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marmar
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September 4, 2013
from Dissent magazine:
The Environmental Consequences of Privatizing Mexico’s Oil
By Christopher Sellers - September 3, 2013
On August 16, an eight-inch pipeline ruptured at Mexico’s oldest refinery in Minatitlán in the south of Veracruz state. Even as oily wastes poured into the Coatzacoalcos River, stretching out twenty miles by the day’s end, a group of long-time residents meeting in this same city recalled the long, damaging toll that the petrochemical industry has inflicted on the environment and people of this region. But their harrowing past and present have barely registered in the many headlines that Mexican oil was making in this nation’s capital, as well as leading American newspapers. There, for the past few weeks, talk has swirled around the new Mexican president’s proposal to (more or less) privatize the country’s oil industry, for well over half a century run by the Mexican state.
This debate over President Enrique Peña Nieto’s plan needs to start considering what any reform may mean for the environment and well being of those in places like Minatitlán. There’s no better starting point for this reflection than the expropriation of 1938, when Mexico became the first developing nation to expel Western-owned oil companies and convert its holdings into a government enterprise. Many Mexicans celebrate this birth of Petróleos Mexicanos, or Pemex, in nearly the same terms as that country’s revolution of the 1910s; it is a modern Declaration of Independence from foreign powers. Hence, leftists like former presidential candidate Andres Manuel López Obrador have charged that the reform amounts to “treason,” while Peña Nieto defends his plan as actually fulfilling the intentions of Lázaro Cárdenas, the president who signed off on the state takeover. Nearly forgotten, both in Mexico and in the United States, is that Cárdenas’s decision to expropriate was sparked by local uprisings in oil refineries and fields that were deeply tied to the labor and environmental abuses of foreign companies.
Excursions into Mexican archives predating 1938 by the historian Myrna Santiago as well as myself have demonstrated just how extensive these abuses were. For local oil workers, strikes and sabotage became a way of life. Beyond the refineries and oil fields of Veracruz and Tamaulipas themselves, massive oil spills regularly threatened the livelihood of fishermen and farmers. And the horrific fires and explosions, the smoke and fumes that billowed from inside oil operations, impinged on the surrounding towns, stoking an anger and resistance that by 1938 made expropriation seem the best solution.
Today’s American readers will find the arguments favoring Peña Nieto’s energy reform familiar. They center around the flaws of the state-run enterprise: its corruption and inefficiency, its coddling of unions, and its monopoly in the national market for consumer goods such as gasoline, which has kept prices high. But thus far, the debates have hardly touched upon the local consequences of this reform for regions that will be most affected, like the towns around the mouth of the Coatzacoalcos River, where 70 percent of Mexico’s petrochemical production has gravitated. ....................(more)
The complete piece is at: http://www.dissentmagazine.org/blog/the-environmental-consequences-of-privatizing-mexicos-oil
The Environmental Consequences of Privatizing Mexico’s Oil
from Dissent magazine:
The Environmental Consequences of Privatizing Mexico’s Oil
By Christopher Sellers - September 3, 2013
On August 16, an eight-inch pipeline ruptured at Mexico’s oldest refinery in Minatitlán in the south of Veracruz state. Even as oily wastes poured into the Coatzacoalcos River, stretching out twenty miles by the day’s end, a group of long-time residents meeting in this same city recalled the long, damaging toll that the petrochemical industry has inflicted on the environment and people of this region. But their harrowing past and present have barely registered in the many headlines that Mexican oil was making in this nation’s capital, as well as leading American newspapers. There, for the past few weeks, talk has swirled around the new Mexican president’s proposal to (more or less) privatize the country’s oil industry, for well over half a century run by the Mexican state.
