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Category: Politics

Hello from the year 2050. We avoided a climate catastrophe — but everything is different

Hello from the year 2050. We avoided a climate catastrophe — but everything is different

Bill McKibben writes: Let’s imagine for a moment that we’ve reached the middle of the century. It’s 2050, and we have a moment to reflect—the climate fight remains the consuming battle of our age, but its most intense phase may be in our rearview mirror. And so we can look back to see how we might have managed to dramatically change our society and economy. We had no other choice. There was a point after 2020 when we began to…

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China is positioned to lead on climate change as the U.S. rolls back its policies

China is positioned to lead on climate change as the U.S. rolls back its policies

Smoke from a coal-fired Beijing power plant that closed in 2017 as part of China’s transition to cleaner energy. AP Photo/Andy Wong By Kelly Sims Gallagher, Tufts University and Fang Zhang, Tufts University As the effects of climate change become more widespread and alarming, U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres has called on nations to step up their plans for cutting greenhouse gas emissions. Every country has a part to play, but if the world’s largest emitters fail to meet their commitments,…

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Deforestation gets worse, five years after countries and companies pledged to stop it

Deforestation gets worse, five years after countries and companies pledged to stop it

Georgina Gustin writes: Five years after joining in a historic commitment to stop cutting the world’s forests, governments and companies are not only failing to slow deforestation, they are rapidly driving the disappearance of more trees. As fires consume Amazonian forests, stoking global concern about the loss of a vital ecosystem and climate regulator, a new report published Thursday finds that forests continue to be cleared at an alarming rate, driven mostly by agricultural expansion and demand for beef, palm…

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With Trump in office, major newspapers increasingly quoted anti-immigrant groups without explaining who they were

With Trump in office, major newspapers increasingly quoted anti-immigrant groups without explaining who they were

The Intercept reports: The Center for Immigration Studies, a far-right, anti-immigrant group, was frequently cited by major U.S. newspapers in the first two years of Donald Trump’s presidency — without mention of the group’s deep ties to the Trump administration, according to a report released Thursday. Ninety percent of news articles in the New York Times, Washington Post, Los Angeles Times, and USA Today that cited the Center for Immigration Studies from 2014 to 2017 did not mention “the extremist…

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Wendell Berry’s lifelong dissent

Wendell Berry’s lifelong dissent

Jedediah Britton-Purdy writes: At a time when political conflict runs deep and erects high walls, the Kentucky essayist, novelist, and poet Wendell Berry maintains an arresting mix of admirers. Barack Obama awarded him the National Humanities Medal in 2011. The following year, the socialist-feminist writer and editor Sarah Leonard published a friendly interview with him in Dissent. Yet he also gets respectful attention in the pages of The American Conservative and First Things, a right-leaning, traditionalist Christian journal. More recently,…

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Why Netanyahu fears Arab voters

Why Netanyahu fears Arab voters

Yardena Schwartz writes: The giant yellow billboard near the Arab town of Nahef in northern Israel declares in Arabic, “This time, we are the decision-makers.” It is a reminder to the nearly 2 million Arab citizens of Israel that in this election, which will be held on September 17, they could decide Israel’s future as a democratic state. Their votes, should they choose to wield them, have the power to end the reign of Benjamin Netanyahu, now Israel’s longest-serving prime…

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Trump administration rolls back clean water protections

Trump administration rolls back clean water protections

The New York Times reports: The Trump administration on Thursday announced the repeal of a major Obama-era clean water regulation that had placed limits on polluting chemicals that could be used near streams, wetlands and other bodies of water. The rollback of the 2015 measure, known as the Waters of the United States rule, adds to a lengthy list of environmental rules that the administration has worked to weaken or undo over the past two and a half years. Those…

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Israel accused of planting surveillance devices near the White House to spy on Trump

Israel accused of planting surveillance devices near the White House to spy on Trump

Politico reports: The U.S. government concluded within the past two years that Israel was most likely behind the placement of cellphone surveillance devices that were found near the White House and other sensitive locations around Washington, according to three former senior U.S. officials with knowledge of the matter. But unlike most other occasions when flagrant incidents of foreign spying have been discovered on American soil, the Trump administration did not rebuke the Israeli government, and there were no consequences for…

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Trump skeptical of using foreign spies to collect intel on hostile countries, sources say

