Gorilla Radio with Chris Cook, Dan Lewis, Walter M. Brasch, Janine Bandcroft February 17, 2016

This Week on GR

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

Last summer, First Nations activists turned around the installation of a new salmon farm in Clayoquot Sound, and while that battle won is a victory worth celebrating, it's not nearly the end, nor even the beginning of the end of the war to reclaim the Sound's environmental integrity for Wild Salmon.

Clayoquot Action has been taking local action to save Clayoquot Sound's magnificent natural environment for years. It recently broadened its scope, taking a trip to Norway, Ground Zero of the international salmon farming industry, to speak directly to both representatives of that industry, and the Norwegian people.

Listen. Hear.

Dan Lewis joined Clayoquot Action's Bonny Glambeck and John Rampanen from the Ahousaht and Kelsemaht First Nations as members of the Wild Salmon Delegation to Norway, and she's back in Canada now with exciting news from her travels to the other side.

Dan Lewis in the first half.

And; despite its pernicious impact on local environments, the fracking industry, or LNG as its known in these parts, has proven as resilient as pacific salmon, returning again and again despite the odds against it. In BC, neither international market disinterest, nor environmental logic can kill it; and it seems the will of the people too is incapable of deterring an industry no-one wants around. Recent events within the Cowichan Valley attest to "LNG's" deleterious effects on democracy, while the provincial government's embarrassing budget inclusion yesterday of its so-called 'Prosperity Fund,' (promised to be predicated upon "LNG" royalties) lends an "Emperor's New Clothes" element to an industry that hasn't yet, and may never, materialize here. Talk about "natural gas"!

Walter M. Brasch is an award-winning newspaper reporter and editor, syndicated columnist, broadcaster, educator, activist, and prolific author whose book titles include: 'Before the First Snow,' 'America's Unpatriotic Acts,' 'Sex and the Single Beer Can,' 'The Press and the State,' 'Social Foundations of Mass Media.' His latest book, 'Fracking Pennsylvania: Flirting with Disaster' is a detailed investigation of that industry, and what its activity means for the people and landscapes where it takes place.

Walter M. Brasch and fracking America in the second half.

And; Victoria Street Newz publisher emeritus and CFUV Radio broadcaster, Janine Bandcroft will join us at the bottom of the hour to bring us news of the coming week from our city's street, and beyond there too. But first, Bonny Glambeck and a salmon farming sea change beginning.

Chris Cook hosts Gorilla Radio, airing live every Wednesday, 1-2pm 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/

G-Radio is dedicated to social justice, the environment, community, and providing a forum for people and issues not covered in the corporate media.

The Death of Democracy: Anatomy of a Mega-Project's Local "Approval" Process

CVRD Chair Lefebure and CAO Brian Carruthers Scrambling To Discredit Boards Unanimous Motion Opposing LNG Facilities At Bamberton

by Don Maroc - Cowichan Conversations

February 15th, 2016

Near the end of the February 10, meeting of the Cowichan Regional District Board (CVRD), Cowichan Bay Director Lori Iannidinardo put forth a motion that the Board advise Steelhead LNG that the CVRD is opposed to any LNG facility being located at Bamberton or anywhere else in the regional district.
She added simply, “this is not where it belongs.”

Don Maroc

 
Veteran Duncan Councillor Sharon Jackson said a majority of the Duncan City Council agrees with Iannidinardo’s opposition to building the LNG on Saanich Inlet or elsewhere in the Cowichan area. 

Sharon Jackson

Rob Douglas, representing the Municipality of North Cowichan, feels we would be setting up a very dangerous conflict with ferries plying the restricted Gulf Islands channels. He suggested exporting LNG is against the spirit of the recent Paris agreement on climate change, and added fossil fuel use “should be wound down, not ramped up.”


Shawnigan Lake’s Director Sonia Furstenau pointed to the CVRD strategic plan which requires a reduction in green house gases (GHG) in response to climate change, which means an LNG facility is not in the future of this area.

Rob Douglas


Aaron Stone, Mayor of Ladysmith, said while his community was quite a distance from the proposed site at Bamberton they are part of the regional district and the entire area should work together.

The mayor also felt that pipelines are a big part of the resistance to the LNG facility.

 

Sonia Furstenau 

Long time CVRD Director from North Oyster Mary Marcotte joined her collegue from Cowichan Bay, saying simply, “It’s not right place.”


Board Chair Jon Lefebure, Mayor of North Cowichan, after making sure there were no others wishing to speak to the issue called for a vote.

Aaron Stone

It went quickly and quietly, as the Chair noted there were no opposition votes, 15-0, a unanimous declaration that the government of the CVRD is not interested in an LNG processing and exporting facility. 

Here is the video of the debate

 
That was it for two days, but on Friday the CVRD Board members met with Provincial Environment Minister Mary Polak to discuss dumping polluted soil in a Shawnigan Lake watershed. The meeting was held behind closed doors, even though it did not fit the regulations for in-camera meetings.


After the Minister finished her discussion and left the meeting, Mayor Lefebure said he apologized for having allowed Director Iannidinardo’s LNG motion to come to a vote.

Lori Iannidinardo

He had been advised by staff that they had spoken to Steelhead LNG representatives about a possible application to change the zoning, and that the Board passing a resolution opposing an LNG facility could be illegal.

Director Iannidinardo claims as she was leaving the meeting room Planning Manager Ross Blackwell told her that her motion has put them all on shaky legal grounds, and that the CVRD would have to seek legal advice in case Steelhead LNG tried to take them to court.


Perhaps Blackwell, and his boss CAO Brian Carruthers, are being too sensitive to international agreements like NAFTA (North American Trade Agreement) and its possible successor the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP).

Jon Lefebure

These investment agreements permit corporations to sue Canada before an international tribunal if any level of Canadian government creates laws or regulations that inhibit the corporation in carrying out their permitted activities.
We don’t know what contact or conversations the CVRD staff have had with Steelhead LNG representatives. Neither do the elected CVRD directors.



Steelhead LNG has not made oral or written applications to the CVRD concerning any kind of land use. If Blackwell or Carruthers has knowledge of any formal proposals or applications from Steelhead LNG, as CVRD employees they have a duty to fully inform the elected members of the Board.

Mary Marcotte

Blackwell and Carruthers should also clarify this issue for the voters/taxpayers of the CVRD. On a previous occasion Blackwell informed a public meeting that a CVRD director could not express a position on a proposal that is imminent. Right or wrong he appears to be sticking to his opinion.

The fifteen elected officials who supported Director Iannidinardo’s resolution made clear that at that moment in time in their opinion was that no LNG processing facility should be located in the CVRD territory.

That action does not imply that they are not open to any new information about LNG operations, nor that new facts could cause them to change their votes.

Iannidinardo notes that since he voted in favour of her motion, Youbou Director Klaus Kuhn told her he made a mistake, he did not understand the resoution.

Planning Manager Blackwell has said there are numerous legal precedents supporting his cautions. Asked to provide examples, he did so promptly, but they all occurred after the proponent had made formal application and the councils/boards had taken some action.

Brian Carruthers

For instance, it is well understood that after a required public hearing has been held for any land use change the elected directors are prohibited from seeking additional information.

Regional or municipal staff should not be criticized for giving advice to elected officials, that’s an important part of their job.

In this case those giving the well-meaning advice could clear the air if they would explain, for both the directors and the public who they represent, the basis for their concerns.

Facebook and other social media are probably not the best place to create mutual understanding.

Artists rendering of 1 kilometer long LNG loading facility

-30-

Welcome to Deception Day BC

Tuesday is BC's Annual "Deception Day" (a.k.a. "Budget Day")

by Rafe Mair - Common Sense Canadian

February 14, 2016

This coming Tuesday will be Annual Deception Day in the BC legislature as the Minister of Finance sets forth the budget for the coming year. That it is a deception, perhaps self-deception, can’t be blamed entirely on this government, since it’s been going on, as the lawyers say, since “man’s mind runneth not to the contrary”. Back in WAC Bennett’s days, the “contingent liability” was invented and in one form or another, it is alive and well today.

