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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.
Stephan: Here is some wonderfully good news. President Biden is doing pretty well about responding meaningfully to remediating climate change. But it is going to take so much more.
President Biden announces suspension of oil and gas leases in Alaska’s Arctic National Wildlife Refuge
WASHINGTON (AP) — The Biden administration on Tuesday suspended oil and gas leases in Alaska’s Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, reversing a drilling program approved by the Trump administration and reviving a political fight over a remote region that is home to polar bears and other wildlife — and a rich reserve of oil.
The order by Interior Secretary Deb Haaland follows a temporary moratorium on oil and gas lease activities imposed by President Joe Biden on his first day in office. Biden’s Jan. 20 executive order suggested a new environmental review was needed to address possible legal flaws in a drilling program approved by the Trump administration under a 2017 law enacted by Congress.
After conducting a required review, Interior said it “identified defects in the underlying record of decision supporting the leases, including the lack of analysis of a reasonable range of alternatives″ required under the National Environmental Policy Act, a bedrock environmental law.
The remote, 19.6 million-acre refuge is home to polar bears, caribou, […]
Stephan: Republicans don't like public education, as Trumpian Education Secretary Betsy DeVos made explicit. But if there has to be public education they want to make sure students are indoctrinated with the right lies, not taught actual facts. The most dangerous force in America today is the Republican Party.
Texas Republican governor and White racist Greg Abbott. Credit: Bob Daemmrich/ZUMA Wire
The absurdity of the Republican Party’s culture wars has reached new heights. A slew of GOP-led state legislatures are enacting new laws that ban teaching “critical race theory” an academic framework that has become the latest conservative boogeyman.
Do you want to learn about racism, discrimination and privilege? Well, Republicans are trying to make it really hard to do so with a slew of bills designed to muzzle educators. In Texas, House Bill 3979 would limit how teachers talk about current events and historic racism in their classrooms. It also bans schools from teaching the 1619 Project, a New York Times endeavor which investigates US history starting with the year the first slaves were brought to what would become the United States. After some political maneuvering, the controversial bill appears to be headed to Republican Gov. Greg Abbott’s desk.
But in Oklahoma, where a critical race theory ban has taken place, the effects have already been chilling. Melissa Smith, an adjunct professor at Oklahoma City Community College, recently learned her […]
Stephan: Pope Francis has just issued new and stricter (although nowhere near strict enough) rules about sexual molestation by the clergy. Good news. But the truth, based on the facts as outlined in this article, is that the Roman Catholic Church, I think as a result of its celibacy rules, is a fundamentally perverted institution. It attracts the sexually dysfunctional and makes their sexual dysfunction worse.
02LEFT: REV. ROBERT “BUD” (KEVIN E. SCHMIDT/QUAD CITY TIMES VIA AP) CENTER: BISHOP ROBERT GUGLIELMONE OF THE ROMAN CATHOLIC DIOCESE OF CHARLESTON (AP PHOTO/BRUCE SMITH). RIGHT: ACTIVIST CATHOLIC PRIEST REV. MICHAEL PFLEGER (KAMIL KRZACZYNSKI/AFP/GETTY | COLLAGE BY CATHRYN VIRGINIA
When news broke this week that Chicago priest Michael Pfleger would be reinstated following multiple accusations of sexual abuse, one of his accusers was crushed. It had taken decades for him to even speak out about what he said he suffered at the hands of Pfleger, who is among the most well-known priests in the Catholic Church.
“It’s a cover-up because of his popularity,” the accuser, who asked to remain anonymous to protect his privacy, told VICE News. “They don’t see that side of him. They don’t know that side when I had bloody underwear. All they see is what’s going on with him now, what he has done since he has been at St. Sabina, the activist that he is now.”
The Chicago archdiocese initially removed Pfleger, a senior pastor at the St. Sabina Church on the South Side of Chicago, from […]
John Schwartz, Climate Reporter - The New York Times
Stephan: An early data point on a trend that is going to become a bigger and bigger issue over the next 20 years, and an important factor in causing internal migrations in nations all over the world, but particularly those close to the equator.
Cool drinks were distributed on a New Delhi roadside in 2017. Credit: Tsering Topgyal/Associated Press
More than a third of heat-related deaths in many parts of the world can be attributed to the extra warming associated with climate change, according to a new study that makes a case for taking strong action to reduce greenhouse gas emissions in order to protect public health.
The sweeping new research, published on Monday in the journal Nature Climate Change, was conducted by 70 researchers using data from major projects in the fields of epidemiology and climate modeling in 43 countries. It found that heat-related deaths in warm seasons were boosted by climate change by an average of 37 percent, in a range of a 20 percent increase to 76 percent.
Some earlier studies have performed similar analysis for individual cities during particular heat waves, but the new paper applies these ideas to hundreds of locations and across decades to draw broader conclusions.
“It is a thoughtful, insightful, clever approach to try to understand how climate change is altering heat-related mortality,” […]
Stephan: The American tax system is rigged to favor the rich, both individuals and corporations. I think many people understand that, but I am not sure they understand just how rigged the system is. Imagine what could have been done to foster wellbeing with the $100 billion discussed in this report?
