Thursday, March 31, 2011
Thursday, March 24, 2011
Tuesday, March 22, 2011
Why We're Bombing Libya
Has anyone in the US government (or the US media) produced even a semblance of a meaningful explanation as to why we are bombing the hell out of Libya? [1]
Incredible really. Rather than fulfilling his promise to extricate the country from two distant, unpopular, interminable wars, the president embarks on a yet another. Spending another $ billion + to do so, at a time when we're worse than broke. A blatantly illegal invasion of a soverign country with no popular support here at home or abroad -- and with virtually no justification. Indeed as justification tales go -- we're bombing civilians to hell in order to "save lives" [2] -- makes "weapons of mass destruction" look like St. Augustine.
The administration hasn't even provided the press with their talking points. As far as I know, this is a first. There's always been something at least like "Make the World safe for Democracy. Accordingly the press, even the "alternative press," is lost. [3]
So for both the press and public here's a first axiom of the Crisis Era:
The US needs oil like a Nuclear Power plant needs water [4]. We need oil not only for fuel, but also for roads, tarmacs and a vast array of products from paint to plastic. We practically consume it directly. The fourfold increase in agricultural productivity over the past half century is almost entirely attributable to oil-intensive mechanization, fertilizers and pesticides. Without oil, we are immobile, at the mercy of the elements and unable to feed ourselves.
In 2003, the Bush administration used the 9/11 attacks as justification to invade Iraq and take direct control of the world's second largest national oil reserves. They fabricated evidence of weapons of mass destruction and concocted liberation and democratization stories, which were enthusiastically amplified throughout the US media. But as former Fed chairman Alan Greenspan acknowledged in his memoir, "everyone knows the Iraq war is largely about oil" [5]
But, still, why Libya? Why now? Libya does have major reserves, approximately 4% of the World's total, [6] much more than teh US. But Obama is not a prime mover. Rather, this is a French undertaking, with Nicolas Sarkozy at the helm. No matter that, unlike Egypt, Yemen and other countries where Obama sided openly with the regime, Libya's uprising is neither popular nor democratic. [6] No matter that Gaddafi's opponents are an armed insurrection and openly anti-American self described mujahideen. [7]
Sarkozy and Gaddafi were among the closest of associates completing deals worth 10 billion euros [8] or that Gaddafi helped underwrite Sarkozy's election campaign. [9]
France imports more oil from Libya than any other country, all told about 12% of its net imports for the 12 months ending Sept 2010. [11] And just as US used Al Qaeda to invade Iraq to get oil, he wants to use mid-east uprisings to attack Libya to get oil.
Sarkozy has been planning this coup for some time. He tried to get Switzerland to go along. No. He tries to get belgium to go along. No. In fact, Sarcozy is widely seen as a clown in his own country. [12]
Eventually, however he gets the US to go along. It seems as though Obama was reluctant. But the press has been taking up the war drums for quite some time.
Presumably Obama’s masters – e.g., oil companies, banks – have been not only directly demanding he take action, but applying all the pressure points: g
Planted stories in US News, e.g., The War Party's Atrocity Porn of Libyan fabrications. These fabrications are actually in every US publication!! E.g, a whole hour of Teri Gross, NPR, on tales of how Khadaffi’s is “out there”
etting the high ranking women in the administration to nag him along. (remember all the talk of how if only women held high office, war would be no more ? )
In the end, Obama agrees that, yes, we must attack to protect Libya’s people.
[4] Alan Greenspan wrote in his book, The Age of Turbulence. George W. Bush, himself was saying in May 2001: “What people need to hear, loud and clear, is that we’re running out of energy in America.” Evidently, as part of the charade of righteousness in our Iraq invasion, oil-talk became verboten.
One might think the US (as well as France and England) had enough to worry about right now -- two distant endless long-term wars, continued unemployment, precipitous national debts and deficits, collapsing currency, nuclear catastrophe, and a ticking time-bomb of environmental collapse -- to name a few.