Balance Schmalance

What is the fault of the current premier is perpetuating the fiction that somehow the budget reflects something of importance. Well, it doesn’t. Twice in the past few days the premier has announced that there will be a balanced budget because “the people expect it.” This tells me that the “balance” bit is not created to reflect the truth but because voters have come to accept that as “very good thing”.

A few rating agencies help perpetuate this myth by declaring that it’s important that a budget is balanced – but it’s not, they know it, they are not telling the truth, and we ought to know that.

To start with, it is merely guesswork as to what the Government will take in and spend next year and the results achieved are likely to bear very little resemblance to the predictions. We don’t have a special day in the legislature where the Minister of Finance stands up and tells us all how he really screwed up and that the result was considerably different than the crap he predicted. And the game is scarcely unique. Surely we all remember the famous “fudge-it budget” from Glen Clark and the later one from Gordon Campbell that was even more atrocious.

British Columbians pay for Hydro’s losses

What’s so deceptive about the budget process is that people believe it reflects the financial health of the province. Well, it comes nowhere near. There is not enough time in an article like this to begin to give the full picture, but let’s just consider BC Hydro.

Early Site C construction (Don Hoffmann)

BC Hydro is a Crown Corporation and its finances are not part of the budget process. Note that well – your elected legislature has no control over and no way of knowing what Hydro does other than what the Liberal-schmoozing media tells them. Hydro does its own thing, subject only to discipline from cabinet, which never happens. Cabinets, being the premiers, would all be in jail if they were directors in the private sector, so egregious has been their neglect.

Every year, BC Hydro incurs an enormous loss, but while that’s none of our legislature’s business, it becomes part of the provincial debt and serviced by the government at huge cost. This means that, far and away, the most expensive part of government, with Site C at 9 billion bucks-plus to come, is paid for by me and thee, including the huge debt it adds annually, completely outside the budget debated and passed by the legislature.

Where the current Liberal government uniquely has a great deal to answer for is the unbelievable burden they placed on Hydro with their political giveaway made to private/Independent Power Producers (IPPs) under Campbell’s Energy Policy of 2003, whereby Hydro must buy all its new power from private companies for at least double the proper cost. Moreover, Hydro must take that power when it’s offered, whether they need it or not. Unhappily, nearly all private power is made during the run-off when Hydro reservoirs are full to overflowing.

IPPs cost British Columbians big time

It’s hard to put a hard cost on the results because all of the agreements are secret – fellow voters, we’re not allowed to know! Moreover, unless you’re an economist, you quickly get dazzled by the figures. One man I have come to respect for thorough and honest analysis, in addition to Erik Andersen, a colleague of The Common Sense Canadian, is Norman Farrell, another CSC colleague, who breaks it down like this:
In fiscal year 2015, BC Hydro purchased 13,377 GWh of electricity from independent power producers for $1,064,000,000 ($79,540 per GWh). In the same period, BC Hydro sold 14,020 GWh to large industrial users for $748,000,000 ($53,250 per GWh).

In other words, each GWh of power purchased from IPPs was resold for $26,290 less that it cost. However, the loss was not limited to $352 million, since the utility had to pay distribution, administration and other overhead costs in addition to the power acquisition price.

See no evil, hear no evil

 

 

 

Budget Day can be fun – if you enjoy shell games

In 2014 the BC provincial debt was $60.693 billion, of which $15.559 billion for is BC Hydro. This means that 1/4 of the debt you and I owe, is totally outside the budget process and none of its anticipated income and expense will be examined by our legislators. Amongst other things, we’ll not learn why Hydro’s debt has risen about $9.4 billion since the Liberals took over, about $3 billion since Christy Clark became premier. We’ll not learn how much the secret deals with private companies (IPPs) have cost, nor a thing about the real cost of the proposed Site C Dam, to name but three areas. The obvious Liberal maxim is “best to keep the tiresome rabble in the dark”.

The budget, which Clark and de Jong tell us is so critical, bears no relation to what really happens, is made up by politicians for politicians with figures to match, and shields BC Hydro the uncontrolled, apparently uncontrollable, and biggest of all fiscal items by far, from any scrutiny.

Some people enjoy being fooled, whether by the carney at the fair, the guy with the shell and two peas or the guy who deals off the bottom of the deck. To them, “Come one! come all!” for next Tuesday is Annual Deception Day in the BC Legislature!

Rafe Mair, LL.B, LL.D (Hon) a B.C. MLA 1975 to 1981, was Minister of Environment from late 1978 through 1979. In 1981 he left politics for Talk Radio becoming recognized as one of B.C.'s pre-eminent journalists. An avid fly fisherman, he took a special interest in Atlantic salmon farms and private power projects as environmental calamities and became a powerful voice in opposition to them. Rafe is the co-founder of The Common Sense Canadian and writes a regular blog at rafeonline.com.

More articles by Rafe Mair

Plan B Syria: American Warmaking Runs Gamet from A to B

The US “Plan B” for Syria and the threat of world war

by Bill Van Auken - WSWS

12 February 2016

Negotiations on Syria’s bloody armed conflict were held in Munich Thursday against the backdrop of a government offensive, supported by Russian airstrikes, to break the grip of Western-backed “rebels” over the largely shattered eastern part of Aleppo.

The talks were convened under the auspices of the 17-member International Syria Support Group, which includes the US and its regional allies—Saudi Arabia, Turkey and Qatar—in the war for regime change in Syria, along with Russia and Iran, which are allied with and actively aiding the government of President Bashar al-Assad.

Washington demanded an immediate cease-fire and halt to Russian airstrikes in Syria. The US, together with the reactionary Arab monarchies and the regime in Turkey, fears that without a halt to the fighting, the Islamist militias that they have supported, financed and armed for nearly five years may face irreparable defeat.

Russia, for its part, reportedly proposed a cease-fire that would begin on March 1, thus allowing enough time for the Syrian government to reestablish its control over Aleppo.

Late Thursday night, US Secretary of State John Kerry and Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov announced that they had reached a tentative deal that would see a ceasefire “within a week” along with expedited humanitarian aid. Kerry allowed that while the agreement looked good “on paper,” it was yet to be tested. All of the underlying conflicts remain unresolved, and both US and Russian military operations are to continue in the name of the struggle against the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS).

On the eve of the Munich talks, Kerry, in an interview with Washington Post columnist David Ignatius, delivered an unmistakable threat in connection with the US negotiating strategy in Munich:

“What we’re doing is testing [Russian and Iranian] seriousness.” he said.

“And if they’re not serious, then there has to be consideration of a Plan B… You can’t just sit there.”

“Plan B” would consist of a sharp escalation of the US military intervention in Syria, carried out under the cover of combating ISIS, but directed at toppling the Assad government.

Saudi Arabia and Qatar have also reportedly spent the last several days discussing a “Plan B” that would involve their participation in direct military intervention to save the “rebels” that they have supported. The Saudi-owned news group al-Arabiya has quoted officials in Riyadh as confirming the House of Saud’s decision to send troops into Syria in what would constitute a provocatively hostile invasion.

Responding to the ominous implications of such an escalation, Russia’s Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev told the German daily Handelsblatt Thursday:

“The Americans and our Arab partners must think hard about this—do they want a permanent war? All sides must be forced to the negotiating table instead of sparking a new world war.”

Medvedev’s choice of words was not mere hyperbole. A military intervention to rescue the “rebels,” which amounts to a war to save Al Qaeda’s Syrian affiliate, the Al Nusra Front, the leading force on the ground in Aleppo province, could quickly bring the US and its allies into combat with Russia, an armed confrontation between the world’s two major nuclear powers.

US officials have spoken in recent days of creating a “humanitarian corridor” to Aleppo and other rebel areas under siege by government forces. Presumably this “corridor” is meant to replace the main supply route for the “rebels” from Turkey, which has been cut off by the government offensive, disrupting the CIA-orchestrated arming of the “rebels” with stockpiles poured in from Libya, the Gulf oil kingdoms and beyond. Such a corridor would require a military force to protect it and enforcement of a “no-fly zone,” meaning a confrontation not only with Syrian government forces, but with Russian warplanes as well.

Turkey, Washington’s NATO ally, is meanwhile blocking its border to Syrian refugees in order to create the maximum crisis possible so that it can pursue its own strategic aims, which include not only regime change in Damascus, but also the bloody suppression of the Kurdish minority on both sides of the frontier.

