Pregnant hammerhead shark washes up on Alabama beach

Great hammerhead shark was carrying 40 pups

By Andrea Vacchiano | Fox News


A deceased pregnant great hammerhead shark washed up on an Alabama beach on Thursday, officials say.

Beachgoers spotted the shark near the shore in Orange Beach. They pulled the 14-foot animal ashore before the city's coastal resources employees arrived.

Though it was a sad sight, city officials were enthused about the opportunity to examine a shark that was so well-preserved.

"While it was very sad that it passed, we were excited about the rare opportunity of seeing a Great hammerhead in such good condition," the City of Orange Beach Coastal Resources' Facebook post read. "We immediately started contacting various agencies to see who had availability to come gather data from this unique specimen."




Beachgoers spotted the shark near the shore in Orange Beach, Alabama. Researchers found that she was pregnant. (City of Orange Beach Coastal Resources via Facebook)

Photos show that workers needed to hoist the shark onto a truck to transport her. Employees contacted a Mississippi State University professor about performing an autopsy on the deceased animal.

A research team was promptly sent to study the dead shark.

SHARK ACTIVITY NEAR EAST COAST BEACHES ON THE RISE

Photos show that workers needed to hoist the shark onto a truck to transport the deceased shark. (City of Orange Beach Coastal Resources via Facebook)

During the necropsy, researchers found 40 shark pups in the mother's body.

"While it is sad, it is very rare to find a large pregnant female, and the data collected will be tremendously helpful in learning about Great hammerhead fecundity," the Facebook post added.



The city contacted a Mississippi State University professor to perform a necropsy on the deceased animal. (City of Orange Beach Coastal Resources via Facebook)

"We are very thankful that our staff was able to get the shark off of the beach, protected from the elements, and iced down within a few short hours of the initial call," the post added. "This was definitely an experience that we won't forget, and we are grateful to have played a small role in this unique case."

MUTUAL AID

‘Such a Florida thing’: Tampa turtle seen hitching ride with alligator ‘like it’s a horse’

When a travel blogger in Tampa, Florida, came across the rare sight of a turtle hitching a ride on top of an alligator, he had to take a photo!

By FOX 35 News Staff

Source FOX 35 Orlando

Hurricanes threaten sea turtle population

Ranger Rob Howell explains the old and new hazards sea turtles face during hatching season.

TAMPA, Fla. – Turtles and alligators are normally not friends. In fact, officials with the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission say alligators eat turtles and other prey that is abundant and easily accessible.

So, when a travel blogger in Tampa, Florida, came across the rare sight of a turtle hitching a ride on top of an alligator, he had to take a photo!

"I was laughing because it just seemed like such a Florida thing," he told FOX 35 News in a statement.

when a travel blogger in Tampa, Florida, came across the rare sight of a turtle hitching a ride on top of an alligator, he had to take a photo!

(Traveling with Jef)

He posted the incredible photo on his Traveling with Jef Facebook page with the caption, "You know you're in #florida when you see a turtle riding a gator around a pond like it's a horse."

One Facebook user jokingly called the turtle a hitchhiker in the comment section of the post, while others commented, "A ride is. A Ride" and "Ooohhhhh FL."

The turtle eventually hopped off the likely 10-foot gator onto a log, Jef told FOX 35 News.

World Zionist Congress roiled by left- and right-wing protests, in sign of Independence Day tensions

A rally at the Supreme Court was a harbinger of a season of Diaspora Jewish participation in the massive Israeli protests against the reforms

World Zionist Organization Vice Chairman Yizhar Hess speaks to protestors assembled outside the room where right-wing Knesset member Simcha Rothman was holding a meeting, April 21, 2023. (Courtesy)

By Ron Kampeas

April 22, 2023

(JTA) — Tensions over Israel’s future have roiled a convening of the World Zionist Congress in Jerusalem, in a harbinger of a season of Diaspora Jewish participation in Israel’s fierce political fights.

First, left-wing and centrist delegates to the group, which determines policy for an arm of the Jewish Agency for Israel, rallied in front of Israel’s Supreme Court on Thursday to protest Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s sweeping proposal to weaken the judiciary. Then, delegates from right-wing groups sought to block voting on resolutions critical of the Israeli government, in a gambit that generated tense scenes from within a body whose deliberations rarely attract public attention.

The tensions spilled over into Friday when the right-wing Knesset member who leads the committee focusing on the judiciary legislation, Simcha Rothman, was briefly cornered by protesters before being whisked away by police.

The incidents offered a sign of how the coming days and weeks might play out in Israel, as thousands of Diaspora Jews make their way to the country for events tied to Israel’s 75th birthday. The birthday comes soon before the days during which Israel’s right-wing government is expected to resume the judiciary legislation, which both proponents and critics say has the potential to change Israel forever. Protests are expected to be fierce.

The World Zionist Congress is the periodic assembly that determines policy for the World Zionist Organization, the arm of the Jewish Agency that aims to act as a bridge to the Diaspora. Among its functions is providing materials for Jewish schools across the globe and influencing the priorities of large, international Jewish organizations with substantial budgets. It also votes on symbolic resolutions about Israel’s character and future.

About 100 delegates in the World Zionist Congress took part in what participants said was a spontaneous march opposing the judiciary legislation on Thursday. They wore T-shirts provided by UnXeptable, a protest movement organized by Israeli expatriates.

“We are out here today because the current efforts of the Israeli government to undermine democracy and promote division threatens to tear us apart and not only cause divisions within Israel; it attacks the Diaspora as well,” said John Furstenberg, the vice president for Australasia for Mercaz, the Zionist arm of the Conservative/Masorti movement, who was a one of a number of speakers at the rally outside the Supreme Court. “We cannot stand idly by and say nothing whilst we see our enemies worldwide taking joy from our distress.”

