now President Bush is considering them for powerful diplomatic positions.
http://www.tompaine.com/opinion/2001/03/23/1.html
THE CARIBOU IN YOUR OWN BACK YARD
by Bill Shutkin
Low-income communities are hit hardest both by rising energy prices and the environmental impacts of power plants. Do environmentalists care?
http://www.tompaine.com/opinion/2001/03/22/2.html
CLOSING BORDERS IN THE NAME OF OPENING THEM
by Heather Szerlag
When international delegates meet next month to discuss a Western Hemisphere free-trade zone, protesters might be stopped at the border while corporate representatives sail right through.
http://www.tompaine.com/opinion/2001/03/22/3.html
OF SHRIMPS AND SPIES
by David Corn
They want to cut Headstart, environmental and other spending, but the anti-government, anti-tax budget hawks overlook the national security establishment as a source for savings, even though the spooks have racked up some monumental failures.
http://www.tompaine.com/news/2001/03/23/index.html
3/23/01
4:01:09 PM
Environmental news from GRIST MAGAZINE
<http://www.gristmagazine.com>
1. NO NUKESKYS! Enviros claimed a victory yesterday as the Russian parliament postponed a vote on allowing imports of spent nuclear fuel into the country for reprocessing. Backers of the measure, including the Russian government and U.S. business interests, say the country would gain a huge revenue source, some $20 billion over the next decade, if it opened itself up to the 20,000 tons of spent fuel around the world. But opponents say corrupt officials would pocket most of the revenue and the country would be inviting an environmental disaster if it accepted the waste. Environmental groups last year gathered 2.5 million signatures in support of a referendum opposing the measure, but the country's Central Election Commission invalidated 600,000 signatures, denying the petition.
straight to the source: Russia Today, Reuters, 23 Mar 2001 <http://www.russiatoday.com/news.php3?id=318660>
2. HE MAY NOT BE CAPABLE OF HIGH-LEVEL DIALOGUE In a letter to President Bush today, European Union leaders write that progress on the Kyoto treaty on climate change is crucial to strong U.S.-European relations and that the president must find the "political courage" to move forward with treaty negotiations. The letter, signed by Swedish Prime Minister Goran Persson, whose country holds the E.U. presidency, and European Commission President Romano Prodi, asks Bush to agree to a high-level dialogue on Kyoto with the E.U. before the next round of international climate talks scheduled for July. The E.U. has grown increasingly concerned that Bush will try to kill the Kyoto deal. Last week, Bush broke a campaign promise and said he would not seek to limit power plants' emissions of carbon dioxide, the main greenhouse gas.
straight to the source: Los Angeles Times, Reuters, Robin Pomeroy, 23 Mar 2001 <http://www.latimes.com/news/science/environ/20010323/tCB00a8841.html>
3. DICK NUKEM Vice President Dick Cheney said on Wednesday that the Bush administration may recommend that the U.S. expand its use of nuclear power because nuclear power plants don't emit many greenhouse gases. "If you want to do something about carbon dioxide emissions, then you ought to build nuclear power plants," Cheney said on MSNBC's "Hardball" program. (Wait, does this administration think CO2 emissions are a problem or not?) Cheney went on to criticize the Kyoto treaty on climate change as "seriously flawed" because it places the burden of reducing greenhouse gases on industrialized nations and doesn't put any emissions restrictions on developing countries like China and India.
straight to the source: MSNBC.com, 22 Mar 2001 <http://www.msnbc.com/news/548005.asp>
read it only in Grist Magazine: The nuclear industry offers itself up as a target of ridicule -- in our Busted! section <http://www.gristmagazine.com/grist/busted/busted062599.stm>
read it only in Grist Magazine: More on Bush's CO2 reversal -- in our Heat Beat section <http://www.gristmagazine.com/grist/heatbeat/thisjustin031501.stm>
4. THE TOM TOM CLUB Senate Democrats went on the attack yesterday, releasing an energy bill that focuses on conserving energy and boosting renewable fuels, rather than on drilling for more oil and natural gas. Senate Minority Leader Tom Daschle (D-S.D.) said the U.S. "cannot drill our way out of this problem" and accused President Bush of using the country's energy problems to justify "an all-out assault on the environment." Like the GOP energy package introduced last month, the Democratic alternative would expand domestic energy production. But tax incentives to promote energy efficiency and wind and solar power lie at the heart of the Democratic bill, which also includes a provision to force the auto industry to develop more fuel-efficient light trucks and SUVs by 2008.
straight to the source: New York Times, Lizette Alvarez, 23 Mar 2001 <http://www.nytimes.com/2001/03/23/politics/23ENER.html>
5. MAYBE THEY JUST NEEDED TO VENTI As Starbucks executives joyously announced a stock split to shareholders during the company's annual meeting in Seattle on Tuesday, demonstrators gathered outside the meeting and stores in 100 other U.S. cities to denounce the company's use of genetically engineered ingredients in some products. The protesters, organized by the Organic Consumers Association, particularly object to the company's use of milk containing the genetically engineered bovine growth hormone. Company officials said they were trying to find replacements for the products. They also noted that none of the ingredients in the company's coffees and teas is genetically engineered and that organic soy milk is available in its stores as a replacement for milk.
straight to the source: Seattle Post-Intelligencer, Kathy Mulady, 21 Mar 2001 <http://seattlep-i.nwsource.com/business/starbucks21.shtml>
read it only in Grist Magazine: Mr. Green Beans -- he's all abuzz about socially responsible coffee -- in our Out on Limb column <http://www.gristmagazine.com/grist/limb/limb081100.stm>
The customer-is-always-right-whale -- a cartoon by Suzy Becker <http://www.gristmagazine.com/grist/ha/ha031901.stm>
The proof of the pudding is in the eating -- a day in the life of Eric Britton, Earth Car Free Day <http://www.gristmagazine.com/grist/week/britton032201.stm>
Electric boogie -- really fun facts about electricty use -- in our Counter Culture section <http://www.gristmagazine.com/grist/counter/counter031601.stm>
3/23/01
3:39:22 PM
EcoNet Headlines: March 23, 2001
Trial Against Russian Environmental Journalist to Start in Vladivostok
The military trial against the Russian environmental journalist Grigory Pasko starts in Vladivostok on March 22. Its final outcome might be even more significant for the development of the rule of law in Russia than the Nikitin case. Read More...
http://headlines.igc.apc.org:8080/enheadlines/985304371/index_html
Judge Rejects Bush Request for Delay in Hearing on Forest Plan
A federal judge on Tuesday rejected a Bush administration request to delay a hearing on a lawsuit challenging former President Clinton's effort to ban road-building on a third of the nation's national forests. Read More...
http://headlines.igc.apc.org:8080/enheadlines/985304582/index_html
Bush Administration Throws Out New Arsenic Standard
The Bush administration has opted to defer - perhaps permanently - new arsenic standards that would slash the acceptable limits for this toxic chemical in drinking water by 80 percent. Read More...
http://headlines.igc.apc.org:8080/enheadlines/985304772/index_html
Terminator Insects Give Wings to Genome Invaders
The United States Department of Agriculture has approved field release of GM pink bollworm this summer, which are made with a mobile genetic element that can jump many species. This is tantamount to giving wings to the most aggressive genome invaders. Read More...
http://headlines.igc.apc.org:8080/enheadlines/985305040/index_html
Biotech Corn Is Test Case for Industry
Allergic reactions have been viewed for years as the primary threat to human health posed by genetically engineered foods, which typically have proteins from other organisms spliced into them for various reasons. But the health complaints about StarLink are the first lodged by consumers against an engineered food. Read More...
http://headlines.igc.apc.org:8080/enheadlines/985305218/index_html
Genetic Pollution Is Threatening Consumers' Right to Choose
Despite the organic movement's stringent efforts to keep GMOs (genetically engineered /modified organisms) out of organic production, some US organic farmers have found their corn (maize) crops, including seeds, to contain detectable levels of genetically engineered DNA. Read More...
http://headlines.igc.apc.org:8080/enheadlines/985305338/index_html
Australia Gives Forests the Chop
The Australian government's policy of state sanctioned ecocide continues unabated. Grotesque mismanagement of Australia's fragile ecosystems continues, posing serious threats to continental sustainability. With some notable exceptions, the media, public and government seem to be turning a blind eye. Read More...
http://headlines.igc.apc.org:8080/enheadlines/985305532/index_html
Forest Conservation Number One Priority for Amazon Residents
Forest industries and revenue hungry governments have been somewhat successful in propagating the myth that ecological colonialists are forcing rainforest conservation upon reluctant rainforest dwellers. WWF blows this falsehood out of the water with a recently released, rigorously implemented survey. Read More...
http://headlines.igc.apc.org:8080/enheadlines/985305707/index_html
Exposure to Questionable Chemical Higher Than Expected
Americans' bodies harbor surprisingly high amounts of a chemical used in soap and cosmetics.... Animal studies suggest that large amounts of the chemical, diethyl phthalate, may disrupt normal hormone function and cause birth defects. Read More...
http://headlines.igc.apc.org:8080/enheadlines/985305861/index_html
Fight Continues to Save Last New World Dry Tropical Forest
On Jan. 12 last year, one day after shelving the Hope Gardens project, Prime Minister Percival Patterson gave developers the consolation prize: Long Mountain. The choice sent shock waves through the environmental and naturalist communities. Read More...
http://headlines.igc.apc.org:8080/enheadlines/985306098/index_html
"Sustainable" New Zealand Fishery in Troubled Waters
The accreditation as "sustainable" of a fishery scheme in New Zealand, which has led to the drowning of more than 5,000 seals over the last decade, has put in troubled waters a non- profit group that aims to use market demand to help the environment. Read More...
http://headlines.igc.apc.org:8080/enheadlines/985306248/index_html
UN Foundation to Get Coral Reef Initiative Off the Ground
An unprecedented initiative designed to reverse the dramatic decline in the world's coral reefs has been promised up to 10 million dollars to support demonstration sites in four seas that could be used as models for conservation action elsewhere. Read More...
http://headlines.igc.apc.org:8080/enheadlines/985306378/index_html
Biotech Food Increases Will Not End Hunger
Faced with an estimated 786 million hungry people in the world, cheerleaders for our social order have an easy solution: we will grow more food through the magic of chemicals and genetic engineering. This despite the Green Revolution lesson that increased food production by itself does not end hunger. Read More...
http://headlines.igc.apc.org:8080/enheadlines/985306516/index_html
GREEN: Only One Norwegian Wolf Left
Hunters in helicopters shot four more wolves over the weekend bringing to eight the number of wolves killed in the government cull and "leaving just one to be slaughtered." Read More...
http://headlines.igc.apc.org:8080/enheadlines/985306746/index_html
EcoNet News
This Week's Headlines and Alerts from EcoNet
http://www.igc.org/igc/gateway/enindex.html
3/23/01
3:38:18 PM
EcoNet Alerts: March 23, 2001
National Marine Fisheries Service Seeks Public Comment on U.S. Navy Sonar
The National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) is seeking public comment on a request by the U.S. Navy to operate its Low Frequency Active Sonar on the world's open oceans. The controversial SURTASS sonar has been blamed for whale and dolphin strandings at test sites around the globe. Several environmental lawsuits have attempted to block further tests to protect marine life. Read More...
http://headlines.igc.apc.org:8080/enalerts/985307029/index_html
Opposition Grows to Kenya's Forest Plan
At the Ogiek.org web site - http://www.ogiek.org/ - you can support the rights of an affected indigenous group and protest the removal of protected status for these large and precious rainforests by sending protest letters to Kenyan officials. Please do so. Read More...
http://headlines.igc.apc.org:8080/enalerts/985307192/index_html
Hudson River Clean-up Alert-Action Needed Now!
After years of fighting for a clean-up, the EPA has called for General Electric to dredge the Hudson of over 100,000 pounds of toxic PCBs it has discharged into the river. But GE is fighting back, and the Bush administration now holds the key to the future of one of our most cherished waterways. Read More...
http://headlines.igc.apc.org:8080/enalerts/985307393/index_html
Yellowstone Bison Elude Capture; Two Arrested
The Montana Department of Livestock unsuccessfully attempted to capture three bison bulls on Horse Butte at 1:00 PM for testing and potential execution. Forest Service and Gallatin County Law Enforcement officers closed areas of the National Forest arbitrarily, restricting documentation of the operation, as well as public access. Two Buffalo Field Campaign (BFC) volunteers were arrested.... Read More...
http://headlines.igc.apc.org:8080/enalerts/985307552/index_html
Tell Your Senator to Support Renewable Energy Today
Democrats in the US Senate, led by Senator Bingaman (NM), are preparing a comprehensive energy bill for introduction as early as next week. UCS recently learned that the bill no longer includes a Renewables Portfolio Standard (RPS). Read More...
http://headlines.igc.apc.org:8080/enalerts/985307715/index_html
Environmental, Labor Alliance to Meet in Portland in April
The Second Annual Meeting of the Alliance for Sustainable Jobs and the Environment (ASJE) will be held in Portland OR on Saturday and Sunday, April 7-8, 2001, with an action agenda addressing current issues including the proposed Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA), the U.S. Canada Softwood Lumber Agreement, corporate accountability, and creating jobs through forest and watershed restoration. Read More...
http://headlines.igc.apc.org:8080/enalerts/985307850/index_html
EcoNet News This Week's Headlines and Alerts from EcoNet http://www.igc.org/igc/gateway/enindex.html
3/23/01
3:30:33 PM
Utne Reader
THE CHEMICAL PAPERS: SECRETS OF THE CHEMICAL INDUSTRY EXPOSED
by Don Hazen, AlterNet
A set of once-secret chemical industry documents -- exposing decades of fraud, lies and coverups about thousands of chemical-related deaths -- has sparked both an upcoming PBS report and a wave of activism across the nation.
THE MOTHER JONES 400
Industry pumped in a record $696 million to elect George W. Bush and a GOP Congress. Just in time for Congress' debate on the McCain-Feingold campaign finance bill, Mother Jones has launched The Mother Jones 400, a fully searchable online database that reveals the nation's top political contributors -- and what they expect in return for their largesse.
Links to the above articles: http://www.utne.com/webwatch
The links are also in our archive at:
http://www.utne.com/webwatch/archive.tpl?d=03/23/2001
3/23/01
3:26:37 PM
ENVIRONMENT NEWS SERVICE
"We Cover the Earth For You"
DUMPING ENDS TODAY AT WORLD'S LARGEST LANDFILL
NEW YORK, New York, March 22, 2001 (ENS) - The most infamous landfill in the United States is closing today after 50 years of accepting a growing amount of New York City's garbage. Fresh Kills on Staten Island, one of New York's five boroughs, accepted its last barge load of trash this morning.
For full text and graphics visit:
http://ens-news.com/ens/mar2001/2001L-03-22-01.html
STUDY TALLIES AMERICANS' EXPOSURE TO CHEMICAL CONTAMINANTS
WASHINGTON, DC, March 22, 2001 (ENS) - Common products such as soap, shampoo and perfume are leaching dangerous chemicals into the bloodstreams of U.S. consumers, reveals a comprehensive new study by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The study, released Wednesday, also carried some good news: national blood levels of lead, and cotinine from second hand smoke, appear to be declining.
For full text and graphics visit:
http://ens.lycos.com/ens/mar2001/2001L-03-22-06.html
CHINESE, AUSTRALIAN EYES ON TIBET MINERAL PROSPECTS
SYDNEY, Australia, March 22, 2001 (ENS) - China is increasing mining in Tibet. Australian mining companies and the University of Tasmania are set to play an integral role in the mineral future of Chinese occupied Tibet.
For full text and graphics visit:
http://ens-news.com/ens/mar2001/2001L-03-22-03.html
RUNNING ON EMPTY, A REPORT ON WORLD'S WATER WOES
TEDDINGTON, United Kingdom, March 22, 2001 (ENS) - A report published today to coincide with World Water Day warns that two out of every three people will face water shortages by 2025.
For full text and graphics, visit:
http://ens.lycos.com/ens/mar2001/2001L-03-22-11.html
TURKISH DAM CRITIC PLOTS SHAREHOLDER REVOLT
LONDON, United Kingdom, March 22, 2001 (ENS) - In its fight to stop the construction of a controversial Turkish dam, Friends of the Earth has taken the unorthodox step of investing in the company building it.
For full text and graphics, visit:
http://ens.lycos.com/ens/mar2001/2001L-03-22-10.html
ENVIRONMENT NEWS SERVICE AMERISCAN: MARCH 22, 2001
EPA Signs Agreement to Review Toxic Pesticides
Antarctic Crack Heralds Massive New Iceberg
Judge Blocks Bush Efforts to Block Roadless Rule
Comments Sought on Carcinogens Report
Nature Photographer John Netherton Dies
Vineyards Contribute to Open Space Protection
Field Guide Highlights Southern California Reptiles, Amphibians
Foresight Protects Children from Earthquake
For full text and graphics visit:
http://ens.lycos.com/ens/mar2001/2001L-03-22-09.html
3/23/01
3:22:56 PM
Dick Cheney and others who promote this "solution" are either badly misinformed or are lying through their teeth. To see why nuclear power is not, cannot be and never will be the solution to global warming see:
http://www.geocities.com/mothersalert/globalwarming2.html
The White House needs to hear from us immediately & consistently that nuclear power is NO "solution" to global warming or anything else. Please call Bush & Cheney at: 202-456-1414 and 202-456-1111. They can also be faxed at: 202-456-2461. Please call and/or fax them day after day after day. Leave no doubt in their minds that nuclear power is scientifically fraudulent when being promoted as a solution to global warming and is totally unacceptable. We need large governmental subsidies of life sustaining/supporting technologies like wind & solar power RIGHT NOW. Emphasis on conservation, too. NO more welfare/subsidies to nuclear power which to any sane society is absolutely unacceptable.
Cheney & the White House & media also need to know of Joe Mangano's study showing a very strong correlation between normal nuclear reactor operating and infant mortality:
http://www.geocities.com/mothersalert/infant.html
The media at reactor sites around the country need to know about this study and the lack of any other such published studies [to the best of my knowledge]. Mangano-like studies need to be conducted at ALL reactor sites throughout the country and world for that matter. People need to know that just one of the totally unacceptable reasons for reactor operations is the amount of people that are killed both in the long term and short term and are sickened by routine reactor operationing.
To see what can be done with positive governmental expenditures of OUR $ and how 75% of electricity in the US can simply be done away with, see: World Reknown Energy Analyst & Expert Dr Amory Lovins:
http://www.ccnr.org/Lovins_figure_4.html
http://www.ccnr.org/amory.html#acc
Lastly, as if any other evidence were necessary re the danger and criminality of nuclear power, Admiral Hyman Rickover, Father of the nuclear Navy was terrified that if the whole truth about Three Mile Island came out, that would end the ENTIRE commercial nuclear power industry in the USA. This is why Rickover used his personal closeness with former President Jimmy Carter to have Carter withold the complete truth of the accident from every American: http://www.geocities.com/mothersalert/rickover.html
3/23/01
3:17:48 PM
Planet Ark World Environment News
Doing environmental research? Search our news archives at: http://www.planetark.org/searchhome.cfm
Japan to allow some biotech crops in food - official - USA http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=10222
US sees drop in 2nd-hand smoke, child lead levels - USA http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=10230
Giuliani vows long-term NYC energy plan but stays mum - USA http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=10229
Calif. pushes power savings to avert summer blackouts - USA http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=10224
FACTBOX - Bush rolls back water, mining, forestry rules - USA http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=10223
UPDATE - Bush scraps another Clinton enviromental rule - USA http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=10213
US Arctic refuge drilling supporters unveil ad campaign - USA http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=10220
UPDATE - Cheney - Energy panel to look at nuclear power - USA http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=10219
Democrats to unveil alternative US energy bill - USA http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=10218
UPDATE - Looser green rules won't stop US gasoline spike - USA http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=10216
Judge denies Bush request to delay forest conservation case - USA http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=10215
UPDATE - US reaches deal to cut pollution at refineries - USA http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=10214
BP may take earnings hit in green fuel switch - study - UK http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=10225
World faces major water shortage by 2025 - UK agency - UK http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=10226
UPDATE - Thirst for water drives desalination boom - expert - SINGAPORE http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=10232
Russian deputies to vote on nuclear waste imports - RUSSIA http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=10231
Kyoto deal seen possible despite Bush position - NETHERLANDS http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=10221
Hungary plans to sue Romanian firm over spill - HUNGARY http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=10217
Millions dying needlessly from dirty water - WHO - EU http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=10228
UPDATE - Oil spill from sunken Brazil rig contained - BRAZIL http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=10227
3/23/01
3:15:17 PM
The Nation
United States Draconian Drug Laws
No single moment in the history of US criminal justice matches the destructive impact of the New York legislature's 1973 session. That was when Governor Nelson Rockefeller set the tone for a national wave of prison-packing schemes with the drug laws that bear his name. The Rockefeller drug laws combined two regressive criminal justice policies into a new and potent brew: They prescribe imprisonment rather than treatment for drug offenders, and they establish mandatory minimum sentences.
The outcome, repeated thousands of times daily around the country: Nonviolent drug offenders get punished out of all proportion to any presumed threat to society. With built-in incentives for police and prosecutors to concentrate on low-level users and with racial discrimination an inevitability, the Rockefeller drug laws are the ancestor of just about every regressive criminal justice policy since enacted--three-strikes laws, federal sentencing guidelines and zero-tolerance police sweeps.
Fortunately, an increasingly effective coalition of New York-based community groups and non-profits have emerged in opposition to these draconian drug laws. And next week, DROP THE ROCK will stage a day of public protest in Albany, New York, to call upon elected officials to completely repeal the Rockefeller Laws.
