Of Time and Tides: Canada Doomed to Misery in the Shallows?

Missing the Tide

by Ray Grigg - Shades of Green

There is a tide in the affairs of men,
Which, taken at the flood, leads on to fortune;
Omitted, all the voyage of their life
Is bound in shallows and in miseries.
On such a full sea are we now afloat,
And we must take the current when it serves,
Or lose our ventures.

- William Shakespeare, The Tragedy of Julius Caesar (Act 4, Scene 3, 218-224)

Canada is at a critical juncture in its history. It can either catch the flooding tide of clean, renewable energies presented by the urgent call of circumstances, or it can miss the rising current of opportunity, succumb to being a purveyor of fossil fuels, and thereby spend the “voyage” of its life “bound in shallows and in miseries.”

If the development of Alberta's tar sands, the proposed building of bitumen pipelines and the dream of a liquid natural gas industry are any indications, we seem to be choosing badly. The cause is clear. Whereas historians and philosophers think in decades and centuries, politicians and economists think in months and years. The difference is enormous. And the folly of living with such brief perspectives is becoming sadly evident.

The latest indication of this unfolding tragedy has been highlighted by the third National Climate Assessment Report, an 839-page study issued to the American government by its climate scientists. Unlike the previous two that were suppressed and manipulated during the eight years of the George W. Bush administration, this one has been signed and endorsed by the White House. “The assessment is clear,” declared President Obama on May 6, 2014. “Not only is climate change a problem in the future, it's already affecting Americans, and people's lives are at risk.”

Indeed. Extreme spring storms and tornadoes ripped through Arkansas and Mississippi killing an estimated 35 people. Torrential rains in early May flooded Florida. The airport in Pensacola recorded an astounding 5 inches (127 mm) in just one hour. Then the rain continued for the rest of the day. After more than 1.5 feet fell (457 mm), the deluge rendered the airport's measuring gauges inoperable. The same day, other parts of Florida got more than 2 feet (600 mm) of rain — the exact amount is uncertain because none of these gauges, either, were capable of registering the intensity of the rainfall. Records since 1880 were shattered. Needless to say, flooding was extensive.

Such extreme weather events in the US have become the norm rather than the exception. A succession of bitter storms racked the East Coast during the winter of 2013-14. On the West Coast, California continues to suffering the worst drought of its 160-year history. Wildfires and water shortages are haunting other states. “Hardly a week goes by without Obama announcing more weather-based disaster relief,” writes William Marsden for Postmedia News (The Vancouver Sun, May 8/14).

So, the Report's conclusion: “climate change poses a clear and present danger to every area of the US is simply the official acknowledgement of the obvious.” Almost every aspect of American life, from safety and security to growing crops and oysters is being affected.

America's perspective on greenhouse gas emissions is undergoing a sea-change. This is undoubtedly a factor in postponing approval of the Keystone XL pipeline that would move Alberta's tar sand bitumen to southern US refineries — tar sands emissions are clearly a considered factor in America's energy relationship with its northern trading partner. Canada's appalling history of thwarting international agreements on carbon dioxide reductions, of abandoning its emission agreements, of failing to meet its negotiated reduction targets, and of perpetually delaying constraints on its own emissions is placing it on the wrong side of history.

While Americans are becoming progressively more nervous about the affronts of extreme weather to their health and prosperity, their president and politicians can't help but notice the unhelpful signals coming from Canada's reigning prime minister and his ruling Conservative Party. Their values and strategies are an uncomfortable reminder to Americans of their own unfortunate years under the Bush administration, a dark and regrettable period in their history when critical time and opportunities were lost to an ideology that was both blind and hostile to the precautionary warnings of climate and environmental science.

Americans now look northward and see a Conservative government in Canada that may be even worse that the Republican one they abandoned and are trying to forget — although “repress” may be a more accurate term to describe their response to the impact of the Bush administration on their collective psyche. Americans see in Canada an even more hostile response to climate science and scientists, an even more suppressive reduction in foundational environmental research, an even more methodical subversion and abandonment of carefully developed conservation policies, and an even more blinkered preference for ideology over evidence. The blatant and corrupting connections between government policies and the fossil fuel industries that warped American thinking are just as evident and constricting in Canada as they were in the United States — Prime Minister Harper is as tightly bound to Alberta crude as President Bush was to Texas oil.

Americans, of course, will make the decisions that are best for their own interests. But climate change blurs borders. Canada's carbon dioxide emissions will contribute to the extreme weather in such states as Florida, Arkansas, Mississippi and California. As America becomes progressively more concerned about its own environmental health, it will judge Canada's errant policies accordingly.

These policies are now moving in opposite directions. While the American government is becoming more environmentally conscientious, the Canadian government is defining itself as an environmental pariah, a outcast that is thwarting efforts to address the largest, most complex and dangerous threat to ever confront human civilization. The flooding tide of environmental awareness is raising consciousness and redirecting the destiny of many nations. But Canada is not one of them. As it steers in a contrary direction, it is missing opportunities, bewildering friends, deserting co-operation and straining important alliances. The farce would be comical if it weren't the prelude to tragedy.

Sustainable Surrender: Not Giving Up the Ghost

When Surrender Means Not Giving Up: The New Sacred Activism

by Carolyn Baker  -  Shift Network Sustainability Showcase

There is nothing to do
And nowhere to go.
Accepting this,
We can do everything
And go everywhere.

~Mark Nepo~

A few weeks ago Andrew Harvey and I recorded a conversation between us on the topic of how to live in the face of catastrophic climate change. We made this recording in the context of other conversations about the need for a “new Sacred Activism” that is informed and updated by the dire realities of runaway climate change and near-term human extinction. [While the focus of this article is not on the science of climate change, the reader will find some of the most recent and ominous research on climate change below.*]

Recently, I’ve noticed some longtime activist voices verbalizing a new perspective and one that some would label as “defeatist.” Writing in his “How To Save The World Blog,” Dave Pollard recently offered a piece entitled “In Defense Of Inaction,” in which he states:

No one is in control. The enemy, if there is one, is not a cabal of elites, but a set of co-dependent collapsing systems that every one of us has a vested interest in trying (insanely) to perpetuate. Systems we have all helped co-create and are almost all dependent on…The question we must each ask ourselves, I think, is this: If we acknowledge that our systems and hence our civilization cannot be reformed or ‘saved’, what can we do now that will make a real difference, for the future, in our communities and for those we love?…The insanely rational answer to this question, I think, is (a) probably nothing, and (b) it’s too early to know.

Subsequently, Wen Stephenson’s “Let This Be The Last Earth Day,”in The Nation Magazine pleads:


End the dishonesty, the deception. Stop lying to yourselves, and to your children. Stop pretending that the crisis can be “solved,” that the planet can be “saved,” that business more-or-less as usual—what progressives and environmentalists have been doing for forty-odd years and more—is morally or intellectually tenable. Let go of the pretense that “environmentalism” as we know it—virtuous green consumerism, affluent low-carbon localism, head-in-the-sand conservationism, feel-good greenwashed capitalism—comes anywhere near the radical response our situation requires… The question is not whether we’re going to “stop” global warming, or “solve” the climate crisis; it is whether humanity will act quickly and decisively enough now to save civilization itself—in any form worth saving. Whether any kind of stable, humane and just future—any kind of just society—is still possible.

Isn’t this just giving up, or giving in? The pathetic whining of defeatists? How can any respectable activist utter these words?

I argue that, in fact, the perspectives articulated by Pollard and Stephenson are utterances of concession, but also of extraordinary courage. The word I choose to describe their perspective is surrender. But isn’t surrender synonymous with “giving up”? Aren’t Pollard and Stephenson really suggesting that we abandon the struggle, acquiesce, go back to business as usual, eat, drink, be merry, or possibly take our own lives?

What can we do?

In my recent article, “What Does It Mean To ‘Do Something’ About Climate Change?”I noted that, ‘Doing something’ implies that developed nations of the world and the fossil fuel industry will come together and:

1) Agree that climate change is actually happening;

2) Understand that the situation is so dire that humanity’s living arrangements must be radically altered;

3) Sacrifice their economic security and industrial profits to significantly reduce carbon emissions;

4) Agree to the reality of climate change and the altering of their living arrangements in time to prevent another 2 degree C rise in temperature.”

I then asked the reader what they genuinely, realistically thought can be done about catastrophic climate change, particularly in the face of more than 30 self-reinforcing feedback loops that are proving the process unstoppable and irreversible.

I believe that what both Pollard and Stephenson may be echoing is a third perspective that Andrew Harvey and I are naming “the New Sacred Activism.” That is to say that the fundamental issue is that we are being challenged to move beyond the triumphalist assumption that we can and must, through our activism, defeat capitalism, catastrophic climate change, economic corruption and collapse, and yes, the extinction of species, including our own. Indeed, our current predicament compels us to transcend the binary inference that if we do not conquer a diabolical system, we are only colluding with it and exhibiting shameful cowardice.