Delegates to the World Zionist Congress protest against the Netanyahu government’s proposed changes to the courts, at the Supreme Court in Jerusalem, April 20, 2023.

 (Josh Drill) Image by

Sheila Katz, the CEO of the National Council of Jewish Women, said delegates from 10 countries participated in the rally. She said she expected more in the coming days, particularly around the General Assembly being held by the Jewish Federations of North America, which is already being assailed by critics of the government for featuring Netanyahu and which is expected to draw 3,000 attendees. Katz is scheduled to be a featured speaker at a massive demonstration planned for Saturday night, which will mark 17 weeks of anti-government protests that have drawn hundreds of thousands of participants.

“All of us who are here believe in the original Zionist vision for this country, and we feel like the current government is losing its way,” Katz said. “And so how do you counter that? You counter it by sharing what the vision really is.”

A second confrontation took place during the congress itself, when a bloc of centrist and left-leaning groups advanced a number of resolutions that would have enshrined the Israeli Declaration of Independence as policy, protected LGBTQ rights and backed those who oppose Netanyahu’s court reforms.

Anticipating that the symbolic resolutions would pass, right-wing groups at the Congress successfully used parliamentary maneuvers to delay voting, though they did not succeed in pressing for individual votes that would have taken many hours and forced delegates to reveal their positions. The votes will now take place online, preventing a repeat of the shouting matches that took place on Thursday, and are expected to result in criticism of Israel’s government.

“This is a victory for the center-left-liberal bloc that will result in the passage of resolutions against the government’s policy, without concessions,” WZO Vice Chairman Yizhar Hess said in a statement about the decision to hold the votes online. “The right tried from the very beginning to prevent there being votes at this Congress. They failed at the beginning. They failed again today.”

This article originally appeared on JTA.org.

‘A Series Of Unfortunate Events’ author to write horror film based on the Golem of Prague

The upcoming film will be an adaptation of the golem of Prague, where a young woman is terrorized by ‘a creature with a mysterious past’
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Daniel Handler, author of the popular children’s book series “A Series of Unfortunate Events” will write the film for a modern retelling of the story of the Golem of Prague. (Getty)

By Jackie Hajdenberg

April 22, 2023

(JTA) — The Jewish author of best-selling children’s book series “A Series of Unfortunate Events” has been tapped to write a horror film based on the legend of the Golem of Prague.

Daniel Handler, known by his pen name “Lemony Snicket,” will write the movie for independent Jewish production company Leviathan Productions, from veteran film producer Ben Cosgrove and Josh Foer, a freelance journalist, the co-founder of the adventure travel brand Atlas Obscura and co-founder of Sefaria, the open-source Jewish text library.

The film will update the 16th century narrative of the golem of Prague, where Rabbi Judah Loew ben Bezalel created an anthropomorphic golem out of clay or mud to protect the ghetto from antisemitic attacks.

In the upcoming film, “a young woman on a college campus finds herself terrorized by a creature with a mysterious past,” Deadline reports.

In the classic golem legend, the Hebrew word for “truth,” “emet” is inscribed on the golem’s body, giving it its powers. Once the golem becomes destructive, the only way to kill it is to remove the letter “aleph,” which leaves the remaining word for “death,” or in Hebrew, “met”.

Handler grew up in a household that “hovered between Reform and Conservative Judaism,” he told Moment Magazine in 2007. And, the main characters of his beloved gothically dark and humorous “Series of Unfortunate Events,” which was adapted into a 2004 film and a 2017 Netflix series, are Jewish.

“Yes. The Baudelaires are Jewish! I guess we would not know for sure but we would strongly suspect it, not only from their manner but from the occasional mention of a rabbi or bar mitzvah or synagogue,” he said. “The careful reader will find quite a few rabbis.”

Handler is also the author of a children’s book, “The Latke Who Couldn’t Stop Screaming,” about an angry latke telling the Hanukkah story while running into various Christmas symbols who are uneducated about Jewish history.

Leviathan Productions has acquired a number of other projects with Jewish themes, including “Photograph 51,” a play by Anna Ziegler about Rosalind Franklin, the British Jewish chemist who discovered the structure of DNA; “The Secret Chord,” a novel by Geraldine Brooks about King David; and “The Pledge,” a 1970 nonfiction book by Leonard Slater about the U.S.’s role in Israel’s 1948 war for independence.

“Jewish stories have incredible resonance because they explore ideas that are universally identifiable,” Cosgrove told Deadline. “Everyone knows what it feels like to be the underdog, the outsider, or the immigrant. Jewish stories tackle these ideas with humor and drama, and people around the world see themselves in our stories.”

This article originally appeared on JTA.org

LA REVUE GAUCHE - Left Comment: Search results for GOLEM 

Vetoing the ESG ban is the most capitalist thing Joe Biden has done as president

Ian Reifowitz 

for Community Contributors Team
Community

DAILY KOS
Monday April 17, 2023 

Republicans love to talk about their devotion to the principles of free-market capitalism. Notice I said talk. But when it comes to action—as exemplified recently by their unprincipled attempts to ban environmental, social, and governance (ESG) investing—they reveal that their true devotion is to the interests of their friends (i.e., major donors). That makes them crony capitalists.

By vetoing that Republican-led attempt, President Joe Biden demonstrated that he's actually the one devoted to coherent principles of ethical capitalism—namely the idea that companies should be free to set their own direction, at least as long as they don't harm or exploit people in doing so. Who'd have thought that Biden would be the better capitalist—in every sense of those words—as opposed to the Party of Trump?

RELATED STORY: Biden bucks Republicans with his first veto

ESG investing may sound exotic, but it’s really just common sense, long-term thinking. The concept emerged around 2004, became widespread after the 2008 financial crisis, and grew even more in response to the 2020 murder of George Floyd and the ongoing Movement for Black Lives.

