Submitted by Dan Bacher on Tue, 09/07/2010 - 8:44am
Leading Scientists Call for Immediate Coho Salmon Protections in Marin
COUNTY OF MARIN FAILS TO PROTECT CRITICAL HABITAT FOR ENDANGERED COHO SALMON
For Immediate Release: September 7, 2010
For more information, please contact:
-Paola Bouley, SPAWN Conservation Director, 415.663.8590 ext 111, Paola@Tirn.Net
-Dr. Peter Moyle, Professor of Wildlife, Fish, and Conservation Biology at U.C. Davis and Associate Director for the Center for Watershed Sciences, Phone: (530) 752-6355, Email: pbmoyle@ucdavis.edu
Olema, CA- Leading aquatic scientists are publicly calling on Marin County Supervisors, for the 2nd time in 3 years, to take immediate action to protect critical habitat for the Bay Area’s last-remaining wild run of endangered coho salmon habitat, and end their delay tactics.
For a century, archeologists have been looking for a gate through a wall built by the Vikings in northern Europe. This summer, it was found. Researchers now believe the extensive barrier was built to protect an important trading route.
[...]
At a press conference Friday, Tummuscheit's team announced a further find -- one that they are calling a "sensation." The researchers have discovered the only gate leading through the Danevirke, a five-meter (16 feet) wide portal. According to old writings, "horsemen and carts" used to stream through the gate, called "Wiglesdor." ...
[...]
New calculations as to the age of the construction indicate, however, that the earliest parts of the wall might have been built by the Frisians and not by the Danes. Archeologists now think the foundation stone might have been laid as early as the 7th century.
[...]
The Frisians, who lived on the west coast of what is now Denmark and on a number of islands in the North Sea, were fighting for supremacy in the region with three other peoples: the Danes, the Slavs and the Saxons (see graphic). "It was the Kosovo of the early middle ages,"
Media Contact
· Kevin Griffis 202-482-4883
· Jim Milbury 562-980-4006
Secretary Locke Extends Disaster Declaration for California Salmon Fishermen
September 2, 2010
U.S. Commerce Secretary Gary Locke announced today an extension of the disaster for California salmon fishermen due to the low numbers of spawning Chinook salmon returning to the Sacramento River and the subsequent reduction in commercial fishery revenues. Today’s announcement continues the disaster declaration made in 2008 for the fishery.
“Low Chinook salmon returns to the Sacramento River predicted again this year are causing significant economic hardship to commercial fishermen and their families in California,” Locke said. “Many fishermen are finding it extremely difficult to make a living during the limited fishing season this year.”
Submitted by Dan Bacher on Wed, 09/01/2010 - 2:20pm
NEW RELEASE 1 September 2010
By: Patrick Porgans
Further Info: Contact Planetary Solutionaries at pp [at] planetarysolutionaries.org, 415-306-3317
Government Data Raises 'More Doubts About the Drought'
California Agriculture Cashing In at Record Breaking Highs
The Golden State’s agricultural earnings have reached historic highs during the so-called three-year drought.
According to U.S. Department of Agriculture, (USDA), California’s cash receipts from crop and livestock sales, in billions of dollars, are as follows: 2009- $34.841; 2008- $38.407; 2007- $36.386; 2006- $31.426; 2005 - $32.4; 2004- $30.939; 2003- $28.232; 2002- $26.544; 2000 - $26.206; and 2000- $25.185.
California’s Governor Schwarzenegger, state water officials, 60 Minutes’ Leslie Stahl, and Fox Cable TV host Sean Hannity, were among those espousing their “Dust Bowl” drought rhetoric for the past three years, depicting images or fallow fields, orchards being ripped out and projections of the state’s agricultural industry going under. It appears their doomsday predictions were all wet.
Government data released yesterday by the USDA, does not support their draconian doom and gloom prophecies reminiscent of the “Great Drought – Dust Bowl” of the 1930’s, and their predictions that billions of dollars in lost revenues were imminent.
In fact, in 2008, the second year of what officials proclaimed may be the state’s “worst drought ever," agricultural “cash receipts” (revenues realized from all agricultural commodities produced in the Golden State) reached a record-breaking high of $38.4 billion (just recently revised from the initial 2008 estimate of $36.2 billion), up from the previous all-time high in 2007 of $36.4 billion.
