British Columbia's Logging Policy and the Extirpation of Species: The Spotted Owl

Government logging future spotted owl habitat is grossly dishonest says enviro group

by Wilderness Committee

July 26, 2019

The B.C. government is allowing massive swaths of forest designated as spotted owl wildlife habitat to be logged away with the sorry excuse that the trees are being felled to provide “future habitat.”

VANCOUVER - These giant clearcuts leave a few spindly trees in the hopes that 100 to 200 years from now the habitat will be suitable for B.C.’s spotted owls — but there are only a handful left in the wild now due to logging of habitat.

Coming to America: 'Off the Charts' Heat

New Study Predicts Millions of Americans May Become Exposed to “Off the Charts” Heat

by TRNN

July 26, 2019

This summer, the climate news cycle has been dominated by two searing heat waves that have afflicted Western Europe. In one European city after another, the record for the all-time high temperature has been broken.

As Western Europe has been baking in the unprecedented heat, experts from the Union of Concerned Scientists issued an alarming new report about future levels of extreme heat back in the United States. According to that report, in less than 20 years, millions of people in the United States could be exposed to dangerous “off the charts” heat conditions of 127 degrees Fahrenheit or more.

Climate scientist Michael Mann discusses the increasing frequency and severity of heat waves, just as the US, Europe, and India are experiencing this Summer

Peering Under the American Power Elite's Rock

Government by Blackmail: Jeffrey Epstein, Trump’s Mentor and the Dark Secrets of the Reagan Era

by Whitney Webb - MintPress News

July 25, 2019

Appalling for both the villainous abuse of children itself and the chilling implications of government by blackmail, this tangled web of unsavory alliances casts a lurid light on the political history of the U.S. from the Prohibition Era right up through the Age of Trump. This report, Part II of this series titled “The Jeffrey Epstein Scandal: Too Big To Fail,” will delve into Cohn’s close ties to the Reagan administration, which was also closely tied to the same organized crime network led by the infamous mob figure Meyer Lansky, which was discussed in Part I.

NEW YORK – Jeffrey Epstein, the billionaire who now sits in jail on federal charges for the sex trafficking of minors, has continued to draw media scrutiny in the weeks after his arrest on July 6. Part of the reason for this continued media interest is related to Epstein’s alleged relationship to the intelligence services and new information about the true extent of the sexual blackmail operation Epstein is believed to have run for decades.

As MintPress reported last week, Epstein was able to run this sordid operation for so long precisely because his was only the latest incarnation of a much older, more extensive operation that began in the 1950s and perhaps even earlier.

Passing: Rutger Hauer - Shepherd of the Sea, Hero for the Planet and a Truly Wonderful Person

THANK YOU RUTGER HAUER 

by Captain Paul Watson - Sea Shepherd Conservation Society

July 24, 2019

In 1997 I was held in Dutch prison awaiting an extradition trial to Norway for sinking one of their illegal whaling ships the “Nybraena”. I was held for 120 days and received incredible support from the Dutch public and most notably from Rutger Hauer who twice visited me at Lelystad Prison. Rutger helped mobilize other celebrities and the Dutch court ruled to release me without extradition to Norway.

Rutger passed away today at the age of 75 and all of us with Sea Shepherd will miss him very much.

His support over the last 22 years gave us all strength and inspiration. When I returned from my 15 month exile at sea in 2013 Rutger along with James Costa hosted a dinner party in Hollywood to welcome me back.

In 2006 Rutger was on a movie set in Cape Town and took the time to take the entire crew of the Farley Mowat out for the evening for dinner and drinks.

When we needed him he was there for us and for the whales and other citizens of the sea. Always generous, always supportive and always with a smile.

He was a good friend. I sailed with him on a few weekends in Santa Monica Bay and shared stories and life experiences.

As an actor he was a legend. In Blade Runner he made the replicant he portrayed possess more humanity than the humans pursuing him. He played good guys, bad guys, a blind guy and of course will always be remembered as The Man of Orange, a legend in his native Netherlands and the world.

Rutger was a Shepherd for the Sea, a hero for the planet and a wonderful person.

An Endless Procession of Murdered Gazans

The Ongoing Dread in Gaza: So Many Names, So Many Lives

by Kathy Kelly  - VCNV.org

July 23, 2019

“I felt shaky and uneasy all day, preparing for this talk” – Jehad Abusalim, a Palestinian from the territory of Gaza

Jehad Abusalim, a Palestinian now living in the United States, grew up Gaza. In Chicago last week, addressing activists committed to breaking the siege of Gaza, he held up a stack of 31 papers.

On each page were names of 1,254 Palestinians living in Gaza who had been killed in just one month of Israel’s “Operation Protective Edge” attacks five years ago.

“I felt shaky and uneasy all day preparing for this talk,” he told the group. He described his dismay when, looking through the list of names, he recognized one of a young man from his small town.

The day before going on the river, members
of the Freedom Flotilla for Gaza joined Voices
For Creative Nonviolence in a protest outside
of Boeing’s offices.

“He was always friendly to me,” Abusalim said. “I remember how he would greet me on the way to the mosque. His family and friends loved him, respected him.”

