It’s possible that I shall make an ass of myself. But in that case one can always get out of it with a little dialectic. I have, of course, so worded my proposition as to be right either way (K.Marx, Letter to F.Engels on the Indian Mutiny)
Friday, March 04, 2022
Eerie string of lights spotted in night sky over Switzerland
By Brian Lada, Accuweather.com Starlink satellites can sometimes show up as chains of tiny streaks in the sky, as seen in this NASA photo taken from the International Space Station. Photo courtesy NASA
A star-studded night sky over Vetroz, Switzerland, was interrupted by an eerie string of lights last weekend -- but one skywatcher was outside waiting for the lights to appear.
"This is it," the man said while filming what appeared to be a row of stars gliding across the sky.
To the untrained eye, the lights could spark rumors of UFOs, but not to folks who were anticipating them. In fact, the parade of lights appeared right on schedule last Saturday.
A train of SpaceX Starlink satellites flies over the Swiss Alps on February 26. Image by Newsflare
The lights were not from a UFO but dozens of new SpaceX Starlink satellites that were launched from Vandenberg Space Force Base in Southern California a week ago.
The formations are known as satellite trains, as the objects follow each other in quick succession. In cases like the one in Switzerland, the train can be tightly packed, but in other cases they can be spread farther apart.
The Starlink satellites are not emitting light, but rather are reflecting light from the sun. This is most pronounced in the hours just after nightfall or just before daybreak.
SpaceX has launched over 2,000 Starlink satellites over the past few years and plans to launch thousands more. The most recent launch occurred on Thursday. The private space company made news last month after 40 of the satellites were knocked out by a solar storm.
Thousands of satellites are required for SpaceX to achieve its goal of providing high-speed Internet access around the world. It could be a game-changer for remote areas where Internet access is extremely limited or unavailable.
However, the fleet of Internet-providing satellites does not come without a catch.
Thousands of satellites constantly orbiting the Earth can interfere with astronomers taking observations of the night sky, as well as contribute to the growing issue of satellites and debris in low-Earth orbit.
SpaceX has worked to make the satellites less reflective, but when the conditions are right like they were over Switzerland, the satellites can easily be seen with the naked eye.
"Wasn't sure whether that one would be visible but it is," the man said about the train of satellites while recording the video.
The satellites tend to appear the brightest in the sky in the days immediately following launch before becoming "invisible to the naked eye within a week of launch," according to SpaceX.
SpaceX is planning at least two more Starlink launches in March and more will follow throughout 2022.
For a chance to see a train of Starlink satellites like the video from Switzerland, observers will need cloud-free weather to keep an eye on the sky during the nights following launch.
Trump Tries to Take Credit for Ukraine’s Resistance Against Russia … Days After Calling Putin a ‘Genius’ for Invading
The former president boasted that he sent Ukraine weapons, conveniently ignoring that he was impeached for delaying military aid to the country
During an interview with Maria Bartiromo on Fox News on Wednesday, Trump bragged about supplying Ukraine with weapons and military aid when he was president. “[Russia] is in much deeper than they thought, to a certain extent because of the weapons that I gave, and that the Ukrainians used so well … amazing,” he said.
Trump conveniently ignored that he was impeached for attempting to use said military aid as leverage to strong-arm Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky into digging up dirt on the Biden Family.
Trump just last week called Putin a “genius” for sending tanks into eastern Ukraine. “That’s the strongest peace force I’ve ever seen,” the former president said on a conservative podcast. “There were more army tanks than I’ve ever seen. They’re going to keep the peace all right. Here’s a guy who’s very savvy … I know him very well. Very, very well.”
Despite his praise of Putin, Trump on Wednesday called the Russian president’s attack on a sovereign nation “a holocaust.” Russia has “to stop killing these people,” he told Bartiromo, saying that a “deal” might bring the conflict to an end.
“You have to work out a deal,” he said. “They have to stop killing these people. They’re killing all of these people, and they have to stop it, and they have to stop it now. But they don’t respect the United States and the United States is like, I don’t know, they’re not doing anything about it. This is a — this is a holocaust. This is a horrible thing that’s happening. You’re witnessing and you’re seeing it on television every night.”
“I think Russia, something could be done with them, because they are not looking so good,” Trump added. “But they don’t respect the United States, they aren’t doing anything about it.”
Trump has flip flopped frequently in recent weeks. In addition to praising Putin before backing Ukraine, he also gave himself credit for NATO’s existence, even though as president he threatened to withdraw the U.S. from the organization. “There would be no NATO if I didn’t act strongly and swiftly,” Trump said in a Monday statement. He also bragged about the weapons he reluctantly provided to Ukraine. “It was me that got Ukraine the very effective anti-tank busters (Javelins) when the previous Administration was sending blankets,” he wrote. “Let History so note!”
