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Tuesday, September 15, 2020
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'This Is a Travesty': Climate Denier Who Has Argued in Favor of Fossil Fuel Emissions Named to Leadership Role at NOAA
"He's not just in left field—he's not even near the ballpark."
by
Julia Conley, staff writer
https://www.commondreams.org/news/2020/09/14/travesty-climate-denier-who-has-argued-favor-fossil-fuel-emissions-named-leadership
Climate scientists were aghast Monday at the news that David Legates, a University of Delaware professor who has repeatedly questioned the scientific consensus that human activity is causing the climate crisis and has claimed that carbon dioxide emissions are beneficial, has been named by the Trump administration to a top leadership role at the federal government's climate research agency.
Legates was appointed—without the knowledge of several NOAA officials, according to one person at the agency—to serve as deputy assistant secretary of commerce for environmental observation and prediction and will report directly to acting NOAA Administrator Neil Jacobs.
Gretchen Goldman of the Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS) called the appointment "a slap in the face to NOAA scientists who work daily to conduct and communicate climate science to the public and decision makers."
"Until now, NOAA has largely evaded the kind of anti-science political appointees that have devastated the EPA and Interior," Goldman told the Washington Post. "With Dr. Legates we risk seeing the same kind of politicization of science and corruption of ethics."
Legates served from 2005 to 2011 as Delaware's state climatologist, and stepped down under pressure from former Democratic Gov. Ruth Ann Minner when it came to her attention that his views on the climate were "not aligned with those of [her] administration."
The appointment, which one anonymous NOAA official referred to as a surprising "midnight hire over the weekend," comes as the agency is monitoring the approach of Hurricane Sally. The storm rapidly strengthened on Monday and was expected to cause an "extremely dangerous and life-threatening storm surge" on the Gulf Coast. "I am directing you to offer any future statements on this or other public policy matters only on behalf of yourself or the University of Delaware, and not as state climatologist," Minner wrote to Legates in 2007 after he wrote an amicus brief in agreement with the Competitive Enterprise Institute, which opposed Delaware's attempt to force the federal regulation of greenhouse gases.
NOAA's National Weather Service has also been issuing warnings to the west coast about the wildfires that have overwhelmed the region in recent days, killing more than 30 people. Agency scientists have contributed to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change's (IPCC) reports on the climate crisis and the warming of the globe, including the 2018 study which warned that greenhouse gas emissions will pose an increasing threat to human life if they are not drastically reduced in the next 10 to 20 years.
The appointment of Legates to help lead the agency undermines that message, critics say, considering he counts among his climate science work a paper called "The IPCC Reconsidered," a Heartland Institute-funded project which called for more, not fewer, fossil fuel emissions.
"The juxtaposition of the apocalyptic wildfires and the announcement of David Legates' appointment is mind-boggling," Jane Lubchenco, who served as NOAA administrator under President Barack Obama, told the Post. "Just at the time when we need continued truth from the nation's lead climate agency, a climate denier is hired. This is a travesty."
In his new role, Lubchenco warned, Legates will "be in a position to squelch the free flow of accurate scientific information to the public, to distort or manipulate scientific findings, curtail monitoring and research, and create an overall chilling atmosphere for the high-quality science and scientists that the nation needs."
Other examples of Legates' work include a 2007 paper—partially funded by Koch Industries, the American Petroleum Institute, and ExxonMobil—which questioned whether the climate crisis is destroying polar bears' habitats as temperatures in the Arctic rise twice as fast as the global average, and sea ice vanishes at a rate of 4% per decade.
Along with former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, Legates spoke in 2016 at a panel discussion on Capitol Hill—when both chambers of Congress were controlled by Republicans—about the documentary "Climate Hustle," which called into question the existence of the scientific consensus regarding human-caused climate change. The panel addressed the question: "Are [scientists] trying to control the climate...or you?"
Brian Kahn, managing editor of Earther, tweeted about a talk Legates gave at the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) in 2018 in which the professor posited that the heating of the planet holds benefit for humans and wildlife, such as the growth of larger crabs.
Legates' presentation was a "total cesspool of misinformation about how carbon dioxide is good, actually," tweeted Kahn.
