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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: Crime has been going down for years in America even as police murders of civilians have been dramatically going up. This to a point where there are more murders by police by an order of magnitude than all the police forces of the 37 developed nations that are members of the OECD. Why is this happening? Here is the answer.
A Miami Police officer watches protestors from a armored vehicle during a rally in response to the recent death of George Floyd in Miami, Florida on May 31, 2020. Credit: Ricardo Arduengo/AFP/Getty
Police unions have emerged as the leading opponent of reform efforts as lawmakers respond to weeks of protests over the police killings of Black people across the country.
Despite years of demonstrations against police violence, data shows that law enforcement agencies killed more people last year than they did five years ago. Black people are killed at a far higher rate than white people.
Looking at the historical data, researcher Lyman Stone, a former federal economist who now serves as a fellow at the conservative American Enterprise Institute, found that police killings mostly fell between the 1960s and the 2000s but have been at high levels ever since.
Stephan: Here, in contrast to Trump's reaction to police violence, is the reaction of someone who actually cares about social wellbeing. This, in my view, is a very big issue, because we are in danger of developing into a police state.
On December 4, 2014, Cleveland was in turmoil. Just days before, a white police officer had killed a 12-year-old boy playing in a park with a toy gun. The city was outraged at its police department, which many said was ill-trained, poorly supervised, and deeply troubled. On that day, Attorney General Eric Holder arrived in town with a report that seemed to bear out those complaints.
“In recent days, millions of people throughout our nation have come together, bound by grief and bound by anguish,” Holder said, mentioning Tamir Rice’s death and the killings earlier that year of Eric Garner in New York City and Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri.
With that, Holder announced the results of the Justice Department’s 1½-year investigation in Cleveland. “There is reasonable cause to believe that the Cleveland Division of Police engages in a pattern and practice of using excessive force,” he declared. The report Holder delivered was a scathing indictment of Cleveland police for “poor and dangerous tactics,” pistol-whippings, guns fired at “unarmed or fleeing suspects,” and of […]
In repressive states across the world, I have often watched with deep dismay the response of foreign military and police forces towards political reform movements or popular mobilization efforts. In many cases, brutal tactics, sometimes made possible by U.S. equipment, are used to stifle civil society and to guard the regime in power from criticism, accountability and reform. Yet, even as a member of an organization that tracks and scrutinizes the policies and behaviors of U.S.-backed foreign security forces, I was ill-prepared for the surreal yet painfully familiar scenes that have taken place across the United States since the killing of George Floyd.
In Washington, D.C., heavily armed riot police, national guard units and a veritable alphabet soup of federal agencies clashed with peaceful protesters at the behest of a president keen on projecting strength through force. These scenes evoked the well-worn playbook of authoritarian states from across the globe. A Black Hawk helicopter and other aircraft, Humvees and hundreds of armed “troops” spread across the streets […]
JAMES FALLOWS, VIVEK WADHWA, PICO IYER, ROLF POTTS, ELIZABETH BECKER, JAMES CRABTREE, ALEXANDRE DE JUNIAC, - Foreign Policy
Stephan: I think it is going to be a long while before things return to what we grew up thinking was normal, and further, I'm not sure that normal will ever return. Apparently, I am not alone in thinking this way because other people are writing about this as well. Here, for instance, is a view about travel in the future.
Credit: Brian Stauffer Illustration for Foreign Policy
As we enter the first summer of this new era of pandemics, a tenuous easing of travel restrictions has begun. This month, the countries of the European Union will reopen their internal borders, and they plan to allow travel from outside the block some time in July. Singapore and China have begun permitting essential travel between them, but only for passengers who test negative for the coronavirus, use a contact-tracing app, and don’t deviate from their itinerary. Iceland will allow tourists, but it plans to test them for the virus at the airport.
Grounded for many months, airlines are beefing up their summer schedules—though the number of flights will be a fraction of their pre-pandemic frequency. Airports are still mostly ghost towns (some have even been taken over by wildlife), and international long-distance travel is all but dead. Around the globe, the collapse of the tourist economy has bankrupted hotels, restaurants, bus operators, and car rental agencies—and thrown an estimated 100 million people out of work.
With uncertainty and fear hanging over traveling, no one […]
Stephan: My wife and I haven't been to a restaurant in months, and you probably haven't been either. And I like restaurants. And you probably do too. So what is going to happen to them in the future? Here is one possible scenario.
A business model that seemed marginal before the coronavirus pandemic now looks like the future of restaurants. Illustration James Clapham/The New Yorker
Last fall, walking down Mission Street, in San Francisco, I noticed a new addition to an otherwise unremarkable parking lot at the base of Bernal Heights Hill: a large, white trailer, about the size of three parking spaces, plastered with a banner that read “food pick up here.” On one side was a list of restaurant brands with names and logos that seemed algorithmically generated: WokTalk, Burger Bytes, Fork and Ladle, Umami, American Eclectic Burger, Wings & Things. The trailer was hooked up to a generator, which was positioned behind two portable toilets; it occupied parking spots once reserved for Maven, an hourly-car-rental startup, funded by General Motors and marketed to gig-economy workers. (G.M. shut down Maven in April.) Through a small window cut into the side, I could see two men moving around what appeared to be a kitchen. The generator hummed; the air carried the comforting smell of fryer oil; […]
Stephan: In the early 1970s two friends of mine, Christopher Bird, and Peter Tompkins, after interviewing several people interested in biodynamic gardening who, in turn, led them to several scientists wrote first an article in Harpers Magazine and, then, a book, The Secret Life of Plants, that created an international sensation. The idea that plants have consciousness was considered my materialist scientists the worse kind of woo-woo thinking. Conferences were held deriding the idea, papers were written, and derogatory interviews filled the media, even as the book became a bigger and bigger best seller. It changed Chris' and Peter's lives forever.