It’s an investing strategy that specifically accounts for how much a company’s practices counter climate change, how it treats its employees, its efforts toward improving diversity, equity, and inclusion within the organization as well as society, and the soundness of its own internal governance structures. “At its core, ESG investing is about influencing positive changes in society by being a better investor,” as Hank Smith, who runs investment strategy for the Haverford Trust Company, told Forbes.

ESG investing differs in an important way from Socially Responsible Investing (SRI), although they sound similar. As Forbes explained: “Whereas ESG investing takes into account how a company’s practices and policies impact profitability and future returns, SRI is more tightly focused on whether an investment is more precisely in line with an individual investor’s values. ESG factors in corporate performance while SRI solely focuses on the investor’s values.” In other words, ESG weighs investment performance in a way SRI does not.

Independent ESG rating agencies (reputable ones include S&P Dow Jones Indices, JUST Capital, Refinitiv, MSCI, and Bloomberg, among others) assess companies’ success in this area. Their work allows people to invest their money in ways that align with their views on these issues while still making comparable returns. Investors who prioritize ESG goals are looking for companies that consider the interest of multiple stakeholders—including workers, customers, the communities where they are located, and the environment—in addition to solely focusing on quarterly profits.

Crunching the numbers shows that ESG investing has been overall a pretty smart move, or at least one that doesn’t hurt investment returns, although there is certainly some debate on this. The chart below, from one analysis, shows that investing in companies with positive ESG ratings produced better gains than an otherwise similar investment that didn’t account for ESG criteria (to clarify, if the result below had been zero, that would mean there was no difference in gains, and any positive number reflects the higher percentage—meaning more money for investors—that the ESG portfolio gained vs. the comparable non-ESG portfolio). The difference was stronger for companies based in Europe and Asia than in North America, but nonetheless was positive in all the largest investing regions, as well as globally.




It certainly makes sense that, in the long run, companies that make sure to recruit and retain talent from diverse backgrounds and enhance the sustainability of our planet are going to do better than those that don’t. The aforementioned Mr. Smith noted “there’s a misconception out there that you need to be willing to give up returns in order to invest responsibly but a growing body of research shows that ESG actually helps mitigate risk.”

Larry Fink is the CEO of BlackRock, the biggest manager of investments in the world, and he believes strongly in the value of ESG investing. In his 2022 letter to CEOs of companies in which BlackRock invests, he wrote that this approach to investing “is not about politics. It is not a social or ideological agenda. It is not ‘woke.’ It is capitalism, driven by mutually beneficial relationships between you and the employees, customers, suppliers, and communities your company relies on to prosper. This is the power of capitalism.”

In case you were wondering, ESG investing is anything but niche. One analysis from 2020 found that $35.5 trillion (with a “t”) are invested according to ESG standards, while other sources have put the figure at $8.4 trillion or $18 trillion, so it likely depends on how the term is defined. But whatever the definition, we’re talking about some serious coin, indicating that there’s a real market out there among investors—especially among younger investors who might feel more able to risk taking losses in the short-term (because they are confident that running a company along ESG principles pays off for investors in the long run) than older generations who would have less time before retirement to recover any short-term loss.




There’s that word again: market. Republicans are supposed to worship at the altar of market forces. The last thing the Party of The Man Who Lost An Election And Tried To Steal It—going back to Reagan or even Goldwater—should want is the big, bad government telling people how to invest their money. However, by attacking ESG investing, they are revealing their true status as nothing but a bunch of hypocrites when it comes to free market principles. This op-ed from Democratic Sens. Whitehouse, Schatz, and Heinrich beautifully summed up what’s going on:


There is a cohort of elected officials in the United States presently engaged in an anti-capitalist crusade against free-market principles. No, they are not socialists. They are congressional Republicans, and they are attempting to prevent financial institutions from allocating capital in accordance with investor preferences and risk management principles. This attempted crackdown is purely ideological in nature — it is an exercise in political pressure to force a gross government overreach into U.S. capital markets.

This campaign, which should offend anyone with even a modicum of pro-market sensibilities, is being championed from within the Republican Party. Republican state lawmakers and members of Congress are attempting to stifle the growth of sustainable investing and to punish corporate efforts at climate-related financial risk management.

The underlying problem is that the fossil fuel industry is running up against a “risk wall,” where long-established economic risks associated with climate change are now sufficiently clear and present to trigger ordinary risk-reporting requirements in financial markets. Rather than reduce their emissions, or face up to the risks that they cause, the fossil fuel industry is trying to break and remake traditional risk reporting to selectively remove reporting of climate-related risks.

Although we’ve been talking about ESG broadly, and Republicans from Mike Pence to Ron DeSantis and more have bleated on about social issues (DeSantis mentioned “Second Amendment Rights” specifically as one social issue motivating his anti-ESG stance) and so-called “woke capitalism,” the part that most offends the GQP is the E—namely environmental sustainability. Because when the fossil fuel industry tells its toadies in the Republican Party (not to mention a couple of Democrats as well) to jump, they don’t even bother asking how high.

RELATED STORY: Toxic train wrecks. Bank failures. Pandemics. Thanks, GOP!

At the federal level, the ridiculousness began, unsurprisingly, with a galactically stupid move during the administration of President Porn Star Hush Money. His Department of Labor, led by none other than Eugene Scalia (yes, that Scalia), essentially sought to stop ESG investing altogether.

In the twice-impeached-now-indicted former guy’s final months in office, Scalia and his minions put out a new rule relating to the Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974 (ERISA) that would have imposed significant barriers on firms looking to create ESG investment vehicles. Time ran out, thankfully, before the rule could go into effect.

