It Makes Sense, But Will It Happen?

       Short and to the point, if you believe in logic and rationalism.

Visit ann arky's home at www.radicalglasgow.me.uk

What Will We Leave Our Great Grand Children?

        Can we trust the greed driven corporations and the puppet politicians that in their pocket, to honestly assess this problem and come up with answers that will perhaps diminish their wealth and power, but work for the benefit of all? I personally think that will not happen, greed blinds logic, it is up to the people to sort this out before it is too late, if it is already, not too late. What is the legacy that we will leave future generations? What will your great grand children inherit?

Visit ann arky's home at www.radicalglasgow.me.uk

War Means Climate Change.

    I get pissed off by those posh political parasitic bastards, who talk about reducing our carbon footprint, telling us to recycle more, just boil enough water for the cups of tea you need, turn your heating down, (though most of us do that because of the bills anyway). Pointing the finger at us, as problem about carbon emission, then in the next breath, talk of launching another war.

 

A really big carbon footprint.

     Apart from the human misery, the financial cost of war is staggering, it is estimated that the Iraq war cost the US approximately $1.5 trillion with a further $600 billion for after care of veterans. War also has a massive carbon footprint, all the way back to the research and development, production, storage, transportation and exports of the arms industry, to the utilisation in the war zone, all for what? One US M1 tank releases as much CO2 as 10 large Mercedes Benz cars. It was estimated that the detonation of 50 nuclear warheads of 15 kilo-tonnes each, would release  approximately 690 million tons of CO2 into the atmosphere. This compares with the estimated 250 to 600 million tons of CO2 released during the Iraq war. Modern wars create massive releases of CO2 into the atmosphere, add to this the CO2 emissions from the necessary reconstruction of the destroyed infrastructure after the destruction. Any government pursuing a green agenda could not possibly contemplate war as an answer to any problem. If your are thinking green, then you have to get rid of states, and their continuous wars for power and resources. No matter how much I recycle, how shallow my bath is, how low my heating is, it is totally wiped by any one of our lords' and masters' brutal escapades in Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, drone attacks in Somalia, Sudan, Pakistan, and Israel's savage war games in Gaza. All of these inhumane and savage, massive carbon footprint, power enterprises, make lots of money for that select few, and that is the real climate problem, it is the system that has to be destroyed.

Visit ann arky's home at www.radicalglasgow.me.uk

Climate Change, Food Crisis And Venezuela.

       So what is really happening in Venezuela, don't expect the mainstream media, that babbling brook of bullshit, to shed any light on the matter, perhaps you can glean something from this video.

Food Fight! from Anarchy Now on Vimeo.

Visit ann arky's home at www.radicalglasgow.me.uk

Should The Greedy Control Our Food??

    It is obvious that climate change is happening, floods, droughts, extreme storms, along with rising temperatures is no longer a prediction, it is here and now. Of course, as is always the case in this capitalist world, when things go wrong it is always the poor and the low waged that pay the highest price. The adverse conditions are creating havoc with our agriculture, which transfers into higher prices for our food. It is symbolic of the insanity of this greed driven capitalist system, that as food prices are rising across the planet, and people can't afford the food the help to grow, or serve in restaurants, governments across the world are dismantling social services.

     One problem that we don't hear much about is the drought in California. According to the U.S. Drought Monitor, 67% of the state of California is classified as “extreme”, a further 9% is “exceptional”, this means wells running dry, no where for cattle to graze, forcing farmers to sell off their livestock, creating a shortage of dairy produce, glut of meat and then a shortage meat. Some scientists claim that 2013/14 is the driest season for 434 years. California is the top agriculture producer in the U.S. And one of the largest in the world, producing beef, dairy produce, wine, and some of the largest fruit and vegetable crops.

      Why should we worry if California goes dry? Well America is a large, rich and powerful country, when it runs out of food, it starts to suck in more from an already suffering world, creating greater shortages and higher prices. Europe is not exempt from the effects of climate change, scientist state that in southern Europe, from southern France through Spain, Portugal, Italy, Greece and to the Balkans, stream and river minimum flow could fall by as much as 40% and in periods of drought that could increase to 80%. This of course would result in food shortages in this area, being exacerbated by the the mighty dollar sucking in food from this and other areas.

