March 31, 2008 :: The Editors :: Comments Off
Demonstrations against Chinese rule in Tibet turned violent in Nepal’s capital Kathmandu, yesterday, as police wielded bamboo clubs and beat demonstrators, including Buddhist monks and nuns. The UN has said Nepal’s harsh clampdown on Tibetan demonstrators violates international human rights law, including the right to peaceful assembly, as embodied in treaties signed by Nepal.
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March 29, 2008 :: The Editors :: Comments Off
Rice is a basic food staple for nearly half the world’s population. The world’s two most populous nations, China and India, depend heavily on the grain for basic sustenance, and for economic stability. The price of rice has doulbed in the last 3 months, causing concern about potential for conflict along Asian border regions. The [...]
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March 29, 2008 :: The Editors :: Comments Off
Reports out of Colombia cite government sources saying the FARC (Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias de Colombia) acquired uranium on the black market. Colombian authorities claim to have recoverd 66 pounds of uranium. The radioactive material, which in some forms can fuel to a nuclear device, was said to have been recovered after information on 3 laptops [...]
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March 28, 2008 :: The Editors :: Comments Off
EXCERPT FROM PLAN B 3.0, CH. 9: “FEEDING 8 BILLION WELL” Lester Brown, EPI :: One of the questions I am most often asked is, “How many peo-ple can the earth support?” I answer with another question: “Atwhat level of food consumption?” Using round numbers, at theU.S. level of 800 kilograms of grain per person [...]
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March 25, 2008 :: J.E. Robertson :: Comments Off
We are on the verge of a major communications and global economic revolution, in which major media, technological advances, cloud computing and dispersed optimization, adapt to and take over new models for living and producing in human society. The New Scientist magazine reports in its March 15-21, 2008 edition that “web 3.0 will be about making information less free”.
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March 25, 2008 :: staff :: Comments Off
As part of the Crisis Policy Forum, the HotSpring collaborative innovation initiative is now planning an effort to tackle the problem of food supply management and chronic food and water scarcity in Africa. The lessons from this experiment in collaborative research will be applicable in many cases to other situations around the world, and we are open to spurring dialogue in those areas as outgrowths of this ongoing discussion.
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March 25, 2008 :: staff :: Comments Off
As part of the Crisis Policy Forum, the HotSpring collaborative innovation initiative is now planning an effort to tackle the problem of food supply management and chronic food and water scarcity in Africa. The lessons from this experiment in collaborative research will be applicable in many cases to other situations around the world, and we [...]
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March 25, 2008 :: The Editors :: Comments Off
25 March :: Yousaf Raza Gillani, newly appointed Pakistan PM of coalition gov’t frees judges deposed, detained under Musharraf’s martial law decree; Gillani was once jailed by Musharraf over corruption allegations when he seized power… US Dept. of Justice yesterday announced approval merger of two satellite radio giants XM and Sirius, leading to potential absolute [...]
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March 24, 2008 :: The Editors :: Comments Off
24 March :: Australia’s gov’t is contemplating increases in food aid to poor regions, nations, after study of soarng food prices, mounting scarcity; SMH reports “A steep two-year rise in global food prices, which in Australia has triggered the Federal Government’s inquiry into grocery prices, has taken a heavy toll on poorer populations, particularly in [...]
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March 23, 2008 :: The Editors :: Comments Off
23 March :: US military has reported 4,000th soldier killed in Iraq conflict; BBC reports 4 US soldiers were killed by a roadside bomb in southern Baghdad, “In Baghdad, the heavily-fortified Green Zone suffered sustained mortar and rocket fire, which killed at least 15 civilians”… Dr. James Hansen, NASA’s leading climate scientist, says both Republican [...]
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March 23, 2008 :: The Editors :: Comments Off
As part of the Crisis Policy Forum, The Hot Spring’s collaborative innovation initiative is now planning an effort to tackle the problem of food supply management and chronic food and water scarcity in Africa. The lessons from this experiment in collaborative research will be applicable in many cases to other situations around the world, and [...]