The Obama administration has issued no warning to the American people that it is embarking on a policy in Syria that could pit the US against the Russian military and potentially trigger a global catastrophe.

There is no significant popular support for US military intervention in Syria, which has been promoted under the false flag of “humanitarianism,” aided by a whole coterie of pseudo-left organizations that have specialized in portraying a bloody sectarian campaign by CIA-backed Islamist militias as a “Syrian revolution.”

The extent of the catastrophe unleashed upon Syria through this intervention was spelled out in shocking terms with the release of a new study by the Syrian Center for Policy Research, which found that fully 11.5 per cent of the population inside Syria has been either killed or injured as a result of the armed conflict. The death toll from the war—combined with the systematic destruction of the country’s social infrastructure and health care system and a dramatic drop in living standards—has caused life expectancy to plummet from 70.5 years in 2010 to an estimated 55.4 years in 2015.

The study found further that the country’s unemployment rate had soared from 14.9 percent in 2011 to 52.9 percent by the end of 2015, and that the overall poverty rate is estimated at 85.2 percent.

In short, the Obama administration has inflicted upon Syria a war that is every bit as criminal and lethal as the war carried out by the Bush administration against Iraq.

The Syrian people are the victims of a US-orchestrated war that is driven by the global strategy of American imperialism to reverse its economic decline through the use or threat of military force. Washington sought regime change in Syria as a means to an end: the weakening of the two principal allies of Damascus, Russia and Iran, and the reassertion of a Western stranglehold on the vast energy resources of the Middle East.

The threat of world war is posed not merely by the prospect of US and Russian warplanes facing off in the skies over Syria, but by the entire logic of the Syrian war for regime change and the broader strategic aims that it serves. This finds expression in NATO’s escalation of the military encirclement of Russia and the increasingly provocative anti-Chinese policy being pursued by the Pentagon in the South China Sea.

The US drive for global hegemony was articulated in the strategic maxim enunciated by the Pentagon nearly a quarter of a century ago that Washington must prevent the emergence of any power capable of challenging the dominance of American capitalism on a global or even regional scale. This “grand strategy” has led to unceasing US wars of aggression since and now poses the real threat of a third, nuclear, world war.

Against this barbaric strategy of the US ruling establishment, the American and international working class must advance its own independent strategy, fighting for the withdrawal of US and all foreign military forces from Syria, Iraq and the entire Middle East and for the unity of the working class across all national, religious and ethnic boundaries in a common struggle to put an end to capitalism, the source of militarism and war.

International Solidarity Movement Appeals for Monitors to Occupied Palestine

ISM calls for internationals to volunteer in Palestine

by International Solidarity Movement

15th February, 2016

Today, Palestinians are facing an enormous amount of pressure in their lives due to the growing violence of Israeli forces. They face restrictions of movement, daily harassment, intimidation and attacks at hands of Israeli occupying forces and extremist settlers. ISM is a Palestinian-led movement; our actions are initiated on the invitation of Palestinians, following their lead and wishes. We, as internationals, are needed to monitor human rights violations and show our support for the popular struggle.

Since the beginning of October, Israeli occupation forces increased their abuse of power by carrying out a series of extrajudicial killings of Palestinians, in a manner that is completely unjustified and, in most cases, constituting crimes of war. Israeli politicians have fueled the motivation to kill Palestinians by making open statements encouraging Israeli citizens to become executioners. In addition, Israeli forces are applying measures of collective punishment towards the families of Palestinians who are killed in this unlawful manner. Over 170 Palestinians have been killed since October, many of them children. On February 14th alone Israeli forces shot dead 5 Palestinians, including 3 children, and critically wounded a 14-year-old girl in al-Khalil.

Israeli forces conducting intimidating military patrol as schoolgirls 

walk down the street in the Old City of al-Khalil

With more volunteers, ISM could more effectively fulfill our commitments to the Palestinian communities we work with, such as walking with schoolchildren and monitoring checkpoints. A larger team also opens up the possibilities of working in more locations and regions where international presence can be useful.

Our presence in Palestine is crucial, because we witness and document what we see and can show the world what is happening on the ground. We do our best to prevent Palestinians from being harassed, and more importantly, we show them we are there in solidarity with them.

In Al-Khalil (Hebron), we need volunteers to walk children to school and monitor checkpoints where students and teachers cross on their way to and from school. Palestinian parents of kindergarten children living in H2 (the area completely controlled by the Israeli military with constant presence of soldiers and settlers) fear to send their children to school without internationals to accompany them. Children in the neighborhoods in H2 routinely face harassment and intimidation from Israeli forces and settlers, and Israeli forces deploy tear gas, stun grenades and rubber-coated metal bullets regularly against schoolchildren at some of the checkpoints ISM monitors.

One of our volunteers walks a group of children to school in al-Khalil

Young schoolboy looks on as Israeli forces body search his teacher 

just outside their school in al-Khalil

In occupied East Jerusalem, many Palestinian families face the constant threat of having their homes demolished by Israeli forces. As a way of showing support and sharing their story, we go to these families to document their situation and report it in the media. In the old city of Jerusalem, some Palestinian families also face eviction, like in the case of grandma Nora; all part of a plan to replace Palestinians in the old city by Israeli settlers. Part of our job is to make sure that these cases don’t stay unknown to the world by reporting them on our website and sharing it on social media.

In Ramallah and its surroundings, we monitor the Friday popular marches. Palestinian popular committees all over the West Bank organize regular demonstrations where ISM is called to participate. We work alongside popular resistance to the occupation, providing international presence and documentation at protests and actions facing attack by Israeli military forces. Sometimes, Palestinians ask us to accompany them to the military court. We attend hearings of their family members or friends in an attempt to show them that they are not alone.

Demonstrators gathered at night around the fire in the ongoing 

protest tent opposing the closed military zone in al-Khalil

 

9-year-old girl being rushed from the scene after Israeli forces shot her 

with live ammunition in the arm during their attack on the weekly 

Friday demonstration in Kafr Qaddum

In Tulkarm and its surroundings, thousands of Palestinians cross the checkpoints everyday to go to work in Israel. The conditions of the crossing are tiring and humiliating for the workers, who arrive several hours before the opening of the gates and have to stand in line in order to be on time for work. Since October, the university of Tulkarm has also been witnessing many violent attacks on campus from the Israeli forces, in which several students were injured with teargas and live ammunition. The ISM team monitors and reports on these Human Rights violations.

A large part of ISM’s work has always involved documenting the violence and impacts of the occupation and the Palestinian struggle against it, working to produce and share media to an international audience to build awareness and global opposition to Israel’s unjust, illegal occupation.

ISM volunteers work amplifying Palestinian voices of resistance while in Palestine and especially after returning to our home countries around the world.

5 children who were forced out of their home in Jerusalem after it was 

demolished; the ISM team met with their family to learn and share their story

When you come to Palestine, try to bring a camera and your laptop if you have one, as both are extremely useful for media work. To plan your trip to the West Bank, please read our traveling information. We ask our volunteers to commit for a minimum of two weeks after completing our two day training, but keep in mind that we always prefer to have volunteers stay for longer periods of time.

Please note that we cannot sponsor people or otherwise facilitate anyone’s entry into Gaza; the information contained here and in our travel and training pages applies to our work in the West Bank and occupied East Jerusalem.

When you decide to come to Palestine to join ISM, or if you have any further questions not covered in our page on joining us in Palestine, please contact palreports@gmail.com or call the phone number for the training coordinator once you have entered Palestine at 059 530 7448

In solidarity,

ISM Team

ISM volunteers raising Palestinian flag in front of the Apartheid wall.

Lies, Damn Lies, and a Bit of Truth at the Republican Debate Slugfest

Republican debate in South Carolina: Lies, mudslinging and an important truth

by Patrick Martin  - WSWS

15 February 2016

The ninth Republican presidential debate of an already interminable primary campaign was another two-hour session of reactionary posturing and mutual mudslinging in which the four leading candidates denounced each other as liars—and were telling the truth when they did so. The debate was held in South Carolina, a week before the February 20 Republican primary. Billionaire demagogue Donald Trump currently leads in state polls, with about one-third of the vote, followed by Texas Senator Ted Cruz, former Florida Governor Jeb Bush and Florida Senator Marco Rubio, in that order.