President Biden withdrew the Trump/Scalia proposal, which it condemned because it “unnecessarily restrained plan fiduciaries’ ability to weigh environmental, social and governance factors when choosing investments, even when those factors would benefit plan participants financially.” Last November, Biden’s Department of Labor issued a new rule which states directly that ESG investing is, in fact, permitted by the ERISA law, as long as such investment decisions reflect the financial interests of investors.

To be clear, as Daily Kos’s Joan McCarter emphasized, no one is “mandating” that firms invest this way. To paraphrase a classic pro-choice line: if you don’t like ESG investing, don’t do it. Biden just wants to make sure that investors, many of whom are people putting their money away in retirement plans, have the freedom to invest in companies that share their values and make money doing so.

Remember also that what Biden did changed absolutely nothing about investing—he merely maintained the status quo at which Fuck a l’Orange had aimed a monkey wrench. Majority Leader Sen. Chuck Schumer pointed out that 92% of S&P 500 companies have been putting out ESG reports on themselves. Praising Biden’s new rule, Schumer declared that it would “allow the free market to do its work.”

Happy ending, right? For now, yes, but not one without a couple of bumps in the road. Once Barely Speaker Kevin McCarthy got his grubby hands on the gavel over in the House of Representatives in January, his party voted (along with one Democrat, Maine’s Jared Golden) to employ the Congressional Review Act of 1996 to revoke the Biden ESG rule. This law allows new regulatory rules to be overturned by a simple majority vote in both houses of Congress (which means no filibuster is possible), subject to a presidential signature. In the Senate, Democratic Sens. Manchin and Tester—both up for reelection next year in fossil-fuel-dependent red states—voted with the Republicans, and the bill passed 50-46. Thankfully, however, the Democrat in the White House had something to say on the matter.

We do need to keep an eye on the course of events going forward. In a move that should shock no one, Republican state attorneys general filed a lawsuit in federal court seeking to block implementation of Biden’s ESG rule. Equally shockingly, they engaged in their usual judge shopping, ensuring that the case would be heard in Texas, in the court of Judge Matthew Kacsmaryk—you know, the mifepristone guy.

Meanwhile, in various states across our country (including, most recently, New Hampshire, where the supposedly moderate Republican governor looks like he’ll be making a White House bid), the GQP is engaged in even more aggressive anti-ESG efforts. The most egregious case is that selfsame Texas—where I guess they do everything bigger. That state passed a law in 2021 that “bars local authorities from doing business with banks that have adopted ESG policies and divested from Texas fossil fuel-based energy companies.” Texas is essentially boycotting such banks. The fear is that the mere existence of an ESG option hurts the state’s oil and gas interests—which are clearly much more important than economic liberty and capitalist principles.

It’s worth noting that a study from the Wharton School of Business projected that the state’s anti-ESG boycott would cost its coffers more than half a billion dollars over just eight months. Other research found similar results, leading to at least a few states to back off, at least for now, on following Texas’s lead here.

Former Texas House member Jason Isaac—no word on whether he was actually wearing a ten-gallon hat when he said this—uttered the quiet part out loud. Isaac now works for the Texas Public Policy Foundation (TPPF), a right-wing outfit that proclaims its mission is to “promote and defend liberty, personal responsibility, and free enterprise.” But apparently that’s only true when the fossil fuel industry that provides a big chunk of its funding says it’s okay.

Isaac made clear the limitations of TPPF’s commitment to free enterprise when it comes to ESG, telling Marketplace that it “discourages investments in the oil and gas industry—the state’s lifeblood.” He also characterized the banks in question as “the enemy,” and argued that Texas government authorities should avoid sending funds to them.

Republicans profess that the government shouldn’t pick winners and losers—that’s not what capitalism is about, according to them—but here they seem to think it’s okay to pick friends and enemies.

Biden and the Democratic Party are the ones more committed to the supposedly Republican value of economic freedom as well as protecting the choices and interests of investors—not to mention the environment. On the other hand, as Sens. Whitehouse, Schatz, and Heinrich so aptly put it, the Republicans are “attempting to bully financial institutions and regulators into ignoring market demand and market risk.” They are “anti-capitalist.”

If anything, that’s too kind. What they are, in fact, are the tools of the same Texas Oil Men they have been going back to Dubya Bush and beyond. Fossils indeed.

RELATED STORY: If corporations always did the right thing, we wouldn't need regulation: Airlines and banks edition


Ian Reifowitz is the author of The Tribalization of Politics: How Rush Limbaugh's Race-Baiting Rhetoric on the Obama Presidency Paved the Way for Trump (Foreword by Markos Moulitsas)

World military spending reaches all-time high of $2.24 trillion

Surge in spending reflects Russia-Ukraine war and ‘increasingly insecure world’, according to leading think tank.

The full-scale invasion of Ukraine has helped drive the surge in defence spending [Libkos/AP Photo]

Published On 24 Apr 2023

World military spending reached an all-time high of $2.24 trillion in 2022, as Russia’s invasion of Ukraine fuelled a sharp jump in military spending across Europe, according to a leading defence think tank.

Global spending rose for the eighth consecutive year, the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI) said on Monday in its annual report on global military expenditure.

There was a 13 percent rise in Europe, the steepest in at least 30 years.

SIPRI said most of that was linked to Russia and Ukraine, but other countries also stepped up military spending in response to perceived Russian threats.

“The continuous rise in global military expenditure in recent years is a sign that we are living in an increasingly insecure world,” Nan Tian, senior researcher with SIPRI’s Military Expenditure and Arms Production Programme. “States are bolstering military strength in response to a deteriorating security environment, which they do not foresee improving in the near future.”

Moscow invaded and seized Ukraine’s Crimean peninsula in 2014, and backed separatist rebels in the country’s east before it began its full-scale invasion in February 2022.