[12] http://www.google.com/search?sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8&q=Sarcozy+clown
Incredible really. Rather than fulfilling his promise to extricate the country from two distant, unpopular, interminable wars, the president embarks on a yet another. Spending another $ billion + to do so, at a time when we're worse than broke. A blatantly illegal invasion of a soverign country with no popular support here at home or abroad -- and with virtually no justification. Indeed as justification tales go -- we're bombing civilians to hell in order to "save lives" [2] -- makes "weapons of mass destruction" look like St. Augustine.
The administration hasn't even provided the press with their talking points. As far as I know, this is a first. There's always been something at least like "Make the World safe for Democracy. Accordingly the press, even the "alternative press," is lost. [3]
So for both the press and public here's a first axiom of the Crisis Era:
The US needs oil like a Nuclear Power plant needs water [4]. We need oil not only for fuel, but also for roads, tarmacs and a vast array of products from paint to plastic. We practically consume it directly. The fourfold increase in agricultural productivity over the past half century is almost entirely attributable to oil-intensive mechanization, fertilizers and pesticides. Without oil, we are immobile, at the mercy of the elements and unable to feed ourselves.
In 2003, the Bush administration used the 9/11 attacks as justification to invade Iraq and take direct control of the world's second largest national oil reserves. They fabricated evidence of weapons of mass destruction and concocted liberation and democratization stories, which were enthusiastically amplified throughout the US media. But as former Fed chairman Alan Greenspan acknowledged in his memoir, "everyone knows the Iraq war is largely about oil" [5]
But, still, why Libya? Why now? Libya does have major reserves, approximately 4% of the World's total, [6] much more than teh US. But Obama is not a prime mover. Rather, this is a French undertaking, with Nicolas Sarkozy at the helm. No matter that, unlike Egypt, Yemen and other countries where Obama sided openly with the regime, Libya's uprising is neither popular nor democratic. [6] No matter that Gaddafi's opponents are an armed insurrection and openly anti-American self described mujahideen. [7]
Sarkozy and Gaddafi were among the closest of associates completing deals worth 10 billion euros [8] or that Gaddafi helped underwrite Sarkozy's election campaign. [9]
France imports more oil from Libya than any other country, all told about 12% of its net imports for the 12 months ending Sept 2010. [11] And just as US used Al Qaeda to invade Iraq to get oil, he wants to use mid-east uprisings to attack Libya to get oil.
Sarkozy has been planning this coup for some time. He tried to get Switzerland to go along. No. He tries to get belgium to go along. No. In fact, Sarcozy is widely seen as a clown in his own country. [12]
Eventually, however he gets the US to go along. It seems as though Obama was reluctant. But the press has been taking up the war drums for quite some time.
Presumably Obama’s masters – e.g., oil companies, banks – have been not only directly demanding he take action, but applying all the pressure points: g
Planted stories in US News, e.g., The War Party's Atrocity Porn of Libyan fabrications. These fabrications are actually in every US publication!! E.g, a whole hour of Teri Gross, NPR, on tales of how Khadaffi’s is “out there”
etting the high ranking women in the administration to nag him along. (remember all the talk of how if only women held high office, war would be no more ? )
In the end, Obama agrees that, yes, we must attack to protect Libya’s people.
[1] http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20110221/wl_nm/us_libya_protests_jets: (Reuters) – Libyan warplanes were bombing indiscriminately across Tripoli on Monday, a resident of the Libyan capital told al Jazeera television in a live broadcast. "What we are witnessing today is unimaginable. Warplanes and helicopters are indiscriminately bombing one area after another. There are many, many dead," Adel Mohamed Saleh said. Saleh, who called himself a political activist, said the bombings had initially targeted a funeral procession."Our people are dying. It is the policy of scorched earth." he said. "Every 20 minutes they are bombing."
[2] http://swampland.blogs.time.com/2011/03/18/why-are-we-going-to-war-with-libya/
[3] Each of the two Salem (NJ) nuclear reactors need 1,100,000 gallons per minute on to absorb the waste heat left over after making electricity and also to cool the equipment and buildings used in generating that electricity http://www.ucsusa.org/assets/documents/nuclear_power/20071204-ucs-brief-got-water.pdf.
