The Invaders: How Humans and Their Dogs Drove Neanderthals to Extinction 

by Pat Shipman  (Author)  Format: Kindle Edition (READ A FREE CHAPTER)

Shipman [is] a genial and authoritative guide to a complex field… Shipman admits that scientists have yet to find genetic evidence that would prove her theory. Time will tell if she’s right. For now, read this book for an engagingly comprehensive overview of the rapidly evolving understanding of our own origins. (Toby Lester Wall Street Journal)

Few if any readers of this lucid and compelling exposition will come away believing that the early modern Europeans were not deeply implicated in the Neanderthals’ disappearance. (Ian Tattersall Times Literary Supplement)

Are humans the ultimate invasive species? So contends anthropologist Pat Shipman―and Neanderthals, she opines, were among our first victims. The relationship between Homo sapiens and Homo neanderthalensis is laid out cleanly, along with genetic and other evidence. Shipman posits provocatively that the deciding factor in the triumph of our ancestors was the domestication of wolves. Perhaps more troubling is the concept of early humans as invaders, rather than just another species finding its way. (Daniel Cressey Nature)

Since the discovery in the 19th century of Neanderthal remains, the cause of their extinction has arguably been the most compelling mystery in human evolution… The Invaders offers us the appealing prospect of an expert writing on her specialism and clearly having a great deal of fun doing so. Shipman builds an extremely compelling case for the role of Homo sapiens as an invasive species who arrived in Europe about 40,000 to 50,000 years ago and had an immediate impact on their new ecosystem. The Neanderthals were not the only victims… What makes Shipman’s argument really stand out and offer a fresh perspective on the extinction of Neanderthals is the role that she gives to wolves in the process that led to the dominance of Homo sapiens. (Simon Underdown Times Higher Education)

According to a leading U.S. anthropologist, early dogs, bred from wolves, played a critical role in the modern human’s takeover of Europe 40,000 years ago when we vanquished the Neanderthal locals… If Shipman is right, she will have solved one of evolution’s most intriguing mysteries. (Robin McKie The Observer)

[A] cautious but compelling argument. (Brian Bethune Maclean’s)

Provocative…Shipman’s story makes for a dramatic and compelling narrative. (Mark Derr Psychology Today)

If you want to understand your own mind, read this remarkable and important book. Summoning new evidence, Pat Shipman shows how our coevolution with wolves contributed to the extinction of Neanderthals and further transformed us through the process of domesticating dogs. You will never look at Fido the same way again! (Nina G. Jablonski, Ph.D., Evan Pugh Professor of Anthropology, The Pennsylvania State University)

Why did the Neanderthals disappear? In a judicious and enthralling account, Shipman makes a compelling case that, as a truly invasive species, humans were the main cause. An original twist adds an accomplice to the scenario: An unexpectedly early prototype of man’s best friend proved to be the Neanderthals’ worst enemy. (Robert D. Martin, A. Watson Armour III Curator of Biological Anthropology, The Field Museum, Chicago)

With her lucid synthesis of recent research, Shipman demonstrates that Homo sapiens was and is the very model of an invasive species. (Harriet Ritvo, Arthur J. Conner Professor of History, Massachusetts Institute of Technology) --This text refers to the hardcover edition.

About the Author

Pat Shipman is retired Adjunct Professor of Anthropology at Pennsylvania State University. --This text refers to the paperback edition.

'Mr. Goodbar' Mexican Gray Wolf Thwarted By Trump's Border Wall Is Shot

Mary Papenfuss
Sat, January 29, 2022, 

A Mexican gray wolf trots across the landscape. (Photo: Courtesy USFWS)

A young Mexican gray wolf recently thwarted in his search for a mate by Donald Trump’s border wall has been shot, researchers have reported.

The two-year-old male, known to scientists as “Mr. Goodbar,” is expected to live but will likely have all or part of his right hind leg amputated, according to a statement from the nonprofit conservation organization the Center for Biological Diversity.

An investigation has been launched to track Mr. Goodbar’s shooter. Mexican gray wolves are protected under the federal Endangered Species Act. The maximum penalty for violating the law is a year in jail and a $50,000 fine.


“Mr. Goodbar’s painful experiences illustrate the inhospitable world we’ve created for Mexican gray wolves and other vulnerable animals,” Michael Robinson, a senior conservation advocate for the Center for Biological Diversity, said in a statement provided to HuffPost. “We hope the criminal who shot Mr. Goodbar will be brought to justice.”

The endangered Mexican gray #wolf who spent five days trying to get around the border wall in New Mexico before turning back was found shot but alive Wednesday. Anyone with information should call 1-844-397-8477 or email fws_tips@fws.gov. https://t.co/p5pkVUuuSy
— Center for Bio Div (@CenterForBioDiv) January 29, 2022

Mr. Goodbar’s injury was spotted during an annual count by helicopter of the Mexican gray wolves in the Southwest by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.