Contrary to our cherished assumption of vanquishing all forms of injustice, we must ask ourselves if we are willing to put love into action even if we don’t physically survive. The extremity of the crisis does not limit Sacred Activism, but rather expands it because we make ourselves available to 1) Bearing witness to the likely irreversible horrors of climate chaos and 2) Commitment to compassionate service to all living beings who suffer with us. This requires unwavering engagement with serving the earth community and practicing good manners toward all species in order to make their demise, and ours, easier. Taking one’s own life or succumbing to escapist self-medication is easy. Commitment to a life of service and fortifying one’s own connection with the sacred, thus deepening one’s sense of meaning and purpose, constitute a far more daunting and painful path.

Very often people who receive a terminal medical diagnosis report that while the announcement was heartbreaking, terrifying, and profoundly unfair, they experienced a certain kind of liberation in the process. Learning that they had only a limited time to live altered every aspect of their lives, particularly their quality of life, their decisions about how they wanted to engage with the remainder of their days, and their relationships with everyone and everything. Similarly, the reward of accepting the reality of near-term extinction is liberating even at the same time that it is agonizing. Something far more meaningful and momentous beyond our own physical survival becomes available to us.

The Hero Archetype

Human consciousness is deeply influenced by personal and cultural archetypes or universal themes of which we may or may not be aware. A few examples of archetypes are: mother, father, hero, savior, martyr, warrior, maiden, crone, healer, and many more. If we are not aware of the archetypes that influence us, we may unconsciously live them out in both creative and destructive ways.

Mythologist Joseph Campbell wrote and taught more about the hero archetype than perhaps anyone in modern times. Campbell simply defined the hero/heroine as “someone who has given his or her life to something bigger than oneself.” According to Campbell, the hero’s task is threefold: separation, initiation, and return. He/she usually experiences some sort of unusual circumstances at birth; sustains a traumatic wound; acquires a special weapon that only he/she can use; proves him/herself by way of some sort of quest or journey through which he/she is forever changed. The hero’s journey is one of death, rebirth, and transformation on which he/she embarks for the wellbeing of the community. Meanwhile, it is the hero, as well as the community who is transformed.

The pitfalls along the journey are many, but one of the most common – and also the most injurious to the hero and the community – is to become inflated with one’s heroic mission. One’s passionate commitment to the journey makes avoidance of this particular snare exceedingly difficult. Along the way, the hero may find him/herself becoming inflated but can always choose to pause, reflect upon the purpose of the journey and “something bigger” which compelled the hero to begin the journey in the first place. This is an opportunity to surrender to the ultimate purpose of the journey and the spiritual forces that motivated and support the hero. In all of mythology, the ultimate purpose is the transformation of consciousness, both one’s own and that of the community. In mythology, failure to surrender to the larger purpose of the journey guarantees the hero’s demise.

In Greek mythology the hero was always aware of the seduction of thinking himself equal to or wiser than the gods. Whenever heroes succumbed to this temptation, they began plummeting toward their demise. Perhaps the most famous example of the inflated hero is Icarus who, determined to soar, flew too close to the sun whereby his wings, which were made of wax, began melting, and he fell into the sea. Whether the wax wings of Icarus or the vulnerable heel of Achilles, the fundamental lesson with which all Greek mythological heroes were confronted was their human limitation and the consequences of forgetting those.

The hero symbolizes courage and sometimes appears as a warrior as well, but whether hero or warrior, courage is one of his/her stellar characteristics. One lesson the hero/warrior must learn is when to fight relentlessly and when to exercise restraint or surrender, for whatever reason, to the dilemma with which he/she is confronted. The Shambhala Warrior, for example, receives training in fighting spiritual rather than physical battles. Discernment regarding restraint or full-on combat is pivotal, and at all times the warrior must examine the heart and will. He/she does not continue fighting at all costs simply because “that is what warriors do.” Rather, the spiritual warrior considers whether or not it is time to stop fighting altogether or whether it may be time to change strategy. Fighting may not mean “winning” in the heroic sense, but rather, fighting for reasons that surpass even one’s survival.

As we confront catastrophic climate change which is likely to result in near-term human extinction, we must ask if we are willing to put love into action, even if we don’t survive. Can we move beyond a triumphalist agenda? Accepting the possibility of near-term extinction is an agony, but an agony that liberates the spiritual warrior in the powers of truth and love in order to discover the diamond hidden in the darkness that cannot be discovered in relentless fighting in order to “overcome.” The diamond can only be acquired by surrendering the need for anyone or anything to survive, even oneself. In the words of Andrew Harvey this is “a glorious and terrible adventure, but it is the antidote to despair.”

What we need now is not heroic victory but, again in Andrew’s words, an “astringent maturity,” an entirely new level of adulthood that acts in ways that bring forth optimum joy, optimum healing, and optimum beauty which will leave seeds for whatever life might remain as most species on the planet face their demise. The sacred inspiration we require results not from false hope or finding solutions, but from a state of active being in which we voluntarily enroll in radical psychological and spiritual training. If we haven’t registered for this psycho-spiritual apprenticeship, then we will persevere in our triumphalist agenda and inadvertently perpetuate despair.

Grief and the new Sacred Activism

Of paramount importance in the new Sacred Activism is regular, conscious grief work. Unless activists mourn, they can easily be consumed with the fires of passion because their psyches are not tempered with the waters of grief. Conscious grieving is an integral aspect of the “astringent maturity” we develop as we balance hero/warrior courage with discerning acceptance of our predicament. In his marvelous book Entering The Healing Ground: Grief, Ritual, And The Soul Of The World,Francis Weller states:

Grief is the work of mature men and women. It is our responsibility to be available to this emotion and offer it back to our struggling world. The gift of grief is the affirmation of life and of our intimacy with the world. It is risky to stay open and vulnerable in a culture increasingly dedicated to death, but without our willingness to stand witness through the power of our grief, we will not be able to stem the hemorrhaging of our communities, the senseless destruction of ecologies or the basic tyranny of monotonous existence…Grief is…a powerful form of soul activism. If we refuse or neglect the responsibility for drinking the tears of the world, her losses and deaths cease to be registered by the ones meant to be the receptors of that information. It is our job to feel the losses and mourn them. It is our job to openly grieve for the loss of wetlands, the destruction of forest systems, the decay of whale populations, the erosion of soil, and on and on. We know the litany of loss, but we have collectively neglected our emotional response to this emptying of our world. We need to see and participate in grief rituals in every part of this country.

Members of the Dagara Tribe of West Africa for hundreds of years have practiced regular grief rituals because they believe that both the earth and the community need periodic releases of grief. Without doing so, they say, the heart becomes and remains hard, and this becomes toxic for the community. Always a community versus a private ritual, the Dagara experience that grieving together solidifies the community and makes conflict resolution less problematic and complicated. As a result of the community grieving together, members of the tribe also experience something that Westerners might not expect, namely, a deepening of joy. In Entering The Healing Ground, Francis Weller shares his conversation with a Dagara woman immediately following a grief ritual. The woman displayed a radiant smile and seemed to exude joy from every pore. When he asked her how she could be so happy after engaging in a grief ritual, she replied, “I’m so happy because I cry all the time.” Her response, it seems, echoes the profound words of William Blake: “The deeper the sorrow, the greater the joy.”

Artist, educator, author, and activist Ann Amberg offers online classes in the powers of the universe and “how we can embrace a bio-spiritual, planetary species identity, inclusive of and embedded in the entire earth community.” Of our current catastrophic climate crisis she writes:

…we must be willing to mature and grow into our place of wholeness as a species in which we invite the earth and universe to inform our identity and to place constraints on our behavior. One evolutionary capacity might be learning to embrace “what time it is” –to partner with loss [my emphasis]–the acceptance that we are actually in an extinction phase and rapidly approaching the end point. To help us understand this destruction, we can recall what the cosmos does: the supernova that has been fusing for billions of years suddenly implodes. We don’t see it coming! It is hard for us to digest the deep ecological truth that the universe is our referent for what it means to be human, that technology will not save us….

Upon first reading Amberg’s statement, I was captivated by the phrase to partner with loss. Indeed, that is the crux of the new Sacred Activism. In partnering with loss, we open a door to unfathomable intimacy with the universe—a relationship that has the capacity to profoundly alter our very identity as consciously self-aware humans. It is one thing to struggle to save the earth, yet quite another matter to feel oneself inextricably connected with it in every cell of the body.