The smaller field, and the likelihood that the lowest finisher among the four may be pushed out of the race after the South Carolina primary, no doubt contributed to making this debate the most vitriolic so far. The four leading candidates all appealed to the basest prejudices in their television audience, vilifying immigrants and the poor, pledging the military annihilation of opponents of US imperialism and denouncing each other for any deviation from an ultra-right world view.

Thus Rubio and Cruz waged a lengthy argument, each charging the other with being too soft in his attacks on immigrants. Trump declared that Bush was even softer on the issue, which has been the main focus of the billionaire’s campaign, with demands for deportation of all 11 million undocumented immigrants and the building of a wall along the US-Mexico border.

Cruz denounced Trump for his past support for abortion rights and campaign contributions to prominent Democrats, including former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, the frontrunner for the Democratic presidential nomination. Trump has in the past dismissed such donations, to both parties, as the cost of doing business for a wealthy real estate baron.

Trump interrupted Cruz to declare, “You probably are worse than Jeb Bush. You are the single biggest liar,” adding, “This guy will say anything, nasty guy. Now I know why he doesn’t have one endorsement from any of his colleagues.” The two candidates—who had generally praised each other before the first primary contests—traded insults and taunts along these lines for several minutes.

There was only one portion of the debate that deviated from this moronic pattern: when Trump, in the course of an exchange with Jeb Bush over US policy in the Middle East, turned to the issue of the war in Iraq, spearheaded by Bush’s brother, President George W. Bush, in 2003.

“They lied,” Trump said of the Bush administration.

“They said there were weapons of mass destruction and they knew there were none.”

Moderator John Dickerson of CBS News intervened, citing Trump’s comments in 2008 when he expressed surprise that Democratic House Speaker Nancy Pelosi had not tried to impeach Bush after the Democrats took control of Congress in January 2007. “You said, quote: ‘which personally I think would have been a wonderful thing.’ Then you were asked what you meant by that and you said: ‘For the war, for the war, he lied, he got us into the war with lies.’ Do you still believe President Bush should have been impeached?”

Trump hemmed and hawed, repeating his criticism of the war in Iraq and attacking Jeb Bush for defending it, but finally declared, referring to impeachment,

“You do whatever you want. You call it whatever you want. I want to tell you. They lied. They said there were weapons of mass destruction, there were none. And they knew there were none. There were no weapons of mass destruction.”

The sudden and unexpected appearance of an actual political truth in the midst of the Republican debate touched off an uproar, with most of those in the auditorium, drawn from the rival campaigns, booing Trump loudly. All the other Republican presidential hopefuls rushed to defend President Bush, Vice President Richard Cheney, Secretary of State Colin Powell and the other officials responsible for the war.

Trump continued with his denunciation of George W. Bush, rejecting claims that as president, Bush had “kept the country safe,” pointing to the obvious fact that the 9/11 attacks took place while Bush was in the White House, and that the president had ignored warnings from the CIA about the preparations of Al Qaeda for attacks within the United States.

Following the debate, both media pundits and Republican office-holders claimed that Trump’s comments on the Iraq War and the 9/11 attacks were a political disaster for his campaign. Significantly, there was no such reaction to Trump’s racist attacks on Mexican immigrants or his fascistic proposal for an unconstitutional and illegal ban on Muslims entering the United States.

In an appearance on the NBC interview program “Meet the Press” Sunday, only hours after the debate, Trump sought to beat a retreat. Asked by interviewer Chuck Todd whether he still believed that the war in Iraq was an impeachable offense, Trump replied,

“Well, that’s for other people to say. And look, that is for other people to say. I can say this, it may not have been impeachable because it was a mistake.”

When Todd suggested that he was risking his frontrunner position in South Carolina polls by calling President Bush a liar, Trump spluttered, “I didn’t call him a liar. I say—I said, I didn’t call anybody a liar.”

He continued lamely,

“Look, I said maybe, Chuck, I said maybe there were lies. Because look, the weapons of mass destruction, they said they existed, and they didn’t exist… There were no weapons of mass destruction. Now, was it a lie? I don’t know.”

There is little doubt the billionaire has been informed, directly or indirectly, that his brief exercise in truth-telling is not looked on favorably by the US military-intelligence apparatus.

Where's the Bears? Left Out of the Great Bear Rainforest Agreement

Bears Left Out of the Great Bear Rainforest Agreement

by Doug Neasloss, Brian Falconer and Chris Genovali - Raincoast Conservation

For those of you celebrating Premier Christy Clark’s announcement declaring “the end of commercial trophy hunting” in the Great Bear Rainforest, you can put away the champagne. While the announcement by the premier and Minister Steve Thomson essentially endorses the effort to buy out commercial trophy hunting businesses, undertaken by Raincoast Conservation Foundation and Coastal First Nations (CFN) several years ago, it commits no direct support, nor does it address trophy hunting by BC residents which accounts for 60% of the grizzly kill in the Great Bear Rainforest and in the rest of province.

The province has still not recognized the ban on trophy hunting imposed by CFN and will continue to issue tags to kill grizzly bears and black bears in all areas of the Great Bear Rainforest, including in some areas where the black bears carry the white “Spirit bear” gene.

In addition, the B.C. government’s announcement regarding the commercial hunt is specifically applicable to CFN territory, which makes up approximately one third of the Great Bear Rainforest.

Yet Thomson’s comments, corrected later by ministry staff, initially gave the impression to the media and the public that commercial trophy hunting had been ended throughout the Great Bear Rainforest.

“The agreement today as we announced retires the commercial hunt for grizzly bear for the Great Bear Rainforest,” he told reporters.

“Protecting the species is the first principle and we will continue to manage the process elsewhere on a science-based approach to grizzly bear and wildlife management generally.”

Premier Clark, speaking at a press conference, said the agreements “include the end of the commercial grizzly hunt in Coastal First Nations traditional territory,” and later referred to ending the trophy hunt on the coast. Although her first statement was slightly more accurate, both neglected to tell the whole story.

Because of erroneous statements by B.C. government representatives and others, widely reported in the extensive media coverage of the announcement and subsequently shared via social media, the incorrect notion that trophy hunting has ended in the Great Bear Rainforest has literally travelled around the globe. To paraphrase Mark Twain, a misconception can travel halfway around the world while the truth is still putting on its shoes.

The reality is the province has committed no financial assistance to the effort to retire the commercial hunting tenures, leaving it up to CFN and Raincoast to negotiate and fund agreements with existing guide outfitting businesses. They have also done nothing to curtail the killing of bears for trophies by B.C. residents in the Great Bear Rainforest.

Trying to clarify the situation, Bears Forever, a project of CFN and the Central Coast First Nations Bear Working Group, has stated:

“While the protection of B.C.’s Great Bear Rainforest may now be assured, protection of bears from trophy hunting is not. There is not protection for any species of bears from resident trophy hunters and protection from commercial trophy hunting is only afforded to bears when they are within certain territories controlled by Raincoast Conservation Foundation and Coastal First Nations. We are committed to continue pushing until all trophy hunting is ended throughout the Great Bear Rainforest.”

Beginning in 2005 and through the end of 2015, Raincoast Conservation Foundation, in collaboration with Coastal First Nations, raised nearly $2 million and purchased three commercial hunting tenures covering over 30,000 square kilometres of the Great Bear Rainforest. As these commercial licenses are put to rest, First Nation owned bear viewing operations — like the Spirit Bear Lodge in Kitasoo/Xai’xais territory — are thriving, with all bear viewing operations generating over 12 times more in visitor spending and 11 times more in government revenues than bear hunting in the Great Bear Rainforest.

While it will be a challenging task, CFN and Raincoast are deeply committed to raising the money and completing the purchase of the remaining hunting tenures.

The province should now step up and end the resident hunt. The bears of the Great Bear Rainforest would then be truly protected. The world would join the 95 per cent of British Columbians who oppose trophy hunting and truly celebrate such an accomplishment.