Taking place on Tuesday, March 27, people from around New York State will gather in Albany for DROP THE ROCK Day, a day of education and action, featuring a rally at the Capitol from 12-2 p.m. with a stirring series of speeches planned. DROP THE ROCK has organized numerous, inexpensive bus caravans leaving from Manhattan, Brooklyn and the Bronx. The more people, the better. So please consider being there if you're able and please pass this note on to anyone you think may be interested. For information on transportation for March 27 and DROP THE ROCK's efforts generally, go to:
And, for more background, read "The Worst Drug Laws," from the most recent issue of The Nation. Currently available at:
http://www.thenation.com/doc.mhtml?i=20010409&s=editors2
3/23/01
3:09:50 PM
State Department Says No US Origin Waste to go to Russia
NUCLEAR INFORMATION AND RESOURCE SERVICE INSTITUTE FOR ENERGY AND ENVIRONMENTAL RESEARCH ECODEFENSE!
For Immediate Release Contact:
Michael Mariotte, NIRS, 202.328.0002
Michele Boyd, IEER, 301.270.5500
State Department Says No US Origin Waste to go to Russia
The U.S. State Department says it will not allow high-level atomic waste of U.S. origin to be shipped to Russia because of Russia's nuclear power collaboration with Iran. The United States will not even consider allowing such imports unless Russia first ends that nuclear collaboration, the State Department said in a letter to environmental groups opposed to the plan. This position could put an end to plans by Russia's nuclear agency Minatom to import nuclear waste from other countries and use the profits to build new atomic power plants. It also would stop a different project led by a U.S. group, the Non-Proliferation Trust, which has also proposed importing high-level waste to Russia under NPT's management, and using the funds for clean-up of contaminated sites and other purposes.
In a March 14, 2001 letter to the Nuclear Information and Resource Service (NIRS), Richard J.K. Stratford, Director of the State Department's Office of Nuclear Energy Affairs, said, ".[A]ny transfer to Russia of power reactor spent fuel subject to U.S. consent rights could only take place if the United States were to conclude an agreement for peaceful nuclear cooperation with the Russian Federation. We have not so far been willing to negotiate such an agreement, because of our longstanding concerns about Russian nuclear cooperation with Iran."
Stratford was writing in response to a letter signed by more than 150 organizations worldwide urging the U.S. to block any shipment of U.S.-origin atomic fuel to Russia. The letter was organized by NIRS, the Institute for Energy and Environmental Research (IEER) and Russia's Ecodefense!.
Because most irradiated reactor fuel in the western world and Asia is either of U.S.-origin or irretrievably mixed-in with fuel of U.S.-origin, the State Department stance effectively rules out the Minatom Project. The project initially passed the Russian lower House of Parliament (Duma) in February, but a second reading was postponed today until at least late April.
The State Department promised that if the Russian situation with Iran should change, and Department consideration of an agreement with Russia were considered, a notice of any proposed decision would be published in the Federal Register, and environmental groups would be invited to meet with State Department officials.
3/23/01
2:41:02 PM
A CRY TO GOD FROM PLANET EARTH
By John McConnell - Founder of Earth Day
Earth Day -- March 20. 2001
Dear God,
As we enter a new millennium, more than ever before people of every creed and culture want an answer to the ultimate questions that have troubled civilization through its history.
What is life all about? Why are we here? Where are we going?
Science and religion have sought answers and end up with only more questions. Beliefs of every kind abound. But no one provides evidence that all fair minded parties can agree on. No one has presented a video tape documenting the existence and nature of heaven - or other dimensions of reality.
Logic demands a cause for every effect. The more we learn about the Cosmos, the more our amazement at both the chaos and order we find. Science now acknowledges there can be no creation without a Creator. Chaos cannot cause beauty, order, music and meaning.
To create art or music, human beings need intellect and emotion. The Creator of Earth and stars must be far superior to us in mind and consciousness. The greatest wisdom we know is love. The Creator must be a God of love.
Religions have at times caused wars and violence. But at their best, they have brought harmony and peaceful progress in the human adventure. I'm grateful for my Christian faith and the reverence for life it has engendered. My life experience has given me a vision of the challenge and opportunity the human family now has to rejuvenate our planet and its human cultures with an Earth Trustee agenda to eliminate poverty, pollution and violence. We have the technology and information that rightly used could make this nest in the stars a garden of Eden.
I pray and I think you hear my prayers. Sometimes miracles happen and I give you thanks. But I cannot understand the unanswered prayers and the pain and suffering that millions of people experience.
You must exist. But Dear God, why don't you show yourself in an unmistakable way and tell the whole human family why we are here and what we should do?
Strangely, my heart is filled with deep anguish -- and exhilarating hope. Please help.
Reverently,
John McConnell
Earth Day - March 20, 2001
www.earthsite.org
3/22/01
6:51:27 PM
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
March 22, 2001
Kentucky Hemp Bill Signed Into Law
The Kentucky state legislature passed a bill establishing an Industrial Hemp Commission (IHC) and today the bill was signed into law by Gov. Patton. The IHC will consist of 17 members including representatives of the governor, the state legislature, state universities, law enforcement and the Kentucky Hemp Growers Cooperative Association. The bill also authorizes an industrial hemp research program to be conducted at one or more selected Kentucky state universities.
HB 100 was passed by the Kentucky House on February 14th by a vote of 66 - 32. On March 8th the bill was passed in the Senate by a vote of 68 -28. HB 100 was signed into law by Kentucky governor Paul E. Patton on Thursday March 22nd. The full text of the bill can be viewed at:
<http://www.lrc.state.ky.us/record/01rs/HB100.htm>
3/22/01
6:30:33 PM
THE LEXINGTON HERALD-LEADER
Lexington, Kentucky
Attack on hemp unfair: A return to “McCarthyism”
It appears that Jeanette McDougal of Drug Watch International mixed a few facts with a lot of misinformation in the anti-hemp commentary that appeared in Monday’s Herald-Leader (inserted below). It’s the old legal tactic: If you don’t have the law or facts, attack the person. In newsprint it’s frequently referred to as character assassination by association or “McCarthyism.”
I have known the Graves family for three generations. During World War II the federal government asked the Graves family, as well as many other Kentucky farmers, to grow hemp for the war effort. Everyone was thanking them in those days instead of attempting to malign them as McDougal did. I know of no member of Andy Graves’ family, passed or present, who would approve of or promote the production or use of marijuana.
As for Woody Harrelson, I defended him without charge in the name of liberty and justice. I didn’t know him before the trial. He came here to test a legal concept in the interest of Kentucky farmers. No one was harmed. McDougal and I have talked by telephone. She faxed me much outdated and narrowly interpreted material.
Modern technology can immediately distinguish between the industrial hemp plants and the marijuana plants, as can the naked eye. We should destroy the marijuana plant, but make every possible use of the industrial hemp plant. In an honest effort to do both, there is no need to try to destroy decent people by insinuation, slander, guilt by association or the use of outdated or misdirected information.
I admire and support McDougal’s objective, but shame, shame, shame on the course she has taken.
Louie B. Nunn Former Kentucky Governor Woodford County
Employing innuendo and specious logic, Jeanette McDougal put forth an all-out conspiracy theory of farmers, businessmen, politicians and others concealing secret identities as pot-smoking hippies engaged in the most seditious form of cultural treason: the legalization of marijuana through the re-commercialization of industrial hemp.
For those of us in the real world, hemp enjoys its current widespread bipartisan support because of its proven benefits in 31 other countries. In fact, the irony of McDougal’s hysteria is that it is completely misplaced considering that more case law and legislation now exists to grow and use medical marijuana while low-THC hemp remains illegal.
But beware of confusing McDougal with the facts, as her focus is to establish guilt by association. The mere insinuation that an individual is even indirectly linked to what still passes for cultural taboo is offered as a poor excuse for a legitimate gripe. One should note that her complaints have yet to be reconciled with the increasingly long roster of conservative politicians and industrialists who support hemp.
Apparently the crown jewel of McDougal’s conspiracy musings is a High Times article published more than 10 years ago, wishfully referring to hemp clothing as “legal pot.” Sorry, but inflating the implications of the unfortunate semantics of a biased journalist does not exactly a conspiracy make.
The informed citizen, armed with the hard facts about industrial hemp’s well-established commercial potential and environmental benefits will eventually triumph over McDougal’s pitiable campaign of misinformation, demagoguery and character smears.
Erik Rothenberg
Director, http://www.VoteHemp.com
Los Angeles
THE LEXINGTON HERALD-LEADER
Lexington, Kentucky
Hemp a cover for legalizing pot
By Jeanette McDougal
Separating hemp reality from hemp rhetoric is like separating fleas from dogs: It’s hard to do, and it’s temporary. When one hemp fact is established, pro-hemp advocates rush in with another of their own facts. Should we really turn for facts to former CIA Director James Woolsey, who bragged about his client the North American Industrial Hemp Council, by saying there was not a tie-dyed shirt owner among the members? He neglected to check their boxers. Several of the board members were either vigorous pro-drug advocates or their close associates.
David Morris, former vice-president of the council, pushed legalization of marijuana, marijuana cigarettes for medicine and industrial cannabis hemp for years in his columns in the St. Paul (Minn.) Pioneer Press. Andrew Graves, founding and former board member, was party to a lawsuit to permit the growing of industrial cannabis hemp. The two lead lawyers in that suit Michael Kennedy of New York and Burl McCoy of Kentucky are on the roster of the National Organization for Reform of Marijuana Laws, an aggressive pro-marijuana legalization advocate.
Actor Woody Harrelson, an admitted pot smoker, marijuana and hemp advocate, hired Joe Hickey, executive director of the Kentucky Hemp Growers Association, as a consultant, allowing Hickey to leave his former job and devote all his time to hemp. Harrelson has sponsored many Kentucky hemp events, including a hemp essay contest for Kentucky schoolchildren, some of whom received a list of hemp facts intermingled with marijuana facts [this is a totally false statement], such as, “smoking marijuana can be beneficial for emphysema, and can be used as a handy way to induce dry mouth before dental operations.”
John Howell, former hemp editor of High Times magazine [false statement - it was Hemptimes], was in Kentucky in 1998 to help Graves, Kennedy and McCoy publicize the message that there is a hemp market. Howell recently represented the cannabis hemp industry at the National Conference of State Legislatures, without disclosing his ties to High Times [false statement - it was Hemptimes]. High Times, one of the oldest and most militant pro-drug/marijuana publications in the United States, announced in its March 1990 edition an “extraordinary plan” to legalize marijuana:
“The way to legalize marijuana is to sell marijuana legally. When you can buy marijuana in your neighborhood shopping mall, it’s legal ... Anything and everything you can think of will be made from hemp ... Supporters of the hemp legalization movement will be able to buy shares in hemp manufacturing. ... Legal and financial recognition of hemp’s industrial value will mean legal marijuana, whether our government likes it or not! Pot will be legal! ... So invest in our future. Buy some legal marijuana. Buy a hemp shirt and wear it proudly!”
As to the economics of cannabis hemp, in 1999 about 540 Canadian farmers planted 35,000 acres of hemp. About 18,700 of those acres were contracted to a company called Consolidated Growers, which went bankrupt (Chapter 7) in February 2000, leaving 232 Canadian farmers (almost half of those who planted hemp that year) holding the hemp bag for $5 million to $6 million. Much of the 1999 crop is still being stored by Canadian farmers.
In 2000, in all of Canada, a mere 13,500 acres were planted, down from 35,000 the year before. Ontario, the only province to do a costs/return per acre analysis, discovered that for fiber only, there was a $107 loss [false - $200 cnd according to Canadian farmers]; for grain only, a $24 loss [false - $200 cnd according to Canadian farmers]; and for grain and fiber, a $48 profit [false - $300 cnd according to Canadian farmers]. An agriculture ministry official also warned farmers to have a contract with a reputable company before planting hemp, or they could lose $600 an acre.
The U.S. Department of Agriculture says the market for hemp fibers “will likely remain a small, thin market.” The report calculates that U.S. imports of hemp fiber, yarn, fabric and seed in 1999 could have been produced on less than 5,000 acres. The hemp liability list goes on and on and on.
Jeanette McDougal, a St. Paul, Minn., schoolteacher, is chairwoman of Drug Watch International’s hemp committee.
3/22/01
6:23:36 PM
Public Citizen
ACTION ALERT:
Media Role Missing from Campaign Finance Coverage
While the McCain-Feingold campaign finance debate will often dominate political news over the next two weeks, one aspect of the story is rarely explained to TV viewers: Where does all the money go?
Many media accounts correctly draw the links between the access that big money can buy and the political favors that donors come to expect. News reports at the beginning of the Senate debate (3/19/01) over McCain-Feingold were often strongly worded: CBS's Bob Schieffer explained that "This money is like a narcotic to politicians and they're having a hard time breaking the habit," while NBC's Lisa Myers reported the issue as a case of "bigger and bigger money buying more and more influence."
But a significant portion of that money goes straight to the media themselves. Estimates of campaign spending in 2000 find that television stations took in about $1 billion in advertising revenue. One study of political ads found that 839,243 political ads were aired in the top 75 media markets during the 200 election season-- that's over 10,000 per market (USA Today, 3/21/01).
The media's front-and-center role in campaign finance goes virtually unacknowledged on the network news broadcasts. As debate on the Senate floor began on March 19, viewers would be hard-pressed to find any straight forward account of how the system actually works. On NBC Nightly News, correspondent Lisa Myers came close, reporting that opponents of McCain-Feingold argue that "this money is needed to buy expensive TV time."
Newspaper accounts are often more direct-- Washington Post columnist David Broder (3/20/01) wrote that the truth about who benefits from the current system "is suppressed in Senate debate for the same reason it was ignored on the TV talk shows: fear of antagonizing the station owners, who control what gets on the air."
It's not hard to see why broadcasters would not be interested in disclosing the extraordinary benefits they get from the current political financing scheme. Earlier in the month, a report by the Alliance for Better Campaigns accused television stations of gouging advertisers by charging more than the basic rate for political ads. The report generated some newspaper coverage (New York Times, Washington Post, Boston Globe, all 3/6/01), but no national television coverage, according to a search of the Nexis online news database.
Broadcasters participate as campaign contributors as well. According to data compiled by the Center for Responsive Politics, big media were big soft-money contributors in the 2000 election cycle:
--Time Warner/CNN: $2,004,438
--Walt Disney/ABC: $1,805,464
--News Corp./Fox: $787,980
--Viacom/CBS: $648,170
--General Electric/NBC: $309,700
This system is known well to journalists and politicians alike. Broadcast lobbies like the National Association of Broadcasters are considered among the most powerful in Washington, and the mechanics of political campaigns are all too familiar to those close to the system. "Today's Senate campaigns function as collection agencies for broadcasters," former Senator Bill Bradley explained in 1991 (Communications & the Law, 3/95). "You simply transfer money from contributors to television stations."
As the issue of campaign finance reform takes center stage, the broadcast industry's participation in the scandal demands greater scrutiny.
ACTION: Encourage the broadcast news outlets to investigate the role of the media industry itself in the campaign finance debate. Media companies have an obligation to explain their role as beneficiaries of the current system.
CONTACT: NBC Nightly News Phone: 212-664-4971 or 202-885-4259 Fax: 202-362-2009 mailto:Nightly@nbc.com
ABC's World News Tonight 47 W. 66 St., New York, NY 10023 Phone: 212-456-7777 Fax: 212-456-4297 mailto:peterjennings@worldnewstonight.abcnews.com
CBS Evening News Phone: 212-975-3691, 202-457-4385 Fax: 212-975-1893 mailto:audsvcs@cbs.com
As always, please remember that your comments will be more effective if you maintain a polite tone. Please cc fair@fair.org with your correspondence.
For more background, please see: --Alliance for Better Campaigns:
http://www.bettercampaigns.org/
--"Hidden Culprit in Campaign Finance Scandal: The TV Industry" by Jeff Cohen:
http://www.fair.org/whats-new/tvindustry.html
3/22/01
6:21:02 PM
Environmental news from GRIST MAGAZINE
<http://www.gristmagazine.com>
1. 10 REASONS TO DRILL ... TODAY Who doesn't want to drill for oil in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge in Alaska? It'll be fun! We will wear special outfits, and when the oil gets in our mustaches, we'll take silly pictures and send them as postcards. Sadly, some people (generally sex offenders, future studies are likely to reveal) oppose the drilling plan. We know better. Read 10 glistening reasons to plunge a masculine drill into Alaska's "Opportunity Refuge" on the Grist Magazine website.
read it only on the Grist Magazine website: The case for oil exploration in the Arctic Refuge -- in our opinions section <http://www.gristmagazine.com/grist/imho/imho032201.stm>
2. BODY, WANNA TEST MY BODY, BODY A study released by U.S. health officials yesterday showed for the first time that most Americans carry detectable levels of plastics, pesticides, and heavy metals in their blood and urine. The study by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention measured the presence of 27 chemicals in humans and found levels in the average person that were far below those where problems with the toxics typically occur. Previously, researchers had only been able to measure the levels of many of these chemicals in air, water, and food. Levels of mercury were found to be lower than expected in children and higher among women of child-bearing age, though still below federal standards.
straight to the source: Washington Post, David Brown, 22 Mar 2001 <http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A40329-2001Mar21.html>
3. BLACK GOLD, FRANK "INCENSED" MURKOWSKI Dealing a blow to plans to drill for oil in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge in Alaska, Republicans on the U.S. House Budget Committee have declined to include any anticipated revenue from the drilling in the federal government budget for the next fiscal year. The chair of the Senate Budget Committee, Sen. Pete Domenici (R-N.M.), said his committee would follow suit. Sen. Frank Murkowski (R-Alaska) and President Bush had hoped to have revenue from drilling included in a budget bill, which under Senate rules cannot be filibustered. Now, it seems likely that opponents of the drilling will be able to filibuster any bills that include a drilling provision. Sixty votes are required to end a filibuster, 10 more than Murkowski would have needed in support of a drilling provision that was part of a budget measure. In related news, nearly 500 scientists sent a letter to Bush this week, warning him that drilling in the refuge would permanently harm wildlife in the area.
straight to the source: New York Times, Lizette Alvarez, 22 Mar 2001 <http://www.nytimes.com/2001/03/22/politics/22ALAS.html>
straight to the source: Los Angeles Times, 21 Mar 2001 < http://www.latimes.com:80/news/nation/20010321/t000024529.html>
read it only in Grist Magazine: When is a caribou an albatross? -- the Arctic Refuge could become Bush's gays-in-the-military -- by David Helvarg <http://www.gristmagazine.com/grist/imho/imho030901.stm>
4. LET THEM DRINK COKE More than 1 billion people lack access to clean drinking water and 3.4 million die each year from diseases linked to water contamination, according to the World Health Organization. In a report timed for U.N. World Water Day today (mark your calendar for next year), the WHO said it had registered no improvement in the numbers since 1990. A report prepared by PricewaterhouseCoopers for the U.N. warned that wars over water are expected to increase around the world, as population numbers continue to soar and environmental degradation continues.
straight to the source: BBC News, 22 Mar 2001 <http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/sci/tech/newsid_1235000/1235460.stm>
read it only in Grist Magazine: Wet's the matter -- fun with water facts -- in our Counter Culture column <http://www.gristmagazine.com/grist/counter/counter050300.stm>
5. TURNING OVER A NEWLEAF The biotech giant Monsanto confirmed accounts this week that it will shelve its first genetically modified crop and stop selling the six-year-old NewLeaf potato to farmers in the U.S. and Canada. The potato, which contains a gene that produces a toxin to repel the Colorado potato beetle, was unable to capture more than 5 percent of the potato-seed market. Farmers were lukewarm on the product because of high prices, and food companies (the folks buying the spuds) steered clear, with consumers growing increasingly concerned about whether genetically modified foods are safe to eat. Last year, for example, McDonald's told its french-fry suppliers not to use the NewLeaf potato. A Monsanto spokesperson said the company suspended its potato plans and will focus instead on larger markets for genetically modified seeds: oilseeds, cotton, corn, and wheat.
straight to the source: Wall Street Journal, Scott Kilman, 21 Mar 2001 (access ain't free) <http://interactive.wsj.com/articles/SB985128671233949916.htm>
Why can't a man be more like a woman? -- a day in the life of Eric Britton, Earth Car Free Day <http://www.gristmagazine.com/grist/week/britton032101.stm>
The Washington Post beefs up its green beat reporting, while CNN cuts back -- in our Muckraker column <http://www.gristmagazine.com/grist/muck/muck020701.stm#news>
Lean and green -- a Colorado family welcomes the simple life -- in our Out on a Limb column <http://www.gristmagazine.com/grist/limb/limb042600.stm>
3/22/01
6:11:32 PM
Real Goods
More Short Renewable Energy Stories:
SAY NO TO OIL DEVELOPMENT ON COSTA RICA'S CARIBBEAN COAST
Harken Energy from Houston, Texas is now poised to drill for oil in a region known as Talamanca - an extremely biologically rich area that is an UNESCO World Heritage Site. The indigenous peoples that live in the area, and support themselves largely from eco-tourism, are opposed to oil development. Read More...
PENNSYLVANIA TO BUILD LARGEST WIND FARM IN EASTERN U.S.
A ridge of pastureland southeast of Pittsburgh will be the site for the largest wind energy facility in the eastern United States. Full coverage, click here.
U.S. SOLAR MANUFACTURERS REPORT HIGHER SHIPMENTS
The shipment of solar thermal collectors in the United States reached a total of nine million square feet in 1999, an increase of 11 percent from the 1998 total of eight million square feet, according to 'Renewable Energy Annual 2000' released by the Energy Information Administration. Read More...