The Personal Perils of Heroic Activism

Recently, I have been personally shaken by the death of my longtime activist colleague and friend, Mike Ruppert. After decades of political struggle and physical health challenges, Mike took his own life on April 13, 2014. Literally thousands of people attribute their awakening to our planetary predicament to Mike’s efforts. The legacy he left for us is enormous, yet everyone close to Mike witnessed his reckless abuse of the body and the emotional wounding which ravaged his psyche and finally led to his suicide. As with many activists, Mike was only capable of surrender by terminating his physical life. While on the one hand, he had every right to choose that path, I believe that his demise is a cautionary tale against heroic activism.

Heroic activism, and particularly activism in which we do not grieve, invariably leads to burnout and compromised bodies and psyches. Rather than being self-indulgent, self-care, including grieving, is a spiritual practice that honors the corporeal container permeated by the sacred for the purpose of advancing its work.

Lean into the Anthropocene

At the website Welcome To The Anthropocene, this relatively new concept is explained:

Every living thing affects its surroundings. But humanity is now influencing every aspect of the Earth on a scale akin to the great forces of nature.

There are now so many of us, using so many resources, that we’re disrupting the grand cycles of biology, chemistry and geology by which elements like carbon and nitrogen circulate between land, sea and atmosphere. We’re changing the way water moves around the globe as never before. Almost all the planet’s ecosystems bear the marks of our presence.

Our species’ whole recorded history has taken place in the geological period called the Holocene – the brief interval stretching back 10,000 years. But our collective actions have brought us into uncharted territory. A growing number of scientists think we’ve entered a new geological epoch that needs a new name – the Anthropocene.

At the very least, humans are changing the chemistry of the planet. At worst, we are rendering it uninhabitable.

At first blush it may seem that the extraordinary quality of intimacy with the earth of which I have spoken would compel us to fight to our last breath to save it. When the heart is entwined with another living being, is not surrender to the demise of the beloved out of the question? Indeed, we stand in awe of earth warriors such as Julia Butterfly Hill, Edward Abbey, and Derrick Jensen who have devoted their lives to defending and protecting our planet. Yet as with a terminally ill beloved human, we must now realistically assess our capacity to spare our own species and thousands of others from near-term extinction. The heroic option of martyrdom for the Earth is indeed a viable one. So also is a conscious consent to admit ourselves to planetary hospice as Zhiwa Woodbury so beautifully and brilliantly articulates in his recent article “Planetary Hospice: Rebirthing Planet Earth.”

Woodbury, an environmental attorney and a practicing Buddhist states that:

“The Great Anthropocentric Extinction is upon us ….Sober consideration of the current, cascading evidence leads to the inescapable conclusion that life as we have come to know it is, quite simply, at an end.” At the conclusion of several pages of analysis of humanity’s unwillingness to meaningfully address and attempt to reverse climate change, Woodbury concludes that “Our situation is regrettably, terminal.”

On the one hand, the mental health profession should have a significant role in preparing us to face our demise, but it is ill-equipped to do so. Eco-psychology, however, “is reinventing psychology by including ‘the psychological processes that tie us to the world or separate us from it’ in a more holistic vision of the human psyche (Buzzell & Chalquist, 2009, p. 17) that views humans and the world we inhabit as inextricably bound together….So from an eco-psychological viewpoint, the question now becomes what is the role of mental health professionals in preparing society for the end of life as we know it?”

The hospice model can be applied with the perspective that the coming catastrophe does not have to result in widespread fear, panic, dread, or hostility. As I have noted in a number of articles such as Preparing For Near-Term Extinction; Fukushima And Catastrophic Climate Change: The Earth Community In Hospice, andHospice Is A Busy Place,12 many people in hospice report that it was the most meaningful time of their lives. For them it provided sacred space in which to reflect deeply upon their lives—to evaluate relationships that were enriching; to make amends and restitution with respect to some relationships that were difficult and painful; to provide service to others in their hospice environment; and to prepare mindfully and reverently for death.

In this regard, Woodbury concludes:

“If we are able to apply the same principles at a societal scale, then ecopsychologists and planetary thanatologists can become the kinds of spiritual midwives that will be needed to transform the planetary death/rebirth process from a painful dislocation rife with suffering and regret into a healing process for both the human race and the Earth itself — even into a Great Awakening.”

Additionally, Woodbury applies Kubler-Ross’s Five Stages of Grief to The Great Dying/Great Awakening. In fact, the author reminds us, we are facing not only the possibility of near-term human extinction in the larger context of our planetary predicament, but also a plethora of endings on a smaller scale in terms of the limits of economic growth, energy depletion, and the end of life as we have known it in a variety of venues. Whatever our ultimate fate as a species, the fundamental assumption that progress is an infinite phenomenon to which humans are exceptionally entitled is unraveling at dizzying speed as human consumption is now literallyconsuming life on earth. Our spiritually puerile affirmations such as “Every day and in every way, everything is getting better and better,” must be supplanted, not by “Every day and in every way, everything is getting worse and worse,” but by a seasoned spiritual equanimity that wisely surrenders to whatever appears at the door of experience—a perspective so beautifully articulated by Rumi’s marvelous “Guest House” poem:

This being human is a guest house. Every morning a new arrival.
A joy, a depression, a meanness, some momentary awareness comes as an unexpected visitor.

Welcome and entertain them all! Even if they are a crowd of sorrows, who violently sweep your house empty of its furniture, still, treat each guest honorably. He may be clearing you out for some new delight.

The dark thought, the shame, the malice. meet them at the door laughing and invite them in.

Be grateful for whatever comes. because each has been sent as a guide from beyond.

The Great Dying cannot be practiced in isolation. Never before have humans required loving community to the extent that we do now. For as Woodbury notes, “… planetary hospice workers will be linked by a transmission of intention – the intention to be spiritual midwives for the rebirth of planet Earth. Just as the hospice movement today relies heavily on trained volunteers, so will planetary hospice rely heavily on the efforts of any and all who share the vision of the Great Dying as the dark night of collective humanity’s soul, and who are equally committed to ushering the human race through this difficult ‘night sea journey’ – during which ‘the sun sinks into the sea only to be devoured by the water monster – into the dawning light of a new day’.” (Washburn, The Ego and The Dynamic Ground,1995, p. 21).

Giving up, becoming defeatist? Is this the essence of the New Sacred Activism? Indeed it is not. Rather, as Woodbury notes, we must open to the “dark night of collective humanity’s soul” and live as if every act, every task performed in daily life, every kindness expressed to another being and to oneself might be the last. This is one way I stay connected with the light in dark times. Walking in reverence, living contemplatively with gratitude, generosity, compassion, service, and an open heart that is willing to be broken over and over again. I do not always live the way I want to live. It’s a practice, and practice never makes perfect. Practice only makes practice, and if I think it’s perfect, I’m not practicing. Nevertheless, I’d rather stumble in the dark, finding an occasional candle to light the way, than become blinded by incandescent heroism. And so in this time of unprecedented darkness, find the light whenever possible, but most importantly, be the light for someone else who may not be as familiar with the darkness as you are—and be willing to admit yourself to planetary hospice at the same time that you commit to being a hospice worker for the earth community. That may be why you came here, and that is the New Sacred Activism.

*The Science of Catastrophic Climate Change
Dr. Michael Mann, Pennsylvania State University, Climate Research Website
http://www.meteo.psu.edu/holocene/public_html/Mann/index.php
Skeptical Science: “Alarming New Study Makes Today’s Climate Change More Comparable To Earth’s Worst Mass Extinction”
http://www.skepticalscience.com/Lee-commentary-on-Burgess-et-al-PNAS-Permian-Dating.html
Thom Hartmann Interviews Dr. Guy McPherson on Conversations With Great Minds, April 6, 2014
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G1GyIohx-tU
“Geo-Engineering Ineffective Against Climate Change”
http://www.livescience.com/43654-geoengineering-ineffective-against-climate- change.html
Time Magazine, “Humanity’s Future Depends On Mission To Mars,”
http://time.com/76178/nasa-chief-humanitys-future-depends-on-mission-to-mars/
Arctic News: “Arctic Methane Impact,” Sam Carana, November 28, 2013
http://arctic-news.blogspot.com/2013/11/arctic-methane-impact.html
Arctic News: “A Runaway Greenhouse Event,” John Davies, September 20, 2013 http://arctic-news.blogspot.co.nz/2013/09/a-runaway-greenhouse-event.html
Louise Leakey, TED Talk, “Is The Human Race In Danger Of Becoming Extinct Soon?” Huffington Post, July 5, 2013
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/louise-leakey/human-extinction_b_3543036.html

Big Oil Ignores Washington, Keeps a Hand in Russia

Exxon, BP Defy White House; Extend Partnership with Russia

by Nick Cunningham - Oilprice.com

Several of the largest oil companies in the world are doubling down in Russia despite moves by the West to isolate Russia and its economy. ExxonMobil and BP separately signed agreements with Rosneft – Russia’s state-owned oil company – to extend and deepen their relationships for energy exploration. The U.S. slapped sanctions on Rosneft’s CEO Igor Sechin in late April, freezing his assets and preventing him from obtaining visas.

