THE BIGGEST TRANSFER OF WEALTH IN HISTORY
And now the lynchpins of leveraged finance are praying that the cash they spent on imports will come back to them. And it will. But it comes back like a young man who got rich in the colonies…with better clothes and a sniffy air. It left a servant; it comes back a master, buying up valuable assets and expecting the indigenes of Wall Street to shine its shoes. Foreign purchases of U.S. assets rose 90% last year. Foreigners are bidding for America’s leading brewery, Britain’s stock exchange, hedge funds, infrastructure projects and technology companies. A Chinese company bought MG. An SWF from the Gulf bought the emblematic Chrysler in New York. A Russian who got rich in fertilizer bought Donald Trump’s Palm Beach mansion for $100 million. And the balance sheet of the U.S. Fed shows $2.3 trillion of US treasury debt held in custody for foreign central banks. The harder the Fed fights the correction…the more money and credit it puts out. This monetary inflation causes prices for oil and imports to rise…and more money goes into foreign reserves and Sovereign Wealth Funds in the East, to be used to buy more assets in the West. Thanks to America’s mad monetary policy, these private assets are being taken into public ownership. Some of America’s most important properties are being nationalized…but by other nations. – Bill Bonner
Thirteen Science Academies Urge Fundamental Social Change
Key vulnerabilities include water resources, food supply, health, coastal settlements and some ecosystems (particularly arctic, tundra, alpine, and coral reef). The most sensitive regions are likely to include the Arctic, Africa, small islands and the densely populated Asian mega-deltas. As the concentration of greenhouse gases increases, these impacts become more severe and spread both geographically and sectorally. To stabilize the climate, emissions should eventually be limited to the net absorption capacity of the earth, which is less than half of current emissions. Immediate large-scale mitigation action is required. At the 2007 Heiligendamm Summit, G8 leaders agreed to seriously consider halving global emissions by 2050. We urge G8+5 leaders to make maximum efforts to carry this forward and commit to these emission reductions. – How long do we go on begging the wealthy elite of this world? How long do we grovel at their feet, send them emails and press releases and collect thousands of signatures? Is it any use to appeal to those who have no hearts? We need to assume that they are without hearts. Then we move to new strategies. We need to de-recognize their annual meetings. We need to call a spade a spade. Through their policies, they commit crimes against humanity. Humanity meaning the teeming masses in every country. The G8 bosses endanger their lives, they propel them into poverty with nary a blink of an eye. Global criminals should be tried in global courts, and if the ICJ is out of service, then we need to create a new global court, supersived by the common people, who have a clear view of what’s what and who’s who as regards construction and destruction of humanity.. – Garda Ghista
THIS IS HOW THE WORLD ENDS
Book review of: Peter D.Ward, Under a Green Sky: Global Warming, the
Mass Extinctions of the Past, and What They Can Tell Us about Our
Future (N.Y.: Collins, 2007).
This Is How the World Ends
“What makes this such a terrifying book is it isn’t based on
theoretical mathematics. Rapid increases in greenhouse gases have shut
down the ocean conveyor several times before, resulting in severe
climate change and mass extinction. If Ward’s analysis is correct, we
know what caused it and we know how to make it not happen again. The
question is: can we save us from ourselves?”
What makes this such a terrifying book is it isn’t based on
theoretical mathematics. Rapid increases in greenhouse gases have shut
down the ocean conveyor several times before, resulting in severe
climate change and mass extinction. If Ward’s analysis is correct, we
know what caused it and we know how to make it not happen again. The
question is: can we save us from ourselves?
Perhaps if people read Under a Green Sky and tell their friends about
it, we might have a chance. Many people are apathetic about global
warming because the press concentrates on superficial metrics like
mean temperature and sea levels rising a few feet. So we grow oranges
in Alaska, who cares? Peter Ward offers a reason why we should all
care, and right now.
The natural world is deteriorating and human health is declining
because those who make the important decisions aren’t the ones who
bear the brunt. Our purpose is to connect the dots between human
health, the destruction of nature, the decline of community, the
rise of economic insecurity and inequalities, growing stress among
workers and families, and the crippling legacies of patriarchy,
intolerance, and racial injustice that allow us to be divided and
therefore ruled by the few.
In a democracy, there are no more fundamental questions than, “Who
gets to decide?” And, “How do the few control the many, and what
might be done about it?”