DOE TO FUND $12 MILLION IN THIN-FILM PV WORK
The U.S. Department of Energy is preparing to fund $12 million in research for the development of thin-film solar photovoltaic technology. Click here, for full coverage.
COSMETIC COMPANY TO INSTALL $1.4 MILLION SOLAR SYSTEM
A large beauty products firm will become the first major company to install a solar electric system in Los Angeles. To read more, click here.
BRITISH PRIME MINISTER BACKS RENEWABLE ENERGY
The British government will provide additional funding of £100 million to support renewable energy technologies and to make Britain a leader in the adoption of green power. For full coverage, click here.
Unique and Shocking Electricity Factoids
 12,133 -- per capita annual electricity consumption (kilowatt-hours) in the U.S. in 1997
 1,381 -- per capita annual electricity consumption (kilowatt-hours) in the rest of the world in 1997
 21.5 -- percent increase in U.S. electricity consumption from 1990 to 1999
 43 -- percent decrease in utility funding for energy efficiency from 1993 to 1998
 90 -- percent of total U.S. coal consumption used to generate electricity in 1998
 33 -- percent of all mercury emissions in the U.S. that came from coal power plants in 1999
 30,000- number of lives cut short in the U.S. each year due to pollution from electric utilities
 37 million -- number of cars necessary to produce the amount of smog-forming pollution that comes from U.S. coal power plants each year
 7.5 -- percent of total U.S. energy consumption from renewable sources in 1998
 94 -- percent of total U.S. renewable energy consumption from hydropower and bio-mass (trash and wood incinerators)$216.7 billion -- revenue of the U.S. electric utility industry in 1999
 $216.7 billion -- revenue of the U.S. electric utility industry in 1999
 $124 billion -- approximate combined revenues of all the governments in Africa
 90 -- percent of total electricity used in a regular lightbulb that is wasted as heat
 1,000 -- reduction in pounds of carbon dioxide emitted into the atmosphere by replacing one traditional lightbulb with a compact fluorescent bulb, over the bulb's lifetime
- Todd Hettenbach
Julia Butterfly Hill, Mark Dubois, Ram Dass, Randy Hayes, and Sat Santokh...
Invite you to join us for a 3 day weekend exploring Spirituality & Social Change
A Creating Our Future Memorial Weekend Workshop: (7 PM, Friday, 5/25 - 2 PM, Monday, 5/28)
This workshop is for spiritually oriented and socially concerned citizens, for activists of all kinds, and is open to all age groups. It will be held in Marin County, California on 1,740 acres of rolling hills, open grasslands, creeks, bay laurel forests; with clean and comfortable dormitory & semi-private lodging.
As Julia Butterfly said about this workshop: "Religion, politics, science or activism without the deep, heartfelt connection to the Sacred is a dying effort, a dying ecosystem of disharmony. My prayer for this workshop is that in the joining of our diverse perspectives, we will be able to see and articulate what a healthy world and future look like as well as the steps necessary to promote this positive, vibrant vision. Equally important, we will leave with a renewed inspiration to live our heart’s calling and our spirit’s passion."
For more information, email satsantokh@home.com, or call 510 895 2813
"Sometimes I wonder, with all our supposed progress, what we're rushing toward and what we're leaving behind." Donella Meadows, from the Global Citizen, January 2001.
3/22/01
6:06:49 PM
Real Goods
Bipartisan Emissions Bill Counters Bush's Broken Promise
WASHINGTON, DC, March 15, 2001 (ENS) - A bipartisan group of U.S. Congress members introduced a bill today that would set emissions limits for carbon dioxide and other power plant pollutants that contribute to global warming and pose a risk to public health. The bill was released two days after President George W. Bush's controversial decision not to support limits on carbon dioxide emissions from power plants. Read more...
Short Renewable Energy Stories:
PBS AIRS TRADE SECRETS OF CHEMICAL INDUSTRY
On March 26 PBS will air "Trade Secrets," a report on the chemical industry produced by the Peabody Award-winning duo of Bill Moyers and Sherry Jones. A newly formed environmental campaign hopes to use the broadcast to spark national awareness and action on the issue. To read more, click here.
SATELLITE PICTURES SHOW GREENHOUSE EFFECT
Observations from satellites support a new theory that carbon dioxide and other emissions are to blame for global warming, confirming what some climate models have been implying, that Earth's "greenhouse" effect increased between 1970 and 1997. Click here to read more.
SALMON PROTECTION SECOND TO POWER PRODUCTION
Salmon protection must be second to power production if the Bonneville Power Administration is to keep its electricity prices from doubling this fall, the federal agency's acting administrator said Monday. Read more...
A GENERATOR IN EVERY BACKYARD?
Not-in-my-backyard could become one-in-every-backyard if technology for distributed generation - micropower - is perfected. Micropower is generally considered an electrical operation that produces no more than 10 megawatts, and is powered by a refined form of the internal combustion engine. Read more...
WORLD'S FORESTS DEPEND UPON JUST TEN COMPANIES
WWF states that if well managed, one fifth of the World's forests could meet global demand for wood and fiber, and that just 10 companies could make this a reality. Click here...
3/22/01
6:02:35 PM
Real Goods
Nuclear Industry Alive and Well
The U.S. nuclear power industry said yesterday that it produced more power in the year 2000 than ever before. The announcement came just one week after Sen. Pete Domenici (R-N.M.) introduced a bill to spur more use of nuclear energy in the U.S., celebrating what he termed a "safe and environmentally clean fuel." Nuclear industry watchdog groups blasted Senator Pete Domenici's (R-NM) introduction of the "Nuclear Energy Electricity Assurance Act of 2001" as nothing more than an invitation to legislate the nuclear industry's wish list. In other nuke news, Russia gave the thumbs up yesterday to a plan to build a floating nuclear power plant on the White Sea. And China said it would move forward with plans to build several new nuclear power plants in its coastal provinces. Read more...
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In Memorium – Donella Meadows – 1941 - 2001
Last month the environmental community lost one of its great leaders. Widely regarded for her work on global environmental and economic systems, Donella Meadows, known to friends as Dana, died of bacterial meningitis on Feb. 20. She was 59. Meadows is recognized for pioneering the "sustainability" movement. Her 1972 international best-seller, "The Limits to Growth," was among the first books to sound an alarm about the ecological impact of a teeming world population.
The book claims that the planet's resources will be lost within the next century if population growth is not significantly curbed. Her follow up book: “Beyond the Limits” is one of the books that inspired me in my early days with Real Goods, and the book that first let me understand the depth of the mess the Earth is in. As a member of the faculty at Dartmouth College for 29 years, Meadows gently pointed her students toward sustainable living for the future.
For the full story, click here.
New Homes Offer Solar Power As Standard Feature
In San Diego, Shea Homes is building the largest development of solar-powered, energy-efficient houses in the country. One hundred houses will have 12 solar panels as a standard feature, providing 1,500 kilowatt hours of solar-generated energy a year, in addition to conventional electricity. An additional 160 homes offer the panels as an option. The panels add about $6,000 to the cost of the homes, which are valued between $400,000 and $600,000. Shea had been considering including solar panels in a development but couldn't do so until last year, when it found technology that would cost buyers about 1 percent of their total home cost.
The homes' efficiency features include a reflective coating under the roof tile to repel heat, "smart" window glass that blocks infrared and ultraviolet rays, extra-efficient ductwork to reduce air-conditioning leakage, and solar-powered water heaters to cut the need for natural gas. The solar-panel system will cut the homes' electricity costs up to 80 percent, while the other efficiency features alone would cut bills by 30 percent. Los Angeles Times, 25 Feb 01, by Michelle Morgante.
3/22/01
5:58:59 PM
Real Goods
Global Warming and the California Energy Crisis – It’s all Tied Together
These past two weeks have brought several global issues to the forefront, particularly Global Warming, and our new government’s insistence on maintaining denial of it. Consider the facts:
 The hottest years in recorded history all have occurred during the past 13 years
 7.5 cubic miles of ice have eroded from a key area of the South Pole in just 8 years
 A report from the U.N. Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change concluded that the rate of climate change in this century is expected to be greater than it has been in the past 10,000 years.
 The same report warns that worldwide temperature will rise as much as 11 degrees this century unless greenhouse emissions are cut substantially (up from 3 or 4 degrees we’ve been hearing in the past).
 The deep oceans are warming, the tundra is thawing, the glaciers are melting, infectious diseases are migrating, and the timing of seasons has changed – all from one degree of warming. And if the earth warms by 11 more degrees later in this century as the IPCC warns, then what?
The Kyoto Protocol mandates only carbon reductions of 6% below 1990 levels. However most scientists estimate that restabilization of our climate will require cuts of 70%. There is only one way to effect this change: a global transition away from coal and oil to an energy economy based on photovoltaics, hydrogen-powered fuel cells, wind generators and other non-carbon based energy sources.
The good news is that with rebates from the California Energy Commission and other state agencies around the country, PV is becoming economically viable. The payback period is often 10 years or less when everything is factored in. And if electric rates double in the next few years, as most expect, that payback period decreases to only five years and a 20% ROI (return on investment), which makes solar PV attractive to almost all folks currently on the electric grid.
I had hoped to report on some of the bills before the California Legislature in this issue, but the task is daunting. There are currently over 100 bills before the Legislature dealing with conservation rebates, additional PV rebates, all kinds of buydowns, and numerous ideas to incent Californians to begin to use renewable energy. This is good news! When it all shakes out, we can only hope that California will set the tone for the necessary changes needed to curb the deadly serious problem of global warming that our government seems unwilling to confront.
Global Warming Update
The Global Warming issue has been seriously heating up since our last issue. With all the brouhaha in the news about GW Bush’s reversal on carbon dioxide emissions and regulation thereof, we thought we’d give our Solar Times readers an opportunity to read the whole definitive story on the subject as reported by Leonie Haimson, a climate change columnist extraordinaire, in the latest Grist Magazine. For the full story, the best summary I’ve seen, click here.
Rest of the World Reacts to Bush Decision
The European Union expressed disappointment with President Bush's decision not to regulate carbon dioxide, and Japan said the decision could undermine the Kyoto treaty on climate change. Germany went so far as to say the rest of the world might have to leave the U.S. behind and begin implementing the treaty alone. E.U. Environment Commissioner Margot Wallstrom said she was especially concerned about Bush's "remarks that more research is needed into the causes of climate change before we know what the solutions are."
In the view of the great majority of the world's climate scientists and governments, the facts are clear that humans are helping to cause global warming by spitting greenhouse gases like CO2 into the atmosphere. Indeed, a study published today in the journal Nature adds to the evidence that humans are changing the atmosphere. For more details on the story, click here.
Greenpeace Walks The Talk in New Headquarters Office
Greenpeace USA proudly boasts that its new headquarters office in Washington, DC, "is a prototype of both ideals and practice with the Earth in mind...an example of their commitment to a green today and better tomorrow." Designed by Envision Design, the 15,000-square-foot renovation project includes pantry countertops made from recycled yogurt containers and rubber flooring made from recycled tires. All woods used are FSC-certified as sustainable, including the wood in the lounge chairs made especially for this project by Knoll. Greenpeace wrote into its lease that the base buildingnot just its own spacewould be PVC-free except for the electrical wiring, for which no viable alternative exists.
Daylighting and light sensors reduce energy consumption, and rooftop solar panels provide electricity and heat water. By going with an open floor plan rather than private offices, the project realized a 45 percent savings in drywall not used; a 61 percent savings in unused doors; a 39 percent reduction in lighting energy consumption; and a 65 percent increase in the number of workspaces, from 57 to 94. A large sliding wall and oversized pivot doors, both made from wheatboard panels, separate the main conference room from the reception area and provide flexibility for many types of gatherings. Interiors & Sources, Jan-Feb 01, by Penny Bonda. [For full text, click here.]
3/22/01
5:47:44 PM
Public Citizen
California "Community Choice": An Easy Option to Protect Consumers
WASHINGTON, D.C. -- Community choice legislation being proposed in California today is a good consumer-oriented step toward providing more leverage for the state's beleaguered consumers, according to Public Citizen.
"Community choice" enables consumers to join together and negotiate with utilities for cheaper electricity rates. California Assembly Bill 48x, introduced by San Francisco Assemblywoman Carole Migden, will have its first public hearing today. The legislation won't solve California's energy crisis but would enable households to decide whether they want their town to join a municipal aggregation. Citizens of a town that votes to do so could opt out of the buying group and choose their own suppliers.
"The one striking aspect of California's energy crisis is that households are defenseless," said Wenonah Hauter, director of Public Citizen's Critical Mass Energy and Environment Program. "This proposed community choice legislation, while not the solution to the state's energy crisis, would provide more options currently denied to California consumers to negotiate for cheaper, more reliable, and more environmentally friendly electricity."
As California's electricity deregulation crisis continues, consumers have few options to choose new energy suppliers that can provide cheaper, more reliable and more environmentally friendly electricity. Two states - Ohio and Massachusetts - have adopted the community choice approach to help consumers, with successful results.
One of the fundamental problems of deregulation is that it doesn't provide true retail choice. Less than two percent of residential consumers in deregulated states have switched their utility. That's because the low volume of electricity usage consumed by households forces utilities to operate on slim per-house profit margins. These narrow profit margins effectively prohibit potential competitors from serving residential customers. For example, Houston-based power marketing firm Enron dropped out of the residential retail market just three weeks after competition began in 1998, claiming it was unable to profit. Before the crisis hit, fewer than 5 percent of Californians have switched providers. Now, all the competitors have dropped out, leaving only the incumbent utilities.
Conversely, large commercial users of electricity are much more profitable for utilities due to their economies of scale. As a result, more utilities jump into the market. Commercial consumers have more options and switch providers at much higher rates than do residential consumers.
Community choice allows residential consumers to band together with other households in their town to increase their economies of scale, placing them on par with industrial consumers. After Ohio adopted community choice in 1999, those cities that have elected to sign on have enjoyed great success at negotiating cheaper electricity deals with alternative providers and choosing providers with a focus on green energy.
An aggregation of more than 400,000 consumers in 90 Ohio cities just signed a deal with Green Mountain Energy that features a rate reduction and offers deals to provide residents with renewable energy. Representatives for each town form aggregations with other towns and negotiate contracts with alternative suppliers on behalf of all residential consumers in their jurisdiction.
"Community choice is good for consumers, and more states should commit to it," Hauter said. "We urge California in particular to institute community choice. California consumers need any relief they can get."
Public Citizen is a nonprofit consumer advocacy organization based in Washington, D.C.
For more information, please visit www.citizen.org
3/22/01
12:11:50 PM
Taken from the World Rainforest Movement Bulletin #44 published by Teresa Perez <teresap@wrm.org.uy> More articles at
- International Day for Forests and Against Free Trade
The so called "free trade" is in reality but the granting of unlimited power to transnational companies to govern the world to the detriment of the vast majority of humanity and nature. Forests worldwide are menaced by the process of liberalization of the economy which tends to weaken yet more the already feeble public controls on logging.
Within such context, Native Forest Network (NFN) International --a global network of forest protection organizations and representatives committed to protecting the world's remaining forest ecosystems, as well as indigenous forest communities-- is calling for an International Day for Forests and Against Free Trade, to take place on April 19th in the Northern Hemisphere and April 20th in the Southern Hemisphere. The event will coincide with the activities that will be undertaken in Quebec City, Canada, against the Summit of the Americas on those same days. This Summit will gather to work for the implementation of the Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA, an expansion of NAFTA (North American Free Trade Agreement) and MAI (Multilateral Agreement on Investment), strongly resisted by social and environmental organizations. Those interesting in learning more about the organization of this global protest are invited to contact the organizers at the following addresses:
Northern Hemisphere e-mail: nfnena@sover.net
http:// www.nativeforest.org
Southern Hemisphere e.mail: aburling@nfn.org.au
http:// www.nativeforest.org
3/22/01
12:09:18 PM
#1 most censored story: corporatizing water worldwide
Our New Resource Crisis
By Peter Phillips
Imagine, that we are beyond the energy crisis - in that we are used to paying double or triple prices for what in the previous century was a small part of the family budget. But now we are faced with a new shortage that taps another precious resource. Water only comes through the tap fours hours a day and we are forced to pay ten to hundred times what we paid in the 90s. Welcome to the world of privatized water, where fresh water is treated like a commodity, traded and sold in the international market to the highest bidder.
No longer can you assume a God-given right to drink from a mountain spring, but instead you will have to pay a toll to drink from Enron Springs, Monsanto Wells or receive tap water from Bechtel Water Works. Global consumption of water is doubling every 20 years, more than twice the rate of human population growth. According to the United Nations, more than one billion people already lack access to fresh drinking water. If current trends persist, by 2025 the demand for fresh water is expected to rise by 56 percent more than the amount of water that is currently available.
Multinational corporations recognize these trends and are trying to monopolize water supplies around the world. Monsanto, Bechtel, Enron and other global multinationals are seeking control of world water systems and supplies.
The World Bank recently adopted a policy of water privatization and full-cost water pricing. This policy is causing great distress in many Third World countries, which fear that their citizens will not be able to afford for-profit water.
Last year in a little known case of high scale international water marketing, a supertanker was reported to have filled up with water from Lake Erie and after paying the Canadian Government they shipped the water to Southeast Asia.
More details:
Special Report 6/99, The Global Water Crisis and the Commodification of the World's Water Supply by Maude Barlow
In These Times, Water Fallout:
Bolivians Battle Globalization 5/15/00
byJim Shultz
Canadian Dimension, 2/2000, Monsanto's Billion-Dollar Water Monopoly Plans
http://www.purefood.org/Monsanto/waterfish.cfm
San Francisco Bay Guardian, 5/31/00, Trouble on Tap, by Daniel Zoll
http://www.sfbg.com/News/34/35/bech2.html
3/22/01
11:49:11 AM
I just discovered this fantastic web site, and I wanted to let you all know about it.
It's called "A-Infos Radio Project," at http://www.radio4all.net, and contains radio programs from all around the world on many progressive topics. I don't know about you, but I often miss programs like TUC Radio, Alternative Radio, WINGS, This Way Out, etc. because of their program schedule on local stations. Well, you can find at least some of their programming on line, plus many others that we don't get locally, such as Renewing The Anarchist Tradition, ResistenzRadio from Germany (Switzerland?); Thin Air from community radio stations across the Rocky Mountains, Labor Express, Earth First! Radio, The Weekly Freak Show, Radio Active Productions, People's Tribune Radio, Unwelcome Guests, and numerous others.
You can listen online, or you can download the entire show for personal use or to re-broadcast it through local community radio channels. And you can upload programming to share on the website! What a great way to get around the mainstream media ban on truth talk! This is a tremendous resource for global liberty and social justice.
Hope you will check it out and enjoy it!
Lawrence
Check out also the Field Guide to the FTAA protest at
http://www.tao.ca/~cobp/guess-what.html
3/22/01
11:45:31 AM
Weaving a Web of Solidarity
A feminist action against globalisation
Summit of the Americas on the FTAA Quebec City, April 2001
On the weekend of April 20-22, leaders of thirty four countries will come to Quebec to tie a new strand in the web of corporate globalisation: the Free Trade Agreement of the Americas (FTAA), the regional accord that will expand NAFTA (North American Free Trade Agreement) throughout the hemisphere.
If they ignore our voices and continue their deliberations, the cries of women will haunt them and undo all their plans. Though they erect a fence to stop us, we will twine our web through its mesh to be the visible symbol of the power of women, of the revolution we weave. When they try to wall us out of their meetings, they will only wall themselves in. We claim all of the world beyond their wall.
We ask our brothers to support us, to honor our women's space so that we who have so often been invisible can stand forth and be seen. We ask you to support us by looking honestly at the ways that, even within our own movements, women are ignored, suppressed, or discounted. And when you support us in this action, where we stand together as women, it will spark actions where we fight side by side. For we know that you too, are weavers of this web.
We ask the ancestors to stand with us. For the web of life links the living and the dead. We ask the generations of the future to stand with us, for we fight for the world you will inherit. We ask the spirits of the earth to support us and be our ground, for we fight for the continuance of life. We are invincible, for life itself weaves with us.
AN INVITATION TO THE WOMEN OF THE WORLD TO
Form an affinity group
An affinity group is a group of 10-20 people with whom you have "affinity", that is, a common bond (family, friends, common issue, work colleagues, etc.), that meets regularly to discuss common issues and to act. Choose one or two members to represent your group at the Council of representatives. The Council of representatives will "meet" in virtual space until the week before the Summit of the Americas, at which point meetings will take place in Quebec. The Council of representatives meetings will be the forum to decide on strategy for the action. Keep your eye on the CMAQ (Quebec Centre for Independent Media) website (www.cmaq.net) for a Women's web of solidarity action link. Initiate (or continue), in your affinity group, a dialogue on the impacts of globalisation on women in your home area.
Women around the world bear the brunt of globalisation - our voices together will allow us to add to the feminist analysis of globalisation, and to strengthen our cause. Weave your part of the web of solidarity- Take what comes out of your dialogue on women and globalisation, and, as a group, weave a section of the web of solidarity to represent your consensus. Use your imagination- use yarn, materials, photos, newspaper clippings. The sky is the limit.
Add your section of the web to the web of solidarity in Quebec City in April 2001
Here are some suggestions on the many ways to join your section of the web to the larger web of solidarity:
* Come as an affinity group to Quebec City in April 2001, to participate in the collective weaving of the web of solidarity.
