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Category: Politics

EPA unveils new coal pollution rules. In the fine print: more deaths

EPA unveils new coal pollution rules. In the fine print: more deaths

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The New York Times reports: The Trump administration has hailed its overhaul of federal pollution restrictions on coal-burning power plants as creating new jobs, eliminating burdensome government regulations and ending what President Trump has long described as a “war on coal.” The administration’s own analysis, however, revealed on Tuesday that the new rules could also lead to as many as 1,400 premature deaths annually by 2030 from an increase in the extremely fine particulate matter that is linked to heart…

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New Russian hacking targeted conservative American think tanks, Microsoft says

New Russian hacking targeted conservative American think tanks, Microsoft says

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The New York Times reports: The Russian military intelligence unit that sought to influence the 2016 election appears to have a new target: conservative American think tanks that have broken with President Trump and are seeking continued sanctions against Moscow, exposing oligarchs or pressing for human rights. In a report scheduled for release on Tuesday, Microsoft Corporation said that it detected and seized websites that were created in recent weeks by hackers linked to the Russian unit formerly known as…

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Veteran left-wing journalist and peace activist Uri Avnery dies at 94

Veteran left-wing journalist and peace activist Uri Avnery dies at 94

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+972 Magazine reports: Uri Avnery, one of Israel’s most prominent journalists and a seminal peace activist who was among the first Israelis to advocate for a sovereign Palestinian state, died in Tel Aviv on Monday morning. He was 94 years old. Born Helmut Ostermann to a bourgeois family in Beckum, Germany in 1923, Avnery’s family moved to Palestine in 1933, shortly after the Nazis came to power. They settled in Tel Aviv. Just a few years after their arrival, Avnery…

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Science, and government scientists, suffer under Trump

Science, and government scientists, suffer under Trump

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Joe Davidson writes: In an administration skilled in myth making, science suffers. Consider findings from the Union of Concerned Scientists, a non-profit advocacy organization that surveyed thousands of scientific experts in the federal government. The first line of its new report paints a dismal picture of the place science holds under President Trump: “A year and a half into the Trump administration, its record on science policy in several agencies and departments is abysmal.” There are a couple of bright…

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Iraqis who helped U.S. military now face obstacles being granted refugee status

Iraqis who helped U.S. military now face obstacles being granted refugee status

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Reuters reports: Trump campaigned in 2016 promising tight restrictions on immigration, and in the past year and a half, his administration has sharply reduced refugee admissions through executive orders and closed-door decisions. The refugee ceiling Trump set last year of 45,000 is the lowest since 1980, when the modern refugee program was established. The United States is on track to admit about 22,000 refugees this year, approximately half of the maximum allowed. Advocates for Iraqis who worked for the U.S….

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Did dairying climates pave the way for the evolution of modern democracy?

Did dairying climates pave the way for the evolution of modern democracy?

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PsyPost reports: An analysis of 108 Old World countries found that cold/wet climates suitable for dairy farming were associated with lactose tolerance in the year 1500, which was in turn associated with higher child survival rates, greater per capita income, and fewer children per family in the year 1800. This enhanced production power was in turn associated with political freedom and civil liberties in the year 2000. The researchers believe that lactose tolerance led to longer life expectancy and postponed…

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As Trump dismantles clean air rules, an industry lawyer delivers for ex-clients

As Trump dismantles clean air rules, an industry lawyer delivers for ex-clients

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The New York Times reports: As a corporate lawyer, William L. Wehrum worked for the better part of a decade to weaken air pollution rules by fighting the Environmental Protection Agency in court on behalf of chemical manufacturers, refineries, oil drillers and coal-burning power plants. Now, Mr. Wehrum is about to deliver one of the biggest victories yet for his industry clients — this time from inside the Trump administration as the government’s top air pollution official. On Tuesday, President…

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EPA is set to roll back restrictions on coal-burning power plants

EPA is set to roll back restrictions on coal-burning power plants

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The Wall Street Journal reports: The Trump administration is escalating an effort to revive the flagging U.S. coal industry with a planned move next week to replace restrictive Obama-era climate policies with new rules designed to help coal-burning plants run harder and stay open longer. The proposed new rules, which the Environmental Protection Agency plans is expected to release within days, would be the latest in a series of reversals of policies the Obama administration adopted to slow climate change….

