Stephan: Six readers sent me this story this morning, from three different sources, and three different countries; it has gone viral worldwide. This is very serious stuff, and it is going to have global geopolitical implications.
The country we grew up in is changing before our eyes, and here is the most important data point of all: The Rasmussen Reports daily Presidential Tracking Poll for Friday shows that 45% of Likely U.S. Voters approve of President Trump’s job performance.
G20 meeting
Chris Uhlmann reporting for Australia’s ABCon Donald Trump & the G20. There is little I can add to this — transcribed below.
What we already knew Barry, that the President of the United States has a particular skill set – that he’s identified an illness in Western Democracies, but he has no cure for it and seems intent on exploiting it.
And we’ve also learned that he has no desire and no capacity to lead the world.
The G20 became the G19 as it ended.
On the Paris Climate Accords the US was left Isolated & friendless. But given that was always going to happen, a deft President would have found an issue around which he could rally most of the leaders. And he had the Perfect one – North Korea’s missile tests.
So where was the G20 statement condemning North Korea which would have put pressure on China and Russia?
Other leaders expected it. They were prepared to back it. But it never came.
There’s a tendency among some hopeful souls to confuse the speeches written for […]
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HIROKO TABUCHI, - The New York Times
Stephan: It has always been clear that there would come a moment when a leverage point was reached in a transition from national grid technology to some more localized variant. It should have been equally obvious of course that unless their was some careful planning to ease the transition the old way would not go without fighting to preserve its profits. Unfortunately we don't have a wellbeing fostering social order, so little planning or policy implementation has taken place.
Rooftop solar panels at a home in Indiana. The state is among several that have rolled back solar incentives.
Credit Luke Sharrett/The New York Times
Over the past six years, rooftop solar panel installations have seen explosive growth — as much as 900 percent by one estimate.
That growth has come to a shuddering stop this year, with a projected decline in new installations of 2 percent, according to projections from Bloomberg New Energy Finance.
A number of factors are driving the reversal, from saturation in markets like California to financial woes at several top solar panel makers.
But the decline has also coincided with a concerted and well-funded lobbying campaign by traditional utilities, which have been working in state capitals across the country to reverse incentives for homeowners to install solar panels.
Utilities argue that rules allowing private solar customers to sell excess power back to the grid […]
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, - Temple University Health System
Stephan: Here is the latest on Alzheimer research, and it is good news and something you should consider adopting in your own diet.
Credit: Magdalena Kucova/Shutterstock
The Mediterranean diet, rich in plant-based foods, is associated with a variety of health benefits, including a lower incidence of dementia. Now, researchers at the Lewis Katz School of Medicine at Temple University (LKSOM) have identified a specific ingredient that protects against cognitive decline: extra-virgin olive oil, a major component of the Mediterranean diet. In a study published online June 21 in the Annals of Clinical and Translational Neurology, the researchers show that the consumption of extra-virgin olive oil protects memory and learning ability and reduces the formation of amyloid-beta plaques and neurofibrillary tangles in the brain — classic markers of Alzheimer’s disease.
The Temple team also identified the mechanisms underlying the protective effects of extra-virgin olive oil. “We found that olive oil reduces brain inflammation but most importantly activates a process known as autophagy,” explained senior investigator Domenico Praticò, MD, Professor in the Departments of Pharmacology and Microbiology and the Center for Translational Medicine at LKSOM. Autophagy is the process by which cells break down and clear out intracellular […]
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E.A. Crunden, Reporter - Think Progress
Stephan: The conversion to electric vehicles is proceeding faster than anyone predicted, and the Trump administration and its commitment to carbon energy looks more and more isolated and peculiar. Here is the latest.
French roads
France plans to fully end the sale of fossil fuel-powered vehicles by 2040 in an effort to become a carbon-neutral nation, Energy Minister Nicolas Hulot announced Thursday in Paris. (emphasis added)
Aiming to be the world’s “number one green economy,” Hulot said gas and diesel-powered vehicles would be phased out over the course of the next two and a half decades, part of a larger effort to meet targets set by the Paris climate agreement. Coal-fired power plants will be eliminated, Hulot said, and citizens will be encouraged to produce their own energy, especially those who own homes. France will also introduce tax incentives — likely in the form of a pollution tax on aging vehicles, or a tax break tied to the purchase of new, cleaner cars — under the ambitious Climate Plan, in addition to ending oil and gas exploration on French land. While Hulot did not detail how France would enact these plans, he emphasized that […]
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Michael Birnbaum and Damian Paletta, - The Washington Post
Stephan: In virtually every European and British publication in English I see story after story about the diminishment of the United States, its abdication of world leadership and other such statements. This may seem like an abstraction with few implications for individual Americans, but I assure that is not the correct interpretation. The Trump administration is trashing the geopolitical balance what has assured peace and prosperity for almost three-quarters of a century. There will be a price, and we will all have to pay it.
G20 meeting
HAMBURG — The growing international isolation of the United States under President Trump was starkly apparent Friday as the leaders of major world economies mounted a nearly united opposition front against Washington on issues ranging from climate to free trade.
At a gathering of the Group of 20 world economic powers — normally a venue for drab displays of international comity — there were tough clashes with the United States and even talk of a possible transatlantic trade war.
The tensions were a measure of Trump’s sharp break with previous U.S. policies. They were also a warning signal of Washington’s diminished clout, as the leaders of the other nations who gathered in Hamburg mulled whether to fix their signatures to statements that would exclude Trump or to find some sort of compromise. Two European officials said they were leaning toward a united front against Washington.
[Tillerson and Trump are diplomatically outgunned at G-20]
German Chancellor Angela Merkel, who faced the difficult job of bridging the differences, made little attempt to paper over the […]
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