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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.
Brady Dennis and Juliet Eilperin, Reporters - The Washington Post
Stephan: Wonderful good news again from the Biden administration. Finally, we have a president who has his priorities straight, and he has been in office for nearly 100 days and there has not been a single scandal or grift by anyone in his administration. When I think about the proceeding four years I feel like we, as a country, were trapped in a horror movie insane asylum.
President Biden plans to pledge this week that the United States will slash its greenhouse gas emissions at least in half by the end of the decade. Credit: Demetrius Freeman/The Washington Post
President Biden this week will pledge to slash U.S. greenhouse gas emissions at least in half by the end of the decade, according to two people briefed on the plan, as part of an aggressive push to combat climate change at home and persuade other major economies around the world to follow suit.
The move comes as Biden convenes a virtual summit of more than three dozen world leaders Thursday, aimed at ratcheting up international climate ambitions and reestablishing the United States as a leader in the effort to slow the planet’s warming.
The planned U.S.pledge represents a near-doubling of the target that the nation committed to under the 2015 Paris climate agreement, when Barack Obama vowed to cut emissions by 26 to 28 percent compared with 2005 levels.
Asked for comment, a White House official said a final decision had not been made.
The Paris accord, which President Donald Trump exited but […]
Stephan: More good news from the Biden administration. Just as Franklin Roosevelt ushered in decades of prosperity in the U.S. with his New Deal, so Biden's infrastructure plans, and commitment to non-carbon energy, are going to create hundreds of thousands of new well-paying jobs. You have to ask yourself why are the Republicans opposed to all of this?
Offshore Wind Turbines Credit: CleanTechnica
WASHINGTON, D.C. — Secretary of Energy Jennifer M. Granholm today joined the Secretaries of the Interior and Commerce at a White House roundtable meeting to announce a national goal to deploy 30 gigawatts (GW) of offshore wind by 2030. This effort will support approximately 77,000 jobs in industry and surrounding communities, generate electricity to power over 10 million American homes, and cut 78 million metric tons of carbon dioxide emissions. This new goal, with additional Department of Energy (DOE) investments announced today, builds on President Biden’s Executive Order to address the climate crisis and create American jobs by accelerating the deployment of renewable energy on public lands and waters, including through swift interagency action to advance offshore wind.
“This offshore wind goal is proof of our commitment to using American ingenuity and might to invest in our nation, advance our own energy security, and combat the climate crisis,” said Secretary Granholm. “DOE is going to marshal every resource we have to get as many American companies, using as many sheets of American steel, employing as many American workers […]
Stephan: Trump made his signature policy his border wall. It was a stupid, incompetent, bit of costly nonsense from the get-go. Beginning with Mexico didn't pay for it. It caused great misery for thousands, and it has proven absurdly easy to overcome. Here's a little truth about Trump's wall.
A ladder in front of newly built border wall at Granjeno, on January 2, 2021. Credit: Scott Nicol
Every month for the past decade, Scott Nicol, a 51-year-old artist and activist, has set out from his home in McAllen to roam the Rio Grande Valley in search of ladders used to scale the border wall in South Texas. On a cool and overcast day in early April, Nicol has centered his hunt on an eight-mile stretch of border between the towns of Hidalgo and Granjeno, where an Obama-era wall meets up with a newly constructed piece of Trump’s wall.
The first stop of the day brings him to a dirt field behind a flea market in Hidalgo. A pair of green and white Border Patrol SUVs are parked atop the eighteen-foot-high concrete levee wall, next to a section of bollard-style fence with a closed gate, their noses pointed toward the Rio Grande. Within minutes, Nicol has spotted a ladder roughly halfway up the levee; it’s about a dozen feet long and has only six rungs. “It’s made of cheap, rough […]
STEVEN LEMONGELLO and GRAY ROHRER, Reporters - Orlando Sentinel
Stephan: Ron De Santis is, in my opinion, one of the worst and most dangerous Republican politicians. I hope the people of Florida are happy with their loss of civil liberties, and their endangerment because now it is legal to run down people in the street when a group of them are gathered doing something you don't like.
Florida Republican governor Ron DeSantis proudly shows off signing anti-riot bill Credit: WPTV
Gov. Ron DeSantis signed Florida’s “anti-riot” bill into law on Monday, a measure that vastly increases law enforcement’s powers to crack down on civil unrest.
The bill, pushed by the Republican governor, has been criticized by Democrats and civil rights groups as unconstitutional for infringing on the First Amendment’s right to peacefully protest.
