Examination Finds Tally Sheets Consistent with Evo Morales’s First-Round Victory
For Immediate Release: November 8, 2019 Contact: Dan Beeton, 202-239-1460
WRITTEN BY CENTER FOR ECONOMIC AND POLICY RESEARCH CEPR
Washington, DC — Statistical analysis of election returns and tally sheets from Bolivia’s October 20 elections shows no evidence that irregularities or fraud affected the official result that gave President Evo Morales a first-round victory, researchers and analysts at the Center for Economic and Policy Research (CEPR) say. Contrary to a postelection narrative that was supported, without evidence, by the OAS Electoral Observation Mission, statistical analysis shows that it was predictable that Morales would obtain a first-round win, based on the results of the first 83.85 percent of votes in a rapid count that showed Morales leading runner-up Carlos Mesa by less than 10 points.
Fishery collapse ‘confirms Silent Spring pesticide prophecy', suggests researchers in new Japanese study in Science, which showed an immediate plunge in insect and plankton numbers after introduction of neonicotinoid pesticides to rice paddies, rapidly followed by the collapse of fish populations.
Fishery collapse ‘confirms Silent Spring pesticide prophecy'
Common pesticides found to starve fish ‘astoundingly fast’ by killing aquatic insects
The research looked at the periods before and after the introduction of neonicotinoids on rice paddies in 1993. Photograph: Andy Rain/EPA
Man spraying pesticides on rice paddyfield
The research looked at the periods before and after the introduction of neonicotinoids on rice paddies in 1993. Photograph: Andy Rain/EPA
The Silent Spring prophecy that pesticides could “still the leaping of fish” has been confirmed, according to scientists investigating the collapse of fisheries in Japan. They say similar impacts are likely to have occurred around the world.
The long-term study showed an immediate plunge in insect and plankton numbers in a large lake after the introduction of neonicotinoid pesticides to rice paddies. This was rapidly followed by the collapse of smelt and eel populations, which had been stable for decades but rely on the tiny creatures for food.
The analysis shows a strong correlation but cannot prove a causal link between the insecticides and the collapse. However, independent scientists said other possibilities had been ruled out and that the work provided “compelling evidence”.
The research is the first to reveal the knock-on effects of insecticides on fish. Harm to bees is well known, but previous studies in Europe have linked neonicotinoids to die-offs in other freshwater species including mayflies, dragonflies and snails and also to falling populations of farmland bird that feed on insects, including starlings and swallows. The insecticide has also been shown to make migrating songbirds lose their way.
Rachel Carson wrote Silent Spring, her seminal book on the dangers of pesticidesin 1962. In their report, the Japanese researchers said: “She wrote: ‘These sprays, dusts and aerosols are now applied almost universally to farms, gardens, forests and homes – nonselective chemicals that have the power to kill every insect, the ‘good’ and the ‘bad’, to still the song of birds and the leaping of fish in the streams.’ The ecological and economic impact of neonicotinoids on the inland waters of Japan confirms Carson’s prophecy.”
“This disruption likely also occurs elsewhere, as neonicotinoids are currently the most widely used class of insecticides globally,” worth more than $3bn year, they said.
Prof Olaf Jensen, at Rutgers University in the US and not part of the research team, said: “This study, although observational, presents compelling evidence. A fishery that was sustainable for decades collapsed within a year after farmers began using neonicotinoids. This is a large and astoundingly fast response.”
The research, published in the journal Science, looked at data from Lake Shinji spanning the decade before and the period after the introduction of neonicotinoids in 1993, from which point the pesticides started running off into the lake. They found neonicotinoid concentrations in the water frequently exceeded levels that are toxic to aquatic invertebrates.
The midge Chironomus plumosus, an important food source for smelt, was one of the worst affected. It vanished completely from all 39 locations sampled in 2016, despite being abundant in 1982. Another important food source, an abundant zooplankton species, Sinocalanus tenellus, fell by 83%.
The researchers found annual catches of smelt fell 90% in the decade after neonicotinoids were introduced, compared with the decade before. Catches of eels dropped by 74% over the same time period.