A fence is being erected around the buildings where the Summit is being held in order to keep protesters out - residents inside the perimeter are required to have identity cards in order to gain access to their own homes during the Summit. This fence symbolises, for us, the anti-democratic process of the FTAA - we want to reclaim that fence, that space. Those wanting to weave (literally or symbolically and non-violently) their parts of the web into the fence are invited to do so on the 19th of April (the day preceding the opening of the meeting). Affinity groups not wanting to approach the fence are invited to plan other kinds of actions using the web parts (blocking an intersection to catch Summit negotiators in the web, or decorating a park with parts of the web, etc.). Creativity and imagination are key! The sky is the limit!
* Send your section of the web to the address below and the women present in Quebec will ensure that your section is woven into the larger web.
* Send a photograph of your section of the web to the address below, and the women present in Quebec will enlarge it and add it to the larger web.
* Get together with other affinity groups in your area and weave your sections together closer to your home.
Québec contact information:
E-mail address: toile_femme@moncourrier.com
Mailing address: Toile femme Québec 2001,
C.P. 70021, Québec,
Québec (Canada) G1R 6B1
Sincerely,
Carol Brouillet
http://www.communitycurrency.org
3/22/01
11:42:21 AM
PROTEST THE FTAA
World leaders will gather in Quebec City in April to rubberstamp a new trade agreement. This NAFTA like agreement was cooked up by corporations and the puppet politicians they dangle on the end of strings. It will adversely affect the lives of millions of people in the Western Hemisphere. The agreement disregards human rights. It is undemocratic and will reduce governments' ability to act on behalf of the people and the environment. A strong message must be sent to Canadian MPs from Canadians that the FTAA is unacceptable.
The Canadian government is working hard to shut out protest. Protesters in Quebec City will be met by the Canadian army and a concrete and barbed wire fence. Anyone who was in Windsor last June saw this disgusting display of force. This is what a police state looks like. The media will do it’s best to distort the proceedings by focusing on violence and not the issues.
WHAT TO DO?
For people not going to Quebec City, WAG (WINDSORites AGAINST corporate GLOBALIZATION) is organizing a nationwide protest against the FTAA. We want your help to send a message to every politician in their home riding. We are looking for individuals or groups to organize an action in coordination with others across the country to make sure every member of Parliament understands that Canadians are opposed to the FTAA.
This invitation to join is being distributed through civil societies, grassroots organizations and student and labour groups. To initiate or join an action happening in your riding contact WAG at FTACTION@mnsi.net WAG's intention is to send a clear message to Canadian MPs that FTAA is unacceptable and must be rejected.
JOIN US IN SENDING THE MESSAGE
Douglas Hayes Windsor area Council of Canadians
Montreal Gazette
Anti-summit activists will pay minister a visit
Anti-free-trade activists say they have lost patience after a year of trying to meet Pierre Pettigrew, federal minister of international trade. So they're going calling on him at his Ottawa office. His visitors will be from Peaceful Convergence Q-2001, an umbrella group of about 30 religious, environmental and women's groups, student associations and unions. 'Citizens' Search' The group announced yesterday it plans a peaceful blockade of Pettigrew's office and intends to make a non-violent "citizens' search" for documents about the forthcoming Summit of the Americas in Quebec City.
The group gave Pettigrew an ultimatum last March to publish all documents on the summit. They also wanted to meet him. Pettigrew, citing the planned involvement of Convergence Q-2001 activists in civil-disobedience actions, refused. Tomorrow the deadline of the ultimatum expires and the government hasn't published any documents.
Philippe Duhamel, president of SalAMI, an anti-free-trade group, said they will try to hand in a petition calling for publication of the documents and a group "of people specially trained in non-violent methods of civil disobedience" will try to get into the building for the symbolic search. "Only a handful of people have seen these documents, not even the MPs who are supposed vote on them," said Regine Laurent, a representative of the Quebec Federation of Nurses. However, the documents have been sent to several powerful business groups in the United States, she said.
http://www.montrealgazette.com/
3/22/01
11:27:07 AM
ENVIRONMENT NEWS SERVICE
"We Cover the Earth For You"
MAD SHEEP SEIZED IN VERMONT
MONTPELIER, Vermont, March 21, 2001 (ENS) - A flock of sheep infected with a condition closely related to mad cow disease has been confiscated from a Vermont farm by the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA).
For full text and graphics visit:
http://ens-news.com/ens/mar2001/2001L-03-21-01.html
WATER, POWER SHORTAGES THREATEN NORTHWEST SALMON
By Cat Lazaroff
WASHINGTON, DC, March 21, 2001 (ENS) - An ongoing drought in the Pacific Northwest, coupled with severe energy shortages in California, is forcing federal regulators to make tough decisions about whether to use scarce water to generate power or aid endangered fish. But a coalition of fishing and conservation groups say that is an artificial choice, and offer a plan they say would provide enough water for all users.
For full text and graphics visit:
http://ens.lycos.com/ens/mar2001/2001L-03-21-06.html
SCIENTISTS DRILL PRESIDENT BUSH ON ARCTIC REFUGE
WASHINGTON, DC, March 21, 2001 (ENS) - Nearly 500 distinguished U.S. and Canadian scientists have sent President George W. Bush a lesson in the environmental consequences of drilling for oil in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge.
For full text and graphics visit:
http://ens-news.com/ens/mar2001/2001L-03-21-02.html
WORLD URGED TO REMEMBER MOST PRECIOUS LIQUID ASSET
GENEVA, Switzerland, March 21, 2001 (ENS) - Under international human rights law, water is implicitly and explicitly protected as a human right, yet one sixth of the world's 6.1 billion people lack access to improved sources of water. That fact forms the backdrop to "Water and Health," the broad but apt theme for World Water Day, organized by the Geneva based World Health Organization (WHO) and marked tomorrow by events across the globe.
For full text and graphics, visit:
http://ens.lycos.com/ens/mar2001/2001L-03-21-11.html
SCIENTISTS OPEN NEW WINDOW ON SOUTHERN FISHERIES
SOUTH GEORGIA, South Atlantic, March 21, 2001 (ENS) - The exploitation of South Atlantic fish species will be better understood thanks to a British Antarctic Survey research station opening tomorrow on South Georgia Island.
For full text and graphics, visit:
http://ens.lycos.com/ens/mar2001/2001L-03-21-10.html
ENVIRONMENT NEWS SERVICE AMERISCAN: MARCH 21, 2001
Petroleum Refiners Agree to Slash Pollution Emissions
New Hard Rock Mining Rules May Be Discarded
Congress Gets First Look at Cleaner Snowmobile
Asian Air Particles Subject of New Study
Forever Wild Campaign Opens in North Carolina
Right Whale Found Dead - Second This Year
New York Awards $84.5 Million for Clean Water
Easter Egg Hunts Start Early in Michigan
For full text and graphics visit:
http://ens-news.com/ens/mar2001/2001L-03-21-09.html
3/22/01
11:23:38 AM
Aloha
Aprill 22nd 2001, the Maui Earth Day Hemp Fest goes off in Kahalui. I'm on the council for sponsors and we are spreading the word that this will be a unique event on this Pacific isle that is presently a state of the USA. The governor of the state help pass a hemp bill and a medical marijuana bill this last year. The state is also going through sovereignty issues as the 1st state to seceed from the USA legally in the next 10 years.
www.freehawaii.org
The present moment a collective of individuals are producing a conscious event in which will be free to the public and is focusing on inviting many organizations, companies etc focused on self sustainability in the eco conscious product and technolgy world. Hawaii is 2000 miles from the mainland of the USA and a lot of the resources are brought in from the outside world which includes, oil, gas, tourist, building supplies, plastics and food. Hawaii was once a sovereign nation recognized by the international world until an 1893 overthrow of the legitimate government. The Annexation of the Hawaiian islands was forced by the business on the islands and non-Hawaiians that were greedy for its land and total disrespect of the native peoples. Tibet ----Hawaii pretty parallel situations, A smaller number of people died from the changes made over the once heaven like island. Past is past lessons are learned and the US government has recognized their wrongs in which ex-President Clinton signed an apology bill in 1993. The rest is politics in which Native Hawaiians are working out and the umbilical cord of US dependency will be shorten or cut off by the transition.. Peacefully. In this peaceful time of the Aquarian age, a collective of Non-Hawaiians are here to help heal the islands into its new future as a sovereign paradise island that will become the beacon of the new future of the earth in healing the wrongs. That includes all the ecological damage done over the 100 years in agriculture and environmental and even health and social/cultural Hawaii. This press release is to all in the community of good sound business and social responsible organizations to come to the aid in co-creating a free event that will bring together the indegineous,native Hawaiian, and non Hawaiian population here in the islands for healing of the "AINA"earth here and abroad. We invite your business to considersponsoring this event and contact Tom at om33us@yahoo.com.
Organizations to contact onelovefamily@onebox.com same goes for potential bands. We invite food,technological, and product booths that promote earth day values. Tom can correspond and explain the benefits of sponsoring this event. the future is in the positive actions we co-create for a better future for our children. To answer or question this event and to volunteer or speakers please contact the onelovefamily@onebox.com . Hawaii has set precedence in the USA for legalizing Hemp which can heal all the over pesticided sugar plantation crops of over 100 years. Help heal Hawaii, that includes the results of the drug war and social problems that are similar across the board in America.
One Love
Harold I
PS: check out www.thc-ministry.org
and spread the word on this event and we need lots of cool mainland sponsors Send any info, demos, catalogs, newsletters, paperwork in care of to One Love Network
Maui Earth Day Hemp Fest
PO BOX 791795
Paia, HI 96779
Contact the Center at 808-276-0883 cell 808-579-6085 office
Sponsors contact: Tom at om33us@yahoo.com
ONE LOVE VIBRATIONS FOUNDATION
In memory of Bob Marleys Vision of World Peace, Unity and One Love
WORLD PEACE BEGINS WHEN WE ALL UNITE WITH COMPASSION FOR THE FUTURE OF OUR CHILDREN
3/22/01
11:18:20 AM
Planet Ark World Environment News
Doing environmental research? Search our news archives at: http://www.planetark.org/searchhome.cfm
Proposed Navy sonar draws environmentalist fire - USA http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=10183
Florida hotline set up to corral thirsty gators - USA http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=10191
US, industry energy efficiency program saves 75 bln KW power - USA http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=10188
Bush EPA yanks safe-water rule proposed by Clinton - USA http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=10186
US groups seek StarLink guarantees ahead of planting - USA http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=10193
New England adopts energy conservation plan for summer - USA http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=10184
N.J. Gov. asks developer to withdraw mall plan - USA http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=10176
California looks for good week after blackouts - USA http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=10182
Green rules threaten US refinery capacity - NPRA - USA http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=10179
US EPA signs pesticide settlement with green group - USA http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=10177
US scientists urge Bush not to drill in Alaska refuge - USA http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=10185
Climate change main threat to UK forests - report - UK http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=10178
Olympics - Greece forges ahead with Olympic rowing complex - GREECE http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=10192
DaimlerChrysler signs contracts to sell fuel cell buses - GERMANY http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=10181
Suspected nuclear protest hits Berlin rail office - GERMANY http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=10180
Schroeder calls on Bush to stick to Kyoto protocol - GERMANY http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=10189
UPDATE - Sulphuric acid tanker sinks in Bay of Biscay - FRANCE http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=10190
EU plans radical overhaul of fishing policy - EU http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=10187
3/22/01
11:13:31 AM
Sustainment Of Humanity
http://homepages.tig.com.au/~insight/14-life.htm
3/22/01
11:05:34 AM
Energy Analyst And Expert Dr Amory Lovins
http://www.ccnr.org/Lovins_figure_4.html
http://www.ccnr.org/amory.html#acc
3/22/01
11:00:06 AM
Environmental news from GRIST MAGAZINE
<http://www.gristmagazine.com>
1. THE BUS STOPS HERE India's Supreme Court may order some 12,000 public buses off roads in Delhi at the beginning of next month because they emit too much pollution. In 1998, the court ruled that the buses must be converted from diesel to natural gas by the end of March of this year. But the Delhi government, which runs 2,000 of the buses, said yesterday that it would not be able to change over the buses until December, and the private operators that run the other 10,000 buses also seem likely to miss the deadline. The court will give its final decision on requests for an extension on Friday. The slow pokes seem unlikely to get a break -- just this Monday, the court strongly criticized the government for not moving quickly enough on the problem.
straight to the source: Planet Ark, Reuters, Y.P. Rajesh, 21 Mar 2001 <http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=10164>
2. A LIFE OF EASEMENT In a deal involving the largest conservation easement ever, the New England Forestry Foundation paid more than $28 million yesterday to protect 762,192 acres of forestland in Maine. In exchange for the money, which came from other foundations, a few millionaires, and more than 1,200 other individuals, the Pingree family will give up its development rights to the land, which covers an area greater than Rhode Island. The deal effectively prevents family members from subdividing the land for housing tracts, but they will still be able to log portions of the tract. The family's logging operation is the only one in the country certified as sustainable by both the Forest Stewardship Council, an independent group, and the Sustainable Forestry Initiative, an industry program.
straight to the source: Bangor Daily News, Susan Young, 21 Mar 2001 <http://www.bangornews.com/cgi-bin/article.cfm?storynumber=30969>
straight to the source: New York Times, Carey Goldberg, 21 Mar 2001 <http://www.nytimes.com/2001/03/21/national/21MAIN.html>
read it only in Grist Magazine: Are huge easements good public policy? -- background on the Maine deal in our features section <http://www.gristmagazine.com/grist/maindish/curtis010801.stm>
3. ARSENIC HAUL The U.S. EPA said yesterday it would revoke a Clinton administration rule to reduce the acceptable level of arsenic in drinking water by 80 percent. EPA Administrator Christie Todd Whitman said that there is "no consensus on a particular safe level" of arsenic in drinking water, and that the Bush administration would base its decision on "sound science and solid analysis." The 10 parts per billion standard approved by former President Clinton matches the standard adopted several years ago by both the World Health Organization and the European Union. The EPA decision hands a victory to the mining industry, and leaves in place an arsenic standard set in 1942, one that the U.S. National Academy of Sciences has said could result in a 1-in-100 risk of cancer in communities that have arsenic in their drinking water.
straight to the source: Washington Post, Eric Pianin and Cindy Skrzycki, 21 Mar 2001 <http://washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A33451-2001Mar20.html>
straight to the source: New York Times, Douglas Jehl, 21 Mar 2001 <http://www.nytimes.com/2001/03/21/politics/21ENVI.html>
straight to the source: MSNBC.com, Miguel Llanos, 21 Mar 2001 <http://www.msnbc.com/news/547052.asp>
4. NO, MR. BOND, I EXPECT YOU TO DIE In yet another decision deemed yucky by environmentalists, the U.S. Bureau of Land Management is proposing to suspend mining regulations approved by former President Clinton to protect the environment. The rules give the BLM more flexibility to deny mining permits that seem likely to lead to lots of pollution and they require companies that mine on federal land to post a bond guaranteeing that they will clean up after themselves if they cause a mess. Sounds reasonable, right? Apparently not to the Bush-era BLM. It wants to open a 45-day comment period on the rules, after which point it could reinstate the former rules that give much more latitude to mining companies or adopt a combination of the new and old rules.
straight to the source: Los Angeles Times, 21 Mar 2001 <http://www.latimes.com/news/science/environ/20010321/t000024538.html>
5. ROADLESS TRAVAILED The Bush administration was hoping to have more time to figure out how to roll back rules approved by the Clinton administration to ban road-building and logging on a third of the country's national forests -- but a federal judge threw a kink into that plan yesterday. The judge denied the administration's plea to delay a hearing on the ban that is scheduled for next week. The hearing will address the state of Idaho's request for an injunction on the ban; the delay sought by the administration would have effectively granted the state its request. Now the administration has only until next week to figure out its position on the roadless rules.
do good: Take action to defend Clinton's roadless plan <http://www.gristmagazine.com/grist/dogood/forests.stm#roadless>
A brief history of car-free day -- a day in the life of Eric Britton, Earth Car Free Day <http://www.gristmagazine.com/grist/week/britton032001.stm>
They paved pears and rice and put up a parking lot -- pavement is replacing the world's croplands -- by Lester R. Brown <http://www.gristmagazine.com/grist/maindish/brown030101.stm>
Driving in circles -- Grist readers talk about cars and Mama Earth -- in our letters section <http://www.gristmagazine.com/grist/letters/letters031301.stm>
3/21/01
1:59:21 PM
Public Citizen
Hagel's Campaign Finance "Reform" Bill Keeps Nearly 60 Percent of National Party Soft Money in the System
Hagel Bill Would Make Corporate and Union Soft Money a Permanent Part of the System
WASHINGTON, D.C. -- Trumpeted by its proponents as a compromise campaign finance reform bill because it "caps" soft money, the legislation sponsored by Sen. Chuck Hagel (R-Neb.) is a sham reform because it would keep nearly 60 percent of soft money in the political system and would do nothing to prevent it from being redirected to state parties.
A new Public Citizen analysis of Federal Election Commission data demonstrates that the Hagel bill's $60,000 annual soft money limit would have allowed $260 million of the $450 million in soft money raised by the national Democratic and Republican parties to seep back into the system during the 2000 election. Only $190 million in soft money (42 percent) would have been banned (see table and graph below).
Even the 42 percent of funds banned could quickly have found its way back into federal elections because the Hagel bill would do nothing to prevent national party officials from redirecting soft money to state parties for the same activities national parties support (such as producing "issue ads," boosting voter registration and conducting get-out-the-vote efforts).
"Not only is this bill a sham, but it would for the first time in more than half a century sanction corporate and union soft money and make it a permanent part of our political system," said Public Citizen President Joan Claybrook. "We urge senators to reject this sham reform."
The Hagel bill would leave about two-thirds of national party soft money from business untouched while eliminating more than 88 percent of union contributions. As a result, the business advantage over labor in soft money in 2000 would have gone from 8-1 ($232 million to $30 million) to 36-1 ($129 million to $3.5 million), Public Citizen's analysis shows.
"This bill would make our system more corrupt, not less," said Frank Clemente, director of Public Citizen's Congress Watch. "We cannot afford for this measure to pass."
Public Citizen is a nonprofit consumer advocacy organization based in Washington, D.C.
For more information, please visit www.citizen.org
3/21/01
1:56:55 PM
Public Citizen
Federal Refund Order Validates Call for Price Caps
Although Regulators Find Evidence of Profiteering, Bush Refuses to Consider Only Option to Protect Consumers
WASHINGTON, DC -- Emerging evidence of price-gouging in California's deregulated electricity market supports calls for regional wholesale price caps, Public Citizen said today.
As California endures another wave of rolling blackouts, federal regulators and the state's electricity grid manager are questioning whether power producers have been escalating the crisis by creating artificial shortages and by gouging utilities and consumers.
In fact, the federal government has told 13 power generators that they may have to refund $69 million in overcharges if they can't justify their prices by March 23. Although ordering refunds is an important acknowledgment that the wholesale market is overpriced, only the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) has the ability to force power producers to sell their power at reasonable prices.
If FERC were to set a regional wholesale price cap in the West - as eight of 11 Western governors have asked - the federal government would protect consumers and taxpayers by ensuring that electricity is sold close to its cost. Therefore, it should set such a cap, Public Citizen maintains.
However, Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham told a Senate hearing on March 15 that "the only action the [Bush] administration will not take is the implementation of price caps."
Public Citizen urges the administration to reconsider.
"Without region-wide wholesale price caps, the electricity market will continue to be overpriced, placing the region's taxpayers and consumers at risk," said Wenonah Hauter, director of Public Citizen's Critical Mass Energy and Environment Program. "Rather than defending the right of energy companies to charge outrageous prices for electricity, the Bush administration should be protecting consumers from greedy corporations."
The California Independent System Operator (CAISO) acts as traffic cop, managing the flow of electricity supply and demand. In February, it issued a report (Report on Real Time Supply Costs Above Single Price Auction Threshold: December 8, 2000 - January 31, 2001) detailing how 13 power generators overcharged Californians by $562 million in December and January. The study found that total energy costs charged by these power generators was $11 billion in those two months, compared with $7 billion for all 12 months of 1999. Although the ISO manages the grid, it lacks authority to regulate the wholesale market. Only FERC has the authority to do that.
In December, FERC found that California's sky-high wholesale electricity prices were not just and reasonable but declined to do anything about it. In response to the CAISO report, however, FERC was forced to act, placing 13 power generators on notice that they would be liable for up to $69 million in overcharges for January's sales alone. These companies have until March 23 to either refund the amount or justify why they were selling electricity so far above the amount other generators were selling. FERC has yet to rule on alleged overcharges for the months of December, February and March.
FERC is investigating allegations that power producers have been intentionally taking plants off line to constrict supply and drive up the price of electricity. The power plants - Alamitos and Huntington Beach - are owned by Virginia-based AES, and the power is marketed by Oklahoma-based Williams. According to the FERC report, the plants were not operating in April and May "for reasons not directly related to the necessary and timely maintenance" of the facilities. As a result of the dubious plant shutdown, the state had to purchase electricity from an alternative AES-owned, Williams-marketed plant for $750 per megawatt hour - 10 times the $63 per megawatt hour charged when the Alamitos and Huntington Beach plants were operational.
"It's about time FERC got off the sidelines and cracked down on these profiteering corporations," Hauter said. "California taxpayers are forking over $50 million a day to these greedy companies, so it is high time the government stepped in to protect consumers."
Public Citizen is a nonprofit consumer advocacy organization based in Washington, D.C.
For more information, visit www.citizen.org
3/21/01
11:26:44 AM
The Prophets Conference
New York City before this coming Wednesday, March 21 in order to receive a substantial early registration tuition savings
http://www.greatmystery.org/nyregister.html
DR.MICHIO KAKU, an internationally recognized authority on Einstein's Unified Field Theory, will discuss at The Prophets Conference - New York City during the weekend of May 18-19, 2001, the greatest quest in all of modern physics, the quest to find "the theory of everything," or, as cosmologist Steven Hawking has said, "to read the mind of God."