He was tranquilized with a dart fired from a helicopter and transported for treatment to the Albuquerque BioPark Zoo, the Center for Biological Diversity reported.

He made news earlier this month as the first tracked wolf to prove the Trump border wall is creating a problem for endangered species. Mr. Goodbar left his pack in eastern Arizona last year and roamed for months to strike out on his own to start his own family in new territory. He was finally stopped in southern New Mexico in late November — not by the challenges of the Chihuahuan Desert, but by Trump’s 30-foot-high border barrier.

The young wolf trotted along the wall for days, likely looking for an opening, which would have provided the possibility of mating with Mexican gray wolves on the other side of the border. But he finally turned back north again, and ended up close to his old territory.

The Center for Biological Diversity and other environmental groups are now battling to open up the border wall in “priority” areas identified as important for animals — not just wolves, but for pronghorn, cougars, bighorn sheep, mountain lions, bobcats, mule deer, kit fox and ringtail.

The reintroduced Mexican gray wolf population numbered some 186 in Arizona and New Mexico in the last count in 2020 (there were 30 across the border in Mexico).

This year, the tally will likely be higher, Robinson said. But the species risks extinction by inbreeding without more genetic diversity, which requires large swaths of unimpeded range for the animals to branch out.

“These wolves are beautiful, intelligent, social animals that we should want to save just because of empathy,” Robinson told HuffPost. “And because we played a role in their decimation, we have an obligation to help them.”

While the Mexican gray wolf remains listed as an endangered species under the law, the Trump administration dropped the classification for other wolves, triggering major hunts in some areas.

This article originally appeared on HuffPost and has been updated.
Related...


Endangered Wolf Thwarted In Love By Trump's Border Wall

It Turns Out Orcas Can — And Do — Kill And Eat Blue Whales

Hilary Hanson

Sat, January 29, 2022

Its sheer size apparently isn’t enough to save a blue whale from becoming dinner for a hungry pod of orcas (aka killer whales).

In a paper published last week in the journal Marine Mammal Science, researchers shared “the first documentation of killer whales killing and eating blue whales: two individuals killed, 16 days apart in 2019, and a third in 2021.”

In the past, there have been reports of orcas chasing blue whales, but this the first official scientific record of orcas successfully hunting, killing and eating them, according to The Guardian.

The incidents all happened in Australia’s Bremer Bay, where female-led orca groups worked together to take down their large prey.

In two of the three cases, the blue whales — which are the largest animals on Earth — weren’t fully grown: one was a young calf and one was a juvenile around a year old. But the third blue whale the orcas ate was a healthy adult between 60 and 70 feet long, more than twice the size of the largest orcas, which only get to be about 30 feet, according to National Geographic.

“When we arrived about 14 killer whales were attacking the blue in [230-ft deep] waters, with the female killer whales leading the attack,” Isabella Reeves, a PhD candidate at Australia’s Flinders University and one of the study’s authors, told New Atlas.

That attack involved some of the orcas repeatedly slamming into the blue whale and biting off chunks of its flesh, while others went for its head and still another took the liberty of going for the tongue ― a nutrient-dense organ that orcas apparently love. Ultimately, about 50 orcas joined in the smorgasbord.

While you may have trouble convincing a blue whale of this, the researchers believe that the orca attacks may actually be a positive sign overall, indicating that blue whale numbers are rebounding after being driven to near-extinction by the whaling industry in the early 20th century.

“Maybe what we’re starting to see now is how the ocean used to be before we took out most of the large whales,” Robert Pitman, an ecologist at Oregon State University and another of the study’s authors, told The Guardian. “As some of these populations continue to recover, we have a better chance to see how normal marine ecosystems function.”

In the meantime, orcas aren’t the only animals enjoying the feast, Gizmodo reported. In the case of the adult whale, the carcass also became a buffet for sharks and scavenging seabirds.

This article originally appeared on HuffPost and has been updated.

Orcas Are Able to Kill and Eat Blue Whales, Scientists Confirm

Annie Roth

Sat, January 29, 2022, 

In March 2019, scientists studying whales near southwestern Australia stumbled on a supersize spectacle that few had seen before — a pod of orcas viciously attacking a blue whale.

Over a dozen orcas surrounded the mighty animal. They had already bitten off its dorsal fin, and the animal was unable to evade the fast and agile predators. The water ran red with the blood of the massive creature, and chunks of its flesh were floating all around. The scientists observed one orca force its way into the blue whale’s mouth and feast on its tongue. It took an hour for the orcas to kill the blue whale, and once they did, about 50 other orcas showed up to devour the carcass.

