activistpost--2019-02-19--The Nightmare Fairyland of the Green New Dealers

When a small child runs around waving their arms saying, “I’m a bird, I’m a bird,” we often will say what a creative imagination they have. If an adult runs around doing the same, we usually say that that person needs help because they are clearly out of touch with reality. Anyone who takes the time to read the proposed Green New Deal legislation can only conclude that the authors are living in a fairyland that is also deeply out of touch with reality.  Read through the list of desired and, indeed, demanded activities the congressional sponsors say they want the federal government to undertake over the next decade. The sponsors resemble a child running around the toy store saying, “I want that, and that, and that, and that, and…” while all the time completely oblivious to the fact that everything they want costs money that their parents do not have an unlimited quantity of.  The child may very well throw a temper tantrum when they are told that not everything they want can be had, or at least not right now all at the same time. What the child is not yet fully cognizant of is the existence and meaning of scarcity, costs, and trade-offs. Food, clothing, a room in which to sleep, and various other nice things from their parents just seem to be there. So why can’t they just have all these other things as well, and just for the asking?  House Resolution 109 (February 7, 2019), “Recognizing the Duty of the Federal Government to Create a Green New Deal,” has a long list of sponsoring congresspersons who seem to be not much different from that child in the toy store. I want an end to climate change; and I want an end to poverty; I want an end to social injustice, and an end to racism, sexism, and ethnic discrimination; I want a fossil fuel-free environment with renewable-energy sources and high-speed railways; I want everyone to have a well-paying, secure, and meaningful job, guaranteed by the government; I want everyone to have good, inexpensive government-supplied housing; I want everyone to have a free education all the way to the PhD level; I want manufacturing and agriculture to be balanced through government support and subsidies; I want happy and respected indigenous peoples; and I want guaranteed and comfortable government-secured retirement pensions for everyone; plus, I want everyone to have guaranteed vacations.  In addition, each of the sponsors of the legislation says, I also want labor unions to have the power to determine work conditions and set wages; and I want all the groups in society, and most especially the ones that I consider to be underprivileged and under-represented and not treated nicely, to sit at the table of governmental decision-making and make sure that every one of these groups gets what I know they want and deserve. And I also want the U.S. government to guide and subsidize the rest of the world to do the same. And I want the government to do it now, before the oceans rise, the sky falls, and greedy capitalists who don’t care about anything other than their selfish profits destroy all living things on the planet.  Then with beautiful little birds chirping in the air in a clear blue sky, we will all live happily ever after in the Green New Deal paradise. The End.  A variety of critics have pointed out that the potential financial costs if the government attempted to implement all of this would likely run into the tens of trillions of dollars, looking over the next few decades. Others have calculated that the possible environmental benefits in monetary terms between now and the end of the 21st century most likely would be way too small to justify the lost growth in the overall American economy. And still others have reminded people of the dangerous loss of personal freedom and decision-making that would result from shifting to the required government central planning if the Green New Deal were to be fully implemented. (See my article “The Green New Dealers and the New Socialism.”)  That most of the politicians who have signed up in support of the Green New Deal seem unconcerned by these consequences should not be too surprising. First, they are spending other people’s money — that is, money to be taxed from the American people or borrowed with future taxpayers expected to foot the bill. Besides, once you are talking in terms of trillions of dollars, one loses all sense of reality. Who can even picture in their mind what those kinds of sums really mean? It all seems like play money in a Monopoly game.  Second, all those politicians suffer from electoral near-sightedness. Their vision extends no further than the next election. For members of the House of Representatives this is only two years after the last election, which means they were already running for re-election even before they were sworn in to their term of office in early January 2019. Their mindset is that of “Après nous, le deluge” (After us, the flood). The full, long-run effects of vote-getting short-run policies will only emerge much later, possibly long after many of them are no longer in office. And if they are still in government when some of those longer-run consequences start to appear, who will go back and check their voting record from decades earlier to prove that it’s really all their fault? The finger can be so easily pointed in other directions.  Third, far too many of them are guided by an ideological zeal that is accompanied by a power lusting for remaking the world in their own image. Which one of them does not suffer from the hubris of the would-be social engineer, the redesigner of society according to their own presumptuous conception of how people should live, work, and interact with their fellow human beings? Nary a one demonstrates any modesty or hesitation in believing that they know better how humanity should live than all those actually living out their individual lives in the world according to their own lights concerning what would be best for them and their families.  According to the Congressional Research Service in its December 2018 profile of Congress, less than 40 percent of all members of the House of Representatives and less than 30 percent of those in the Senate had any prior experience in business. Before winning their congressional positions, the large majority had careers in state or local government offices, or in the law profession, or in teaching.  