[2] http://swampland.blogs.time.com/2011/03/18/why-are-we-going-to-war-with-libya/
[3] Each of the two Salem (NJ) nuclear reactors need 1,100,000 gallons per minute on to absorb the waste heat left over after making electricity and also to cool the equipment and buildings used in generating that electricity http://www.ucsusa.org/assets/documents/nuclear_power/20071204-ucs-brief-got-water.pdf.
[4] Alan Greenspan wrote in his book, The Age of Turbulence. George W. Bush, himself was saying in May 2001: “What people need to hear, loud and clear, is that we’re running out of energy in America.” Evidently, as part of the charade of righteousness in our Iraq invasion, oil-talk became verboten.
One might think the US (as well as France and England) had enough to worry about right now -- two distant endless long-term wars, continued unemployment, precipitous national debts and deficits, collapsing currency, nuclear catastrophe, and a ticking time-bomb of environmental collapse -- to name a few.
[12] http://www.google.com/search?sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8&q=Sarcozy+clown
Tuesday, March 15, 2011
Japanese Meltdown: Tight Coupling
It seems that in the second week of the crisis era blog, we're well embarked on a crisis era; the Japanese earthquake/tsunami/nuclear power plant fire/meltdown/global financial market meltdown are not only crises in and of themselves but illustrative of two critical aspect of the emerging crisis era -- tight coupling and what we might call emerging crisis inter-linkage.
Earthquakes are an inherent condition on earth, the result of tectonic plate movements that have been grinding since before life on the planet. Since there has been land and ocean, earthquakes have likewise been naturally coupled with tsunami. And earthquakes/tsunamis are deadly events for humans and other creatures as well as man-made and natural systems. But never has there been an earthquake so potentially deadly dangerous as this one. And that's because of tightly coupled systems.
Nuclear Power plants are in many ways at the forefront of crisis protection. Indeed, I often take graduate students to visit a nuclear power plant for this reason. But though modern nuclear managers may be good at mitigating the danger, it's still dangerous!
And not all are always all that good.
And, looking at it from a big picture, reckless: Katsuhiko Ishibashi, a Kobe University seismologist observed: Japan is an earthquake-prone archipelago, and lining its waterfront are 54 nuclear plants. It’s been like a suicide bomber wearing grenades around his belt,” Ishibashi served on a committee setting safety guidelines for Japan’s nuclear reactors in 2005, but he resigned because he thought people weren’t heeding his warnings about the potential for a nuclear disaster.
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Wednesday, March 9, 2011
Phila Fracking Hearing
Before I begin my own statement, I’d like to remind everyone here of Article 1, Section 27 of the Pennsylvania Constitution:
The people have a right to clean air, pure water, and to the preservation of the natural, scenic, historic and esthetic values of the environment. Pennsylvania's public natural resources are the common property of all the people, including generations yet to come. As trustee of these resources, the Commonwealth shall conserve and maintain them for the benefit of all the people.My name is Ross Levin, and I’m a high school student in the Philly suburbs. I am here representing myself as a private citizen, but also representing the Green Party of Philadelphia, as well as every young person who will have to deal with the consequences of fracking for far longer than anyone who is currently writing the rules for it.
Especially after the recent confirmation that wastewater from natural gas wells is indeed much more toxic, and radioactive, than gas companies had revealed, it is clear that the Delaware River Basin Commission’s proposed regulations don’t go far enough. The Green Party of Pennsylvania endorses the following actions: halting drilling until every well complies with the Clean Water Act, a drilling moratorium on state lands (unless the public specifically votes otherwise in a referendum), a ban on drilling that doesn’t strictly conform to a wastewater reclamation plan, and harsh penalties for violating these regulations. The party is also currently working to endorse an outright ban on fracking. Most politicians and political groups are not willing to take such a firm stand, but this is in fact a highly practical vision for the future of fracking in Pennsylvania. It makes no sense to hurt ourselves and future generations, by poisoning our drinking water, in order to get the short term gain of gas and corporate profits.