This debate over President Enrique Peña Nieto’s plan needs to start considering what any reform may mean for the environment and well being of those in places like Minatitlán. There’s no better starting point for this reflection than the expropriation of 1938, when Mexico became the first developing nation to expel Western-owned oil companies and convert its holdings into a government enterprise. Many Mexicans celebrate this birth of Petróleos Mexicanos, or Pemex, in nearly the same terms as that country’s revolution of the 1910s; it is a modern Declaration of Independence from foreign powers. Hence, leftists like former presidential candidate Andres Manuel López Obrador have charged that the reform amounts to “treason,” while Peña Nieto defends his plan as actually fulfilling the intentions of Lázaro Cárdenas, the president who signed off on the state takeover. Nearly forgotten, both in Mexico and in the United States, is that Cárdenas’s decision to expropriate was sparked by local uprisings in oil refineries and fields that were deeply tied to the labor and environmental abuses of foreign companies.
Excursions into Mexican archives predating 1938 by the historian Myrna Santiago as well as myself have demonstrated just how extensive these abuses were. For local oil workers, strikes and sabotage became a way of life. Beyond the refineries and oil fields of Veracruz and Tamaulipas themselves, massive oil spills regularly threatened the livelihood of fishermen and farmers. And the horrific fires and explosions, the smoke and fumes that billowed from inside oil operations, impinged on the surrounding towns, stoking an anger and resistance that by 1938 made expropriation seem the best solution.
Today’s American readers will find the arguments favoring Peña Nieto’s energy reform familiar. They center around the flaws of the state-run enterprise: its corruption and inefficiency, its coddling of unions, and its monopoly in the national market for consumer goods such as gasoline, which has kept prices high. But thus far, the debates have hardly touched upon the local consequences of this reform for regions that will be most affected, like the towns around the mouth of the Coatzacoalcos River, where 70 percent of Mexico’s petrochemical production has gravitated. ....................(more)
The complete piece is at: http://www.dissentmagazine.org/blog/the-environmental-consequences-of-privatizing-mexicos-oil
September 4, 2013
By Lawrence Davidson
President Barack Obama sidestepped the political hole he had dug for himself (what we might call the “red line” hole) over his proposed attack on Syria. Having insisted there must be “consequences” for a breach of international law, specifically the alleged use of banned chemical weapons by the Syrian government, he was faced with both popular American reluctance to support military action and congressional pique over not being included in the decision process.
As a consequence President Obama announced on Aug. 31 that he now supports a congressional debate and vote on the issue of attacking Syria. Then he told us how he sees the situation, “This (Syrian chemical) attack is an assault on human dignity. … It risks making a mockery of the global prohibition on the use of chemical weapons. … Ultimately this is not about who occupies this (White House) office at any given time, it’s about who we are as a country.”
For all I know, the President really believes his own words, but I am pretty sure his implied question of “who we are as a country” is meant to be rhetorical. If one was to give an evidence-based answer to that inquiry, as it relates to chemical weapons, it would be embarrassing in the extreme.
Lest we forget, the U.S. defoliated parts of Vietnam with a chemical weapon called Agent Orange and by its use killed a lot more than large swaths of jungle. Agent Orange killed and maimed an estimated 400,000 Vietnamese and an estimated half a million children have subsequently been born deformed. It also did a fatal job on many of the American troops that handled the stuff. ..................(more)
The complete piece is at: http://consortiumnews.com/2013/09/03/hypocritical-righteousness-on-syria/
Hypocritical Righteousness on Syria
from Consortium News:
Hypocritical Righteousness on Syria
September 3, 2013
Secretary of State John Kerry waxed eloquent about the need to punish national leaders who violate international law. He meant Syria’s Bashar al-Assad but his lecture could have applied to American officials who enabled the invasion of Iraq, including himself, just one of many U.S. hypocrisies, as Lawrence Davidson notes.
By Lawrence Davidson
President Barack Obama sidestepped the political hole he had dug for himself (what we might call the “red line” hole) over his proposed attack on Syria. Having insisted there must be “consequences” for a breach of international law, specifically the alleged use of banned chemical weapons by the Syrian government, he was faced with both popular American reluctance to support military action and congressional pique over not being included in the decision process.
