SACRAMENTO, CALIFORNIA — California just dealt Monsanto a blow as the state’s Environmental Protection Agency will now list glyphosate — the toxic main ingredient in the U.S.’ best-selling weedkiller, Roundup — as known to cause cancer.

Under the Safe Drinking Water and Toxic Enforcement Act of 1986 — usually referred to as Proposition 65, its original name — chemicals that cause cancer, birth defects, or other reproductive harm are required to be listed and published by the state. Chemicals also end up on the list if found to be carcinogenic by the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) — a branch of the World Health Organization.

In March, the IARC released a report that found glyphosate to be a “probable carcinogen.”

Besides the “convincing evidence” the herbicide can cause cancer in lab animals, the report also found:

“Case-control studies of occupational exposure in the U.S.A., Canada, and Sweden reported increased risk for non-Hodgkin lymphoma that persisted after adjustments to other pesticides.”

California’s decision to place glyphosate on the toxic chemicals list is the first of its kind. As Dr. Nathan Donley of the Center for Biological Diversity said in an email to Ecowatch, “As far as I’m aware, […]

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This week, Alabama made headlines for revising its state science education standards. For the first time, teachers in the state will be required to teach evolution and the fact that humans contribute to climate change. But buried in that news was acknowledgement of a “sticker” that the state requires be placed on its biology textbooks, telling students that evolution is a “controversial theory,” not a fact.

That sticker is actually a one-page insert placed in the front or back cover of every biology textbook a child reads in public schools in the state, according to Steve Ricks of the Alabama State Department of Education. “It encourages students to question the theory [of evolution] and ask questions about it.” The insert was advocated for by conservative Christians, according to the Associated Press.

Below is a copy of the insert, which has appeared in Alabama textbooks since 2005, according to Ricks. It reminds students that “no one was present when life first appeared on earth. Therefore, any statement about life’s origins should be considered as theory, not fact.” It also suggests students “keep an open mind,” and remember that “[t]here are many unanswered questions about the origin of life not mentioned in your […]

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Marijuana use continues to become legal in more places, but that doesn’t mean the drug’s popularity among adolescents is growing, a new study finds.

Although disapproval of marijuana use has decreased dramatically among young adults — suggesting that this age group is viewing the drug less negatively — that’s not the case for younger adolescents, according to the study.

The researchers found that disapproval of marijuana use has actually increased among adolescents ages 12 to 14. In 2013, 79 percent of kids in this age group said they strongly disapproved of people using marijuana, up from 74 percent who said the same in 2002. (emphasis added) [Where Americans Smoke and Grow Marijuana (Maps)]

The finding “was surprising,” given the growing legalization of the drug, said Christopher Salas-Wright, an assistant professor of social work at the University of Texas at Austin and the lead researcher on the study, published Sept. 16 in the American Journal of Drug and Alcohol Abuse.

In the study, the researchers looked at data collected between 2002 and 2013 in the National Survey on Drug Use and Health, […]

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Amanda Underwood is a mother of five who works at a fast-food restaurant in Alexander City, Alabama. She recently borrowed her friend’s car to pick up food for her friend’s children and received a traffic ticket for driving with a suspended license. Underwood is already having trouble making ends meet, and if she cannot afford to pay off the ticket, she may once again end up washing police cars to earn her way out of jail and back to her job and family.

In Alexander City, where nearly 30 percent of the city’s 15,000 residents live below the poverty line, people who receive a fine for traffic violations and misdemeanors in court are told by the judge to go to the “back room” behind the judge’s bench. In the back room, which is not open to public, they must pay the fine in full before the end of business hours, or they are booked into the jail located in another part of the same building, according to a federal complaint filed by the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) on September […]

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The F-35 Joint Strike Fighter is supposed to replace almost 90 percent of America’s tactical aviation fleet. Too bad it ‘wasn’t optimized for dogfighting,’ according to the Air Force.

The U.S. Air Force has finally admitted that its new F-35 Joint Strike Fighter isn’t maneuverable enough to beat older jets in a dogfight. But despite its earlier promises that the pricey, radar-evading warplane would excel in close combat, now the flying branch insists that the stealthy F-35 doesn’t even need to dogfight.At a conference in Maryland on Sept. 15, Gen. Herbert Carlisle, head of the Air Force’s Air Combat Command, described the F-35 as not maneuverable as some of its predecessors.“That’s not what the airplane was designed to do,” Carlisle added, according to National Defense magazine. “It’s a multi-role airplane that has an incredibly comprehensive, powerful, integrated avionics and sensor suite.”Col. Edward Sholtis, an Air Combat Command spokesman, said the F-35 would be able to compensate for its relative sluggishness. “The F-35 wasn’t optimized for dogfighting maneuvers, […]

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