Doug Neasloss is elected chief councillor of the Kitasoo/Xai’xais First Nation. Brian Falconer is guide outfitter coordinator for Raincoast Conservation Foundation. Chris Genovali is Raincoast’s executive director.

Ding Dong the Junket King is Dead: Scalia Dies While Vacationing with Wealthy Patrons

Good news for the quail: Supreme Court Junket King Scalia Dies While Vacationing with Wealthy Patrons at Private West Texas Getaway

by Dave Lindorff  - This Can't Be Happening

February 14, 2016

It’s appropriate that Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia died at a luxury resort while freeloading as the guest of thus far unidentified wealthy sponsors as one of 40 guests at a private quail-hunting vacation party.

The resort where he died, Cibolo Ranch Resort, located on land stolen by its founder from the Apache and Comanche people in the Big Bend region of west Texas, is a posh retreat favored by the ultra rich, offering rooms priced from $350 to $800 a night -- and it’s a safe bet that the bed Scalia died in was located in a top-priced room -- and that the credit card that was swiped to pay for it didn’t have his name on it. (According to one report, the guests at the gathering had their bills covered by the resort's owner, John Poindexter, a mullti-millionaire real estate owner, rancher and former investment banker.)

The acerbic, blunt-speaking Scalia made his name as a High Court judge accepting freebies from wealthy businesspeople and right-wing outfits like the Federalist Society, even taking free trips and vacation junkets from the likes of the aptly-titled “Vice” President Dick Cheney back in 2004 when Cheney had a case pending before the court involving an effort to force the VP to disclose what oil company executives had attended a closed meeting in his office on energy policy early in the first term of the Bush-Cheney administration. (Scalia, notably, did not recuse himself from hearing that case.)

We don’t at this point know what Scalia’s final junket was about -- Poindexter makes a point of saying it "wasn't about politics or law -- but it’s no surprise he wasn’t there on his own dime. It wasn’t the way Scalia operated. Indeed, so egregious and frequent were Scalia’s junkets that in October 2015 the New York Times wrote an editorial condemning them [1] and calling for a reform to make such legalized bribery illegal.

Supreme Court justices, unlike members of Congress, don’t need to report such things as who takes them on luxury hunting trips. They are simply required under a vague judicial ethics standard to recuse themselves when they themselves feel they have a conflict of interest. Scalia made it abundantly clear, during his record 30-year tenure on the Supreme Court bench, that he did not feel getting freebies from the wealthy, affect his his judicial judgement even when his benefactor had a case pending before him.

Now that Scalia is gone, it will be interesting to see what Justice Clarence Thomas will do. Thomas, who emulated his mentor Scalia both in his voting on almost all cases brought to the High Court during his 25 years on the bench, also emulated him in taking every advantage of free vacations funded by wealthy right-wing businesspeople, like the Koch brothers and others. How will Thomas vote now on cases, without Scalia to guide him? Will he glom on to another surviving right-wing jurist -- perhaps Samuel Alito?

Justice Antonin Scalia takes his leave of the Supreme Court

It will also be interesting to see who President Obama comes up with to nominate as a replacement for Scalia. The initial signs aren’t good. His first words on learning of Scalia’s death were to say that he would nominate a replacement “in due time,” adding, “There will be plenty of time for me to do so and for the Senate to fulfill its responsibility to give that person a fair hearing and a timely vote.”

Actually, there is not a lot of time. If this president had an ounce of political sense, he would have realized that he was dealing with a Supreme Court that had, until Scalia’s death, four justices over the age of 77, and one, Clarence Thomas, who while only 67, has on the bench become at least as unhealthy looking his mentor Scalia. If he hasn’t long ago settled on, and done a preliminary vetting of at least one qualified replacement to nominate to fill a potential vacancy, he has been grossly negligent.

With this his last year in office, and an election year, Obama should be putting forward a nominee immediately, and demanding that the confirmation process begin. As we have painfully learned since 2000, when the Supreme Court turned the country over to the election loser, George W. Bush, there are few things more important going forward in this country than the composition of the US Supreme Court.

Even if Republicans in the Senate are able to prevent a Senate confirmation vote, or if they were able to deny confirmation of an Obama nominee on a straight party-line vote, the battle over Scalia’s replacement would certainly energize voters.

Scalia was a lighting rod for passionate hatred by most Democrats and independents too, for his opposition to women’s right to control their own bodies and reproductive health, for his lack of judicial ethics, for his full-throated defense of the state-sponsored execution, his opposition to equal opportunity, his support for government spying, and of course for his vote to halt the vote counting in Florida in the Bush-Gore presidential race.

Twitter has erupted following the news of Scalia’s death. My favorite two tweets:

“Antonin #Scalia requested cremation in his will, but millions of women will meet tomorrow to discuss if that's really best for his body.”

and:

“With the sudden passing of #Scalia, millions of women are in a panic, wondering where to turn to for personal medical advice.”

His admirers call this doctrinaire Catholic jurist a “man of God.” If so, and if his professed belief in a supreme being turns out to be correct, he will be facing a challenging hearing at heaven’s gate, and not just for his demonstrated fondness for other people's money. He also goes to his day of judgement with a lot of blood staining his robes -- including, perhaps, that of Gustavo Garcia, whose petition to the Supreme Court for a stay of execution in Texas was denied last Wednesday by Scalia, in what appears to have been his last official act.

 
Links:
[1] http://www.nytimes.com/2006/01/27/opinion/27fri4.html?_r=0

Sea Change for Norway's Salmon Farming Industry

Tide change in Norway

by Clayoquot Action

February 14, 2016
 

On the final day in Oslo, the Wild Salmon Delegation met with Cermaq, the Norwegian company with 15 salmon farm sites in Clayoquot Sound UNESCO Biosphere Reserve. We visited Cermaq to share with them the reasons why the Delegation had come to Norway; and to discuss our perspective on the similarities and differences between British Columbia and Norway, the emerging consensus that open-net salmon farming is a dinosaur technology, and the tide change unfolding daily in major Norwegian media.

Norwegians were surprised to learn about the nitrogen pump in BC—wild salmon transport ocean-based nitrogen up rivers and fertilize the growth of temperate rain forests. This connection between wild salmon, monumental cedars, and the bears, wolves, and eagles was novel over there. They also wanted to learn about the importance of cedar and salmon to indigenous cultures throughout BC.

“Salmon farming must be conducted on Nature’s premises”

Norway, like Canada, is a country which values Nature, and is proud of their clean and healthy environment. We heard a clear consensus from politicians of all parties—from the leader of the Green Party, to new fisheries minister Per Sandberg. He spoke at the Wild Salmon in the North conference this week in Alta, saying “Wild salmon are an important priority for Norway, and salmon farming must be conducted on Nature’s premises, not those of humans”.

Turns out there are indigenous Sami people living in Norway who face similar challenges to indigenous people in Canada. Aili Keskitalo, President of the Sami Parliament also spoke in Alta. She said “We find it hypocritical to restrict traditional fishing to save wild salmon, yet at the same time promote ocean dumping of toxic mine tailings in Repparfjorden, a National Wild Salmon Fjord”.

BC wild salmon economy 8 times bigger than salmon farming

Some things are different in Norway, where for example the biomass of farmed salmon is one thousand times bigger than the biomass of wild salmon, and the wild salmon economy is a thing of the past. In British Columbia, the wild salmon economy is eight times bigger than salmon farming; supporting indigenous, commercial, and sports fisheries, as well as a $1.4B ecotourism industry. Salmon farming puts this pre-existing economy at risk.

A clear consensus has emerged over the past two weeks, through meetings with wild salmon advocates, academics, and an investigative journalist. When asked the question, “how can Canada avoid the problems Norway is experiencing with open-net pen salmon farming?”, without hesitation every single person replied: “Shifting to closed containment production is the only way forward”.

There has long been a consensus from the industry in Norway. Until recently the industry’s voice has been: to the extent they were willing to acknowledge any problems, they would say “we are working on this, and technological solutions will be in place in a couple of years”. But they have been saying the same thing for decades.

“Tide change beginning to sweep Norway”

Signs of a tide change beginning to sweep the industry are breaking daily in major Norwegian media. Dagbladet, the country’s second biggest paper, ran a story pointing out that catches are plummeting in the Alta, “the world’s best salmon river” as the amount of farmed salmon in the nearby Altafjord increases. The production manager of Grieg Seafood’s operations in Alta was quoted saying: “The only solution is to get the fish into closed containment”.