I had another friend Alan Chadwick, the leading biodynamist of his day whose gardens remain world famous, who was also a kind of remote viewer who specialized in plants, who told me that what Secret Life of Plants was saying was true. Plants not only had consciousness individually, but they they and all life were part of a matrix of consciousness. Then the Gaia Hypothesis emerged, that hinted at this nonlocal consciousness network without quite saying it.
Now, years later, it turns out the materialists were wrong; there is indeed a matrix of consciousness. Here is some of the recent plant research supporting that concept.
‘You need to imagine a plant as a huge brain’ … the plant neurobiologist Stefano Mancuso. Credit: Alessandro Moggi
I had hoped to interview the plant neurobiologist Stefano Mancuso at his laboratory at the University of Florence. I picture it as a botanical utopia: a place where flora is respected for its awareness and intelligence; where sensitive mimosa plants can demonstrate their long memories; and where humans are invited to learn how to be a better species by observing the behaviour of our verdant fellow organisms.
But because we are both on lockdown, we Skype from our homes. Instead of meeting his clever plants, I make do with admiring a pile of cannonball-like pods from an aquatic species, on the bookshelves behind him. “They’re used for propagation,” he says. “I am always collecting seeds.”
Before Mancuso’s lab started work in 2005, plant neurobiology was largely seen as a laughable concept. “We were interested in problems that were, until that moment, just related to animals, like intelligence and even behaviour,” he says. At the time, it was “almost forbidden” to talk about behaviour […]
Stephan: I have been telling my readers for 20 years that if you want to support good health for yourself and your family, go through your home and garden supplies and eliminate all toxins and poisons, which means most of the things you see in stores and on television. The toxin load carried by most Americans in their bodies is gobsmacking, and can be the source of a whole spectrum of diseases and illnesses.
So what to replace them with? Try these.
There have never been more choices when it comes to organic, natural, or eco-friendly cleaning products. Knowing which products are certified organic and which ones are just a safer alternative to traditional cleaners is often confusing. And how do you know which ones can really get the job done?
That’s where we come in. To help you choose the safest and most effective nontoxic cleaning products, we’ve put together recommendations of 13 products that fit the bill.
Because the market for USDA certified organic cleaning products is relatively small and some options can be on the pricier side, we’ve also included a few noncertified safer alternatives worthy of consideration.
How We Chose
To curate our list of top-rated cleaning products, we considered many criteria. Some key elements include:
The types of ingredients in a product. We took a careful look at the ingredients used in each product to make sure they were safe, nontoxic, and naturally derived. We avoided products with ingredients that have the potential to negatively impact the health of your family or the environment.
Top choices from reputable environmental organizations. Groups like […]
Stephan: This is getting almost no American media coverage, other than a few short pieces such as this one from CNN, but I see this latest incursion of the Alaskan Air Defense Identification Zone (ADIZ) as a big geopolitical deal. When you read this little piece see it in the context of Trump's withdrawing thousands of troops from NATO, and his complete unconcern when briefed back in March that Putin was offering bounties for Americans killed in Afghanistan. Trump is basically committing treason because he is obligated in some way to Putin.
But that is only one level of what is happening. This is not being done for Americans, this is Putin showing countries currently allied with the U.S.: You can't rely on the fact that the Americans will protect you. Look at what I am doing on America's borders; what I am doing in Afghanistan; and what that buffoon in the White House is doing with NATO. America is weak, and led by weak people, while I am strong and smart. America doesn't scare me.
Russian aircraft
US F-22 fighter jets intercepted four Russian Tu-142 reconnaissance aircraft Saturday entering the Alaskan Air Defense Identification Zone (ADIZ), NORAD said in a statement.Saturday’s intercept follows similar encounters earlier this month in which US F-22 jets intercepted Russian nuclear-capable bombers near Alaska on three separate occasions. The last previous one was Wednesday when US F-22 fighter jets intercepted two Russian IL-38 maritime patrol aircraft entering the Alaskan Zone late Wednesday.NORAD also said the Russian aircraft came within 65 nautical miles south of the Alaskan Aleutian island chain and loitered in the ADIZ for nearly eight hours. It added the Russians remained in international airspace and at no time entered US or Canadian sovereign airspace.”This year alone, NORAD forces have identified and intercepted Russian military aircraft including bombers, fighters, and maritime patrol aircraft on ten separate occasions when they have flown into the ADIZ,” said NORAD commander Gen. Terrence J. O’Shaughnessy.
