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US Beekeepers File Suit Against Trump EPA Charging ‘Illegal’ Approval of Insecticide Linked to Mass Die-Off
US Beekeepers File Suit Against Trump EPA Charging ‘Illegal’ Approval of Insecticide Linked to Mass Die-Off
“Honeybees and other pollinators are dying in droves because of insecticides like sulfoxaflor, yet the Trump administration removes restriction just to please the chemical industry.”
“It is inappropriate for EPA to solely rely on industry studies to justify bringing sulfoxaflor back into our farm fields,” said Michele Colopy of the Pollinator Stewardship Council, a party to the suit. “Die-offs of tens of thousands of bee colonies continue to occur and sulfoxaflor plays a huge role in this problem. EPA is harming not just the beekeepers, their livelihood, and bees, but the nation’s food system.” (Photo: Ashraf Amra/Anadolu Agency/Getty Images)
A group of beekeepers joined forces on Friday against Trump’s EPA by filing a lawsuit over the agency’s move to put a powerful insecticide—one that scientists warn is part of the massive pollinator die-off across the U.S.—back on the market.
The lawsuit (pdf) charges that the EPA’s approval of sulfoxaflor—touted by its manufacturer, agro-chemical giant Corteva, as a “next generation neonicotinoid”—was illegally rendered as it put industry interests ahead of the health of pollinators and ignored the available science.
“EPA is harming not just the beekeepers, their livelihood, and bees, but the nation’s food system.”
“Honeybees and other pollinators are dying in droves because of insecticides like sulfoxaflor, yet the Trump administration removes restriction just to please the chemical industry,” said Greg Loarie, an attorney with Earthjustice, the legal aid group representing the beekeepers. “This is illegal and an affront to our food system, economy, and environment.”
According to a statement by Earthjustice:
EPA first approved sulfoxaflor in 2013, but thanks to a lawsuit brought by Pollinator Stewardship Council, the American Beekeeper Federation, and Earthjustice, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals overturned that decision. The Court ruled EPA failed to obtain reliable studies regarding the impact of sulfoxaflor on honeybee colonies.
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Think US Media Won’t Help Lead Nation Into War With Iran Based on Flimsy or False Intelligence? Looks Like They Already Are
Think US Media Won’t Help Lead Nation Into War With Iran Based on Flimsy or False Intelligence? Looks Like They Already Are
“Do U.S. reporters, anchors, and editors really want more Middle Eastern blood on their hands? If not, they need to fix their rather credulous and increasingly hawkish coverage of Iran—and fix it fast.”
CNN’s presentation of video footage released by the U.S. military. (Photo: CNN/Screengrab)
If there were any lingering hopes that the corporate media learned from its role in perpetuating the lies that led to the 2003 invasion of Iraq and would never again help start a Middle East war on the basis of false or flimsy evidence, the headlines that blared across the front pages of major U.S. news websites Thursday night indicated that such hopes were badly misplaced.
The U.S. military late Thursday released blurry, black-and-white video footage that it claimed—without any underlying analysis or further details—showed an Iranian patrol boat removing an unexploded limpet mine from the Japanese-owned Kokuka Courageous, one of the oil tankers damaged in attacks in the Gulf of Oman.
Here’s how CNN presented the U.S. military’s video:
Iran has denied any involvement in the attacks, and Yutaka Katada—the owner of the Kokuka Courageous—contradicted the Trump administration’s account during a press conference on Friday.
“Our crew said that the ship was attacked by a flying object,” Katada said. “I do not think there was a time bomb or an object attached to the side of the ship.”
Independent critics were quick to call for extreme skepticism in the face of U.S. government claims, given the quality of the “evidence” and the warmongering track records of those presenting it.
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Landmark UN Report to Show ‘Transformational Change’ Urgently Needed to Save Humanity and Natural World From Nightmarish Future
Landmark UN Report to Show ‘Transformational Change’ Urgently Needed to Save Humanity and Natural World From Nightmarish Future
“Anyone who denies that we are in a human-induced extinction crisis is either lying or not paying attention.”
The dried up bed of Wayoh Reservoir near Bolton as the heatwave continues across the UK on July 23, 2018 in Bolton, England. A United Nations report scheduled for official release on Monday will say that up to 1 million species face extinction as a result of human activity. (Photo: Christopher Furlong/Getty Images)
A new landmark United Nations report on biodiversity set for release on Monday will say that a perilous and miserable future awaits the natural world and human civilization unless we rapidly bring an end to humanity’s destructive “business as usual” approach to the economy, food production, and energy usage.
Signaling the need for urgent “transformative changes” in order to save humanity and the natural world, the 1,800-page report and a separate executive summary will represent the first time the UN has published such an exhaustive report on the state of Nature.
As Agence France-Presse, which obtained a draft of the conclusions, reports Saturday that “The bombshell Summary for Policymakers… makes for very grim reading.”
According to AFP’s review of the draft report and the summary, the documents “paint a picture of widespread destruction wrought by man, some of it irreparable.”
While the final report is due out May 6, aspects of what the study will say have been disclosed via drafts reported on by the press in recent weeks and public statements by officials and researchers involved in its creation.
As Common Dreams reported last month, at last one of the overarching findings of the report is that human destruction of natural systems has put the world on a path towards a mass extinction that could wipe out over a million species.