Many in Congress have had little or no experience in running an enterprise, satisfying customer demands, meeting employee payrolls, or ensuring that a company’s bottom line remains in the black in the face of market competition. This does not mean that law or teaching are not worthy occupations, or that they preclude someone from having a good understanding of the market process or the value of securing individual liberty; after all, I’m in the teaching profession myself. But those who have operated a business are likely to be more aware of the reality and workings of financial costs and benefits, uncertain investment decision-making, the need for making inescapable trade-offs, and personal risks of success and failure that occur in the world of competitive private enterprise.  Of course, having been a businessperson before entering politics does not ensure that someone is immune to the power-lusting or social-engineering bug, nor does it prevent such a person from easily falling into the mindset of spending other people’s money. Even those who claim to be for free enterprise, individual freedom, and limited government too often show themselves cut from the same political cloth as any others running for or holding political office. Indeed, those businesspeople who end up in political positions too frequently seem badly infected by the interventionist and welfare-statist viruses. (See my articles “If Political Candidates Advocated Liberty” and “Donald Trump the Corrupt Creation of America’s Bankrupt Politics.”)  It is not really surprising that those who have most enthusiastically signed on to the Green New Deal are those in the “progressive” wing of the Democratic Party, and especially those who are the self-declared democratic socialists among them. Only a socialist can still believe that government planning can solve all the problems of the world, that merely commanding resources and directing people can take care of humanity’s economic and social shortcomings, and all within a decade of setting the plan in motion.  Read through House Resolution 109, and not once do you find any reference to limits, scarcity, trade-offs, costs, or consumer choice and private-enterprise decision-making. Like a throwback to the Stalinist five-year plans of the 1930s, great transformations will be conjured up: new infrastructures in the form of roads, transportation, buildings, energy, and production will be redesigned and introduced in every corner of society with merely the will and command to free the world of fossil fuels and their effects. To be fair, they have shown greater modesty than the Stalinist enthusiasts of that earlier time; the Green New Dealers have given themselves a decade to perform these miracles, rather than work within the frame of a Soviet-style five-year plan.  They admit at several points that there may be the constraints of what science and technology will allow to be physically achieved; but they also propose the necessary government funding for research and development so that even nature should not serve as an inescapable obstacle to Utopia. The government experts will surely know which technologies deserve support to meet the targets and goals laid out in the economy-wide encompassing green central plan.  Nor should there be any concern about the money for all this, because that is what taxing the rich and government borrowing are for; and last but certainly not least, the money to pay for it can always be created since that is what central banks are for. The latter especially may have to be used since America is also to guide and subsidize similar green plans in the other parts of the world. Who said American progressives and democratic socialists don’t believe in making America great again? What could be greater than Americans paying for all that may be needed to save the entire planet? If that does not make you proud to be an American, what does?  Listen to their responses to those who challenge their green plan. Again, like the immature child, they pout and stamp their feet that the only problem is that the rich don’t want to pay up what they owe society. Or the racists and sexists want to maintain the existing social order of things so they can have the power to oppress the victims of their exploitive profit seeking. If not for the enemies of the good, all would be possible without limit or natural constraint.  Is it really necessary nearly 100 years after the publication of Austrian economist Ludwig von Mises’ famous essay “Economic Calculation in the Socialist Commonwealth” (1920) to point out that it is not enough to know in technological terms what you would like to do or achieve? It is fundamentally essential in a world of inescapable scarcity of the means to attain our various desired ends to know in value terms what are the competing and most highly valued uses for which the limited factors of production might be applied.  How will the Green New Dealers know whether they have invested too much in a high-speed railway line in Nebraska compared to one in Idaho? Or how will they know whether either one has been worth it at that time and in those places compared to solar panel constructions in North Dakota or wind turbines in Mississippi? How will they know whether a government housing project in Boston has really been affordable in comparison to a new “free” medical clinic in Tucson, Arizona? How will they know any of this in relation to a vast and complex variety of consumer items that citizens all around the country would have been willing to buy, if their incomes had not been taxed and there had been a competitive free market in the production and sale of finished consumption goods?  The answer is, there will be no real and meaningful answer. Without a private competitive market for the factors of production (land, labor, capital) in which private enterprisers offer factors prices based on their alternative entrepreneurial judgments about the types and quantities of consumer goods that market demanders might be willing to buy in the future at particular anticipated prices, there is no way to know whether the means at society’s disposal (that means all of us as individual buyers and sellers) have been cost-efficiently used to attain as many of the alternative and competing ends we would like to see possibly achieved. (See my article “Why Socialism Is Impossible.”)  But the proposed Green New Deal implicitly does away with a functioning, competitive price system. Instead, what the Green New Dealers offer is a free-for-all of political plundering through interest group horse-trading and pandering. That’s what they say in the proposal: “A Green New Deal must be developed through transparent and inclusive consultation, collaboration and partnership with frontline and vulnerable communities, labor unions, worker cooperatives, civil society groups, academia, and businesses.” The government, labor unions, and stakeholder groups will also acquire equity ownership in the private enterprises that, clearly, now will be producing for environmental-sustainability and social-justice outcomes rather than for self-interested profit guided by market-based prices to satisfy consumer demands.  