However, the sanctions do not extend to Rosneft itself, allowing western companies to continue to do business with the Russian oil giant. ExxonMobil signed an agreement with Rosneft, extending its partnership to build a liquefied natural gas (LNG) terminal on Russia’s pacific coast. Known as the Far East LNG project, the export terminal will receive natural gas from Russia’s eastern fields as well as from Sakhalin-1, an island off Russia’s east coast. Rosneft announced the deal in a press release on its website on May 23.

The following day, Rosneft and BP signed an agreement to jointly explore oil in the Volga-Urals region. It will consist of a pilot project in the Domanik formations, and if successful could lead to the development of shale oil in Russia. Rosneft will maintain a 51 percent ownership of the joint venture and BP will own 49 percent.

The signing of the agreement occurred during a ceremony at the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum. The oil majors attended despite pressure from the White House to boycott the event. Many big name companies chose not to attend even though they have large economic interests in Russia, including PepsiCo, German companies E.ON and Siemens, and some of the biggest banks in the U.S.

By defying the White House, the oil majors salvaged what would have otherwise been an embarrassing event for the Kremlin. The absence of the world’s largest companies would have demonstrated Russia’s increasing isolation. Instead, Russia used the event to detail plans to expand its massive energy sector. “(They're) eager to continue work on projects in Russia,” Russia’s Energy Minister Alexander Novak said of ExxonMobil and Royal Dutch Shell.

BP CEO Bob Dudley emphasized his company’s determination to stick with Russia. “We are very pleased to be a part of Russian energy complex,” he said at the forum. “President (Putin) has urged us today to invest into shale oil... There's so many natural resources in Russia, the openness and partnerships Russia has with companies from all over the world is a good thing for energy,” Dudley added.

Even though there are international sanctions on Rosneft’s Igor Sechin, Dudley insisted that their business with Rosneft will continue. “It does not affect our cooperation with the company itself,” Dudley said, referring to sanctions on Rosneft’s boss. He was even able to meet Sechin privately.

French oil giant Total S.A. also signed an agreement with Lukoil – Russia’s second largest oil company – to explore for shale oil and gas. Total’s chief executive Christophe de Margerie also went to lengths to reassure the Russian hosts. “My message to Russia is simple – business as usual,” he said at the event.

To be clear, the oil companies are not legally running afoul of international sanctions. But their collective shrug in the face of European and American pressure to boycott Russia – along with the $400 billion natural gas deal Russia signed with China last week – illustrates the difficulty with which the West will have at undermining Russia’s energy sector, if it chose to do so. Russia is too big of a prize for the likes of ExxonMobil, BP, and Shell.

Or viewed another way, the moves to deepen business in Russia suggest that the world’s biggest oil companies are confident that the U.S. and Europe won’t be so bold as to truly attack Russia’s energy machine.

Talking with Syria's Diaspora

Meeting Syrians in Lebanon

by Eva Bartlett - In Gaza

In Lebanon for a few days (turned weeks), arranging a new Syria visa. The pleasant young hotel employee who also helps out at the shop across the street, where I get my water, shyly asks me, “May I ask you a question?” Sure. “You’ve got a Palestine necklace, a Syria bracelet… where are you from?”

When I tell him I love both countries, he says proudly “ana min Souria,” (I’m from Syria).

The Western media’s allegations go that Syrians in Syrian simply say they support President Bashar al-Assad because they are afraid to say otherwise. I don’t buy it. But my encounters with Syrians outside of Syria further convince me.

He replies to my very simple question “What do you want for Syria?” with the standard “Inno Syria raja mittle man kan ‘abl,” (that Syria is like it was before). Since I don’t want to make assumptions on what he perceives the cause of the strife to be, I ask, “with the President?”

“Akiid, of course with him,” he replies.

I breach taboo and ask what his religion is (people don’t do that in Syria, it’s largely not discussed, and most Syrians I’ve met will say “I’m Syrian” when I ask that question, and I ask the question not to play the sectarian card but to know and show that among supporters of President Assad are Syrians of all backgrounds, faiths, ages.). He’s Muslim, Druze.

I ask my usual “is this a revolution?” He tsks, lifting his chin up in the Arab nod no, and says, “Many Syrians are not wealthy, some of them have been bought off, paid-off to participate.”

*****

Another night we take a walk to Beirut’s Corniche, the seaside walkway filled with joggers, walkers, lovers, fishers. An older man sits playing an ‘oud rigged up to a speaker. He wears a conical red hat and is singing some love ballad. “He’s from Haleb (Aleppo),” my new friend tells me. I ask how he knows. “From his clothing, and the song is a Haleb song.”

We stop into a shop for water, my friend saying to the shop-keeper “mesa al-hrir,” (good evening). After a few courtesies, he asks the owner, “where are you from?” Sweida, same as my friend. Turns out they know each-others’ families. “I knew it from the moment you said good evening, knew you were from Sweida,” the shop-keeper says. Then the usual back-and-forth, “there’s no charge for the water,” and “la, haram,” (no way, I’m paying) for about 5 minutes before he pays and we leave.

He tells me about the area his from, in the mountains and agricultural. “People are very poor there, but everyone is hospitable. If you come to someone’s house, they’ll feed you and you’ll sleep over. You’ll see, come to our village, everyone will insist that you visit and stay with them (which of course I experienced in Palestine as well).”

Returning to the hotel we stop at a petrol station where some of his friends work. From Sweida. I’m introduced, he mentions I’m heading back to Syria. “Beiti beitek,” the younger guy says, my house is your house. “Come stay at our house,” as though he’d heard our conversation of 10 minutes ago.

We near the hotel and get stuck between an oncoming car and a man pushing a food cart uphill. He graciously apologizes, we apologize and step off to the side. My friend recognizes his dialect and asks, where are you from? Sweida. They comment on mutual friends for a minute, then the man says, “I want to serve you some food, drink, what do you want.” I decline at first, but he keeps offering, so I take him up on the foul, the boiled broad beans seasoned with salt, cumin, chili and fresh lemons. They chat for a while and the man readies to continue uphill. The discussion between who will pay ensues, my friend wins out with the logic, “If I were in your house, I’d accept your hospitality. We’re in the street. Take my money.”

We duck into his uncle’s shop to sit down. His uncle is of course from Sweida, as are a number of men in and outside the shop. More beiti beiteks.


*****

In the corner store where I’ve been buying groceries the past few days, the cheerful guy who bags the groceries–he’s always teasing the regular customers, always with a smile and great personality–turns out to be Syrian. He notices my wristband today and his smile gets brighter. But he jokes, “Are you with Bashar or with the ‘revolution’?” The inflection on the last word mocks it, revealing which side he is on. “I’m with the people of Syria,” I say. “If you want Bashar, that’s your choice. But I’m not with the armed ‘rebels’,” I say, using the same inflection he’d used for ‘revolution’.

We chat a while, the Lebanese cashier joins in, so I ask if she’s Syrian. “No, but I love Syria.”

This charming young man carries himself with the same dignity I’ve seen already in Syria, and with those I’ve met here, and in occupied Palestine. What is it about being screwed over that makes one dignified? It’s like a theme…

The waiter in the breakfast lobby, he too is Syrian. He’s been working here for a while, and goes back every few months or so to Deir Zror. He hasn’t fled because of the situation, he came here for work. He asks what my hurry is to get back to Syria. “I came here to learn about Syria and share what I see and what Syrians tell me,” I reply. “Besides, it so nice there, you Syrians are so damn nice!”

“It’s heaven there,” he says.

*****

Another of the employees is from Deir Zror. “Fi mishekels honak, Da’ash,” he says. “There are problems there, ISIS is there.” ISIS and al-Qaeda groups are fighting there, he says. And the army is fighting against all of the armed groups.

He’s worried about his wife and kids. What can he do? Can’t afford to bring them to Beirut, is worried for their safety there. “They just stay in the home all of the time,” he says. But that even that won’t guarantee their safety.

*****

At breakfast one morning, still waiting for my visa application to be processed, I sit working on my laptop. A man keeps glancing my way, and finally comes over to say he likes the Syrian bracelet I wear. We get talking. He’s Syrian, from Aleppo. At the end of our talk, he says again how happy it made him to see me wearing this bracelet… and adds, “I can’t wear my Syrian flag here because there are so many stupid people, they might kidnap me or worse. I’m not afraid of my government, but I am afraid of these thugs.”

Below is our conversation. 

