KATE SHEPPARD, - Mother Jones
Stephan: There is nothing really surprising in any of this, or at least there shouldn't be. But it is nice to have one's suspicions confirmed.
Source URL: http://www.motherjones.com/blue-marble/2012/05/corporate-hypocrisy-climate-change
Links:
[1] http://www.ucsusa.org/assets/documents/scientific_integrity/a-climate-of-corporate-control-summary.pdf
[2] http://www.ucsusa.org/assets/documents/scientific_integrity/a-climate-of-corporate-control-report.pdf
Many large corporations are saying one thing and doing another on climate change, the Union of Concerned Scientists found in a study released Wednesday.
The group examined the role that 28 publicly-traded companies played in two significant efforts to address climate change: the EPA’s finding that greenhouse gases endanger public health, and the 2010 ballot initiative in California to suspend the state’s own climate law. (Here are links to the executive summary [1] and the full report [2]).
UCS found that many oil and electric companies were actively engaged in efforts to obstruct climate policy. Chesapeake Energy, Tesoro, Murphy Oil, Occidental Petroleum, Valero Energy, and Peabody Energy were consistently opposed to dealing with climate change: both their PR and their actions worked against new, science-based laws to cut greenhouse gases.
Other companies were less straightforward about their positions. ExxonMobil put out corporate PR that was positive about climate policy while engaging in actions that undermined efforts to deal with climate change. For example, its contributions to anti-climate-action lawmakers outweighed contributions to pro-climate-action lawmakers by a ratio of 10 to 1.
ConocoPhillips, another oil giant, touted on its website that it ‘recognizes that human activity
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DAVID EDWARDS, - The Raw Story
Stephan: The most dangerous social movement in the U.S. today is the rising power of the Theocratic Right. Not least because such a large part of its energy comes from judgment and hate. I see these stories almost every day now, there is nothing special about this one, and this pastor is by no means unique in his views. I chose to publish this report as an example. Because each of these stories seems unconnected to the others, it seems to be hard for people to see the overall pattern, but when placed in the context of the anti-choice, anti-contraception, pro-creationist, anti-climate change, pro-dominionist web it is one piece of a larger whole.
The pastor of New Hope Baptist Church in Seneca, Kansas says President Barack Obama has gone too far in supporting same sex marriage and it’s time for the U.S. government to begin killing gay men and lesbians.
‘Terrorists are dangerous, the economy is a real and present danger,
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CHAD TERHUNE, - Los Angeles Times
Stephan: This is the Illness Profit System in all its glory -- a system perverse, corrupt, and interested in only one thing: profit. As its extraordinarily poor health outcomes prove, actual wellness is hardly a consideration.
A Long Beach hospital charged Jo Ann Snyder $6,707 for a CT scan of her abdomen and pelvis after colon surgery. But because she had health insurance with Blue Shield of California, her share was much less: $2,336.
Then Snyder tripped across one of the little-known secrets of healthcare: If she hadn’t used her insurance, her bill would have been even lower, just $1,054.
‘I couldn’t believe it,’ said Snyder, a 57-year-old hair salon manager. ‘I was really upset that I got charged so much and Blue Shield allowed that. You expect them to work harder for you and negotiate a better deal.’
Unknown to most consumers, many hospitals and physicians offer steep discounts for cash-paying patients regardless of income. But there’s a catch: Typically you can get the lowest price only if you don’t use your health insurance.
That disparity in pricing is coming under fire from people like Snyder, who say it’s unfair for patients who pay hefty insurance premiums and deductibles to be penalized with higher rates for treatment.
The difference in price can be stunning. Los Alamitos Medical Center, for instance, lists a CT scan of the abdomen on a state website for $4,423. Blue Shield says its negotiated rate at […]
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TIM DICKINSON, - Rolling Stone
Stephan: The conservative uber-rich, thanks to Citizens United, are planning to buy this election to get the kind of government they want, so they can make billions more. The Koch Brothers alone are reported to be planning to put in more money than the entire McCain campaign cost in 2008, and the overall total will be well north of a billion. Frankly, I think they have a pretty good chance of pulling it off. Thanks to a massive disinformation campaign Romney's already looking better to women in spite of his anti-choice positions and commitment to eliminate all manner of family support programs. I thought you might like to meet your likely new overlords.
Presidential politics has always been a rich man’s game. But now, thanks to the Supreme Court ruling in Citizens United that upended decades of limits on campaign donations, financing a presidential race is the exclusive domain of the kind of megadonor whose portfolios make Mitt Romney look middle-class. ‘I have lots of money, and can give it legally now,’ Texas billionaire and top GOP moneyman Harold Simmons recently bragged to The Wall Street Journal. ‘Just never to Democrats.’
In past elections, big donors like Simmons gave millions for advocacy groups like Swift Boat Veterans for Truth. By law, such groups were only allowed to run issue ads – but instead they directly targeted John Kerry, drawing big fines from the Federal Elections Commission. Now, with the blessing of the Supreme Court, the wealthy can legally hand out unlimited sums to groups that openly campaign for a candidate, knowing that their ‘dark money’ donations will be kept entirely secret. The billionaire Koch brothers, for instance, have reportedly pledged $60 million to defeat President Obama this year – but their off-the-book contributions don’t appear in any FEC filings.
Even more money from megadonors is flowing into newly created Super PACs, which, unlike advocacy groups, […]
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Wednesday, May 30th, 2012
TIM MAURER and DAVID WEINSTEIN, - Foreign Policy
Stephan: Increasingly I think one needs to assume every email you send, every phone conversation you have, every tweet you make is monitored and recorded somewhere.
Welcome to the new frontier of cyber-espionage, and remember this name: ‘Flame’ — a mysterious new cyber spy tool that hit the headlines on Monday, May 28. Its code is 20 times larger than Stuxnet, the mysterious computer worm that temporarily crippled Iran’s Siemens nuclear centrifuges, and it ‘might be the most sophisticated cyber weapon yet unleashed’ according to Kaspersky Lab, a Russian-based cybersecurity firm. Kaspersky published the findings of its analysis on Monday in addition to the Iranian Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT) and Budapest University. Most of the infected systems are located in the Middle East, with Iran, Israel, Palestine, Sudan, Syria, Lebanon, and Hungary topping the list. Flame stands out in the various ways through which it ‘exfiltrates’ data, including surreptitiously recorded audio data captured by internal microphones. However, unlike Stuxnet, Flame was designed to spy — not destroy.
The variety of spy tools that Flame employs is astonishing. According to Kaspersky, ‘of course, other malware exists which can record audio, but key here is Flame’s completeness — the ability to steal data in so many different ways.’ It also takes snapshots of instant messages and records a user’s keystrokes. Flame is remotely controlled through a command and […]
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