      It is also very obvious that if we continue to let “market forces” sort things out, a group of rich people will make a killing from the food crisis, the rich will feed very well indeed, as they usually do, and the poor will go hungry and increase in numbers. Tackling climate change is only one part of the solution, but is to little avail if we don't sort out the system of distribution of the world's food. At the present the food is there to see to our needs, the problem is who owns it, and who decides its distribution method. The “market” is no more than a euphemism for a “bunch of greedy rich bastards”, do we really want them to be in control of OUR survival? 

 

 Visit ann arky's home at www.radicalglasgow.me.uk

Beyond Capitalism.

 This from A World To Win:

      This People’s Inquiry offers a chance to share ideas and information about the related crises facing humanity. It is open to individuals, campaign groups, trade unions, academics and students. Working together, we can deepen our knowledge and work on solutions.

       Climate change has passed a tipping point and extreme weather is just one of the results. The global economic and financial system has entered a renewed, deeper crisis. Anger at the way political systems are corrupted by corporations and lobbyists is at boiling point.

      There is worldwide opposition and resistance, but as yet no shared strategy for getting beyond capitalism. Reaching the point where we achieve such a strategy is the main purpose of the inquiry.

We have suggested six areas for the inquiry together with some questions that will help focus our work:

• The ecosystem, including climate change and species loss
• Global economy and finance, where the 1% rule over the 99%
• The state, democracy and social rights (like health and housing)
• Ideology and philosophy – dialectics of liberation   
• Culture, education and sport – how they can help set us free
• Networks/organisations/strategies for revolutionary change

A World to Win is proposing a three-stage process:

1. Gathering evidence through papers, web references and contributions from individuals and groups. People can bear witness about their own situation or campaign, through text or by sending video or audio files.
2. Face-to-face meetings in different locations, and on-line meetings, to assess and discuss the evidence, draw conclusions and make proposals.
3. A working group, which contributors will be invited to join, will discuss the results and collaborate on the contents of a draft final report that maps out a way forward.

The inquiry is hosted on A World to Win’s network platform. Please register to post material,  make comments and get the inquiry under way!

Paul Feldman
Communications editor

Visit ann arky's home at www.radicalglasgow.me.uk

Greed Versus The Environment

 

Health and Environmental Effects of the Tar Sands

 

      Across the United States, oil refineries are seeking permits to expand their facilities to process heavy crude oil from the tar sands. Processing tar sands oil will mean more asthma and respiratory diseases, more cancer, and more cardiovascular problems. Many local communities are opposing the expansions.

In Canada, the toxic burden on communities near the tar sands is already enormous. In addition to direct human exposure, oil contamination in the local watershed has led to arsenic in moose meat—a dietary staple for First Nations peoples—up to 33 times acceptable levels. Drinking water has also been contaminated.

      The alternative is simple: we need to break our addiction to oil and fossil fuels. We could be on the road to a new energy future if we simply redirect the investment capital slated for the tar sands into sustainable alternatives. Heightened investments in clean energy also mean the creation of new green jobs. We need to stop investing in dirty fossil fuels and start funding the future.

Read the full article HERE:

Read more: What are the Tar Sands? | Rainforest Action Network http://ran.org/what-are-tar-sands#ixzz2XAYsM8xS

ann arky's home.

INFORMED OR MANIPULATED.

     The debate rages, but are we all properly informed or are we emotionally taking sides like in a faith thing, is climate change a religion where you follow one church or the other. Are we informed or manipulated, where does the truth lie? An interesting article from The Libertarian Alliance:

Dear Roger Harrabin,

   Re-reading your memo below reminds me that there is now a considerable debate as to whether the BBC have been even handed, or not, regarding the all important issue of Climate Change, or more accurately the extent that CO2 emissions have on any such change.