While the former president seems to fancy himself savvy in international relations, his former national security advisor, John Bolton, cast doubt on Trump’s knowledge of the region and his influence on Putin during his administration. “[Trump] barely knew where Ukraine was,” Bolton said in a recent appearance on far-right network Newsmax.
Bolton also dismissed Trump’s claim that Putin wouldn’t have invaded if he were still president.
“This horrific disaster would never have happened if our election was not rigged and if I was the president,” Trump told the crowd at the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) over the weekend.
“It’s just not accurate to say that Trump’s behavior somehow deterred the Russians,” Bolton said.
China’s Propaganda Machine Gears Up for Putin — and Blames America for the Invasion
China’s Communist Party wants you to think the West fueled Russia’s invasion and that China is the world’s new peacemaker
Russia's President Vladimir Putin and his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping pose during a meeting at the Diaoyutai State Guesthouse on Feb. 4, 2022. Alexei Druzhinin/TASS/Getty Images
For most of February, a Twitter user named @SpicyPandaAcc churned out one uplifting tweet after another about the 2022 Winter Olympics and their host city Beijing.
The Spicy Panda account celebrated Chinese aerial skier Xu Mengtao, a gold medalist and a “role model” who “tells us love and persistence will make a dream come true.” Spicy Panda praised Beijing and its many attractions, tweeting on February 14 that a “tour of the snow-kissed Forbidden City is a once-in-a-lifetime experience!” The account’s boosterism extended to the Chinese Communist Party, with Spicy Panda lauding the party’s carbon emissions goals and hailing the Winter Games as “a watershed for the accelerated implementation of hydrogen energy in China. #Beijing2022.”
On occasion, Spicy Panda took a more hard-edged tone, like when it criticized the Biden administration’s pull-out from Afghanistan or when it shared an American freestyle skier’s praise for China’s Covid protocols at the games: “#AaronBlunck revealed the real China that is totally different from what some American media have said!”
On Feb. 22, Spicy Panda shared one final video about the Olympics. (“Happy moments come and go, but memories stay!”) Then it abruptly switched its focus to the looming conflict between Russia and Ukraine. “‘#Ukraine is not just a neighbor. It is an inherent part of our own history, culture and spiritual space.’ ——Russian President Putin #RussiaUkraineCrisis #Russian.” As Russia launched its invasion of Ukraine, Spicy Panda shared videos from the Russian state-owned RT network and promoted other pro-Putin content until Twitter suspended the account in late February.
At one point, Spicy Panda boasted close to 50,000 followers, and its tweets often generated hundreds of shares by what looked to be bot-like accounts. Spicy Panda’s bio was vague, containing just a single line: “Shed light on the unspoken truth and offer sharp and spicy insights into the changing world.” But according to Darren Linvill, a Clemson University professor who studies disinformation and state actors on social media, @SpicyPandaAcc was “one of the best quality Chinese propaganda accounts I’ve ever seen,” adding that the account was one of a fleet of such propaganda accounts. And if one gets pulled off Twitter, Linvill says, another account will soon take its place.
Disinformation and social-media experts say Spicy Panda was just one example of how the Chinese government has used Russia’s attack on Ukraine as an opportunity to wage its own propaganda war that targets both its domestic population and the English-speaking world beyond its borders.
So far, the Chinese Communist Party’s propaganda has stopped short of fully supporting Russia in the bloody conflict in Ukraine, experts say. Rather, the overarching point of this campaign is to depict China as a rational, sober world power, and the United States and the West as a reckless, violent, and imperialistic forces that threaten global peace.
“They are trying to contrast themselves with what they now see as a fraying, destructive security apparatus across Europe,” says Emerson Brooking, a resident senior fellow at the Digital Forensic Research Lab of the Atlantic Council and coauthor of the book Likewar: The Weaponization of Social Media. “China is trying to say, ‘We’re peaceful, but look at how the West, and especially the United States, always turns to violence.’ “
In recent years, China has adopted a largely favorable stance toward Putin and the Russian government, with Chinese President Xi Jinping calling Putin his “best friend.” In the days before and after the Russian invasion, Chinese officials have refused to use the word “invasion” to describe Russia’s actions and have opposed sanctions on Russian individuals and banks. When the United Nations Security Council voted to condemn the invasion, China abstained from the vote. At the same time, spokespeople for the Chinese Communist Party have blamed the U.S. and NATO for sparking the conflict between Russia and Ukraine, and Chinese social-media platforms have amplified Russian messaging, including by promoting Putin’s bombastic speech attempting to justify the invasion and suppressing pro-Ukraine and anti-Russia content, researchers say.