Is it also necessary nearly 75 years after the publication of Friedrich A. Hayek’s classic essay “The Use of Knowledge in Society” (1945) to remind people who should know better that it is the height of arrogance to presume that the designers of the Green New Deal and any others appointed to detail and implement such a grand epoch in American central planning, that there is more dispersed, decentralized, and ever-changing knowledge possessed in the minds of all of humanity combined than any group of social engineers can ever hope to master and integrate to solve the various problems of society?  Here, too, is an instance of the infantile ignorance of the green social engineers who believe that, like Olympian gods high above the ordinary mortals of humankind, they can direct the best future for not only all those in the United States but the entire population of the world. Straitjacketing everyone within the confines of the green plan means that hundreds of millions of people are prevented from deciding how best to use what they know that many others do not, and in ways that in the competitive, price-guided market process enable all to benefit from what everyone else knows. (See my article “F.A. Hayek and Why Government Can’t Manage Society.”)  With the implementation of the Green New Dealers’ dreamland, America will begin the transition from a system of price-guided production serving and satisfying market-based consumer demand to what Ludwig von Mises called the “planned chaos” of waste-creating surpluses of unneeded and wrongly made goods along with life-frustrating shortages of desired and essential consumer items and producer commodities.  No longer singularly directed by competitive prices, the forms and types of production will increasingly be determined by the political dictates of the coalition of “inclusive” groups participating in the democratic decision-making of remaking America into the green world of the future. But precisely because of the direct and indirect supply-chain interdependencies of sectors of the economy in a social system of division of labor, resulting imbalances and distortions in one sector will have inescapable spillover effects on many other sectors.  A component part needed for one production process is lagging in availability because of manufacturing delays in the factory supplying that part because its energy supplies are dependent upon faulty solar panels caused by inferior inputs allocated to its manufacture under the green plan.  In another part of the country, highways are crisscrossed with newly installed electric-car powering stations, which are underutilized or not used at all because far fewer electric-powered automobiles have been produced than the planners had planned. Or the traffic flows in that area of the country have turned out to be far less than the green planners had projected because of other mismatches between central plan and local realities.  The types of competitive, market-based flexibilities in resource allocations and production adjustments that are constantly adapting the supplies to the demands in the face of unexpected and changing circumstances in a system of private, free enterprise under the incentives of profit and loss are all lacking under the green plan. Prices and wages cannot adapt to the changing circumstances because various politically connected stakeholders in these imbalanced corners of the economy insist on preserving their socially just standards and locations of living while numerous historically “victimized” groups insist that any change that does occur must protect or improve upon their existing material or social status in society; to not listen to these groups would imply continuing residues of racism, sexism, and social injustice. And there are, of course, the diehard Green New Deal ideologues who insist that personal sacrifices must be happily made because there is no going back to “capitalism.” It’s either the green plan or an end to the planet. With each passing day, every passing month and year, the dislocations in the economy grow with accompanying acrimonious accusations, buck-passing rationalizations and excuses, and grandiose political justifications for the increasing shortages, decreasing qualities, and lagging achievements in all the green plan had promised. There are outspoken complaints by more and more people; here and there groups of consumers and workers and disappointed members of old or new victimized groups publicly demonstrate with anger and insistence that something better be done. They are met with the green planners promising plan corrections and social improvements, along with accusations about shadowy and dangerous enemies of the beautiful green world being built. The “democratic” socialism about which its new proponents almost lyrically sing is really an extended political plunderland of all those groups listed in the proposed legislation whose leaders will get together and decide how much of other people’s money, social positions, and future life opportunities will be divvied up among their assigned followers at the expense of others in society. It is a gangster politics of coercively imposed outcomes that reduces both victims and recipients of redistributed booty to the status of slave-like dependents of those in governmental power who are determining their fates. In spite of the colorful rhetoric of the common good, the general welfare, and social justice, the political arena is populated with those hungering for political power, with those wanting to take from others what they cannot peacefully acquire, and with those who dream dreams of remolding the human matter of society into a better world of their fanciful imaginations. Everyday democratic politics is corrupt and wealth-inhibiting enough in the context of the modern interventionist welfare state. But if the Green New Dealers have their way, this will be taken to an entirely new and more destructive level as one great plan for global salvation is imposed on everyone, everywhere, with no avenues of escape in our age of electronic Big Brother surveillance and control. Once embarked on, history suggests that such central-planning systems are very difficult to reverse without great and costly hardships to nearly everyone in society. Sign up here to be notified of new articles from Richard M. Ebeling and AIER. Richard M. Ebeling, an AIER Senior Fellow, is the BB&T Distinguished Professor of Ethics and Free Enterprise Leadership at The Citadel, in Charleston, South Carolina. Ebeling lived on AIER’s campus from 2008 to 2009. This article was sourced from AIER.org