As a private citizen and as a person who will live for many decades after the gas being extracted today is burned, I will not be satisfied with anything less than a total moratorium on all new natural gas wells. In Pittsburgh, people have already had to forgo drinking tap water at times because it was considered dangerous. In towns all over Pennsylvania and Texas and Wyoming and other states, we have already seen the horrible consequences of fracking. We know what will happen if we allow this practice in the Delaware River Basin. Our water will be poisoned, ecosystems will be devastated, and people will get sick and die. To me, there is no acceptable level of death in the name of fossil fuels and money.
I'd like to issue a kind of challenge to everyone here. Everyone knows what is going on, everyone who has come here probably appreciates the scale of the problem, so we must match the scale of our actions to that. We know what will happen if this is allowed, and so our actions must be on that same scale, not just writing letters or testifying at hearings where everyone agrees with us.
Thank you for this opportunity to speak today.
Ross Levin
Tuesday, March 8, 2011
A Fracking Mess
The Philadelphia City Council is holding a hearing *today* on drilling in the Delaware River watershed.
WHEN: Tuesday, March 8th, 2011 5:30 – 7:30 PM
WHERE: City Council Chambers (4th Floor), City Hall, Philadelphia, PA
More on fracking here: http://crisisera.blogspot.com/2011/03/fracking-our-water.html
[1] Vanity Fair, A Colossal Fracking Mess: The dirty truth behind the new natural gas. By Christopher Bateman • Photographs by Jacques del Conte • June 21, 2010: http://www.vanityfair.com/business/features/2010/06/fracking-in-pennsylvania-201006
[2] A Vanity Fair video look at a town transformed by fracking: http://www.vanityfair.com/culture/features/2010/06/fracking-video-201006
See also: http://crisisera.blogspot.com/2011/03/fracking-our-water.html
Monday, March 7, 2011
Fracking our water
Fracking is a process for extracting natural gas from shale located deep in the earth’s crust. Frackers drill vertically about a mile deep into the crust of the earth and then drill horizontally for some distance. They then pump under very high pressure about 4 to 5 million gallons of good potable water per well with enabling chemicals to fracture the shale and release methane gas from it. The water that returns in the well, which is only a fraction of the water that was pumped into it, is highly toxic. It contains not only the toxic enabling chemicals, but also heavy metals and radioactive materials released from the shale. The fracking water is first left in pools for evaporation and the remainder is containerized and shipped off to public water treatment plants for processing. The process was exempted during the Bush Administration from the Clean Water and Clean Air Acts. [1, 2]
Philadelphia Councilwoman Blondell Reynolds Brown has partnered with Clean Water Action, Protecting Our Waters, Delaware Riverkeeper Network, Sierra Club of Southeastern PA, PennEnvironment and other groups to host a Open Forum on Gas Drilling in the Delaware River watershed.
WHEN: Tuesday, March 8th, 2011 5:30 – 7:30 PM
WHERE: City Council Chambers (4th Floor), City Hall, Philadelphia, PA
WHY: Hydrofracking introduces highly corrosive salts, carcinogens like benzene, and radioactive elements including radium 226, as well as hydrofracking constituents such as diesel fuel, hydrochloric acid, and worse, into Philadelphia’s water supply — the cleanest part of our watershed, the Upper Delaware river. Regulators have been completely unable to protect public health from this deep type of gas drilling which is so new that its risks are only beginning to be studied.
Notes:
1. NY Times, February 27, 2011, Drilling Down: Regulation Lax as Gas Wells' Tainted Water Hits Rivers , By IAN URBINA … A method to extract more natural gas often produces wastewater laced with radioactive or other toxic substances. http://www.nytimes.com/2011/02/27/us/27gas.html
2. Democracy Now!, March 4, 2011: The environmental contamination and human health risk associated with the extraction of natural gas using horizontal drilling and hydraulic fracturing, or “fracking,” was little known across the United States for years, until a documentary film brought the issue to the national stage. Josh Fox directed the film Gasland, which chronicles the devastation affecting communities where fracking is taking place, and the influence of the natural gas industry over regulation of the techniques and chemicals used in the process. The industry aggressively attacked the film, especially when it was nominated for an Academy Award this year… http://www.democracynow.org/2011/3/4/natural_gas_industry_attacks_oscar_nominated
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