Dr. Kaku is co-founder of string field theory, a formalism that one day may unify superstring theory, the leading candidate for the fabled unified field theory, which eluded Einstein for the last 30 years of his life.
The key to the unified field theory may be the 10th dimension. For decades, mystics, magicians, theologians, and mathematicians have marveled at the beauty of hyperspace. Mystics and theologians thought that hyperspace may be the home of spirits, but no one found any evidence for higher dimensions.
Now, physicists realize that hyperspace may be the home of unified field theory. The vibrations and harmonies of the superstring, in turn, give us the laws of physics. In other words, the mind of God may be "music resonating through hyperspace."
This theory, in turn, may answer some of the deepest questions of all time: is time travel possible? Can we travel through wormholes to distant stars?
Lastly, Dr. Kaku explores the possibility that intelligent life forms in outer space have already harnessed the power of hyperspace, using it as a way in which to span the galaxies. Dr. Kaku discusses the mind-boggling possibilities of any advanced civilization that can harness the unified field theory.
Dr. Kaku is the author of 9 books, including the international best-sellers Hyperspace, and Visions: How Science Will Revolutionize the 21st Century. He has appeared on Nightline, Good Morning America, 60 Minutes, The Larry King Show, as well as numerous science documentaries by BBC-TV, PBS-TV, The Learning Channel, and the Discovery Channel. He hosts his own weekly national radio science program, and has appeared on over 600 radio stations.
He graduated from Harvard in 1968, summa cum laude, and number one in his physics class. He received his Ph.D. at the University of California at Berkeley in 1972, and taught at Princeton University. He is currently the Henry Semat Professor of Theoretical Physics at the Graduate Center of the City University of New York. His Ph.D. level books are required reading at the leading physics laboratories around the world.
New York Magazine voted him one of the "100 smartest people in New York City." Dr. Michio Kaku:
Michio Kaku, Ram Dass, Huston Smith, Gregg Braden, Gabrielle Roth, Ralph Metzner, Stanislav Grof, Riane Eisler, John Mack, Oriah Mountain Dreamer, Robert Anton Wilson, and Russell Targ will be looking at, and in some instances, taking us to expanded states of consciousness and the uncommon knowledge and heightened awareness often obtained from them. We will look at the magnitude of the implications fostered by acknowledging this journey as true Gnosis. Together, we will explore the relevance of this experience into every area of our lives.
The Prophets Conference also envisions a Deeper Sense of Destiny at what is clearly showing itself to be a highly critical juncture in history and assesses avenues for imagining and reconfiguring Reality.
Full information on The Prophets Conference - New York City and The Prophets Conference - Victoria, B.C., is linked from
or call for a brochure at 1-888-777-5981.
3/21/01
11:13:48 AM
Utne Reader
http://www.utne.com/webwatch/archive.tpl?d=03/21/2001
THERE'S NO PLACE LIKE HOME
by Kirkpatrick Sale, The Ecologist
Could 'bioregionalism' be the way out of our environmental crisis? Kirkpatrick Sale makes the case for the political philosophy he helped to develop.
BEIJING GOES FOR THE GOLD
by Mike Murphy, Weekly Standard
Hitler's propaganda machine deftly used the Olympics to project Nazi Germany as a gracious and patriotic country. Will China in 2008 -- with its dismal human rights record -- be a repeat of Berlin in 1936?
ACUPUNCTURE (AND AQUAPRESSURE) FOR SEXUAL HEALTH
by Michael Gerber, M.D., H.M.D., Alternative Medicine
Acupuncture can effectively treat a number of sexual problems, according to Dr. Michael Gerber in Alternative Medicine magazine. But, if you're squeamish about needles, consider using "aquapressure" to stimulate your body.
Links to the above articles: http://www.utne.com/webwatch
3/21/01
11:10:05 AM
NASA Announces Near Earth Asteroid March 23rd
by Mitch Battros (ECTV)
NASA has just announced another NEA which will come within 0.05 AU's (astronomical units). The name of this asteroid is '2001 EC16'. The trajectory mentioned is approximately the distance of four earth - moon distances. In astronomy terms this is considered a near miss. If just a slight intervention was to occur in this asteroid trajectory, asteroid '2001 EC16' could adjust further away, or come even closer.
On 21 Mar 2001 there were 291 known Potentially Hazardous Asteroids. This may only account for approximantaly 10% to 15% of estimated NEA's which may come into our orbit. The vast majority is still undetected. This most recently discovered near-Earth asteroid 2001 EC16, is a ~150m-wide space rock spotted on March 15th by Eleanor Helin and colleagues using JPL's NEAT/MSSS 1.2-meter survey telescope in Hawaii. 2001 EC16 will pass approximately four lunar distances from Earth on March 23rd.
Other upcoming Earth-asteroid encounters (Mar 1 - Apr 30)
1) '2000 PN9' Date: 2001-Mar-02 17:292001 - Distance: 0.0610 AU
2) '1998 SF36' Date: 2001-Mar-29 18:37 - Distance: 0.0383 AU
3) '1986 PA 2001' Date: 2001-Apr-03 01:06 - Distance: 0.1465 AU
4) '2000 EE104 2001' Date: 2001-Apr-12 20:37 Distance: 0.0822 AU
Asteroids, The Real Threat...03/15/01
by Mitch Battros (ECTV)
Research is coming in fast regarding estimations of possible asteroid impact to earth. It appears most scientist in the field of astrophysicist, astronomers and paleontologist disagree with NASA's statement last month suggesting we are at least 30,000 years away from any real danger of an asteroid collision. The general consensus is we simply don't know 'when' it will hit. Everyone agrees it is not 'if' but 'when'. Several believe we are ripe for impact in our lifetime. I was curious if the sharp increase in fireballs we have witnessed in the last year could be a sign. I could not get a definitive answer, but I can't help but think it is part of a cycle which may be just beginning to reach our orbit.
Another unknown is 'how big'. Again, no definitive answer, but it was stated by many that there is a good chance it will be an asteroid we are not tracking, or off our radar screen. Let us not forget NASA themselves stated "we are only tracking about 10% of what we think is out there". They went on to plead to have more telescopes pointed to the sky. Related to this issue, it is known that the vast majority of asteroids found, are recorded by amateur astronomers with their telescopes pointed up. Below you will find statements from noted scientist, some of which were in a PBS Nova interview.
Dr. Victor Clube: "Essentially, there are two catastrophic machines in the solar system which are directing missiles at us. One of them is the asteroid belt, which is regularly perturbed by Jupiter in its orbit close to the asteroid belt, and the other one is the so-called Oort Cloud, which is perturbed by the galactic environment. We're a kind of target amongst all these bodies milling around which have come from places further out in the solar system." Peter Thomas: "Every now and then, a passing star disrupts this icy reservoir in the far reaches of the solar system, sending comets inward towards the planets. Comets orbiting in a newly-discovered reservoir known as the Kuiper belt occasionally dislodge themselves, as well. Eventually, any of these comets may wind up perilously close to the earth. So far, scientists have found only a small percentage of the total number. They estimate that there are a few hundred thousand earth-crossing asteroids bigger than the one that exploded above Tunguska, and about two thousand larger than half a mile. If any of these larger rocks were to hit us, it would cause a global catastrophe."
Gene Shoemaker (deceased): "Paleontologists, of course, are accustomed to think in terms of long-term geologic processes affecting the evolution of life. And if you now suddenly tell them, "Well, occasionally, a stone the size of a mountain falls out of the sky and produces a global catastrophe," they just don't like that. It's against their scientific religion, if you will."
David Raup: "We didn't know anything about what had been learned through the '60s and '70s about meteorite impact and the impact rates, because we had grown up with our textbooks, which said that there indeed were bombarding asteroids and comets, but this was all in the early days, the so-called "early bombardment" of the earth, and it was all over. And sure, a meteor crater was probably an impact crater, but that's only one. It couldn't affect geologic history."
Duncan Steel: "If we're going to take the case of a global catastrophe, those only occur something like once every one hundred thousand years, maybe at the outside, once every two hundred thousand years. So, that's a very long time scale compared to the human lifetime. However, for these smaller objects, the maybe hundred-meter fragments of asteroids which mostly blow up in the atmosphere but nevertheless cause widespread devastation underneath, those occur much more frequently. We certainly should be expecting at least one of those to occur over the fifty or a hundred years. If we continue at our present rate, it will take us another five or six hundred years before we discover ninety-nine percent of them. However, the total number of astronomers involved in looking for earth-threatening asteroids is, in fact, than the staff of something like a High Street McDonald's restaurant. That is the number of people, worldwide, that we're talking about looking for asteroids."
Clark Chapman: "It happens like a game of cosmic darts. It happens at random. It could happen just as likely tomorrow as it could during some particular day three hundred thousand years from now, and a big one could come in at any time. Particularly, I can say that because we have not searched for them all. We only know a small fraction of the ones that exist, and we happen to know from calculating their orbits that those particular ones are not going to hit any time in the next hundred years or so, which is about as far as we can reliably calculate the orbits. But the other ninety percent that we haven't found yet could hit any time.
Steve Ostro: "Imagine, for a moment, if instead of these objects being tiny and not visible to the naked eye, they were suddenly made visible. Suppose that there was a button you could push and you could light up all the earth-crossing asteroids larger than about ten meters. There would be over a hundred million of these objects in the sky, and you'd go outside at night, and instead of being able to see a few thousand bright stars, the sky would be filled with millions of these objects, all of which are capable of colliding with the earth, and all of which are moving on slightly different courses through the sky at slightly different rates."
Victor Clube: "I hate the thought of us behaving us like ostriches and stuffing our heads in the ground pretending that there are no potential dangers around the corner. The reality is that these fireball increases will happen fairly suddenly, when they happen. We have no means at the moment for predicting them. They may happen tomorrow. They may happen a hundred years hence. Who knows? The fact is, we do not, as a society, as a world society, have the means of handling this situation at the moment."
Peter Thomas: "Astronomers now recognize that the universe is not the tranquil place we once thought. Our home within it, the earth, is vulnerable. The only thing we know for sure is that someday, the earth will once again be hit by a devastating rock. But unlike most other natural disasters, a cosmic impact may be avoidable. At the very least, we have the means to search the sky, to see whether we or our children face this risk in the next century."
As always, the information provided is for you to make your own conclusions as to facts and data. Remember, follow your truth, not mine or anyone else. From my perspective, I believe NASA was careless in their intention to calm the publics inquisition regarding asteroids and comets. Disinformation only causes distrust and broadens the gap between control and empowerment. I continued to emphasize Nasa's "Public Relations" policy is out of date and out of touch. I am hopeful the apparent old style 'good ole boys' will rotate out sooner rather than later. I remain convinced the most effective method to reduce harm is through being informed. mb Here is another must read article:
http://www.earthchangestv.com/breaking/March2001/0315asteroids_close.htm
Mitch Battros
Producer - Earth Changes TV
3/21/01
11:04:41 AM
ENVIRONMENT NEWS SERVICE
"We Cover the Earth For You"
GIANT OIL RIG SINKS OFF BRAZILIAN COAST
RIO DE JANEIRO, Brazil, March 20, 2001 (ENS) - The world's largest oil rig, located 130 kilometers (80.7 miles) off the northeastern coast of Brazil, hit bottom today, despite salvage attempts by its owner, the Brazilian state oil company Petrobras.
For full text and graphics visit:
http://ens-news.com/ens/mar2001/2001L-03-20-01.html
BUSH ADMINISTRATION THROWS OUT NEW ARSENIC STANDARD
WASHINGTON, DC, March 20, 2001 (ENS) - The Bush administration has opted to defer - perhaps permanently - new arsenic standards that would slash the acceptable limits for this toxic chemical in drinking water by 80 percent. U.S. Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Christine Todd Whitman announced today that EPA will propose to withdraw the pending arsenic standard for drinking water that was issued on January 22.
For full text and graphics visit:
http://ens.lycos.com/ens/mar2001/2001L-03-20-06.html
PARTNERSHIPS CRUCIAL TO SAVING SPECIES, NORTON SAYS
WASHINGTON, DC, March 20, 2001 (ENS) - Interior Secretary Gale Norton said Monday she plans to shift her department's conservation efforts from listing at risk species to "incentive based programs" aimed at reducing threats to dwindling species. Norton pointed to the Aleutian Canada goose, proposed for removal from the endangered species list, as an example of the rare successes of current efforts to protect vanishing species.
For full text and graphics visit:
http://ens.lycos.com/ens/mar2001/2001L-03-20-07.html
STAMP OF APPROVAL FOR NZ FISHERY ANGERS SEAL PROTECTIONISTS
By Bob Burton
WELLINGTON, New Zealand, March 20, 2001 (ENS) - The accreditation of a New Zealand fishery as sustainable by the Marine Stewardship Council has prompted on outcry from New Zealand's major environment groups. The fishery has led to the drowning of 5,600 seals in 10 years.
For full text and graphics visit:
http://ens-news.com/ens/mar2001/2001L-03-20-02.html
EUROPEAN CITIES' SEWAGE STANDARDS STINK, SAYS EU
BRUSSELS, Belgium, March 20, 2001 (ENS) - Ten years after the adoption of European Union's urban wastewater directive, 37 European cities continue to discharge untreated wastewater into the environment, and many others are discharging large quantities of effluent without adequate treatment.
For full text and graphics, visit:
http://ens.lycos.com/ens/mar2001/2001L-03-20-11.html
UK PUTS ITS FAITH IN CARBON TRUST
LONDON, United Kingdom, March 20, 2001 (ENS) - Convincing business to play its part in fighting climate change is the key role of the United Kingdom's Carbon Trust, launched today by deputy prime minister John Prescott.
For full text and graphics, visit:
http://ens.lycos.com/ens/mar2001/2001L-03-20-10.html
ENVIRONMENT NEWS SERVICE AMERISCAN: MARCH 20, 2001
Roadless Rule Faces New Roadblock
Fluoridated Water Called Environmental Poison
Controversial Navy Sonar Could Deploy Oceanwide
Energy Crisis Prompts Push for New Options
Uranium Enrichment for Power Plants Moving to Paducah
Clean Cities Welcomes 80th Coalition
Environmentalists Intervene in Big Cypress Lawsuit
3M Gives $5.1 Million to Protect Vanishing Habitat
For full text and graphics visit:
http://ens.lycos.com/ens/mar2001/2001L-03-20-09.html
3/21/01
11:00:01 AM
Planet Ark World Environment News
Doing environmental research? Search our news archives at: http://www.planetark.org/searchhome.cfm
UPDATE - Calif. suspends second wave of blackouts - USA http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=10167
Valero board approves 51-MW unit for Calif. refinery - USA http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=10162
US sees energy output falling short of demand - USA http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=10163
Electricity-starved Calif. braces for a tough day - USA http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=10165
Aleutian Canada goose taken off Endangered list - USA http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=10159
Lawmakers want Arctic oil drilling cut from Bush budget - USA http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=10174
EPA Whitman backs Bush rejection of carbon dioxide cap - USA http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=10172
UPDATE - US energy costs pose recession risk - Abraham - USA http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=10170
Greens call on Japan to end whaling, US to act - USA http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=10171
Global warming could put palm trees in Swiss Alps - SWITZERLAND http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=10160
POLL - Most Italians oppose genetic foods - ITALY http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=10173
Court order may cripple commuters in Indian capital - INDIA http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=10164
Finland met Kyoto carbon dioxide goals in 2000 - SF - FINLAND http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=10161
Shark boat row flares in Galapagos - ECUADOR http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=10168
Canada disappointed by Bush move on pollution - CANADA http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=10169
Cambodia bats cause furore by living in museum roof - CAMBODIA http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=10166
CHRONOLOGY - Petrobras rig disaster latest in series - BRAZIL http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=10175
3/21/01
10:57:12 AM
EARTH DAY 2001 APRIL 22
March and rally in New York City. March from Times Square, noon, to Dag Hammarskjold park at the United Nations.
NO MORE NUCLEAR POWER
FIGHT GLOBAL CLIMATE CHANGE
STOP THE BUSH ROLLBACK OF ENVIRONMENTAL REGULATION
BUILD A SUSTAINABLE ENERGY FUTURE
Sponsored by Nuclear Information and Resource Service, WISE-Amsterdam, Earth Day Network, NYC Students for the Earth.
Speakers include Harvey Wasserman, Karl Grossman, Michael Mariotte (NIRS), Debby Katz (Citizens Awareness Network), Peer De Rijk (WISE-Amsterdam), Richard Worthington (Earthlife South Africa), David Rovics (renegade singer/songwriter). More to be announced soon.
The action is being held in conjunction with the April 17-30 meeting of the United Nations Commission on Sustainable Development (CSD) to determine what energy technologies are "sustainable." The U.S., Canada, Britain and France are pushing the concept that nuclear power should be considered a sustainable technology, and its use promoted across the globe. We need to tell the CSD that nuclear power is deadly, not sustainable. We should encourage the use of clean renewable energy sources and increased energy efficiency. We must create the climate for a sustainable future and we can only do that by acting and raising our voices together. Join us, and help create a world you want to live in.
For more information, contact
Michael Mariotte or Cindy Folkers at NIRS, 202-328-0002, nirsnet@nirs.org, and check NIRS' website, www.nirs.org.
We will send bulk flyers to anyone willing to distribute them.
3/21/01
10:46:00 AM
An Appeal for the International Community The Palestinians are being terminated
The Palestinian people in the occupied territories still live under the comprehensive blockades imposed by the Israeli forces throughout the past six months. The Palestinians are deprived of having clean water, food, medications and free transportation on their homeland, as a result of being famished and blockaded. The Israeli forces prevented 125 thousand Palestinian laborers (who provide for more than half a million more) from going to their workplaces!! To prevent Palestinian farmers and laborers from reaching their plots (that are occupied by the Israeli government); the army spent 2.5 million $ to renew the electrified sieges that expand along the borders, terrorizing actions are done, closing of passages and borders, and facilitating robberies done by the Israeli occupants on the Palestinian Olive farms. Due to these practices, 60% of the Palestinians went below the standard of poverty, making the rate of unemployment in Gaza sector alone 45%, and in the West Bank 32% - According to the UN office reports in the Palestinian lands.
3/21/01
10:35:38 AM
Environmental news from GRIST MAGAZINE
<http://www.gristmagazine.com>
1. HOW CRUDE The world's largest oil rig sank off the coast of Brazil today, and workers for the state oil company Petrobras are racing to prevent oil from spilling into the sea. Some 400,000 gallons of crude oil and diesel were stored on the rig or in nearby pipelines, and a company spokesperson said ships were standing by to contain any oil slick that emerges. In the past three years, Petrobras has suffered two major oil spills and other incidents that led to the deaths of 81 workers; some employees claim the company puts workers and the environment at risk by hiring inexperienced labor to cut costs.
straight to the source: MSNBC.com, 20 Mar 2001 <http://www.msnbc.com/news/545136.asp>
2. RELAX? DON'T DO IT! As blackouts swept through California yesterday, President Bush and his advisers continued to talk about a national energy policy that would open up federal lands to more oil and gas drilling. However, neither Bush nor Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham outlined any specific plans that would help California or other states tackle energy woes in the short term (i.e., the next several years). The only specific policy cited by Abraham was to open the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge to drilling. He also said some anti-pollution measures now in place were too strong, discouraging oil companies from building refineries in the U.S.
straight to the source: New York Times, Joseph Kahn, 20 Mar 2001 <http://www.nytimes.com/2001/03/20/politics/20ENER.html>
3. ANOTHER REASON TO KILL YOUR TELEVISION Okay, so the Bushies say we're having an energy crisis. Ever wonder who's the bad guy using all the electricity? Well, look in the freakin' mirror. U.S. citizens on average use almost 10 times more electricity than people in the rest of the world. And did you know that 90 percent of the electricity used in an incandescent bulb is wasted as heat? Shocking! We shine a compact-fluorescent light on these and other astounding facts on the Grist Magazine website.
read it only in Grist Magazine: Electric Boogie -- fun with facts -- in our Counter Culture section <http://www.gristmagazine.com/grist/counter/counter031601.stm>
4. VENUES RISING FROM THE WAVES Despite concerns raised by environmentalists, the International Olympic Committee backed organizers of the Athens 2004 games this weekend and said that venues proposed for water sports would not harm rare wetlands. The IOC environmental commission held three days of meetings in Athens during which enviros claimed that a development planned for the rowing and canoeing sites would threaten the wetlands. But the commission members gave the plan the go-ahead, warning only that the Athens organizers should make sure that a mechanism existed to protect the wetlands area after the games were over. Overall, the members said they were impressed by the environmental measures taken so far by the organizers.
straight to the source: Planet Ark, Reuters, 20 Mar 2001 <http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=10154>
read it only in Grist Magazine: A week in the life of the person who fretted about the environment for the Sydney Olympics <http://www.gristmagazine.com/grist/week/hellyer040300.stm>
5. THE SHINING PATHOGEN Infectious diseases are on the rise in wildlife populations around the world, threatening Florida's manatees and other endangered species. Although the diseases may not get as much media attention as those affecting domesticated livestock, nasty microbes of all sorts are becoming more active in previously unexposed wild areas, says Peter Daszak, a wildlife disease researcher. He calls the threats "pathogen pollution." Why the jump in infectious outbreaks? Cheryl Woodley of the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration says that climate change, habitat degradation, and farm runoff into rivers and bays are big contributors to the problem.
straight to the source: Washington Post, Cheryl Lyn Dybas, 19 Mar 2001 <http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A23844-2001Mar18.html>
Car-free and easy -- a day in the life of Eric Britton, Earth Car Free Day <http://www.gristmagazine.com/grist/week/britton031901.stm>
This just in -- the latest climate change news -- in our Heat Beat section <http://www.gristmagazine.com/grist/heatbeat/thisjustin031501.stm>
Bright lights, dark city -- the latest in the comic adventures of Zed, the last of his species <http://www.gristmagazine.com/grist/zed/zed030901.stm>
3/21/01
10:27:37 AM
Does HAARP Play a Role to Counter Magnetic Effect?...
by Mitch Battros (ECTV)
I have just come across an article written by Nicholas Jones who has posted on Al Bielek's site. It has sparked a very exciting curiosity. I will keep an open mind on this one. It does match very well with my theory of how our magnetic field affects human behavior. Here is an article I wrote back in October 2000. It describes a sun-earth-human connection. The adhesive that puts it all together is none other than 'magnetics'.
http://www.earthchangestv.com/breaking/October2000/1030human.htm
The official HAARP website, run and operated by the US Navy:
http://server5550.itd.nrl.navy.mil/projects/haarp/haarpIndex.html
states clearly the HAARP is all about 'charged particles'. Is it possible they knew about the current mega solar cycle? Is the HAARP more about trying to neutralize the solar flare and CME activity and its effect on weather and human behavior?
