Pope Francis's visit to Canada was full of tensions — both from what was said and what wasn’t


Christine Jamieson, Associate Professor, Theological Studies, Concordia University

Tue, August 2, 2022

THE CONVERSATION

Pope Francis waves to the crowd, making his way to the Plains of Abraham during his Papal visit in Québec City on July 27, 2022. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Jacques Boissinot

Reactions to Pope Francis’s apology in Canada for harm perpetrated by members of the Catholic Church on children at Indian Residential Schools were far from unanimous.

While some have acknowledged the apology was genuine and deeply felt, there was tension and a mix of welcome reception and protest.

Evelyn Korkmaz, a survivor of St. Anne’s Indian Residential School in Ontario, expressed the tension well:

“I had my ups and downs, my hurrays, my disappointments… my wanting more and not getting it. I’ve waited 50 years for this apology and finally today I heard it… Part of me is rejoiced, part of me is sad, part of me is numb, but I am glad I lived long enough to have witnessed his apology. But like I said I want more, because 50 years is too long to wait for an apology.”

The Pope’s visit to Canada, despite being met with reception and protest, was significant. Visiting Indigenous people on their land was a step in the right direction, but the visit was full of tensions — both from what was said and what wasn’t.
Meeting on Indigenous land

In late March an Indigenous delegation from Canada visited the Pope. And last week, the Pope met with Indigenous people on their land, in their homes.

The Pope, representing the Catholic Church, coming to what we now call Canada was significant. He came, as he said, on a “penitential pilgrimage” to encounter, to listen, to apologize.

The Anishinaabe speak of this as entering one another’s lodge — done in an effort to understand each other’s way of being and acting in the world.

Pope Francis wears a headdress he was given after his apology to Indigenous people during a ceremony in Maskwacis, Alta. on July 25, 2022. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Nathan Denette

The encounter with Pope Francis was full of tensions, in part healing for survivors and their families and in part triggering deep wounds from a traumatic past.

These tensions were illustrated during Cree woman Si Phi Ko’s protest. After former Truth and Reconciliation commissioner Chief Wilton Littlechild placed a headdress on the Pope’s head, Phi Ko could not be silent as she saw it as a sign of disrespect. But for Chief Littlechild, Pope Francis choosing to visit his territory was an honour.

This tension, poles of reception and protest was evoked not only from what was said by Pope Francis in his apology, but by what was omitted.
What was omitted

While recognizing the importance of the apology, former TRC commissioner Murray Sinclair saw a “deep hole” in it.

Sinclair said the Catholic Church’s role in the cultural genocide of Indigenous Peoples was more than just the work of a few bad people, adding it was:

“A concerted institutional effort to remove children from their families and cultures, all in the name of Christian supremacy. While an apology has been made, that same doctrine is in place.”

This doctrine Sinclair is referring to is the Doctrine of Discovery. The Doctrine of Discovery is a legal framework that justified acts like the colonization of North America and its roots are in a series of papal statements. Over the course of the Pope’s visit, many called for it to be rescinded.

As Sinclair mentioned, the church played a role in the cultural genocide of Indigenous people, which is something the Pope failed to acknowledge until he was on the plane home. “I didn’t use the word genocide because it didn’t come to mind but I described genocide,” Francis said

.

A protester holds a sign as Pope Francis takes part in a public event in Iqaluit, Nunavut on July 29, 2022. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Dustin Patar

What was also omitted, in some instances, was the presence of survivors — from the procession to sitting in the front seats during the eucharist, both in Edmonton and at Sainte-Anne-de-Beaupré. Indigenous symbols and ceremonies were also omitted from the altar and during the service.

While Pope Francis sincerely sought reconciliation, reconciliation did not seem to touch these forms of celebration and the clash of cultures was palatable.
Tensions stretched wide

There are also tensions within the Catholic Church itself that were reflected during the papal visit. The tension is between what philosopher Bernard Lonergan calls “classism” and “historical mindedness.”

The Catholic Church as an institution has not adopted a framework that can come to terms with its role in the spiritual, sexual, cultural, emotional and physical abuse suffered by Indigenous children at Indian Residential Schools.

This was clear through the lack of sensitivity to Indigenous cultures during the eucharist and the presence of cardinals, bishops and clergy in the first rows that, at times, obscured the fact that the visit was meant to be an encounter with Survivors and Indigenous communities.

As many said during the Pope’s visit, healing must take place within both parties.

Healing for Indigenous Survivors will constitute both an interior and exterior journey. Healing within the Catholic Church must constitute a reappropriation of truth and value in face of all evil it has been part of.

- - -

This article is republished from The Conversation, a nonprofit news site dedicated to sharing ideas from academic experts. It was written by: Christine Jamieson, Concordia University.

Read more:

Pope Francis’ visit to Canada: The complicated relationship between Indigenous communities and the church

I survived the ’60s Scoop. Here’s why the Pope’s apology isn’t an apology at all

FIRST INTERRACIAL KISS ON TV

Resurfaced ‘Drunk History’ Clip Tells How Nichelle Nichols ‘Literally Integrated Space’

Elyse Wanshel
Mon, August 1, 2022 

Nichelle Nichols and Raven-Symoné as Nichols on “Drunk History.” (Photo: CBS Photo Archive / Contributor via Getty/Screenshot “Drunk History”/Comedy Central via YouTube)

Nichelle Nichols played a key role in helping others live long and prosper.

After news broke that the “Star Trek” icon died Saturday in Silver City, New Mexico, at the age of 89, tributes to the pioneering actor flooded social media.

One of these salutes was by comedian Ashley Nicole Black, who tweeted that Nichols’ “beautiful legacy” was an example of “what it really means to use the platform you have to make the world a better place.”



“I think of her example often and I hope others will too,” Black wrote before offering an actual example of how Nichols’ decisions helped others aim for the stars.

Black tweeted a clip from a “Drunk History” episode she narrated about Nichols’ life.