Covert Operations
The billionaire brothers who are waging a war against Obama.
by Jane Mayer
On May 17th, a black-tie audience at the Metropolitan Opera House applauded as a tall, jovial-looking billionaire took the stage. It was the seventieth annual spring gala of American Ballet Theatre, and David H. Koch was being celebrated for his generosity as a member of the board of trustees; he had recently donated $2.5 million toward the company’s upcoming season, and had given many millions before that. Koch received an award while flanked by two of the gala’s co-chairs, Blaine Trump, in a peach-colored gown, and Caroline Kennedy Schlossberg, in emerald green. Kennedy’s mother, Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis, had been a patron of the ballet and, coincidentally, the previous owner of a Fifth Avenue apartment that Koch had bought, in 1995, and then sold, eleven years later, for thirty-two million dollars, having found it too small.
The gala marked the social ascent of Koch, who, at the age of seventy, has become one of the city’s most prominent philanthropists. In 2008, he donated a hundred million dollars to modernize Lincoln Center’s New York State Theatre building, which now bears his name. He has given twenty million to the American Museum of Natural History, whose dinosaur wing is named for him. This spring, after noticing the decrepit state of the fountains outside the Metropolitan Museum of Art, Koch pledged at least ten million dollars for their renovation. He is a trustee of the museum, perhaps the most coveted social prize in the city, and serves on the board of Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center, where, after he donated more than forty million dollars, an endowed chair and a research center were named for him.
ScienceDaily (Aug. 27, 2010) — In a landmark study to be published in the journal Nature, scientists have been able to create the first picture of genetic processes that happen inside every cell of our bodies. Using a 3-D visualization method called X-ray crystallography, Song Tan, an associate professor of biochemistry and molecular biology at Penn State University, has built the first-ever image of a protein interacting with the nucleosome -- DNA packed tightly into space-saving bundles organized around a protein core. The research is expected to aid future investigations into diseases such as cancer.
Earlier this morning Glen E Friedman got a call from pal Russell Simmons asking for help on a new project to send a message about the current Ground Zero Mosque hullabaloo.
Glen and Russell collaborated similarly some years back on what is now known as The Liberty Street Protest [more photos, and previous BB coverage here & here]—massive antiwar signs housed in the windows of Russell's apartment, which is literally across the street from Ground Zero.
This new visual protest today occupies those very same windows. It addresses all who believe that the First Amendment and freedom of religion applies only to them.
By Brian Day, Staff Writer
Posted: 08/20/2010 06:52:24 PM PDT
CASTAIC - A high-tech ray gun built for the military that fires an invisible heat beam capable of causing unbearable pain will be tested on unruly inmates in the sheriff's detention facility in Castaic, officials said Friday at an unveiling event.
The "Assault Intervention System" (AIS) developed by the Raytheon Co., could give the Sheriff's Department "another tool" to quell disturbances at a 65-inmate dormitory at the Pitchess Detention Center's North County Correctional Facility, said Cmdr. Bob Osborne, head of the technology exploration branch of the sheriff's Department of Homeland Security Division.
[...]
Similar devices have already been sold to the U.S. military, however the machine demonstrated Friday is the first to be placed in an American correctional institution, sheriff's officials said.
[...]
When asked if the public can expect to see similar AIS devices mounted on patrol cars in the future or attached to deputies' utility belts, Osborne said, "not in my lifetime."
But Booen said his company is working on much smaller versions of the AIS. Progress on that research is a closely held secret, he added.
"That's our vision," said Booen. "We want to get to the point where it is a hand-held device."
Submitted by Dan Bacher on Sun, 08/22/2010 - 10:51am
Federal Appeals Court Upholds Central Valley Steelhead Protections
by Dan Bacher
The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco on August 20 rejected an attempt by corporate agribusiness to strip protected status from wild steelhead rainbow trout in California’s Central Valley.
Six San Joaquin Valley irrigation districts - Stockton East, South San Joaquin, Merced, Modesto, Oakdale and Turlock - challenged the steelhead listing under the Endangered Species Act (ESA) by the National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS). They argued that ocean-going Central Valley steelhead population should be removed from the endangered species list based on their opinion that freshwater rainbow trout might someday replace extinct steelhead populations.
The Great Russian Heat Wave of 2010 is one of the most intense, widespread, and long-lasting heat waves in world history. Only the European heat wave of 2003, which killed 35,000 - 50,000 people, and the incredible North American heat wave of July 1936, which set all-time extreme highest temperature records in fifteen U.S. states, can compare. All of these heat waves were caused by a highly unusual kink in the jet stream that remained locked in place for over a month.