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Trump administration says conserving oil is no longer an economic imperative

Trump administration says conserving oil is no longer an economic imperative

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The Associated Press reports: Conserving oil is no longer an economic imperative for the U.S., the Trump administration declares in a major new policy statement that threatens to undermine decades of government campaigns for gas-thrifty cars and other conservation programs. The position was outlined in a memo released last month in support of the administration’s proposal to relax fuel mileage standards. The government released the memo online this month without fanfare. Growth of natural gas and other alternatives to petroleum…

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Interior secretary’s school friend crippling climate research, scientists say

Interior secretary’s school friend crippling climate research, scientists say

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The Guardian reports: Prominent US climate scientists have told the Guardian that the Trump administration is holding up research funding as their projects undergo an unprecedented political review by the high-school football teammate of the US interior secretary. The US interior department administers over $5.5bn in funding to external organizations, mostly for research, conservation and land acquisition. At the beginning of 2018, interior secretary Ryan Zinke instated a new requirement that scientific funding above $50,000 must undergo an additional review…

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Trump administration is considering pulling back $3 billion in foreign aid

Trump administration is considering pulling back $3 billion in foreign aid

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The Washington Post reports: The Trump administration is considering taking back more than $3 billion in foreign aid that Congress already approved, in a move that senators from both parties are calling questionably legal and promising to resist. The Office of Management and Budget instructed the State Department and the U.S. Agency for International Development earlier this month to provide a balance sheet of foreign aid projects that have not yet been funded. Unless Congress intervenes, the money may be…

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The president’s lawyer and his cooperation in the Russia investigation

The president’s lawyer and his cooperation in the Russia investigation

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Bob Bauer writes: The New York Times reports that White House Counsel Don McGahn has interviewed extensively with the special counsel, cooperating with the president’s consent but perhaps more extensively than President Trump may have anticipated. The result may be a further strain on what, according to the Times, was already a difficult working relationship. One source of the tension appears to be the president’s expectation of loyalty from a counsel who maintains a different view of his function—namely, that…

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Trump’s claims of no collusion are hogwash

Trump’s claims of no collusion are hogwash

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John O. Brennan writes: When Alexander Bortnikov, the head of Russia’s internal security service, told me during an early August 2016 phone call that Russia wasn’t interfering in our presidential election, I knew he was lying. Over the previous several years I had grown weary of Mr. Bortnikov’s denials of Russia’s perfidy — about its mistreatment of American diplomats and citizens in Moscow, its repeated failure to adhere to cease-fire agreements in Syria and its paramilitary intervention in eastern Ukraine,…

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Revoke my security clearance, too, Mr. President

Revoke my security clearance, too, Mr. President

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Retired Navy admiral William H. McRaven writes: Dear Mr. President: Former CIA director John Brennan, whose security clearance you revoked on Wednesday, is one of the finest public servants I have ever known. Few Americans have done more to protect this country than John. He is a man of unparalleled integrity, whose honesty and character have never been in question, except by those who don’t know him. Therefore, I would consider it an honor if you would revoke my security…

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Senate intel wants to follow the money in the Russia probe. But Treasury isn’t making that easy

Senate intel wants to follow the money in the Russia probe. But Treasury isn’t making that easy

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BuzzFeed reports: In its investigation of Russia’s interference in the 2016 election, the Senate Intelligence Committee has spent more than a year trying to follow the money. But its efforts, unparalleled on Capitol Hill, have been hampered by a surprising force: the US Treasury Department, which has delayed turning over crucial financial records and refused to provide an expert to help make sense of the complex money trail. Even some of the department’s own personnel have questioned whether Treasury is…

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Trump’s racism is evident throughout his presidency, irrespective of whichever racial slurs he has or hasn’t uttered

Trump’s racism is evident throughout his presidency, irrespective of whichever racial slurs he has or hasn’t uttered

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Jason Johnson writes: Trump is a racist. That doesn’t hinge on whether he uttered one particular epithet, no matter how ugly it is. It’s about the totality of his presidency, and after only 18 months in office you can see the roots of his racial animus throughout his policy initiatives whether you hear it on tape or not. Over the course of his career, well before he took office, Trump’s antipathy toward people of color has been plainly evident. In…

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