    In the interests of the impartiality that the BBC desperately wish to show, so as to be conforming with the Royal Charter that guarantees your independence, would you please give publicity to the following:-

    I have no commercial or vested interest whatever in these issues but, as a scientist trained by ICI in the 1950s I merely seek for a true presentation.

    We are being told to sacrifice our standard of living to reduce the quantity of CO2 in our atmosphere. How big a factor is CO2 in our atmosphere?

     It surprises everyone I ask when they learn that this beneficial trace gas is 0.037% of our atmosphere. The line would be so thin on a pie chart as to be near invisible. Not only is CO2 a benign gas it is essential for all pant life and we need 7% of it in our lungs to live. Furthermore it is at an historically low level. So how can this minuscule quantity of trace gas affect our climate? As common sense and real science tells us it cannot and does not!

Read the full article HERE:

ann arky's home.

TOMORROW'S WORLD.

      What a lousy summer, but we did have a few good laughs, now winter is on the horizon, it's time to think.

TOMORROW’S WORLD!!

See the fat cat’s grinning smile

as Corporate Capitalism runs amok,

Chasing profit as it goes

firing millions of ordinary folk.

Raping and polluting land after land,

starting bloody wars.

Toxic waste, sweat shop wages

and oil covered sea shores.

Where have all the flowers gone

beneath this ozone free sky?

To join the birds, to join the fox

on yonder plutonium field to die.

Mercury fish, strontium lamb

trees that never show a leaf,

radio active beaches, toxic streams

good lean BSE-antibiotic beef.

In a world of epidemic, plague and famine

it’s bottled water and chemical food.

Of course, it’s all tested on rats and mice

so you know its got to be good.

Beneath a sky that’s always black,

hurricane winds and endless drought,

its oxygen masks for the toxic air,

corporate profit’s what its all about.

ann arky's home.

COAL ACTION SCOTLAND.

Sunday 25th April, 19:00-21:00, ACE, 17 West Montgomery Place, Edinburgh

     The Autonomous Centre of Edinburgh and Coal Action Scotland present an evening of radical films centering around community resistance to new coal.

       We will be featuring a guest speaker who has worked extensively in Columbia and will talk about her experiences visiting communities near the Cerrejon mine, her work with social organisations opposing another huge opencast coal mine in Catatumbo and the importance of international solidarity.

      We will also be showing some films from the occupation and eviction of the Mainshill Solidarity Camp near Douglas, South Lanarkshire as well as some footage of indigenous resistance in Columbia.

     We also hope to show some films from Australia if there is time. Please spread the word - hope to see to see you there!

http://coalactionscotland.noflag.org.uk/

ACE is at: 17 West Montgomery Place, Edinburgh EH7 5HA

ann arky's home.

TAR SANDS KILL.

     

     Take action to keep BP out of the tar sands – the single most destructive project on earth. The BP Fortnight of Shame is a call to action from the UK Tar Sands Network, Rising Tide and the Camp for Climate Action to force BP to reverse their crazy plans to move into Canada’s tar sands. It runs between the annual Fossil Fools day on April 1st, and BP’s Annual General Meeting on April 15th. We hope to send a loud message to BP to stay out of the Tar Sands. Grassroots groups across the UK and around the world, will be taking action in solidarity with First Nations communities in Canada to stop BP’s deadly plans in their tracks.

Why are Tar Sands such a problem?

     Attempts to avert the planet from sliding into climate crisis are being threatened by a single massive project in the Canadian wilderness. Already, millions of barrels of tar sands oil are being extracted every day,producing three to five times as many greenhouse gas emissions as conventional oil. The extraction process is immensely resource-intensive,currently using enough natural gas every day to heat 3.2 million Canadian homes. Add to this the mass deforestation the projects are causing, ridding us of desperately needed carbon sinks, and it becomes clear this project cannot be allowed to continue if we are serious about preventing runaway climate change. The effects tar sands are having on local First Nations communities are devastating. The tar sands development in Alberta covers an area the size of England, with toxic tailing ponds so huge they are visible from space,leaking poisons into the local water supply. Not only are indigenous livelihoods and futures being destroyed, but communities on land where tar sands extraction has been imposed are experiencing disturbingly high rates of rare forms of cancer and auto-immune diseases.

