Jake Johnson, Seniors Editor and Staff writer - Common Dreams
Stephan:
It is a measure of how sick American society has become that voters elect to Congressional offices Republicans who in turn vote to trash their lives, as this report describes.
Republican MAGAt Rep. Jodey Arrington of Texas speaks at a press conference on April 26, 2023 in Washington, D.C. Credit: Tasos Katopodis / Getty
The new proposal underscores the Republican Party’s “thirst for cruel budget cuts,” said Democratic Rep. Brendan Boyle
House Republicans unveiled a budget blueprint on Tuesday that proposes trillions of dollars in federal spending reductions over the next decade, specifically targeting Medicaid and federal nutrition assistance for steep cuts.
House Budget Committee Republicans’ new resolution also calls for the establishment of a “bipartisan debt commission” to examine and propose changes to “the drivers of U.S. debt… such as Social Security and Medicare.” (Social Security does not, in fact, contribute to long-term federal deficits.)
“MAGA Republicans are driving our nation towards a costly government shutdown because they want to make cruel cuts to everything from healthcare to education, and this MAGA Budget doubles down on their extreme cuts,” Rep. Brendan Boyle (D-Pa.), the top Democrat on the House Budget Committee, said in response to the new […]
We are being warned again and again that we are destroying earth’s ecosystems to our own detriment. And yet what are the Republicans in the House trying to do. Cut support for, Medicaid, and a host of other social programs designed to foster wellbeing. I think these MAGAt men and women are contemptible, but what worries me even more are the people who voted these cretins into office.
Scientists warn that entire genera are being driven to extinction by human activities including overfishing Credit: Carl de Souza
Humans are driving the loss of entire branches of the “Tree of Life,” according to a new study published on Monday which warns of the threat of a sixth mass extinction.
“The extinction crisis is as bad as the climate change crisis. It is not recognized,” said Gerardo Ceballos, professor at the National Autonomous University of Mexico, and co-author of the study published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS).
“What is at stake is the future of mankind,” he told AFP.
The study is unique because instead of merely examining the loss of a species, it examines the extinction of entire genera.
In the classification of living beings, the genus lies between the rank of species and that of family. For example, dogs are a species belonging to the genus canis — itself in the canid family.
“It is a really significant contribution, I think the first time anyone has attempted to assess modern extinction rates […]
The corruption of the U.S. Congress is so great that this is the result. American petroleum corporations continue to promote carbon energy to keep their profits high, even though it is destroying the earth’s ecosystems.
Oil pumps Credit: RSN
The US accounts for more than a third of the expansion of global oil and gas production planned by mid-century, despite its claims of climate leadership, research has found.
Canada and Russia have the next biggest expansion plans, calculated based on how much carbon dioxide is likely to be produced from new developments, followed by Iran, China and Brazil. The United Arab Emirates, which is to host the annual UN climate summit this year, Cop28 in Dubai in November, is seventh on the list.
The data, in a report from the campaign group Oil Change International, also showed that five “global north countries” – the US, Canada, Australia, Norway and the UK – will be responsible for just over half of all the planned expansion from new oil and gas fields to 2050.
Greenhouse gas emissions from all of the oil and gas expansion that is planned in the next three decades would be more than enough to drive global temperatures well beyond […]
Trump has a long history of anti-semitism, and as he becomes more deranged he is becoming more blatant about it, as well as his anti-Black racism. And yet he remains the leading candidate of the Republican Party, which tells one so much about Republican voters.
Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish New Year, began at sundown on Friday and Donald Trumpposted his own message with a veiled threat to so-called “liberal Jews.”
“Just a quick reminder for liberal Jews who voted to destroy America & Israel because you believed false narratives! Let’s hope you learned from your mistake & make better choices moving forward! Happy New Year!” the meme says.
It goes on to list the “things Trump did” for Jews while he was in office. It claims among other things, that Trump “signed an executive order for Judaism to be a nationality in addition to a religion so it would fall under the category Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. That act prohibits discrimination on the basis of race, color and national origin in programs receiving federal financial assistance.”
The meme eliminated a key part of what the Civil Rights Act says. The Civil Rights Act of 1964 “prohibits discrimination on the basis of race, color, religion, sex or national origin.” The meme eliminates the word “religion” from the description of what the Civil Rights Act did. As a […]
Daniel Boffey , Chief Reporter - The Guardian (U.K.)
Stephan:
Take this as an example of corporate greed placing profit above all other considerations. This is only possible because since Reagan the Republican Party has been changing the tax structure, and loosening control of the corporations controlled by of the uber-rich, who rented them to make it happen. This should have been a criminal offense.
Ukrainian forces retaking control of an oil and gas drilling platform in the Black Sea. Credit: Telegram/@DIUkraine / AFP /Getty
US oil and gas multinationals are facing fresh questions over their trade with Russia after customs records revealed that more than $7.1m (£5.7m) worth of equipment manufactured by Halliburton has been imported into the country since it announced the end of its Russian operations.
Last September Halliburton, one of the world’s largest providers of products and services for oil and gas exploration, sold its Russian office to local management amid pressure on all US companies to cease their trade after the invasion of Ukraine.
Russian customs records seen by the Guardian show that despite this move to sell up on 8 September, Halliburton subsidiaries exported equipment of a value of $5,729,600 to its former operation in Russia in the six weeks that followed the sale.
The equipment was largely shipped from the US and Singapore although the records show it originated in a range of countries, including the UK, Belgium and France.
The bulk of exports from the subsidiaries ended on […]