As a consequence President Obama announced on Aug. 31 that he now supports a congressional debate and vote on the issue of attacking Syria. Then he told us how he sees the situation, “This (Syrian chemical) attack is an assault on human dignity. … It risks making a mockery of the global prohibition on the use of chemical weapons. … Ultimately this is not about who occupies this (White House) office at any given time, it’s about who we are as a country.”
For all I know, the President really believes his own words, but I am pretty sure his implied question of “who we are as a country” is meant to be rhetorical. If one was to give an evidence-based answer to that inquiry, as it relates to chemical weapons, it would be embarrassing in the extreme.
Lest we forget, the U.S. defoliated parts of Vietnam with a chemical weapon called Agent Orange and by its use killed a lot more than large swaths of jungle. Agent Orange killed and maimed an estimated 400,000 Vietnamese and an estimated half a million children have subsequently been born deformed. It also did a fatal job on many of the American troops that handled the stuff. ..................(more)
The complete piece is at: http://consortiumnews.com/2013/09/03/hypocritical-righteousness-on-syria/
September 4, 2013
from Consortium News:
Hypocritical Righteousness on Syria
September 3, 2013
By Lawrence Davidson
President Barack Obama sidestepped the political hole he had dug for himself (what we might call the “red line” hole) over his proposed attack on Syria. Having insisted there must be “consequences” for a breach of international law, specifically the alleged use of banned chemical weapons by the Syrian government, he was faced with both popular American reluctance to support military action and congressional pique over not being included in the decision process.
As a consequence President Obama announced on Aug. 31 that he now supports a congressional debate and vote on the issue of attacking Syria. Then he told us how he sees the situation, “This (Syrian chemical) attack is an assault on human dignity. … It risks making a mockery of the global prohibition on the use of chemical weapons. … Ultimately this is not about who occupies this (White House) office at any given time, it’s about who we are as a country.”
For all I know, the President really believes his own words, but I am pretty sure his implied question of “who we are as a country” is meant to be rhetorical. If one was to give an evidence-based answer to that inquiry, as it relates to chemical weapons, it would be embarrassing in the extreme.
Lest we forget, the U.S. defoliated parts of Vietnam with a chemical weapon called Agent Orange and by its use killed a lot more than large swaths of jungle. Agent Orange killed and maimed an estimated 400,000 Vietnamese and an estimated half a million children have subsequently been born deformed. It also did a fatal job on many of the American troops that handled the stuff. ..................(more)
The complete piece is at: http://consortiumnews.com/2013/09/03/hypocritical-righteousness-on-syria/
Hypocritical Righteousness on Syria
from Consortium News:
Hypocritical Righteousness on Syria
September 3, 2013
Secretary of State John Kerry waxed eloquent about the need to punish national leaders who violate international law. He meant Syria’s Bashar al-Assad but his lecture could have applied to American officials who enabled the invasion of Iraq, including himself, just one of many U.S. hypocrisies, as Lawrence Davidson notes.
By Lawrence Davidson
President Barack Obama sidestepped the political hole he had dug for himself (what we might call the “red line” hole) over his proposed attack on Syria. Having insisted there must be “consequences” for a breach of international law, specifically the alleged use of banned chemical weapons by the Syrian government, he was faced with both popular American reluctance to support military action and congressional pique over not being included in the decision process.
As a consequence President Obama announced on Aug. 31 that he now supports a congressional debate and vote on the issue of attacking Syria. Then he told us how he sees the situation, “This (Syrian chemical) attack is an assault on human dignity. … It risks making a mockery of the global prohibition on the use of chemical weapons. … Ultimately this is not about who occupies this (White House) office at any given time, it’s about who we are as a country.”
For all I know, the President really believes his own words, but I am pretty sure his implied question of “who we are as a country” is meant to be rhetorical. If one was to give an evidence-based answer to that inquiry, as it relates to chemical weapons, it would be embarrassing in the extreme.