The moves have spread alarm among other countries that neighbour Russia or were once part of the Soviet Union’s sphere of influence, with Finland’s spending up 36 percent and Lithuania’s military spending up by 27 percent, according to SIPRI.

In April, Finland, whose border with Russia stretches some 1,340km (833 miles), became the 31st member of NATO. Sweden, which has avoided military alliances for more than 200 years, also wants to join.

“While the full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022 certainly affected military spending decisions in 2022, concerns about Russian aggression have been building for much longer,” said Lorenzo Scarazzato, researcher with SIPRI’s Military Expenditure and Arms Production Programme. “Many former Eastern bloc states have more than doubled their military spending since 2014, the year when Russia annexed Crimea.”

The think tank said military spending in Ukraine surged more than six times to $44bn in 2022, the highest single-year increase in a country’s military expenditure ever recorded in SIPRI data.

As a percentage of gross domestic product (GDP), military spending surged to 34 percent in 2022, compared with 3.2 percent the year before.

Russian military spending grew by an estimated 9.2 per cent in 2022, to about $86.4bn, according to SIPRI. That was equivalent to 4.1 per cent of Russia’s 2022 GDP, up from 3.7 percent in 2021.

The United States remained the world’s largest military spender — up 0.7 percent to $877bn in 2022 — which was 39 percent of total global military spending. The increase was largely driven by “the unprecedented level of financial military aid it provided to Ukraine,” SIPRI’s Nan Tian said.

US financial military aid to Ukraine totalled $19.9bn in 2022, according to the think tank.

China remained the world’s second-largest military spender, allocating an estimated $292bn in 2022. This was 4.2 percent more than in 2021 and represents the 28th consecutive annual increase.

Meanwhile, Japan spent $46bn on the military in 2022, a rise of 5.9 percent from the previous year. SIPRI said it was the highest level of Japanese military spending since 1960.

Japan and China led military spending in Asia and Oceania, which amounted to $575bn. SIPRI said military expenditure in the region had been rising since at least 1989.

Tensions in East Asia have risen over the self-ruled island of Taiwan, which Beijing considers part of its territory. China also lays claim to almost all of the South China Sea, a major maritime trading route, parts of which are also claimed by countries including the Philippines, Vietnam and Malaysia.

Japan and China are also embroiled in a dispute over the Senkaku or Diaoyu Islands, which lie northeast of Taiwan.

Tokyo also has a long-running dispute with Moscow over the Northern Territories, which lie northeast of Hokkaido and were seized by the Soviet Union at the end of World War II. Russia calls them the Kuril Islands.

SOURCE: AL JAZEERA

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Texas Activist: It's Clear That Elon Musk Moved Into Our Border Community "To Colonize The Region

Posted By Ian Schwartz
On Date April 23, 2023

DEMOCRACY NOW! REPORTS: We get an update from South Texas, where Elon Musk’s SpaceX rocket blew up four minutes after launch Friday and residents reported particulates or ash rained down on their neighborhoods near the Lower Rio Grande Valley National Wildlife Refuge. We speak with Bekah Hinojosa of Another Gulf Is Possible, who has been targeted for participating in protests against SpaceX. She says, “We’re clearly being exploited by a billionaire and his pet project.” She also responds to the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission’s approval Thursday of three new liquified natural gas projects in the area.

AMY GOODMAN: We turn now to South Texas, where Elon Musk’s SpaceX is claiming success after the first launch of its massive new rocket, dubbed “Starship.” The two-stage prototype lifted off Thursday morning from SpaceX’s sprawling base on Texas’s Gulf Coast near the U.S. border with Mexico, becoming the largest and heaviest machine ever to fly under its own power. At least six of the rocket’s 33 engines failed during flight. The vehicle self-destructed over the Gulf of Mexico about four minutes after liftoff. Residents of Port Isabel, near the launch site, reported particulates or ash rained down on their neighborhoods. The fiery end to the launch was the latest in a series of explosions around SpaceX’s launch site near the Lower Rio Grande Valley National Wildlife Refuge.

This comes as three liquefied natural gas projects in the Rio Grande Valley were just approved by the FERC. That’s the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission. Indigenous, environmental and community organizers responded Thursday to the SpaceX launch and explosion and denounced the new projects. This is Christopher Basaldú.

CHRISTOPHER BASALDÚ: Rio Bravo Pipeline and SpaceX, none of these companies consulted with the original people of this land, the Carrizo/Comecrudo Tribe of Texas. None of them consulted with the tribe. None of them have our consent. But yet, they still want to destroy Native homelands, ancestral homelands. We never gave our consent, and they’re moving forward. The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, they never consulted with the tribe. They don’t have our consent, and they’re moving forward anyway. That’s not justice. … They’re enabling Musk to destroy our lands and destroy this beautiful area. It needs to stop. These are all the histories of colonial genocide against Native people and Native lands.

AMY GOODMAN: For more, we’re joined in Brownsville, Texas, by Bekah Hinojosa, an environmental and community advocate with the grassroots collaborative Another Gulf Is Possible. She’s one of the many people who spoke out against SpaceX and faced repression and prosecution. Last year, police broke into her home and arrested her after she was accused of spray-painting the words “gentrified” and “stop SpaceX” under a mural in downtown Brownsville. She’s still fighting these charges.

Bekah Hinojosa, welcome to Democracy Now! It’s great to have you with us. So, yesterday, Elon Musk declared success when his SpaceX rocket exploded. Now, actually, though he was, of course, mocked by many — what does a failure mean if your rocket explodes out of control? — scientifically, it’s a chance to test different ways of trying to shoot off this rocket. But you’re on the ground. If you can talk about what SpaceX means for your communities?