"He's not just in left field—he's not even near the ballpark," Lubchenco told NPR.
'Outrageous': Sanders Blasts AstraZeneca for Raising Drug Prices Despite $1.2 Billion From Taxpayers for Covid-19 Vaccine
Big drug companies don't need more subsidies. We need to end their greed." —Sen. Bernie Sanders
by
Brett Wilkins, staff writer
https://www.commondreams.org/news/2020/09/14/outrageous-sanders-blasts-astrazeneca-raising-drug-prices-despite-12-billion
Bernie Sanders on Monday was among critics denouncing AstraZeneca—one of the world's biggest and most profitable pharmaceutical corporations—for aggressively raising the prices of some of its best-selling drugs in recent months, even after it secured a more than $1 billion taxpayer handout for the development of a Covid-19 vaccine.
The Los Angeles Times reports AstraZeneca has implemented two rounds of price hikes for some of its most popular medications in 2020. In January, the U.K.-based company announced it would modestly raise prices on 13 different products. Shortly after the company's January announcement, the coronavirus pandemic accelerated around the world. AstraZeneca subsequently instituted price hikes that were much steeper than some of its top competitors.
The price of some AstraZeneca drugs has increased by up to 6%, according to an investigation by the Times and 46brookyln Research, a nonprofit group focusing on the pharmaceutical industry.
According to Pharm Exec, AstraZeneca is the world's 11th-largest pharmaceutical company by 2019 sales. The Times reports it enjoyed over $3.6 billion in operating profits over the first half of 2020.
News of the price hikes sparked condemnation from progressive leaders and activists.
"It's outrageous for Big Pharma to use the pandemic as an opportunity to raise prices on life-saving medicine," Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), who made Medicare for All—including prescription drugs—a pillar of his near-miss 2020 presidential run, tweeted on Monday. "Big drug companies don't need more subsidies. We need to end their greed."
"Pharma corporations are sophisticated political actors that understand this is a risky time to be seen increasing prices, and yet these corporations are addicted to price increases," Peter Maybarduk, who oversees drug policy for the nonprofit watchdog group Public Citizen, told the Times.
In April, AstraZeneca entered talks with Oxford University to develop a Covid-19 vaccine, and the following month the company secured $1.2 billion from the Department of Health and Human Services to produce at least 300 million doses of a vaccine by January 2021. HHS Secretary Alex Azar, a former executive at U.S. drugmaker Eli Lilly, hailed the contract as a "major milestone."
However, AstraZeneca's work on a Covid-19 vaccine hit a significant barrier last week, with U.S. and U.K. clinical trials temporarily paused after a patient developed a potentially dangerous complication. Trials partially resumed on Monday in the U.K., while they remain on hold in the U.S. pending an investigation into the British patient.
Oxford University has also come under fire in Britain after the prestigious institution changed course under pressure from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation from a plan to make any Covid-19 vaccine available for free or at a very low cost to signing the deal with AstraZeneca. The company said in July that it will not profit from its Covid-19 vaccine, although critics have noted that there is no way to guarantee that it won't, and the Oxford deal gives AstraZeneca sole rights without any affordability requirement.
News of the latest Big Pharma price hike came a day after President Donald Trump signed an executive order he said will lower prescription drug prices. Critics immediately dismissed Trump's move as an election year publicity stunt.
The administration has not commented on AstraZeneca's move. Although the government has committed to providing pharmaceutical companies with over $10 billion in taxpayer funding to develop a Covid-19 vaccine, the administration has not required them to disclose how much they would charge for it.
The United States has the world's highest prescription drug prices. According to 2019 data from the House Ways and Means Committee, U.S. drug prices are nearly four times higher than the combined average price for 11 other similar countries.
"With one exception, we found that individual drug prices in the U.S. ranged from 70% (Lantus Solostar—a type of insulin) to 4,833% (Dulera—a prescription asthma medication) higher than the combined mean price in the other 11 countries," the report states. "Compared to individual countries, drug prices in the U.S. ranged from 0.6 to 67 times the price for the same drugs."
