Earth Day celebration address, California State University, Northridge
I would like to thank the students at Cal State University, Northridge for inviting me to speak on campus today. I have just returned from an exciting trip to Mexico City and I'd like to share some of my observations with you this afternoon.
First of all, it is important to note and ask the question why is it that the corporate press are not even touching the events playing out right now in the capital city of our neighbor to the south and their importance to us? Had I not actually been there myself, I would be hard pressed to convince any audience that events of this magnitude were actually taking place anywhere in the world, let alone in a country as important and close to us as Mexico.
First of all, it is important to note and ask the question why is it that the corporate press are not even touching the events playing out right now in the capital city of our neighbor to the south and their importance to us? Had I not actually been there myself, I would be hard pressed to convince any audience that events of this magnitude were actually taking place anywhere in the world, let alone in a country as important and close to us as Mexico.
The Three Trillion Dollar War – The True Costs of the Iraq Conflict
The Three Trillion Dollar War – The True Costs of the Iraq Conflict.
Joseph Stiglitz and Linda Bilmes.
W.W. Norton & Company, N.Y. 2008.
Following on their previous pronouncement that war costs could amount to as much as 1 trillion to 2 trillion dollars, ten times more than even then previously thought [1], Stiglitz and Bilmes have furthered their research into the cost of the war with their new title The Three Trillion Dollar War. But it isn’t – three trillion dollars that is. More than likely it will be much higher, as this "realistic-moderate" appraisal is continually described as conservative, with comments about always using the conservative numbers and even discounting certain costs as they could not be properly quantified. The "full tally" indicates "the numbers that we believe (conservatively) best captures the costs of the Iraq venture, even without counting interest – the total for Iraq alone is more then $4 trillion; including Afghanistan, it increases to $5 trillion."
Joseph Stiglitz and Linda Bilmes.
W.W. Norton & Company, N.Y. 2008.
Following on their previous pronouncement that war costs could amount to as much as 1 trillion to 2 trillion dollars, ten times more than even then previously thought [1], Stiglitz and Bilmes have furthered their research into the cost of the war with their new title The Three Trillion Dollar War. But it isn’t – three trillion dollars that is. More than likely it will be much higher, as this "realistic-moderate" appraisal is continually described as conservative, with comments about always using the conservative numbers and even discounting certain costs as they could not be properly quantified. The "full tally" indicates "the numbers that we believe (conservatively) best captures the costs of the Iraq venture, even without counting interest – the total for Iraq alone is more then $4 trillion; including Afghanistan, it increases to $5 trillion."
The new imperialists – Ideologies of Empire
The new imperialists – Ideologies of Empire
Ed. Colin Mooers.
Oneworld Publications, Oxford, England. 2006.
Ed. Colin Mooers.
Oneworld Publications, Oxford, England. 2006.
The E.L.F.s are mad! Why aren’t we?
Sorry kids, but you’re just going to have to deal with the fact that we are greedy narcissists. We’re dyed in the wool consumers, we worship Mammon, and eliminating the cancer of capitalism is simply out of the question.
What’s that, our beloved sons and daughters? You’re worried that the air will be too polluted to breathe, the water too toxic to drink, the rain forests too sparse to act as the Earth’s lungs, and the resources too depleted to sustain you and the other sentient inhabitants of this planet? You don’t believe “clean” coal, biofuels, and nuclear power will sustain the exquisite industrial civilization we will bequeath you once we’ve siphoned off the last drop of oil and departed for the big suburb in the sky?
What’s that, our beloved sons and daughters? You’re worried that the air will be too polluted to breathe, the water too toxic to drink, the rain forests too sparse to act as the Earth’s lungs, and the resources too depleted to sustain you and the other sentient inhabitants of this planet? You don’t believe “clean” coal, biofuels, and nuclear power will sustain the exquisite industrial civilization we will bequeath you once we’ve siphoned off the last drop of oil and departed for the big suburb in the sky?
Hillary's hawks -- How Obama's and Clinton's advisors mirror their stands on the war
In their focus on the electoral horse-race, the media have ignored a key difference between Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton -- the positions of their foreign policy advisors on the Iraq war. As political scientist Stephen Zunes points out in Foreign Policy in Focus, Clinton's key advisors overwhelmingly supported it, while Obama's opposed it. The differences in their positions on whether to go to war mirror those of the two candidates. They also give a sense of how Clinton and Obama are likely to deal with the immensely difficult foreign policy challenges they'll face if elected, including dealing with Iraq.
From Zunes's revised version of his article:
The president makes the decisions, but who advises the president? We know Donald Rumsfeld, Paul Wolfowitz, and Richard Perle insisted to Bush that American forces would be treated as liberators if we went into Iraq. McCain has surrounded himself with people likely to encourage him to follow a similar disastrous path if he becomes president. But what about Obama and Clinton?
From Zunes's revised version of his article:
The president makes the decisions, but who advises the president? We know Donald Rumsfeld, Paul Wolfowitz, and Richard Perle insisted to Bush that American forces would be treated as liberators if we went into Iraq. McCain has surrounded himself with people likely to encourage him to follow a similar disastrous path if he becomes president. But what about Obama and Clinton?
There Will Be Blood: The madness of American capitalism...but no method
There Will Be Blood
Written and directed by Paul Thomas Anderson
There Will Be Blood, the latest from director Paul Thomas Anderson and adapted from Upton Sinclair's 1927 novel, Oil!, concerns the rise and descent of ruthless oil baron, Daniel Plainview (Daniel Day-Lewis). It is, on one hand, a visually stark look at the machinations of American capitalism, as represented by the misanthropic Plainview. On the other hand, its failure is rooted in the lack of historical exposition that gives insight of how a miserable, scheming tycoon came to be. The film resorts to the ultimately simplistic notion of "innate evil" or "human nature" instead of attempting to examine social or economic relations explored in Sinclair's novel.