Gorilla Radio with Chris Cook, Heather McSwan & Barbarah Nicoll, Max van der Werff, Janine Bandcroft July 25, 2019

This Week on GR

by C. L. Cook - Gorilla-Radio.com

July 25, 2019

When residents of the rural Kootenays community of Glade discovered surveying tape above the creek providing their water they got worried. Worried because they knew the tape belonged to Kalesnikoff Lumber Co, a local outfit planning to start logging in the watershed.

That was four years ago, and what followed for the small community is a legal struggle that has run all the way to British Columbia's Supreme Court.

Heather McSwan and Barbarah Nicoll are active members representing the Glade Watershed Protection Society.

Heather McSwan and Barbarah Nicoll in the first half.



Listen. Hear.

And; on July 17th, 2014, Malaysia Airlines flight MH17 crashed, shot from the sky over Ukraine. All 298 people aboard perished. Those on flight MH17 came mainly from four countries, and in the aftermath of the disaster, the Joint Investigation Team, an international body comprising representatives of those nations was formed to investigate; but, politics has hampered the search for truth from the beginning.

Max van der Werff is an independent Dutch investigator and filmmaker who along with journalist and director, Yana Yerlashova formed Bonanza Media, to produce the documentary film, 'MH17- Call for Justice', released last week.

Max van der Werff and demanding justice for the victims of MH17 five years after the fact in the second half.

And; Victoria-based activist and long-time Gorilla Radio contributor, Janine Bandcroft will be here at the bottom of the hour with the Left Coast Events Bulletin of some of the good things to be gotten up to in and around our town in the coming week. But first, Heather McSwan and Barbarah Nicoll, fighting for Glade's, and all of our, right to clean water.

Chris Cook hosts Gorilla Radio, airing live every Thursday between 11-Noon Pacific Time. In Victoria at 101.9FM, and on the internet at: http://cfuv.uvic.ca.  He also serves as a contributing editor to the web news site, http://www.pacificfreepress.com. Check out the GR blog at: http://gorillaradioblog.blogspot.ca/

MH17: A Call for Justice Left Unanswered Five Years On

MH17- Call for Justice

by Bonanza Media

July 17, 2019

Bonanza media investigative team of independent journalists take exclusive interviews with one of the suspects of downing the MH17, Malaysian prime minister; colonel that collected black boxes and much more. Eye opening testimonies from witnesses and irrefutable evidence from experts.

Exclusive footage shot in Malaysia, The Netherlands and at the crash area in Ukraine.

Malaysian Prime Minister Charges Evidence Tampering, Cover-up in MH17 Air Disaster Investigation

MH17 EVIDENCE TAMPERING REVEALED BY MALAYSIA – FBI ATTEMPT TO SEIZE BLACK BOXES; DUTCH COVER-UP OF FORGED TELEPHONE TAPES; UKRAINIAN AIR FORCE HID RADAR RECORDS; CRASH SITE WITNESS TESTIMONY MISREPORTED

by John Helmer - Dances with Bears

July 22, 2019

A new documentary from Max van der Werff, the leading independent investigator of the Malaysia Airlines Flight MH17 disaster, has revealed breakthrough evidence of tampering and forging of prosecution materials; suppression of Ukrainian Air Force radar tapes; and lying by the Dutch, Ukrainian, US and Australian governments.

An attempt by agents of the US Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) to take possession of the black boxes of the downed aircraft is also revealed by a Malaysian National Security Council official for the first time.

The sources of the breakthrough are Malaysian — Prime Minister of Malaysia Mohamad Mahathir; Colonel Mohamad Sakri, the officer in charge of the MH17 investigation for the Prime Minister’s Department and Malaysia’s National Security Council following the crash on July 17, 2014; and a forensic analysis by Malaysia’s OG IT Forensic Services of Ukrainian Secret Service (SBU) telephone tapes which Dutch prosecutors have announced as genuine.

The 298 casualties of MH17 included 192 Dutch; 44 Malaysians; 27 Australians; 15 Indonesians. The nationality counts vary because the airline manifest does not identify dual nationals of Australia, the UK, and the US.

God Spare Us Our Successes: US Wins Saudi Troop Deployment Approval

U.S. Troops Back in Saudi Arabia: What Could Go Wrong? 

by David Swanson

July 21, 2019

The First Gulf War back in 1990 was a big huge success. One of the things it accomplished was a major U.S. troop presence in Saudi Arabia. Muslims around the world were outraged. 

Bombs were repeatedly set off at Khobar Towers where troops were stationed. In 1998 Osama Bin Laden declared:

“For over seven years the United States has been occupying the lands of Islam in the holiest of places, the Arabian Peninsula, plundering its riches, dictating to its rulers, humiliating its people, terrorizing its neighbors, and turning its bases in the Peninsula into a spearhead through which to fight the neighboring Muslim peoples. . . .

“The ruling to kill the Americans and their allies — civilians and military — is an individual duty for every Muslim who can do it in any country in which it is possible to do it, in order to liberate the al-Aqsa Mosque and the holy mosque from their grip, and in order for their armies to move out of all the lands of Islam, defeated and unable to threaten any Muslim.”