activistpost--2019-04-10--April is National Alcohol Awareness Month Time for Education and Action about Alcohol Abuse and Al

April is National Alcohol Awareness Month — Time for Education and Action about Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism

April is National Alcohol Awareness Month, and the first weekend in April is Alcohol Free Weekend. This is a campaign to inform and change social norms about drinking.  Every day hundreds of Americans die because of alcohol abuse and alcoholism, and thousands more are admitted into hospitals, psychiatric facilities, or jails and prison. Alcohol places thousands more at risk for divorce, unemployment, bankruptcy, and physical and emotional problems such as depression. Because it affects so many people, alcoholism is considered the number one public health problem in America – even surpassing cancer and heart disease, and is the third leading cause of preventable death in the U.S.  Alcohol Awareness Month (AAM) is a national grassroots effort that was started by the National Council on Alcoholism and Drug Dependence in 1987, and it quickly spread throughout the country. AAM highlights the need to support education, prevention and treatment for alcoholism and alcohol-related problems. It is an opportunity for families and communities, together, to educate themselves about the critical issues of alcohol abuse and alcoholism, and reach out and educate their children on the reasons to stay alcohol free.  Alcoholism is a disease that affects children, families and communities across the nation. In fact, most people know someone who has been affected by this disease as over half of all adults have a family history of alcoholism or alcohol problems. In this regard, alcoholism does not just affect the alcoholic but others around, and therefore it is also called a family disease.  Alcohol is a toxic and addictive drug. Each year there are well over 88,000 deaths because of alcohol, and according to the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism (NIAAA), there may be as many as 15.1 million individuals with an alcohol problem or alcoholism in the United States. Alcoholism was, is, and remains one of the most pervasive and tragic diseases affecting society.  Alcohol Free Weekend is a special opportunity for parents to teach about alcohol in their homes. For at least one weekend each year people are saying that America does not need to rely on alcohol for pleasure or pastime. This also gives parents opportunity to further reflect upon the dangers and consequences of drinking with their children.  Although it is among the nation’s most deadly diseases, alcoholism is preventable. Each year AAM offers an opportunity to work in a unified effort to raise awareness about the negative consequences of drinking and to do something about it. It also asks families to look at the level of emotional pain that alcohol has caused in their lives and encourages adults to talk about alcoholism with spouses, children, and friends.  The best prevention is to help send the message to youth that one does not need to drink in order to enjoy leisure activities and have a fulfilling and healthy life. In fact, at least 34 percent of Americans do not drink at all.  AAM also encourages individuals with an alcohol problem to seek treatment. Help is only a telephone call away. If a person believes that he or she or a family member may have an alcohol problem or if one is hurting or in emotional pain because of alcohol, it is best to contact a local treatment agency or call the national referral helpline operated by the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) at 1-800-662-HELP.


activistpost--2019-10-02--School Districts Use Gaggle To Monitor Students Free Speech And Social Media Posts

School Districts Use “Gaggle” To Monitor Students’ Free Speech And Social Media Posts

Today, I give you a frightening story about free speech censorship and watchlists just in time for the countdown to Halloween.  A recent article in The Tennessean reveals how the Williamson County School District (WCS) is monitoring students’ free speech and social media posts.  The WCS recently implemented a “threat surveillance program” called Gaggle, that is so invasive and frightening one would be hard pressed not to call it a “gag” program that limits students’ free speech.  When the WCS was asked to reveal specific details about what Gaggle and authorities are monitoring students speech for, they claimed they could not reveal any details “due to federal family protection laws.”  Public & private schools are joining the ranks of alphabet soup surveillance agencies like DHS, the FBI and the NSA claiming they cannot reveal surveillance details.  The Tennessean was able to shed some light on what Gaggle monitors by saying it, “operates using a mathematical algorithm to identify high risk words and phrases when students are logged into the district’s server.”  Gaggle’s video was a little more revealing, claiming that they monitor students social media posts 24/7 for things like:  When school districts and private corporations start monitoring students for things like profanity and insulting language, we should all be worried because it will not end there.  Soon social media providers will monitor everyone.  Parents think school districts have crossed the line with Gaggle.  “I’m concerned about the mining of all the other student-written text, regarding bullying, profanity, or anything offensive. Aren’t kids going to be too nervous to write anything that’s potentially controversial? What kind of education will they get if they’re walking on eggshells not to offend the computer algorithm?” WCS parent Thomas Morgan said.  Gaggle’s monitoring of students is a lot more invasive than what parents are being told.  Gaggle’s “Safety Management Dashboard” allows school staff and law enforcement to identify and track individual students who have the highest number of incidents.  The Gaggle Safety Management Dashboard allows superintendents, principals and other educators who are responsible for student safety to investigate and answer the following questions:  Mr. Morgan was right, students will be walking on eggshells because they will be afraid of getting put on a watchlist.  Gaggle is like Alexa on steroids.  A Gaggle video called “do you know what your students are doing online?” is a damning account of exactly how invasive their threat to free speech is.  Gaggle’s Bloomington, Illinois staff listens to and watches students social media content in real-time 24 hours a day, 365 days a year.  The video also revealed that at least seven school districts are using Gaggle: Oklahoma Public Schools, Cincinnati public schools, Duval public schools, Fort Wayne Community schools, Johnston County schools, Denver Public schools and last but not least the Williamson County School District.