Americans are finding it increasingly difficult to afford their medicines. A recent Gallup poll found that one in five U.S. households were unable to afford medication prescribed by a doctor.
Mass migration set to increase as world warms
September 15th, 2020, by Paul Brown
https://climatenewsnetwork.net/mass-migration-set-to-increase-as-world-warms/
Climate change is now driving mass migration, which will only worsen unless governments take global heating seriously.
LONDON, 15 September, 2020 −There is strong evidence that deteriorating environments caused by climate change are driving millions of people to resort to mass migration in their search for a better life, both within countries and across borders.
As temperatures rise these migrations will only increase, particularly in Latin America and India, which is predicted to overtake China as the country with the largest population by 2025.
An analysis of environment and migration, published in Nature Climate Change, of 30 studies of individual countries across the world shows that there is no one single factor that drives migration.
But most research has found that environmental hazards have a major influence. Rising temperature levels, changes in rainfall and single sudden events like hurricanes are all triggers.
Policies for improvement
The analysis, by the International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis (IIASA) in Austria and research partners across Europe, was undertaken to try to inform policy makers about how to avert mass human migration.
It points out that two of the most high-profile mass migration episodes in recent times – the Syrian refugee crisis in 2015 and the “migrant caravan” from Central America to the United States in 2018 – have been partly attributed to severe droughts in the countries concerned.
While some studies conclude that environmental factors were not the main driver of migration, most thought it was one of the primary causes. The analysis says governments should expect significantly higher migration flows in the future.
Perhaps surprisingly, given the publicity surrounding the issue, migrations were not centred on poor people trying to enter rich nations in Europe or North America. Instead, most movements were from the countryside to urban areas in the same country, particularly in agriculturally dependent countries, or from one middle-income country to another.
“The best way to protect those affected is to stabilise the global climate by rapidly reducing greenhouse gas emissions from burning fossil fuels”
People with particularly low incomes normally stayed where they were, despite environmental pressures, because they had no way of financing a move, while richer people had the means to adapt to new circumstances and so they also stayed put.
“Environmental factors can drive migration, but the size of the effects depends on the particular economic and socio-political conditions in the countries,” explains the lead author Roman Hoffmann, from Germany’s Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research (PIK).
“In both low and high income countries, environmental impacts on migration are weaker – presumably because either people are too poor to leave and therefore essentially become trapped or, in wealthy countries, they have enough financial means to absorb the consequences. It is mainly in middle-income regions and those with a dependency on agriculture that we see strong effects.”
IIASA predicts future higher levels of environmental migration for countries in Central America, the Caribbean, Brazil and Argentina. In Africa it is the Sahel region south of the Sahara that is already drying out, and East Africa that has the highest potential for people migrating because of climate change.
Eyes on India
Perhaps the most disturbing prediction is that India, with 1.3 billion people and soon to be the most populous country in the world, is likely to see large migrations. The heat and floods in the country are already killing hundreds of people a year, and many millions who are still dependent on subsistence agriculture are struggling with changing climate conditions.
“Our research suggests that populations in Latin America and the Caribbean, several countries in sub-Saharan Africa – especially in the Sahel region and East Africa – as well as western, southern and south-east Asia, are particularly at risk,” says co-author Anna Dimitrova from the Vienna Institute of Demography of the Austrian Academy of Sciences.
While the report is aimed at preparing governments for migrations that will inevitably happen in the future, with difficult consequences for both the migrants and the host country, the research suggests the best way of averting the coming crisis is to tackle climate change and reduce further rises in temperatures.