BEKAH HINOJOSA: You know, we’re tired of living under the constant threat of flammable rocket explosions because of SpaceX. You know, Elon Musk is on his quest to colonize Mars, and it’s beginning — he’s beginning by colonizing our community that’s on the frontlines of the U.S.-Mexico border, you know, that’s on the frontlines of the Gulf Coast, where we’re dealing with layers and layers of injustices. You know, our community is opposed to SpaceX’s operations. Yesterday, 27 organizations from the Rio Grande Valley signed on to a letter officially opposing the rocket launch.

AMY GOODMAN: So, talk about how — who controls where he does this work? And, in fact, does he choose this area of Texas on the Mexico border because of the deregulation of Texas and the fact — what kind of regulation does he face? And what kind of consent is required, if any, of the local community?

BEKAH HINOJOSA: It’s very clear that Elon Musk moved into our border community to take over, to colonize the region. We’re clearly being exploited by a billionaire and his pet project. You know, we are a low-income community of color. And Texas has a long history of deregulation, of just rubber-stamping permits and approvals for any big industry, and also give out numerous tax subsidies. You know, that’s what we’ve seen with SpaceX.

He’s moved into our community and turned us into a testing ground. It’s at the point now where I hear a noise, my family and I, and we wonder, “Is that SpaceX?” And we come to find out that the rumble is because of a rocket launch. Or I hear a huge explosion or blast from 10 miles away, and it turns out that SpaceX has done some kind of unannounced rocket testing. You know, we’re constantly dealing with just the growth of SpaceX and their operations.

AMY GOODMAN: So, Bekah, last year, you were violently arrested after police broke into your home without showing you a warrant. You were detained for, what, more than a day, for 26 hours. Police took your glasses. They placed you in a cold cell, after you were interrogated, charged with what? A misdemeanor? Accused of spray-painting these words “gentrified” and “stop SpaceX” under a mural in downtown Brownsville. The outgoing Brownsville Mayor Trey Mendez posted a photo of you on his social media, thanking the police for your arrest. He also wrote, quote, “Ms. Hinojosa has been quoted in several anti-SpaceX articles.” Can you talk about the former Mayor Mendez’s ties to SpaceX, and how local officials have come after environmental and community advocates, like you, over opposition to SpaceX? You’re still fighting these charges?

BEKAH HINOJOSA: You know, I’m still — I’m steal dealing, fighting to have this charge dropped against me. You know, SpaceX is growing into our community. SpaceX and Elon Musk are actively handing out money here and there, and it’s becoming political hush money. You know, it’s buying out politicians. We’ve seen when a SpaceX testing goes wrong, which it always goes wrong, and burns down wildlife refuge, you know, political officials just turning the other way.

And I’ve been personally impacted now by SpaceX buying out community member — buying out politicians, when, you know, last year, four police broke into my apartment. When I asked for a warrant and tried to put on my shoes, they threatened me with resisting arrest. They jailed me for 26 hours. And then I come to find out, once I’m released, that Mayor Trey Mendez, who’s still in office for the next month, has doxed me. You know, he posted my mugshot on his official Facebook page.

AMY GOODMAN: He’s the current mayor.

BEKAH HINOJOSA: He is the current mayor. His term ends in May. He’s chosen not to run for reelection. And I’ve come to find that the mayor has doxed me. He published my mugshot on his official Facebook platform. He posted my job, trying to get me fired. You know, he singled me out and targeted me because I’ve been publicly — I’ve been speaking up about the dangers of SpaceX for years.

And what this means is that, you know, the city is signaling to us that any community organizer speaking up could be next. They’re targeting community activists. And we are actively rallying and pressuring the city to investigate Mayor Mendez for abuse of power. You know, we won’t tolerate elected officials singling out and targeting and doxing community members. You know, the city is signaling to us that they’re selling out to a private space industry.

AMY GOODMAN: Talk about how the environment has been impacted. For people who were watching TV to see the SpaceX launch, you see in the upper left “Boca Chica.” Talk about Boca Chica, where the fresh waters of the Rio Grande trickle into the Gulf of Mexico, the beaches and protected lands, such as the Lower Rio Grande Valley National Wildlife Refuge, near SpaceX.

BEKAH HINOJOSA: Yeah. I want to make it clear that Boca Chica Beach was never for sale. You know, Elon Musk has come and colonized our region. Boca Chica Beach is part of a state park. It’s part of the Lower — near the Lower Rio Grande Valley Wildlife Refuge. It’s part of an international wildlife corridor that’s very important for species to migrate, for genetic diversity. Boca Chica Beach and the entire region is also sacred lands of the Carrizo/Comecrudo Tribe. And, you know, families have been going there for generations to fish. Boca Chica Beach is considered the poor people’s beach, because it’s for local people that go, don’t have to pay fees to enter, and can go fish to feed their families. It’s also where the Carrizo/Comecrudo Tribe hold their sacred ceremonies.

And Elon Musk and SpaceX have been using their private police force and the local police to turn people away, so he can host his press conferences and parties and test dangerous rocket equipment. You know, that’s what we’ve been seeing. You know, some of the routine testing has caused over 60 acres of the wildlife refuge to burn down, has sparked grass fires. We’ve seen threats and death of migratory birds and endangered species like the ocelot.

AMY GOODMAN: I also wanted to ask about this point that we raised in the lede, as well, and that is, last year, the Federal Aviation Administration determined that SpaceX’s plans for orbital launches would have no significant impact on the Gulf Coast region. The FAA’s ruling came after SpaceX founder Elon Musk accused the agency of having a fundamentally broken regulatory structure, after it didn’t rapidly approve an early Starship test flight. The FAA has also reportedly faced pressure from major SpaceX contractors, including NASA, Pentagon and the National Reconnaissance Office, all of whom rely heavily on SpaceX to launch satellites and astronauts to orbit and beyond. NASA has selected, for example, a version of SpaceX’s Starship as a lander for its upcoming Artemis III mission, which aims to return astronauts to the moon for the first time in half a century. So they’re using this private company for the Pentagon, for the FAA, for all of this NASA work.

