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.
Stephan: While we dither and argue about climate change we are beginning to see massive change in the planet. Here another just discovered example of what I mean. Ten years from now we will be living in a different world.
Melting ice in the Arctic
The massive melting of glaciers as a result of global heating has caused marked shifts in the Earth’s axis of rotation since the 1990s, research has shown. It demonstrates the profound impact humans are having on the planet, scientists said.
The planet’s geographic north and south poles are the point where its axis of rotation intersects the surface, but they are not fixed. Changes in how the Earth’s mass is distributed around the planet cause the axis, and therefore the poles, to move.
In the past, only natural factors such as ocean currents and the convection of hot rock in the deep Earth contributed to the drifting position of the poles. But the new research shows that since the 1990s, the loss of hundreds of billions of tonnes of ice a year into the oceans resulting from the climate crisis has caused the poles to move in new directions.
The scientists found the direction of polar drift shifted from southward to eastward in 1995 and that the average speed of drift from 1995 to 2020 was 17 times faster […]
Stephan: The District of Columbia whose population this year is 714,153, has a population that is just slightly smaller than the populations of North Dakota and Alaska, and larger than the populations of Vermont and Wyoming. Yet while those states all have two senators, and at least one representative in the House, D.C. has no voting representation. I lived in D.C. twice and like an overwhelming majority of Washingtonians found this lack of representation outrageous. It should have been made a state decades ago, and it now seems it may become one. As this story describes D.C. statehood has now passed in the House. Can it pass in the Senate? Biden will certainly sign the bill if it does. But it is a big if, in the Senate because of the Republican senators. However, I think it may finally happen, and that would be good news.
Aerial of the U.S. Capitol under restoration. The United States Capitol is the meeting place of the United States Congress, the legislature of the Federal government of the United States. Located in Washington, D.C., it sits atop Capitol Hill at the eastern end of the National Mall.
The House, in a party-line vote on Thursday, approved legislation to make Washington, D.C., the 51st state in the nation, sending the bill to the Senate.
It’s the second time the House has approved such legislation in two years, but the statehood bill, long a goal for the nation’s capital, faces an uphill climb in a Senate evenly divided between the two parties.
Winning a vote in the Senate would likely require ending the filibuster that requires most legislation to clear a 60-vote hurdle. Even then, not all 50 Democrats in the Senate back making D.C. a state.
The 216-208 House vote on H.R. 51, named to reflect that D.C. would become the nation’s 51st state, comes as Democrats have stepped up their efforts on a series of measures aimed at racial justice.
Stephan: The Republicans in Oklahoma have now legalized murder and maiming with your car, and other state legislatures controlled by Republicans are planning to do the same thing. Is this a political party or a racist death cult?
In Oklahoma if you don’t like this crowd it would be okay to run them down with your car. Credit: Alex Henderson
Oklahoma Governor Kevin Stitt (R) signed a bill into law that would ultimately protect drivers who injure or kill protesters while attempting to flee the scene of demonstrations. The law also imposes more rigid penalties for protesters obstructing public roadways.
It also notes that “drivers cannot be held criminally or civilly liable for killing or injuring a protestor if they are “fleeing from a riot,” and there is “reasonable belief” that they are in danger.”
“We are sending a message today in Oklahoma that rioters […]
David Badash, The New Civil Rights Movement, - Raw Story
Stephan:
Daunte Wright protest demonstrators
A possibly unconstitutional Minnesota bill would punish anyone convicted of a crime during a political protest by stripping them of their right to any state-funded assistance, including food stamps, student loans, medical assistance, unemployment, or rent or mortgage assistance, among other programs.
Republican state Senator David Osmek filed SF 2381, a one-page bill which reads in part: “relating to public safety; prohibiting any state loan, grant, or assistance for persons convicted of offense related to protest, demonstration, rally, civil unrest, or march.” HF 466, a companion House bill, was filed by GOP Rep. Eric Lucero.
“A person convicted of a criminal offense related to the person’s illegal conduct at a protest, demonstration, rally, civil unrest, or march is ineligible for any type of state loan, grant, or assistance, including but not limited to college student loans and grants, rent and mortgage assistance, supplemental nutrition assistance, unemployment benefits and other employment assistance, Minnesota supplemental aid programs, business grants, medical assistance, general assistance, and energy assistance.”
Stephan: Jair Bolsonaro, the president of Brazil, is a Hispanic bully and Trumper clone who, like Trump, has severely damaged the wellbeing of the country he rules. His view is the Amazon belongs only to Brazil, and is his to do with as he will. As with Trump's proclamations, it is bully crap. The Amazon is a major factor in the wellbeing of the entire earth, and anyone with an IQ with a higher number than theirT waist size should know this. Here are the facts, and they are not pretty. This is not good news.
Damages wrought by climate change and deforestation have transformed the Amazon rainforest. New research suggests the changes to this icon of the natural world caused by human activity may mean the Amazon now emits more greenhouse gases than it absorbs. Credit: Universal Images Group/Getty
The Amazon rainforest may now emit more greenhouse gases than the famously lush ecosystem absorbs, according to new research.