“We are already fighting World War III and I am sorry to say we are winning. It is the war against the earth”…..Raymond Dasmann
In a message dated 7/11/2008 10:22:41 P.M. Eastern Daylight Time, lsalzman@rcn.com writes:
Those of you who may have read Ted Nordhaus and Michael
Shellenberger’s books (The Death of Environmentalism, 2005; Break
Through 2008) know how they have stirred things up in the
environmental movement and the mass media. They have been widely
interviewed and widely praised for their bashing of the environmental
movement and for their purported new vision of activism. I dissected
both of these books on my web site (www.lornasalzman.com) as well as
on culturechange.org, as being ahistorical, neo-liberal and
fraudulent.
It turns out that I am not the only one who identified these shysters
(Nordhaus is a pollster and Shellenberger a public relations hack who
now represents Hugo Chavez’s government in Venezuela). Alex Smith, in
British Columbia, hosts a magnificent and comprehensive environmental
radio show which is available at the site below (printed transcripts
are also available). Tonight I found the time to listen to the two
shows he mentions below: “Plotting the Green Death”, in which he
interviews both Nordhaus and Shellenberger. Clearly Smith has their
number.
In the course of the first of these shows Smith lays wide open the
financial and political support infrastructure for these books: the
once-liberal Nathan Cummings Foundation (which helped fund Alternet,
according to Smith), now become a mouthpiece for what can only be
described as desperado capitalism, under its present director Peter
Tieg. Cummings once funded many small and diverse environmental
groups. No more. It has shed whatever liberal pretenses it once had
in favor of an overt unabashed effort to destroy, once and for all,
the entire environmental movement. Cummings is on the warpath against
environmentalism and found the perfect tools. They got perfect fools
into the bargain.
The appearance of Nordhaus and Shellenberger was their biggest coup
and opportunity. Here, in the shape of two ostensible liberals, was
their path to undermining the credibility and survival of
environmentalism. What was the plan and their objective? Here is my
analysis.
The climate change emergency has grabbed the attention of the public,
the government and the media like no other issue. Every day credible
scientists, scientific journals and scientific research bodies come
out with a new pronouncement about the acceleration of global
warming. Every day the date of the “tipping points”, beyond which
there is no turning back, advances towards us. Every day scientists
like James Hansen are in the public view saying we have only a
handful of years to stabilize and reduce CO2 concentrations. Every
day there are cries for legislation and policies and actions to
reduce energy use.
This latter point is the crucial one. Reduction in energy use
threatens economic growth, otherwise known as capitalism. It is
becoming clear and undeniable that only a massive reduction in the
use of fossil fuels gives us any chance at all for mitigating global
warming and averting ecocide. Moreover, the smiley faces of those who
propose salvation through renewable energy – solar, wind, biofuels,
hydrogen fuel cells – cannot disguise the fact that all of these
sources together cannot – in the time remaining to us – fill our
present energy demand.
The ONLY thing that can buy us time – the time to bring a fully
renewable energy economy on line – is a radical reduction in energy
consumption and tough mandatory energy efficiency measures and
statutes in every sector of the economy.
High oil prices have already cut into energy consumption and into all
other areas of consumer purchases. This reduction in consumption is
anathema to capitalism and growth. Without continued growth the
economy starts crumbling.
To industry, investors, financiers and business owners, this means
recession if not depression, zero growth. Of course zero growth is
the only thing that CAN possibly fend off the worst effects of global
warming, and as such it should be not just welcomed but sought. This
is, however, not in the capitalist cards.
So what do the capitalists need to do? They need to DISTRACT the
public and the media from the Bad News that says: buy less, consume
less. They need to distract the public from the science that
announces more grim news every day. They need to promote the Good
News: prosperity (which N&S say is the answer to the world’s
environmental problems, if such problems exist at all), jobs, growth,
globalization. If you thought that N&S were neo-cons in disguise, you
aren’t far off. Read Democrats instead. Their message, and that of
the Nathan Cummings Foundation, is that things will start looking up
as soon as we stop pretending there are constraints. Out there in
that blue sky is the promise of salvation through technology, through
optimism, through prosperity. The environmentalists have it all
wrong, they say. We have it right. Trust us.