In the 2018 clip, Raven-Symoné plays Nichols in a reenactment of the famous moment in which Martin Luther King Jr. helped Nichols realize how much her role as Lt. Nyota Uhura — who was the communications officer on the Starship Enterprise in the original “Star Trek” TV series — meant to Black Americans.

In the clip, Black tipsily paraphrased that Nichols was thinking about quitting “Star Trek” right before attending an NAACP fundraiser that Nichols and King both attended. At the event, King gushed about “Star Trek” to Nichols and told the actor she couldn’t quit the show because, as Black paraphrased:

“’You are the only Black woman on television who doesn’t play a servant. You’re the only person out there providing hope to Black people that there’s a future where maybe they won’t be seen as less than, and they’ll be seen as equals”

Nichols shared the story of her interaction with King as well during a 2011 episode of PBS’ “Pioneers in Television.”

“He was telling me why I could not [resign],” she recalled on the show in 2011. “He said I had the first nonstereotypical role, I had a role with honor, dignity and intelligence. He said, ‘You simply cannot abdicate. This is an important role. This is why we are marching. We never thought we’d see this on TV.’”

Nichelle Nichols as Lt. Nyota Uhura and William Shatner as Capt. James T. Kirk in the 1968 “Star Trek” episode  "Plato's Stepchildren."

Nichelle Nichols as Lt. Nyota Uhura and William Shatner as Capt. James T. Kirk in the 1968 “Star Trek” episode "Plato's Stepchildren." (Photo: CBS Photo Archive via Getty Images)

The “Drunk History” clip also covers how Nichols made history in November 1968, when her “Star Trek” character kissed Capt. James T. Kirk, played by white actor William Shatner — which is often credited as the first interracial kiss on American television.

Black touches on how Nichols dedicated decades of her life to advocating for space exploration as well, particularly among women and minorities.

Nichols launched a consultant firm, Women in Motion, which partnered with NASA to recruit minority and female personnel for the space agency. Her recruits included Guion Bluford, the first African American astronaut in space; Sally Ride, the first female American astronaut; and Mae Jemison, the first Black woman to travel into space.

“So, Nichelle Nichols was the first Black lady to go to space for fake, and she recruited the first Black lady to go to space for real,” Black explained on “Drunk History,” adding: “She literally integrated space.”

It also seems that Nichols was a fan of the “Drunk History” tribute to her life.

“She reached out to the show after it aired to say she was pleased with it,” Black tweeted.

This article originally appeared on HuffPost and has been updated.

Watch ‘Drunk History’ Telling The Story Of Nichelle Nichols And ‘Star Trek’ [UPDATED]

| FEBRUARY 5, 2018 | BY: ANTHONY PASCALE 

On Tuesday Comedy Central’s Drunk History will turn it inebriated gaze on a bit of Star Trek history, telling the tale of Nichelle Nichols. The segment features comedian Ashley Nichole Black narrating a story about how Nichols was convinced to stay in her role as Uhura by Martin Luther King, TV’s first inter-racial kiss and Nichols work with NASA. You can watch the full segment and read our exclusive interview with creator and star Derek Waters.

Singer and actress Raven Symoné plays Nichelle Nichols, Jaleel White plays MLK, Craig Cackowski plays Gene Roddenberry and Waters plays William Shatner. Check out the clip below.

UPDATE: Full Drink History Segment

 

Interview: Derek Waters on bringing Star Trek to Drunk History

What gave you the idea to turn your attention to the history of Star Trek and Nichelle Nichols?

The genesis of any story is hearing something that sounds familiar, but told in a brand new way. So, hearing what Nichelle Nichols had done and how Martin Luther King inspired her to stay and the importance of her is just a great moment in history, not just Star Trek, that more people need to know about. And on top of that there is the first inter-racial kiss and recruiting astronauts like Mae Jemison. It’s one of those stories like “yeah, but did you know this? and did you know that?” How did I not know all of that?

Did you have a chance to talk to Nichelle about the episode?

I never met her, but I did send it to her and she said that she loved it and couldn’t stop laughing, so that is the seal of approval.

How was the narrator and cast picked for this episode?

With narrators I talk to them about something that is going on that they would really want to talk about and what kinds of stories are important to them. I talked to Ashley Nichole Black about what she knew about Nichelle Nichols and she said she loved Nichelle Nichols. She knew all of this stuff and she had the strongest reaction to I assigned it to her. And I love Raven and thought this would be the perfect part for her and luckily she said yes. And I thought it would be really cool to have Jaleel White as Martin Luther King and somehow it all happened.

Raven Symoné as Nichelle Nichols and Derek Waters as William Shatner in Drunk History

What did you do to find your inner Shatner?

I don’t know. I normally wear that outfit so I was kind of being myself. I watched that episode over and over again. With these shows I never want to do an impression, it’s more about how I would have been in a scene.

You guys had to recreate part of the Star Trek set and get costumes together, was that a challenge?

You can’t use the trademark obviously, but we wanted to get as close to it as possible. That stuff is fun for me. It looks a bit off, but you can tell our hearts are in the right place. And that is what I want the show to be like. They are doing a history show, but it’s drunk, and their hearts are in the right place and they are trying their best to make it as authentic as possible.

Raven Symoné as Nichelle Nichols in Drunk History

Airs on Tuesday

Drunk History “Game Changers” airs on Comedy Central on Tuesday, February 6 at 10pm ET/PT. For more about the show or to watch full episodes and clips, visit cc.com.

 

Patriotic fervour erupts on Chinese social media over Pelosi's Taiwan visit

IT'S LIKE XI GOING TO HAWAII 

SUPPORTING IT'S INDEPENDENCE

Eduardo Baptista
Wed, August 3, 2022 

U.S. House Speaker Pelosi visits Taiwan

BEIJING (Reuters) - The sight of the U.S. House of Representatives Speaker Nancy Pelosi arriving in Taiwan late on Tuesday was too much to bear for many mainland China internet users, who wanted a more muscular response from their government.