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March 22, 2008 :: The Editors :: 2 Comments
The Chinese government’s military crackdown on demonstrators in Tibet and in neighboring Chinese provinces has been intense, though foreign media have been unable to confirm reports of mounting death tolls. In Sichuan province, there are allegations of 23 killed by security forces in one incident, including a 16-year-old. Reports of mounting fear among civilians in Tibet and Sichuan have become common in recent days.
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March 22, 2008 :: The Editors :: Comments Off
Sen. Barack Obama’s Philadelphia speech continues to bring new faith to his message of hope and unity. The message has been called “historic” and “presidential”, lauded even by conservative pundits as the most important address of the ’08 campaign. Observers have speculated widely that his “A More Perfect Union” speech was a tipping point that [...]
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March 19, 2008 :: The Editors :: Comments Off
‘WE THE PEOPLE, IN ORDER TO FORM A MORE PERFECT UNION’ SPEECH TACKLES RACIAL DIVIDE IN U.S., DISTANCES CANDIDATE FROM PASTOR’S REMARKS Senator Barack Obama of Illinois, by the slimmest of margins the frontrunner for the Democratic party’s nomination for president, yesterday delivered a major policy speech on race and tolerance in America. Major mainstream [...]
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March 17, 2008 :: J.E. Robertson :: Comments Off
On Thursday of last week, we found on the same day reports that mortgage foreclosures were at an all-time high in the US, the US dollar had fallen to an all-time low against the euro ($1.56 to 1€), the Federal Reserve joined with other central banks to infuse $200 billion into capital markets, oil hit [...]
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March 17, 2008 :: The Editors :: Comments Off
A revolutionary web-based social networking project, Witness.org has created a platform for delivering evidentiary video documenting human rights abuses for the collective conscience of the online world. ‘The Hub’, as the video sharing platform is called, is designed to ensure that individuals who have documented potential human rights abuses, or who are able to give [...]
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March 16, 2008 :: The Editors :: Comments Off
Two days after peaceful demonstrations across Tibet turned violent in the capital Lhasa, the Reuters news agency has reported that the violent clashes between protesters and Chinese security forces have spread to neighboring provinces. Supporters of the Dalai Lama, the exiled spiritual leader of Tibetan Buddhists, say they have confirmed at least 80 deaths among demonstrators.
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March 15, 2008 :: The Editors :: Comments Off
International media reports say that sources in the Tibetan exile community, from India to New York, have confirmed that at least 30 civilian demonstrators were killed by Chinese security forces as they moved to end a demonstration in the Tibetan capital, Lhasa, on Friday. Demonstrations had begun on Monday, and for four days, reports suggest the majority of demonstrations were peaceful.
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March 13, 2008 :: The Editors :: Comments Off
TheHotSpring.com :: The emergence of ecological economic trends, methods and industries, means that a wave of job creation could be the stabilizing factor which helps American industry recover both momentum and public appeal, potentially helping to ease pricing pressures and banks’ concerns about lending to individuals and small and medium-sized businesses. An industry-environmentalist joint conference [...]
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March 13, 2008 :: The Editors :: Comments Off
TheHotSpring.com :: The ongoing transition to an environmentally sustainable economy, focusing on energy and agricultural resources, is already opening the door to a range of new industrial and engineering services related to resource and ecosystem resilience (now understood to be vital to the stability of the natural environment whose own services underpin every element of [...]
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March 13, 2008 :: The Editors :: Comments Off
13 March :: The Environmental Protection Agency plans to tighten standards for ground-level ozone pollution, reducing the maximum allowable from 84 parts-per-billion to 75 ppb over an 8-hour period; critics say “implementation could be decades away”, depending on regulatory procedure and court review; last year, an official review suggested maximum allowable ozone levels of 60 [...]