The Russian invasion of Ukraine has triggered a flood of disinformation in multiple languages to influence people’s perception of the conflict. This has been true in Russia for almost a decade, as pro-Putin politicians and state-owned media have sought to change public opinion after the Ukrainian people in 2014 ousted a pro-Russian president and resisted Putin’s attempts to keep the country within Russia’s sphere of influence.
As researcher and investigative journalist Jane Lytvynenko pointed out, in the days and weeks leading up to the invasion, Russian officials spread misleading or outright false claims about their plans, claiming that Ukraine was a threat to Russia, that it supported terrorist attacks on Russia, and that its desire to join NATO posed an existential threat to Russia. Putin and Russian politicians who belong to his United Russia political party say an incursion into Ukraine would be a “de-Nazification” mission, likening Ukraine’s government to Adolf Hitler’s.
Since the invasion began, much of Russia’s disinformation content has appeared in the Russian language, as opposed to the Russian influence operations in English that targeted the 2016 and 2020 American elections. The need for a campaign targeting Russian citizens in their own native tongue is obvious, according to Darren Linvill, the Clemson professor. “Putin is very focused on justifying this activity to the Russian people,” he says.
In China’s case, the ruling Communist Party’s objectives are more subtle. They align within the country’s broader goal of asserting its role as a — if not the — global power of the 21st century.
One recurring theme in Chinese propaganda is the notion that the United States initiated and is fueling the conflict in Ukraine. The Chinese Communist Party understands the power of a viral meme and often uses political cartoons in its propaganda, experts say. For instance, Zhao Lijian, a spokesman for the Foreign Ministry, tweeted this cartoon on Feb. 25:
On Feb. 27, Hua Chunying, another Chinese foreign ministry official, took aim on Twitter at both the U.S. and NATO, claiming that if those two entities “really care about peace and the #Ukrainian people, why can’t they simply say they won’t take Ukraine into NATO and allow Ukraine to be a bridge instead of a battlefield?”
The Chinese also like to use domestic critics of the U.S. government in their propaganda. It’s a tactic that Kenton Thibaut, a resident China fellow at Digital Forensic Research, describes as “borrowing foreign voices.” Chinese spokeswoman Hua Chunying’s tweet, for instance, built on an earlier tweet from former congresswoman Tulsi Gabbard who said that the Russian invasion could’ve been “avoided if Biden Admin/NATO had simply acknowledged Russia’s legitimate security concerns regarding Ukraine’s becoming a member of NATO.” Beneath that, Hua also shared Gabbard’s appearance on Tucker Carlson’s primetime Fox News show where she made similar comments.
Thibaut, the Chinese disinformation expert, says she’s seen the Gabbard-Carlson clip in heavy rotation in Chinese propaganda. She’s also seen a clip featuring another Fox News host, Laura Ingraham, used by the Chinese. The larger aim of repurposing this English-language content, Thibaut says, is to promote the idea that the U.S. “is really the cause of this conflict. It’s U.S. imperialism, overreach, and interventionism.”
Within China’s borders, the disinformation campaign has a different look, researchers say. The domestic propaganda tends to promote the image of China as a peaceful world power — a country whose rise to economic and military might happened “without a shot fired,” as the Communist Party likes to (inaccurately) put it. The country’s propagandists and its censors appear to be working in concert to elevate stories and posts that play up themes of peace talks, negotiations, and de-escalation, while blocking content that speaks to the horrors of the invasion and the popular unrest in response to that attack. The effect of this, researchers say, is a near-complete blackout on any pro-Ukraine content on domestic platforms.
According to research provided by Thibaut, posts censored by WeChat, a popular Chinese social-media platform, say things like “Russian anti-war people burned their passports: ‘Apologize to the world!'”; “Rally for Ukraine!”; “Putin’s Invasion of Ukraine: A Historic Mistake That Endangers National Fortune!”
Kenton Thibaut/Atlantic Council
Emerson Brooking of the Atlantic County’s Digital Forensic Lab says China is playing a different game than any other nation as it relates to the Russia-Ukraine conflict. While the Chinese have made clear their antagonism toward the U.S., there isn’t an overtly pro-Putin tone in their domestic Chinese propaganda. That’s in line with China’s decision to abstain from the U.N. Security Council vote condemning the Russian invasion. “They’re picking neither,” Brooking says. “The message is: it’s a shame what the west has pushed Russia to do.”