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Orcas, also known as killer whales despite being members of the same family as dolphins, are apex predators known to feed on nearly every species of large whale. But they typically go after calves rather than adults. This was the first time orcas had been observed successfully killing and eating an adult blue whale.

The attack was the first of three such events that were witnessed from 2019 through 2021. These events, described in a paper published last week in the journal Marine Mammal Science, have put to rest a long-standing debate among scientists about whether orcas could make a meal out of an adult blue whale.

A pod of orcas taking down a blue whale is “the biggest predation event on Earth, maybe the biggest one since dinosaurs were here,” said Robert Pitman, a marine ecologist at Oregon State University and an author of the paper.

Anecdotal evidence that orcas are capable of making a meal out of an adult blue whale has long existed, but it wasn’t until 2019 that scientists were able to confirm this through firsthand observation.

“Upon approach, we were astounded at what we were seeing,” said Rebecca Wellard, founder and lead researcher at Project ORCA, who was among the researchers who witnessed the 2019 attack. “When you come across a unique event like this, I think it takes a while to process just what you are seeing.”

Blue whales, the largest creatures that have ever lived, can grow up to 110 feet in length, but the animal being attacked was only 70 feet long, which raised questions about whether it was a younger blue whale. But Wellard and her team were able to photograph the blue whale before the orcas tore it to shreds. Based on its appearance, as well as the location and time of year it was photographed, they concluded that it was an adult pygmy blue whale, a subspecies that is genetically similar to the most massive of the blue whales, but with a smaller size and other distinguishing characteristics.

Pygmy blue whales reach lengths of up to 79 feet, so this animal was most likely an adult.

“I think a full-grown pygmy blue whale could be mistaken for a regular blue whale that was not quite mature,” said Erich Hoyt, a research fellow with Whale and Dolphin Conservation and author of “Orca: The Whale Called Killer.” He was not involved in the research.

Hoyt said the fact that the orcas were able to successfully hunt the pygmy blue whale served as strong evidence that they could do the same to even the most massive blue whales. “Blue whales are fast, but orcas are faster,” he said.

The event that Wellard and her team witnessed took place off the coast of Bremer Bay, a biologically rich region where large numbers of orcas, blue whales and other cetaceans can be seen during certain times of the year.

“The killer whales we research off Bremer Bay are rewriting the textbook on what we thought we knew about this species,” Wellard said.

Photographers aboard whale-watching boats in the region have documented two other orca attacks on blue whales since the attack observed in 2019. Over a dozen orcas coordinated to carry out both attacks on juvenile blue whales. While scientists had observed orcas with dead blue whale calves in the past, such attacks had not yet been documented from start to finish.

Although the predation of blue whales by orcas is gruesome, scientists say it could be a positive sign for the health of whale species in the area. The whaling industry nearly drove blue whales into extinction, and the fact that enough of them now exist to be preyed on by orcas may hint at population growth.

“What we could be seeing now is a return to ‘normalcy’ as populations of large whales, and their predators, continue to recover,” Wellard said. “It may just have been a matter of time before an observation like this was made. Nonetheless, these hunts signal a positive step for both species’ populations.”

© 2022 The New York Times Company

Petrobras estimates that proven reserves reached 9.88 bln boe in 2021

Jan 28 (Reuters) - Brazil's oil company Petrobras on Friday estimated that its proven reserves of oil, condensate and natural gas totaled 9.88 billion barrels of oil equivalent (boe) at the end of 2021.

The calculation follows the criteria of the SEC, the U.S. capital market regulator.

From the total volume of reserves estimated by the oil company, 85% corresponds to oil and condensate, and 15% to natural gas.

The company said last year it made the biggest addition of reserves in its history (1.97 billion boe), resulting in the replacement of 219% of this year's production, already considering the divestments it made.

"These results demonstrate our trajectory of improvement of the management system, with a focus on maximizing the generation of value from our assets," he said in a statement.

If considered the criteria from the Brazilian national regulatory agency ANP, Petrobras estimated that its proven reserves reached 10.29 billion boe in 2021.

 (Reporting Letícia Fucuchima; Writing by Carolina Pulice; Editing by Richard Chang)

The next Cascadia earthquake could be devastating. Start your preparations

Bridget Good
Fri, January 28, 2022

Oregon Department of Transportation's two-year, $18 million I-105 Bridge Preservation Project repaired, repaved and added seismic upgrades to the bridges and ramps between downtown Eugene and Delta Highway on I-105. The work was completed in 2020.