"Going to bed yesterday night, I was so angry I could not sleep," blogger Xiaoyuantoutiao wrote on Wednesday.

"But what angers me is not the online clamours for 'starting a fight', 'spare the island but not its people'...(but that) this old she-devil, she actually dares to come!"

China considers Taiwan part of its territory and has never renounced the use of force to bring the island under its control. But Taiwan rejects China's sovereignty claims and says only its people can decide the island's future.

Hashtags related to Pelosi's visit, such as "the resolve to realise national reunification is rock solid", went viral on China's Weibo microblogging platform. By Wednesday, about a dozen of these patriotic hashtags had racked up several billion views.

Some bloggers even regarded Pelosi's temerity as justification for an immediate invasion of Taiwan, with many users posting the term "there is only one China".

Others said China's military should have done more to stop her plane from landing, and thousands of users mocked a viral Weibo post published by an official People's Liberation Army account last week that had simply read "prepare for war!".

"In the future if you are not preparing to strike, don't make these statements to deceive the common people," said one user.

The highest level U.S. visit to Taiwan in 25 years has been furiously condemned by China, which has demonstrated its anger with a burst of military activity in the surrounding waters, and by summoning the U.S. ambassador in Beijing, and announcing the suspension of several agricultural imports from Taiwan.

Countering U.S. support for Taiwan is one of Beijing's most important foreign policy issues, and state-controlled Chinese media has helped ensure public opinion firmly backs Beijing's stance.

A livestream tracking the journey of Pelosi's plane to Taipei by Chinese state media on China's dominant chat app WeChat was watched by 22 million users on Tuesday.

But Weibo crashed before her plane landed, leaving users in the dark for about 30 minutes to an hour before and after Pelosi stepped onto the airport tarmac.

Without mentioning events in Taiwan, Weibo said on Wednesday the platform crashed because its broadband capacity was overstretched.

But the level of outrage on Weibo still hit fever pitch, with irate netizens calling for stronger military and economic countermeasures against Taiwan and the United States far outnumbering voices of moderation.

Still, there were people urging long-term patience in the face of mounting domestic challenges and unfavourable global sentiment towards China, as well as some for peace.

"If there really is a war, China will endure the suffering, currently the world powers have not really chosen team China, we would not get any help. Just like Russia, it would be a bit of a lonely war," wrote one user.

Weibo, which censored calls for peace and criticism of Russia following the outbreak of the war in Ukraine, did not promote hashtags that criticised the outburst of nationalist fervour in response to Pelosi's visit.

Qin Quanyao, a Beijing-based blogger, wrote an essay on Tuesday on WeChat in which he noted the current online jingoism harked back to the time of late Chairman Mao Zedong, when primary school children sang songs about the "liberation" of Taiwan.

"From Weibo, WeChat to various online platforms, the atmosphere suddenly became tense, seemingly returning to the era of 'we must liberate Taiwan' when we were children," he wrote.

(Reporting by Eduardo Baptista, Editing by Brenda Goh & Simon Cameron-Moore)

Explainer-Two years since Beirut blast, why has no top official been held to account?


A general view shows the Beirut silos damaged in the August 2020 port blast

Wed, August 3, 2022 

BEIRUT (Reuters) - Lebanon on Thursday marks the second anniversary of the Beirut port explosion which killed at least 215 people, wounded thousands and damaged swathes of the capital.

Despite the devastation wrought by the blast, one of the biggest non-nuclear explosions ever recorded, a judicial investigation has brought no senior official to account.

With the probe frozen for months, many Lebanese see this as an example of the impunity enjoyed by a ruling elite that has long avoided accountability for corruption and bad governance, including policies that led to a financial collapse.

Here is a recap of how the blast happened, and the obstacles that have paralysed the investigation.


WHAT HAPPENED?

The explosion just after 6 p.m. on August 4, 2020, resulted from the detonation of hundreds of tonnes of ammonium nitrate which ignited as a blaze tore through the warehouse where they were stored.

Originally bound for Mozambique aboard a Russian-leased ship, the chemicals had been at the port since 2013, when they were unloaded during an unscheduled stop to take on extra cargo.

The ship never left the port, becoming tangled in a legal dispute over unpaid port fees and ship defects.

No one ever came forward to claim the shipment.

The amount of ammonium nitrate that blew up was one fifth of the 2,754 tonnes unloaded in 2013, the FBI concluded, adding to suspicions that much of the cargo had gone missing.

The blast was so powerful it was felt 250 km away in Cyprus and sent a mushroom cloud over Beirut.

WHO KNEW ABOUT THE CHEMICALS?

Senior Lebanese officials, including President Michel Aoun and then-Prime Minister Hassan Diab, were aware of the cargo.

Aoun said shortly after the blast he had told security chiefs to "do what is necessary" after learning of the chemicals. Diab has said his conscience is clear.

Human Rights Watch said in a report last year that high-level security and government officials "foresaw the significant threat to life ... and tacitly accepted the risk of deaths occurring".

WHO HAS INVESTIGATED THE BLAST?

The justice minister appointed Judge Fadi Sawan head investigator shortly after the blast. Sawan charged three ex-ministers and Diab with negligence over the blast in December, 2020, but then hit strong political pushback.

A court removed him from the case in February, 2021 after two of the ex-ministers - Ali Hassan Khalil and Ghazi Zeitar - complained he had overstepped his powers.

Judge Tarek Bitar was appointed to replace Sawan. He sought to interrogate senior figures including Zeitar and Khalil, both of them members of Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri's Amal Movement and allies of the Iran-backed Hezbollah.

He also sought to question Major-General Abbas Ibrahim, head of the powerful General Security agency.

All have denied wrongdoing.

HOW HAS THE PROBE BEEN STYMIED?

All of the current and former officials Bitar has sought to question as suspects have resisted, arguing they have immunity or that he lacks authority to prosecute them.

This tussle has played out in the courts, in political life and on the streets.

Suspects swamped courts last year with more than two dozen legal cases seeking Bitar's removal over alleged bias and "grave mistakes", leading to several suspensions of the investigation.