Lest we forget, the U.S. defoliated parts of Vietnam with a chemical weapon called Agent Orange and by its use killed a lot more than large swaths of jungle. Agent Orange killed and maimed an estimated 400,000 Vietnamese and an estimated half a million children have subsequently been born deformed. It also did a fatal job on many of the American troops that handled the stuff. ..................(more)
The complete piece is at: http://consortiumnews.com/2013/09/03/hypocritical-righteousness-on-syria/
September 4, 2013
Meals at home mask deep economic problems in Italy
Three quarters of Italians eat lunch at home, but family-friendly statistic hide fact that Italy’s economy is in deep trouble
ROME — Of all the statistics available on Italy and its varied economic problems, few are as eye-opening as the fact that at around 1 p.m. on any given day, three-quarters of the population will normally be sitting down to lunch in their own homes.
According to data from statistics agency ISTAT, lunch is the most important meal of the day for 68 per cent of Italians and 74.3 per cent usually eat it at home, a figure which has grown as a long recession has hit spending on food and eating out.
As anyone who has seen the shuttered afternoon streets of a small Italian town knows, it can be hard to get much done at lunchtime in Italy, even though many shops and businesses stay open until relatively late in the evening to compensate.
.......(snip).......
But behind the well-known importance of mealtimes, lies a picture of a country whose justly celebrated culinary tradition is matched by a crippling set of problems which have resisted reform and given it one of the most sluggish economies in the world for more than a decade. .......................(more)
The complete piece is at: http://www.thestar.com/news/world/2013/09/03/lunch_hour_in_italy_serves_up_some_sour_economic_lessons.html
Meals at home mask deep economic problems in Italy
Meals at home mask deep economic problems in Italy
Three quarters of Italians eat lunch at home, but family-friendly statistic hide fact that Italy’s economy is in deep trouble
ROME — Of all the statistics available on Italy and its varied economic problems, few are as eye-opening as the fact that at around 1 p.m. on any given day, three-quarters of the population will normally be sitting down to lunch in their own homes.
According to data from statistics agency ISTAT, lunch is the most important meal of the day for 68 per cent of Italians and 74.3 per cent usually eat it at home, a figure which has grown as a long recession has hit spending on food and eating out.
As anyone who has seen the shuttered afternoon streets of a small Italian town knows, it can be hard to get much done at lunchtime in Italy, even though many shops and businesses stay open until relatively late in the evening to compensate.
.......(snip).......
But behind the well-known importance of mealtimes, lies a picture of a country whose justly celebrated culinary tradition is matched by a crippling set of problems which have resisted reform and given it one of the most sluggish economies in the world for more than a decade. .......................(more)
The complete piece is at: http://www.thestar.com/news/world/2013/09/03/lunch_hour_in_italy_serves_up_some_sour_economic_lessons.html
September 4, 2013
(In These Times) Residents of Chicago’s predominantly African-American community of Englewood are fighting Mayor Rahm Emanuel and Norfolk Southern (NS)—a major railroad corporation that posted $1.7 billion in profits last year—over a proposed freight yard expansion in their neighborhood that they argue will significantly increase diesel pollution, which is linked to asthma attacks, cancer and heart disease. Community activists say NS and the city have largely ignored their concerns.
Englewood residents first learned in late 2011 of the Emanuel-backed plan to expand NS’s existing 140-acre intermodal terminal at 47th Street—where trains and trucks swap freight containers—by an additional 84 acres. At the time, NS had been quietly buying up private properties in the area for about three years and had started bulldozing them. Only after the Resident Association of Greater Englewood (RAGE) exposed this apparent land grab and it became public knowledge that the company was in talks with the city to purchase 105 city-owned lots for the expansion was a public meeting finally convened with representatives of the railroad.
“(NS) came with guns,” says Asiaha Butler, president of RAGE. “They had armed security at a community meeting at a high school, as if they were going to be attacked.” She says this was only one example of a pattern of disrespect by the company toward the residents.