Jan. 26 marked the 322nd anniversary of the last major Cascadia Subduction Zone (CSZ) earthquake. As a Community Emergency Response Team (CERT) member living in Salem, I’ve spent the past six years working to motivate community preparedness around this topic.

You can see a tornado travel; you can watch it shift direction. You can see floodwaters rise and landslides and avalanches flow. You can watch a volcano spewing and wildfires and storms approaching.

Earthquakes are different. They are some of the greatest ghost stories ever told —suddenly everywhere around us at once, unseen but for the destruction they cause. They can’t be predicted, and there isn’t an earthquake season. The precious few seconds’ warning that ShakeAlert can now bring will be all you get.

Forty-six of these megathrust CSZ earthquakes have occurred over the past 10,000 years, averaging one every 223 years.

The next one will undoubtedly overwhelm local emergency responders. Roads and bridges will be heavily damaged. Most communication systems will be down. The Willamette Valley is expected to go as long as 50 days without natural gas, 100 days without electricity and a whopping 400 days without water/sewer.

Responders from outside the disaster area will take time to arrive — how much time will depend on the area of devastation.

Cascadia megathrust earthquakes appear to have triggered San Andreas earthquakes roughly two-thirds of the time over the past 3,000 years. New research by UC Davis and San Diego State finds that roughly 20% of San Andreas earthquakes have coincided with earthquakes on the San Jacinto Fault. Further research has shown that roughly 20% of CSZ earthquakes have been followed by a Cascade Range volcanic eruption within a reasonably short time frame (days to months).

There is no doubt that a major tsunami, much larger than the one that came to our shores on Dec. 15 of this year, will follow a CSZ earthquake.

Get prepared for quake: Build your preparedness kit in 24 weeks

Salem CERT volunteer Bridget Good

The probability of the CSZ, the San Andreas and the San Jacinto rupturing together (especially to their full rupture lengths), followed by a volcanic eruption (or two), is highly unlikely. However, any combination of these disasters will further impact the country’s available resources and response times.

Having supplies on hand for you and your family will be crucial. You are smart and resourceful, but being resourceful requires having access to resources, which are plentiful now (toilet paper, anyone?). They won’t be when disaster strikes. There are people and pets who depend on you. Be ready.

I wish you the very best on your preparedness journey. The time to prepare is now.

There is a ghost on our horizon.

Salem resident Bridget Good serves as a Community Emergency Response Team (CERT) volunteer. She also manages the city’s CERT Salem Facebook page and hosts the website, SurvivingCascadia.com You may reach her at bridget.shannon.good@gmail.com.

This article originally appeared on Salem Statesman Journal: Be ready for the next Cascadia earthquake

At his Texas rally, Trump recited the lyrics to a '60s R&B hit to warn against immigration. It was written by a Black civil rights activist who was a member of the communist party.


Sarah Al-Arshani,Morgan Keith
Sat, January 29, 2022, 

 Former U.S. President Donald Trump makes an entrance at the Rally To Protect Our Elections conference on July 24, 2021 in Phoenix, Arizona. The Phoenix-based political organization Turning Point Action hosted former President Donald Trump alongside GOP Arizona candidates who have begun candidacy for government elected roles.

Brandon Bell/Getty ImagesMore


Trump used a 1968 Al Wilson song to compare immigrants to a freezing snake that bites its rescuer.


Trump recited lyrics to "The Snake" at rallies throughout his first campaign for president.


Wilson's family said the singer would likely not agree with Trump's use of the song.

Former President Donald Trump once again used 'The Snake" to push anti-immigrant sentiments at a rally in Conroe, Texas, on Saturday.

The crowd erupted in applause after Trump asked if they wanted to hear the song, which he referred to as a poem.

The 1968 soul hit, which was sung by Al Wilson, a Black man, is about a "tender-hearted woman" who saw "a poor half-frozen snake" and took it in.

The woman "wrapped him up all cozy in a coverture of silk" and "laid him by the fireside with some honey and some milk."

When the woman returned, the snake was "revived" but "instead of saying thanks, that snake gave her a vicious bite (ooh)," the lyrics continue.

When the woman cries and asks the snake why he bit her, the snake replies that she knew he was a snake before she took him in.

"And that's what's happening to the United States of America with immigration," Trump said. "I think it's pretty accurate, do you agree?"

Trump has recited the song – using the snake as a metaphor for immigrants – at multiple rallies throughout his first bid for president.

In 2016, Wilson's daughter, Alene Wilson-Harris, told Business Insider's Allan Smith that she's not sure her father would "see eye-to-eye" with Trump or his use of the song.

"While I think that he would've had, at least some sort of appreciation for the fact that his music is appreciated by Trump to the affect that he would utilize the song, there are some things in my father's life that may have been an interesting perspective for him to have to grapple with in light of how [the song] was used," she said. "And, some of the things that are the platform of Trump."