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Researchers Warn Arctic Has Entered ‘Unprecedented State’ That Threatens Global Climate Stability
Researchers Warn Arctic Has Entered ‘Unprecedented State’ That Threatens Global Climate Stability
“Never have so many Arctic indicators been brought together in a single paper.” And the findings spell trouble for the entire planet.
The Yukon River winds through western interior Alaska in early April. (Photo: UAF/Todd Paris)
A new research paper by American and European climate scientists focused on Arctic warming published Monday reveals that the “smoking gun” when it comes to changes in the world’s northern polar region is rapidly warming air temperatures that are having—and will continue to have—massive and negative impacts across the globe.
The new paper—titled “Key Indicators of Arctic Climate Change: 1971–2017“—is the work of scientists at the International Arctic Research Center at the University of Alaska Fairbanks and the Geological Survey of Denmark and Greenland in Copenhagen (GUES).
“The Arctic system is trending away from its 20th century state and into an unprecedented state, with implications not only within but beyond the Arctic.” —Jason Box, GUES
“The Arctic system is trending away from its 20th century state and into an unprecedented state, with implications not only within but beyond the Arctic,” said Jason Box of the GUES, lead author of the study. “Because the Arctic atmosphere is warming faster than the rest of the world, weather patterns across Europe, North America, and Asia are becoming more persistent, leading to extreme weather conditions. Another example is the disruption of the ocean circulation that can further destabilize climate: for example, cooling across northwestern Europe and strengthening of storms.”
John Walsh, chief scientist at AUF’s research center, was the one who called arctic air tempertures the “smoking gun” discovered during the research—a finding the team did not necessarily anticipate.
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With Trump Pushing Regime Change in Venezuela, Critics Warn News Outlets Failing US Viewers Once Again
With Trump Pushing Regime Change in Venezuela, Critics Warn News Outlets Failing US Viewers Once Again
“If the US had a major state TV network it would sound exactly like this. 100% pure, uncritical cheerleading.”
Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) speaks about Venezuela before the arrival of President Donald Trump during a rally at Florida International University on February 18, 2019 in Miami, Florida. President Trump is scheduled to speak about the ongoing crisis in Venezuela. (Photo: Joe Raedle/Getty Images)
Ahead of a speech in Miami on Monday in which President Donald Trump promoted the ouster of Venezuela President Nicolas Maduro, progressive media critics continued their warnings that corporate news outlets like CNN, MSNBC, and others are carrying water for the White House’s regime change policy in the country despite interventionist failures like the invasion of Iraq in 2002, the overthrow of the Libyan government in 2011, and the long U.S. history of backing bloody coups and civil wars in Latin America going back to the 1980s.
“The self-aggrandizing ‘factchecking’ brigade that emerged to confront the Trump administration is suddenly nonexistent as it rolls out a transparent, cynical PR strategy to delegitimize a Latin American government it’s trying to overthrow.”
—Adam Johnson, media critic
Leading the charge is journalist Adam Johnson, a contributor to Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting (FAIR) and host of the Citations Needed podcast, who recently warned that the “same U.S. media outlets that have expressly fundraised and run ad campaigns on their image as anti-Trump truth-tellers have mysteriously taken at face value everything the Trump White House and its neoconservative allies have said in their campaign to overthrow the government of Venezuela.”
According to Johnson, “The self-aggrandizing ‘factchecking‘ brigade that emerged to confront the Trump administration is suddenly nonexistent as it rolls out a transparent, cynical PR strategy to delegitimize a Latin American government it’s trying to overthrow.”
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Just Like Iraq, Warns Venezuela’s Maduro, US Wants to ‘Get Hands on Our Oil’
Just Like Iraq, Warns Venezuela’s Maduro, US Wants to ‘Get Hands on Our Oil’
“We will not allow a Vietnam in Latin America,” says nation’s president ahead of opposition demonstrations on Wednesday.
Pro-government supporters attend a rally against U.S. President Donald Trump in Caracas, Venezuela in 2018. (Photo: Ueslei Marcelino/Reuters)
Warning that U.S. military intervention could lead to a Vietnam War-style conflict, Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro has said that while he’s willing to open talks with opposition leaders he will not bow to the demands of foreign “imperialists” and accused the U.S. government and other right-wing forces—like was done in Iraq and elsewhere—of trying to get their “hands on our oil.”
Maduro’s latest comments, which came via interviews and a video posted online, arrived just ahead of planned street demonstrations by the nation’s opposition on Wednesday and amid new threats via U.S. national security advisor John Bolton who continues to lead the charge for regime change on behalf of the Trump administration.
“If the U.S. intends to intervene against us they will get a Vietnam worse than they could have imagined.”
—President Nicolas Maduro
In an interview with Russia’s RIA Novosti published Tuesday, Maduro rejected demands by the opposition and the White House to step down or hold snap presidential elections. While the U.S. has recognized president of the National Assembly, Juan Guaido, as “Interim President” of the country, Maduro said that while he believes new parliamentary elections should be held the next presidential election would not be until 2025, as scheduled. Though the opposition largely boycotted the 2018 presidential election last May—and they were criticized as fraudulent by some—Maduro won with more than 67 percent of the vote.
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