The ex-ministers have said any cases against them should be heard by a special court for presidents and ministers. That court has never held a single official accountable, and it would pass control of the probe to ruling parties in parliament.

The probe has been in complete limbo since early 2022 due to the retirement of judges from a court that must rule on several complaints against Bitar before he can continue.

The finance minister - who is backed by Berri - has held off signing a decree appointing new judges, citing concerns with the sectarian balance of the bench.

WHAT DOES HEZBOLLAH THINK?

Bitar has not pursued any members of the heavily armed, Iran-backed Hezbollah group.

But Hezbollah campaigned fiercely against him last year as he sought to question its allies. One senior Hezbollah official sent Bitar a message warning that the group would "uproot" him.

An anti-Bitar protest called by Hezbollah and its allies last October escalated into deadly violence.

Hezbollah has accused the United States, which lists the group as a terrorist organisation, of meddling in the probe.

The U.S. ambassador has denied this.

Hezbollah dismissed accusations made at the time of the blast that it had stored arms at the port and says it had nothing to do with the blast. Its adversaries have long accused the group of controlling the port - something it also denies.

(Writing by Timour Azhari and Tom Perry, Editing by Angus MacSwan)

Groups ask UN to investigate Beirut's massive 2020 blast


FA rescue team surveys the site of a massive explosion in the port of Beirut, Lebanon, Aug. 7, 2020. A group of Lebanese and international organizations on Wednesday, Aug, 3, 2022, called on members of the U.N. Human Rights Council to send a fact-finding mission to investigate the Beirut Port blast two years ago. The call came as the domestic investigation has been stalled since December following legal challenges by charged officials against the judge leading the investigation into the Aug. 4, 2020 blast that killed nearly 220 and injured over 6,000.

AP Photo/Thibault Camus

BASSEM MROUE
Wed, August 3, 2022 

BEIRUT (AP) — Lebanese and international organizations Wednesday called on the U.N. Human Rights Council to send a fact-finding mission to investigate the Beirut port blast two years ago, as a domestic probe continues to stall.

The call by groups including Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International came as the Lebanese investigation has been stalled since December following legal challenges by charged and accused officials against the judge leading the investigation. The Aug. 4, 2020 blast killed nearly 220 people, injured over 6,000 and caused widespread damage in Beirut.

The call also came amid concerns that a large section of the port's giant grain silos, shredded by the massive explosion, might collapse days after a smaller part fell following a weekslong fire of fermented grain ignited by the scorching summer heat. Lebanese authorities closed a main road outside the port and directed traffic into internal streets as a precautionary measure.

The northern block of the silos has been slowly tilting for days since the other part collapsed Sunday.

A group of U.N. experts also called Wednesday for an international investigation saying “this tragedy marked one of the largest non-nuclear blasts in recent memory, yet the world has done nothing to find out why it happened.”

The organizations called on the U.N. rights council to put forward a resolution at the upcoming council session in September that would dispatch “without delay, an independent and impartial fact-finding mission” for the explosion.

They believe the mission would establish the facts surrounding the explosion, including the root causes, without political intervention. This would support the victims’ campaign for an effective investigation, they said. The groups want to establish state and individual responsibility and support justice for the victims.

Many have blamed the Lebanese government’s longtime corruption and mismanagement for the tragedy considered one of the largest non-nuclear explosions in history when hundreds of tons of highly explosive ammonium nitrate, a material used in fertilizers, detonated at the port.

Official correspondence between political, security and judicial officials reveal that many were aware about the hazardous substances unloaded in the port a decade ago without taking meaningful action to remove it.

After the blast, port, customs and legal documents revealed that the ammonium nitrate had been shipped to Lebanon in 2013 on a worn out Russian ship and stored improperly at a port warehouse ever since.

Tarek Bitar, the judge leading the Lebanese investigation, charged four former senior government officials with intentional killing and negligence that led to the deaths of dozens of people. He also charged several top security officials in the case.

None of them have been detained and two of those charged were re-elected to parliament in May.

An initial investigation by Human Rights Watch points to the potential involvement of foreign-owned companies, as well as senior political and security officials in Lebanon.

“It is now, more than ever, clear that the domestic investigation cannot deliver justice,” the groups said adding that the establishment of an international fact finding mission mandated by the U.N. Human Rights Council is “all the more urgent.”

The group said that previous calls by survivors of the explosion and families of the victims remain unanswered.

“As the Lebanese authorities continue to brazenly obstruct and delay the domestic investigation into the port explosion, an international investigation is the only way forward to ensure that justice is delivered,” said Diana Semaan, acting deputy director at Amnesty International.


On Beirut blast anniversary, Christian patriarch condemns govt



Thu, August 4, 2022

(Reuters) -Lebanon's top Christian cleric on Thursday denounced his country's government for failing to bring to justice those responsible for the Beirut port blast, marking the huge explosion's second anniversary with demands for accountability.

Bechara Boutros al-Rai, in a mass commemorating its victims, said that "God condemns those officials" who were stalling investigations that the government "has no right" to block.

The blast at the port, which killed at least 220 people and was recorded as one of the largest non-nuclear explosions in history, was caused by massive stores of ammonium nitrate kept at the site since 2013.

Two years on, no senior official has been held to account.

A domestic probe into the exact causes of the explosion - and who was responsible for or negligent regarding the ammonium nitrate's presence - has been stalled for more than six months.

There is still no unified official death toll. Two security sources told Reuters that their counts were at least 220 dead, with at least 20 more people unaccounted for, mostly Syrian nationals.

(Reporting by Maya Gebeily; Editing by Frank Jack Daniel and John Stonestreet)

Truth about Beirut port blast cannot be hidden, pope says


Pope Francis holds weekly general audience at the Vatican


Wed, August 3, 2022 

VATICAN CITY (Reuters) - Pope Francis said on Wednesday he hoped the people of Lebanon can be comforted by justice over the Beirut port blast that killed at least 215 people two years ago, saying "the truth can never be hidden".

