Monday, October 28th, 2019
Stephan: I continue to be fascinated by the growing schism trend that is taking most of Europe and the United States in antipodal directions. In the U.S. the Trump administration is opening up the pristine forests of Alaska to logging and oil exploration and encouraging fracking. In Europe, in contrast, they are trying to exit the carbon era as fast as they can and "rewilding" their land. Here is the latest on the European side of the trend, this time covering what is happening in Finland.
Spawning areas have been restored in Finnish rivers with support from Rewilding Europe Capital.
Credit: ARCTIC
Compelling comeback
What a difference a decade makes. Ten years ago fishermen from the village of Selkie in the Finnish region of Karelia woke to find thousands of dead fish floating in the Jukajoki River, poisoned by pollution from Linnunsuo, a nearby peat production area. Today, with support provided by Rewilding Europe Capital (Rewilding Europe’s enterprise loan facility), not only are Linnunsuo and the river system to which it is connected well on their way to being restored, but an ambitious and expanding rewilding programme now encompasses rivers, wetlands and forests right across Finland.
Tero Mustonen is director of Snowchange, a Finnish NGO and European Rewilding Network member which has played an instrumental role in the rewilding process. He expects the scope and positive impact of the process to continue their upward trajectory.
“Rewilding in Finland has already resulted in the return of thousands of migratory birds and the recovery of climate critical peatlands, while trout will […]
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Sunday, October 27th, 2019
ick Buxton & Todd Miller, - truthout
Stephan: Here is the story beneath the story of Trump's wall. As usual it is a tale of corruption and special interests. The United States has entered into a era of corruption that makes the Roman empire look good.
Donald Trump inspects border wall prototypes in San Diego, California, on March 13, 2018.
Donald Trump is a master of distraction, but he is also an illusionist and there are few illusions bigger than his favourite obsession – the US border wall. On 1 October the New York Times reported that Trump told aides he would like to electrify his proposed wall and add to it a water-filled trench, stocked with snakes or alligators. Much of the wall that Trump fantasises about already exists – 654 miles of physical barriers – built long before he came to office. The existing border is also far more deadly in effect than even Trump’s own disturbed imaginings. A physical wall can be easily cut through, climbed over or burrowed beneath, but it’s more difficult to escape the violence of the US border regime already in place.
Trump’s wall is a clever sleight of hand. For his supporters, the wall has become a powerful symbol of hostility to outsiders, suppressing national pathologies, history and injustices. But it also distracts […]
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Sunday, October 27th, 2019
Michela Tindera, - Forbes
Stephan: Citizens United, in my opinion, the worst Supreme Court decision since the Dred Scott decision in 1857, opened the floodgates of money that turned the majority of American Congress members both House and Senate into political whores whose affection could be purchased for money. This is a just-released story about Obama and a group of White racist billionaires, who did everything they could to keep him from being elected and, once elected to sabotage his ability to act.
Charles Schwab is one of at least 20 billionaires whose names appears on the 2012 donor list.
Credit: Getty
A nonprofit group with a bland name, Americans for Job Security, spent $5 million supporting Republicans in the 2010 midterms and $15 million denouncing former President Obama in the 2012 election, but until this week, the group never had to file disclosures showing where its money was coming from.
“This is the first time in the Citizens United-era that a dark money group was forced to disclose their donors in a certain time period,” said Jordan Libowitz, a spokersperson for nonprofit watchdog group Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, referring to the 2010 Supreme Court case that wiped away previous restrictions on political spending.
Americans for Job Security had previously claimed it was not a political organization and therefore did not have to disclose its donors. But after years of litigation, CREW convinced the Federal Election Commission otherwise. AJS filed a list of its backers and beneficiaries […]
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Sunday, October 27th, 2019
Sam Levin, - The Guardian (U.K.)
Stephan: The violence and thuggery of American police is like nothing else seen in any Western country.
According to VOX:
Isaiah Murrieta-Golding was handcuffed after a police officer shot him. Photograph:
Courtesy Jose Zavala/Chandler Law
Newly released video shows a Fresno, California, police officer shooting a fleeing, unarmed 16-year-old in the back of the head and then handcuffing the boy as he lies motionless on the ground.
Surveillance footage of the 14 April 2017 killing of Isiah Murrietta-Golding, released this week by the family’s attorney, has spread across the US, with critics calling it another example of extreme police brutality and unjustified lethal force that would have received little attention if lawyers hadn’t published the video.
The footage shows the teenager running from officers, jumping a fence, falling to the ground and continuing to flee. Murrietta-Golding was an estimated 35 feet away from the officers when one of them fired a single bullet into his head. The officer then hopped the fence, approached the boy’s limp body and handcuffed his hands behind his back.
The video comes after the police department in Fresno, a city in California’s Central Valley, refused to release […]
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Sunday, October 27th, 2019
Hannah Knowles , General Assignment Reporter - The Washington Post
Stephan: According to research done by the Washington Post, while police killings have dropped to an all-time low for four years in a row at least 1000 men, women, and children have been murdered by American police. I think it is very important to ask why this is not a matter of national urgency.
The San Bernardino Police Department released body-camera footage, which was edited by the department, on Oct. 25 showing the fatal shooting of Richard Sanchez.
Credit: San Bernardino Police Department
Officers yelled at Richard Sanchez to drop his gun — and eventually, he did. He started to walk toward law enforcement, out of a house a relative had fled to call 911 to report Sanchez was intoxicated, making threats and saying irrational things.
Police shouted for the 27-year-old man to put his hands up. He did that, too.
“Stop!” an officer ordered. Sanchez kept walking, arms still raised.
Three seconds and two commands later, the officer opened fire. Body-camera footage now released by police in San Bernardino, Calif., captures the five shots that killed Sanchez and a woman’s screams as he fell onto the lawn.
The officer’s decisions “did not meet the standards held by our […]
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