“The best way to protect those affected is to stabilise the global climate by rapidly reducing greenhouse gas emissions from burning fossil fuels as well as simultaneously to enhance adaptive capacity, such as through improving human capital,” says Jesus Crespo Cuaresma, a researcher with the IIASA World Population Program and professor of economics at the Vienna University of Economics and Business. − Climate News Network
Headlines with Sonali, Sept. 14
https://www.risingupwithsonali.com/2020/09/14/headlines-september-14-2020/
Headlines: September 14, 2020
Daily Newsflash
- September 14, 2020
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Wildfires continue to plague the West Coast of the United States with at least 2 dozen people having lost their lives in California alone and millions of acres burning. According to California’s fire authority more than 16,000 firefighters were working hard to contain nearly 30 wildfires around the state. The largest fire is the North complex fire over much of Butte county. The weather forecast of strong winds in the coming days could exacerbate the flames. Across all three Western states that include Washington and Oregon, a total of 35 people have died. Smoke has blanketed the region and the western United States now has some of the worst air quality in the world. President Donald Trump, who has remained largely silent on the massive fire crisis, visited California on Monday. Trump, who has long been a climate change denier, has reduced California’s struggles with fire to poor fuel management, which experts say is only part of the problem.
Trump’s rival, Democratic Presidential nominee Joe Biden, released a statement saying, “climate change poses an imminent, existential threat to our way of life. President Trump can try to deny that reality, but the facts are undeniable.” However, Biden has refused to go as far as endorsing a Green New Deal to tackle the climate and economic crisis. Vermont Senator and two-time Presidential candidate Bernie Sanders during a virtual townhall on Saturday addressed the issue of climate change saying this. On the other side of the country from the West coast fires, Tropical storm Sally was upgraded to a hurricane expected to hit the Gulf Coast with winds of up to 85 mph. The storm could hit the state of Louisiana as a Category 2 hurricane which has winds of 96-110 mph.
Meanwhile Trump continues to stoke anxiety with numerous disturbing statements over the weekend that showed little respect for the rule of law. The so-called “law and order” president in an interview on Fox News effectively said that a Portland protester who was killed by federal forces deserved to die and discussing the federal law enforcement’s killing of Portland protester Michael Reinoehl as “retribution,” ignoring the U.S. Constitution’s protections of due process and rule of law and offering it up as a justified extrajudicial assassination. During his weekend rally in Nevada Trump made another outrageous statement saying he would “negotiate a third term” if he were to win reelection in November even though the 22nd amendment to the U.S. constitution clearly stipulates only 2 terms for Presidents. Also during his rally Trump claimed contrary to evidence that President Barack Obama spied on his 2016 campaign and got caught, leading his supporters to chant “Lock Him Up.”
Meanwhile national polls show Biden maintaining a strong lead less than 2 months before the November 3rd race. According to a Newsweek analysis, “No recent national poll shows Trump leading or even tied with Biden.” Additionally Biden leads Trump in several key swing states including Minnesota, Nevada, New Hampshire, Wisconsin and Arizona. Trump headed to Arizona on Monday where a new poll showed Biden leading him 52 to 42%. That poll is apparently the 8th consecutive public poll showing Biden in the lead and in 17 out of the past 20 Arizona polls, Biden has maintained his lead. In Florida which has been a flashpoint for Presidential races, Biden will make his first visit on Tuesday. The former Vice President is struggling with Latino voters in particular. Some Democratic Party leaders have expressed frustration at the lack of voter outreach in the Latino community. José Parra who was former Senator Harry Reid’s senior adviser told the Washington Post, “What worries me is how late in the game they are trying to put those pieces into place.” In part Biden is grappling with the record-breaking number of deportations that the Obama administration oversaw. Meanwhile former Presidential candidate and billionaire Michael Bloomberg has vowed to spend $100 million of his fortune to boost turnout for Biden in Florida.
Eclipsing issues and polls ahead of the November 3rd race are doubts and confusion about voting under a President who has manufactured claims about widespread voter fraud, as well as the dangers of voting in person during a pandemic. State leaders have slammed the US Postal Service—led by Trump loyalist Louis DeJoy and overseen by a GOP-dominated board—for sending out confusing mailers about the election. Colorado’s Secretary of State Jena Griswold sued USPS over mailers that she said were “not just confusing,” but “wrong.” A federal judge has now granted her a temporary restraining order for the mailers being sent to Colorado. Meanwhile Mr. Biden’s campaign has created a “legal war room” that includes two former solicitors-general and hundreds of lawyers that the New York Times described as, “the largest election protection program in presidential campaign history.”
