IF YOU ENJOY SR AND FIND IT USEFUL WOULD YOU PLEASE DONATE
When I began Schwartzreport my purpose was to produce an entirely fact-based daily publication in favor of the earth, the inter-connectedness and interdependence of all life, democracy, equality for all, liberty, and things that are life-affirming. Also, to warn my readers about actions, events, and trends that threaten those values. Our country now stands at a crossroads, indeed, the world stands at a crossroads where those values are very much at risk and it is up to each of us who care about wellbeing to do what we can to defend those principles. I want to thank all of you who have contributed to SR, particularly those of you who have scheduled an ongoing monthly contribution. It makes a big difference and is much appreciated. It is one thing to put in the hours each day and to do the work for free, but another to have to cover the rising out-of-pocket costs. For those of you who haven’t done so, but read SR regularly, I ask that you consider supporting it.
SARAH FERRIS and NICHOLAS WU, Staff Writers - Politico
Stephan: I think the Republicans under McConnell and McCarthy have made a bad error. These hearings are going to be based on videos and first-person witnesses. The Republicans are going to claim it is all political but, as with the George Floyd video, a critical consensus will emerge on what happened because people will see it with their own eyes.
Speaker Nancy Pelosi announced Thursday she would create a new committee to investigate what she said are “many questions” about the events leading up to the deadly Jan. 6 insurrection at the Capitol, and the federal response to that day.
“This morning, with great solemnity and sadness, I’m announcing that the House will be establishing a select committee on the Jan. 6 insurrection,” Pelosi said, adding that the committee will look into both the “root causes” of the storming of the Capitol, as well as broader security concerns for the complex.
“It is imperative that we seek the truth of what happened,” Pelosi said.
Democrats are moving to create the panel four weeks after Senate Republicans blocked a bipartisan effort to establish an independent commission. Pelosi said she still preferred a bipartisan approach, resembling Congress’s probe into the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, but said she had no indication Senate Republicans could be persuaded to ever agree to that tack.
Pelosi did not disclose who would lead the commission, saying she would “make those announcements later.” Several of her members, including House Majority Whip Jim Clyburn have privately pushed for Homeland Security Chair Bennie Thompson (D-Miss.), who seems to be the caucus favorite with […]
Stephan: Let's begin with Dick Cheney, lackey of the military-industrial industry, and his "Weapons of Mass Destruction," and trace the trend down to today. We have destroyed, Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria, and Yemen, and the only people to benefit are those on the M-I gravy train. Almost a trillion squandered in Afghanistan, to say nothing of the human suffering, violence, and death created.
What we are beginning to see clearly is that when only 1% of a population are involved with the military bad things happen.
The Taliban have seized control of a THIRD of Afghanistan as they continue to accelerate their blitz offensive while the US continues to withdraw their forces.
The US has wasted nearly $1trillion on the “pointless” 20-year battle trying to stave off the terror group who are fighting to gain ultimate control over the war-torn country.
The Taliban have been on tenterhooks to forge ahead with their scheme since President Joe Biden announced the withdrawal of troops back in April and have since continued at “lightning speed”.
Jihadist forces have now advanced across rural areas, putting them in reaching distance of major cities such as Herat and Kabul.
A recent US intelligence report warned they could take the capital, Kabul, within six months.
They have now seized hold in almost twice as much of Afghanistan as they had two months ago – sparking concerns they are planning an explosive offensive this summer.
It would see mark “the greatest jihadist victory since the Soviets quit in 1989,” one observer told the Daily Mail.
It would exceed even the worst-case scenarios US intelligence warned of months ago, prompting President Biden […]
Stephan: When you travel abroad you can always spot the Americans. It isn't their clothes, teenagers in Shanghai have hipper clothes than teenagers in Los Angeles. Nor their haircuts. Nor their gadgets. What makes Americans stand out is their weight, both men, and particularly women.
Let me be clear, the U.S. population is not the fattest in the world. According to the World Atlas, "the world's most obese countries are small Pacific Island nations such as Nauru, Palau, and Tuvalu, to name a few. Approximately half of the population of these countries are obese. The reason is that almost all of the food consumed in these island nations are imported and therefore expensive. However, fast-food chains offer a cheaper and more convenient alternative.