BEKAH HINOJOSA: No, it’s very clear that Elon Musk and SpaceX has become — you know, is becoming too big to hold accountable, and is getting away with harming our community. And what we need are real solutions. We need investments, you know, in Earth, the problems we have here on the planet, climate change. And instead, we see our tax subsidies go towards a billionaire’s pet project, for a billionaire to go to space as part of his sci-fi adventure.

AMY GOODMAN: I wanted to finally ask you about the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission approving the Rio Grande LNG, Texas LNG, you know, liquid natural gas, and the Rio Bravo Pipeline Thursday, just hours after the SpaceX explosion. These projects are within a few miles from SpaceX and have faced fierce opposition from groups like yours. Talk about what’s at stake with these projects, especially in the Rio Grande and the Gulf of Mexico as area of the country that are on the frontlines of the climate crisis.

BEKAH HINOJOSA: Yeah, we’re dealing with layers and layers of environmental disasters here in the Rio Grande Valley. You know, communities, we’ve been — I’ve been fighting back to stop these LNG terminals for nearly a decade. Rio Grande LNG, Texas LNG and the Rio Bravo Pipeline plan to build next door to SpaceX, within six miles. And we’re terrified of the very real threat that exploding rockets next to giant tanks of gas, next to giant tankers of gas, where we’ve already seen, you know, rocket shrapnel raining even further past six miles.

And we’re being left in the dark. We haven’t heard from regulatory agencies about the flammable risks. And communities here have made it absolutely clear that we oppose these LNG export terminals. All of our communities have passed anti-LNG resolutions — Port Isabel, South Padre Island, Laguna Vista, Long Island Village — because of the threat of flammable explosion from SpaceX, because this would completely destroy our way of life. We are one of the last little pieces of the South Texas coastline that doesn’t have refineries or flare stacks. And, you know, LNG would completely change our way of life for the worse.

AMY GOODMAN: Well, Bekah Hinojosa, I want to thank you for being with us, environmental and community advocate with the grassroots collaborative Another Gulf Is Possible.

The North Seas can be the world’s biggest power plant

Tomorrow, we will be taking another crucial step toward a green and independent Europe.

Off-shore wind turbines in the North Sea are essential to reach global climate goals | Pool photo by Christian Charisius/AFP via Getty Images

BY ALEXANDER DE CROO, MARK RUTTE, XAVIER BETTEL, EMMANUEL MACRON, OLAF SCHOLZ, LEO VARADKAR, JONAS GAHR STØRE, RISHI SUNAK AND METTE FREDERIKSEN

APRIL 23, 2023 

Alexander De Croo is the prime minister of Belgium. Mark Rutte is the prime minister of the Netherlands. Xavier Bettel is the prime minister of Luxembourg. Emmanuel Macron is the president of France. Olaf Scholz is the chancellor of Germany. Leo Varadkar is the prime minister of Ireland. Jonas Gahr Støre is the prime minister of Norway. Rishi Sunak is the prime minister of the United Kingdom. Mette Frederiksen is the prime minister of Denmark.

We need offshore wind turbines— and we need a lot of them.

We need them to reach our climate goals, and to rid ourselves of Russian gas, ensuring a more secure and independent Europe.

Held for the first time last year, Denmark, Germany, Belgium and the Netherlands came together for the inaugural North Sea Summit in the Danish harbor town of Esbjerg, setting historic goals for offshore wind with the Esbjerg Declaration. It paved the way for making the North Seas a green power plant for Europe, as well as a major contributor to climate neutrality and strengthening energy security.

This Monday, nine countries will meet for the next North Sea Summit — this time in the Belgian town of Ostend — where France, Ireland, Luxembourg, Norway and the United Kingdom will also put their political weight behind developing green energy in the North Seas, including the Atlantic Ocean and the Irish and Celtic Seas. Together, we will combine and coordinate our ambitions for deploying offshore wind and developing an offshore electricity grid linking our countries, putting Europe on the path toward a green economy fueled by offshore green power plants.

Collectively, our target for offshore wind in the North Seas is now 120 gigawatts by 2030, and a minimum of 300 gigawatts by 2050 — larger than any of the co-signatories’ existing generation capacity at a national level. And to deliver on this ambition, we are committing to building an entire electricity system in the North Seas based on renewable energy by developing cooperation projects.

This is a massive undertaking and a true example of the green transition in the making. It also requires huge investments in infrastructure, both offshore and on land.

It presents us with a political and environmental dilemma as well: We are facing a climate crisis at the same time some of our ecosystems are in decline, and offshore wind is an integral part of both climate action and safeguarding our energy security. Thus, time is of the essence, and we must follow up on the progress already made on reining in the burden of bureaucracy for renewable projects.

We cannot wait years for permitting processes while global temperatures rise, and autocratic regimes have the power to turn the lights off in our living rooms and halt production in our industries. Instead, we must work toward rapid deployment of offshore wind, while making every effort to safeguard our healthy and robust marine ecosystems for future generations.

Crucially, the green transition is also a cornerstone for maintaining our competitiveness in the global economy. And while the North Seas will be a major provider of clean, affordable energy for our industries and businesses in the form of electricity and hydrogen, we must ensure we don’t simply move from one dependence to another. As such, we need to make space for European value chains when it comes to green tech and diversify our sources of critical raw materials for wind turbines, batteries and the like. We will work together within NATO and the European Union to increase the security of offshore and underwater infrastructure, stepping up efforts to react effectively to growing traditional and hybrid threats.