activistpost--2019-11-06--“Bathroom Big Brother”: Schools Are Using an App to Track Students’ Restroom Time

There is no doubt we are living in increasingly Orwellian times. Most of us are not surprised when it is revealed that yet another government agency is spying on us in yet another way. Being surveilled nearly everywhere we go (and even in our own homes) has become the norm.  And if it isn’t government agencies doing the spying, it is Big Tech companies. It seems like every day we are told about another privacy violation coming from Google, Facebook, and Amazon. Recently it was announced that Big Tech and government are forming an unholy dystopian alliance called HARPA that will use companies including Google, Amazon, and Apple to collect data on users who exhibit characteristics of mental illness that could lead to “violent behavior.”  Side note: If you think that avoiding the use of social media platforms will keep you safe from Big Tech’s prying eyes, I’ve got bad news for you.  Unfortunately, children are not exempt from surveillance and the growing police state.  Schools – once a place where children went to learn – have increasingly become Big Government indoctrination centers. One way in which this is becoming painfully evident is in the surveillance methods implemented by public schools.  This morning, I read a headline that sent chills down my spine:  SCHOOLS ARE USING AN APP TO TRACK STUDENTS WHILE THEY PEE  Remember hall passes? They were little slips of paper that teachers gave to students to show they had permission to leave class for a few minutes.  In hundreds of schools across the US, paper hall passes have been replaced with an app that parents and students are finding particularly invasive.  The app is called e-hallpass, and here is how it works:  I visited the e-hallpass website to learn more about the system while I was gathering information for this article. I am not going to share a link to the site in this article for various reasons. If you’d like to check it out for yourself, the site isn’t hard to find online. If you do give the site a visit, be sure to check out the videos on the e-hallpass system. If you are liberty-minded and care about privacy, you will likely find them as disturbing as I do.  With e-hallpass, it isn’t just your child’s teacher who will know their whereabouts at all times – it is the entire school staff.  In the videos on the e-hallpass website, there is a lot of talk about “holding kids accountable for the time they are spending outside of the classroom.” Do we really need to micro-manage every second of the school day?  What if a student has a health issue that requires frequent bathroom visits? Those kinds of health issues can be embarrassing enough for child (heck, for anyone!) without being tracked and interrogated about why they were in the restroom for 10 minutes. And who dictates exactly how long a bathroom trip should take? What about students with conditions like IBS, and girls when it is “that time of the month”?  Students do not have to use their personal devices for the e-hallpass app, but they can use their own devices if they’d like to. This raises additional privacy concerns, for obvious reasons – apps are notorious for accessing data they shouldn’t. Imagine a child using the app on their own device, and that device syncing up with the family computers, and something like this or this happening.  In its privacy policy, e-hallpass says that student data is not shared with third-party companies for marketing or advertising, and parents can request deletion. The company says that schools are entirely in charge of the data the program collects and can delete it as often as they like…as if that is comforting.  What about the parents? Do they have a say in what kind of data on their child is collected and how it is used?  So, schools don’t even have to tell parents what kinds of apps and software they are using – and they are to be trusted with additional data on kids?  How do students feel about e-hallpass?  Christian Chase, a senior at Heritage High School in Virginia, shared his thoughts with The Washington Post:  Chase has a petition going on Change.org. On the page, he describes how the system works and why he objects to it:  Students at an Illinois high school were surveyed about e-hallpass last year. The majority were not happy with the system:  Parents aren’t thrilled about the app, either.  Some parents expressed serious concerns about the use of the app. Privacy attorney Brad Shear, who runs the website Shear on Social Media Law, Life, and Tech, has two children in the Montgomery County school district in Maryland. He told The Post that if the district decides to test e-hallpass in schools, he and other parents are ready to speak up in objection:  In an article on the subject, Shear outlined how much it would cost taxpayers to implement the e-hallpass systems in all of the schools in his district:  I’d argue that the money would be better spent on improving academics at public schools in the US, considering that the country is lagging in academic achievement when compared with other advanced industrial nations.  Some politicians are asking questions, too.  Recently, a few legislators sent letters to more than 50 education technology companies and data collectors, asking them to explain what kind of information they collect and how it is used.  The list of companies who were sent letters includes:  Even the FBI is warning parents about this kind of technology.  Last year, the FBI (I know, I know – they aren’t really one to talk about protecting the privacy of individuals, but here we are) issued a warning about the increasing use of technology in schools:  The FBI’s report goes on to say that the widespread collection of sensitive information by EdTech “could present unique exploitation opportunities for criminals” and provides one troubling example of that actually happening:  Here’s what you can do to keep your children’s data a bit safer.  The FBI provides the following list of recommendations for families: • Research existing student and child privacy protections of the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA), the Protection of Pupil Rights Amendment (PPRA), the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA), and state laws as they apply to EdTech services. • Discuss with their local districts about what and how EdTech technologies and programs are used in their schools. • Conduct research on parent coalition and information-sharing organizations which are available online for those looking for support and additional resources. • Research school-related cyber breaches which can further inform families of student data vulnerabilities. • Consider credit or identity theft monitoring to check for any fraudulent use of their children’s identity. • Conduct regular Internet searches of children’s information to help identify the exposure and spread of their information on the Internet.  The Parent Coalition for Student Privacy, which was founded in July 2014 by Leonie Haimson of New York and Rachael Stickland of Colorado, offers a free Parent Toolkit for Student Privacy you can download. Haimson and Stickland waged a successful campaign to shut down a $100 million student data-collection project funded by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and operated by a specially created nonprofit called inBloom. It was designed to be a massive student database that could make it easier to share information with for-profit data-mining vendors and other third parties without parental notification or consent.  Are children being conditioned to accept the expanding police state?  It seems like kids are being programmed to accept whatever “authority figures” demand of them – including monitoring their private bathroom activities. Children are being taught that privacy must be sacrificed in the name of security (the e-hallpass promotional videos mention “security” over and over) and are being conditioned to accept 24/7 surveillance as normal and necessary. Perhaps most disturbing is the fact that childhood is increasingly becoming criminalized.  In the article Say No to “Hardening” the Schools with Zero Tolerance Policies and Gun-Toting Cops, John W. Whitehead wrote,