Speaking at his weekly general audience, Francis noted that Thursday would be the second anniversary of the blast, which also wounded thousands of people and damaged large swathes of the capital.

"My thoughts go to the families of the victims of that disastrous event and to the dear Lebanese people. I pray so that each one can be consoled by faith and comforted by justice and by truth, which can never be hidden," he said.

Despite the devastation wrought by the blast, one of the biggest non-nuclear explosions ever recorded, a judicial investigation has brought no senior official to account.


With the probe frozen for months, many Lebanese see this as an example of the impunity enjoyed by a ruling elite that has long avoided accountability for corruption and bad governance, including policies that led to financial collapse.

Francis said he hoped that Lebanon, helped by the international community, could see a "renaissance" and be a land of peace and pluralism where members of different religions can live together in fraternity.

The pope was to have visited Lebanon in June but the trip was postponed, partly because of his health and partly because of the political situation in Lebanon.

(Reporting by Philip Pullella; Editing by Nick Macfie)

Why the Texas grid causes the High Plains to turn off its wind turbines


Jayme Lozano
Wed, August 3, 2022 

The Abilene Reporter-News

LUBBOCK — The state’s High Plains region, which covers 41 counties in the Texas Panhandle and West Texas, is home to more than 11,000 wind turbines — the most in any area of the state.

The region could generate enough wind energy to power at least 9 million homes. Experts say the additional energy could help provide much-needed stability to the electric grid during high energy-demand summers like this one, and even lower the power bills of Texans in other parts of the state.

But a significant portion of the electricity produced in the High Plains stays there for a simple reason: It can’t be moved elsewhere. Despite the growing development of wind energy production in Texas, the state’s transmission network would need significant infrastructure upgrades to ship out the energy produced in the region.

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“We’re at a moment when wind is at its peak production profile, but we see a lot of wind energy being curtailed or congested and not able to flow through to some of the higher-population areas,” said John Hensley, vice president for research and analytics at the American Clean Power Association. “Which is a loss for ratepayers and a loss for those energy consumers that now have to either face conserving energy or paying more for the energy they do use because they don’t have access to that lower-cost wind resource.”

And when the rest of the state is asked to conserve energy to help stabilize the grid, the High Plains has to turn off turbines to limit wind production it doesn’t need.

“Because there’s not enough transmission to move it where it’s needed, ERCOT has to throttle back the [wind] generators,” energy lawyer Michael Jewell said. “They actually tell the wind generators to stop generating electricity. It gets to the point where [wind farm operators] literally have to disengage the generators entirely and stop them from doing anything.”

Texans have already had a few energy scares this year amid scorching temperatures and high energy demand to keep homes cool. The Electric Reliability Council of Texas, which operates the state’s electrical grid, warned about drops in energy production twice last month and asked people across the state to lower their consumption to avoid an electricity emergency.

The energy supply issues have hit Texans’ wallets as well. Nearly half of Texas’ electricity is generated at power plants that run on the state’s most dominant energy source, natural gas, and its price has increased more than 200% since late February, causing elevated home utility bills.

Meanwhile, wind farms across the state account for nearly 21% of the state’s power generation. Combined with wind production near the Gulf of Mexico, Texas produced more than one-fourth of the nation’s wind-powered electric generation last year.

Wind energy is one of the lowest-priced energy sources because it is sold at fixed prices, turbines do not need fuel to run and the federal government provides subsidies. Texans who get their energy from wind farms in the High Plains region usually pay less for electricity than people in other areas of the state. But with the price of natural gas increasing from inflation, Jewell said areas where wind energy is not accessible have to depend on electricity that costs more.

“Other generation resources are more expensive than what [customers] would have gotten from the wind generators if they could move it,” Jewell said. “That is the definition of transmission congestion. Because you can’t move the cheaper electricity through the grid.”

A 2021 ERCOT report shows there have been increases in stability constraints for wind energy in recent years in both West and South Texas that have limited the long-distance transfer of power.

“The transmission constraints are such that energy can’t make it to the load centers. [High Plains wind power] might be able to make it to Lubbock, but it may not be able to make it to Dallas, Fort Worth, Houston or Austin,” Jewell said. “This is not an insignificant problem — it is costing Texans a lot of money.”

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Some wind farms in the High Plains foresaw there would be a need for transmission. The Trent Wind Farm was one of the first in the region. Beginning operations in 2001, the wind farm is between Abilene and Sweetwater in West Texas and has about 100 wind turbines, which can supply power to 35,000 homes. Energy company American Electric Power built the site near a power transmission network and built a short transmission line, so the power generated there does go into the ERCOT system.

But Jewell said high energy demand and costs this summer show there’s a need to build additional transmission lines to move more wind energy produced in the High Plains to other areas of the state.

Jewell said the Public Utility Commission, which oversees the grid, is conducting tests to determine the economic benefits of adding transmission lines from the High Plains to the more than 52,000 miles of lines that already connect to the grid across the state. As of now, however, there is no official proposal to build new lines.

“It does take a lot of time to figure it out — you’re talking about a transmission line that’s going to be in service for 40 or 50 years, and it’s going to cost hundreds of millions of dollars,” Jewell said. “You want to be sure that the savings outweigh the costs, so it is a longer process. But we need more transmission in order to be able to move more energy. This state is growing by leaps and bounds.”

A report by the American Society of Civil Engineers released after the February 2021 winter storm stated that Texas has substantial and growing reliability and resilience problems with its electric system.

The report concluded that “the failures that caused overwhelming human and economic suffering during February will increase in frequency and duration due to legacy market design shortcomings, growing infrastructure interdependence, economic and population growth drivers, and aging equipment even if the frequency and severity of weather events remains unchanged.”

The report also stated that while transmission upgrades across the state have generally been made in a timely manner, it’s been challenging to add infrastructure where there has been rapid growth, like in the High Plains.

