ALICE MIRANDA OLLSTEIN and MEGAN MESSERLY, Staff Writers - Politico
Stephan:
I think it is time that Americans face what the United States has become. I never see this discussed on news channels and only very rarely in print. We have dreadful infant mortality, awful maternal mortality, rotten child care, hundreds of thousands of hungry children, and terrible family support for low income families, and families of color. And now as this article describes particularly in Republican controlled Red states we are becoming a third world country in prenatal and maternity care. All of this is the result of Republican Party connivance but, more importantly, these people are in office because of voters. The problem with America, is about a third of the American population, and what is being done now it is going to shape America for a generation.
An individual enters the Greenwood OB/GYN Associates clinic across the street from the Greenwood Leflore Hospital in Greenwood, Miss., Oct. 21, 2022. Credit: Rogelio V. Solis / AP
New data from the nonpartisan health advocacy group March of Dimes shows that the U.S. saw a 4 percent decline in hospitals with labor and delivery services between 2019 and 2020.
Access to maternal health care is evaporating in much of the country, as hospitals close and obstetricians become harder to find for millions of pregnant people.
New data from the nonpartisan health advocacy group March of Dimes shows that the U.S. — which already has the worst maternal mortality rate among developed nations — saw a 4 percent decline in hospitals with labor and delivery services between 2019 and 2020.
But the raw figure masks the inequities playing out across the country, according to the report. Alabama and Wyoming lost nearly one-quarter of their birthing hospitals in that time period, while Idaho, Indiana and West Virginia lost roughly 10 percent.
“It’s a crisis,” said Stacey Brayboy, the senior vice […]
BRITTANY PETERSON and SIBI ARASU, Reporters - Associated Press
Stephan:
This is good news. Long overdue, but good news nonetheless. It is new technologies like what this report describes that must be implemented to prepare us for the devastating effects of climate change.
This artist’s rendering provided by Solar AquaGrid, shows a wide-span solar canal canopy being piloted in California’s Central Valley. Credit: Solar AquaGrid / AP
Back in 2015, California’s dry earth was crunching under a fourth year of drought. Then-Governor Jerry Brown ordered an unprecedented 25% reduction in home water use. Farmers, who use the most water, volunteered too to avoid deeper, mandatory cuts.
Brown also set a goal for the state to get half its energy from renewable sources, with climate change bearing down.
Yet when Jordan Harris and Robin Raj went knocking on doors with an idea that addresses both water loss and climate pollution — installing solar panels over irrigation canals — they couldn’t get anyone to commit.
Fast forward eight years. With devastating heat, record-breaking wildfire, looming crisis on the Colorado River, a growing commitment to fighting climate change, and a little bit of movement-building, their company Solar AquaGrid and partners are preparing to break ground on the first solar-covered canal project in the United States.
American life expectancy is actually decreasing. Here are simple things that can extend your life by many years. The only thing I would add is to develop the daily practice of meditation. If you are interested, I have created a nonreligious technique, Meditation for Modern Minds,. It is a technique based entirely on the scientific research on meditation.
It’s clear now more than ever that living longer is heavily influenced by lifestyle choices like diet and exercise, but a recent unpublished study found that certain habits can add more than 20 additional years to your life.
The research, presented last month at the American Society for Nutrition’s annual meeting, found that practicing eight healthy habits at age 40 was associated with an additional 24 years of life for men.
Women saw similar benefits from incorporating the practices in their lives at age 40, with 21 extra years added to their lives.
“We were really surprised by just how much could be gained with the adoption of one, two, three, or all eight lifestyle factors,” said Xuan-Mai Nguyen, lead study author and health science specialist at the Department of Veterans Affairs, in a press release.
“The earlier the better, but even if you only make a small change in your 40s, 50s, or 60s, it still is beneficial.”
8 habits that could add up to 24 years to your life
You may have noticed that the Fitch credit rating of the U.S. has been down graded. What is Fitch? To quote Investopedia, “Fitch offers sovereign credit ratings that describe each nation’s ability to meet its debt obligations. Sovereign credit ratings are available to investors to help give them insight into the level of risk associated with investing in a particular country.” This all may seem very arcane and of little relevance to your life but in fact the Fitch rating has all sort of implications for the lives of ordinary people. But apart from that, why is this happening? Here, I think, is a good explanation of why this matters and who is responsible for this happening.
House Speaker Kevin McCarthy talks to reporters at the U.S. Capitol Building on July 25, 2023. Credit: Anna Moneymaker / Getty
Democratic lawmakers and economists placed the blame squarely on the Republican Party after Fitch downgraded the United States’ long-term credit rating on Tuesday, citing repeated standoffs over the nation’s debt ceiling in recent years.
The downgrade from AAA—the highest possible rating—to AA+ came months after President Joe Biden and House Republicans reached an agreement to lift the debt ceiling until January 2025, setting the stage for another potentially damaging fight just after the presidential election.
Earlier this year, Republicans—led by House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.)—used the need to raise the debt ceiling and avoid a catastrophic default as leverage to pursue sweeping federal spending cuts, more punitive work requirements for aid recipients, and other right-wing priorities.
Rep. Brendan Boyle (D-Pa.), the top Democrat on the House Budget Committee, said Tuesday that the credit downgrade “rests on the shoulders of Speaker McCarthy and the extreme MAGA Republicans who openly rooted for default.”
Eduardo Garcia, Climate Change Journalst - The Revelator
Stephan:
The world, including the United States faces arguably the greatest existential crisis humanity has ever faced — climate change. The need to properly educate children on this crisis and what to do about it is going to determine how successful states are in responding to what is happening. As this article describes all of this has become enmeshed in the Republican culture war to the long term detriment of the Red states.
Citation: To read the study referenced in this article see the research study by the National Center for Science Education: Making the Grade.
States rated “F” in educating children about climate change are:
Alabama
Georgia
South Carolina
Texas
Virginia
States rated “D” in educating children about climate change are:
Indiana
West Virginia
Florida
Ohio
What do you notice about that? Except for Virginia which is purple but has a Republican governor, all the low ranking states are Red, Republican controlled states.
Climate change education has been caught in the crossfire of the culture wars. While some U.S. states are boosting climate literacy, others are effectively miseducating children by depriving them of the skills they’ll need to face the biggest challenge of their generation.
Studies show that climate education can help inspire kids to become more resilient, teach them about climate solutions, and prepare them to take jobs in the flourishing clean energy economy ― all while reducing climate anxiety and the carbon footprint of schools. Perhaps more importantly, advocates say that climate education has a positive ripple effect in local communities and across generations.
However, despite the rapid increase in heatwaves, droughts and climate-induced wildfires, K-12 teachers in most states typically devote just a couple of class hours per school year to climate change. And in recent years, several bills supporting climate education have failed in the U.S. Congress.
But behind the scenes, there’s a major push by advocates striving to improve climate education in two major ways: by training teachers, and […]