Written and directed by Paul Thomas Anderson
There Will Be Blood, the latest from director Paul Thomas Anderson and adapted from Upton Sinclair's 1927 novel, Oil!, concerns the rise and descent of ruthless oil baron, Daniel Plainview (Daniel Day-Lewis). It is, on one hand, a visually stark look at the machinations of American capitalism, as represented by the misanthropic Plainview. On the other hand, its failure is rooted in the lack of historical exposition that gives insight of how a miserable, scheming tycoon came to be. The film resorts to the ultimately simplistic notion of "innate evil" or "human nature" instead of attempting to examine social or economic relations explored in Sinclair's novel.
Juno: The safe, "independent" comedy
Juno
Directed by Jason Reitman
written by Diablo Cody
Juno, the much-talked about film about a pregnant teenage hipster, has been praised for being this year’s “little film that could." This film became popular as major studios continued to churn out bombastic comic-book movies and crude, simple-minded comedies while working to break a writers’ strike. However, Juno offers nothing much as an alternative and is indeed another crowd-pleaser that takes the path of least resistance, albeit more “quirky” than the glossy studio fare.
Directed by Jason Reitman
written by Diablo Cody
Juno, the much-talked about film about a pregnant teenage hipster, has been praised for being this year’s “little film that could." This film became popular as major studios continued to churn out bombastic comic-book movies and crude, simple-minded comedies while working to break a writers’ strike. However, Juno offers nothing much as an alternative and is indeed another crowd-pleaser that takes the path of least resistance, albeit more “quirky” than the glossy studio fare.
Meat’s meat...so let’s eat
Canine. It’s what’s for dinner.
We pride ourselves on our devotion to the principle of equality here in the United States, so it’s time to put our values where our mouths are, so to speak. Pigs, chickens, cows, and the like already endure abject suffering so we can consume their flesh, so it is only fair that we include “man’s best friend.” How could they better prove their deep loyalty to us than by sacrificing their lives to feed us?
There is plenty of room on our plates to accommodate a few slices of Lassie. Even here in our resource-hog of a nation people experience hunger. Why not run a hundred million or so Rovers through the meat industrial complex each year? We have no reservations about torturing and slaughtering billions of other sentient beings to satiate our lust for meat. Research has indicated that pigs are actually more intelligent than dogs and thus would be more conscious of their misery. So there is no valid moral objection.
We pride ourselves on our devotion to the principle of equality here in the United States, so it’s time to put our values where our mouths are, so to speak. Pigs, chickens, cows, and the like already endure abject suffering so we can consume their flesh, so it is only fair that we include “man’s best friend.” How could they better prove their deep loyalty to us than by sacrificing their lives to feed us?
There is plenty of room on our plates to accommodate a few slices of Lassie. Even here in our resource-hog of a nation people experience hunger. Why not run a hundred million or so Rovers through the meat industrial complex each year? We have no reservations about torturing and slaughtering billions of other sentient beings to satiate our lust for meat. Research has indicated that pigs are actually more intelligent than dogs and thus would be more conscious of their misery. So there is no valid moral objection.
Four score organizations express opposition to Yucca Mountain nuclear waste dump
Takoma Park, MD – A dozen national organizations, joined by 68 state and local grassroots groups from across the country, filed comments to the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) yesterday expressing strong opposition to the risks inherent in the proposed high-level radioactive waste dumpsite targeted at Yucca Mountain, Nevada and its associated waste transport plans through 45 states. This marks the latest effort by dump opponents – some of whom have been active against the Yucca dump for nearly three decades – as the DOE has pledged to file its long-delayed construction and operating license application to the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) by June 30, 2008.
“The Bush administration’s rash rush to begin the Yucca licensing proceeding is a blatant attempt to make the dump a done deal before the next, potentially anti-dump, President enters the White House,” said Kevin Kamps of Beyond Nuclear, a national watchdog on nuclear power and radioactive waste issues.
“The Bush administration’s rash rush to begin the Yucca licensing proceeding is a blatant attempt to make the dump a done deal before the next, potentially anti-dump, President enters the White House,” said Kevin Kamps of Beyond Nuclear, a national watchdog on nuclear power and radioactive waste issues.
2007: Annus Mirabilis and the Smiling Garden of Eden
In 1905 Albert Einstein, presented the Annus Mirabilis ("Wonderful Year")
Papers, in which he explained the mass–energy equivalence formula, E = mc2,
which lead to the development of nuclear energy. In 1955, a few days before
his death, Einstein together with Bertrand Russell issued the
Russell-Einstein Manifesto, highlighting the dangers posed by nuclear
weapons, and calling for world leaders to seek peaceful resolutions to
international conflict. One of the paragraphs in the manifesto read; “We
shall try to say no single word which should appeal to one group rather than
to another. All, equally, are in peril, and, if the peril is understood,
there is hope that they may collectively avert it.”
The year 2007 has been a “Wonderful year” in the quest for nuclear supremacy. While as ‘global citizens’ we have been distracted by the dangers of a nuclear-armed Iran, the possible failed state of Pakistan, and the push for disarmament by North Korea, our political and economic leaders have been making aggressive moves towards reinstating the forgotten supremacy of Nuclear Energy.
The year 2007 has been a “Wonderful year” in the quest for nuclear supremacy. While as ‘global citizens’ we have been distracted by the dangers of a nuclear-armed Iran, the possible failed state of Pakistan, and the push for disarmament by North Korea, our political and economic leaders have been making aggressive moves towards reinstating the forgotten supremacy of Nuclear Energy.