Cummings and N&S are thus the handmaidens facilitating Business as
Usual and presenting a fancy show of fireworks with the hope that
depressed people will embrace their argument and reject the pessimism
and spectre of hardship and sacrifice presented by those who commit
the error of being truthful about global warming. For them, the
biggest obstacle is environmentalism, in all shapes and sizes, that
must be squashed once and for all, so as to allow the happy voice of
unfettered capitalist growth to dominate public dialogue.
Small wonder, therefore, that so many confused people and climate
change deniers have welcomed N&S’ book Break Through with open arms.
Here at last their worst fears are allayed and their fervent hopes
substantiated. Here at last is some good news that they can throw
back at the environmentalists. Here at last are some “credible
liberals” who themselves say environmentalists are wrong. Here at
last is justification for their doubts about climate change.
N&S are the hired guns for the Cummings “cosa nostra”. They have the
blessing of godfather Peter Tieg and the foundation board members.
They are truly “made men”.
http://e360.yale.edu/content/feature.msp?id=2033
Analysis
After Bush, Restoring Science
to Environmental Policy
The Bush administration has been widely criticized for placing politics over science when it comes to environmental policy-making. The next president must act to reverse that trend.
Over the 7½ years of the Bush administration, it’s hard to name a major U.S. government regulatory agency that hasn’t seen some type of scandal involving science. From the Environmental Protection Agency to the Bureau of Land Management to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, we’ve heard repeated complaints from government scientists who say their work on environmental issues has been inappropriately edited by political appointees, that they themselves have been muzzled, and that their agencies have put out rank misinformation to the public.
To get a sense of just how extensive such problems have been, consider the findings of a 2007 report by the Union of Concerned Scientists, which sought to survey federally employed climate researchers across several agencies. Almost half of the 300-odd survey respondents felt pressured to eliminate words like “climate change” or “global warming” from documents or communications; a similar number perceived inappropriate changes to their work that altered its scientific meaning.
And that’s just climate scientists. Surveys of researchers at the Fish and Wildlife Service and the National Marine Fisheries Service — whose work underlies implementation of the Endangered Species Act — found similar complaints. And recently, when unionized Environmental Protection Agency scientists backed out of their cooperation agreement with the agency’s political leadership, one cited reason was that lately the agency has ignored “its own Principles of Scientific Integrity whenever political direction from other federal entities or private sector interests so direct.”
It will fall to the next president to repair the relationship between government-employed scientists and the nation’s political leadership. And since most of the assaults on science during the Bush administration have occurred at pressure points where scientific information feeds into the regulatory process, the next administration must strive more broadly to bolster the role of science in environmental and other types of agency decision-making, so that the best available information once again drives policy.
Both major presidential candidates, Barack Obama and John McCain, appear to take this matter seriously. Obama, who has accused the Bush Administration of ignoring or distorting data to shape its decisions on science-related issues, has said his policies would be based on “evidence and facts.” As for McCain, in his role as chair of the Senate Commerce Committee, he has eviscerated the Bush administration on matters of science. In one particularly sharp exchange in 2005, McCain upbraided an administration representative for failing to produce a required government report on global warming.
So assuming the next president aims not only to restore scientific integrity to the federal government, but also to restore morale and functionality at places like the Environmental Protection Agency, here’s a brief overview of some of the types of changes that need to be implemented.
Let’s begin where the Bush science scandals themselves did — with scientific advisory committees to federal agencies. As early as 2002, complaints began to emerge suggesting these little known expert bodies, which have been dubbed the “Fifth Branch” of American government and which advise agencies on anything from the dangers of various environmental chemicals to the risks of particulate air pollution, were being tilted politically to favor the interests of the administration’s supporters and allies. To name just one highly publicized example, in 2002 the Bush administration shook up the membership of a Centers for Disease Control and Prevention panel that advises the agency on how to protect children from lead poisoning. The administration named to the panel several scientists with industry connections, who could be expected to oppose stronger protective standards.