Trump skeptical of using foreign spies to collect intel on hostile countries, sources say

CNN reports: President Donald Trump has privately and repeatedly expressed opposition to the use of foreign intelligence from covert sources, including overseas spies who provide the US government with crucial information about hostile countries, according to multiple senior officials who served under Trump. Trump has privately said that foreign spies can damage relations with their host countries and undermine his personal relationships with their leaders, the sources said. The President “believes we shouldn’t be doing that to each other,” one…

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The Republican Party is doomed

The Republican Party is doomed

Stanley B. Greenberg writes: The 2020 election will be transformative like few in our history. It will end with the death of the Republican Party as we know it, leaving the survivors to begin the struggle to renew the party of Lincoln and make it relevant for our times. It will liberate the Democratic Party from the country’s suffocating polarization and allow it to use government to address the vast array of problems facing the nation. From listening to the…

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White House pressured NOAA to repudiate weather forecasters who contradicted Trump’s erroneous hurricane predictions

White House pressured NOAA to repudiate weather forecasters who contradicted Trump’s erroneous hurricane predictions

The New York Times reports: The White House was directly involved in pressing a federal scientific agency to repudiate the weather forecasters who contradicted President Trump’s claim that Hurricane Dorian would probably strike Alabama, according to several people familiar with the events. Mick Mulvaney, the acting White House chief of staff, told Wilbur Ross, the commerce secretary, to have the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration publicly disavow the forecasters’ position that Alabama was not at risk. NOAA, which is part…

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Neoliberalism is pushing the UK towards a Brexit cliff-edge

Neoliberalism is pushing the UK towards a Brexit cliff-edge

George Monbiot writes: At first sight it’s incomprehensible. Why risk everything for a no-deal Brexit? Breaking up their own party, losing their parliamentary majority, dismantling the UK, trashing the economy, triggering shortages of food and medicine: how could any objective, for the Conservative and Unionist party, be worth this? What good does it do them? Yes, some people will benefit. To judge by recent donations to the Conservative party, some very rich people approve of Boris Johnson’s policies. A no-deal…

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Chaos is being normalised. It is all part of Boris Johnson’s pernicious plan

Chaos is being normalised. It is all part of Boris Johnson’s pernicious plan

Paul Mason writes: On Saturday, for the first time in living memory, neo-fascists were chanting the name of the serving prime minister. Supporters of the English Defence League and the Democratic Football Lads Alliance wandered around Whitehall some drunk, harassing random remain protesters and shouting into the faces of journalists until, inevitably, they attacked the police. It’s part of an unnerving trend that’s emerged in the past two weeks: the normalisation of chaos. We have a parliament suspended against its…

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Trump discussed easing Iran sanctions, prompting Bolton pushback

Trump discussed easing Iran sanctions, prompting Bolton pushback

Bloomberg reports: President Donald Trump discussed easing sanctions on Iran to help secure a meeting with Iranian President Hassan Rouhani later this month, prompting then-National Security Advisor John Bolton to argue forcefully against such a step, according to three people familiar with the matter. After an Oval Office meeting on Monday when the idea came up, Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin voiced his support for the move as a way to restart negotiations with Iran, some of the people said. Later…

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NOAA’s chief scientist stands up for scientific integrity and against political interference

NOAA’s chief scientist stands up for scientific integrity and against political interference

A Message from Craig McLean: Hurricane Dorian and Exceptional Service, addressing his colleagues, states: During the course of the storm, as I am sure you are aware, there were routine and exceptional expert forecasts, the best possible, issued by the NWS Forecasters. These are remarkable colleagues of ours, who receive our products, use them well, and provide the benefit of their own experience in announcing accurate forecasts accompanied by the distinction of all credible scientists—they sign their work. As I’m…

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In Brazil’s rainforests, the worst fires are likely still to come

In Brazil’s rainforests, the worst fires are likely still to come

By Robert T. Walker, University of Florida The number of fires this year in the Amazon is the highest since 2010, reaching more than 90,000 active fires. Farmers and ranchers routinely use fires to clear the forest. But this year’s number reflects a worrisome uptick in the rate of deforestation, which had started to drop around 2005 before rebounding earlier this decade. Many people blame the Brazilian government and its pro-agriculture policies for the current crisis. But as an environmental…

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