The more I write, the more excited I become. There appears to be some profound connection with what many of us have been experiencing in our own lives. More and more evidence is coming forward suggesting a correlation between solar storms and human behavior. NASA has now confirmed a sunspot-solar flare connection. Soon they will go just as public with a solar flare-extreme weather connection. The element that binds the two is, yes you guessed it, 'magnetics'. The following is an equation I published in July 1999...
Equation: Sunspots = Solar Flares = Magnetic Shift = Shifting Ocean and Jet Stream Currents = Extreme Weather
Now take a look at Nicholas Jones' article which he suggest is for mind control. Although I may have reservations for this conclusion, he has produced some valuable information.
Could the HAARP Project be for Mind Control?
By Nicholas Jones
nicholasjones99@yahoo.com
Earth is wrapped in a donut shaped magnetic field. Circular lines of flux continuously descend into the North Pole and emerge from the South Pole. The ionosphere, an electromagnetic-wave conductor, 100 kms above the earth, consists of a layer of electrically charged particles acting as a shield from solar winds. Natural waves are related to the electrical activity in the atmosphere and are thought to be caused by multiple lightning storms. Collectively, these waves are called ‘The Schumann Resonance’, the current strongest at 7.8 Hz. These are quasi-standing extremely low frequency (ELF) waves that naturally exist in the earth’s ‘electromagnetic’ cavity, the space between the ground and the ionosphere. These ‘earth brainwaves’ are identical to the spectrum of our brainwaves.
(1 hertz = 1 cycle per second, 1 Khz = 1000, 1 Mhz =1 million. A 1 Hertz wave is 186,000 miles long, 10 Hz is 18,600 miles. Radio-waves move at the speed of light.)
The Creator designed living beings to resonate to this natural frequency pulsation in order to evolve harmoniously. The ionosphere is being manipulated by US govt. scientists using an Alaskan transmitter called HAARP, (High-Frequency Active Auroral Research Program) which sends focused radiated power to heat up sections of the ionosphere, which bounces power down again. ELF waves from HAARP when targeted on areas can weather-engineer and create mood changes affecting millions. The intended wattage is 1,700 billion watts of power. A former govt. insider deduced they want to flip the world upside down. 64 elements in the ground modulate, with variation, the geomagnetic waves naturally coming from the ground.
The ‘earth’s natural brain rhythm’ above is balanced with these. These are the same minerals as the red blood corpuscles. There is a relation between the blood and geomagnetic waves. An imbalance between Schumann and geomagnetic waves disrupts biorhythms. These natural geomagnetic waves are being replaced by artificially created very low frequency (VLF) ground waves coming from GWEN Towers.
GWEN (Ground Wave Emergency Network) transmitters placed 200 miles apart across the USA allow specific frequencies to be tailored to the geomagnetic-field strength in each area, allowing the magnetic field to be altered. They operate in the VLF range, with transmissions between VLF 150 and 175 KHz. They also emit UHF waves of 225 - 400 MHz. The VLF signals travel by waves that hug the ground rather than radiating into the atmosphere. A GWEN station transmits circularly up to 300 miles, the signal dropping off sharply with distance. The entire GWEN system consists of, (depending on source of data), from 58 to an intended 300 transmitters spread across the USA, each with a tower 299-500 ft high. 300 ft copper wires in spoke like fashion fan out from the base of the system underground, interacting with the earth like a thin shelled conductor, radiating radio wave energy for very long distances through the ground. USA bathes in this magnetic field which rises to 500 ft, even going down to basements, so everyone is mind-controlled. The whole artificial ground-wave spreads out over USA like a web. It is easier to mind-control and hypnotize people who are bathed in an artificial electromagnetic-wave. (Covering the entire floor with aluminum and buying a CET cylinder from Nordic Living Water Systems helps.) GWEN transmitters have many different functions including controlling the weather, mind, behavior and mood control.
These work in conjunction with HAARP and the Russian Woodpecker transmitter, similar to HAARP. The Russians openly market a small version of their weather-engineering system called Elate, which can fine-tune weather patterns over a 200 mile area and have the same range as the GWEN unit. One operates at Moscow airport. The GWEN Towers shoot enormous bursts of energy into the atmosphere in conjuction with HAARP. The website www.cuttingedge.org wrote an expose of how the major floods of the Mid-West USA occurred in 1993.
Invisible enormous rivers of water, consisting of vapors that flow, move towards the poles in the lower atmosphere. They rival the flow of the Amazon River and are 420 to 480 miles wide and up to 4,800 miles long. They are 1.9 miles above the earth and have volumes of 340 lbs of water per second. There are 5 atmospheric rivers in each Hemisphere. A massive flood can be created by damming up one of these massive vapor rivers, causing huge amounts of rainfall to be dumped.
The GWEN Towers positioned along the areas north of the Missouri and Mississippi Rivers were turned on for 40 days and 40 nights, probably mocking the Flood of Genesis. (This was in conjunction with HAARP, that creates a river of electricity flowing thousands of miles through the sky and down to the polar ice-cap, manipulating the jet-stream , like The Woodpecker.) These rivers flooded, causing agricultural losses of $12-15 billion. HAARP produces earthquakes by focusing on the fault lines. GWEN Towers are on the fault lines and volcanic areas of the Pacific Northeast.
In 1963 Dr Robert Becker explored effects of external magnetic-fields on brainwaves showing a relationship between psychiatric admissions and solar magnetic storms. He exposed volunteers to pulsed magnetic-fields similar to magnetic-storms, and found a similar response. US 60 Hz electric power ELF waves vibrate at the same frequency as the human brain. UK 50 Hz electricity emissions depress the thyroid.
Dr Andrija Puharich in the 50’s/60’s, found clairvoyant’s brainwaves became 8 Hz when their powers were operative. He saw an Indian Yogi in 1956 controlling his brainwaves, deliberately shifting his consciousness from one level to another. Puharich trained people with bio-feedback to do this consciously, making 8 Hz waves. A healer made 8 Hz waves pass into a patient, healing their heart trouble, her brain emitting 8 Hz . One person emitting a certain frequency can make another also resonate to the same frequency.
Our brains are extremely vulnerable to any technology which sends out ELF waves, because they immediately start resonating to the outside signal by a kind of tuning-fork effect. Puharich experimented discovering 7.83 Hz (earth’s pulse rate) made a person ‘feel good’ producing an altered-state. 10.80 Hz causes riotious behaviour and 6.6 Hz causes depression. Puharich made ELF waves change RNA and DNA, breaking hydrogen bonds to make a person have a higher vibratory rate. He wanted to go beyond the psychic 8 Hz brainwave and attract psi phenomena. James Hurtak, who once worked for Puharich, also wrote in his book The Keys of Enoch that ultra-violet caused hydrogen bonds to break and this raised the vibratory rate.
Puharich presented the mental effects of ELF waves to military leaders but they would not believe him. He gave this information to certain dignitaries of other Western nations. The US govt burned down his home in New York to shut him up and he fled to Mexico. However Russians discovered which ELF frequencies did what to the human brain and began zapping the US Embassy in Moscow on 4 July 1976 with electromagnetic-waves, varying the signal, including focusing on 10 Hz. (10 Hz puts people into a hypnotic state, Russians and North Koreans use this in portable mind-control machines to extract confessions.
Found also in an American church to help the congregation believe!) This Russian “Woodpecker” signal was traveling across the world from a transmitter near Kiev. The US Air Force identified 5 different frequencies in this compound harmonic Woodpecker was sending through the earth and atmosphere. Nikola Tesla revealed in 1901 power could be transmitted through the ground using ELF waves. Nothing stops or weakens these signals. The Russians retrieved Tesla’s papers when they were returned to Yugoslavia after his death.
Mitch Battros
Producer - Earth Changes TV
3/21/01
10:14:32 AM
ENVIRONMENT NEWS SERVICE (ENS)
"We Cover the Earth For You"
BRAZILIAN OIL GIANT TRIES TO SAVE SINKING RIG
RIO DE JANEIRO, Brazil, March 19, 2001 (ENS) - The world's largest oil rig, located 130 kilometers (80.7 miles) off the northeastern coast of Brazil, continued to sink today, despite salvage attempts by its owner the Brazilian state oil company Petrobras.
For full text and graphics, visit:
http://ens.lycos.com/ens/mar2001/2001L-03-19-12.html
BEYOND EARTH'S DYING CORAL REEFS
WASHINGTON, DC, March 19, 2001 (ENS) - A pioneering project aimed at reversing the decline of the world's coral reefs today received the largest grant ever given by the United Nations Foundation.
For full text and graphics visit:
http://ens-news.com/ens/mar2001/2001L-03-19-01.html
SOUTHEAST ASIAN NATIONS ATTEMPT TO OUTLAW HAZE
KUALA LUMPUR, Malaysia, March 19, 2001 (ENS) - It is partly cloudy in Kuala Lumpur today with a high temperature of 93 degrees and humidity of 93 percent. There are scattered hot spots and a small area of slight haze over central Sumatra, Indonesia - nothing to worry about, and Southeast Asian countries would like to keep it that way.
For full text and graphics visit:
http://ens-news.com/ens/mar2001/2001L-03-19-02.html
RECYCLING REACHES CANADA'S NORTH - FINALLY
IQALUIT, Nunavut, Canada, March 19, 2001 (ENS) - Nunavut's capital Iqaluit is finally doing what almost every other North American city does: recycling. Last week, Iqaluit Mayor John Matthews launched a paper recycling program for the town. The program is a partnership between municipal, territorial and federal agencies.
For full text and graphics, visit:
http://ens.lycos.com/ens/mar2001/2001L-03-19-11.html
AUSTRALIA'S ARMED FORCES PLEDGE TO CUT EMISSIONS
CANBERRA, Australia, March 19, 2001 (ENS) - The Commonwealth's largest department, biggest user of energy, and major emitter of greenhouse gases, The Department of Defence, has joined the Greenhouse Challenge, a voluntary government program to limit emissions.
For full text and graphics visit:
http://ens-news.com/ens/mar2001/2001L-03-19-05.html
KENYA'S FOREST PLAN ROUSES OPPOSITION
NAIROBI, Kenya, March 19, 2001 (ENS) - Opposition is growing to the Kenyan government's plan to clear more than 67,000 hectares (165,560 acres) of forest. The plan is to resettle landless people, largely at the foot of Mount Kenya. The Kenyan government says most of the land is already settled and now needs to be formally managed.
For full text and graphics, visit:
http://ens.lycos.com/ens/mar2001/2001L-03-19-10.html
TRADING KEEPS HALONS OUT OF THE OZONE
PARIS, France, March 19, 2001 (ENS) - The United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) has launched a web portal to help implement a key environmental treaty on protecting the ozone layer, the Montreal Protocol.
For full text and graphics visit:
http://ens-news.com/ens/mar2001/2001L-03-19-03.html
ECO-TRAIN TO ROLL THROUGH TOKYO
TOKYO, Japan, March 19, 2001 (ENS) - A special eco-train will be running through downtown Tokyo beginning Wednesday to showcase recycling, energy efficiency and noise reduction.
For full text and graphics visit:
http://ens-news.com/ens/mar2001/2001L-03-19-04.html
ENVIRONMENT NEWS SERVICE AMERISCAN: MARCH 19, 2001
Whitman Supports Bush on Carbon Dioxide Emissions
Endangered Hyena Skull Lands Iowa Man in Jail
Weeds May Provide Medicinal Treasures
Revamped Conservation Program Could Aid Grassland Birds
$3 Million Gift Endows Professorships at Duke
Tongass National Forest Gains 155 Acres
ExxonMobil Wins Award for Tiger Conservation Efforts
Plant Trees Online to Aid Siberian Tigers
For full text and graphics visit:
http://ens.lycos.com/ens/mar2001/2001L-03-19-09.html
3/21/01
10:09:30 AM
Planet Ark World Environment News
Doing environmental research? Search our news archives at: http://www.planetark.org/searchhome.cfm
FACTBOX - StarLink tainted corn from 1999, 2000 crops - USA http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=10149
Bush economist says CO2 caps could cause blackouts - USA http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=10153
Group - Growing number of US schools are toxic - USA http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=10157
UPDATE - Power blackout shuts down Taiwan nuclear plant - TAIWAN http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=10158
Norway hunters kill four wolves from helicopters - NORWAY http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=10155
UPDATE - Toyota in talks with Ford for possible cooperation - JAPAN http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=10150
Olympics - IOC backs Athens 2004 on environment - GREECE http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=10154
German minister concerned at US CO2 stance - GERMANY http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=10151
Czech Temelin reactor restarts after repair - CTK - CZECH REPUBLIC http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=10156
World's biggest oil rig stops sinking off Brazil - BRAZIL http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=10152
3/19/01
7:59:53 PM
For all of us thinking of living or travelling in Europe......
It looks like the Brits have been buzy!
The European Commission has just announced an agreement whereby English will be the official language of the EU rather than German which was the other possibility. As part of the negotiations, Her Majesty's Government conceded that English spelling had some room for improvement and has accepted a 5 year phase-in plan that would be known as "Euro-English".
In the first year, "s" will replace the soft "c". Sertainly, this will make the sivil servants jump with joy. The hard "c" will be dropped in favour of the "k". This should klear up konfusion and keyboards kan have 1 less letter.
There will be growing publik enthusiasm in the sekond year, when the troublesome "ph" will be replaced with "f". This will make words like "fotograf" 20% shorter.
In the 3rd year, publik akseptanse of the new spelling kan be ekspekted to reach the stage where more komplikated changes are possible. Governments will enkorage the removal of double letters, which have always ben a deterent to akurate speling. Also, al wil agre that the horible mes of the silent "e"s in the language is disgraseful, and they should go away.
By the fourth year, peopl wil be reseptiv to steps such as replasing "th" with "z" and "w" with "v". During ze fifz year, ze unesesary "o" kan be dropd from vords kontaining "ou" and similar changes vud of kors be aplid to ozer kombinations of leters.
After zis fifz yer, ve vil hav a reli sensibl riten styl. Zer vil be no mor trubl or difikultis and evrivun vil find it ezi to understand ech ozer. Ze drem vil finali kum tru! And zen ve vil tak over ze world!
3/19/01
7:56:47 PM
My name is Trevor Osborne.
I was trained as an agricultural scientist and farm advisor in the UK in the early 1950's. This was the time when the chemical farming era just began. We were taught age old methods that worked with nature, not against it as we now do. Pests and diseases were controlled naturally by what was known as good husbandry... both crop husbandry and animal husbandry. The premise was, if your soils are healthy, then your crops will be healthy. If your crops are healthy then your animals will be healthy (see below). Healthy crops and animals have natural resistance to all disease. If it were not the case those species would have died out aeons ago. Nature does not rely on drugs and mass slaughter to control diseases, it relies on the species natural immunity and they survive because that's the way nature works... when you let it! It seems we have chosen to ignore the lessons we learned over many centuries. How long is it going to take for humanity to wake up to this fact? What we need to do is learn and practice "health creation" not "disease eradication" both in agriculture and in human health. Then, and only then will be start to reverse the disastrous situation we find ourselves in both sectors.
This brings me to the current Foot & Mouth Disease (FMD) situation. FMD is not a fatal disease under normal classification methods. It is akin to flu in humans... yes, people can die from it but usually only the weak, elderly and undernourished. In other words those people whose immune systems are low. Simplistically, the same applies to FMD... those animals with very weak immune systems may die. Those with weak immune systems will suffer the symptoms and then recover. Those with strong immune systems will not even exhibit the symptoms (see attached article).
This being the case the obvious LONG TERM answer to the problem is, build the immune system of the animals. And this is done by practising good husbandry. This doesn't mean we have to go back 50 or 100 years. No, it is about using what we know of the old, and combining it with the new. For example, it is well know in some circles that most agricultural soils have been depleted of certain minerals and humus... both of which are necessary for healthy and nutritious crops. There is a quick and economic answer to this. It involves applying mineral-rich volcanic rock dust and organic carbon to the soils. Two companies I know of in Australia are involved in this, there are probably more in other counties:
1. International Mineral Consultants Pty Ltd: www.minplus.com.au/
2. Sustainable Agriculture & Food Enterprises Pty. Ltd. www.mineralfertiliser.com.au/
To supplement my above statements I have attached a document written by Sir Albert Howard (Hon Fellow of Imperial College of Science) in 1945 entitled, DISEASE AND HEALTHY LIVESTOCK. It can be found at the following website:
http://www.whatareweswallowing.com/
I am also including a copy taken from Hansard (Australian Parliament records) and one from the US Congress both of which allude to the importance of soils to animal & human health. If you require more evidence regarding the above please ask.
I hope this brief overview may provide you with an inkling of where we are collectively heading and what needs to be done to change to a win-win-win direction.
Regards...
Trevor Osborne, NDA
Soil Degradation
A serious situation has been brought to my attention that should be of concern to all of us: a situation that affects every man, woman and. child in this country, irrespective of age. I refer to the mineral degradation of the soils from which our food is derived. A United States Senate report in 1936 said that the alarming fact is that the foods (fruits, vegetables and grains) now being raised on millions of acres of land that no longer contain enough of certain minerals are starving us, no matter how much of them we eat.' From preliminary investigations, it has become evident that our soils are equally as deficient in trace minerals as the soils in the United States are - if not more so - not only from the plants point of view, but also from the human body's point of view.
There is little, if any, consideration given to the mineral content of our foods. The only consideration to date has been to maximising the yields of any given crop. So, if the crop requires more trace minerals to grow well, it is given them; but if we humans require trace minerals to be healthy but the plant does not need them our requirements are totally ignored. What is more, it is not commonly realised that vitamins control the body's use of minerals and that, in the absence of minerals, vitamins have no function to perform at all. Lacking vitamins, the system can make some use of minerals; but, lacking minerals, vitamins are completely useless. This is vital to the health of our nation. Without the proper mineral balance in our bodies, we cannot function properly and we start degenerating in a progressively downward spiral - slowly at first, but then faster and faster until the degeneration gets to a point where we, as individuals, can no longer ignore the devastating symptoms that, more often than not, end up killing us. That is the way it happens to most of us. And the sad part is that we think it is natural, just a part of getting old. It is not natural and it is not part of getting old.
Back in 1936, the warning was loud and clear that, if we do not get all the minerals we need to stay healthy, we will get sick, suffer and have shorter lives. Dr Linus Pauling, twice a Nobel prize winner, stated that you can trace every sickness, every disease and every ailment to mineral deficiency. What we have been doing for the past 50 years or so is taking 60 minerals [start page 1763] out of the soil and only replacing three: nitrogen, phosphorus and potassium. If you ran your bank account like that, with $60 out and $3 in, what would happen? You would end up bankrupt.
Although this is a very serious and complex situation, there are some simple, commonsense answers. For example, some very positive research has been conducted over several years in North Queensland and elsewhere, where the adding of mineral rock dust containing up to 70 mineral elements to various soils not only increased the tonnage of the crops there but also reduced the acidity of the soil, while replenishing the depleted minerals at the same time. According to our preliminary research, this Queensland quarry has an estimated reserve of around 20 million tonnes, while another 23 reserves have already been identified. There is simple evidence to support what I am saying, for all of those who would like to check it out.
3/19/01
7:52:52 PM
On March 20th a New Spirit of Humanity will circle the Planet!
March 20th will mark the first "World Day of Planetary Consciousness" as Sunrise Celebrations take place planet-wide, beginning with a Maori welcome in New Zealand and ending with a Polynesian performance in Samoa. This first spring day of the New Millennium will culminate in a gala event in Hungary featuring messages and participation from Honorary Members of the Club of Budapest including:
The Dalai Lama, Mikhail Gorbachev, Arthur C. Clarke, Peter Ustinov, Ervin Laszlo, Jane Goodall, Peter Russell, Edgar Mitchell, Robert Muller, Peter Gabriel and Betty Williams.
On this World Day people from many cultures and nations will unite under the banner of the Planetary Vision Festival 2001 to celebrate the spirit of humanity's new consciousness that is dawning with this new era, including in: Auckland, Nelson, Brisbane, Fukuoka, Beijing, Khatmandu, Delhi, Auroville, St. Petersburg, Kiev, Jerusalem, Delphi, Budapest, Guardea, Vienna, Lucerne, Paris, Brighton, Sao Paolo, New York City, Philadelphia, Washington D.C., Toronto, Kansas City, Monterrey, Vancouver, San Francisco and Apia.