Rev. John Ellis, who lives near the planned expansion site, says he is particularly disgusted with the city. “[The city has] been terrible,” he says, citing the lack of proper notification given to the residents of the plan. “They feel they don’t have to notify anybody—‘this is a black neighborhood so who the hell cares?’ I mean it, that’s basically what it is.” ....................(more)
The complete piece is at: http://inthesetimes.com/uprising/entry/15497/seeking_environmental_justice_community_battles_railroad_and_rahm/
Seeking Environmental Justice, Community Battles Railroad and Rahm
(In These Times) Residents of Chicago’s predominantly African-American community of Englewood are fighting Mayor Rahm Emanuel and Norfolk Southern (NS)—a major railroad corporation that posted $1.7 billion in profits last year—over a proposed freight yard expansion in their neighborhood that they argue will significantly increase diesel pollution, which is linked to asthma attacks, cancer and heart disease. Community activists say NS and the city have largely ignored their concerns.
Englewood residents first learned in late 2011 of the Emanuel-backed plan to expand NS’s existing 140-acre intermodal terminal at 47th Street—where trains and trucks swap freight containers—by an additional 84 acres. At the time, NS had been quietly buying up private properties in the area for about three years and had started bulldozing them. Only after the Resident Association of Greater Englewood (RAGE) exposed this apparent land grab and it became public knowledge that the company was in talks with the city to purchase 105 city-owned lots for the expansion was a public meeting finally convened with representatives of the railroad.
“(NS) came with guns,” says Asiaha Butler, president of RAGE. “They had armed security at a community meeting at a high school, as if they were going to be attacked.” She says this was only one example of a pattern of disrespect by the company toward the residents.
Rev. John Ellis, who lives near the planned expansion site, says he is particularly disgusted with the city. “[The city has] been terrible,” he says, citing the lack of proper notification given to the residents of the plan. “They feel they don’t have to notify anybody—‘this is a black neighborhood so who the hell cares?’ I mean it, that’s basically what it is.” ....................(more)
The complete piece is at: http://inthesetimes.com/uprising/entry/15497/seeking_environmental_justice_community_battles_railroad_and_rahm/
September 3, 2013
http://vimeo.com/72979888
Bill Moyers Essay: The End Game for Democracy
August 23, 2013
Bill Moyers says the parody and satire of Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert pay Washington the disrespect it deserves, but in the end it’s the city’s predatory mercenaries who have the last laugh.
http://billmoyers.com/segment/bill-moyers-essay-the-end-game-for-democracy/
Bill Moyers Essay: The End Game for Democracy
http://vimeo.com/72979888
Bill Moyers Essay: The End Game for Democracy
August 23, 2013
Bill Moyers says the parody and satire of Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert pay Washington the disrespect it deserves, but in the end it’s the city’s predatory mercenaries who have the last laugh.
http://billmoyers.com/segment/bill-moyers-essay-the-end-game-for-democracy/
September 3, 2013
Published on Tuesday, September 3, 2013 by Common Dreams
Why Global Warming Will Be Far Worse, Far Sooner, Than Forecasts Predict
by John Atcheson
The International Panel on Climate Change’s Fifth Assessment Report on global warming – dubbed AR5 – is due out in 2014, but information is leaking out already, and once again, it is likely to be outdated on the day it’s released.
Worse, it will substantially understate both the rate and pace of warming, and it’s consequences. Here’s why.
Outdated on day of release: The IPCC process virtually assures that all the research used in the report will be several years old. Since it only uses peer reviewed work and a consensus process, it has a long lead-time and a least common denominator data set. The latest research and any research that challenges established theory is left on the cutting room floor.