 

*****

The Aleppo man isn’t the only Syrian here to tell me he can’t wear his Syria bracelet. A seriously cheerful employee at a maneish (flatbread Lebanese version of pizza [forgive my rough approximation!]) and pastries (stuffed with spinach) stand calls me habib-gelbi (habib=love, gelbi=my heart) when he sees my Syria wrist-band. He particularly wants a Hands Off Syria wristband, which I will try to get to him. But, he notes, he can’t wear it at work. Why? My boss won’t let me.

*****

Disturbing, there is racism towards, well, many people in Lebanon. Not to the tourists, but towards Palestinians, Syrians, hired-maids from various countries. This is well-documented, although–of course–not all Lebanese are such (and in the south I didn’t see many hired maids, and there was a lot more brotherly/sisterly will). My Sweida friend talks about this one day. He works in a hotel, and also–without pay–minds his uncle’s simple shop. In fact, he’s given up his own personal life to better that of his family: in Syria these days, because of this nonsense manufactured war and crises, and the sanctions, and the insurgents’ looting of factories, and so many more things… life is more expensive than it used to be. He came here not to flee the fighting, but to support his brother’s university studies… to become a doctor. He, himself, was on the road to being an engineer. But he’s put everything on hold, works two jobs, helps whoever comes into his shop with a graciousness not often seen, never complains, and is on top of all of this subjected to classist racism from some Lebanese who deem him inferior.

His dream was to be a mathematics prof, but while he is intelligent, he was one percentile below those required to entry. So he studied engineering instead. “But my dream was to teach math,” he said.

One day, he’s busy tutoring two Syrian teens who are poor in math. He’s doing it balesh, without pay, because he wants to help and loves math. A hotel manager walks into his uncle’s shop where he is tutoring, scoffs at him and snarks something like, “do you even know anything, how can you teach?”

He endures belittling comments like this all the time. “What can I do, I need to work, so I nod and say, okay,” he says, making a mouth-zipped motion. But in that instance, his already straight back straightened and he told the man, “I am educated, I am an engineer. I’m working in the hotel because I have no money. But don’t think that this defines who I am.”

The man slinked away, and later apologized to him, saying, “I had no idea.” He apparently calls my friend ya Professor now.

But that slight happy ending aside, the racism is discouraging. Recent news reports that Palestinians fleeing Syria, from wherever, are not to be allowed into Lebanon.

“When they had their civil war, many Lebanese fled to Syria. We opened our doors to them. We fed them and wouldn’t take money,” my friend says. “But now that we are suffering, no one helps Syrians in Lebanon, they are treated like dirt.”

In general, I agree, from what I’ve seen on the streets and heard. But that said, a caveat, twice while walking I’ve seen Lebanese stop and give money to the Syrian women with children camped on the sidewalks daily.

*****

Biding my time, waiting for paperwork to be done, I end up in a place north of Beirut, with a very generous friend who gives me a room for 5 days. Near some of Lebanon’s wonders, I visit Jeita Grotto, Jbeil (Byblos), and the cable-car leading up to the hilltop where –in the Middle East–the largest statue of Mary resides. I’m more interested in the scenery, and lovely scenery it is. Coming down from the hill, a thin older man with a pleasant face stops my car and opens the door. We start chatting immediately, I think it began with him detecting my ajnerbia intonation. “Where are you from?” he asks. I reply and ask him the same. Syria. I knew it, from his presence, his humility and dignity. I know this sounds a bit repetitive, but walahi come here and meet these people, and you too will be repeating yourself: they are kind, dignified, humble, intelligent, know what the US/NATO/Zios have planned for them…

We chat a bit. He is also from Halab (Aleppo), has been working here for years, not because of the manufactured war. But because of the situation, he’s recently brought his wife and kids here. I ask my usual simple questions: “What’s the problem? What do you think of the President?”

He replies–noting that he is speaking his mind, isn’t afraid to do so–that he will vote for President Assad . “I’m with him. Before all of this we were safe and had few problems.”

I ask the taboo question again, for the sake of clarity, and he replies “I’m Sunni Muslim, but in Syria it’s not important what religion you are.”

He’s Sunni. Bashar al-Assad is Alawi. The Western media has made MUCH of the so-called Alawi devotees to President Assad. But in my experience, in Syria and out, Syrians across the board support Assad. It just depends if they’ve been corrupted by NED/Soros or other funds or whether they’ve been seduced by the Wahabi, Takfiri notion of raping, desecrating, destroying Syria for greater pleasures in a promised hereafter.

****

In a village near the Chouf Cedar Reserve, I come across another Syrian who has left because of the armed gangs in Aleppo. He’s a talented woodworker, and one evening stops by the hotel to have a cup of warm milk. I’ve already had a coffee (he saw me in the street earlier and invited me to his employer’s house for coffee), and a instant-coffee-milk mixture (everyone calls it Nescafe, whether its Nestle or not) with the guesthouse manager while talking Syria, but “Ibrahim” keeps insisting he buy me a coffee, something.

He shows me photos of his handiwork–lovely wood furniture, cupboards, intricate ceiling decor. I ask if this is what he did for work in Syria. “I had my own shop, but its been destroyed. Our house was destroyed, too.” I ask when he’ll go back. “I can’t go back, the ‘rebels’ are there, I can’t get back.”

“Halab helua, ahlan mekkan. Aleppo is beautiful, the most beautiful place,” he says.

We look at online photos of Aleppo.

“See how beautiful it is!” He points out the landmarks, repeating himself, Halab helua.

The Umayyad mosque, a castle, a hotel which he says is one of the oldest in the world…

“Bas kharaboo. But they’ve destroyed it all. Here, our house is here…. but it’s destroyed. The most beautiful place n the world.”

All this is said in the same soft voice, not a trace of anger or bitterness, just sadness, longing.

Big Fossil Targets 3rd World for Smokin' Consumption Growth

Let Them Eat Carbon: Like Big Tobacco, Big Energy Targets the Developing World for Future Profits

by Michael T. Klare  - TomDispatch

In the 1980s, encountering regulatory restrictions and public resistance to smoking in the United States, the giant tobacco companies came up with a particularly effective strategy for sustaining their profit levels: sell more cigarettes in the developing world, where demand was strong and anti-tobacco regulation weak or nonexistent. Now, the giant energy companies are taking a page from Big Tobacco’s playbook.

As concern over climate change begins to lower the demand for fossil fuels in the United States and Europe, they are accelerating their sales to developing nations, where demand is strong and climate-control measures weak or nonexistent. That this will produce a colossal increase in climate-altering carbon emissions troubles them no more than the global spurt in smoking-related illnesses troubled the tobacco companies.

The tobacco industry’s shift from rich, developed nations to low- and middle-income countries has been well documented.

“With tobacco use declining in wealthier countries, tobacco companies are spending tens of billions of dollars a year on advertising, marketing, and sponsorship, much of it to increase sales in... developing countries,” the New York Times noted in a 2008 editorial.

To boost their sales, outfits like Philip Morris International and British American Tobacco also brought their legal and financial clout to bear to block the implementation of anti-smoking regulations in such places. “They’re using litigation to threaten low- and middle-income countries,” Dr. Douglas Bettcher, head of the Tobacco Free Initiative of the World Health Organization (WHO), told the Times.

The fossil fuel companies -- producers of oil, coal, and natural gas -- are similarly expanding their operations in low- and middle-income countries where ensuring the growth of energy supplies is considered more critical than preventing climate catastrophe. “There is a clear long-run shift in energy growth from the OECD [Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, the club of rich nations] to the non-OECD,” oil giant BP noted in its Energy Outlook report for 2014. “Virtually all (95%) of the projected growth [in energy consumption] is in the non-OECD,” it added, using the polite new term for what used to be called the Third World.

Tomgram: Michael Klare, What's Big Energy Smoking?

[Note for TomDispatch Readers: We're back, post-Memorial Day, and I just wanted to remind those of you who have already contributed $100 (or more) to this site for our newest Dispatch Book, Rebecca Solnit's Men Explain Things to Me, that the author is on the road until early June, so your signed copies won't go out until then. In the meantime, though, I can offer our thanks. Without your donations, we simply wouldn't be operating. They're that crucial. In fact, any of you who meant to get a signed, personalized copy of Men Explain Things to Me (and it is spectacular!) in return for a contribution but haven't done so yet, click right over to our donation page and check out the offer for that or other remarkable books. Tom]

“The industry’s position was that there was no ‘proof’ that tobacco was bad, and they fostered that position by manufacturing a ‘debate,’ convincing the mass media that responsible journalists had an obligation to present ‘both sides’ of it.” Using a handful of scientists as their expert witnesses, the major tobacco companies also denied the science linking cigarette smoking and cancer and claimed that anti-tobacco findings were driven by a political agenda. Using publicity outfits, think tanks, and those “objective” scientists in their pay or thrall, they put their money where their mouths were and financed a massive campaign of what, in retrospect, can only be called disinformation on the effects of tobacco smoking on human health. In this way, they created the doubt and debate they wanted, successfully postponing a reckoning for their industry for years.