“Several alternative explanations for the collapse were evaluated and rejected: invasive species, hypoxia, or changes in fish stocking cannot plausibly explain the observations,” said Jensen. Furthermore, catches of icefish, which do not rely on the affected invertebrates for food, remained unchanged.
The research shows neonicotinoid pesticides can affect entire food webs, he said. On the lack of other reports of similar collapses, Jensen said: “There is the issue of not seeing a problem if we don’t look for it.”
Matt Shardlow, from the charity Buglife, said: “Japan has had a tragic experience with nerve-agent insecticides. In the paddy fields, where the air once thrummed with the clatter of billions of dragonfly wings, these insecticides have imposed near silence.”
“The annihilation of humble flies and the knock on effects on fish serve as further testament to the dreadful folly of neonicotinoids,” he said. “Let’s hope this is a wake-up call for Asian countries and they move to quickly ban the chemicals from paddyfields.”
“It is also extremely worrying that the levels of neonicotinoids in rivers in eastern England, as recently reported by Buglife, are very similar to the levels reported in this research,” Shardlow said. “Unfortunately, while it is clear that harm must have been done to UK river health, the exact impact of neonicotinoids has yet to be quantified.”
Students join the Global Climate Strike in Perth. (Source: WIkimedia Commons)
The Climate Strike is sweeping the United States! Millions of people around the world are walking out of their schools and workplaces from today until next Friday to take to the streets, following the lead of young people who are anxious about their future on a warming planet and furious at politicians’ ongoing failure to act against the climate crisis.
Their anger is justified. It’s been decades since those in the halls of power understood global warming as a serious threat, but the stranglehold of powerful industries over US politics has kept our federal budget greasy with handouts for Wall Street, fossil fuel corporations, and the military-industrial complex, who all benefit from perpetuating an economy based on extraction and war that’s burning our planet.
But the kids are awake like never before, and they’re demanding a Green New Deal to transform the economy at the scale and urgency that matches the acceleration of climate chaos.
There’s no shortage of funds to pay for such an ambitious program if the obstacles to a green economy are fairly targeted: fair taxes on the wealthy, corporations, and Wall Street could yield $886 billion in estimated annual revenue, ending direct and indirect subsidies for coal, oil, and gas could amount to $649 billion, and the US could safely redirect at least $350 billion from the Pentagon’s current spending.
Our governments have long had the technical solutions available to get started. One estimate calculates the total cost of shifting to 100% renewable energy over 10 years at $4.5 trillion. That’s less than the $6 trillion committed so far to nearly two decades of the endless wars waged since 9/11 in 2001, when many of the kids marching today weren’t even born.
The next generation can grow up in an economy that’s about nurturing life, not waging death.
To save the planet, we need to cut the Pentagon.
Just 11% of the Pentagon’s current $716 billion budget -- about $80 billion -- would pay to produce enough wind and solar energy to power every one of the 127.59 million households in the United States**. That’s a ninth of one year’s military budget, to cover the up-front costs of construction and installation of enough renewable electricity for every home in the country. That’s just based on the 2018 costs of renewable energy, which have dropped more than half over the previous two years and are still getting cheaper.
With the right kind of regulatory structures operating in the interests of the consumer public, rather than for-profit utilities, zero-carbon electricity could effectively be free for all - a Green New Deal could make energy bills a thing of the past.
During the original New Deal, massive federal investments made it possible to electrify vast swathes of the country. At the height of World War II in 1945, the U.S. federal government spent almost $1 trillion in today’s dollars to fight what many around the world considered an existential threat. 74 years later, this country is approaching that level of military spending, which makes it all too easy for elements in the national security establishment to foment military threats where none need exist.
Meanwhile the climate emergency actually is an existential threat, no longer one that those in power can conveniently deferred to their children and grandchildren, but one with increasingly devastating impacts playing out in real time. The WWII mobilization created a massive military-industrial complex to secure an increasingly unsustainable world order, which has benefited Americans at the expense of many others. It’s time to wind that down, and invest in the infrastructure for a new collective purpose: building a society where everyone can survive and thrive.
The kids get it. It’s time for our governments to follow their lead.