The following day the front page of the paper in Bergen read:

“CEO of Marine Harvest prepared to invest US $100M: if everything works as planned, closed containment systems will replace open-net pen salmon farms”.

The Delegation also met with MP Frank Bakke-Jensen, from the governing party, and suggested that with the clear consensus emerging in Norway finally being acknowledged by industry, the government runs the risk of no longer providing leadership, unless they get out in front of the parade.

After meeting with Cermaq we met some Oslo friends outside, and held up banners and flags to demonstrate that wild salmon people are on the move in Norway. It was a perfect way to end our time in Oslo—because Cermaq’s offices are located at the mouth of the Akerselva River, where we’d recently seen a wild salmon spawner which had literally swum under the cobbles beneath our feet, heading up the river.

Returning to Canada informed, connected and stoked

The Wild Salmon Delegation returns to Canada much better informed about the state of disarray in which the Norwegian industry finds itself due to sea lice, disease outbreaks, and genetic pollution of wild stocks. We’re connected to the wild salmon movement in Norway, and stoked to continue to advocate for protection of wild salmon. Perhaps most exciting of all is the connections which Ahousaht citizens n̓aasałuk (John Rampanen) and his son Qwyatseek wove with Sami people, who have depended not only on the reindeer herds but also the wild salmon for millennia.

A special thanks to Rune Jensen from Salmon Camera who helped develop the Norway ground plan; Kurt Oddekalv from Green Warriors of Norway, the Delegation host in Bergen who also facilitated the Alta action; and Sami reindeer driver Åsá Márgget Anti, who opened her heart and home, introduced us to Sami elder Tore Bongo, and took n̓aasałuk and Qwy reindeer herding in the middle of a sub-zero Arctic night. Ollu gittu, ƛeeko ƛeeko, tusen takk—a thousand thanks from the bottom of our hearts to everyone who supported the Wild Salmon Delegation to Norway—in so many ways!

Dan Lewis in Norway with Clayoquot Action’s Wild Salmon Delegation.

Israel Recedes Further into Its Fantasy Cocoon

Israel's Army and Government at Loggerheads Over Cause of Attacks

by Jonathan Cook - Dissident Voice 

February 12, 2016

Israel’s frantic cocoon-weaving entered a new phase last week, as Benjamin Netanyahu’s government stepped up efforts to stifle the last vestiges of dissent.

The military censor’s office, a draconian 70-year-old hangover from British rule in Palestine, extended its powers over Israeli press and TV to prominent blogs and social media.

The government has also threatened to revoke the press cards of “journalists and editors who are negligent in their work” – aimed at those who depart too obviously from the official line.

These moves follow culture minister Miri Regev’s announcement of a “loyalty law” that will deny state funding to artists and cultural institutions that are not sufficiently patriotic.

The education minister, settler leader Naftali Bennett, meanwhile, is reportedly preparing a raft of measures: a ban on access for pupils to literature and theatre not in line with government thinking, cuts to already very limited pluralism education and a new civics textbook vilifying the Palestinian minority.

In this atmosphere of inculcated ignorance and prejudice, it is easy for Mr Netanyahu to persuade public opinion that the recent wave of Palestinian protests and attacks, which have left more than 160 Palestinians and 29 Israelis dead, is solely the result of “incitement” from Palestinian officials and media. The Israeli right suggests that Palestinians who stab or drive cars at their oppressors, most often soldiers and settlers, are easily inflamed into action by words that appeal to ancient prejudice.

As the Israeli public discourse grows ever more detached from reality, Israel’s military commanders sound like an oasis of sanity – at least, by comparison.

The Israeli army actually has an operational interest in understanding what drives the Palestinian attacks – both to better counter them and to quieten growing government pressure for drastic responses, ones that could trigger the collapse of Mahmoud Abbas’s Palestinian Authority.

The military have sent intelligence officials into Israeli prisons to interview Palestinians who were not killed during their attacks, including children as young as 13.

What the army has found should surprise no one. Palestinians feel desperate and hopeless about a situation in which their own and their families’ freedoms are tightly restricted by a seemingly endless Israeli occupation.

The Palestinians behind the attacks – “lone wolves”, as Israelis call them – are often also facing extreme personal crises: suicidal thoughts, financial troubles or grief from a relative or friend’s death at Israel’s hands.

Few have had any experience of Israelis beyond the soldiers who mistreat them at checkpoints and during raids on their villages, and the settlers who lord it over them.

These findings have provoked a widening rift between the government and military.

Mr Netanyahu and his allies, drawing on the Israeli right’s traditional “iron wall” philosophy of ruthlessly crushing Palestinian dissent, have demanded greater privations for those under occupation to make them submit.

Last week, the government responded to an attack on a checkpoint by a Palestinian security official that injured three Israeli soldiers by locking down Ramallah, the Palestinians’ current economic and political capital.

The army effectively overruled that decision the next day. Gadi Eisenkott, the chief of general staff, has repeatedly warned that collective punishment will only fuel Palestinian anger and increase attacks.

He argues that more permits for Palestinian labourers to work in Israel, improving the Palestinian economy, is “an Israeli interest and a restraining factor”. He also prefers nurturing existing ties with the Palestinian security forces.

The military doves, however, are no less deluded than the political hawks.

The politicians want a collective stick to beat the Palestinians, one that will only intensify the conflict. The military, on the other hand, want individual perks for good behaviour to perpetuate the status quo a little longer.

What neither side wishes to talk about is the framework that creates Palestinian despair and anger: the occupation.

The personal crises identified by the military that spur Palestinians to violence – debt, depression and the killing of a friend or relative – are not a stroke of bad luck befalling individuals. They are an inevitable by-product of the systematic abuses inflicted on an entire occupied population.

Lawlessness from land-hungry Jewish settlers, severe movement restrictions, home demolitions and “policing” by a hostile army ensure Palestinians live as a subjugated people, slaves to ever harsher repression.

Anyone who challenges Israelis’ bubble of illusions faces the Israeli government’s wrath, as UN secretary-general Ban Ki-moon found last month. When he pointed out the obvious – that it was “human nature to react to occupation” – Mr Netanyahu accused him of “stoking terror”.

Worse vitriol rained down on Sweden’s foreign minister, Margot Wallstrom, when she made much the same point – and urged an investigation into the apparent executions of some of the Palestinians recently killed by the army. She was accused of “defamation” and officially barred from visiting Israel.

The blinkered assumptions of both Israel’s politicians and its generals mean neither can find a way out of the current mire.

Those who wish simply to perpetuate Palestinian suffering may triumph over those who would prefer to intensify it. Either way, Palestinians will continue to resist.

Jonathan Cook, based in Nazareth, Israel is a winner of the Martha Gellhorn Special Prize for Journalism. His latest books are Israel and the Clash of Civilisations: Iraq, Iran and the Plan to Remake the Middle East (Pluto Press) and Disappearing Palestine: Israel's Experiments in Human Despair (Zed Books). Read other articles by Jonathan, or visit Jonathan's website.

"Everyone should have access to knowledge regardless of their income or affiliation:" 'Aaron Swartz' of Science Releases Cumulative Research Knowledge from Proprietary Confines

Welcome to the Pirate Bay of science: Researcher illegally shares millions of science papers free online to spread knowledge

by Fiona MacDonald - Science Alert

12 Feb., 2016

A researcher in Russia has made more than 48 million journal articles - almost every single peer-reviewed paper every published - freely available online. And she's now refusing to shut the site down, despite a court injunction and a lawsuit from Elsevier, one of the world's biggest publishers.

For those of you who aren't already using it, the site in question is Sci-Hub, and it's sort of like a Pirate Bay of the science world. It was established in 2011 by neuroscientist Alexandra Elbakyan, who was frustrated that she couldn't afford to access the articles needed for her research, and it's since gone viral, with hundreds of thousands of papers being downloaded daily.

But at the end of last year, the site was ordered to be taken down by a New York district court - a ruling that Elbakyan has decided to fight, triggering a debate over who really owns science.