Submitted by Dan Bacher on Fri, 08/20/2010 - 10:30am
Coalition Supports Chesbro's Request to Delay MLPA Process
by Dan Bacher
On August 17, the Partnership for Sustainable Oceans (PSO), a coalition of conservation and fishing industry organizations, announced that it "fully supports" the request by Assemblymember Wesley Chesbro to delay the implementation of Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger's fast-track Marine Life Protection Act (MLPA) Initiative on the North Coast.
Chesbro recently asked California Resources Secretary Lester Snow for a six-month delay in the controversial process to allow more time to develop a plan that balances marine conservation with access for the public and traditional user groups. To date, Snow has not responded to Chesbro's request.
"I have met with Resources Secretary Lester Snow and strongly urged him to slow down the process and that no action be taken by the Blue Ribbon Task Force for at least six months to allow more time to develop a plan that protects marine life and balances the access rights of traditional user groups," Chesbro said. "I am confident that given enough time we can develop a workable solution between the fishing community, North Coast tribes and environmentalists. There has already been some movement in this direction. This is something that cannot be rushed."
Chesbro's request came in response to the increasing criticism of the MLPA Initiative by California Indian Tribes, fishermen, environmentalists and human rights advocates.
Submitted by Dan Bacher on Fri, 08/20/2010 - 10:26am
South Coast MLPA Report Now Ready For Public Review
by Dan Bacher
A Draft Environmental Impact Report (DEIR) is now complete for the Marine Protected Area (MPA) proposals covering California's South Coast Study Region under Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger's Marine Life Protection Act (MLPA) Initiative. A 45-day public comment and review period began on August 18 and will run through October 4, according to a news release from the California Department of Fish and Game.
"The DEIR analyzes the potential environmental impacts of each of the five MPA proposals currently under consideration for this area, which extends from Point Conception to the California border with Mexico," said Thomas Napoli, Department of Fish and Game spokesman. "The MPA proposals are part of the larger Marine Life Protection Act (MLPA) process, which will create new MPAs along the length of California's coastline."
Napoli said the DEIR was prepared by the California Fish and Game Commission with assistance from the California Department of Fish and Game (DFG) as part of the required environmental review process under the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA). The process began in June with a public scoping phase, during which DFG solicited comments on the range of issues and type of information that should be considered in the DEIR. These comments helped to shape the content of the DEIR released this week.
MLPA Initiative officials and their corporate "environmental" NGO allies tried to bypass the CEQA process in their fervor to fast-track the MLPA in an attempt to greenwash the abysmal environmental legacy of Governor Schwarzenegger, but massive opposition by fishing and conservation groups forced the state of California to comply with the law and begin an environmental review (http://www.capitolweekly.net/article.php?xid=z03lb1yk59habr).
The retail company Target just gave over $150,000 to buy ads supporting a far-right Republican candidate for governor in Minnesota.
That's bad enough. But the stakes are much higher than one candidate and one company. If we don't push back hard, this will just be the tip of the iceberg. Other corporations will learn that they can pour money into elections to buy the outcome they want. So we're sending a message to Target's CEO that we won't shop there if Target continues spending money on elections.
... They are now termed "advise and assist brigades" by the administration, and the press dutifully reported this new term in their stories.
No wonder the press missed it. They can’t be expected to take dictation and fact-check it too.
Normally, misleading text and headlines are so commonplace they just don’t bother one like they used to. But this is Iraq. And I’m worried that the American public may be misled into thinking that all we’ll have over there a month from now are a few clerks and supply officers. The public might wrongly perceive from a false-fact like "all combat troops gone" that the light they’re seeing at the end of this horrific tunnel is fairly strong, when maybe it’s not that strong and it’s pretty far away.
What the administration has done (and the press would know this if they’d simply do their collective job) is rebrand the Iraqi mission with an new tag-line (“New Dawn”), and re-label six fully-combat-capable brigades with new, kinder and gentler titles. That’s basically the story. Here’s the February memo from Gates to CENTCOM giving the go-ahead to roll-out the kinder/gentler new mission tag-line that we’ll all going to hear so much about.
The New Dawn mission tagline and associated public relations effort doesn’t fit well with the word “combat”–and actually the American people have had their fill of the term too. So no accident that the administration has simply renamed six (or so) brigade combat teams as “advise and assist” brigades. The units may have received minor personnel changes, but otherwise are in no way different from existing combat brigades in Iraq. Indeed, some or maybe all of them are already deployed and functional under our current “Operation Iraqi Freedom” mission. The only thing that has changed is the name.
For a century, archeologists have been looking for a gate through a wall built by the Vikings in northern Europe. This summer, it was found. Researchers now believe the extensive barrier was built to protect an important trading route.