Sound familiar today? It should. As Naomi Oreskes and Erik Conway documented in their classic book Merchants of Doubt, the seeding of doubt into the cigarette controversy proved a brilliant move. The two authors call it “the tobacco strategy.” It was so successful for the cigarette companies that it would be imitated and replicated in similar encounters over acid rain, the ozone hole, and finally global warming, a “debate” still ongoing and, as Oreskes and Conway make clear, with the same tiny cast of doubting scientists, who have moved conveniently from one issue to the next (without themselves doing original work), ending up in league with the fossil fuel industry. It’s quite a tale of men representing whole industries who have ended up repeatedly on the wrong side of science. On the effects of tobacco, acid rain, and the chemicals that were destroying the ozone layer, they were notoriously wrong and yet, for the industries that supported them, notoriously right. It’s clear enough how the fourth of these “debates” on climate change will be decided. The question is only when -- and on that question hangs human health on a global scale.

In the meantime, Big Energy has never stopped learning from Big Tobacco’s successes. As TomDispatch regular Michael Klare, the author of The Race for What’s Left, reveals today, they are once again adapting and exploiting the latest tobacco strategy in a new and devastating way. It couldn’t be a more shameful tale and no one has told it -- until now. Tom 

Let Them Eat Carbon: Like Big Tobacco, Big Energy Targets the Developing World for Future Profits

by Michael T. Klare

As in the case of cigarette sales, the stepped-up delivery of fossil fuels to developing countries is doubly harmful. Their targeting by Big Tobacco has produced a sharp rise in smoking-related illnesses among the poor in places where health systems are particularly ill equipped for those in need. “If current trends continue,” the WHO reported in 2011, “by 2030 tobacco will kill more than 8 million people worldwide each year, with 80% of these premature deaths among people living in low- and middle-income countries.” In a similar fashion, an increase in carbon sales to such nations will help produce more intense storms and longer, more devastating droughts in places that are least prepared to withstand or cope with climate change’s perils.

The energy industry’s growing emphasis on sales to these particularly vulnerable lands is evident in the strategic planning of ExxonMobil, the largest privately owned oil company. “By 2040, the world’s population is projected to grow to approximately 8.8 billion people,” Exxon noted in its 2013 financial report to stockholders. “As economies and populations grow, and living standards improve for billions of people, the need for energy will continue to rise... This demand increase is expected to be concentrated in developing countries.”

This assessment, explained Exxon CEO Rex Tillerson, will govern the company’s marketing plans in the years ahead. “The global business environment continues to provide a mix of challenges and opportunities,” he told financial analysts at the New York Stock Exchange in March 2013. While the demand for energy in the developed economies “remains relatively flat,” he noted, “energy demand for the economies of the non-OECD countries is expected to grow about 65% to support anticipated growth.”

In recognition of this trend, Exxon has undertaken a wide variety of initiatives intended to boost its sales capacity in China, Southeast Asia, and other rapidly developing areas. In Singapore, for example, the company is expanding a refinery and petrochemical facility that make up its “largest integrated manufacturing site in the world.” The refinery is being modified to produce more diesel, so as to better service the growing fleets of trucks, buses, and other heavy vehicles in the region. Meanwhile, the hydrocarbon processing facility at the chemical plant is being doubled to meet the rising demand for petrochemicals used in making plastics and other consumer goods, especially in China. (“China alone is expected to represent over half of global demand growth” for these products, Tillerson observed last year.)

To promote its products in China, Exxon has established a “strategic alliance” with the China Petroleum and Chemical Corporation (Sinopec), one of China’s state-owned energy giants. A key goal of the alliance is the establishment of an “integrated world-scale refinery and petrochemical complex” in eastern China which, Exxon officials noted, is to “become a major marketer of petrochemicals throughout China and petroleum products throughout Fujian Province.” A major component of this joint effort, the Fujian Refining and Ethylene Integrated Project, came on line in September 2009.

Exxon is also expanding its capacity to supply liquefied natural gas (LNG) to Asia. In partnership with Qatar Petroleum, it has built the world’s largest LNG export facility at Ras Laffan in Qatar and is building a mammoth LNG operation in Papua New Guinea. This $19 billion project, which began operation in April, includes a 430-mile pipeline to deliver gas from the island’s interior highlands to an export terminal near Port Moresby, the capital. “The project is optimally located to serve growing Asia markets where LNG demand is expected to rise by approximately 165% between 2010 and 2025,” said Neil W. Duffin, president of ExxonMobil Development Company.

Next on the company’s agenda is a plan to draw on the natural gas being extracted in ever greater quantities from domestic shale formations in the United States via hydro-fracking and convert it into LNG for export to Asia. Although various American politicians have been pushing the strategic export of such supplies to Europe to “rescue” that continent from its reliance on Russian gas, Exxon has other ideas. It sees Asia, where gas prices are higher, as the natural market for its LNG -- and U.S. foreign policy be damned. “By exporting natural gas,” Tillerson told the Asia Society in June 2013, “the United States could shore up the energy security of Asian allies and trading partners and stimulate investment in American domestic production.”

Big Energy’s “Humanitarian” Mission

In promoting such policies, Exxon’s executives are careful to acknowledge that growing concerns over climate change are generating increased resistance to fossil fuel consumption in Europe and other First World areas. When it comes to the rest of the planet, however, such concerns, they claim, should be outweighed by a “humanitarian” impulse to provide cheap fossil energy to poor people. Drawing on the arguments of Danish environmental renegade Bjørn Lomborg, author of The Skeptical Environmentalist, they argue that tending to the needs of the poor constitutes a greater priority than curbing global warming. “We must also recognize that there is a humanitarian imperative to meeting these growing global energy needs,” Tillerson typically asserted in 2013.

Asked why global warming shouldn’t be of greater concern, the Exxon CEO parroted Lomberg’s anti-environmental perspective. “I think there are much more pressing priorities that we... need to deal with,” Tillerson told the Council on Foreign Relations in June 2012. “There are still hundreds of millions, billions of people living in abject poverty around the world. They need electricity... They need fuel to cook their food on that's not animal dung... They'd love to burn fossil fuels because their quality of life would rise immeasurably, and their quality of health and the health of their children and their future would rise immeasurably. You'd save millions upon millions of lives by making fossil fuels more available to a lot of the part of the world that doesn't have it.”

Although the leaders of the other giant energy firms, including BP, Chevron, and Royal Dutch Shell, are less outspoken than Tillerson, they are pursuing a similar marketing strategy. “Demand growth [for petroleum products] comes exclusively from rapidly growing non-OECD economies,” BP noted in its recent report on the global energy outlook. “China, India, and the Middle East account for nearly all of the net global increase.” Like ExxonMobil, BP and the others are hard at work expanding their capacity to sell fossil fuels in these growing markets.

Nor are only the oil and gas companies pursuing this strategy. So is Big Coal. With coal demand declining in the U.S., thanks to the growing availability of low-cost natural gas generated by fracking, the coal firms are shipping ever more of their American output to Asia, which will contribute significantly to increasingly the carbon emissions there. According to the Energy Information Administration (EIA) of the Department of Energy, U.S. coal exports to China rose from essentially zero in 2007 to 10 million tons in 2012. Exports to India increased from 1.5 million to seven million tons and to South Korea from virtually nothing to nine million. Exports to just these three countries jumped by more than 1,000% during these years.

The EIA summarized the situation this way: “Companies in key parts of the U.S. coal supply chain -- both producers and railways -- have increased sales to Asia because of rising Asian coal demand, overall strong export prices, and lower U.S. consumption of coal to produce electric power.” Looked at from another perspective, diminished carbon emissions from coal in the United States -- much touted by President Obama in his embrace of natural gas -- has no significance when it comes to climate change, because of the greeenhouse gases being produced when all that coal is consumed in Asia.

To increase sales yet more, the giant coal companies are promoting the construction of new shipping terminals on the West Coast, including two each in Oregon and Washington State. The largest of these, the Gateway Pacific Terminal near Bellingham, Washington, will handle up to 48 million metric tons of coal a year, most of it destined for China and other Asian countries.

Although the terminals are often promoted by local officials as sources of new jobs, they are sparking fierce opposition from community activists and Native Americans who view them as posing a severe threat to the environment. Claiming that coal dust and spills from trains and loading facilities will harm fishing sites they deem vital, members of the Lumni tribe are citing longstanding treaty rights in their efforts to block the Cherry Point Terminal, one of the planned Washington State facilities.