Among the most bizarre tactics that the GOP and Trump’s campaign are deploying against Biden are claims that he is responsible for the current mess in the nation, even though Biden has not held office for the past 3 and a half years. Republican National Committee Chairwoman Ronna McDaniel on Sunday said, “Joe Biden can’t run from his disastrous record responding to the coronavirus.” Meanwhile Trump officials were found to have interfered with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC)’s reporting on the coronavirus pandemic, among them a former Trump campaign staffer named Michael Caputo. Politico obtained internal documents from the Department of Health and Human Services that showed attempts to water down CDC’s warnings. The move is in line with recent revelations of Trump’s own statements downplaying the dangers of a virus he knew to be deadly. Additionally, Trump’s weekend rally in Las Vegas, Nevada, flouted social distancing measures and face coverings as thousands congregated in close quarters in an indoor space for the first time since Trump’s rally in Tulsa, Oklahoma. Nevada’s governor Steve Sisolak denounced the rally as “reckless and selfish.”
Two Los Angeles Sheriff’s deputies were shot in an attack over the weekend that landed them in the hospital and sparked violent clashes with protesters. In apparent retaliation for the shooting, LA Sheriffs cleared a months-old protest camp in Grand park across from City Hall that had been set up after George Floyd’s killing in Minneapolis in late May. Additionally, journalist Josie Huang was violently arrested while covering the protests that were taking place outside the hospital where sheriffs were being treated. Authorities say she didn’t identify herself as a journalist or have credentials, but video evidence points to the contrary. In Georgia a deputy was fired for violently beating up a Black man who had been a passenger in a car that had a broken taillight. The Clayton County Sheriff’s deputy was seen on video assaulting Roderick Walker in a life-threatening manner but Mr. Walker is the one who remains in jail and has been charged with battery and obstructing officers. U.S. law enforcement’s racist violence has drawn attention from the international community leading the United Nations’ human rights chief Michelle Bachelet to call for “urgent and profound action to combat systemic racism.”
Popular Resistance, today's articles
Cutting Through Western Imperialist Propaganda About China, Plus A Tribute To Kevin Zeese
By Margaret Flowers and Kevin Zeese, Clearing the FOG. As US empire wanes and China's economy and global reach grow, the United States has entered a Cold War with China that includes economic warfare, military antagonism, and a misinformation campaign. Western imperialist media promote myths designed to build public opposition to China and support for this US aggression. This leaves even those on the left confused. Rarely do we hear from Chinese people who would provide clarity about their country. To fill that gap, the new Qiao Collective, composed of Chinese analysts and scholars, was created this year. -more-September 14, 2001: The Day America Became Israel
By Maj. Danny Sjursen, USA (Ret.), Popular Resistance. The rubble was still smoldering at Ground Zero when the U.S. House of Representatives voted to essentially transform itself into the Israeli Knesset, or parliament. It was 19 years ago, 11:17pm Washington D.C. time on September 14, 2001 when the People’s Chamber approved House Joint Resolution 64, the Authorization for the Use of Military Force (AUMF) “against those responsible for the recent attacks.” Naturally, that was before the precise identities, and full scope, of “those responsible” were yet known - so the resolution’s rubber-stamp was obscenely open-ended by necessity, but... -more-Trump's War On Journalism Takes Center Stage
By Kevin Gosztola, Shadowproof. In the last half-century, journalists James Bamford, Ben Bradlee, Seymour Hersh, and Neil Sheehan were each threatened with prosecution under the Espionage Act. But the U.S. government never followed through with Espionage Act charges against a journalist until 2019, when WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange was arrested and charged. Trevor Timm, the executive director for the Freedom of the Press Foundation (FPF), told a magistrate court judge, “[President Donald] Trump’s administration is moving to explicitly criminalize national security journalism, and if this prosecution is allowed to... -more-US-Linked PR Firm Ran Fake News Networks For Right-Wing Latin American Regimes
By Ben Norton, The Grayzone. A major US PR firm located just a few blocks from the White House has been caught running an industrial grade propaganda operation on social media. The information warfare blitzkrieg relied on fake accounts and pages to spread disinformation on behalf of right-wing, US-backed governments in Latin America, while deploying covert propaganda to destabilize the leftist governments in Venezuela and Mexico. The company behind the campaign, CLS Strategies, signed a contract to represent Bolivia’s far-right junta and provide “strategic communications counsel” in the lead-up to that country’s... -more-Ending The Pentagon's Pandemic Of Spending