“If you look at the breadth of this particular piece of legislation, it is the strongest anti-rioting, pro-law enforcement piece of legislation in the country,” DeSantis said at a press conference in Winter Haven surrounded by Polk County Sheriff Grady Judd, uniformed deputies and other law enforcement. “There’s just nothing even close.”
DeSantis also hinted that Minneapolis Police Officer Derek Chauvin, who he said last year had murdered George Floyd, might be acquitted and that the state was “prepared.”
“I don’t know what’s going to happen,” DeSantis said. “But I can tell you that case was bungled by the attorney general there in Minnesota. They didn’t handle it properly. And so there may be people […]
Stephan: This business about the bees is a huge deal. Bees of various species are essential to a healthy environment, and agriculture. If you use one of these products please stop. If someone in your neighborhood uses Roundup, please print this article out and take it over to them. The future of the bees will determine the future of humans. No one should be allowed to sell products containing glyphosate. Go to the place where you purchase stuff for your lawn and garden, show them the article, and ask them to stop selling Roundup, or any variant. Only through citizen action at the pocketbook level will we be able to rid ourselves of this poison.
Bumblebee
Commonly used herbicides across the U.S. contain highly toxic undisclosed “inert” ingredients that are lethal to bumblebees, according to a new study published Friday in the Journal of Applied Ecology.
The study reviewed several herbicide products and found that most contained glyphosate, an ingredient best recognized from Roundup products and the most widely used herbicide in the U.S. and worldwide.
While the devastating impacts of glyphosate on bee populations are more broadly recognized, the toxicity levels of inert ingredients are less understood because they are not subjected to the same mandatory testing by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).
“Pesticides are manufactured and sold as formulations that contain a mixture of compounds, including one or more active ingredients and, potentially, many inert ingredients,” explained the Center for Food Safety in a statement. “The inert ingredients are added to pesticides to aid in mixing and to enhance the products’ ability to stick to plant leaves, among other purposes.”
The study found that these inert substances can be highly toxic and even block bees’ breathing capacity, essentially causing them to drown. While researchers found that some of the […]
Stephan: Good news. Even power companies are accepting the need to exit the carbon energy era, and when corporations see this future real progress will be made.
President Joe Biden delivers remarks on Russia in the East Room at the White House in Washington, U.S., April 15, 2021. Credit: Reuters/Tom Brenner
A group of U.S. electricity companies wrote to President Joe Biden this week saying it will work with his administration and Congress to design a broad set of policies to reach a near-term goal of slashing the sector’s carbon emissions by 2030.
Washington should implement policies, including a clean energy standard, or CES, to ensure the electricity industry cuts carbon emissions 80% below 2005 levels by 2030, the group of 13 power interests, including generators Exelon Corp (EXC.O), PSEG(PEGPP.UL) and Talen Energy Corp, said in a letter to Biden.
The letter, a copy of which was seen by Reuters, did not mention Biden’s goal to fully decarbonize the power sector by 2035 as part of his strategy to fight climate change. But it said the 2030 timeline is consistent with Biden’s wider goal of decarbonizing the entire economy by 2050.
“A federal policy framework can be designed to support the power sector’s deployment of strategies that […]
Stephan: This is not good news, and it was utterly predictable. When I was a young man I lost two women friends (I was not the father) to kitchen abortions and it convinced me a woman MUST have control over her body, or we can never have gender equality. And what I also learned from those experiences back in the 1960s was how many women were dying of septicemia as a result of bad abortion protocols. Roe vs Wade made those deaths mostly disappear. Now thanks to evangelicals and christofascists these deaths are coming back.
Young pregnant woman being examined during pregnancy while coronavirus pandemic Credit: Getty
Last week was Black Maternal Health Week, which reproductive justice activists started in 2018 to raise awareness of the grim fact that maternal mortality rates for Black women are up to three times higher than they are for white women. For the first time ever, the White House also joined in, with President Joe Biden issuing a proclamation noting that “America’s maternal mortality rates are among the highest in the developed world” and calling on “all Americans to recognize the importance of addressing the crisis of Black maternal mortality and morbidity in this country.”
Stephan: More good news from the Biden Administration. As this article describes, Biden is reversing the Trumpian nonsense and replacing it with real science. The rules they impose are exactly right, in my opinion.
Xavier Becerra answers questions during his confirmation hearing before the Senate Finance Committee. Credit: Greg Nash/Getty
The Trump administration, under pressure from allied anti-abortion groups, ended fetal tissue research at the National Institutes of Health and established an ethics board to review government support for the research at universities and other labs. The board, which was filled with critics of the research, met just once and rejected 13 of 14 projects that NIH scientists had deemed worthy of support.