Planetary consciousness is the recognition of the vital interdependence and essential interconnection of all humankind and the earth. It is a new consciousness that can help us create a shared vision of "a united humanity living in harmony with nature", at this crucial time in our history.
In the words of Sir Arthur C. Clarke; "At the dawn of the new Millennium, we have an opportunity to make a better world. If we act with responsibility and compassion we can change the way we relate to each other and to the planet. I much appreciate the efforts of the Planetary Vision Festival to focus attention on the unity of humankind and the need for us to evolve a planetary consciousness."
Planetary Vision Festival 2001 is the first in an annual series of events and programs celebrating our new planetary consciousness and its related ethics and actions. The Festival will unite people planet-wide in awareness of the great opportunities present at this special time to shape a sustainable and peaceful future for all, and help inspire humanity to new ethics, new actions and new heights!
The Festival was launched on World Day One (January 1, 2001), the official first day of the 21st Century and the Third Millennium. Groups in 26 countries joined together on this World Day to participate in two new global initiatives: "The First Global Singalong", a singalong of universal songs, and "First Steps - A Walk for the Future", a local/global walk for our common future. Further Planetary Vision Festival world programs this year are the first World Month of Planetary Understanding (March 21st to April 21st) and the first World Day of Planetary Ethics (September 22nd).
For further details visit the PVF2001 website and contact:
David Woolfson, Director
email: pd@planetaryvision.net
Phone: 1-905-881-0735
Fax: 1-905-881-8731
http://www.PlanetaryVision.net
World Day of Planetary Consciousness
World Day of Planetary Consciousness Tuesday, March 20th, 5:45 AM for New York City Sunrise Event across from the UN - 1st Ave at 43rd St
Be a Part of the New Spirit of Humanity to circle the Planet!
Sunrise Celebrations from New Zealand (First Light) to Samoa (Last Light) will mark the first World Day of Planetary Consciousness on March 20. Join the New York City event at 5:45 AM across the street from the United Nations at the steps on 1st Ave at 43rd St.
The gathering will begin with a Native American blessing. The highlight for the New York City event will be The World Peace Flag Ceremony. As the flags of all the UN member states are held, we will connect with the people and places in that nation to send our love, thoughts and prayers. The Earth Flag will be used to honor the planet and all those not specifically represented by the other flags. If you have a special, positive focus for a particular nation, please include it with the RSVP form.
This one-hour event is designed to recognize the oneness and interdependence of all humanity with the Earth. It will be held outside, so dress warmly. Breakfast will follow the event. For those who cannot attend, please send your messages and prayers or join with the other activities to mark this first day of spring.
You are also invited to the 31st Earth Day on the Vernal Equinox with the ringing of the Peace Bell at the United Nations at 8 AM. This is organised annually by the Earth Society Foundation. The Club of Rome is sponsoring a round table discussion on environmental issues at the Church Center from 11 AM -6 PM.
3/19/01
7:47:50 PM
Earth Day Equinox Celebration on March 20
The Peace Bell is to be rung at 8:31 a.m. on Tuesday, March 20 – the moment Spring begins -- followed by two minutes for silent prayer. This provides an occasion where people around the world can join in simultaneous heartfelt prayer - deepening their commitment to think and act as responsible trustees of Earth.
Earth Day provides an opportunity to bring people together in a great common effort for peace, justice and the care of Earth.
Sincerely,
John McConnell
Earth Day Founder
www.earthsite.org
Earth Day Records
The first Earth Day, proclaimed by the City of San Francisco and celebrated on March 21, 1970 was created by John McConnell. What led him to the idea was his interest in Space exploration and awareness of the March Equinox, nature's primary day of global equilibrium.
This special moment of nature's equipoise provides a sound basis for members of the human family to simultaneously join -- each in their own way -- in silent prayer or reflection : a time for dedication and commitment to the care of our planet, a time for thanksgiving and celebration. Earth Day is on the first day of Spring -- nature's symbol of renewal and new life.
Observed each year at the United Nations and to some extent around the world, nature's Earth Day celebration of life has been a dynamic force for resolution of conflicts and peaceful progress -- for harmony with neighbor and nature by people acting as responsible trustees of Earth.
A global understanding about Earth Day -- its history, meaning, purpose and Earth Trustee vision -- will encourage peaceful progress.
We will then acknowledge and accommodate our differences more freely because nature's day will bring us together on what we agree is most important -- the nurture of people and planet.
These new connections with one another will bring united support for common global goals, one unanimous holiday and new hope for the future.
Here is a chance to unite the world in a common cause that will benefit all.
The first Earth Day in the New Millennium will be on March 20. Spread the word that you will observe this important Earth Day -- and Nature will Sing!
Back in 1957 John McConnell was Co-Publisher of the Toe Valley View, a small North Carolina newspaper. He wrote an editorial right after the first Sputnik Satellite urging a bright visible "Star of Hope" satellite that would be a symbol of peace and goodwill. This brought global publicity for a new world view (though the Satellite was never launched) and headed McConnell toward Earth Day.
Margaret Mead -- Earth Day 1977
"Earth Day is the first completely international and universal holiday that the world has ever known. Every other holiday was tied to one place, or some political or special event. This Day is tied to Earth itself, and to the place of Earth in the whole solar system.
At this moment, when I climb the steps and ring the Peace Bell, it will be the Equinox in every part of the world, and we can all celebrate it at once on behalf of every part of the world."
PURPOSE OF MARCH 20, 2001 EARTH DAY
By John McConnell -- 2-17-01
85 year old founder of Earth Day
From its beginning the purpose of the authentic Earth Day was to provide an annual date on which the whole world (people of every creed and culture) would rededicate themselves to the care of Earth. The March Equinox (nature's special day of equilibrium) provided an appropriate time to celebrate the wonder of life on our planet. This could be a special day for the human family to focus on a common cause that would appeal to all -- stewardship of Earth.
The more we think and act as Earth Trustees, the more we will see and do the things that will eliminate pollution, poverty, injustice and conflict - violence, war.
We appeal to those in positions of power to now provide a moral equivalent of war: Provide an Earth Trustee Media Blitz to save civilization. Feature and headline actions that benefit people and planet -- that promote peace, justice and the care of Earth. Aided by wise use of our new technology we can then make the world a happy home for all.
Given suitable attention, Earth Day on March 20, 2001 could be a great new beginning for people and planet -- an Earth Trustee Millennium with new health and prosperity for the human family and the amazing web of life that covers our globe.
3/19/01
7:41:23 PM
Whale researcher says Navy's new sonar can kill
By CHRISTOPHER DUNAGAN, The Sun of Bremerton, Wash.
BREMERTON, Wash. (March 8, 2001) http://www.nandotimes.com) - Oceans off the Bahamas seem lonelier this winter as whale researchers scan the water for the beaked whales they have been studying for years, a scientist says.
At least some of the whales were caught in a Navy exercise nearly a year ago, and now Ken Balcomb fears many whales were killed by sonar.
Balcomb, who divides his time between Washington state's San Juan Islands and the Bahamas, has spent years identifying beaked whales. Now, the only ones he sees are strangers - probably visitors from other areas.
Balcomb, of the Center for Whale Research, is normally a reserved and cautious scientist. Recently, he sent a strongly worded letter to the Navy warning that the proposed deployment of a new low-frequency sonar system could have devastating effects on whales throughout the world.
The Navy has acknowledged that sonar may have contributed to the deaths of seven whales in the Bahamas. The whales beached themselves last March 15 during an exercise involving five ships.
A natural phenomenon, called a "surface duct," may have transmitted greater volumes of sound to lower depths, according to a report.
The National Marine Fisheries Service suggested that the whales may have become disoriented by the sound and died due to beaching. Balcomb is calling for better analysis.
"Considering the observed damage to the whales that stranded and died and the short time period between stranding and death, the NMFS statement that the whales died from stranding is patently absurd," Balcomb said in his letter. "The whales that we observed swimming toward shore and stranding were only the temporary survivors of an acoustic holocaust that can be likened to fishing with dynamite."
Balcomb contends the Navy has not adequately considered how loud noise from sonar may resonate within air chambers located in the whales' skulls.
"The killing is largely due to resonance phenomena in the whales' cranial air spaces that are tearing apart delicate tissues around the brain and ears," Balcomb said in his letter.
"This is an entirely separate issue from auditory thresholds and traumas that the Navy has fixated upon."
Balcomb's letter uses mathematical equations to describe the relationship between the size of air spaces and the resulting resonance.
He also questions whether the Navy has proposed adequate precautions with its new low-frequency sonar, which he says can create resonance frequencies.
"The Navy has consistently tried to de-link the low-frequency active sonar with the normal sonar," he said. "If you really investigate resonance, you will see there is a common denominator."
Joe Johnson, who leads a team studying the environmental impacts of low-frequency sonar, said laboratory studies were done to measure resonance effects on rats, mice and guinea pigs.
It takes a fairly steady tone to create resonance, he said. Frequency change and sound levels used in the low-frequency sonar system are not great enough to cause injury in whales, although they may cause behavioral changes.
"Based on everything we've seen," he said, "this is not going to have an impact on the species." If in doubt, Johnson said, consider that the large whales - blue whales and humpback whales - generate the same volumes and frequencies as the Navy's low-frequency sonar.
Balcomb, a former Navy man himself, said he is disappointed that the Navy has not provided adequate answers to the Bahamas incident.
"We are not talking theory stuff here," Balcomb said in an interview. "The Navy can throw up all kinds of theoretical reasons why it didn't happen. But it happened. There has to be something wrong with the theory. I'm trying to get them to look at the resonance issue."
The Navy's new system, towed by a ship, uses a series of speakers to produce low-frequency sounds that can travel hundreds of miles. Reflected waves are used to locate other ships.
The system would not be deployed close to shore, the Navy says, and operational procedures reduce the chance of a whale being nearby during transmission.
IF YOU WANT TO DO SOMETHING ABOUT THIS PROBLEM, HERE IS WHAT YOU CAN DO: CONTACT MARK PALMER BELOW TO ASK RECEIVING THE NECESSARY INFO TO GET INVOLVED IN PROTESTING THE PROPOSED PERMIT
From: Mark Palmer <mpalmer@mother.com> Subject: LFA: MMPA Permit in Federal Register Next Week?
STOP THE NAVY NOISE!
International Marine Mammal Project, Earth Island Institute
Dear LFA Activists:
We understand that the National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) will likely be publishing their proposed permit for the Navy to "incidentally take" marine mammals during operation of the LFA Sonar system. The permit will be published in the Federal Register towards the end of next week, if all goes according to plan. A permit is required under the provisions of the Marine Mammal Protection Act and the Endangered Species Act. There will be a 45-day comment period for the public. Natural Resources Defense Council is planning to provide background information and examples of comments for the public, so I expect to pass along that information on this list as soon as it is available. If, as expected, the NMFS permit is full of holes, we expect the permitting process to become part of the planned litigation.
-- Mark J. Palmer
Assistant Director International Marine Mammal
Project Director Wildlife Alive Earth Island Institute
300 Broadway, Suite 28
San Francisco, CA 94133
(415) 788-3666 x139
(415) 788-7324 (fax)
mpalmer@mother.com
www.earthisland.org
Cheryl Magill shootdaguy@yahoo.com
Re: Fwd: Whale researcher says Navy's new sonar can kill
SURTASS LFA Sonar system.
I have a copy of the FEIS, and it thicker than two Metropolitan Area phone books. It is comprised primarily of the submitted comments of those criticizing the deployment of this system. It is mostly a documented protest. These submissions are reduced to about 25% of their original image size. Petitions are reduced in size too, and the entire presentation is a scrunched-up version of the massive response generated in opposition to the deployment of this potentially devastating technology.
But that won't necessarily stop the US Navy & government officials who may choose to disregard public opinion.
The release of the information about the MMPA Permit is expected to be published in the Federal Register any day now. I would hope that upon its release you could publish at least a portion of that information.
To see a copy of Dr. Balcomb's letter to Joe Johnson and to read in detail his description of what happens to a marine mammal which is experiencing these sonar pressure waves, please go to these URLs:
http://manyrooms.net/bahamas.html
http://manyrooms.net/balcomb.htm
http://www.geocities.com/shootdaguy/rooms/outlinec.html
The greater question also is the one which Dr. Balcomb raises about the disappearance of the Cuvier's Beaked Whales in the Bahamas. What about other stranding situations? What was the health of the remaining population after sonar damage had caused animals to strand along the shore?
So far as we know, more energy and effort has been spent to deny responsibility and to deny that harm was done. To date, we remain unaware of any effort made on the part of the Navy to study the health of remaining populations in areas where sonar damage is thought to have occurred.
Best regards,
Cheryl A. Magill
Stop LFAS Worldwide!
3/19/01
7:35:26 PM
Please Sign On to a Petition to 39 Pharmaceutical Companies whose High Prices are Killing Hundreds of Thousands of People in South Africa at:
"Since 1998, the pharmaceutical industry has blocked the medicines legislation, claiming it would infringe on their patent rights. During that period, 400,000 South Africans have died of AIDS-related causes. High prices are effectively denying medicines to poor patients, condemning them to a premature death. We call on the 39 pharmaceutical companies to withdraw immediately and unconditionally from this case." CLIP
See also http://www.msf.org/petition/39.htm
3/19/01
7:25:07 PM
Philadelphia Inquirer
Arms race in outer space?
By Karl Grossman
The United States is seeking to make space a new arena of war.
This is in violation of the intent of the basic international law on space, the Outer Space Treaty (OST) of 1967. The OST, ratified by most of the world's nations, sets aside space for "peaceful purposes."
But the U.S. administration and military have other ideas.
"In the coming period the United States will conduct operations to, from, in and through space in support of its national interests both on the Earth and in space," declares the recently released report of the "Space Commission" chaired by U.S. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld.
Stressing that it is "possible to project power through and from space in response to events anywhere in the world," the report declares that "missions initiated from Earth or space . . . would give the United States a much stronger deterrent and, in a conflict, an extraordinary military advantage."
The 13-member panel, formally called the Commission to Assess United States National Security Space Management and Organization, recommends a transition of the U.S. Space Command, which now coordinates U.S. space military activities, into a "Space Corps," a separate military entity like the Marine Corps.
The report follows up a series of military reports that call for the United States to "control space" and from it to "dominate" the Earth below. These include the "Vision for 2020" report of the Space Command, its cover depicting a laser weapon shooting a beam from space zapping a target below. Vision for 2020 then proclaims the Space Command's mission - "dominating the space dimension of military operations to protect U.S. interests and investment."
Vision for 2020 compares U.S. military plans for space to how centuries ago "nations built navies to protect and enhance their commercial interests," how the empires of Europe ruled the waves and thus the world.
The Space Command's Long Range Plan says, "Space power in the 21st century looks similar to previous military revolutions, such as aircraft-carrier warfare and Blitzkrieg." A Space Command logo: "Master of Space."
Far more than words are involved. About $6 billion a year - plus funds in the "black" or secret budget - have in recent years been going to U.S. space military programs. The Alpha High-Energy Laser, a TRW space weapon, last year was test-fired for the 22d time.
The Space-Based Laser, a joint TRW, Lockheed Martin and Boeing project, got the go-ahead last year. Its "lifecycle cost" is between $20 billion and $30 billion. In December, the Pentagon chose Stennis Space Center in Mississippi as its development site - and that was under the Clinton administration. In President Bush, we have an administration far more gung-ho for "Star Wars."
And although U.S. citizens may not be familiar with the full extent of what is going on, the nations of the world are. Because of the U.S. plans, there was a United Nation vote in November on a resolution for "Prevention of an Arms Race in Outer Space." It sought to "reaffirm" the OST, specifically its provision that space be kept for peaceful purposes. More than 160 nations voted yes. We abstained.
It was a Philadelphian, Craig Eisendrath, who as a young foreign service officer at the State Department in the 1960s, was instrumental in drafting the OST. "We sought to deweaponize space before it got weaponized," he explains.
Our leadership may think this country can control space and dominate the Earth below, but other nations will not sit back and accept that. They will respond in kind. There will be an arms race and inevitably war in space.
Our friend and neighbor Canada is leading a U.N. initiative (strongly backed by Russia and China) to strengthen the OST with a ban on all weapons in space. (The treaty now bans nuclear weapons and weapons of mass destruction.) Space could be kept for peace and mechanisms put in place to assure compliance. But our country opposes Canada's effort.
"If the U.S. is allowed to move the arms race into space, there will be no return," says Bruce Gagnon, coordinator to the Global Network Against Weapons and Nuclear Power In Space
www.space4peace.org
"We have this one chance, this one moment in history, to stop the weaponization of space from happening." There's only a narrow window to prevent the heavens from becoming a war zone.
Karl Grossman, professor of journalism at the State University of New York/College at Old Westbury, wrote the forthcoming book "Weapons in Space" and the TV documentary "Star Wars Returns."
USA Space Command Web Site: http://www.spacecom.af.mil/usspace
3/19/01
6:08:59 PM
Environmental news from GRIST MAGAZINE
<http://www.gristmagazine.com>
1. DELTA DAWN, WHAT'S THAT OIL SPILL YOU'VE GOT ON The Niger River Delta -- 42,000 square miles of wetland that is home to 7 million Nigerians -- has been ravaged by five multinational oil companies extracting 2 million barrels of crude oil per day from the area. From 1986 to 1996, oil spills equal to 10 Exxon Valdez disasters fouled rivers and jungles in the region, according to a study commissioned by the CIA. Even the multinationals admit that spills continue today. Clean-up efforts and compensation have been slow to come from the companies. "The oil companies must and should be subordinate to the people. Right now they are lords and masters," says Oronto Douglas, who works at the Nigerian advocacy group Environmental Rights Action.
do good: Take action to help out Nigerian enviros <http://www.gristmagazine.com/grist/dogood/politics.stm#chevron>
2. THE SPRUCE GOOSE In a rare success story, U.S. Interior Secretary Gale Norton is announcing today that the Aleutian Canada goose, once thought to be extinct, has recovered and no longer needs to be protected under the Endangered Species Act. The goose population has grown from only hundreds in the late-1960s to 37,000 today. Norton attributes the recovery to cooperation between state and federal agencies and private landowners in Alaska, Oregon, and California. In another boost for endangered species, a federal court in New Orleans last week struck down a federal regulation that loosened habitat protections for endangered species. The ruling, which came in a case involving sturgeon living along the Gulf Coast, may make it easier for enviros to block development in areas where endangered species live.
straight to the source: USA Today, Tom Kenworthy, 18 Mar 2001 <http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2001-03-18-goose.htm>
straight to the source: Wall Street Journal, Jim Carlton, 19 Mar 2001 (access ain't free) <http://interactive.wsj.com/articles/SB984955000420511028.htm>
3. THE QUESTION IS, IS OUR ROADS BUILDING? The Bush administration indicated on Friday that it is looking for ways to roll back rules approved by the Clinton administration to ban road-building and logging on a third of the country's national forests. In one of his first acts in office, President Bush put off the date the rules would come into effect until 12 May, and in a court motion filed on Friday, the administration offered to postpone that date still further, probably until at least early summer. The motion effectively granted a request by the timber behemoth Boise Cascade, which had asked a federal judge to issue an injunction preventing the rules from taking effect.
straight to the source: New York Times, Douglas Jehl, 17 Mar 2001 <http://www.nytimes.com/2001/03/17/politics/17FORE.html>
do good: Take action to defend Clinton's roadless plan <http://www.gristmagazine.com/grist/dogood/forests.stm#roadless>
My favorite marten -- a day in the life of Al Thieme, Cascadia Wild! <http://www.gristmagazine.com/grist/week/thieme031601.stm>
When is a caribou an albatross? -- the Arctic Refuge could become Bush's gays-in-the-military -- by David Helvarg <http://www.gristmagazine.com/grist/imho/imho030901.stm>
A fish story -- average Joes and Janes can make a difference -- by Paul Rogat Loeb <http://www.gristmagazine.com/grist/books/books031700.stm>
3/19/01
6:05:33 PM
The Nation
Faced with increasing opposition to exclusive contracts that promote the sale of its beverages in public schools around the country, Coca-Cola staged a press conference last Wednesday, at which executives announced that they plan to change the corporation's approach to doing business with school districts around the country. One of the most active companies looking to exploit America's school systems as a new market, Coca-Cola's backtracking represents an important victory for anti-corporate grassroots mobilizing.
As John Nichols reports in his latest installment of The Online Beat, his web-only column for The Nation: "The proposed corporate policy shifts clearly represent a response to protests against Coke's aggressive marketing of sugar and caffeine to children." Read Nichols's full account currently at:
http://www.thenation.com/thebeat
NAME THE PRESIDENT:
There were so many brilliant entries to our "Name the President" contest that our judges were hard pressed to choose the winning five. So we decided to turn the final decision over to our readers. We've winnowed the field of more than 750 entries down to eight finalists. Please use our online ballot to vote for your favorite title by the voting deadline of April 2. You can even monitor the results by viewing running, up-to-the-minute tallies. Cast your ballot at:
http://www.thenation.com/special/namepres
MAKING EVERY VOTE COUNT:
Election 2000 showed the U.S. electoral system to be deeply flawed. Some of the problems - voter disenfranchisment, the influence of big money on politics, and the exclusion of alternative political voices - are ones that citizens's movements have been working on for years.