21stcenturywire--2019-07-29--Orwellian Own-Goal Finlands Fake News Training Children to Believe Only Mainstream Propaganda

Orwellian Own-Goal: Finland’s ‘Fake News’ Training Children to Believe Only Mainstream Propaganda

In the US and Britain, scapegoating Russia has become a way for the ruling Establishment to control political discourse. In Finland, this practice has been taken to an entirely new level, as the government attempts to integrate the Russiagate narrative into their country’s laws and educational system – creating a new Orwellian mesh to capture the minds of the younger generation.  Think tanks and institutions in the West are heralding the Nordic nation’s efforts to integrate the anti-Russian narrative into its education system and indoctrinating students to only believe mainstream media reports – and dismiss any criticism against the ruling Establishment as “Russian disinformation.”  Globalist pundits are currently celebrating Finland topping the list of European countries deemed to be the most ‘resilient’ to Russian disinformation, according to the Media Literacy Index, published by billionaire anti-Russian activist George Soros’s Open Society Institute.  The irony of Finland’s Orwellian own-goal here seems to be lost on mainstream media commentators who seized on this story because it appeared to validate their own anti-Russian paranoia and confirmation bias…  Finland is “winning the war on fake news” and its findings in this “war” may be crucial to Western Democracy, the CNN claimed.  In May 2019, in Helsinki, Finland at the Espoo Adult Education Centre, lecturer Jussi Toivanen, who is the Chief Communications Specialist at Finnish Prime Minister’s Office spoke about misinformation and “Russian propaganda.”  They showed methods used to deceive users on social media: image and video manipulations, half-truths, intimidation and false profiles.  Another slide, featuring a diagram of a Twitter profile page, explained how to identify bots: look for stock photos, assess the volume of posts per day, check for inconsistent translations and a lack of personal information.  Finally, it had the popular deepfake video showing Barack Obama talking various nonsense.  Jussi Toivanen’s course is part of a program of the Finnish government which has been on-going since 2014. Two years before Russia allegedly meddled in the US elections, thus Finland was ahead of the curve on Russian hysteria.  Toivanen, didn’t specifically say anything concrete, as cited by the CNN, he said that it was “difficult to pinpoint” the exact number of misinformation campaigns that have targeted Finland. Regardless, they nevertheless play on issues like immigration, the European Union, or whether Finland should become a full member of NATO.  NOTE: Finnish reporter Jessikka Aro claimed that ‘fake news’ stories created by ‘the Russians’ have led to “real threats” against her:    .   Allegedly, Russian trolling ramped up in 2015, and Finnish President Sauli Niinisto called on every Finnish citizen to take responsibility and fight false information. That, of course, by itself wasn’t enough, so American help was needed.  Toivanen then said something that’s been becoming and more apparent – the targets of propaganda need to taught from very young age to only believe the Western propaganda, any other kind is inherently wrong and evil, but the US-fabricated one can’t possibly be fake news.  At the French-Finnish School of Helsinki, a bilingual state-run K-12 institution, training children to spot any alleged attempt by Russia to influence their fragile minds is taken quite seriously.  In Valentina Uitto’s social studies class, a group of 10th-graders were locked in debate over what the key issues will be in next week’s EU elections.  The students broke off into groups, grabbing laptops and cell phones to investigate their chosen topics – the idea is to inspire them to become digital detectives, like a rebooted version of Sherlock Holmes for the post-Millennial generation.  The French-Finnish School partners with Finnish fact-checking agency Faktabaari. Together they create a sort of course frame for students from elementary to high school that would make them “media literate.”  