**There are 127,586,000 households total in the U.S., according to the most recent Census.
The cost of wind power for the average US household for one year is $581.28 as of 2018, and the cost for solar electiricty is $623.92.
127.59 million households × $581.28 (Cost per Household with Wind Power for 1 Year) ≅ $74.2 billion
127.59 million households × $623.92 (Cost per Household with Solar Electricity for 1 Year) ≅ $79.6 billion
So based on 2018 costs of renewable energy, producing enough wind and solar electricity to power every one of the 127.59 million households would cost up to $79.6 billion, which is 11.1% of the $716 billion current military budget.
See more trade-offs from the federal budget between military spending and other priorities with NPP's Trade-Offs Tool.
« Remembering Frances Crowe
Students join the Global Climate Strike in Perth. (Source: WIkimedia Commons)
The Climate Strike is sweeping the United States! Millions of people around the world are walking out of their schools and workplaces from today until next Friday to take to the streets, following the lead of young people who are anxious about their future on a warming planet and furious at politicians’ ongoing failure to act against the climate crisis.
Their anger is justified. It’s been decades since those in the halls of power understood global warming as a serious threat, but the stranglehold of powerful industries over US politics has kept our federal budget greasy with handouts for Wall Street, fossil fuel corporations, and the military-industrial complex, who all benefit from perpetuating an economy based on extraction and war that’s burning our planet.
But the kids are awake like never before, and they’re demanding a Green New Deal to transform the economy at the scale and urgency that matches the acceleration of climate chaos.
There’s no shortage of funds to pay for such an ambitious program if the obstacles to a green economy are fairly targeted: fair taxes on the wealthy, corporations, and Wall Street could yield $886 billion in estimated annual revenue, ending direct and indirect subsidies for coal, oil, and gas could amount to $649 billion, and the US could safely redirect at least $350 billion from the Pentagon’s current spending.
Since our leaders are behaving like children, we will have to take the responsibility they should have taken long ago. We have to understand what the older generation has dealt to us, what mess they have created that we have to clean up and live with. We have to make our voices heard. –Greta Thunberg
Barbara Gard calls her three-hectare property, nestled below the forested peak of Sumas Mountain, a “miniature Stanley Park.” Its lush trees and flowing creek reminded her of Vancouver’s majestic park, and she immediately knew she wanted to call it home.
But she said her peaceful retreat in Abbotsford now feels more like a nightmare. Gard is among thousands of landowners along the Trans Mountain pipeline expansion route who have not yet granted the Crown corporation access to their property, and she said her dealings with the project’s owners over the years have shattered her mental health.
“It’s caused me emotional devastation,” said Gard, a 64-year-old school psychologist on medical leave from work. “They are killing me through stress and legal fees.”
Numerous hurdles remain before significant construction can begin on the massive project. Trans Mountain Corp. has not signed agreements with 33 per cent of landowners, no part of the detailed route has been approved, about half of the necessary permits are outstanding and it must meet dozens of conditions with the Canada Energy Regulator, formerly the National Energy Board.
Further, it faces resistance in southwest B.C., where landowners are digging in their heels, Indigenous groups are filing legal challenges and protesters are planning to ramp up activity.
The federal Liberal government bought the pipeline for $4.5 billion last year. The parliamentary budget officer has said that if the expansion is not complete by the end of 2021, it would be fair to conclude the government overpaid for the asset.
Last Updated on Wednesday, 11 September 2019 13:28
A U.S. Ohio-class nuclear-armed submarine can carry enough nuclear warheads to wipe 24 cities off the map.
TAMARA LORINCZ
Cities across Canada held commemorations this week to mark the 74th anniversary of the tragic atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Lantern ceremonies, peace walks and vigils for nuclear disarmament were held in Victoria, Nanaimo, Salt Spring, Castlegar, Winnipeg, Ottawa, Kingston, Toronto and Montreal.
There are 108 Canadian cities that are part of Mayors for Peace, an international movement for the abolition of nuclear weapons. The mayor of Hiroshima started Mayors for Peace in 1982 and today there are 7,785 member cities worldwide.