Brooking adds: “The ideal outcome for China is that China positions itself as the adult in the room.”
A mysterious new substance may have been found in the Earth’s core
Joshua Hawkins Thu, March 3, 2022,
There’s a lot that we don’t know about the Earth, like how was life on Earth created? But we also don’t know a lot about the makeup of the planet itself, like how old the Earth’s core is. A new study may turn everything we think we know about the Earth’s inner core on its head. Now researchers say the Earth’s core isn’t a solid compressed ball of iron alloy. But, it also isn’t a completely liquid core either. Instead, the new study proposes that the Earth’s inner core is a mushy mixture of elements such as silicon, carbon, oxygen, and hydrogen. This new paper suggests the Earth’s inner core is a mushy mix of elements
Earth's inner core and outer core
The researchers published the paper in the journal Nature on February 9, and it offers an interesting look into the core of our planet. Initially, scientists believed the Earth’s inner core was composed of a highly compressed ball of solid iron alloy. However, the findings showcased in the paper seem to point towards something different.
First, the researchers note that understanding the Earth’s inner core is difficult for several reasons. Chief among these is the fact that seismological observations have shown a complicated structure that seems to make little sense. One of the currently unresolved problems with understanding the Earth’s core is that it features a low shear-wave velocity that is unmatched by the sound velocities found in iron and iron alloys. This has led the researchers to believe that the core also includes light elements that lend themselves to a superionic state, rather than a solid state. The researchers used computer simulations to try to understand what the core is made of. “Using ab initio molecular dynamics simulations, we find that hydrogen, oxygen, and carbon in hexagonal close-packed iron transform to a superionic state under the inner core conditions, showing high diffusion coefficients like a liquid,” the paper reads.
Models and more studies
Earth in space
Another study conducted in 2021 seems to suggest the same thing. In that study, researchers sent seismic waves through the core of the planet. Those waves, called shears, found that the Earth’s inner core isn’t completely solid iron. Instead, it’s more of a mushy substance.
Of course, there’s no real way to tell exactly what the Earth’s inner core is without seeing it for ourselves. Unfortunately, sending a probe that deep into the Earth is impossible. That’s why the researchers focused on computer simulations for their latest study. The results from those simulations showed that the Earth’s inner core may instead consist of hardened iron. This superionic alloy would then allow other elements to slosh around it. Essentially, the core would feature both solid and liquid states, making it even more complicated than we previously imagined.
If these theories prove true, it could help us understand a lot about why the Earth’s core seems to change constantly. The model could shed light on how the planet generates its magnetic field, too. Of course, the scientists will need to prove the model first. And that means waiting for the perfect moment to run more experiments and test their outcomes. For now, it is interesting at least, to think of the Earth’s inner core sloshing around a latticework of superionic alloy. A constant current of molten liquid moving within our planet.
Opioid crisis: Congress and Biden suggest radical change to War on Drugs approach
The U.S. drug overdose crisis continues unabated, driven by the coronavirus pandemic and the powerful synthetic opioid fentanyl.
A new report from the Commission on Combating Synthetic Opioid Trafficking, a bipartisan working group led by Rep. David Trone (D-MD) and Sen. Tom Cotton (R-AK), argued that the U.S. should shift from a War on Drugs-style focus on supply to a treatment-style focus on demand.
“U.S. and Mexican efforts can disrupt the flow of synthetic opioids across U.S. borders, but real progress can come only by pairing illicit synthetic opioid supply disruption with decreasing the domestic U.S. demand for these drugs,” the report stated.
Illegally-trafficked fentanyl — a synthetic opioid similar to the prescription narcotic morphine but 50-100 times more powerful — is now the primary driver of the opioid crisis, accounting for roughly two-thirds of overdose deaths each day.
During his State of the Union address on Tuesday night, President Biden laid out several steps towards addressing both demand and supply: "There is so much we can do: increase funding for prevention, treatment, harm reduction, and recovery," Biden said. "Get rid of outdated rules that stop doctors from prescribing treatments. And stop the flow of illicit drugs by working with state and local law enforcement to go after traffickers. If you’re suffering from addiction, know you are not alone. I believe in recovery, and I celebrate the 23 million Americans in recovery."
The congressional commission's recommendations include expanding access to medication therapies and opioid use disorder (OUD) medication, resources for those in and out of incarceration, fentanyl test strips, and other novel harm reduction methods.
