JOE ROMM, - Think Progress
Stephan: Forty three percent of Americans do not believe in climate change -- correlated strongly with the Republican christofascist Trumper cult -- and even the 57 percent who do aren't sure what can or should be done. Meanwhile, planet earth is literally changing beneath our feet.
Scientists Led by the University of Edinburgh used drone-mounted cameras to study erosion of permafrost coastline in the Canadian Arctic. Credit: Noah Bell
Drone surveys have revealed erosion of coastal permafrost in the Arctic — up to 3 feet a day. Researchers reported Friday that the recent rate of erosion is six times higher than the historical rate.
Meanwhile, the Arctic just saw the hottest May on record, with temperatures in northwest Russia hitting a remarkable 84 degrees Fahrenheit (29 degrees Celsius). Global warming is driving Arctic sea ice to near-record lows, which in turn is driving ever-worsening summer heat waves in the southern United States, according to another new study.
In the first study, a team led by University of Edinburgh scientists flew drone-mounted cameras over a section of permafrost coastline in the Canadian Arctic.
They found that during a 40-day period in the summer of 2017, the coast had retreated a remarkable 47 feet — with daily rates of collapse sometimes exceeding 3 feet.
“Big chunks of soil and ground break […]
1 Comment
Katelyn Beaty, - The New York Times
Stephan: Here is another one of those pieces that gives a nonmember of the cult a view into the christofascist fundamentalist world where sex and sexuality are so torturously dysfunctional. I run these pieces because if you didn't grow up in that world it is very hard to understand how that portion of Americans view life.
CreditCreditIllustration by Najeebah Al-Ghadban; Photograph via Metropolitan Museum of Art
When I was 14, a circuit speaker came to my church’s youth group to talk about sexual purity. I don’t remember many details from the talk but vividly recall signing a True Love Waits pledge, a small notecard promising that I would remain a virgin until marriage. Twenty years later, that ritual strikes me as almost innocuous — how much power do we give to the scribbled signature of a teenager who had only the faintest idea what sex was? Yet it also carried a psychological burden that many of my peers and I are still unloading.
A majority of adults who came of age in evangelical churches in the 1990s and 2000s were exposed to “purity culture,” a term for teachings that stressed sexual abstinence before marriage. We had our own rituals, such as “purity balls,” and our own merchandise, such as “purity rings.” I had a “Wait for Me Journal”Read the Full Article
No Comments
Saturday, June 15th, 2019
Donald Shaw, Money-in-Politics - Sludge
Stephan: How many ways does the Republican Party need to tell voters they do not support a healthy democracy before Americans awaken from their stupor? Or is it the real truth that Americans themselves no longer care about living in a democracy.
In spite of every presidential and Congressional crime that emerges every day, Trump's approval rating today is 42.4% so I think we have to realize that almost half of American voters don't really care about democracy. They care more about their racism, or the suppression of women, or their personal greed, or just don't want to be bothered with voting at all.
Republican Senator and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell
In 2016, Russian hackers targeted voting systems in 21 states and, according to Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s report, breached systems in Illinois and two counties in Florida, gaining access to information on millions of registered voters. In his report, Mueller described the Russian government’s interference in the 2016 elections as “sweeping and systematic.”
Three years later, security experts warn that not enough has been done to address vulnerabilities in the U.S. election system. The director of the Federal Bureau of Investigations recently told Congress that “the threats just keep escalating,” adding that he viewed the 2018 midterms as a “dress rehearsal for the big show in 2020.”
In fourteen states, some 2018 midterm voters submitted their votes on touchscreens that did not produce paper trails necessary to verify their votes or audit election outcomes. If votes had been inaccurately processed in these precincts—whether through equipment errors or foreign hacking operations—election officials wouldn’t have been able to find or correct the problems.
Several Democratic and Republican […]
1 Comment
Saturday, June 15th, 2019
Sophia Tesfaye , - AlterNet/Salon
Stephan: Yet more on the corruption of democracy by the Republican Party. We don't really have a two party system anymore. We have one christofascist White supremacist cult and a party that dithers, runs around waving its hands in the air putting party above country.
Republican Senator Marsha Blackburn
At least a dozen Republican congressional campaigns used materials stolen from Democrats by Russian hackers during the 2016 election. Several other Republican campaigns received millions in contributions from an oligarch with close ties to Russian President Vladimir Putin. In 2018, the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee called on the National Republican Congressional Committee to make a bipartisan pledge not to utilize stolen or hacked information in House elections. After months of negotiations, in September of 2018, House Republicans backed out and refused to sign the pledge. These are just some of the often-overlooked reasons why Republicans have been so reluctant to criticize President Trump’s willingness to accept “dirt” on an opposing candidate from a foreign government.
One day after Trump told ABC’s George Stephanopoulos that he wouldn’t necessarily go to the FBI in the event his re-election campaign is contacted by foreign groups, Senate Republicans killed legislation to safeguard American democracy from foreign interference.
Democratic Sen. Mark […]
No Comments
Saturday, June 15th, 2019
Benjamin D. Katz, - Bloomberg
Stephan: In the U.S. we have the poorly designed lethal Boeing 737 that has now killed several hundred people because of its design flaws. In Europe they have... the hybrid electric Airbus. Which plane do you think represents the future?
Airbus hybrid electric aircraft
Airbus SE is considering bringing the world’s first hybrid-electric airliner to market as it weighs its strategy for replacing the bread-and-butter A320neo narrowbody in the next 15 years — a move that would mark a technological leap for the aerospace industry.
The European planemaker has grown confident that the revolutionary propulsion system will be ready for roll-out on an all-new single-aisle jet around 2035, according to people with knowledge of its planning. While the company has been public about its interest in hybrid engines, Airbus is now willing to consider powering its most important aircraft with the technology, said the people, who asked not to be named discussing internal deliberations.
Timelines aren’t certain and will shift as different capabilities evolve, the people said, adding that Airbus would start with a smaller single-aisle and work its way up to a size comparable to the A321neo, which seats as many 240 people. Any decision to move forward would also take into account market dynamics and competition with global rival Read the Full Article