Montreal is an executive member of Mayors for Peace and a twin city of Hiroshima. In 1998, Hiroshima gave Montreal a peace bell, which has been placed in the city’s beautiful botanical gardens and is rung every year in a ceremony on Aug. 5.
Cities do not want to be targets of a nuclear weapons attack. When the Japanese cities were bombed in 1945 by the United States, they were reduced to rubble and over 200,000 people were killed. The nuclear weapons that exist today are 3,000 times more powerful and can be launched within minutes.
The activists confronting Shell at the COP: Three Nigerians – Nnimmo Bassey, Gowin Ojo and Rita Uwaka are part of the action
RECALLING THAT In 1988, at the Climate Change Conference in Toronto, three hundred global scientists, along with other participants concluded:
Humanity is conducting an unintended, uncontrolled, globally pervasive experiment whose ultimate consequence could be second only to a global nuclear war. the Earth’s atmosphere is changed at an unprecedented rate by pollutants resulting from depositions of hazardous, toxic and atomic wastes and from wasteful fossil fuel use. These changes represent a major threat to international security and are already having harmful consequences over many parts of the globe.... it is imperative to act now.
In the Conference statement, Changing Atmosphere Conference in 1988 and they called for the global community, to Reduce CO2 emissions by approximately 20% of 1988 levels by the year 2005 as an initial global goal. Clearly the industrialized nations have a responsibility to lead the way boththrough their national energy policies and their bilateral multilateral assistance arrangement.
AWARE THAT In 1992, under article 4 of UNFCCC developed states made a commitment to return to 1990 levels by the end of the decade (i.e. 2000) (Article 4, UNFCCC);
RECALLING THAT in September 2007, at the UN, the Chair of the IPCC Rajendra Pachauri supported,"moving from a meat-based diet to a plant based diet."
RECALLING THAT In 2009 at an IPCC press conference at COP15, it was proclaimed that at a 2 degree rise in temperature, the poor, the vulnerable and the disenfranchised would not survive, at 1.5, they might
AWARE THAT in 2013, all member states adopted Sustainable Development Goal 13- “Climate change presents the single biggest threat to development, and its widespread, unprecedented impacts disproportionately burden the poorest and most vulnerable. Urgent action to combat climate change is needed.
APPRECIATING THAT in 2015. at COP 21, Secretary General, Ban Ki Moon, in Paris, urged states to negotiate with a global vision NOT with vested national interests
WELCOMING ON August 4 2019 Secretary General Antonio Guterres’ statement: We are facing a grave climate emergency. We need urgently to accelerate with Climate Action for the transformation the world needs. This is the battle of our lives. It is a battle we can win. It is a battle we must win.
IMPLEMENTING SDG13, ACHIEVING A GLOBAL VISION, ADDRESSING THE CLIMATE CHANGE EMERGENCY, AND KEEPING THE RISE IN TEMPERATURE BELOW 1.5 C WOULD INVOLVE:
Honestly, is the phrase “climate-change denier” appropriate for Jair Bolsonaro, the Trumpian president of Brazil, who has denied that climate change is anything to worry about. But far more important, in office, he has opened the planet’s “lungs,” the Amazon rainforest, to exploitation and devastation. He’s a man who is essentially giving lung cancer to his country’s former carbon sink. Under his reign, according to the New York Times, the Brazilian Amazon has already lost 1,330 square miles of forest cover. That, of course, is a planetary, not just a Brazilian, catastrophe and the man working so hard to make it so will, as a result, be partially responsible for the future warming of the planet. In other words, he’s not a climate denier but an aider and abettor of the phenomenon.
That, at least, is the phrase I’ve started using for these guys. Maybe “climate change criminals” would be more appropriate. Yes, Donald Trump has “denied” climate change, calling it a “Chinese hoax,” tweet-mocking global warming whenever it snows, and so on. Far more important, though, he and his cronies are working hard in just about every way imaginable to increase U.S. carbon emissions (which are, as of 2018, again on the rise). So TomDispatch regular Aviva Chomsky arrives just in the nick of time with a vivid description of how so many of the rest of us, particularly labor and environmental groups, are trying to get ourselves together on a planet where a number of our leaders are increasingly intent on taking us all down. Tom
Jobs, the Environment, and a Planet in Crisis Unions vs. Environmentalists or Unions and Environmentalists?