The song was written by Oscar Brown Jr., an African-American activist and musician, PBS reported.

His daughter, Maggie Brown, told PBS she was actually relieved that Trump cited the song to Wilson, adding that she "hated the idea of him using Oscar's words to create such a platform."

"Wait until Republicans find out that he's quoting a former Black nationalist and former communist party member," she said.

Nuclear weapons development coming soon to Los Alamos National Laboratory amid safety concerns


Adrian Hedden, Carlsbad Current-Argus
Sat, January 29, 2022, 

A main component of nuclear weapons was poised to be built in New Mexico after federal regulators granted approval for a plan to prepare Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL) for the work.

The National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA), an arm of the U.S. Department of Energy, announced earlier this month it approved LANL’s project to prepare areas of the lab to be used in plutonium pit production – a project known as LAP4.

Plutonium pits are hollow spheres of plutonium that when compressed using explosives cause a nuclear detonation, per a DOE report.

More: Nuclear waste storage in New Mexico would be blocked if Senate, House bill pass Legislature

The pits were first used in the 1940s during the Manhattan Project, the report read, used to detonate atomic bombs tested at the Trinity Site in south-central New Mexico and then in the bomb dropped on Nagasaki in Japan – largely credited with ending World War II.

Since the war ended, Los Alamos’ pit production was limited to research purposes, and from 2007 to 2011 the lab produced pits to replace those in 31 warheads carried on U.S. military submarines.

Between 1952 and 1989, most of the plutonium pits in the U.S. were generated at the Rocky Flats Plant near Denver amid the Cold War with a peak nuclear stockpile of 31,225 weapons outfitted with the pits reported in 1967, read the report.

More: Waste Isolation Pilot Plant plans for 30 nuke waste shipments from Los Alamos lab in 2022

Rocky Flats was shut down in 1989, and after concerns that the pits produced since the 1980s or earlier would begin to deteriorate over time, Los Alamos was called to make new ones.

This undated file photo shows the Los Alamos National Laboratory in Los Alamos, N.M. Another group of workers is suing Los Alamos National Laboratory over its COVID-19 vaccine mandate. The complaint filed Friday, Oct. 22, 2021, in federal court argues the mandate discriminates against employees who seek religious or medical exemptions. (The Albuquerque Journal via AP, File)More

The DOE called on Los Alamos to increase efforts at the lab to produce 30 pits a year by 2026, and the Savannah River Site in South Carolina was tasked with producing 50 pits annually by 2030.

That means that by that year, the U.S. would be producing 80 pits per year.

More: Waste Isolation Pilot Plant criticized for accepting out-of-state nuclear waste

But to prepare LANL for the work, a project to remove existing equipment and glove boxes was needed to make way for pit manufacturing equipment.

That work was intended to begin this spring via a project known as the Decontamination and Decommissioning Subproject, the first of five operations to get the site ready.

“Achieving this milestone is a significant accomplishment and showcases NNSA’s commitment to modernizing the equipment and infrastructure needed to safely manufacture pits for the nuclear stockpile,” said Summer Jones, NNSA assistant deputy administrator for production modernization at LANL.

“LAP4 is a complex, challenging endeavor, and getting the approval to begin the D&D subproject is a big step toward restoring this important capability.”

More: State of New Mexico demands feds investigate WIPP, federal nuclear programs
Opponents call for environmental review of plutonium operations

The effort to resume producing plutonium pits and thus nuclear weapons at the New Mexico lab and in South Carolina as met with controversy from government officials and watchdog groups in both states opposing the projects.

Santa Fe City Councilors passed a resolution last year calling for a “site-wide” environmental impact statement to be conducted and any safety issued be resolved and certified by the federal government before pit production was increased.

“The Governing Body (Santa Fe City Council) requests that the National Nuclear Security Administration suspend any planned expanded plutonium pit production until all nuclear safety issues are resolved, as certified by the independent Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board,” read the resolution.

More: Ready for the future: WIPP projects in 2021 advance nuclear waste disposal mission

Nuclear Watch New Mexico and Savannah River Site Watch subsequently in June 2021 filed a lawsuit in U.S. District Court for the District of South Carolina’s Aiken Division against the DOE and NNSA, arguing pit production should not be increased until site-wide environmental analysis were conducted at both facilities.

“The drastic expansion of plutonium pit production and the utilization of more than one facility to undertake this production are substantial changes from the Defendants’ long-standing approach of producing a limited number of pits at only one facility,” the suit read.

The suit argued the increased pit production was not only intended for replacing existing warheads but to develop a new warhead known as the W87-1.