In the Pacific Northwest, opposition to the coal terminals and the rail lines that will be so crucial to their operation -- some of which will traverse Indian reservations and pass through green-minded cities like Seattle -- is gaining strength. The process has been similar to the way climate activists mobilized against the Keystone XL pipeline that, if built, is slated to bring carbon-dense tar sands from Canada to the U.S. Gulf Coast. But the coal companies and their allies are pushing back, insisting that their exports are essential to the country’s economic vitality. “Unless the ports are built on the West Coast,” said Jason Hayes, a spokesman for the American Coal Council, U.S. suppliers won’t be viewed as “reliable business partners” in Asia.

Although community and tribal opposition may succeed in blocking or delaying a terminal or two, most analysts believe that, in the end, several will be built. “There are two billion people in Asia who need more power, so eventually more U.S. coal will get onto global markets,” says Matt Preston, an analyst for the energy consultancy firm of Wood Mackenzie.

Perpetuating the Fossil Fuel Era

In the end, all these efforts to boost fossil fuel sales in Asia and other developing areas will have one unmistakable result: a sharp rise in global carbon emissions, with most of the growth in non-OECD countries. According to the EIA, between 2010 and 2040 world carbon dioxide emissions from energy use -- the main source of greenhouse gases -- will rise by 46%, from 31.2 billion metric tons to 45.5 billion. Little of this increase will officially be generated by the planet’s wealthiest countries, where energy demand is stagnant and tougher rules on carbon emissions are being put in place. Instead, almost all of the growth of CO2 in the atmosphere -- 94% of it -- will be sloughed off on the developing world, even if a significant part of those emissions will come from the combustion of U.S. fossil fuel exports.

In the view of most scientists, an increase of carbon emissions on this scale will almost certainly lead to a global temperature rise of at least four degrees centigrade and possibly more by the end of this century. That’s enough to ensure that the changes we are already seeing, including severe droughts, stronger storms, raging wildfires, and rising sea levels, will be eclipsed by exponentially greater perils in the future.

Everyone will share in the pain from such warming-induced catastrophes. But people in developing lands -- especially the poorest among them -- will suffer more, because the societies they live in are least prepared to cope with severe catastrophes. “Climate-related hazards exacerbate other [socioeconomic] stressors, often with negative outcomes for livelihoods, especially for people living in poverty,” the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change observed in its most recent assessment of what global warming will mean for planet Earth. “Climate-related hazards affect poor people’s lives directly, through impacts on livelihoods, reduction in crop yields, or destruction of homes, and indirectly through, for example, increased food prices and food insecurity.”

Certainly, the giant fossil fuel companies bear a moral, if not as yet in our society a legal, responsibility for the intensification of climate change and the lack of serious response to it. Beyond this, their carefully planned strategy of selling carbon products to those most at risk can only be viewed as outright immorality. Just as health officials now condemn Big Tobacco’s emphasis on cigarette sales to poor people in countries with inadequate health systems, so someday Big Energy’s new “smoking” habit will be deemed a massive threat to human survival.

Above all, Big Energy is insuring that one small ray of good news when it comes to climate change -- the contracting use of coal, oil, and gas across the developed world -- will prove meaningless. The economic incentive to sell fossil fuels to developing countries is undeniably powerful. The need for increased energy in developing countries is no less indisputable. In the long run, the only way to meet these needs without endangering our global future would be through a mammoth drive to expand renewable energy options there, not by shoving carbon products down their throats. Rex Tillerson and his cohorts will continue to claim that they are performing a “humanitarian” service with their new “tobacco” strategy. Instead, they are actually perpetuating the fossil fuel era and helping to create a future humanitarian catastrophe of apocalyptic dimensions.

Michael T. Klare, a TomDispatch regular, is a professor of peace and world security studies at Hampshire College and the author, most recently, of The Race for What’s Left. A documentary movie version of his book Blood and Oil is available from the Media Education Foundation.

Follow TomDispatch on Twitter and join us on Facebook and Tumblr. Check out the newest Dispatch Book, Rebecca Solnit's Men Explain Things to Me.

Copyright 2014 Michael Klare

Syrian Election Continues Amid Terror Attacks

Upcoming Elections Are Important - Here's Why

by Eva Bartlett - In Gaza

The Syrian army is not only defending the country and the Syrian people, but fighting against terrorism, imported sectarianism, and for the rights of Syrians to live as they did before this concocted crisis began: in safety.

Even now, as the elections near and rallies in support of the elections and President Assad are occurring all over Syria, the terrorist-”rebels” are shelling the rallies, killing people who are genuinely supporting democratic efforts (vs the propagandized “democracy-bringing ‘rebels’”).

May 26, 2014, Daily Mail:

British jihadists make up the largest foreign contingent of one of the most violent terrorist groups in Syria, now infamous for beheading, crucifying and stoning to death enemies.

Syrian rebel commander Brigadier-General Abdulellah al-Basheer has urged the UK to send weapons to help fight Sunni Islamist group The Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS).

Almost two out of three of ISIS’ fighters are foreign-born and have chosen to join a group bent on creating an Islamic state in the war-torn country and Iraq.

The group is so extreme that it has even been denounced by Al Qaeda.

Lilly Martin, living in Latakia, Syria the past 20+ years, wrote:

Some media have dropped the term civil war, and instead use the term ‘sectarian war’. They try to incorrectly compare the Sunni-Shia divisions we have seen in Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, and Iraq to Syria. Syria is not a Sunni-Shia clash. Syria is 18 different sects. The terrorists in Syria have burnt as many Sunni mosques as churches. The terrorists in Syria have burnt as many Korans as Bibles. It is true that the only sect that had a militia was the Sunni sect, that of the Free Syrian Army, but the men fighting the FSA daily were not exclusively Shites, and were not in a militia; they were Sunni members of the Syrian Arab Army, as well as their fellow soldiers from all 18 sects. The Syrian Arab Army has never been an Alowi army, and has never represented one of the 18 sects exclusively.

Syria has 23 million people and they are from 18 religious sects. The Sunni Muslim sect is the largest at about 60%. Most of the current Presidential cabinet of ministers is from the Sunni sect. The current Parliament, which was voted on by general election during this crisis, is a very mixed group, with the Sunni sect well represented. Syria is a secular government, and the only secular government in the Middle East. After 40 years of socialist and secular type of government, the topic and labels of sects is disgusting to most Syrians. To the broad and educated mind, those are trivial matters that are only focused on by foreign governments, who are secular as well, or monarchies.

The Syrian opposition, SNC, located in Istanbul, Turkey, was founded by Muslim Brotherhood leaders for the purpose of regime change in Syria. The members are mainly followers of radical Islam, which is not a sect but is a political ideology, in direct opposition to both secular ideology and democratic ideology.

The Syrian citizens, who have not been living in Paris, Riyadh, and London for the last 30 years, find the SNC repugnant and out of touch with Syrian society or political views. This is why most of the Syrian public has never followed or supported the SNC. The SNC is supported and followed by western governments and their Arab allies who don’t care what the Syrian public wants.

Articles:

• Syria: Free and Fair Elections Despite Western Sabotage, May 23, NSNBC
• A Tale of Two Elections: Syria, Ukraine, and the West’s Double Take on Democracy, May 21, 2014, Oriental Review
• Rebel shelling kills Assad supporters at Daraa campaign rally, May 23, 2014, al Akhbar
• Syrian elections: democratic reform threatens western ‘regime change’ agenda, May 16, 2014, Tim Anderson
• Syrian update prior to Presidential election, May 3, 2014, Lilly Martin, OpEd News
• Nusra says behind Homs suicide attack, May 26, 2014, al Akhbar
• Harakat Hazm: America’s new favorite jihadist group, May 22, 2014, al Akhbar
• ISIS Destroys 3000 Year-old Assyrian Artifacts in Syria, May 17, 2014, Aina News
• Syrian rebels cut off water to Aleppo in botched attack on regime areas – and manage to create shortage in their own strongholds, May 12, 2014, The Independent
• Nusra Front cuts off water supply to both halves of Aleppo, May 11, 2014, The National
• Syria: Light at the End of the Tunnel, May 16, 2014, New Eastern Outlook
• The Criminal Record of the Head of the Syrian National Coalition, Feb 9, 2014, New Eastern Outlook
• America Has Switched Sides: Now Backs Al Qaeda and Nazis, May 10, 2014, Washington’s Blog
• Latakia captives speak out about their ordeal, others still missing, May 8, 2014, al Akhbar

 

Photos from Sana News:Syrians erupting in 

enthusiasm as election date approaches, May 25, 2014

 

Tartous

Safita

Lattakia

PetroChina's Corruption Problems

China’s Oil Giant At Center Of Corruption Probe

by Ky Krauthamer - Oilprice.com

Grins were on the faces of China National Petroleum executives this week as they celebrated a blockbuster 30-year deal for Russian gas. It was a good day for CNPC, the state-owned colossus at the center of China’s oil and gas webs and one of Eurasia’s biggest energy investors.