Long considered to be a bulwark against climate change because of its capacity to absorb carbon dioxide, a new study suggests rising temperatures, increasing drought and rampant deforestation have likely overwhelmed the Amazon’s ability to absorb more greenhouse gases than it emits, reports Craig Welch for National Geographic.
The sobering findings appear in a new study published earlier this month in the journal Frontiers in Forests and Global Change that calculates, for the first time, the net emissions of greenhouse gases from both human and natural sources in the Amazon Basin, reports Liz Kimbrough for Mongabay.
A key distinction in appreciating the study’s findings is that they do not just concern carbon […]
Stephan: If you have listened to any of the rightwing media on television, or radio, or read rightwing websites, you may have been as surprised as I have been, that the Republicans generally are upset and opposed to the jury's decision in the Derek Chauvin trial. In fact, they have politicized it into an act of war by the left. Am I exaggerating? Read and decide yourself.
What seems to be happening is that without Trump to focus them, the Republican Party has become even more radicalized, and this is a very dangerous trend.
Hannity, Ingraham, and Carlson, the three leading propagandists employed by Fox
Throwing Derek Chauvin under the bus should have been a no-brainer for the “I’m not a racist” crowd. The pretense behind “blue lives matter” has been that it’s not that conservatives are racist but that Black Lives Matter goes “too far.” They argue that most police killings are unfortunate accidents to be tolerated in the name of greater social safety and that the “few bad apples” who do it on purpose can be held to account without widespread reform.
It was always nonsense, of course. But Chauvin’s conviction on three counts for murdering George Floyd provided conservatives a golden “hey, at least we’re not that guy” opportunity. The evidence against Chauvin was overwhelming. The video of the murder showed the world the nonchalant determination on Chauvin’s face as he snuffed out Floyd’s life. Police officials testified against Floyd. Prosecutor Steve Schleicher gave conservatives an out by saying, “This wasn’t policing, this was murder.” Conservatives could have easily clung to Chauvin’s conviction as an “exception that proves the rule” situation, […]
Robin Carart-Harris, Head of the Centre for Psychedelic Research at Imperial College London - Guardian (U.K.)
Stephan: Although I have never done psychedelic research myself, because psychedelics produce altered-states of consciousness, including nonlocal states of consciousness, the two research communities since the 1960s have been intertwined and so over the decades I have had the pleasure of knowing many of the research researchers and physicians. A little know but very sad story is the suppression of this research beginning with Nixon and his "War on Drugs" which began in 1971. As a result the funding for this research dried up and it was worth your academic appointment to become openly involved in such studies. As a result untold thousands did not get the mental health assistance they should have and could have. It is good news about an important trend that this work is once again being carried out.
When taken in high doses, psilocybin [derived from magic mushrooms] profoundly alters the quality of conscious awareness, releasing suppressed memories and feelings.’ Credit: Misha Kaminsky/Getty
Mental illness is the 21st century’s leading cause of disability, affecting an estimated billion people across the world. Depression is the number one contributor: more than 250 million people have this condition globally. The number of people prescribed antidepressant medications, the first-line treatment for depression, increases each year,and the market for them is valued at approximately $15bn (£11bn).Yet depression prevalence rates have not decreased since accurate record-keeping began. One reason for this paradox is the failure of science to adequately explain how and why depression occurs.
Psychiatry has long sought and failed to find a compelling biomedical explanation for depression. One popular idea, the “serotonin hypothesis”, was inspired by the observation that drugs that increase the activity of this naturally occurring brain chemical have antidepressant effects. First produced in the mid-1980s, Prozac (chemical name fluoxetine) is the most famous selective serotonin reuptake inhibitor (SSRI) antidepressant.Of these, Cipralex (escitalopram) is one of the newest and best performing.
Stephan: Biden and his administration have been in office just over three months without a single scandal or grift. Or, put the other way, Trump and his orcs have been out of office for just over three months and we are still having their grifts and scandals breaking into the news like syphilitic pustules. Here is today's Pence pus pocket. It is yet another example of the sense of privilege and entitlement all Trumpers seem to feel. What really concerns me though is that none of these people seem to be getting held responsible for their loathsomeness.
More details continue to emerge about the Trump-Pence administration.
Mike Pence, source of the latest Trump scum report
“While coronavirus cases surged to record levels late last December, Vice President Mike Pence went on a ski vacation in Vail, Colorado. The trip came with a massive bill to taxpayers, with Secret Service protection alone costing $757,527.85, according to documents obtained by CREW. At the time of his holiday travel, Pence was the head of the White House coronavirus task force, which put out dire warnings after Thanksgiving as the CDC recommended that Americans stay home over the holidays in order to limit the spread of the virus. Clearly, Pence did not follow the government’s advice, and in the process put dozens of Secret Service agents at heightened risk of infection,” the group said on Thursday.LISTEN: Special Comedy Exclusive – The Raw Story Podcast Interviews ‘President […]