Tomorrow, we will be taking another crucial step toward a green and competitive Europe, with even more turbines spinning in the North Seas. And every turbine gets us closer to a green future.

We know the way — now, it’s a matter of picking up the pace.

Indiana Residents Thought There Was an Explosion—It Turned out to Be a Meteor

By Wire Service
April 23, 2023

The meteor that likely caused a sonic boom in Indiana was captured by the home security system of Greenwood resident Bryan Bunton. (Courtesy of Bryan Bunton)

It’s a bird, it’s a plane, it’s a … meteor flashing through the Indiana night sky.

Residents of Hamilton County, Indiana, had the out-of-this-world opportunity to witness a meteor Friday night.

Residents reported what they thought might have been an explosion due to the loud sound and flashing lights, according to a tweet from Hamilton County Emergency Management.

The agency’s “current theory” is the sound and light were caused by a sonic boom from a meteor.

Pilots in Kentucky saw a meteor to the north and a lightning detection center picked up signals over Carroll County, Hamilton County Emergency Management reported.

Videos taken by residents and published by CNN affiliate WTHR show a bright light streaking across the sky. Several videos also captured the rumbling sound caused by the meteor.

Hamilton County Emergency Management thanked the National Weather Service and FAA for helping them “quickly figure out what happened.”

A meteor is a piece of space rock entering the earth’s atmosphere, according to NASA. The bright streak with the appearance of a “shooting star” is actually the extremely hot air produced by the meteor. The rocks usually burn up in earth’s atmosphere before reaching the ground.

Indiana’s flashing lights fell during the Lyrids, one of the oldest recorded meteor showers. Meteors from the shower are expected to be most frequent on Saturday night into the early hours of Sunday morning.

Hamilton County is located in central Indiana.

The-CNN-Wire

Biden EPA to issue power plant rules that lean on carbon capture

Equipment used to capture carbon dioxide emissions is seen at a coal-fired power plant owned by NRG Energy where carbon collected from the plant will be used to extract crude from a nearby oilfield in Thomspsons, Texas, US . 

The US government may soon require natural gas-fired power plants to install technology to capture carbon emissions, sources said, as President Joe Biden's administration enacts new rules to help decarbonise the power sector in 12 years.

The Environmental Protection Agency as soon as this week is expected to unveil standards for new and existing power plants, which belch roughly a quarter of US greenhouse gas emissions, two sources said. The rules will replace former President Donald Trump's American Clean Energy rule and former President Barack Obama's Clean Power Plan, both of which were invalidated by courts.

More than a year in the making, the standards should be based on a plant's potential to reduce emissions through carbon capture and storage (CCS) technology, according to clean air law experts and industry representatives in talks with the EPA.

Utility companies may need to decide whether they want to build new baseload gas plants with CCS technology or zero-emission renewable energy. States would develop plans for bringing their plants into compliance.

"These standards could level the playing field between new gas plants and new renewable energy," said Thomas Schuster, head of the Sierra Club's Pennsylvania chapter. Most new gas plants currently do not pay for emitting carbon, so the rules could make it harder for them to compete with solar and wind power.

Biden has pledged that the power business will decarbonise by 2035. According to the Clean Air Act, the standards must be based on "best system of emission reduction," technologies deemed affordable and technically feasible.

The proposal will reflect two major developments to ensure the rules are legally defensible. One, a Supreme Court decision last July, barred EPA from forcing a system-wide shift in electric generation but allowed it to issue plant-specific rules.

Second, the Inflation Reduction Act created tax credits making carbon capture and hydrogen more affordable and affirmed EPA's authority to regulate power plants. The law offers more than $100 billion in clean electricity tax incentives, including a 70% increase in credits for each ton of carbon captured and sequestered.

"If you're building a new fossil [plant], it needs to control its emissions, said Lissa Lynch, director of the federal legal group at the Natural Resources Defense Council. Existing technology can capture and store approximately 90% of carbon emissions, Lynch said.

EPA could set varying standards for plants, applying stringent measures for ones that run constantly and easier ones for "peaker" plants which run during high power demand, Lynch said.

CLEANER POWER

US Energy Information Administration figures show fossil fuels accounted for more than 60% of US electricity generation in 2022, with 60% of that coming from gas and 40% from coal. Renewables accounted for 21.5%, with nuclear energy making up the rest.

The EIA projected that this year, 54% of new generation (21GW) will be solar and 14% will be natural gas (7.5GW).

Federal utility TVA has the most planned gas capacity at 5GW followed by investor-owned Duke Energy with 3 GW planned.

TVA's portfolio in the coming decades will include carbon-free sources "and sources like natural gas that complement that diversity without sacrificing rates or reliability", a spokesperson said.

Duke plans for natural gas to be part of its mix but "operated less as baseload generation and as more of a peaking/ramping resource over time to balance out the variability in renewable resources", a spokesperson said.

Some industry representatives signaled in comments to the EPA last year that they do not think power plant standards should be based on carbon capture and storage, with the National Mining Association saying it is not an "adequately tested technology." The group cited failure of a Texas project called Petra Nova that was mothballed in 2020.

Utility Southern Company, which is phasing out its large fleet of coal generation, said new gas turbines should be favored "to safeguard electric needs of the US".

Southern, which also runs the National Carbon Capture Center with the Department of Energy, said commercial deployment of carbon capture technology "is many years away" despite the cost-reduction potential of the Inflation Reduction Act.

Waterspout hits a beach in Florida, USA

The wind picked up chairs and umbrellas and even knocked over a beachgoer.

SEE LA REVUE GAUCHE - Left Comment: Search results for MH370 

I BELIEVE A WATERSPOUT TOOK DOWN THIS FLIGHT

Scroll Staff
3 hours ago

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