By Mandy Smithberger, Tom Dispatch. The inadequate response of both the federal and state governments to the Covid-19 pandemic has had a devastating impact on the United States, creating what could only be called a national security crisis. More than 190,000 Americans are dead, approximately half of them people of color. Yelp data show that more than 132,000 businesses have already closed and census data suggest that, thanks to lost wages, nearly 17% of Americans with children can’t afford to feed them enough food. In this same period, a number of defense contractors have been doing remarkably well. -more-Long-Awaited Win For Water Protectors
By Water Protector Legal Collective. On Thursday, September 10, 2020, in a long-awaited ruling, United States District Court Judge Daniel Traynor (District of North Dakota) allowed a lawsuit challenging law enforcement’s 2016 use of fire hoses and munitions against water protectors opposing the Dakota Access Pipeline (DAPL) to move forward with discovery. The case had been stalled for more than two years after Morton County and other defendants filed a motion asking the court to dismiss the case. Plaintiff Vanessa Dundon is a member of the Navajo/ Diné Nation who was shot in the eye with a teargas canister while attempting to aid... -more-
With Global Heating, Expect Inferno Seasons In The American West
By Peter Kalmus and Natasha Stavros, LA Times. More than 3.1 million acres have burned in California this year — some 3% of the state — with many wildfires still at zero containment and months of fire season left to go. This far exceeds the previous record set in 2018, when 1.7 million acres burned, including the town of Paradise. These raging fires, some exacerbated by the blistering heat last weekend, are the direct result of climate change. The planet is currently 1.0°C to 1.2°C (about 2°F) hotter than it ought to be. This excess heat is entirely due to humans, mainly from burning fossil fuels and destroying forests. -more-Toronto: Rally For Six Nations Members Arrested In Land Dispute
By Muriel Draaisma, CBC.ca. Hundreds of people demonstrated outside of the office of the Ontario ministry of Indigenous affairs in Toronto on Saturday to show support for members of Six Nations of the Grand River arrested in a land dispute. Demonstrators carried placards and a large banner that read: "Land Back." The gathering near Bloor Street East and Church Street was in support of a group that calls itself the Six Nations Land Defenders. "Land Back" was painted in red capital letters on the street near the office with messages in chalk surrounding the words. -more-Our Unjust System Of Mass Supervision
By Mark Rice, Urban Milwaukee. Wisconsin’s disastrous system of mass supervision is at odds with our widely shared values of justice, human dignity and compassion. Detaining people struggling with poverty, housing insecurity, mental health issues and addiction issues for alleged rule violations is at odds with common sense approaches to justice. Yet, public officials in Wisconsin have been keeping its prisons and jails overcrowded for many years by doubling down on this unjust practice. A new report by Human Rights Watch and the ACLU demonstrates the deep racial injustice and extent of the harm caused by mass supervision in Wisconsin. -more-Social Justice Demonstrations Mark First Week Of NFL
By Justine Coleman, The Hill. NFL players marked the first full weekend of professional football by participating in social justice demonstrations, with various teams opting to stay in the locker room, link arms or kneel during the national anthem. All eyes were on the NFL players after a summer of protests against racial injustice years after former NFL player Colin Kaepernick first began kneeling during the anthem to demonstrate against police brutality and racial injustice. -more-The Liberal Class Is Complicit In Mass Murder
By Roger Hallam, Popular Resistance. There is an out-of-fashion quote that goes something along the lines of: “For Evil to flourish good people need only to do nothing.” The notion of “evil” has been banished from the supposedly sophisticated discourse of the “woke” liberal classes. But for 99% of human history, evil was very much a material reality, namely the grotesque arbitrary power of the rich to rape, starve and murder. The modern evil is the plan by the corporate elite and their political administrators to willingly, in the full knowledge of the science, engage in putting greenhouse gases into the air to the point of... -more-As an independent media source free of advertising, we rely on your support.
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