Josh Keefe, - International Business Times/The Raw Story
Stephan: Much of the social research on money and politics is partisan crap, paid for by entities that have a vested interest in a certain outcome. And the protocols get very iffy. But we are beginning to see some good stuff, as this report describes. What it tells us is that the United States is in a crisis of corruption.
Credit: Shutterstock
For politicians, decrying money’s influence in politics is almost always a safe bet. Much of Donald Trump’s and Bernie Sanders’ appeal in last year’s presidential election came from their attacks on money in Washington, D.C., with Trump promising to “drain the swamp” when elected. Overwhelming majorities consistently affirm to pollsters a belief that money has a corrupting effect on the U.S. government. But few have been able to precisely quantify that corrupting effect and measure how much money it takes to move congressional votes. Until now.
Because there are so many factors and variables influencing political decisions, researchers have found it difficult to prove causation between campaign money and congressional votes. But in a new study, researchers led by Thomas Ferguson believe they found a group of public officials that illustrates money’s impact: Democrats who changed their mind about Dodd-Frank.
Ferguson and his team assert that they were able to document exactly how the finance industry, which lobbied heavily to undue parts of the historic 2010 law, […]
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Stephan: Another SR prediction validated. As a result of the protectionist carbon centered energy policies of the Republican Party, now brought into full focus under Trump, the United States is forfeiting millions of jobs -- Non carbon energy workers already exceed coal workers in the U.S. -- and the prosperity that comes from being preeminent in the new technology. This report lays it out.
I want to be clear here. China is not a social order under which I would care to live; I want to live in a wellness oriented democracy. But the Chinese have a president who serves for a decade, a system that is designed to think in terms of centuries, and a population of nearly 1.5 billion that is at peace and whose collective intention is to stay that way.
A Chinese solar panel factory
Quora Questions are part of a partnership between Newsweek and Quora, through which we’ll be posting relevant and interesting answers from Quora contributors throughout the week. Read more about the partnership here.
Answer from Michael Barnard, low-carbon innovation analyst:
Is it right for China to invest in solar rather than coal? Absolutely yes, with a shaving of nuance.
First off, is solar a good energy generation type to invest in? Yes, completely.
It’s not quite as cheap as onshore wind generation at utility scale right now, but it’s now price competitive with natural gas generation in a large number of companies including some of the biggest such as the USA, China and India. And it’s getting cheaper fast. The last projection of completely apple-to-apple generation prices indicated that wind and solar prices will intersect around 2022 and be so cheap that other sources would have to be even more heavily subsidized through multiple tax […]
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Paula Cocozza , - Alternet
Stephan: One of the best ways to assess the wellbeing of a nation is how it treats its children, which is to say its future. In the United States we do very poorly, so poorly in fact that the social outcome data suggest a declining future. Even to shortened life span. Here is one of the reasons I think this.
Credit: Screen Capture from “Resiliance” film trailer.
There is a scene in James Redford’s new film, Resilience, in which a paediatrician cites a parental misdeed so outmoded as to seem bizarre. “Parents used to smoke in the car with kids in the back and the windows rolled up,” she says, incredulous. How long ago those days now seem; how wise today’s parents are to the dangers of those toxins. Yet every week in her clinic in the Bayview-Hunters Point area of San Francisco, children present with symptoms of a new pollutant – one that is just as damaging. But unlike the smoke-filled car, this new pollutant is invisible, curling undetected around children’s lives and causing lasting damage to their lungs, their hearts, their immune systems.
“Stress,” Redford says. “It is a neurotoxin like lead or mercury poisoning.” He mentions the city of Flint in Michigan, where residents were exposed to lead in drinking water. “And that’s literally what’s going on” with […]
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Caitlin Dewey and Moriah Balingit, - The Washington Post
Stephan: The sheer nastiness of this is defines the word nefarious.
Secretary of Agriculture Sonny Perdue has lunch with elementary schoolchildren at Catoctin Elementary School in Leesburg, Va. Perdue and Sen. Pat Roberts (R-Kan.) visited the school to unveil an interim rule “designed to provide flexibility for school meals.”
Credit: Jahi Chikwendiu/The Washington Post
After only six days on the job, Agriculture Secretary Sonny Perdue moved to stall one of former first lady Michelle Obama’s signature accomplishments: stricter nutritional standards for school breakfasts and lunches, which feed more than 31 million children.
Speaking at Catoctin Elementary School in Leesburg, Va., on Monday with Sen. Pat Roberts (R-Kan.) and Patricia Montague of the School Nutrition Association, Perdue announced that his department would be slowing the implementation of aggressive standards on sodium, whole grains and sweetened milks that passed under the Obama administration.
The measure is similar to a policy rider that House Republicans inserted in this week’s appropriations bill. It also echoes a bipartisan compromise made by Senate Republicans and Democrats last year, which did not pass before the end of the session.
“We know […]
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Mac McClelland, - Rollingstone
Stephan: This is an excellent article on the role of drugs that allow one to open to nonlocal consciousness and wellbeing. Well researched and written.
What Psychedelics Really Do to Your Brain
Dr. X is a dad. Appropriately – boringly – at 4:37 p.m. on a national holiday, he is lighting a charcoal grill, about to grab a pair of tongs with one hand and a beer with the other. His kids are running around their suburban patio, which could be anywhere; Dr. X, though impressively educated now, grew up poor in a town that is basically nowhere. Like most Americans, he is a Christian. Like a lot of health-conscious men, he fights dad bod by working out once or twice a week, before going into his medical practice.
Inside how ayahuasca, MDMA, DMT and psilocybin mushrooms affect the body – and how researchers are using them to help people with mental illness
Somewhat less conventionally, two hours ago, he was escorting a woman around his yard, helping her walk off a large dose of MDMA. He’s the one who’d given it to her, earlier in the morning, drugging her out of her mind.
This would be psychedelic-assisted therapy, the […]
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