The exercises include examining claims found in YouTube videos and social media posts, comparing media bias in an array of different “clickbait” articles, probing how misinformation preys on readers’ emotions, and even getting students to try their hand at writing fake news stories themselves. (Because articles in UK Media and US Media such as “WORLD WAR 3 ALERT” aren’t clickbait, at all).  This approach, though, needs to be careful, since skepticism may ultimately turn into cynicism in students, and nobody would want that, you want them to only believe the targeted propaganda.  Finland, possibly following in the US’ footsteps is also “exporting democracy,” but they are doing it through experts, who are teaching others how to spot alleged Russian misinformation.  Russia, of course, maintains that it doesn’t interfere in any domestic politics, but who believes that anyway.  Regardless, Willard’s class appears to be taking a page from Ukraine’s democracy: in his class, focus is shifted on developing a “strong national narrative” rather than attempting to even debunk alleged false claims.  Of course, there’s skeptics, who consider that specifically teaching children to only believe Western propaganda isn’t enough. Social Media platforms should do everything they can to filter and censure the content, so that it doesn’t even have a chance to approach any citizen of the “democratic” world.  Aro’s first open-source investigation back in 2014 looked at how Russia-linked disinformation campaigns impacted Finns.  In the last Finnish elections officials saw no “symptoms” of Russian meddling, and according to Toivanen that means Finland has become a difficult target for the alleged Russian trolls.  Thus, a more proactive approach is needed, and look forward to it.


aljazeera--2019-01-10--Outrage over apparent segregation in South Africa school

Outrage over apparent 'segregation' in South Africa school

A South African primary school teacher was suspended on Thursday after a photograph appeared to show black children sitting separately from white children in a classroom, sparking a storm of racism accusations.  The pupils were attending their first day at the Schweizer-Reneke school in North West province, and the teacher had taken a photograph to send to anxious parents.  It rapidly spread on social media as it showed about 17 white children sitting around a large table, with four black children around a small corner table in the background.  "From the information I got from the meeting, it seems that there are a lot of cases here of racism," provincial Education Minister Sello Lehari said after visiting the school.  "I will send a team to do an investigation into all schools... to deal with issues of racism in totality," Lehari said.  Student activist Mcebo Dlamini wrote on social media the "most provoking" aspect of the image "is not that black kids are ostracized from white kids, that is common in our supposedly post-apartheid Africa", South African news website TimesLIVE reported.  "Rather what becomes painful is that there are black people who still insist that racism has ended and who think that blacks and whites can have peaceful relations that do not have undertones of racism".  Race relations remain tense in South Africa 25 years after the end of white-minority apartheid rule, with fierce racism-related controversies erupting regularly on social media and in politics.  "We saw the photo and we were also angered by what we saw," Jozeph du Plessis, chairman of the school's governing body, told the eNCA television channel.  "The kids were quite unsettled - you must realise they were five years old on their first day at school - and she grouped them in a way she thought would settle them quickly and comfort them.  "There was no intent of racism or segregation from the teacher's side.  "We are investigating - perhaps it could be a language issue, perhaps those kids are not speaking Afrikaans, but I can't speculate."  Some white parents on Thursday took their children from the school after protesters gathered outside.