“The commission does take a very strong look at demand reduction in how to go about finding ways to reduce demand,” Bryce Pardo, an associate director of the RAND Corporation's Drug Policy Research Center and the principal investigator of the report, told Yahoo Finance. “There are things the commission recognizes that need to be done beyond just the simple: ‘We need to figure out where this is coming from and stop the flow.’”
U.S. President Joe Biden delivers the State of the Union address to a joint session of Congress in the U.S. Capitol House Chamber on March 1, 2022 in Washington, DC. (Photo by Saul Loeb - Pool/Getty Images)
Leo Beletsky, a professor who studies the impact of laws and their enforcement on public health at Northeastern University, explained that America's demand for illicitly-manufactured opioids is indicative of a larger issue of a broken health care system, substance use treatment, and social support systems.
“Without addressing these root causes, focus on drug supply doesn’t address the addiction and overdose crisis — it actually makes it worse," Beletsky told Yahoo Finance.
'This is a national emergency'
The government focus on drug supply began with the "War on Drugs," which President Richard Nixon declared in mid-1971.
In the following decades, non-violent drug-related incarcerations increased substantially from 50,000 in 1980 to over 400,000 by 1997.
As the Council on Foreign Relations noted, however, "this approach has been widely criticized for failing to keep people from cycling in and out of prison and for disproportionately targeting Black Americans."
The U.S. opioid crisis was initially driven by prescription opioids in the mid-90s and 2000s, led by the widespread use of Oxycontin, followed by the rise of deadly synthetic opioids in the last decade or so.
Since 1999, nearly 1 million people have fatally overdosed — a number that is “more people than we’ve lost in all the battles in America in our wars, including the Civil War, Korean War, Vietnam War, Iraq, World War I, World War II," Rep. Trone, who lost his 24-year-old nephew to a fentanyl overdose in 2016, told Yahoo Finance. "Unbelievable the number of deaths have happened from overdoses."
Synthetic opioids are the leading driver of overdose deaths. (Chart: CDC)
For the 12-month period ending September 2021, an estimated 104,000 Americans died from drug overdoses. Roughly 65% of those deaths involved synthetic opioids like fentanyl.
Ways to reduce demand for opioids include expanding access to medication-assisted treatment (MAT) — which uses medications like buprenorphine, methadone, and naltrexone in conjunction with other interventions — as well as increasing the availability of naloxone to reverse overdoses and removing the X waiver, which requires specific training in order to be allowed to prescribe buprenorphine, a medication used to help those with opioid withdrawal symptoms.
Trone stated that the commission is entirely in agreement that MAT is “a winner” and should be expanded further. During the State of the Union, Biden likely was referring to the X waiver when he mentioned "outdated rules."
Trone added that “we’ve got to focus heavily on elevating the director of the Office of National Drug Control Policy to a Cabinet-level position. This is a national emergency and we need one voice at the very top to coordinate everybody, all agencies. That’s really crucial, and we’ve got to work on mental health, because if we don’t tie in mental health to this, we are never, ever going to be successful.”
'Not much we can do in Mexico'
Part of what makes fentanyl — which was initially created as a prescription painkiller — desirable for some is how manufacturers are able to increase its potency.
But that comes at a cost with its effects on the human body.
“With fentanyl in particular, what creates the overdose crisis is the combination of the drug’s potency, which overwhelms the system and then causes respiratory arrest, but also the physiological effects of fentanyl that are specific to that drug causing chest wall rigidity, the ability of which can cross the blood to the brain very, very quickly,” Pardo said. “You have very few minutes to reverse an overdose, whereas with heroin you have a lot more time. These kinds of things are more critical now in today’s day and age.”
How synthetic opioids like fentanyl makes their way into the United States. (Chart: Commission on Combating Synthetic Opioid Trafficking)
Initially, fentanyl was shipped directly to the United States after Chinese producers created the drug in labs. As Chinese authorities became more stringent on fentanyl production, the producers would slightly alter their formulas, creating fentanyl “analogues” that essentially created a game of ‘Whack-a-Mole’ for regulators. In May 2019, however, China began controlling all fentanyl-related substances, which curbed much of the production of fentanyl-like substances.
Unfortunately, this didn’t stop fentanyl manufacturers in China entirely. Instead, they began using non-fentanyl synthetic opioids and turned to Mexico to distribute drugs.