To address cases like this, the 1972 Federal Advisory Committee Act (FACA), which governs such committees, must be revised and more strictly enforced. A 1970s “good government” statute designed to ensure openness, balance, and transparency, of late FACA has been repeatedly circumvented through the formation of committees not subject to it — the now-infamous Bush-Cheney energy task force being a prime example. And as Rena Steinzor, a law professor at the University of Maryland and president of the Center for Progressive Regulation, notes, “The problem is not just that they put these panels together outside of FACA, outside of that statutory protection.” Additional issues arise when it comes to ensuring that advisory committees formed under FACA aren’t rife with conflicts of interest. The law allows the granting of “waivers” that let potentially conflicted scientists serve anyway, and this has been widely abused. “The disclosures are late, never publicized, and conflicts are waived all the time,” notes Steinzor.
While the next administration cannot itself reform FACA, it can ask Congress to do so. Meanwhile, a new administration could pledge that all of its advisory committees will be formed under FACA and that any conflict-of-interest waivers will be made public (or not made at all).
To ensure the proper translation of science into environmental decision-making, the next president must reconsider the use of the Data Quality Act, a bite-sized piece of legislation slipped into a 2001 appropriations bill by Representative Jo Ann Emerson (R-MO) and which, as interpreted by the Bush administration, has grown into a handy device for misusing science to upend regulation. The act allows interested parties to file complaints whenever the government “disseminates” scientific information they find objectionable. This makes it a key tool for gumming up the regulatory works by questioning the validity of government science — an increasingly common industry tactic employed on issues ranging from climate change to the regulation of mercury pollution.
And it’s not just the Data Quality Act itself: In a legally dubious move, the administration has used the act as the foundation for an unprecedented government-wide system of peer review for information that feeds into regulatory decision-making. Peer review sounds like a good thing — until you canvass the science world’s objections to this particular form of it. In essence, the new peer review system turns out to be more about slowing down government action than ensuring scientific accuracy. And it has already impaired agency function, notes George Washington University epidemiologist David Michaels, author of the new book Doubt is Their Product: How Industry’s Assault on Science Threatens Your Health (Oxford, 2008).
For example, Michaels cites the National Toxicology Program’s “Report on Carcinogens,” which is supposed to be released every two years. But the last such report — the 11th Report on Carcinogens — appeared in January of 2005, meaning the next edition is already more than a year late. If you examine the review process for that report, it’s clear the new peer review rules are to blame.
The next administration, then, ought to re-evaluate the Data Quality Act and government-wide peer review system with the following principle in mind: When it comes to using science to support regulatory decision-making, the perfect can easily become the enemy of the good. Government agencies rarely have ideal data or studies at their disposal; much of the information they rely upon cannot, by its very nature, undergo rigorous academic peer review. But agencies can rarely wait for better information to take action — because if they do, more people (or more endangered species) might be harmed. The Data Quality Act and peer review system push us in the direction of ever-more scrutiny of science that might be used to support government regulation, when what we actually need is the opposite: Federal agencies that are limber, less burdened, more free to act promptly in the public interest.
At the same time, the next president and his cabinet officials must strive to ensure that scientists working at these federal agencies not only get treated fairly, but can feel confident their work gets taken seriously and plays the proper role in government decision-making. This is not merely a question of propriety, but one of morale. After all, what scientist would want to work for an agency where, to use a recent example from the Fish and Wildlife Service, a political appointee named Julie MacDonald was, according to the Interior Department’s inspector general, “heavily involved with editing, commenting on, and reshaping the Endangered Species Program’s scientific reports from the field”?
To help prevent such abuse, the next administration should put in place a disclosure system whereby agency science is made public as soon as the scientists are finished with it — not after the political appointees take a red pen to it. The administration should also pledge to address the many other cases we’ve seen in recent years in which political appointees and government scientists have clashed — for instance, cases where scientists have been denied the ability to speak to the media, or have seen press releases about their research heavily edited, or not released at all. What our environmental regulatory system truly needs is more independence from political sectors of the executive branch, so scientists and other professionals can do their jobs without worrying about who might be offended or how their actions play politically.
When it comes to the role of science in environmental policy, then, the next administration should seek to solve the problems of the past by embracing two broad principles for the future. First, agencies must remain free to use the best science available to do their jobs promptly and effectively, rather than having to endlessly defend that science and have it repeatedly vetted. And second: Political appointees need to back off and let federal agency scientists — and agency professionals more generally — do their jobs with integrity and independence.
We need science in government more than ever before. Because the Bush administration represented such a big step backward in this arena, the next administration must take at least two steps forward just to catch up.
POSTED ON 06.30.08 IN Climate Science & Technology North America
