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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 another take on the American food system. Please take this very seriously; I am seeing more and more research on the emerging food crisis trend. This fall I predict we are going to see a significan increase in grocery prices, and that is going to have a very distressing effect on low income families, and the elderly.
Man’s hands wearing rubber gloves holding product in a supermarket during an epidemic of an infectious disease
For many Americans, grocery shopping has become an intensely stressful experience. To maintain social distancing, people must queue before entering stores. Once inside, they must scramble to find increasingly scarce products, including household staples from milk and eggs to pork and beef. Others can no longer afford to go to grocery stores. Instead, they wait for hours to get goods from food banks that are also running short on supplies.
But in a seeming paradox, farmers are destroying their products—including many of the same goods that stores lack. Dairy Farmers of America, the country’s biggest dairy co-op, has called many of its members and instructed them to dump their milk. The cooperative has estimated that farmers are now dumping up to 3.7 million gallons of milk per day. Sanderson Farms, a chicken processor, smashes 750,000 eggs each week. Farmers have been plowing their produce into the ground.
How is it that Americans can face shortages, and in some cases go […]
Stephan: The negative food trends are not confined to the U.S. Humanity has got to change its fundamental values to recognize that wellbeing must be the primary social value. The alternative, as this report spells out, is a disaster of epic proportions, and climate change is just going to make this worse and worse.
Hashem Mahmoud Atin, a 10-month-old displaced Yemeni child suffering from acute malnutrition and who is unable to reach a hospital for treatment, is held by his mother at a camp in Abs in northern Yemen’s Hajjah province on September 3, 2020. (Photo: Essa Ahmed/AFP/Getty
The convergence of socio-environmental “disasters, economic shocks, and public health crises, all compounded by the Covid-19 pandemic,” has magnified the risks of famine, “endangering the lives of millions” of people living in Yemen, South Sudan, northeast Nigeria, and the Democratic Republic of the Congo, the United Nations’ top humanitarian official warned in a statement obtained by the New York Times over the weekend.
“It is critical we come together as one united global community to defeat this disease, and protect the most vulnerable nations and communities from its potentially devastating effects.” David Beasley, World Food Program
In a letter to members of the U.N. Security Council, Mark Lowcock, under-secretary general for humanitarian affairs and emergency relief coordinator, warned of the looming intensification of malnutrition, starvation, and death in all four areas—encompassing some of the world’s most destitute regions, each one further hampered […]
Clara Moschini, Editor-in-Chief - European Food Agency
Stephan: I see the growing food crisis as a worldwide trend that is going to destabilize a number of countries, and there is far too little discussion and planning about how to respond. The United States should clean up its own act, and then act as a world leader.
North Koreans eating grass
Strict containment measures due to Covid-19 and a sharp decline in funding, bring the economy already abundantly at risk of North Korea to its knees. Now more than ever, the food crisis afflicts a large part of the population, so much so that the head of the World Food Program (WFP) David Beasley has made an international appeal for humanitarian assistance. During the Korea Global Forum for Peace, organized annually by the Seoul Unification Ministry, the director general of WFP clearly expressed his confidence in cooperation between all states and called for it to be put into practice: “I am confident that the international cooperation is the key that will unlock a brighter future for children in the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (North Korea). This is our opportunity to create the better world we all want to see. “
Today the living conditions of the civilian population in North Korea are becoming more and more serious, just think that 60% of North Koreans risk hunger every day.
Stephan: In my estimation history is going to conclude that Donald Trump's unhinged repeated attacks on the military, which I think stem from his time in a high school military academy as well as his draft dodging -- he is a physical coward -- are going to turn out to be turning points in the 2020 election. So on balance, I see this as good news.
Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Mark A. Milley
President Donald Trump launched an unprecedented public attack against the leadership of the US military on Monday, accusing them of waging wars to boost the profits of defense manufacturing companies.”I’m not saying the military’s in love with me — the soldiers are, the top people in the Pentagon probably aren’t because they want to do nothing but fight wars so that all of those wonderful companies that make the bombs and make the planes and make everything else stay happy,” Trump told reporters at a White House news conference.Trump’s extraordinary comments come as several defense officials tell CNN relations between the President and Pentagon leadership are becoming increasingly strained.They also followed efforts by Trump to convince the public that he had not made a series of reported disparaging remarks about US military personnel and veterans, which were first reported by The Atlantic magazine.Trump referred to Marines buried at cemetery in France in crude and derogatory terms, a former senior official saysA former senior administration […]
Stephan: White Christians and the institutional churches they support have come to a point where they have to make a decision. Are they going to be spiritual organizations promoting the teachings of Jesus, or are they going to become a racist sexist minority cult? Within the next 25 years America is going to become a majority-minority society and the choices being made now are going to determine how this trend plays out.