For example, in the AR 4 – released in 2007 -- the IPCC forecast sea level rise to be, at most, 59 centimeters. Conventional wisdom up to that time suggested that continental ice sheets took thousands of years to melt. But well before that report was issued, research had revealed that dynamic forces were causing these ice sheets to melt much faster. As a result, even as the AR4 was being released, some researchers were forecasting sea level increases of as much as 3 meters – nearly 5 times the worst-case AR4 estimate. ......................(more)
The complete piece is at: http://www.commondreams.org/view/2013/09/03-0
Why Global Warming Will Be Far Worse, Far Sooner, Than Forecasts Predict
Published on Tuesday, September 3, 2013 by Common Dreams
Why Global Warming Will Be Far Worse, Far Sooner, Than Forecasts Predict
by John Atcheson
The International Panel on Climate Change’s Fifth Assessment Report on global warming – dubbed AR5 – is due out in 2014, but information is leaking out already, and once again, it is likely to be outdated on the day it’s released.
Worse, it will substantially understate both the rate and pace of warming, and it’s consequences. Here’s why.
Outdated on day of release: The IPCC process virtually assures that all the research used in the report will be several years old. Since it only uses peer reviewed work and a consensus process, it has a long lead-time and a least common denominator data set. The latest research and any research that challenges established theory is left on the cutting room floor.
For example, in the AR 4 – released in 2007 -- the IPCC forecast sea level rise to be, at most, 59 centimeters. Conventional wisdom up to that time suggested that continental ice sheets took thousands of years to melt. But well before that report was issued, research had revealed that dynamic forces were causing these ice sheets to melt much faster. As a result, even as the AR4 was being released, some researchers were forecasting sea level increases of as much as 3 meters – nearly 5 times the worst-case AR4 estimate. ......................(more)
The complete piece is at: http://www.commondreams.org/view/2013/09/03-0
September 3, 2013
Published on Aug 30, 2013
http://www.democracynow.org -Democracy Now! co-host Juan González discusses his reports for the New York Daily News about how one of the New York City's fastest growing chains of charter schools, Success Academy, has far higher suspension rates than other public elementary schools. "More than two dozen parents have come to me complaining about their children -- who are special needs, special education children, or children with behavior problems," González reports. "They feel are being pushed out or forced out by the charter school in an effort to to improve the test scores." Success Academy uses its high test scores to attract funding, and just secured a $5 million grant it will use to expand from 20 to 100 schools. González obtained a copy of secretly recorded meetings in which school administrators pressed one parent to transfer her special education kindergarten student back into the public school system.
Democracy Now!: Growing Charter School Chain Suspends Special Needs Kids in Bid to Raise Test Scores
Published on Aug 30, 2013
http://www.democracynow.org -Democracy Now! co-host Juan González discusses his reports for the New York Daily News about how one of the New York City's fastest growing chains of charter schools, Success Academy, has far higher suspension rates than other public elementary schools. "More than two dozen parents have come to me complaining about their children -- who are special needs, special education children, or children with behavior problems," González reports. "They feel are being pushed out or forced out by the charter school in an effort to to improve the test scores." Success Academy uses its high test scores to attract funding, and just secured a $5 million grant it will use to expand from 20 to 100 schools. González obtained a copy of secretly recorded meetings in which school administrators pressed one parent to transfer her special education kindergarten student back into the public school system.
September 3, 2013
http://vimeo.com/72979888
Bill Moyers Essay: The End Game for Democracy
August 23, 2013
Bill Moyers says the parody and satire of Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert pay Washington the disrespect it deserves, but in the end it’s the city’s predatory mercenaries who have the last laugh.
http://billmoyers.com/segment/bill-moyers-essay-the-end-game-for-democracy/
Bill Moyers Essay: The End Game for Democracy
http://vimeo.com/72979888
Bill Moyers Essay: The End Game for Democracy
August 23, 2013
Bill Moyers says the parody and satire of Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert pay Washington the disrespect it deserves, but in the end it’s the city’s predatory mercenaries who have the last laugh.
http://billmoyers.com/segment/bill-moyers-essay-the-end-game-for-democracy/
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