“The Chinese chemical manufacturers are now just offering precursor chemicals to drug trafficking organizations or anybody who is interested in manufacturing fentanyl,” Pardo said. “They’re easy to find on social media platforms or other kinds of [business-to-business] networks. Social media is a platform that is the wild west. People are putting up listings for retail purposes. There are pictures on Snapchat where you can easily obtain drugs on those platforms, as well as other platforms we looked at. Twitter, Pinterest, Linkedin, where you do find these other listings for precursor chemicals and bulk amounts of precursor chemicals that are being sold, with the intention of synthetic opioid manufacturing by some criminal actors in Canada or Mexico or where have you.”
There are many ways fentanyl flows into the U.S. (Chart: Government Accountability Office)
Mexican drug cartels can illegally traffic drug precursor chemicals into the United States through various ways such as passenger boat, cargo ship, train, commercial plane, drone, mail carrier, and vehicle border crossings. These routes have been the primary sources of illicit fentanyl in the U.S. since 2019, according to the report.
“There’s not much we can do in Mexico,” Trone said. “The Mexican government has a lot of great people that would love to make a difference, but they’ve chosen that it’s not in their best interest given the level of violence the cartels have brought against people in Mexico. The level of corruption has taken many people. They’re now working for the cartels and not for the government. There’s not a lot we could do right now in Mexico, unfortunately, given the position they’ve taken. It kind of comes back down to: What are we going to do to slow the demand down?”
Adriana Belmonte is a reporter and editor covering politics and health care policy for Yahoo Finance. You can follow her on Twitter @adrianambells and reach her at adriana@yahoofinance.com.
TELL CP TO BARGAIN FAIRLY Top Fertilizer Maker Nutrien Asks Canada to Halt Rail Strike
Jen Skerritt Thu, March 3, 2022,
(Bloomberg) -- Nutrien Ltd., the world’s biggest crop-nutrient producer, wants the Canadian government to stop a strike at one of the nation’s largest railways because the disruption could potentially lead to smaller harvests.
About 3,000 workers at Canadian Pacific Railway Ltd. voted in favor of going on strike March 16 if a collective bargaining agreement isn’t reached, according to their union. That would impact Nutrien’s ability to move potash, nitrogen and other crop chemicals to retail locations across Canada just ahead of spring planting, the company said in an email.
Without such products, harvests could be reduced when food prices are soaring. The fertilizer supply chain is still “reeling” from impacts of everything from Covid-19 to sanctions on Belarus and Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, Nutrien said. Crop nutrient prices are at all-time highs amid concerns about shortfalls.
“The global food supply is already stretched and cannot afford further negative impacts at this time,” the company said Wednesday in a statement. “We would be very disappointed to see a labor dispute have such a significant impact on global agricultural supply chains, and consequently, we would hope that the Canadian government will consider intervening to avert another transportation crisis.”
A disruption in rail service will have “serious implications” as global food security concerns are heightened and there is strong demand for Canadian potash, said Natashia Stinka, spokeswoman for Canpotex, a joint venture that markets sales outside North America for Nutrien and Mosaic Co.
“Our overseas partners are counting on Canpotex to deliver the potash they need to sustain global food production,” Stinka said Thursday. “We are doing what we can, but reliable rail service is vital.”
CPR LATEST QUARTERLY RESULTS Q4
2021
Latest Quarterly Results (CAD $)Q4 2021
% Change
Total Revenues ($M) $2,040 1% Operating Ratio (%) 59.2% +530 bps Adjusted Operating Ratio (%)(1) 57.5% +360 bps Operating Income ($M) $832 -10% Adjusted Operating Income ($M)(1) $868 -6% Diluted EPS(2) $0.74 -38% Adjusted Diluted EPS(1)(2) $0.95 -6% (1) For a full description and reconciliation of Non-GAAP Measures see CP’s Q4 2021 Earnings Release (2) As a result of the five-for-one share split of the Company's issued and outstanding Common Shares, which began trading on a post-split basis on May 14, 2021, per share amounts and all outstanding Common Shares for comparative periods of 2020 have been retrospectively adjusted.
U.S. senators grill regulators over climate policy on natural gas projects
A natural gas piping is seen as a sign warns of underground
natural gas pipelines outside Rifle
Thu, March 3, 2022 By Timothy Gardner
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Top U.S. senators from both parties on Thursday grilled Democratic energy regulators who recently approved guidelines for approving new natural gas projects that allow consideration of environmental justice, landowner and climate issues.
The three Democrats on the five-member Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) voted in February to update the guidelines, for the first time since 1999, a move that analysts say could present hurdles for new gas projects. The two Republicans on the panel opposed the guidelines.
"In my view, there is an effort underway by some to inflict death by a thousand cuts on the fossil fuels that have made our energy reliable and affordable," said Senator Joe Manchin, a Democrat from natural gas producing West Virginia. Manchin heads the Senate Energy Committee, at which all five FERC members appeared in a hearing.