"The Pacific island nations are closely followed by a string of Middle Eastern nations – Kuwait, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and Libya. Around three-quarters of the population in these countries is overweight and well over a third is considered obese."
But you don't see a lot of tourists in Paris from Nauru, and Islamic nations often wear deliberately baggy, clothes, particularly the women, so it is hard to tell much about their weight. But amongst Europeans and Asians, Americans stand out for their weight, and they are getting more obese every year.
The United States is the world's 10th most obese country and the most obese country in North America with 36.2% of its population having a body mass index of over 30.0. Nearly 78 million adults and 13 million children in the United States deal with the health and emotional effects of obesity every day. According to the CDC, an average adult is 26 pounds heavier now than in the 1950s.
This obesity issue is linked to all kinds of illnesses, but until now obesity as a source of pain had not been established. Now it has.
Restricting certain foods — like “junk” food and sweets — in the name of health can be problematic for those who are… Credit: Chuck Burton / The Associated Press
The Western diet is associated with many ills, and now chronic pain may be added to the list.
Fats provide important health benefits, but they can be too much of a good thing. Most people eat too many omega-6 fats and not enough omega-3. A new study looks at the potential for omega-6 fats’ influence on neuropathic pain in people with diabetes and other conditions.
Researchers at the University of Texas Health Science Center at San Antonio studied the effects of omega-6 fatty acids themselves by measuring the role of these dietary lipids in pain conditions and found that the substances themselves seem to cause pain and inflammation.
The abundance of omega-6 polyunsaturated fats prominent in the typical Western diet “served as a significant risk factor for both inflammatory and neuropathic pain,” UT said in a statement.
Diabetes, autoimmune disorders and cardiovascular diseases are known to be affected by nutritional choices, the researchers said. […]
Stephan: I have been warning this was coming for years. The states in the West that have the worst water problems are also the states where the MAGA militia cretins are strongest. This article gives a sense of what is happening, and what is coming.
In 2021, some western states have been suffering record drought — one of the many examples of the type of crisis people can expect as climate change continues to accelerate. Far-right extremists in western states, however, aren’t pointing the finger at climate change, but rather, are using the drought to attack their usual targets, from Jews to Latinos. Journalist Kelly Weill, in an article published by the Daily Beast on June 24, describes some of the ways in which the drought is inflaming political tensions in western states and bringing extremists and conspiracy theorists out of the woodwork.
One of the effects of climate change, according to scientists, is more hurricanes and severe flooding in places that are prone to hot, humid weather and more droughts and wildfires in places that are prone to hot, dry weather. Humid Florida has a long history of being battered by hurricanes, but it can expect them to become more frequent as climate change accelerates. Similarly, residents […]
Stephan: As a result of the Trump EPA pro-pesticide decisions, the decline of bees in the U.S., which I have reported on several times in the past, continues. This has critical implications for the country's agriculture and your life and the life of your family. You can expect your food prices to go up, and you can also see less healthy plants in your garden. Seen in the context of the concurrent radical decline of the Monarch butterflies it is obvious that industrial chemical monoculture agriculture is destroying the planet's ecosystems and is not sustainable.
Working bees on honey cells Credit: Shutterstock
Beekeepers this year in the United States reported the second highest annual loss of managed honey bee colonies since records began in 2006, according to results of a nationwide survey released Wednesday.
The non-profit Bee Informed Partnership (BIP) said in its preliminary analysis that beekeepers—ranging from small backyard keepers to commercial operations—lost 45.5% of their colonies between April 2020 and April 2021. The results are based on a survey of over 3,300 U.S. beekeepers managing a combined 192,384 colonies.
“The worrisome part is we see no progression towards a reduction of losses.”
“This year’s survey results show that colony losses are still high,” said Nathalie Steinhauer, BIP’s science coordinator and a post-doctoral researcher in the University of Maryland Department of Entomology, in a statement.
The annual loss is 6.1 percentage points higher than the average loss rate of 39.4% over the last 10 years, the researchers said.