"Payment of $32 is just insane when you need to skim or read tens or hundreds of these papers to do research. I obtained these papers by pirating them," Elbakyan told Torrent Freak last year. 

 "Everyone should have access to knowledge regardless of their income or affiliation. And that’s absolutely legal."

If it sounds like a modern day Robin Hood struggle, that's because it kinda is. But in this story, it's not just the poor who don't have access to scientific papers - journal subscriptions have become so expensive that leading universities such as Harvard and Cornell have admitted they can no longer afford them. Researchers have also taken a stand - with 15,000 scientists vowing to boycott publisher Elsevier in part for its excessive paywall fees.

Don't get us wrong, journal publishers have also done a whole lot of good - they've encouraged better research thanks to peer review, and before the Internet, they were crucial to the dissemination of knowledge.

But in recent years, more and more people are beginning to question whether they're still helping the progress of science. In fact, in some cases, the 'publish or perish' mentality is creating more problems than solutions, with a growing number of predatory publishers now charging researchers to have their work published - often without any proper peer review process or even editing.

"They feel pressured to do this," Elbakyan wrote in an open letter to the New York judge last year.

"If a researcher wants to be recognised, make a career - he or she needs to have publications in such journals."

That's where Sci-Hub comes into the picture. The site works in two stages. First of all when you search for a paper, Sci-Hub tries to immediately download it from fellow pirate database LibGen. If that doesn't work, Sci-Hub is able to bypass journal paywalls thanks to a range of access keys that have been donated by anonymous academics (thank you, science spies).

This means that Sci-Hub can instantly access any paper published by the big guys, including JSTOR, Springer, Sage, and Elsevier, and deliver it to you for free within seconds. The site then automatically sends a copy of that paper to LibGen, to help share the love.

It's an ingenious system, as Simon Oxenham explains for Big Think:

"In one fell swoop, a network has been created that likely has a greater level of access to science than any individual university, or even government for that matter, anywhere in the world. Sci-Hub represents the sum of countless different universities' institutional access - literally a world of knowledge."

That's all well and good for us users, but understandably, the big publishers are pissed off. Last year, a New York court delivered an injunction against Sci-Hub, making its domain unavailable (something Elbakyan dodged by switching to a new location), and the site is also being sued by Elsevier for "irreparable harm" - a case that experts are predicting will win Elsevier around $750 to $150,000 for each pirated article. Even at the lowest estimations, that would quickly add up to millions in damages.

But Elbakyan is not only standing her ground, she's come out swinging, claiming that it's Elsevier that have the illegal business model.

"I think Elsevier’s business model is itself illegal," she told Torrent Freak, referring to article 27 of the UN Declaration of Human Rights, which states that "everyone has the right freely to participate in the cultural life of the community, to enjoy the arts and to share in scientific advancement and its benefits".

She also explains that the academic publishing situation is different to the music or film industry, where pirating is ripping off creators. "All papers on their website are written by researchers, and researchers do not receive money from what Elsevier collects. That is very different from the music or movie industry, where creators receive money from each copy sold," she said.

Elbakyan hopes that the lawsuit will set a precedent, and make it very clear to the scientific world either way who owns their ideas.

"If Elsevier manages to shut down our projects or force them into the darknet, that will demonstrate an important idea: that the public does not have the right to knowledge," she said. 

"We have to win over Elsevier and other publishers and show that what these commercial companies are doing is fundamentally wrong."

To be fair, Elbakyan is somewhat protected by the fact that she's in Russia and doesn't have any US assets, so even if Elsevier wins their lawsuit, it's going to be pretty hard for them to get the money.

Still, it's a bold move, and we're pretty interested to see how this fight turns out - because if there's one thing the world needs more of, it's scientific knowledge. In the meantime, Sci-Hub is still up and accessible for anyone who wants to use it, and Elbakyan has no plans to change that anytime soon.

Western Media War Against the Crimean People

Fact Versus Bias in the Western Media War Against the Crimean People

by Roger Annis - New Cold War

Feb 10, 2016  

Data has been published for the first time in Ukraine detailing the reactions of Ukrainian police and armed forces personnel stationed in Crimea at the time of the Maidan coup in February 2014 and the secession vote in Crimea one month later. The information was reported in the Ukrainian news outlet Interfax.com.ua on Feb 5, 2016.

Celebration in Simferopol’s Lenin
Square following Crimean secession
vote in March 2014

Interfax reports the findings of a Rada (parliamentary) committee investigating the circumstances of the secession. The committee says that of the approximately 2,300 Ukrainian national police (SBU) personnel who were stationed in Crimea at the time, only 215 remained loyal to Kyiv.

Of the app. 20,320 armed forces members deployed in Crimea, 6,000 returned to Ukraine. The remainder, a large majority, pledged allegiance to the new, Republic of Crimea and the armed forces of Russia.

Crimea seceded from Ukraine and joined the Russian Federation after an overwhelming majority of the population (some 97 per cent of the 80 per cent who voted) approved the measure in a referendum on March 16, 2014.

Western governments and mainstream media have always presented the Crimea secession vote as a case of “annexation” by Russia. This was never a case of accurate news reporting and objective analysis. It was, instead, a manufactured political claim that was part of a cynical manipulation of the ‘Maidan’ protest movement in order to serve Western interests.[1]

Accordingly, little factual information has been published in the West about the aspirations of the Crimean people, including that media has largely censored reporting of the numerous polls of the people of Crimea taken in 2014 and 2015. Polls show consistently that an overwhelming majority of Crimeans, including those of Ukrainian and Tatar ethnicity, are satisfied with the decision to secede from Ukraine.

An example of the continued, biased reporting of Crimea by Western mainstream media was provided by the weekday, radio newsmagazine program on the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, The Current. It broadcast a 25-minute story on January 26, 2016 titled, ‘Russian regrets? Crimeans disenchanted two years after annexation’. Now here is a quiz for the inquiring reader:

Question: Should a serious journalist inquiry into the situation today in Crimea interview people living there, or should it, instead, select disgruntled observers living in Ukraine and further abroad?

Answer: That depends. If it is a serious inquiry, then, of course, the people actually living in Crimea should be canvassed, preferably providing a cross-section of opinion and experience. But if it is a inquiry intended to serve a pre-determined viewpoint–in this case that the Crimean people were bullied into seceding from Ukraine and are today unhappy and regretful of that decision–then by all means do not talk to Crimeans themselves. Because repeated polls show that the interview subjects will not provide the desired responses.

Guess which option the biased producers of The Current chose? Here are the three invited guests on its January 26 program:

“Dmitry Porfirov left Crimea late last year and now lives in Lviv, Ukraine.” Prior to leaving Crimea, Porfirov told CBC, he had “feelings” that he was no longer welcome in Crimea. And he did not like living with the economic hardships created by Western sanctions and acts of sabotage by right-wing Ukrainian paramilitaries.

“Ridvan Bari Urcosta, a Tatar and political scientist who left Crimea a few months after Russia took control in 2014…” The CBC interview host introduced this guest by saying “Inside Crimea, ethnic Tatars are one of the groups most fiercely opposed to Russian annexation.” Which happens to be a blatant misrepresentation of the situation in Crimea, including among the Crimean Tatar people. One of the few published polls which has specifically sought out Tatar respondents, in early 2015, showed half of Tatar respondents happy with secession, 30 per cent opposed, and 20 per cent not knowing one way or the other. Tatar political and social organizations in Crimea vigorously challenge the false claim that the disgruntled or hostile Tatar minority speaks for all Crimean Tatars. But this is mainstream Western media, and the subject is Russia and Crimea, so inconvenient facts are not allowed when they get in the way of the ‘correct’ story.

“Journalist Dimiter Kenarov has been covering Crimea over the past two years. ” He spoke to the program from Vermont, USA. Kenarov did acknowledge in the interview that “some kind of majority of Crimeans” supported what he called “Russian annexation”, and he also offered that there is “no chance” that Crimea will ever return to Ukrainian control.