Despite some Texas lawmakers’ vocal opposition against wind and other forms of renewable energy, the state has prime real estate for harnessing wind power because of its open plains, and farmers can put turbines on their land for financial relief.

This has led to a boom in wind farms, even with transmission issues. Since 2010, wind energy generation in Texas has increased by 15%. This month, the Biden administration announced the Gulf of Mexico’s first offshore wind farms will be developed off the coasts of Texas and Louisiana and will produce enough energy to power around 3 million homes.

“Texas really does sort of stand head and shoulders above all other states when it comes to the actual amount of wind, solar and battery storage projects that are on the system,” Hensley said.

One of the issues often brought up with wind and solar farms is that they may not be able to produce as much energy as the state needs all of the time. Earlier this month, when ERCOT asked consumers to conserve electricity, the agency listed low wind generation and cloud coverage in West Texas as factors contributing to a tight energy supply.

Hensley said this is where battery storage stations can help. According to the U.S. Energy Information Administration, utility-scale batteries tripled in capacity in 2021 and can now store up to 4.6 gigawatts of energy. Texas has been quickly developing storage projects. In 2011, Texas had only 5 megawatts of battery storage capacity; by 2020, that had ballooned to 323.1 megawatts.

“Storage is the real game-changer because it can really help to mediate and control a lot of the intermittency issues that a lot of folks worry about when they think about wind and solar technology,” Hensley said. “So being able to capture a lot of that solar that comes right around noon to [1 p.m.] and move it to those evening periods when demand is at its highest, or even move strong wind resources from overnight to the early morning or afternoon hours.”

Storage technology can help, but Hensley said transmission is still the big factor to consider.

Solar is another resource that could help stabilize the grid. According to the Solar Energy Industries Association, Texas has about 13,947 megawatts of solar installed and more than 161,000 installations. That’s enough to power more than 1.6 million homes.

This month, the PUC formed a task force to develop a pilot program next year that would create a pathway for solar panels and batteries on small-scale systems, like homes and businesses, to add that energy to the grid. The program would make solar and batteries more accessible and affordable for customers, and it would pay customers to share their stored energy to the grid as well.

Hensley said Texas has the most clean-energy projects in the works that will likely continue to put the region above the rest when it comes to wind generation.

“So they’re already ahead, and it looks like they’re going to be even farther ahead six months or a year down the road,” he said.

This article originally appeared on Abilene Reporter-News: Why the Texas grid causes the High Plains to turn off its wind turbines

Palestinians left in tense limbo by Israeli expulsion order

ZIONIST APARTHEID IS ETHNIC CLEANSING






nA boy plays by the family house, at the Palestinian hamlet of Khallat al-Dhaba, in the cluster of Bedouin communities in Masafer Yatta, West Bank, Monday, Aug. 1, 2022. Palestinians living in Masafer Yatta, in the occupied West Bank, fear they could be expelled at any time after Israel's Supreme Court ruled in favor of the military earlier this year in a two-decade legal battle.

 (AP Photo/Nasser Nasser)More

SAM McNEIL
Thu, August 4, 2022 

AL-FAKHEET, West Bank (AP) — After repeatedly rebuilding his home only to have it demolished by Israeli soldiers, Mohammed Abu Sabaha has a new plan to remain on the land — he is moving into a cave.

Abu Sabaha is among some 1,000 Palestinians at risk of expulsion from an arid region of the occupied West Bank that the Israeli military has designated as a live-fire training zone. Israel's Supreme Court upheld their expulsion in May after a two-decade legal battle.

Most residents of the area, known as Masafer Yatta, have remained in place since the ruling, even as Israeli security forces periodically roll in to demolish structures. But they could be forced out at any time, and rights groups fear Israel will do it gradually to evade international scrutiny.

The entrance to Abu Sabaha's cave is surrounded by the ruins of homes and animal pens that the soldiers demolished in earlier raids. The coo and cackle of chickens can be heard from inside a wrecked coop. A set of stone steps leads down into the cave, where he has strung up electrical lights, but it will take time to turn it into a home for his wife, parents and six children.


“We have suffered a lot because of this ruling. Especially the kids, who were born here,” he said, standing in the dimly lit cave. “They fled demolitions, then went back when we rebuilt, so many times.”

When the army isn't demolishing homes it is staging training exercises nearby. Tanks throw up dust clouds and heavy machine-gun fire and explosions echo across the desert hills. Abu Sabaha says his 3-year-old daughter Zeynab tenses up every time she sees them.

“She's always afraid they will come to destroy once again," he said.

The military declared this part of Masafer Yatta a firing and training zone in the early 1980s. Israeli authorities said the residents — Arab Bedouin who practice a traditional form of agriculture and animal herding — only used the area part of the year and had no permanent structures there at the time. In November 1999, security forces expelled some 700 villagers and destroyed homes and cisterns. The legal battle began the following year.

The families say they have been there for decades — from long before Israel captured the West Bank in the 1967 Mideast war — and have nowhere else to live. Some residents have traditionally resided in caves part of the year, as they graze sheep and goats in different areas.

Israel’s Supreme Court sided with the state in May, after the villagers rejected a compromise that would have allowed them to enter at certain times and practice agriculture for part of the year.

Since then, the army has demolished several structures and seized vehicles, setting up roadblocks and checkpoints to limit movement, according to Nidal Younes, head of the local council.

“All of this is within the framework of occupation, to frighten, to scare, to make people’s lives extremely difficult to force them to leave,” he said.

Masafer Yatta is in the 60% of the occupied West Bank known as Area C, where the Israeli military exercises full control under interim peace agreements reached with the Palestinians in the 1990s. Palestinian structures built without military permits — which residents say are nearly impossible to obtain — are at risk of demolition.

Area C is also home to several Jewish settlement outposts that are protected by the army despite being built without Israeli authorization. Nearly 500,000 settlers live in communities across the West Bank, most of which were planned and approved by the government. Many resemble small towns or suburbs, with apartment blocks, shopping malls and factories.