To help energize the forces of change, The Nation has teamed up with the Institute for Policy Studies, a progressive think tank likely familiar to many Nation readers, to create an Electoral Reform website. The idea is to provide a clearinghouse for information, a resource for education and a springboard for action and interaction. You'll find essays, reports, investigative articles, legal briefs, legislative updates, activist resources and an events calendar - even a Voters Bill of Rights. And the site will be updated constantly. So check it out at:
http://www.ips-dc.org/electoral
RECENT ARTICLES:
You can also still read recent articles of interest from the pages of The Nation, including Ellen Willis on The Sopranos; Marc Cooper on labor strife in Hollywood; William Greider on lessons learned from David Stockman and Reaganomics; Robert Dallek on presidential libraries; Naomi Klein on the World Social Forum, Eben Moglen on Napster, Robert Sherrill on death-penalty politics and Vincent Bugliosi on Bush vs. Gore. All available at:
3/19/01
6:02:53 PM
Public Citizen
McConnell Denials of Money-Legislation Link Are Implausible; Campaign Finance Reform Essential to Giving Americans a Voice in Government
Statement of Public Citizen President Joan Claybrook
Today, debate begins in the Senate over campaign finance reform - a debate that at long last has a very real shot of leading to change.
But the public is battling many people who don't want change, who have feasted on today's legalized bribery and corruption. One of those - in fact, the leading opponent of campaign finance reform - is Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, the chief fundraiser for Senate Republicans in the last two election cycles and the King of Prevaricators.
Among the industries he has tapped for boatloads of money is the casino gambling industry, as Public Citizen documented in a recent report. At the same time, he worked behind the scenes to block a bill that the casino industry strongly opposed. The bill would have outlawed gambling on college sports in Nevada; this legalized gambling is a major loophole that undercuts the prohibition in all other states.
But yesterday, on Meet the Press, McConnell denied that he played any role at all in stopping the bill. He misled the press and the public about his insider activities and his role in preventing Senate consideration of the legislation. He even claimed he supported the bill, which he has never done until the report was issued last Thursday.
Amazingly, he also denied - with a straight face - any connection between campaign contributions and legislation.
He totally lost all credibility with that ridiculous statement. Everybody in America knows that the industries that throw cash at the lawmakers get their way on bills. It happens every day.
Why is Senator McConnell issuing denials? Is he embarrassed about his role in the campaign money machine? Does he have something to hide?
The fact is that big money drowns out the voices of average Americans. Polluters give cash to block measures to clean up the air and water. HMOs use it to ensure that their customers can't hold them accountable for denying necessary care. Drug companies use it to keep the prices of drugs higher than most people can afford.
Members of Congress spend uncounted hours on the telephone begging for money and cozying up to corporate lobbyists with their hands out. And powerful members shake down business lobbyists who want action -- or inaction -- on a particular bill. You may not be able to buy a member of Congress but you can definitely rent one.
Americans know what's going on in Washington and they're tired of the sellout. The more money in politics, the less their votes count. The McCain-Feingold bill would rightly ban the most corrupting kind of money we see in politics today -- soft money.
But opponents of reform have offered an alternative, a false tradeoff. In exchange for banning some soft money, they want to triple the amount that individuals can give directly to candidates, known as hard money.
This is a terrible idea. The wealthy already give the most money to candidates. This proposal would only allow them to give more and further tilt public policy toward the elite in our society. As Warren Buffet said yesterday on This Week, this would create "a government of the wealthy, by the wealthy and for the wealthy."
Tripling the hard money limit would let 80 percent of the soft money banned by McCain- Feingold back into the system. That's not reform. That's a fraud. Corporations would be able to bundle tens of thousands of dollars from their executives and their wives and children to reward politicians for doing their bidding. Candidates would be more attentive to the interests of the wealthy by doing such things as cutting taxes for big businesses.
Increasing the hard money limits means more money in politics, and that's just what we don't need.
I've always thought of retirement as a time to relax. Granny D is spending her retirement on her feet - walking across the country, and -- for the next two weeks -- walking around this building to call attention to the need for campaign finance reform.
Let's give Granny D the retirement she deserves.
Let's pass the McCain-Feingold bill, so we can take back our government and let the American public call the shots.
Public Citizen is a consumer advocacy organization based in Washington, D.C. For more information, please visit
www.citizen.org
3/19/01
5:57:59 PM
Massive New Top Secret Spy-Satellite Program to Cost up to $25 Billion
by Peter Pae
A team of Southern California aerospace companies is covertly recruiting engineers across the country for a new generation of spy satellites under what analysts believe is the largest intelligence-related contract ever.
The supersecret project for the National Reconnaissance Office is estimated to be worth up to $25 billion over two decades, providing a major boost to the Southland's aerospace industry and solidifying the area's dominance of high-tech space research.
NRO: Big Brother's Eyes in the Sky
"As the 21st century approaches, the NRO is guided by its vision of being Freedom's Sentinel in Space: One Team, Revolutionizing Global Reconnaissance. The mission of the National Reconnaissance Office is to enable U.S. global information superiority, during peace through war. The NRO is responsible for the unique and innovative technology, large-scale systems engineering, development and acquisition, and operation of space reconnaissance systems and related intelligence activities needed to support global information superiority."
Equipped with powerful telescopes and radar, the nation's newest eye in space is expected to form the backbone of U.S. intelligence for several decades, analysts said. The satellites will be farther out in space and harder to detect than the massive spy probes that currently orbit the Earth. They will also be able to fly over and take pictures of military compounds anywhere in the world, in darkness or through cloud cover, with far more frequency.
Company officials are restricted from talking about the highly classified contract, but Roger Roberts, general manager of the Boeing Co. unit in Seal Beach overseeing the project, gave a hint of its scope.
The endeavor will require 5,000 engineers, technicians and computer programmers over the next five years, and that will just be for the initial design and development of the satellites, he said. That figure doesn't include thousands more who will be required to assemble the satellites, most likely at Boeing Satellite Systems in El Segundo, and thousands of workers employed by hundreds of subcontractors and parts suppliers such as the 1,900-employee Marconi Integrated Systems in San Diego. Sending the satellites into space will also require new rockets, which should also bolster the launch industry.
The need for engineers has been so great that two months ago Boeing opened a recruitment office in Sunnyvale, where it is targeting both dot-com survivors and Lockheed Martin Corp. engineers who built many of the spy satellites now in orbit. After dominating that business since the 1950s, Lockheed lost the new contract to Boeing.
John Pike, a Washington, D.C.-based military space consultant, believes that in all, the work could eventually mean jobs for at least 20,000 people in California.
"Lots of kids will be sent to college, lots of swimming pools are going to get built and a lot of people will spend their career working on this project," Pike said.
Still, most state officials said they know little about the project.
"I don't think most people are aware of how big this is," said Mike Marando, spokesman for the California Technology, Trade and Commerce Agency. "We know California benefits substantially, but by exactly how much we just don't know."
The National Reconnaissance Office hasn't helped. The enigmatic agency announced the contract in a three-paragraph news release posted on its bare-bones Web site little more than a year ago. The project is officially known as Future Imagery Architecture.
Despite slowly opening itself up in recent years, the NRO still remains one of the most secretive government agencies. Even its innocuous logo--a space probe circling the globe--was a secret until 1994. Besides saying it awarded the contract to Boeing "to develop, provide launch integration and operate the nation's next generation of imagery reconnaissance satellites," not much else has been revealed.
Virtually everything else about the contract--its dollar amount, the number of satellites to be built, who is doing what and where, and the capabilities of the satellite--is secret. Even the duration of the contract is deemed classified.
"This program is so secret that most of the people who work on it won't have a good sense of what they are doing," said Loren Thompson, a defense analyst at the Arlington, Va.-based Lexington Institute.
Still, aerospace analysts have been able to draw some conclusions through past reconnaissance programs based on public information gleaned from different sources, such as watching the size and frequency of rocket launches carrying secret spy satellites.
Analysts generally agree that the number of satellites involved in the new program will be at least a dozen to two dozen, compared with roughly half a dozen spy satellites now in orbit. The new models are likely to be significantly smaller and cheaper than the current generation of spy satellites, which cost about $1 billion each, weigh 15 tons and can take up to 18 months to build.
With a bigger constellation of satellites, the probes will be able to revisit and take pictures of an area more frequently than the current versions. The need is driven in part by inadequacies identified during the Persian Gulf War, when military commanders complained about intelligence photos arriving late.
The new system would be less detectable by those being observed. For instance, U.S. intelligence officials were alarmed recently when they found a large contingent of North Korean troops lined up near the demilitarized zone with South Korea. Analysts believe that the North Koreans were able to move troops undetected by coordinating the operation with the orbit of a U.S. spy satellite.
And with improvements in optical and radar technology, U.S. intelligence officials hope to place the satellites at a higher orbit so they can take pictures of a ground target for a longer period.
Satellites can now "linger" over an area about 10 minutes. U.S. officials hope to double that span with the new probes. In all, the Federation of American Scientists believes the new satellites will be able to collect eight to 20 times more images than the current system.
The agency now operates three optical satellites called KeyHole, which take photographic and infrared images, and three school-bus-size radar satellites known as Lacrosse, which can see through clouds and darkness, analysts said. Boeing is building both types of satellites under the contract.
"They were talking about integrating new technology and building satellites that are one-third the size that NRO is used to," said Marco A. Caceres, a senior space analyst for the Teal Group in Fairfax, Va. "They're going to be cheaper, but there are also going to be a lot more of them."
In an unusual moment of candor, an NRO spokesman confirmed last week that the satellites will be smaller and cheaper but more numerous than the current crop.
"I can tell you that we plan to begin launching [the satellites] around . . . 2005," said spokesman Art Haubold. "It's a multiyear effort that will provide a more capable but less costly means of filling the nation's imaging needs."
He declined to specify the value of the contract, although he said, "We're talking about a big part of our business. That's all I can say."
Boeing and other contractors--which would normally gloat--aren't talking, other than to confirm that they are part of the winning team. Besides Boeing, which will oversee the contract and build the satellites, the other main companies include Raytheon Corp., Eastman Kodak Co. and Harris Corp.
Analysts believe that Aerospace Corp., a government-funded research operation in El Segundo, drew up the blueprints for the new satellites.
Although the firms declined to discuss the contract, workers at Raytheon in El Segundo are probably developing the radar-imaging equipment as well as the ground-based controls for the satellites.
Meanwhile, Rochester, N.Y.-based Eastman Kodak is working on processing the images captured by the satellites. The role of Harris Corp., a Florida-based maker of telecommunications components and provider of support services to the Defense Department, is unclear.
"I can only confirm that we are a contractor," said Mark Day, a spokesman for Raytheon's Electronic Systems unit in El Segundo. Raytheon and Boeing's operations in El Segundo both trace their origins to the former Hughes Aircraft Co., a longtime handler of top-secret programs during the Cold War.
The NRO, created in 1960 to build and operate spy satellites, has an annual budget of at least $6 billion, exceeding yearly spending of either the Central Intelligence Agency or the National Security Agency.
Pike estimates that the new contract accounts for about $1 billion of the annual budget and has a lifetime of at least 20 years. After factoring in about $5 billion for design and development, he believes the total worth of the contract to be as much as $25 billion, which includes building the satellites and maintaining them.
In comparison, the Manhattan Project to develop the atomic bomb, which at one time employed as many as 125,000 people, cost the U.S. $20 billion after adjustment for inflation.
The NRO program "will be the most expensive program in the history of the intelligence community," the Federation of American Scientists recently concluded. Much of that expense will be incurred in the South Bay, an area represented by Rep. Jane Harman (D-Rolling Hills), a member of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, which last week received a classified briefing about the project from the NRO.
"I used to say that the area was the aerospace center of the world," Harman said. "I would now say it is the center of the world for space-based intelligence."
Since the 1950s, U.S. spy satellites had mostly been designed and built in Northern California at Lockheed Martin's massive 275-acre Sunnyvale facility, which during its heyday employed more than 30,000 people.
It was in Sunnyvale that the first spy satellites, known as Corona, were built. Although it made its last flight in 1972, the project's existence was revealed and declassified only by a special order of President Bill Clinton about 25 years later. Declassified documents say the NRO launched 145 Corona satellites, each of which flew a few days at a time taking photographs with six- to 10-foot resolutions, compared with resolution of approximately six inches on current satellites.
Instead of transmitting the images to Earth, Corona capsules were allowed to free-fall and be snatched up in midair by a C-119 Flying Boxcar, often after several attempts. The capsules usually contained hundreds of pounds of film.
In late 1999, the NRO stunned the industry and awarded the contract to build the next generation of spy satellites to a Boeing-led team. The competition, which took three years, was considered among the fiercest in recent memory, analysts said.
"I wish I can tell you how we won the contract. It's a story worth telling your grandchildren," said James Albaugh, president of Boeing's space and communications business.
In aerospace, Boeing's coup was considered a huge turning point that reflected a shift in fortunes of the world's top two defense contractors. Lockheed shares fell for weeks after the news was made public.
"This was the most serious loss for Lockheed in a decade," Thompson said. "This was a core business for Lockheed for decades. It was a large part of the reason why Sunnyvale existed at all."
The aftermath is visible at Lockheed's Sunnyvale facility; the massive structure in which the first spy satellite took shape was recently torn down for an Internet firm. Nearby, Boeing opened a recruiting office to handle hundreds of applications weekly from Lockheed engineers drawn by a newspaper ad.
"Stars. Sunsets. Satellites. Southern California has it all," it said, somewhat boastfully.
http://commondreams.org/headlines01/0318-02.htm
3/19/01
5:52:06 PM
Greenhouse Effect Confirmed Over 27 Years
LONDON, United Kingdom, March 15, 2001 (ENS) - While the political fight is heating up in Washington and Brussels over how to limit the emissions of greenhouse gases linked to climate change, scientists have published new evidence that global warming is really occurring.
The warming of Earth's climate has now been verified from space by comparison of satellite data over a 27 year time span.
A scientific study conducted at the Imperial College of Science, Technology and Medicine, London which was released today compares observational data obtained from satellites that orbited the Earth in 1970 and in 1997.
Physicist Dr. John Harries, who led the Imperial College study says, "The results presented here provide to our knowledge the first experimental observation of changes in the Earth's outgoing longwave radiation spectrum, and therefore the greenhouse effect."
Previous studies that confirmed global warming were based on computer models that projected future results based on satellite observations.
Dr. John Harries, professor of earth observation at the 150 year old Imperial College (Photo courtesy Imperial College, London) Dr. Harries was president of the Royal Meteorological Society, 1996-97. He served as director of projects and technology at the British National Space Center from 1986 to 1994.
His scientific team analysed the data in the form of spectra of the Earth's outgoing longwave radiation. This longwave, or infrared, radiation is a measure of how the Earth cools to space, and it carries the imprint of the gases that are responsible for the greenhouse effect.
The researchers found differences that indicate a statistically significant increase in the Earth's greenhouse effect in the characteristic spectral bands of carbon dioxide, methane, ozone and two different chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs), refrigerants linked to ozone depletion.
The data compared in the London Institute study were obtained from two satellites which orbited the Earth 27 years apart.
Starting in October 1996, the Interferometric Monitor of Greenhouse Gases instrument, on board the Japanese ADEOS satellite, produced about nine months of global observations of the spectrum of outgoing longwave radiation.
Some 27 years earlier, NASA had a similar instrument, the Infrared Interferometric Spectrometer, collecting data the spectrum of outgoing longwave radiation that was carried on board the Nimbus 4 spacecraft, between April 1970 and January 1971.
The study, reported in today's issue of the journal "Nature," compares the two data sets. The comparison shows that less radiation was moving from Earth into space in 1997 than in 1990.
This means that these gases are being retained in the Earth's atmosphere, forming a greenhouse-like layer that traps the heat of the Sun close to the planet.
There is no evidence in the report on whether or not the surface temperature of the Earth is actually rising. Harries said this is because the greenhouse effect could start a climate cycle that forms more clouds, keeping more of the Sun's rays from reaching Earth.
An image of global temperature in the year 2050 if greenhouse gases are not limited (Image courtesy Hadley Centre, UK Meteorological Office) But the carefully calculated conclusions are clear - global warming is a reality.
"These unique satellite spectrometer data collected 27 years apart show for the first time that real spectral differences have been observed and that they can be attributed to changes in greenhouse gases over a long time period," the scientific team writes.
"We're absolutely sure, there's no ambiguity. This shows the greenhouse effect is operating and what we are seeing can only be due to the increase in the gases," Harries said.
The new evidence comes at a politically difficult time, when implementation of the 1997 Kyoto Protocol agreement to reduce greenhouse gases in industrialized nations is uncertain. Last November, the latest round of talks collapsed. They are set to resume in July.
On Tuesday, President George W. Bush reversed a campaign promise to require power plants fueled by oil and coal to cut emissions of carbon dioxide, the most abundant greenhouse gas.
http://ens.lycos.com/ens/mar2001/2001L-03-15-02.html
See http://www.geocities.com/mothersalert/globalwarming2.html
As to why Nuclear Power is NOT the solution to global warming.
3/19/01
5:47:32 PM
Planet Ark World Environment News
Doing environmental research? Search our news archives at: http://www.planetark.org/searchhome.cfm
Vietnam island cleans up minor diesel oil leak - VIETNAM http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=10132
Alaska okays $1.85 million for refuge oil hunt lobby - USA http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=10137
Organic cotton directory launched on the Internet - USA http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=10147
INTERVIEW - Green Mountain captures 10 pct of Ohio's power market - USA http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=10146
Sewage spill forces closing of some Miami beaches - USA http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=10145
Environmentalists rally support to stop NYC power plants - USA http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=10140
Starlink bio-corn said to be in 430 million bushels - USA http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=10139
US science panel says more data needed on bio-crop safety - USA http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=10148
Calif. plans to revive power savings steps for summer - USA http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=10138
US governors press for more on-farm conservation - USA http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=10127
GM considering fuel cell uses beyond automobiles - USA http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=10135
UPDATE - GM threatened with NY lawsuit over PCB site - USA http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=10134
North end of Texas City port re-opens after oil spill - USA http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=10133
US to relax pollution rules for some Midwest gasoline - USA http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=10130
UN Web site encourages recycling of greenhouse gas - UNITED NATIONS http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=10143
Britain's Eden Project defies foot-and-mouth virus - UK http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=10141
Adriatic nations worry about NATO bombs in the sea - ITALY http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=10144
Over one million sea turtles nest on Indian coast - INDIA http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=10131
Germany's RWE to build 20MW biomass plant by 2003 - GERMANY http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=10129
UPDATE - Greenpeace occupies German nuclear dump - GERMANY http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=10128
Bush asks for delay in forest conservation case - USA http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=10136
Petrobras rules out major oil spill in rig accident - BRAZIL http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=10142
3/19/01
5:40:29 PM
ENVIRONMENT NEWS SERVICE (ENS)
"We Cover the Earth For You"
EUROPE SPOOKED BY BUSH'S U-TURN ON CO2 LIMITS
COPENHAGEN, Denmark, March 16, 2001 (ENS) - U.S. President George W. Bush has spread gloom through Europe's climate change community by abandoning an election campaign promise to limit the carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions from fossil fueled utilities and reiterating his opposition to the United Nations Kyoto Protocol.
For full text and graphics visit:
http://ens-news.com/ens/mar2001/2001L-03-16-01.html
EPA CUTS COST OF GAS BY ALLOWING HIGHER EMISSIONS
WASHINGTON, DC, March 16, 2001 (ENS) - Gas prices for Chicago and Milwaukee drivers will be less likely to skyrocket this summer because of a rule change by the Environmental Protection Agency that will allow a greater amount of volatic organic compounds (VOCs) to be emitted from exhaust pipes.
For full text and graphics visit:
http://ens-news.com/ens/mar2001/2001L-03-16-03.html
MISSING PELTS LEAD TO QUESTIONS OVER CANADIAN SEAL HUNT
By Neville Judd
OTTAWA, Canada, March 15, 2001 (ENS) - A new report claims that Canada exported only half of the almost two million pelts from seals killed between 1982 and 1999. An animal welfare group wants to know, where did the other million pelts go?
For full text and graphics, visit:
http://ens.lycos.com/ens/mar2001/2001L-03-16-11.html
AUSTRALIA DECLARES BIOLOGICAL WAR ON THE CANE TOAD
CANBERRA, Australia, March 16, 2001 (ENS) - They are said to attack anything that moves and will eat anything that can fit in their mouths. Since being introduced to Australia from Venezuela in 1935, the cane toad has proved to be the most durable of invasive species, resistant to all attempts at extermination. This week they spread to a world heritage site and moved politicians to act.
For full text and graphics, visit:
http://ens.lycos.com/ens/mar2001/2001L-03-16-10.html
ENVIRONMENT NEWS SERVICE AMERISCAN: MARCH 16, 2001
Foot-and-Mouth Disease Hotline Now Open
Silicon Valley City Hosts Energy Summit
Kellogg's Recalls Gene Altered Corn Foods
Texaco Refinery Fined $4 Million for Waste Violations
One Enviro Rep OK'd for Industry Chemicals Trade Panel
Waterworks, Dams Need Dollars to Halt Decay
Clean Coal Technology Catches On
Bay Area Frog, Snake Get Reprieve from Development
Public Asked to Help Locate HazWaste Truck
For full text and graphics visit:
http://ens-news.com/ens/mar2001/2001L-03-16-09.html
HEALING OUR WORLD: WEEKLY COMMENT
By Jackie Alan Giuliano, Ph.D.
Every hour of every day, children die all over the world because of short sighted political choices that keep toxic substances steadily flowing into our air, water, and food and keep the world's water supplies clouded with human waste. You don't hear about them on the evening news, all these dead children. They are just considered the necessary consequences of progress and the unequal distribution of wealth in our world.
For full text and graphics visit:
http://ens-news.com/ens/mar2001/2001L-03-16g.html