Category Archives: News to use

Useful news for all to advance knowledge of the world and how it works

Climate Change Is Ecological Destruction: Greenwashing and False Solutions at COP 26 — HUMAN WRONGS WATCH

Barbara Crane Navarro

Human Wrongs Watch By Navdanya International (Vandana Shiva) – TRANSCEND Media Service* The climate emergency we face today is part of several interlocking crises involving our health, our soils, and the biodiversity on the planet. The same line of thinking and actions that are driving climate change is leading to biodiversity loss and extinction of[…]

Climate Change Is Ecological Destruction: Greenwashing and False Solutions at COP 26 — HUMAN WRONGS WATCH

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Muitos compradores de ouro estabelecidos em países ricos; Suíça, Canadá e Reino Unido compraram 72% das exportações de ouro do Brasil e contribuem para a violência, desmatamento, poluição e contaminação mortal por mercúrio associada à mineração ilegal de ouro! – Se você compra ou usa ouro, isso também pode estar relacionado a você! 

Barbara Crane Navarro

Casa comunal Yanomami

«Meus ancestrais morreram da mesma coisa que estou enfrentando agora; mineração ilegal de ouro e epidemias espalhadas pelos garimpeiros. Mineiros de ouro trazem Covid-19 xawara e violência.»

  • Dario Kopenawa Yanomami

Desmatamento e contaminação por garimpeiros em território indígena

No início de novembro de 2021, Dario Kopenawa Yanomami soube do recente assassinato de três de seus parentes em uma comunidade remota, Moxihatëtëa, por garimpeiros ilegais. Sua preocupação é que à medida que os garimpeiros e os criminosos que os apóiam se tornem cada vez mais violentos, possa haver outro incidente como o massacre de Haximu em 1993, no qual dezesseis Yanomami foram massacrados por pesquisadores. Os sobreviventes de Haximu lembram: «Os garimpeiros mataram nossos irmãos e irmãs e também mataram nosso pai com facões; alguns, eles morreram de armas de fogo.»

Sobreviventes do massacre de Haximu segurando os restos mortais cremados de seus parentes assassinados

«São feridas abertas…

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U.S. Plans to Spend Billions to Increase Covid Vaccine Supplies – The New York Times

…“This is about assuring expanded capacity against Covid variants and also preparing for the next pandemic,” Dr. Kessler said. “The goal, in the case of a future pandemic, a future virus, is to have vaccine capability within six to nine months of identification of that pandemic pathogen, and to have enough vaccines for all Americans.”

The move comes as the Biden administration also plans to buy enough of Pfizer’s new Covid-19 pill for about 10 million courses of treatment to be delivered in the next 10 months, paying over $5 billion, according to people familiar with the agreement. The government has also pledged $3 billion for rapid over-the-counter tests, which are needed to detect the virus before the Pfizer drug can be prescribed.

Taken together, the investments amount to an aggressive effort to vanquish a pandemic that is heading into its third year. When given promptly to trial groups of high-risk unvaccinated people who developed symptoms of the disease, the Pfizer drug sharply reduced the risk of hospitalization and death. Pfizer applied on Tuesday for federal authorization of the drug on an emergency basis…

As Gas Prices Surge, Biden Asks F.T.C. to Investigate – The New York Times

President Biden asked the Federal Trade Commission on Wednesday to consider whether “illegal conduct” by large oil and gas companies is pushing up gasoline prices for American consumers, the latest effort by the administration to target concentration in the energy industry in a bid to bring down prices at the pump.

The move is unlikely to spur immediate action by the F.T.C., which has the power to break up large industry players, and it is unlikely to affect gasoline prices materially any time soon.

But it could spur the commission to open an investigation to gather data on how companies set gasoline prices, which could be used in future enforcement actions.

Mr. Biden’s letter to Lina Khan, the antitrust champion he appointed as chair of the commission, claims “mounting evidence of anti-consumer behavior by oil and gas companies.” The president noted that prices at the pump have risen even as the costs of refined fuel have fallen and industry profits have gone up. The two largest players in the industry, ExxonMobil and Chevron, have doubled their net income since 2019, he wrote, while announcing billions of dollars in plans to issue dividends and buy back stock…

Iowa Guv Used COVID Money To Pay Her Own Staff, Audit Reveals | Talking Points Memo

Iowa’s governor used federal COVID relief funds to pay her own staff’s salaries and cover a pre-existing budget shortfall, the state’s auditor said in a report released Monday.

The report accused Gov. Kim Reynolds’ (R) office of using nearly $450,000 from the federal Coronavirus Relief Fund — part of the CARES Act meant to help local governments deal with COVID — to pay the salaries and benefits of 21 staffers from mid-March through June 2020.

Though the money was used to pay staff in the governor’s office, it was taken from the Iowa Department of Homeland Security and Emergency Management’s COVID response funds — even though the staffers paid with the money didn’t qualify for the COVID money, state auditor Rob Sand found. The blog Bleeding Heartland first reported the payments in September.

A spokesperson for Reynolds told auditors that during the time period in question, the governor’s office was focused on COVID response — but, “Documentation to support this conclusion was never provided,” the report noted. Reynolds’ office also has not provided documentation describing how the money was allocated, nor anything describing the time each staffer spent on COVID, the report said…

Source: Iowa Guv Used COVID Money To Pay Her Own Staff, Audit Reveals | Talking Points Memo

Satellites discover huge amounts of undeclared methane emissions | Space (Me…  Oops!)

Plumes of methane leaking from a landfill in Spain detected by Canadian company GHGSat.

Plumes of methane leaking from a landfill in Spain detected by Canadian company GHGSat. (Image credit: ESA/GHGSat) Huge amounts of uncounted emissions of highly warming greenhouse gas methane are being released by “super-emitters” all over the world, satellite observations reveal.

 

Scientists have only recently worked out how to detect methane emissions from space, but what they have seen since has taken them by surprise. The greenhouse gas, which is 80 times more potent than carbon dioxide, is leaking from gas pipelines, oil wells, fossil fuel processing plants and landfills all over the world. It is frequently released through negligence and improper operations; the emissions, in many cases, are not accounted for in mandatory greenhouse gas inventories.

“We see quite a lot of those super-emitters,” Ilse Aben, senior scientist at the Netherlands Institute for Space Research (SRON) told Space.com. These are large emissions, and we see a lot of them on the global scale — much more than we had expected.”

Source: Satellites discover huge amounts of undeclared methane emissions | Space

US bishops’ advisory group says communion should not be partisan | RNZ News

Some 55 percent of US Catholics believe abortion should be legal in all or most cases, compared to 59 percent of the general population, according to a Pew Research survey conducted in April.

Sadd told bishops that some members of the advisory council expressed doubt that the document would serve to heal existing rifts in the church.

Nearly 20 percent of Catholics have left the church in the past two decades, according to a Gallup poll in March, as sexual abuse scandals involving predatory priests have emerged and members disagreed on social issues.

Source: US bishops’ advisory group says communion should not be partisan | RNZ News