The Palestinians and the international community view the settlements as a major obstacle to resolving the century-old conflict because they absorb and divide up the land on which a future Palestinian state would be established alongside Israel.

Israel officially considers the West Bank disputed territory subject to negotiations, but every government since 1967 has expanded settlements, and the country's dominant right-wing parties are opposed to Palestinian statehood. One of the Supreme Court justices who issued the ruling on Masafer Yatta is a settler.

Eugene Kontorovich, a legal scholar at Israel's Kohelet Policy Forum, a right-wing think tank, said Israel could not allow “private squatters to determine the uses of state land" and was justified in barring people from entering a military firing range.

“The technical, legal justification is that it’s not their land," he added.

Rights groups say several other Palestinian communities across the West Bank could face similar threats of expulsion if the international community does not pressure Israel over Masafer Yatta. Israel has declared firing zones in 20% of the West Bank, affecting some 5,000 Palestinians from 38 communities, according to the U.N. Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs.

Dror Sadot, a spokeswoman for the Israeli rights group B'Tselem, said Israel would likely implement a “quiet transfer” in which it gradually makes life so difficult that families trickle out on their own.

The Association for Civil Rights in Israel, which has been waging a legal battle on behalf of the residents of Masafer Yatta for more than two decades, has filed another petition against the Supreme Court ruling.

Roni Pelli, an attorney with the group, said the “terrible ruling” goes against international law, which prohibits the transfer of civilians out of occupied territory.

“The legal consequence is that international humanitarian law is no longer relevant in the West Bank because the military commander can issue any order he wants,” she said.

“You don’t have to put people on trucks to force them from the land," she added. "I am really, really worried that it might become a humanitarian disaster.”

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Associated Press reporters Emily Rose in Jerusalem and Nasser Nasser in al-Fakheet, West Bank contributed to this report.

Kyrsten Sinema Is Demanding Democrats Keep A Tax Break For The Super-Wealthy

Kevin Robillard
Wed, August 3, 2022 

Sen. Kyrsten Sinema (D-Ariz.) wants Democrats to drop a provision tightening a tax loophole associated with hedge fund managers and private equity executives from their $740 billion package enacting President Joe Biden’s climate, health care and tax plans, according to reports from Politico and Axios.

Sinema’s apparent desire to nix the provision — which raises just 2% of the proposal’s total revenue and does not even fully close the loophole — does not immediately endanger Democrats’ hope of passing the legislation out of the Senate in the coming days. But it shows how the moderate first-term senator is willing to protect some of the country’s wealthiest Americans from even small tax hikes.

Sinema’s office would not directly confirm nor deny the reports, and said the senator is still reviewing the legislation and awaiting rulings from the Senate parliamentarian on its contents. Politico and Axios also reported Sinema wants additional funding for drought resiliency — a key priority for Arizona, where water supply remains a top issue.

The carried interest loophole is infamous. It allows hedge fund managers and venture capitalists to have their income taxed at the 15% capital gains rate instead of at much higher income tax rates, often saving them millions of dollars a year. Wall Street has worked ferociously to defend the loophole over the course of the past decade, ensuring its survival despite pledges from Presidents Barack Obama and Donald Trump to eliminate it.

Sen. Kyrsten Sinema (D-Ariz.) leaves her office to walk to the Senate Chambers in the U.S. Capitol Building on Aug. 2 in Washington, D.C. 

(Photo: Anna Moneymaker via Getty Images)

The loophole is now most closely associated with the private equity industry, where it applies to the 20% of a fund’s investment profits that its managers take in on top of a fixed fee. If Democrats close the loophole, managers will instead pay the top marginal income tax rate of 37%.

Democrats’ existing proposal, agreed to by Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.) and Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (N.Y.), would not eliminate the loophole. It would instead require managers to hold investments for five years instead of three years to get the more favorable rate, and create stricter requirements for those investments.

Manchin and Schumer’s proposal would raise just $14 billion over the next decade, while a plan from Sens. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) and Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.) to completely close it would’ve raised $70 billion.

Still, even the modest proposal appears important to Manchin.

“On the carried interest — for the wealthiest one-tenth of 1% of Americans to take advantage of a tax break for them, that they have no risk at all and they get to take the lowest tax rate?” Manchin told a local West Virginia radio host last week. “So we got rid of that.”

On Wednesday, Manchin said he wanted an explanation from Sinema.

“I just want someone to explain. I can’t understand it,” he told Fox News of her reported opposition. He did not suggest tightening the loophole was make-or-break: “I’m sure [Sinema] has a reason, and I want to hear more about it.”

Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), perhaps the Senate’s leading proponent of taxing the wealthy, has worked with Sinema to craft compromise proposals in the past.

“Americans understand that the tax code has been twisted and manipulated to protect the richest among us, and they’re sick of it,” she told HuffPost. “Narrowing the carried interest provision is something that makes the code just a little fairer. And we should hang on to it.”

The overall package gets most of its cash from stricter IRS enforcement, and from instituting a 15% corporate minimum tax, which aims to block large companies from zeroing out their tax bills with credits and deductions. It spends about $300 billion reducing the deficit, and $370 billion on clean energy and climate change projects. It also gives Medicare the power to negotiate lower prices for prescription drugs and funds subsidies for Obamacare.

On Tuesday, Sinema discussed the legislation with the Arizona Chamber of Commerce and the National Association of Manufacturers, two groups who oppose all of the tax hikes in the legislation.

Her business-friendly positioning has paid dividends for her campaign account: In 2021 alone, she received more than $144,000 in donations from industry groups that lobbied against closing the carried interest loophole. More recently, she took in $100,000 from Wall Street and $50,000 from pharmaceutical companies in the second quarter of 2022 alone.

“We can only assume that she’s been motivated by the money they’re donating to her campaigns,” one former Sinema staffer, speaking on condition of anonymity because they still work in Democratic politics, told HuffPost. “I knew she was always trying to be an atypical Democrat. She wants to be Arizona’s new maverick. I never thought she would just toe the party line. But throwing away campaign promises you made and snubbing your nose at the people who got you elected, that makes you the opposite of a maverick. It makes you a corporate shill.”