As has been reported in news outlets (though not in biased Western media such as the CBC), the people of Crimea are enduring the harsh consequences of Western economic sanctions created in order to punish them for their 2014 secession vote. They are also suffering from acts of violent sabotage against their economy by right-wing extremists in Ukraine. Since September 2015, extremists have blockaded commercial road shipments between Ukraine and Crimea, including food. The governing regime in Kyiv endorsed the blockades by making them official, in December. In November 2015, the extremists blew up electricity pylons, severing the electrical service from Ukraine on which Crimea depended. Again, Kyiv effectively endorsed the action by declining to restore service[2]

By any measure, the attacks on electricity service and the cutting of food and other vital road and rail transport constitute acts of terrorism. Did the broadcast on The Current make any inquiries along these lines? No, it did not.[3] Nor did the CBC broadcast investigate the legality and morality of economic sanctions imposed by the imperialist countries of Europe and North America against Crimea. Such investigations would get in the way of the pre-determined script of a “Russian annexation” and “Crimean disenchantment”.

This article is translated into Dutch and published on the new website in Holland, Novaya Gazeta.

Notes:

[1] Sadly, Western media and governments are not the only ones to promote the meme of ‘Russian annexation’ of Crimea. Certain quarters of the international left opt to sing from the same songsheet. 

[2] Most electrical service in Crimea has been restored via the emergency installation of undersea power cables from Russia under the Kerch Strait as well as boosting of emergency electrical production. Full energy independence from Ukraine will be achieved in Crimea by summer 2016, and further strengthened after that by construction of a natural gas pipeline from Russia and several natural gas-powered electrical generation stations. 

[3] There was a brief, rote mention that “power lines were sabotaged by people suspected to be with anti-Russia activists”[?].

Hillary's New Hampshire Nightmare and the Ghost of George McGovern

Hillary Clinton’s Very Bad Night

by Robert Parry - Consortium News

February 10, 2016

Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s stunning 22-point loss to Sen. Bernie Sanders in New Hampshire is even more devastating when looked at in the context of the modern history of this first-in-the-nation primary: No one has ever lost by such a margin and gone on to win the presidency.

Among Democrats, no one who lost by even half that margin in New Hampshire has recovered to win the party’s nomination. In 2008, Barack Obama lost to Hillary Clinton by 2.6 percentage points; in 1992, Bill Clinton lost to Paul Tsongas by 8.4 percentage points; in 1984, Walter Mondale lost to Gary Hart by 9.4 percentage points; in 1972, George McGovern lost to Edmund Muskie by 9.3 percentage points.

The magnitude of Hillary Clinton’s New Hampshire drubbing has establishment Democrats wringing their hands as it dawns on them that no candidate in modern U.S. political history has bounced back from a 22-point loss in that first-in-the-nation primary to win the White House, reports Robert Parry.

In two of those cases, New Hampshire did favor neighboring politicians – Sen. Tsongas from Massachusetts and Sen. Muskie from Maine – but Tuesday’s 22-point margin for Vermont Sen. Sanders cannot be explained simply by making the “nearby-favorite-son” argument. Sanders swept nearly every demographic group, including women, losing only to Clinton among New Hampshire’s senior citizens and the state’s small number of non-white voters. Sanders’s margin among young voters was particularly impressive, 82 percent, roughly the same proportion as the Iowa caucuses last week.

If Hillary Clinton hopes to overcome her New Hampshire drubbing, she would have to look for encouragement from the legacy of Republican George W. Bush who lost the 2000 New Hampshire primary to Sen. John McCain by a margin of 49 percent to 30.2 percent, but even Bush’s landslide loss represented a smaller margin of defeat than Clinton suffered on Tuesday.

A Worried Establishment

Clinton’s failure to generate momentum or much enthusiasm in her pursuit of the Democratic presidential nomination presents the Democratic Party establishment with a dilemma, since many senior party leaders fret about the risk that Sanders, a self-described “democratic socialist,” might lead the Democrats to the kind of electoral disaster that Sen. George McGovern did in 1972.

Though the Democrats rebounded in 1976 with Jimmy Carter’s victory amid Republican disarray over Richard Nixon’s Watergate scandal, the Republicans soon reestablished their domination over presidential politics for a dozen years with Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush. For the Democrats to reclaim the White House in 1992, it took a “New Democrat,” Arkansas Gov. Bill Clinton, to repackage the Democratic message into one proposing “neo-liberal” (anti-regulatory, free-trade) economics, embracing Republican tough-on-crime tactics, and rejecting “Big Government.”

President Clinton also emphasized “micro-policies,” best illustrated by his call for “school uniforms,” rather than proposing “macro-policies” for addressing poverty and other structural problems facing Americans. Though the economy performed fairly well under Clinton – his success lessening pressures from liberal groups – he also opened the door to Wall Street and other corporate excesses (by supporting deregulation of the financial and media industries).

At that point in the 1990s, the “neo-liberal” strategies had not been tested in the U.S. economy and thus many Americans were caught off-guard when this new anti-regulatory, free-trade fervor contributed to a hollowing out of the Great American Middle Class and a bloated Gilded Age for the top One Percent.

The full consequences of neo-liberalism became painfully apparent with the Wall Street Crash of 2008 and the resulting Great Recession. The suffering and hopelessness now affecting many Americans, including the white working class, has led to an angry political rejection of the American Establishment as reflected in the insurgent candidacies of Donald Trump and Sanders.

A Legacy Campaign

Hillary Clinton (like Jeb Bush) faces the misfortune of running a legacy campaign at a time when the voters are angry about the legacies of both “ruling families,” the Clintons and the Bushes. Though Sanders is a flawed candidate faulted for his muddled foreign-policy prescriptions, he (like Trump) has seized the mantle of fighting the Establishment at a time when millions of Americans are fed up with the Establishment and its self-serving policies.

In some ways, the Iowa and New Hampshire results represented the worst outcome for establishment Democrats. Clinton’s razor-thin victory in Iowa and her slashing defeat in New Hampshire have left Democratic strategists uncertain as to whether they should rally behind her – despite her lukewarm to freezing-cold reception from voters – or try to recruit another candidate who could cut off Sanders’s path to the nomination and represent a “more electable” choice in November.

If Clinton continues to stumble, there will be enormous pressure from Democratic leaders to push her aside and draw Vice President Joe Biden or perhaps Sen. Elizabeth Warren into the race.

If that were to occur — and, granted, the Clintons are notoriously unwilling to admit defeat — the Democrats could experience a political dynamic comparable to 1968 when anti-Vietnam War Sen. Eugene McCarthy challenged the prohibitive favorite President Lyndon Johnson and came close enough in New Hampshire to prompt Sen. Robert Kennedy to jump into the race — and to convince Johnson to announce that he would not seek another term.

Many idealistic Democrats who had backed McCarthy in his seemingly quixotic fight against Johnson were furious against “Bobby-come-lately,” setting up a battle between two anti-war factions of the Democratic Party. Of course, the history of the 1968 campaign was marred by the assassinations of Martin Luther King Jr. and then Robert Kennedy, followed by the chaotic Chicago convention, which handed the nomination to Johnson’s Vice President Hubert Humphrey.

Then, after Republican Richard Nixon secretly sabotaged Johnson’s Vietnam peace talks, Nixon managed to eke out a victory over Humphrey.

While Campaign 2016 reflects a very different America – and the key Democratic issue is “income inequality,” not the Vietnam War – some parallels could become obvious if the presumptive nominee (Johnson in 1968 and Clinton in 2016) is pushed out or chooses to step aside.

Then, the Democratic choice would be plunging ahead with a back-bench candidate (McCarthy in 1968 and Sanders in 2016) or looking for a higher-profile and more mainstream alternative, such as Biden who (like Humphrey) would offer continuity with the sitting president or Warren who shares many of Sanders’s positions (like Robert Kennedy did with McCarthy) but who might be more acceptable to “party regulars.”

A Warren candidacy also might lessen the disappointment of women who wanted to see Hillary Clinton as the first female president. At the moment, however, the question is: Did New Hampshire deal a death blow to Hillary Clinton’s campaign or can she become the first candidate in modern U.S. political history to bounce back from a 22-point loss in the first-in-the-nation primary?

Investigative reporter Robert Parry broke many of the Iran-Contra stories for The Associated Press and Newsweek in the 1980s. You can buy his latest book, America’s Stolen Narrative, either in print here or as an e-book (from Amazon and barnesandnoble.com).