Why target BP?

     BP are the only major oil company with no tar sands extraction projects currently in operation. This is about to change. Since 2007, BP have quietly ditched the ‘Beyond Petroleum’ sham, because investing in renewables simply wasn’t making them enough profit. They have decided to go Back to Petroleum, with a vengeance, under the leadership of new Chief Executive Tony Hayward. Moving into tar sands was one of the first steps Tony Hayward took, acquiring a half share in the Sunrise Project with Husky Energy. The Sunrise Project will be huge, producing 200,000 barrels of filthy oil a day, and using Steam-Assisted Gravity Drainage (SAGD), an extraction process even more energy and water intensive than the more visible surface-mining operations.

     The recession has given us a window of opportunity. BP have been forced to postpone their final decision on whether to go ahead until the second half of 2010. This means it is not too late for us to stop this outrageous project. BP are desperate for Sunrise to go ahead, and will certainly not go down without a fight, but with effective and sustained action we can win this one.

Read the full article here:  http://www.no-tar-sands.org/

ann arky's home.

MANIPULATION/CORRUPTION OR BOTH?

Received this in an e-mail, interesting reading.

09 11 24 Three Things You Absolutely Must Know About Climategate

IAIN MURRAY, November 24, 2009

     They’re calling it “Climategate.” The scandal that the suffix –gate implies is the state of climate science over the past decade or so revealed by a thousand or so emails, documents, and computer code sets between various prominent scientists released following a leak from the Climate Research Unit (CRU) at the University of East Anglia in the UK.

      This may seem obscure, but the science involved is being used to justify the diversion of literally trillions of dollars of the world’s wealth in order to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by phasing out fossil fuels. The CRU is the Pentagon of global warming science, and these documents are its Pentagon Papers.

Here are three things everyone should know about the Climategate Papers. Links are provided so that the full context of every quote can be seen by anyone interested.

First, the scientists discuss manipulating data to get their preferred results. The most prominently featured scientists are paleoclimatologists, who reconstruct historical temperatures and who were responsible for a series of reconstructions that seemed to show a sharp rise in temperatures well above historical variation in recent decades.

       In 1999, Phil Jones, the head of CRU, wrote to activist scientist Michael “Mike” Mann that he has just “completed Mike’s Nature trick of adding in the real temps … to hide the decline”(0942777075). This refers to a decline in temperatures in recent years revealed by the data he had been reconstructing that conflicted with the observed temperature record. The inconvenient data was therefore hidden under a completely different set of data. Some “trick.”

      Mann later (2003) announced that “it would be nice to try to ‘contain’ the putative ‘MWP,’ even if we don’t yet have a hemispheric mean reconstruction available that far back” (1054736277). The MWP is the Medieval Warm Period, when temperatures may have been higher than today. Mann’s desire to “contain” this phenomenon even in the absence of any data suggesting that this is possible is a clear indication of a desire to manipulate the science. There are other examples of putting political/presentational considerations before the science throughout the collection.

       Secondly, scientists on several occasions discussed methods of subverting the scientific peer review process to ensure that skeptical papers had no access to publication. In 2003, Tom Wigley of the University Corporation for Atmospheric Research in Boulder, Colorado, complained that paleoclimatologist Hans von Storch was responsible for “the publication of crap science ‘in order to stimulate debate’” and that they “must get rid of von Storch” (1051190249) as an editor of the journal Climate Research (he indeed subsequently resigned).

      In 2005, Michael Mann said that there was a “fundamental problem w/ GRL now,” referring to the journal Geophysical Research Letters published by the American Geophysical Union (AGU), because “they have published far too many deeply flawed contrarian papers in the past year or so” and “it is probably best to do an end run around GRL now where possible.” Tom Wigley responded that “we could go through official AGU channels to get him [the editor of GRL] ousted” (1106322460). A few months later, the editor of GRL having left his post, Mann comments, “The GRL leak may have been plugged up now w/ new editorial leadership there” (1132094873).