Igor Bobic contributed reporting.

MSNBC Host Succinctly Nails Problem With America's Most Outrageous Tax Loophole

Ed Mazza

Tue, August 2, 2022 

MSNBC’s Stephanie Ruhle said there’s one tax loophole that nearly everyone on both sides of the aisle says should be closed. Yet, they’ve done nothing about it for years.

That may soon change as the deal struck last week between Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.) and Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) could finally close what’s known as the carried interest loophole.

“Carried interest is a share of the profits that private equity or hedge fund managers take as compensation. It’s a performance fee,” Ruhle explained on MSNBC on Monday night. “And under existing law, this money earned by these executives ― a tiny group of the most highly compensated businesspeople on Earth ― they get taxed at a capital gains rate of just 20 percent.”

That is half the typical tax rate for other high-income earners.

“SO WHY DOES IT STILL EXIST?” she tweeted:

Watch her fuller explanation of the loophole ― and the one Democratic senator who might block closing it ― below. The clip also includes a conversation with former Labor Secretary Robert Reich:

A race to save fish as Rio Grande dries, even in Albuquerque

Wed, August 3, 2022 


ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. (AP) — On a recent, scorching afternoon in Albuquerque, off-road vehicles cruised up and down a stretch of dry riverbed where normally the Rio Grande River flows. The drivers weren't thrill-seekers, but biologists hoping to save as many endangered fish as they could before the sun turned shrinking pools of water into dust.

For the first time in four decades, America's fifth-longest river went dry in Albuquerque last week. Habitat for the endangered Rio Grande silvery minnow — a shimmery, pinky-sized native fish — went with it. Although summer storms have made the river wet again, experts warn the drying this far north is a sign of an increasingly fragile water supply, and that current conservation measures may not be enough to save the minnow and still provide water to nearby farms, backyards and parks.

The minnow inhabits only about 7% of its historic range and has withstood a century of habitat loss as the nearly 1,900 mile-long (3,058-kilometer) river was dammed, diverted and channeled from Colorado to New Mexico, Texas and northern Mexico. In 1994, the U.S. government listed it as endangered. Scientists, water managers and environmental groups have worked to keep the fish alive for three decades — as required by the Endangered Species Act — but the efforts haven't kept pace with demand for water and climate change.

Years of drought, scorching temperatures and an unpredictable monsoon season are zapping what's left of its habitat, leaving officials with little recourse but to hope for rain.

“They're adapted for a lot of conditions but not to figure this out,” said Thomas Archdeacon, a U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service biologist in charge of a program to rescue the fish. “When you have flow one day and no flow the next for miles, they don’t know how to get out of that.”

When parts of the river dry out, officials use hand nets and seines to pull fish from warm puddles and relocate them to still-flowing sections of the river. The minnow's survival rate after being rescued is slim — just over 5% — due to the stress of warm, stagnant water and being forcibly relocated.

Still, leaving the fish in the pools is a certain death sentence, said Archdeacon. He and the other biologists drove over miles of dried riverbed to where the water picked up again — at the outflow of a sewage treatment plant. Only a handful of the 400 rescued fish would survive, with their best chance swimming through treated sewage.

Over the years, the government has bred and released large numbers of silvery minnows, but for the species to recover, it always comes down to habitat, officials say.

And few options remain to get significantly more water into the river.

“Climate change is coming at us so fast right now that it’s outstripping those tools that we developed over the last few decades,” said John Fleck, a water policy researcher at the University of New Mexico.

Historically, one way to send more water into the river has been to release it from upstream reservoirs. But this year, New Mexico has been unable to store extra water because of a downstream debt it owes Texas as part of a compact. Deep into the driest period the West has seen in 1,200 years, the river wasn't replenished by rainstorms that came in June.

“The timing and the placement of the storms weren't in the right place to keep the river flowing,” said Dave Dubois, New Mexico's state climatologist.

To keep more water in the Rio Grande, the state and irrigation districts are offering to pay farmers to leave fields unplanted, but so far, few have opted in. In New Mexico, small-scale farming is the norm and many farmers water their fields with centuries-old earthen canals that run through their backyards, maintaining the land for cultural reasons, too.

By fallowing their fields, farmers would help save water for the minnow and alleviate the debt to Texas. But officials say that in one key district on the river, only 5% of land was left fallow this year.

“We need more people to do it,” said Jason Casuga, chief engineer for the Middle Rio Grande Conservancy District. But the program is just in its second year, and farmers want to grow crops, Casuga said.

For the past four years, Ron Moya has farmed about 50 acres (20 hectares) of hay and produce near Albuquerque. A retired engineer, Moya said he answered a calling to work the same land that generations of his family had cultivated before him. Last year, Moya left 10 acres (4 hectares) of his plot unplanted in exchange for several thousand dollars, but said he wouldn’t do it this year — even though he was offered more money — because he wanted the moisture to keep the soil on his farm alive. Moya is skeptical that fallowing alone will achieve much.

“There’s people whose livelihood depends on growing their hay. That’s what they know. Can you imagine the whole valley being fallowed? That just seems silly,” he said.

Nor is there much water to squeeze out of New Mexico's biggest city, Albuquerque. Like other Western metropoles, the city of roughly 563,000 has dramatically cut its per-capita water use, from about 250 gallons (946 liters) per day in 1994 to to 119 gallons (450 liters) in 2019, according to data provided by the city's water utility. Albuquerque also uses groundwater and water from the Colorado River.

According to Mike Hamman, New Mexico's state water engineer, “the low hanging fruit has already been picked in Albuquerque, so now it gets a little harder."

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The Associated Press receives support from the Walton Family Foundation for coverage of water and environmental policy. The AP is solely responsible for all content. For all of AP’s environmental coverage, visit https://apnews.com/hub/climate-and-environment

Brittany Peterson And Suman Naishadham, The Associated Press