Trump’s evangelical cabal are behind Republican attacks on women’s reproductive rights. Credit: Google Images
Early on in “Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass,” the first of three autobiographies Douglass wrote over his lifetime, he recounts what happened—or, perhaps more accurately, what didn’t happen—after his master, Thomas Auld, became a Christian believer at a Methodist camp meeting. Douglass had harbored the hope that Auld’s conversion, in August, 1832, might lead him to emancipate his slaves, or at least “make him more kind and humane.” Instead, Douglass writes, “If it had any effect on his character, it made him more cruel and hateful in all his ways.” Auld was ostentatious about his piety—praying “morning, noon, and night,” participating in revivals, and opening his home to travelling preachers—but he used his faith as license to inflict pain and suffering upon his slaves. “I have seen him tie up a lame young woman, and whip her with a heavy cowskin upon her naked shoulders, causing the warm red blood to drip; and, in justification of the bloody deed, […]
Stephan: Let me just say it: These are acts of evil.
Projects Trump administration believes could be fast-tracked include gas leasing development plan in the Arctic national wildlife refuge in Alaska. Credit: Al Grillo/AP
The Trump administration has identified dozens of major fossil fuel, energy and water projects that could be fast-tracked by expediting environmental reviews amid the pandemic, according to internal government documents.
At least 19 of the projects are from companies that have spent a total of $16m lobbying the interior department since early 2017, according to an analysis by the conservation group the Center for Western Priorities. ConocoPhillips spent $11.2m of that amount lobbying the department, including on plans to drill for oil and gas within the National Petroleum Reserve in Alaska, the group said.
Three of the companies that could potentially benefit have met with the interior secretary, David Bernhardt, personally. Another is the Garrison Diversion Conservancy District, which Bernhardt represented as a lawyer at the firm Brownstein Hyatt Farber Schreck. The district is seeking to divert water from the Missouri River to supply the Red River Valley in North Dakota, a project environmental advocates oppose.
Stephan: Here is Tuesday's Republican Scum Report. If you donated to support Trump there is a good chance it went to pay his legal bills. Everything about Trump is a grift designed to benefit him and his family.
President Donald Trump and Ivanka Trump, official White House Credit: Joyce N. Boghosian.
According to a report from the New York Times, some Republican officials are casting a skeptical eye at both the millions of dollars in donations that Donald Trump is spending on legal fees as well as the reasons for some of the expenditures.
The report notes that the president “… and his affiliated political entities have spent at least $58.4 million in donations on legal and compliance work since 2015,” which is raising some eyebrows.
For comparison’s sake, the Times reports that former President Barack Obama spent $10.7 million on legal fees during the equivalent period starting in 2007 and that former President George Bush spent even less — which included his legal battle over his election that went all the way to the Supreme Court.Defend democracy. Click to invest in courageous progressive journalism today.
What has some Republicans concerned is funds that should be used for political purposes appear to be going out to pay for some of Trump’s personal legal […]
Stephan: The stock market is an artificial world; its economy is not the nation's functional economy. The reality is the U.S. faces the largest endebtedness in 8 decades. and the trade deficit, well, here are the facts on the trade deficit. Trump's incompetence could hardly be made clearer. Biden is going to inherit an economy akin to that of the Geat Depression of the 1930s. It will be an excellent time to do what Roosevelt did and try completely new approaches; ones whose first priority is fostering wellbeing instead of maximizing profit. Countries like New Zealand are showing the way. Trump is like Nero, a historical grotesque whose very being makes the principle clear, by being the extreme antipode
Photo: Getty Motage: Salon
Donald Trump promised on the campaign trail in 2016 that, if elected president, he would bring about a rapid and unprecedented decline in the U.S. trade deficit.
But new figures released by the Commerce Department on Thursday—nearly four years after Trump’s victory in the 2016 presidential election—show that the trade deficit soared to a 12-year high in July due in large part to a surge in imports, bringing the total negative trade balance in the first seven months of 2020 to $340 billion.
“Trump pledged to eliminate the trade deficit and end job outsourcing, but the overall 2020 deficit is on track to be larger than when he took office, and his Labor Department has certified more than 300,000 American jobs were lost to outsourcing and imports during his presidency,” Lori Wallach, director of Public Citizen’s Global Trade Watch, said in a statement.
Wallach noted that the 300,000 job-loss number is likely an underestimate given that it only “reflects the number of workers whose trade-related job losses were approved for Trade Adjustment Assistance (TAA) retraining and other […]