More: How the federal military spending bill will impact WIPP and nuclear projects in New Mexico

This project was developed with proper environmental analysis, the suit read, or proper planning for where associated nuclear waste would be disposed of.

“The drastic expansion of plutonium pit production and the utilization of more than one facility to undertake this production are substantial changes from the Defendants’ long-standing approach of producing a limited number of pits at only one facility,” read the suit.

In southeastern New Mexico is the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP), a repository for low-level transuranic (TRU) nuclear waste – clothing materials and equipment irradiated during nuclear activities.

More: Waste Isolation Pilot Plant struggles to control costs, per annual performance evaluation

But the litigants argued WIPP was already at limited capacity and its current permit with the New Mexico Environment Department (NMED) specified the repository would have to cease waste disposal by 2024 and begin the decommissioning process.

The DOE last year submitted a permit renewal application to NMED that removed the 2024 closure date, leaving WIPP’s lifetime largely open ended.

Still, the suit alleged the DOE failed to address the need for waste disposal.

“As a National Academy of Sciences has concluded, the WIPP is already oversubscribed for future waste from multiple sites and will overextend its capacity from this increase in TRU production from the pit project and other DOE projects set to generate large amounts of TRU waste,” read the suit.

“The Defendants have failed to meaningfully address this critical waste disposal question.”

Adrian Hedden can be reached at 575-618-7631, achedden@currentargus.com or @AdrianHedden on Twitter.

This article originally appeared on Carlsbad Current-Argus: Los Alamos National Lab prepares for nuclear weapons development

Union rejects pay offer in U.S. refinery worker contract talks -sources



Fri, January 28, 2022
By Erwin Seba

HOUSTON (Reuters) -The United Steelworkers union (USW) rejected a pay increase offered by lead oil company negotiator Marathon Petroleum in talks for a new three-year agreement covering U.S. refinery workers, people familiar with the matter said on Friday.

The offer was for a 4% pay increase over three years for 30,000 refinery and chemical plant workers represented by the union, the three sources said.

Under the current contract, which expires Feb. 1, workers received pay increases of 3.5% in each of the contract's first two years and 4% in the third and last year.

Marathon spokesman Jamal Kheiry said talks with the union were continuing.

"We’re in active discussions on various topics," Kheiry said. "We are committed to bargaining in good faith and working toward a mutually satisfactory agreement."

In a message to members on Friday afternoon that was seen by Reuters, the USW said Marathon was ignoring issues the union has raised in the talks that began on Jan. 13.

"Their wage proposals to date are paltry," the USW message said. "In light of their earnings & dividends to shareholders, they are offensive. It's time for the companies to quit screwing around, recognize the seriousness of the approaching deadline and move towards a settlement."

On Wednesday, the USW said in a message to members that Marathon had offered a 3% pay increase over three years.

Going into talks, the union was seeking "significant" pay increases and improvements in health insurance, according to sources within the union.

Refiners and chemical producers began recovering in 2021 from large losses in 2020 when lockdowns and work-from-home policies drove down motor fuel demand.

In 2015, negotiations between the USW and then-lead company Shell Plc broke down leading to a series of strikes nationwide. This is the first year Marathon is the lead negotiator.

(Reporting by Erwin Seba; Editing by David Gregorio and Stephen Coates)

Teen who turned down $5,000 from Elon Musk to shut down a Twitter account tracking the billionaire's jet says he gets too much work satisfaction to settle for less than $50,000

Isobel Asher Hamilton

Sun, January 30, 2022

Elon Musk in 2021 at a press event on the grounds of the Tesla Gigafactory near Berlin.Patrick Pleul/picture alliance via Getty Images

• 19-year-old Jack Sweeney runs a Twitter account that tracks Elon Musk's private jet.

• Musk offered Sweeney $5,000 to remove it and give advice on how to make his jet less trackable.

• Sweeney told Insider he thought $5,000 was too low for the satisfaction he gets from the work.

A 19-year-old who was offered $5,000 by Elon Musk to shut down a Twitter account tracking the billionaire's jet told Insider he refused the offer because it wasn't enough to replace the satisfaction he gets from running the account.

Protocol was the first to report that Jack Sweeney had been approached by Musk via private messages on Twitter. The DMs, a screenshot of which Sweeney shared with Insider, showed Musk asked him to take down the Elon Musk's Jet Twitter account, saying it was a "security risk."

Musk tweeted earlier this month, saying that social-media accounts discussing his whereabouts were "becoming a security issue."

In the Twitter conversation viewed by Insider, Sweeney discussed with Musk how his bots are able to track the jet, and gave technical advice on how the billionaire could potentially make his jet less trackable.

"How about $5k for this account and generally helping make it harder for crazy people to track me?" Musk asked.