For some, however, those grins could soon turn to grimaces, because the deal comes against a backdrop of a series of high profile corruption investigations by the state, and CNPC has been caught in the dragnet. A former CNPC chairman is currently under investigation and a top executive of CNPC subsidiary PetroChina has just been arrested.

They are two of the biggest suspects in a spiraling drive against corruption that has become a hallmark of President Xi Jinping’s rule.

The crackdown on executives at some of China’s largest companies is yet more proof, if anyone needed it, that the Xi administration takes the latest anti-graft drive very seriously indeed.

But behind the arrests and investigations, some China watchers see signs of internal strife at the highest levels of the ruling Communist Party.

The list of energy execs under scrutiny by the national corruption fighting bureau, officially known by the Orwellian title, “Central Discipline Inspection Commission,” is getting longer every week. One of the biggest fish was netted in September, when officials announced that CNPC’s former chairman Jiang Jiemin was under investigation. Jiang also chaired CNPC’s PetroChina subsidiary (ranked 6th on the Fortune Global 500 list), before his March 2013 move to head the state-owned Assets Supervision and Administration Commission.

 Other prominent figures swept up by the state include:

• Bo Qiliang, PetroChina vice president in charge of CNPC’s overseas business, detained on or around May 13;
• Zhang Benquan, general manager of CNPC’s Iran subsidiary, detained in April;
• Yan Cunzhang, general manager of PetroChina’s foreign cooperation department, detained in April;
• Li Hualin, former CNPC deputy general manager, reportedly a target of a Communist Party corruption probe;
• Wang Daofu, former PetroChina chief geologist, under investigation along with Ran Xinquan, former general manager at PetroChina subsidiary Changqing Oilfield Co.;
• Sun Weidong, former deputy manager of PetroChina subsidiary Yumen Oilfield Co., under investigation;
• Yang Guoling, assistant general manager and senior accountant at Yumen Oilfield Co., indicted for corruption; Three top executives at CNPC supplier Sichuan Star Cable reportedly disappeared in July 2013 and another either fell or jumped to her death in September.

CNPC-linked companies are not the only energy and resources companies caught up in the crackdown.
The former chairman and another former executive of China Resources Holdings Co. (233rd on the Fortune 500 list), are under investigation, as are several top executives at various geology and fuel companies. Zhu Changlin, head of North China operations at the State Grid (7th on the Fortune list), is under investigation, along with several managers at regional power operators.

Jiang and several others of those named have been linked to Zhou Yongkang, one of China’s most powerful men until Xi’s advent, which has led some observers to suspect the net is tightening around Zhou, a former CNPC chairman and national security chief, who dropped out of sight last year.

The corruption probes into former CNPC deputy general manager Li Hualin and Ji Wenlin, a former regional vice-governor who reportedly cut deals with CNPC, “are among several believed to be part of an unprecedented probe into Zhou,” the South China Morning Post wrote earlier this year.

If – and this is a big if – Zhou is formally charged, he would be one of the most senior Communist Party higher-ups ever prosecuted since the Communists came to power in 1949.

In a related story, the South China Morning Post described how Zhou used the CNPC as a springboard to political power in the 1990s, which eventually saw him appointed to the supreme Politburo Standing Committee. There, he chaired the Political and Legal Affairs Committee (PLAC), which controlled police and security forces and the judiciary until some of its functions were transferred to the new State Security Committee, which was set up by the anti-corruption crusading Xi.

Zhou retired in 2012, but the activities that reportedly amassed billions for him and his family apparently came under scrutiny upon Xi’s accession to the presidency in 2013.

Apart from rumors, nothing has been heard of him for months, and his name is taboo in official media, as BBC China editor Carrie Gracie noted on her blog.

Some sources claim he is under house arrest. But no one knows for sure, and those that do aren’t talking.

Rousing Europe's Precariot: EU Elections Shocker? Not Entirely

The Workless Class Woke Up

by Gilad Atzmon

The undeniable surge in the support for Euro Sceptics and right wing parties in yesterday’s European Parliament election, suggests that the European working class, isn’t as apathetic as the Zionised Left wants it to be.

The nationalist, patriotic and anti-immigration parties took the lead all over Europe last night. In France, Marine Le Pen’s National Front pushed the shameless Socialist Party into third place. In Britain the situation was similar. Nigel Farage’s UKIP has taken the lead and is now a major player in British politics.

While the British conservatives were quick to react, advocating that immigration policy be reviewed and amended, the Left and its crony media expressed shock at the rise of the “far Right” and “Nazis.” Once again it is painful, but not surprising to witness the Left’s detachment from the working class.

French PM Valls who recently used every available tool to harass hugely popular black comedian Dieudonne in order to appease the French Jewish Lobby (CRIF), announced last night that the election results represented “a political earthquake in France.’ But can a popular vote on such a vast scale be an earthquake, a surprise or a shock? Not really, a moment of truth or epiphany is a better description of the political shift. However, the Left’s evident surprise exposes the depth of its detachment from society and is tragically symptomatic of contemporary left thinking and politics.

This state of alienation is easily understood. Advocacy of liberal immigration policies in the West has been supported for the last few decades by both Left and Jewish progressive institutions. The reasons are clear. The progressive Jew tends to believe that a multi ethnic and fragmented society made up of multiple identities, is ‘good for the Jews.’ In such circumstances, Jews are merely one ethnicity among many. Open immigration also weakens the host nation. Jews, who have been subject to animosity and hostility throughout their history, understand that weakening the cohesive bond of their host nations is an effective strategy to protect Jews.

The contemporary Left also invests in weakening society by means of fragmentation. It generally understood that the working classes often ally themselves with nationalist and patriotic ideologies. The British lower class, for instance, is far more excited these days by the Union Jack and the Queen than the remote possibility of a ‘communist revolution’ ahead. For the Left, therefore, the migrant communities provide an oxygen supply that helps to counter Working Class cohesiveness. Support from immigrants also conveys an image of a bond between the Left and working people. However, as we learned yesterday, such an agenda puts the Left in clear conflict with indigenous people and especially with the deprived underclass.

Considering their mutual interest in ID politics and immigration, it is natural that Left and Progressive institutions are maintained by funding from Jewish lobbies. When Tony Blair led Britain into a criminal war, the Zionist Lord ‘cashpoint Levy, was his chief fundraiser with help from the LFI (Labour Friends Of Israel). In France, the so-called ‘socialist’ government is more Zionist than Netanyahu’s government. But it goes further. Nick Clegg, the leader of the British Liberal Democrats, who was demolished in yesterday’s election, aired a desperate SOS call to the Jewish world in the week before the election. The short-sighted Liberal Democrat announced his full support for the Jewish manifesto for the European Parliament. He was evidently hoping that some rich Jews would be kind enough to bail him out. He was obviously wrong. I guess the Jewish financers are slightly more sophisticated. Yesterday the British voters sent Nick Clegg home. The third British party is on the verge of eradication.

George Soros and his Open Society Institute provide us with a spectacular view into the alliance between Jewish tribal interests and Left and Progressive politics. Soros, a funder of the Zionist light J Street, is the de facto funder of most Left and progressive institutions around the world. Soros invests a portion of his wealth in ID politics, pro immigration groups and even some Palestinians NGOs and you may ask why? Simple, he is a kind philanthropic person who supports a lot of very good causes that are also ‘good for the Jews.’ And, as mentioned above, a multiplicity of identities, ethnicities and a fragmented society is indeed very good for the Jews.

The EU Parliamentary election results sent a clear warning to the Left and I hope that there is someone within the Left who is still capable of reacting and actually addressing the needs of the people. The election also delivers a clear warning to Jewish and Zionist lobbies. The situation in Europe is reaching a boiling point.

I am an immigrant myself. I love living in Britain, I want Britain to be strong and productive. I want my kids to enjoy the best of British education. For many years I was regarded by the Left as a symbol of multi-culturalism, but that was never my goal. I have no interest in imposing my culture or ethnicity on others. I use my art as a means of communication. I believe that beauty is the medium as well as the message.

I live in London, one of the most diverse cities in the world. In my city a lot of people from many places live in peace practicing their religions and celebrating their identities. We do not need The Guardian of Zion, the Labour Party or the Jewish lobby to teach us tolerance. We do not need a Zionist organisation to monitor our speech or ‘correct’ our ‘politics. Instead the Left needs to reinstate its commitment to the working people, to labour, education and health. And in order to do so, the Left must first emancipate itself from its Zionist leadership and its Jerusalemite attitude.



The Wandering Who? A Study Of Jewish Identity
politics and Jewish Power in particular