An illustration picture taken in London on December 18, 2020 shows the logos of Google, Apple, Facebook, Amazon, and Microsoft displayed on a mobile phone and a laptop screen. (Photo: Justin Tallis/AFP/Getty
Bolstering demands for a global minimum tax to rein in corporations’ evasive tactics, a new analysis released Monday showed that a half dozen companies based in the United States paid almost $100 billion less in taxes over the past decade than stated in their annual reports.
Between 2011 and 2020, Amazon, Facebook, Alphabet (the owner of Google), Netflix, Apple, and Microsoft—known as the “Silicon Six”—paid roughly $219 billion in income taxes, which amounts to just 3.6% of their more than $6 trillion in total revenue, according to the Fair Tax Foundation. Income tax is paid on profits, not total revenue, and researchers said these tech giants are adept at reducing their tax liabilities by shifting profits to offshore tax havens.
Had the “Silicon Six” paid the prevailing tax rates in the countries in which they operate, they would have given global tax authorities over $149 billion more than they […]
David Badash, Staff Writer - Raw Story/The New Civil Rights Movement
Stephan: The Republican Party could not make it any clearer that they are a a White supremacist anti-democracy cult. Republican Texas governor Greg Abbott, based on a long series of actions and public statements doesn't seem to be very bright, or very subtle. He certainly makes no attempt to hide his contempt for democracy, and his commitment to White supremacy. But what amazes me is how many people in Texas seem to be quite comfortable with this. That has to be true because otherwise you have to ask yourself, how could a man like this get elected as governor? It isn't as if he makes any effort to hide his prejudices.
Fascist racist Gregg Abbott,Republican governor of Texas. Credit: Smiley N. Pool/The Dallas Morning News//TNS
“I will veto Article 10 of the budget passed by the legislature,” Abbott said on Twitter just minutes ago. “Article 10 funds the legislative branch. No pay for those who abandon their responsibilities.”
In an angry statement posted two minutes past midnight – when the Texas legislature’s session had officially ended – Abbott had said the voter suppression bill and bail reform were “must-pass emergency items” and promised he would call lawmakers back for a special session to pass those bills.Raw Story Exclusive: Michael Cohen Says Indictments Coming Within 60 days
Calling it “very on-brand for Texas Republicans,” Democratic Texas state Representative Gene Wu noted not only is Abbott defunding lawmakers, but the hourly workers:Punishing working class office staff, maintenance, and other support […]
Stephan: Why is this man not in prison? Because he was pardoned for multiple felonies by Trump. That apparently gave him the sense that he had a free pass to commit continued acts of treason. Those were no pardoned by Trump, so why hasn't he been charged for treason as a result of his words and actions as described in this report? There is something seriously wrong with a legal system that would arrest and kill a Black man for a minor traffic offense, but a former national security adviser can commit treason and walk away. And listen to the audience applaud and cheer him.
Here is the video of former national security advisor Michael Flynn saying that he thinks a coup like the coup in Myanmar should happen in the US. pic.twitter.com/7mGYjfXg18
Michael Flynn, former national security adviser in the Trump administration, appeared to call for a Myanmar-like coup to take place in the U.S. during a conference in Texas attended by many supporters of the QAnon conspiracy theory.
MarketWatch reports that Flynn made the remarks while speaking at the conference in Dallas, which was called “For God & and Country Patriot Roundup.” In a video shared online, someone from the audience asks Flynn, “I want to know why what happened in Myanmar can’t happen here?”
This question elicited a round of cheers from the audience.
Once the crowd quieted, Flynn responded, “No reason. I mean, it should happen here.”
Myanmar’s military seized power and overtook the country’s democratically-elected government in February. Since the coup, hundreds have been killed by Myanmar security forces and thousands of pro-democracy demonstrators have been detained according to the Assistance Association for Political Prisoners.
Flynn was former President Trump‘s first national security adviser before being fired […]
Stephan: I don’t actually know anyone who still smokes tobacco, do you? But, as this report describes, tobacco smokers have actually increased. It is a measure of how self-destructive humans are that people, particularly young people choose to ignore all the evidence and willfully surrender their wellbeing to addiction and slow form suicide.
The study said efforts to curb smoking had been outstripped by population growth. Credit: Khalil Mazraawi/AFP/Getty
Smoking killed almost 8 million people in 2019 and the number of smokers rose as the habit was picked up by young people around the world, according to new research.
A study published in the Lancet on Thursday said efforts to curb the habit had been outstripped by population growth with 150 million more people smoking in the nine years from 1990, reaching an all-time high of 1.1 billion.
The study’s authors said governments need to focus on reducing the uptake of smoking among young people, as 89% of new smokers were addicted by the age of 25 but beyond that age were unlikely to start.
“Young people are particularly vulnerable to addiction, and with high rates of cessation remaining elusive worldwide, the tobacco epidemic will continue for years to come unless countries can dramatically reduce the number of new smokers starting each year,” said the study’s lead author Marissa Reitsma, a researcher at the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation.