      Having seemingly succeeded with Climate Research and Geophysical Research Letters, the most recent target of the scientists’ ire has been Weather, a journal of the Royal Meteorological Society (RMS). Phil Jones commented in March 2009, “I’m having a dispute with the new editor of Weather. I’ve complained about him to the RMS Chief Exec. If I don’t get him to back down, I won’t be sending any more papers to any RMS journals and I’ll be resigning from the RMS” (1237496573).

     This issue is all the more important because the scientists involved in these discussions have repeatedly accused their critics of being irrelevant because they fail to publish in the peer reviewed literature. For example, in October this year, Mr. Mann told Andy Revkin of the New York Times:

    [L]egitimate scientific skepticism is exercised through formal scientific circles, in particular the peer review process. Those such as [Stephen] McIntyre [the target of much of the criticism in the CRU Papers] who operate almost entirely outside of this system are not to be trusted.

     If you are saying on the one hand that you will not take notice of someone until they have been published while on the other you are working behind the scenes to stop any such publication, I would venture to suggest that you are not operating with any degree of bona fides either towards the media or the legitimate scientific process.

     Finally, the scientists worked to circumvent the Freedom of Information process of the United Kingdom . Nowhere is this better evidenced than in the email reproduced in full below (minus Dr. Jones’ contact details):

From: Phil Jones p.jones@xxxxxxxxx.xxx

To: “Michael E. Mann” mann@xxxxxxxxx.xxx

Subject: IPCC & FOI

Date: Thu May 29 11:04:11 2008

Mike,

Can you delete any emails you may have had with Keith re AR4?

Keith will do likewise. He’s not in at the moment – minor family crisis.

Can you also email Gene and get him to do the same? I don’t

have his new email address.

We will be getting Caspar to do likewise.

I see that CA claim they discovered the 1945 problem in the Nature paper!!

Cheers   Phil

     The context in the subject header is clearly the Freedom of Information Act 2000 (FOI), while AR4 refers to the Fourth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. What is most important to know here is that, according to the Taxpayers’ Alliance in the UK , “at least one FOI request on exactly this correspondence had apparently been submitted by a David Holland on May 5th 2008.”

     The Freedom of Information Act, however, explicitly forbids deletion of any material subject to a FOI request. The penalty for such a criminal act is a fine of up to £5,000. Presumably being found guilty of such an act, or even suggesting it, would also bring about significant disciplinary procedures at any reputable university. A complaint has been made to the British information commissioner.

     This is, however, just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to attitudes toward FOI. Numerous other references are made about ways to avoid divulging information (the following summaries are by the blogger Bishop Hill):

    Tom Wigley discusses how to deal with the advent of FOI law in UK . Jones says use IPR argument to hold onto code. Says data is covered by agreements with outsiders and that CRU will be “hiding behind them.”(1106338806)

     Jones says that UK climate organisations are coordinating themselves to resist FOI. They got advice from the Information Commissioner [!](1219239172)

     Jones tells Mann that he is sending station data. Says that if McIntyre requests it under FOI he will delete it rather than hand it over. Says he will hide behind data protection laws. Says Rutherford screwed up big time by creating an FTP directory for Osborn. Says Wigley worried he will have to release his model code. (1107454306)

   There appears to be a prima facie case that there was a conspiracy to prevent the release of information subject to FOI.

   There are many other disturbing revelations in the CRU Papers, including a particularly disturbing assessment by a computer programmer of the state of CRU data. These have yet to be fully analyzed.

     So what does this all mean? It does not mean that there is no warming trend or that mankind has not been responsible for at least some of the warming. To claim that as result of these documents is clearly a step too far. However, it is clear that at least one branch of climate science — paleoclimatology — has become hopelessly politicized to the point of engaging in unethical and possibly illegal behavior.

     To the extent that paleoclimatology is an important part of the scientific case for action regarding global warming, urgent reassessments need to be made. In the meantime, all those responsible for political action on global warming should stop the process pending the results of inquiries, investigations, and any criminal proceedings. What cannot happen is the process carrying on as if nothing has happened.

This could prove to be climate science’s Vietnam.

ann arky's home.