Sweeney responded: "Sounds doable, account and all my help. Any chance to up that to $50K?"

The 19-year-old cited college funding and told the billionaire the money could go towards buying a Tesla Model 3.

"I've done a lot of work on this and 5k is not enough," Sweeney said in an interview with Insider. He added $5,000 wasn't enough to replace "the fun I have in this, working on it."

In the messages viewed by Insider, Musk said he would think about Sweeney's counter-offer, then later said "doesn't feel right to pay to shut this down."

Musk did not respond when contacted for comment by Insider.

Sweeney told Insider Musk appears to have implemented some of his technical advice, using a blocking system that changes his jet's identifier making it harder to track.

"I just have to work around it," Sweeney said.

Sweeney told Insider he had decided to go public with Musk's offer because the billionaire had lost interest in a deal.

"He went the opposite way of me, so why wouldn't I go the opposite way of him?" he said.

Sweeney started the Elon Musk's Jet Twitter account in June 2020. The account uses bots to scrape publicly available air traffic data, alerting followers to the movements of Musk's private jet. He said he had been working on the technology behind the account a few months before he launched it as a lockdown project.

Sweeney said he had the idea because he was a fan of Musk's. "I knew he had the jet, and I just knew it would reveal what business is going on and where he is going and stuff," he said.

Sweeney said his father works aviation, sparking an interest in planes. "I had the apps where you can track planes and stuff," Sweeney said, adding "I kind of thought they were cool."

While at college, Sweeney said he has a part-time job working for a company called UberJets, where he builds a platform to help track chartered flights so the company can find clients cheaper seats. He added that his work on the Elon Musk's Jet Twitter account is on his GitHub, meaning he can showcase it to employers.

Elon Musk offers teen $5,000 to stop tracking his private jet

The young man asked for a Model 3 instead

RONAN GLON

Jan 28th 2022 

Being rich and famous comes with a few unexpected downsides. For Elon Musk, the co-founder and CEO of Tesla, one of the drawbacks of fame is having to offer a 19-year-old college freshman $5,000 to stop tracking the movements of his private jet on social media sites.

University of Central Florida student Jack Sweeney started tracking Musk's jet — which, by the way, is not electric or emissions-free — in June 2020. Several apps allow just anyone with an internet connection to track commercial flights, but private jet owners and operators normally try to fly under the radar (sorry, not sorry). Sweeney got around this by obtaining public data from the Federal Aviation Administration, according to USA Today, and he created a bot linked to a Twitter account named ElonJet that posts updates every time the plane takes off and lands.

The account has amassed 124,100 followers as of writing, and it ended up catching Musk's attention. He reached out to Sweeney and asked him to delete it. "Can you take this down? It's a security risk," he wrote, adding that "I don't love the idea of being shot by a nutcase" and that he worries about "crazy people" tracking his every move. Sweeney answered that he's willing to shut down the account in exchange for a Model 3, which carries a base price of $44,990. Musk made a counter-offer: $5,000. Sweeney replied to the billionaire asking for $50,000.

Musk considered it, according to Protocol, but he ultimately decided that it "doesn't feel right to pay to shut this down." Sweeney said that he has received Bitcoin offers from folks who want him to keep the account open, surprisingly, but he ultimately made Musk a different offer and asked for an internship. There's no word yet on whether he'll get it, which company he'd end up in, or what he'd be doing.

Until then, ElonJet remains active. Musk's plane landed in Austin, Texas, on January 26 after flying around Hawaii for a few days.

Mennonites helped turn Paraguay into a mega beef producer – indigenous people may pay the price

Joel E. Correia, Assistant Professor of Latin American Studies, University of Florida
Sat, January 29, 2022, 

South America's bi-oceanic highway, which will stretch from the Pacific to the Atlantic -- cutting right through Paraguay -- is scheduled for completion in 2022. 

Joel Correia, Author provided

The “new Panama Canal” – that’s how some are hailing a highway now under construction in South America that spans the continent, from the Atlantic to the Pacific.

The Bi-Oceanic Corridor cuts through the Paraguayan Chaco, Latin America’s second-largest forest after the Amazon – and, these days, a hub of cattle ranching and soybean farming.

The Chaco – once a flat, scrubby and supposedly inhospitable forest – was transformed into a fertile agricultural region by Mennonite settlers who came to Paraguay in the early 1900s.

By 2017 this landlocked country of 7 million had become the world’s sixth-largest exporter of beef. When the new road is completed in 2022, it will markedly increase beef and other agricultural exports by truck to global markets via seaports in Chile and Brazil.


The bi-oceanic highway is only one visible sign of the Chaco’s agricultural boom: Extensive deforestation also scars the region. Roughly 14% of the Chaco forest was cut down between 2001 and 2014.