“Though we see fluctuations from year to year,” said Steinhauer, “the worrisome part is we see no progression towards a reduction of losses.”
Stephan: Have you ever wondered why police violence in the United States is so very different from every other developed democracy in the world? How is it over 1,000 people a year are killed by American police when, in a country like Norway, police don't even fire their weapons more than once or twice in a year, and rarely kill anyone, and certainly not as George Floyd was murdered by Derek Chauvin while three other police officers looked on and did nothing to stop the torture and killing?
Part of it is clearly the training. Police in other countries go through several years of training and must have college degrees, while U.S. police require nothing more than a high school diploma, and only train for a few months. But another part of it is the consciousness that is instilled in trainees, and that continues thereafter. The idea that the police are at war with the people they are supposed to serve. This is the best essay I have read on this subject.
Illustration by Danielle Del Plato
In may 2020, Darnella Frazier, a 17-year-old with a smartphone camera, documented the killing of George Floyd by a Minneapolis police officer. Most Americans who watched the video of Floyd begging for his life, as Officer Derek Chauvin kneeled on his neck, saw a human being. Robert Kroll did not. The head of the Police Officers Federation of Minneapolis saw a “violent criminal” and viewed the protests that followed as a “terrorist movement.” In a letter to union members, he complained that Chauvin and the three other officers involved in Floyd’s death had been “terminated without due process.”
Kroll’s response was typical. In the apocalyptic rhetoric of police-union leaders, every victim of police misconduct is a criminal who had it coming, and anyone who objects to such misconduct is probably also a criminal, and, by implication, a legitimate target of state violence. Due process is a privilege reserved for the righteous—that is, police officers who might lose their jobs, not the citizens who might lose their lives in a chance encounter with law […]
Stephan: Jennifer Rubin in this essay describes another aspect of The Great Schism Trend that is becoming such a pronounced feature of the United States. About a third of Americans are now living in what Rachel Maddow calls "Earth 2," something new in our history. There have been other times when the country was severely divided, but this is the first time one side lives in a fact-based world, and the other does not.
Doses of coronavirus vaccines are seen at a vaccination facility in Cloverdale, California. Credit: Melina Mara/The Washington Post
We have plenty of fault lines in America, including those having to do with race, religion and class. Now, we have a fault line based on the willful refusal to embrace science. This is not an academic issue; it will kill many Americans. Others will experience long-term side effects.
Bloomberg reports: “Covid-19 transmission is accelerating in several poorly vaccinated states, primarily in the South plus Missouri and Utah, and more young people are turning up at hospitals. The data present the clearest sign of a rebound in the U.S. in months.” This failure seems to be the result of rotten, red-state governments that routinely fail to meet the needs of its people, a toxic MAGA culture that spurns scientific expertise, and a self-destructive, right-wing media that discourages rational thinking.
Certainly, an evangelical Christian movement that embraces conspiracy theories and refuses to hold people accountable for their actions also plays […]
Stephan: If you read me regularly you know that for some time I have been saying the problem with America is Americans, and the fact that we cannot tell ourselves the truth about ourselves and, thus, in spite of our economic strength, our society is exceptional only its social inferiority across a wide range of social outcome measures. Facts are facts. Nicholas Kristoff seems to have come to the same conclusion.
“America is back” became President Biden’s refrain on his European trip this month, and in a narrow sense it is.
Credit: Erin Kirkland/The New York Times
We no longer have a White House aide desperately searching for a fire alarm to interrupt a president as he humiliates our country at an international news conference, as happened in 2018. And a Pew Research Center survey found that 75 percent of those polled in a dozen countries expressed “confidence in the U.S. president to do the right thing,” compared with 17 percent a year ago.
Yet in a larger sense, America is not back. In terms of our well-being at home and competitiveness abroad, the blunt truth is that America is lagging. In some respects, we are sliding toward mediocrity.
Greeks have higher high school graduation rates. Chileans live longer. Fifteen-year-olds in Russia, Poland, Latvia and many other countries are better at math than their American counterparts — perhaps a metric for where nations will stand in a generation […]