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March 12, 2008 :: The Editors :: Comments Off
12 March :: Democrats propose permitting telecom firms to defend themselves in ex parte communications with judges, away from view of plaintiffs, where evidence includes classified national security information; move is designed to allow court cases to move forward, permit phone companies right to mount defense, but with no offer of retroactive immunity for any [...]
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March 11, 2008 :: The Editors :: Comments Off
11 March :: NY Times reports “The House Judiciary Committee filed a lawsuit on Monday seeking to force the White House chief of staff and the former White House counsel to cooperate with the committee’s investigation into the firing of a group of federal prosecutors”; Bolten, Miers have been protected by Bush-appointed AG Mukasey, who [...]
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March 10, 2008 :: The Editors :: Comments Off
A new study has found that selective seratonin re-uptake inhibitors (SSRI, or anti-depressants), sex-hormones, painkillers and anti-biotics in significant quantities in the drinking water of 24 out of 28 major metropolitan areas in the United States. Though the term “trace amounts” appears multiple times in today’s reporting of the findings, that term does not necessarily [...]
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March 10, 2008 :: The Editors :: Comments Off
10 March :: Anti-depressants, sex-hormones, painkillers and anti-biotics in significant quantities (though reporting has used term “trace amounts”, which does not necessarily speak to quantity) in 24 of 28 US metropolitan areas tested; contaminated drinking water goes to 41 million Americans; health effects unknown, but potentially concerning as “Experts say medications may pose a unique [...]
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March 9, 2008 :: The Editors :: Comments Off
9 March :: Sharif, Zardari form coalition gov’t in Pakistan, calling into quesiton the viability of Pres. Pervez Musharraf, politically; Musharraf has lost substantial support for his hardline attempts to reform the nation’s government structure in his favor, declaring martial law, throwing out judges who ruled against him, detaining lawyers and muzzling the press; former [...]
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March 8, 2008 :: The Editors :: Comments Off
Reports that have cropped up online, through the blogosphere and which echo a Newsweek report from mid-2004, suggest the White House may be planning to implement a security protocol that would include canceling the 2008 elections in case of “catastrophic emergency”. The key may lie in still classified “top secret” document that combines National Security [...]
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March 8, 2008 :: The Editors :: Comments Off
8 March :: US pres. George W. Bush has vetoed legislation that would have barred the CIA from using harsh interrogation techniques classed by critics as torture, such as “waterboarding”, a form of simulated drowning; the New York Times reports the veto is affirmation of Bush’s “legacy” as jealous defender of expanded executive power: “The [...]
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March 7, 2008 :: The Editors :: Comments Off
7 March :: “Pariah states” Florida, Michigan, punished for voting early in party primaries, now want “do-over” opportunity, as DNC, state gov’ts spar over who would fund a re-vote; Clinton campaign announces $35 million fundraising peak in February, including an astounding $4 million in 48 hours after Tuesday’s vital wins in Texas, Ohio, yet Barack [...]
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March 4, 2008 :: staff :: Comments Off
At its current growth rate, global installed wind power capacity will top 100,000 megawatts in March 2008. In 2007, wind power capacity increased by a record-breaking 20,000 megawatts, bringing the world total to 94,100 megawatts—enough to satisfy the residential electricity needs of 150 million people. Driven by concerns regarding climate change and energy security, one in every three countries now generates a portion of its electricity from wind, with 13 countries each exceeding 1,000 megawatts of installed wind electricity-generating capacity.
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March 2, 2008 :: The Editors :: Comments Off
2 March :: A demonstration estimated in excess of 50,000 and including former presidents Corazon Aquino and Joseph Estrada called for Philippine pres. Gloria Macapagal Arroyo’s resignation, amid allegations her husband took multi-million-dollar kickbacks in a telecommunications deal… State of Georgia yet to reform pension system to permit African American police officers who worked before [...]
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