By Aviva Chomsky
When it comes to heat, extreme weather, wildfires, and melting glaciers, the planet is now in what the media increasingly refers to as “record” territory, as climate change’s momentum outpaces predictions. In such a situation, in a country whose president and administration seem hell-bent on doing everything they conceivably can to make matters worse, the Green New Deal (GND) seems to offer at least a modest opening to a path forward.
You know, the resolution introduced this February in the House of Representatives by Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) and Edward Markey (D-MA). Unsurprisingly, the proposal has been roundly attacked by the right. But it’s stirred up some controversy on the left as well. You might imagine that labor unions and environmental organizations would be wholeheartedly for a massive federal investment in good jobs and a just transition away from fossil fuels. But does organized labor actually support or oppose the Green New Deal? What about environmental organizations? If you’re not even sure how to answer such questions, you’re not alone.
RECALLING THAT in 1988 in the Climate Change Conference in Toronto, the participants concluded: Humanity is conducting an unintended, uncontrolled, globally pervasive experiment whose ultimate consequence could be second only to a global nuclear war. the Earth’s atmosphere is changed at an unprecedented rate by pollutants resulting from depositions of hazardous, toxic and atomic wastesand from wasteful fossil fuel use ... These changes represent a major threat to international security and are already having harmful consequences over many parts of the globe.... it is imperative to act now. (Climate Change in the Conference statement, Changing Atmosphere Conference in 1988}
In the Conference statement for Changing Atmosphere Conference in 1988, they called for the global community, to Reduce CO2 emissions by approximately 20% of 1988 levels by the year 2005 as an initial global goal. Clearly the industrialized nations have a responsibility to lead the way both through their national energy policies and their bilateral multilateral assistance arrangement.
NOTING THAT, in 2013, Canada agreed to Sustainable Development Goal 13- “Climate change presents the single biggest threat to development, and its widespread, unprecedented impacts disproportionately burden the poorest and most vulnerable. Urgent action to combat climate change is needed
APPRECIATING THAT in 2015. at COP 21, Ban Ki Moon, in Paris, urged states to negotiate with a global vision not a vested national interest
BEING ALARMED THAT In 2019, the IPCC have warned that there are only a dozen years for global warming to be kept to a maximum of 1.5C, beyond which even half a degree will significantly worsen the risks of drought, floods, extreme heat and poverty for hundreds of millions of people.
WELCOMING in August 4 2018, Secretary General Antonio Guterres’ statement: We are facing a grave climate emergency. We need urgently to accelerate with Climate Action for the transformation the world needs. This is the battle of our lives. It is a battle we can win. It is a battle we must win.
Implementing SDG13 addressing the emergency, and achieving A global vision for Canada would be:
Demonstrators block a road during a protest in the streets following the federal government's approval of the Enbridge's Northern Gateway pipeline in Vancouver, B.C., on June 17, 2014. (Reuters)
The British Columbia Civil Liberties Association is set to release what it calls a "trove" of heavily redacted documents disclosed by the Canadian Security Intelligence Service on Monday morning.
They concern the BCCLA's allegation that CSIS was monitoring the organizing activities and peaceful protests of Indigenous groups and environmentalists who were opposed to the now-defunct Enbridge Northern Gateway Pipeline project.
I remember well the antiwar movement of the Vietnam era. I was in it and it was distinctly in the streets, big time. I was typical, for instance, in traveling to Washington in October 1967 for a march on the Pentagon, which proved to be the largest antiwar protest ever staged to that point -- a crowd so vast I had never seen the likes of it before. And I returned to the capital a year or two later for a far more chaotic antiwar demonstration in which I remember having to choose between staying with a bold friend eager to rush further into the tear-gas-laced streets around the Washington Mall or run for it -- alone. (I reluctantly chose to stay.) And then there were all the little moments of work and opposition over so many years, the moments when you weren’t with crowds of people in those streets, but you were still focused on opposing that American war from hell.