The Mennonites’ success in transforming the Chaco into a ranching powerhouse now undermines their own long-sought solitude, endangers this famous forest and threatens the very existence of indigenous people who’ve lived in the region since time immemorial.

Latin America’s Mennonites

The Mennonites of the Paraguayan Chaco who now number around 40,000, first arrived in the 1920s, escaping persecution from Stalin’s Russia by way of Canada.

At least 2.13 million Mennonites live in 87 countries, with large populations in the United States, Canada and Ethiopia. Just under 10% of Mennonites live in Latin America.

Among other core beliefs, the Mennonites – a Christian religious minority originally from Germany – maintain a strict adherence to non-violence, including refusing to fight in war, and to the separation of church from state. Their beliefs led to their persecution in Germany and later in Russia, resulting in multiple migrations and relocations around the world.

In some Mennonite colonies, settlers still wear distinctive conservative clothing – often bonnets and long dresses for women and denim overalls with plaid shirts for men – and ride bicycles and horses as transportation. Other Mennonite colonies, like in Filadelfia or Neuland in Paraguay, lead a modern lifestyle based on ranching and agriculture.

Taming Paraguay’s ‘Green Hell’

When the Mennonites arrived to Paraguay a century ago, the country was at the brink of war with neighboring Bolivia, which claimed the Chaco as its own.

The Paraguayan government granted the new Mennonite arrivals citizenship and land in the Chaco, with guarantees they could maintain their educational systems, speak their language and avoid military conscription. Allowing Mennonites to establish settlements in the Chaco reasserted Paraguay’s territorial claims but dispossessed many indigenous peoples from their lands.

With its extreme heat, thorny plants, scarce water and difficult conditions, many early Mennonite settlers called the Chaco a “Green Hell.” Nevertheless, their relative isolation and autonomy promised a long-sought freedom.

Mennonites continued arriving to Paraguay through the late 1940s. They worked collectively, in agricultural cooperatives, to develop the Chaco.

As their businesses grew, particularly cattle ranching, so did the need for reliable transportation to get their products to markets more quickly. In the 1960s Mennonite organizations helped get a highway called the “Trans-Chaco” built. Today it is a partially paved, pothole-ridden highway abhorred by truckers. It will soon be completely reconstructed even as the the Bi-Oceanic Corridor is underway.

With strong global demand for Paraguayan beef and other agricultural exports, many Mennonite communities today are thriving. In one of South America’s poorest countries, they enjoy living standards comparable to those in Spain or Portugal.

Changes on the forest frontier

The Mennonite’s success has come at a high cost, though, when it comes to environmental change, land conflicts and indigenous rights, my research in Paraguay finds.

The growing beef industry and expansion of soybean production from Brazil into eastern Paraguay are pushing ever more people into the Chaco. The population of Boquerón – the farming region of the Chaco where Paraguay’s Mennonite colonies are located – increased from about 15,000 in 1982 to roughly 67,000 today, according to government data.

Farmland, once cheap and plentiful for those willing to clear it, is getting prohibitively expensive. And as more people move in, the Chaco forest is disappearing ever faster. Deforestation is exacerbating conflicts over land rights with indigenous communities seeking to regain their ancestral lands.

Indigenous peoples are the hardest hit by change in the Chaco.

Some Ayoreo Totobiegosode communities, for example, live in voluntary isolation from broader society. Expanding development threatens their territories in the Chaco, undermining their right to life.

The Chaco’s deforestation impacts other indigenous Paraguayans, whose traditional livelihoods and cultural practices rely on the animals and plants now being replaced by soybeans and cows. Many indigenous communities additionally complain that agriculture has limited their ability to access the Chaco’s scarce water.


Paraguayan President Mario Abdo Benítez says he expects many more people to settle in the Chaco after the Bi-Oceanic Corridor highway is complete, drawn by the new economic opportunities it will bring.

The influx means the Mennonite communities who converted Paraguay’s so-called “Green Hell” into a mega beef exporter are experiencing unforeseen consequences too. The solitude they once sought is slipping away.

As new residents move into the Chaco, the rhythm of life is changing. Once quiet streets buzz with the motorcycles that are now ubiquitous, as people ride to and from work. Bars have popped up, playing music late into the hot, dusty nights.

This article is republished from The Conversation, a nonprofit news site dedicated to sharing ideas from academic experts. It was written by: Joel E. Correia, University of Florida.

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Joel E. Correia has received funding from the National Science Foundation, U.S. Department of Education, and several university grants. The opinions expressed in this article are the author's and do not reflect any organization that has funded him in his research. Correia is also an active member of the American Association of Geographers, which partners with The Conversation.