Richard Glick, a Democrat and the chairman of FERC, said the goal of the guidelines is to "provide an updated, legally durable framework" that incorporates guidance the commission has gotten from federal courts into its approach on permitting natural gas pipelines and liquefied natural gas facilities.
The building and operation of natural gas pipelines and liquefied natural gas projects can leak methane, a powerful greenhouse gas and release particulate emissions that cause health problems.
Oil, gas and coal interests and lawmakers from fossil fuel producing states have stepped up their criticism of Democratic policies on climate and pipelines since Russia's invasion of Ukraine. The situation threatens exports of oil and gas from Russia, which produces about 10% of the world's crude oil and about 40% of Europe's natural gas.
Senator Angus King, an independent who caucuses with Democrats, agreed with Glick that the guidelines would provide legal certainty to natural gas projects because it would protect them from lawsuits saying their emissions impacts had not been vetted.
"Here we are saying FERC can't require the examination of the most serious environmental threat that this country and the world has ever faced, I think that's preposterous," he said.
King said FERC should work with backers of gas projects and other stakeholders to sharpen the clarity of the guidelines.
Senator John Barrasso of Wyoming, the committee's top Republican, has said FERC's ruling was "just the latest attack in (President Joe) Biden's war on American energy."
Biden only nominated one of the current members of FERC, Willie Phillips, a fellow Democrat, and a former chair of Washington, D.C.'s utility commission.
An interim guideline FERC approved on Feb. 17 requires environmental impact statements on natural gas projects that emit above 100,000 metric tons per year of greenhouse gases, a process that opponents say can be lengthy and unwieldy.
(Reporting by Timothy Gardner; editing by Richard Pullin and David Gregorio)
140-year-old record low to be challenged as temps plunge in LA
Renee Duff Thu, March 3, 2022
Record lows left untouched since the late 1800s could be in jeopardy as a chilly and wet pattern overtakes Southern California and the rest of the Southwest this weekend, according to AccuWeather forecasters. The potentially historic cold snap has experts pondering how low temperatures would have plunged had a similar atmospheric setup been in place 140 years ago when there were far fewer urban heat island effects.
AccuWeather Meteorologist Ryan Adamson called the upcoming chill "startling for some" in the wake of above-average temperatures and, in some cases, record warmth in recent days.
This graph shows the observed temperatures compared to normal and record ranges in downtown Los Angeles over the past few weeks.
Temperatures can drop low enough to challenge records in Downtown Los Angeles on both nights this weekend, according to Adamson.
On Saturday night, AccuWeather is projecting a low of 41 degrees Fahrenheit in the City of Angels, which is within striking distance of the bottom mark for the date of 39 set in 1882. Temperatures around the 40-degree mark on Sunday night would tie that date's record low which has stood since 1893. This would be a 40-degree temperature plunge from the end of February into the first days of March, when high temperatures topped out in the lower 80s in L.A., with other parts of California setting new marks for record high temperatures.
The forecast for Downtown Los Angeles shows the trend to chillier weather this weekend. (AccuWeather)
To say a lot has changed since the late 1800s when these record lows were first stamped into the weather history books would be an understatement. In terms of population alone, the downtown area had 3.9 million residents as of the 2020 U.S. census, a 78-fold increase since the 1890 population of around 50,000. Buildings, roadways, sidewalks and vehicles -- all of which contribute to higher temperatures being observed in urban heat islands -- have also increased in vast numbers across Southern California since the late 1800s.
As a result, forecasters say it's certainly possible that had the atmospheric setup that is projected this weekend been in place during early March of 1882 and 1893, the record lows for these dates could be considerably lower and much farther out of reach than currently predicted this weekend.
Beyond L.A., AccuWeather meteorologists say the potential for near-record temperatures will be lower elsewhere across Southern California, but it will still be on the chilly side compared to normal levels. Temperatures will be 5-15 degrees below average in general across the region, including into parts of the Desert Southwest.
Palm Springs, California, can expect high temperatures in the 60s with overnight lows dipping into the upper 40s this weekend, a far cry from the record-breaking high of 93 on March 1.
Heavy storm clouds move in over downtown Los Angeles as snow tops the San Gabriel mountain range on Sunday, Dec. 26, 2021. (AP Photo/Richard Vogel)
Farther east in Phoenix, high temperatures are projected to dip into the middle 60s by Sunday, about 10 degrees lower than the average of 75.
The good news for residents eager for warmth to return is that forecasters say its comeback will not be too far in the distant future. Seasonable temperatures could make an appearance again in Southern California by early next week, but it may take another day or two before the chill erodes farther east.
In the meantime, the cooler and wetter conditions should help to temporarily ease concerns of wildfires across the region and help crews gain the upper hand on ongoing blazes.
Florida wildlife officials lift Goliath grouper fishing ban
Ben Montgomery Thu, March 3, 2022
Despite opposition from scientists and divers, the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission voted yesterday to lift the ban on catching Goliath grouper, an embattled species that was nearly fished to extinction in the 1980s.
Under the rules approved yesterday, fishermen will soon be allowed to apply for one of 200 permits and tags to harvest Goliath grouper, which can grow to be eight feet long and weigh up to 800 pounds.
Harvesting Goliath grouper has been banned since 1990.
They presented commissioners with a petition containing signatures from 66,400 opponents of lifting the ban.
What they're saying: "This is simply not the time to reconsider a harvest for this species," Chris Malinowski, director of research and conservation at the Ocean First Institute, said at the meeting.
Commissioners who backed the change say a limited harvest with a slot limit of 24-36 inches, and a rule that mandates reporting biological data for the catch, will provide scientists more information about the status of the species.
Of note: Commissioner Steven Hudson, the only no vote, asked FWC staff to explore a fishing ban around several aggregated spawning grounds for Goliath grouper.
Axios
Anna Netrebko out of Met Opera over her support of Putin
RONALD BLUM Thu, March 3, 2022
NEW YORK (AP) — Soprano Anna Netrebko withdrew from her future engagements at the Metropolitan Opera rather than repudiate her support for Russian President Vladimir Putin, costing the company one of its top singers and best box-office draws.
“It is a great artistic loss for the Met and for opera,” Met General Manager Peter Gelb said in a statement Thursday. “Anna is one of the greatest singers in Met history, but with Putin killing innocent victims in Ukraine, there was no way forward.”
Gelb had said Sunday that the Met would not engage artists who support Putin.
The Met made repeated efforts in recent days attempting to convince Netrebko to repudiate Putin but failed to persuade her, a person familiar with the developments said, speaking on condition of anonymity because that detail was not announced.
The Met’s decision followed the collapse of the international career of Russian conductor Valery Gergiev, who has been close to Putin as artistic and general director of the Mariinsky in St. Petersburg.
The invasion of Ukraine has led to a show of solidarity in the arts and culture world with Ukrainians and a backlash against the Russian government and those with ties to it that won't reject Putin's actions. The ripple effects have also reached the international sports world.
Netrebko, a 50-year-old from Krasnodar, received the People’s Artist of Russia honor from Putin in 2008.
She was photographed in 2014 holding a Novorussian flag after giving a 1 million ruble donation (then $18,500) to the opera hose in Donetsk, a Ukrainian city controlled by pro-Russia separatists.
On Tuesday, Netrebko withdrew from all her upcoming performances. Her next listed performance was at Barcelona's Gran Teatre del Liceu on April 3, followed by three concerts with her husband, Azerbaijani tenor Yusif Eyvazov, and an April 13 concert with the Berlin Philharmonic.
“I am opposed to this senseless war of aggression and I am calling on Russia to end this war right now, to save all of us. We need peace right now,” she said. "This is not a time for me to make music and perform. I have therefore decided to take a step back from performing for the time being. It is an extremely difficult decision for me, but I know that my audience will understand and respect this decision.”
There was no immediate response from Netrebko to Gelb's announcement.
Netrebko made her Met debut on Feb, 14, 2002, in Prokofiev's “War and Peace” and quickly became a house favorite. She has appeared in 192 performances at the house, the last a New Year's Eve gala she starred in on Dec. 31, 2019.
Netrebko will be replaced by Ukrainian soprano Liudmyla Monastyrska in Puccini’s “Turandot” for five performances from April 30 to May 14, including a May 7 performance broadcast to theaters worldwide. The Met said Netrebko also will be replaced as Elisabetta in Verdi's “Don Carlo” for five performances from Nov. 3-19.
The Met also said it would construct its own sets and costumes for next season's new production of Wagner's “Lohengrin” rather than share them with Moscow's Bolshoi Opera, as originally planned.
Gergiev was fired this week as chief conductor of the Munich Philharmonic, and the Gergiev festival, an annual event since 1996, was canceled by the Rotterdam Philharmonic Orchestra, where he was principal guest conductor from 1995 to 2008. He also was dropped by the Vienna Philharmonic, the Edinburgh Festival in Scotland and Milan’s Teatro alla Scala.