aljazeera--2019-01-18--Trumps shutdown is a historic opportunity for real change

Trump's shutdown is a historic opportunity for real change

This week, the White House Council of Economic Advisers doubled its estimate of how much the shutdown - the longest in US history - will cost the economy. Others are warning that it could push the US towards a recession. Families across the country are scrambling to feed their children, keep their homes, and pay for expensive medications. As hundreds of thousands of federal and contract workers continue without pay, Trump has demanded that workers return to their jobs, stating that the shutdown will continue indefinitely - for months or even years - until his racist, multibillion-dollar border wall is approved.  Despite Trump's claims that what he is doing is for the safety of everyday Americans, this moment could not make it plainer that he does not care about any of us - not even the working class white people he claims to represent. The wall's aim is not to protect ordinary Americans, but to rile up Trump's base using racism.  This is a classic divide-and-conquer tactic, aiming to get poor white people to blame people of colour and not the political and corporate elite, for poverty. The wall will also make loads of money for an ever-growing corporate defence industry, who are deep in Trump's pockets, and see militarised borders, surveillance, deportation, war and incarceration as opportunities to make cash.  But polling shows that Trump's plan is backfiring. By refusing to back down, Trump is actually losing support among his base. This carves out a path for leftists to present a new vision for this country, one that sees the fate of everyday people - both within and outside the US border - as deeply connected. We have an opportunity to present a political pathway where there is enough for all of us. We have an opportunity to actually win more people towards our side, and away from Trump, the fascist far right, and the political and corporate elite.  A shutdown happens when Congress cannot agree on the budget. In recent years, we've become used to the threat of shutdown but no president has openly called for one. In May, Trump tweeted that "our country needs a good 'shutdown.'" Months later, he announced that he would not sign any spending bill that does not include $5.6b for a border wall - a demand that Democrats refuse to meet.  As a result, working-class people across the country - already struggling - have been pushed into an even more vulnerable position. Over 800,000 workers are being forced to work without pay - some will be reimbursed after the shutdown ends, others won't. Families are preparing to go without food stamps - and potentially, without their tax refunds - next month.  In New York City, imprisoned people at a local jail launched a hunger strike to protest the cancellation of family visits due to staffing shortages caused by the shutdown. Others have reported that they aren't receiving their medication.  For Native American sovereign nations, the US has failed to maintain treaty agreements due to the shutdown. As a result, guaranteed funding for programs like healthcare, education and safety are all on the brink of collapse. On the Navajo Nation, many are stuck in their homes - unable to get to the grocery store or take care of vital needs, like getting to a pharmacy - because ploughs aren't operating in the midst of heavy snowfall.  43,000 immigration hearings have been cancelled - the number set to grow by 20,000 weekly. People have been waiting years for these hearings and are now being told they might have to wait years more.  Small farmers aren't receiving millions in payouts they were promised due to falling crop prices at the hands of Trump's trade wars.  All across the country, working-class families are struggling and, in a sign of how out of touch our politicians are, the Trump administration has told the country to treat the shutdown like a vacation or to do chores for their landlords in lieu of paying rent.  But the state of things - with people working for free and services to everyday Americans being cut - is not an inevitable byproduct of the shutdown. In fact, in the midst of the shutdown, the Trump administration has made changes to policy in order to serve the interests of the uber-wealthy and corporate class. As a result of the lobbying efforts of the credit-reporting companies and mortgage industry, IRS workers were called back to work (and are being paid) to carry out income verifications for lenders. This process earns the mortgage banking industry millions of dollars in fees each year.  While rules are being bent so big corporations can make even more money, a judge struck down a union lawsuit demanding workers be paid for their time immediately.  The shutdown is hard-lined for working class people and negotiable for the rich.  Long before Trump's demand for expanding the wall at the US-Mexico border, this country's priorities were out of whack. Every year, US taxpayer dollars are used to cultivate a world of war, violence, incarceration and deportation - not one of safety and of meeting basic human needs.  Of our discretionary budget, the US spends nearly 10 times more on defence than health and human services, 9 times more than education and 9 times more than housing. Under Trump's proposed discretionary spending for 2019, these margins have increased.  Much of this money is going to private companies, who in the age of Trump see dollar signs in his tough on crime, hard-lined immigration, warmongering approach to governance. The fact that the shutdown is happening over a wall is a scary symbol of where society is and where it is headed.  We are living in an era where not social services and jobs for working class people but police, wars, border walls and prisons are the priorities of the government.  And this is not a purely American trend. All over the world, as communities are battling the devastating effects of climate change and poverty, governments are building walls, closing borders and abandoning green initiatives. Since the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989, at least 55 new border walls have been built all around the world. During this same period, poverty has been wrecking our society with at least 80 percent of humanity living on less than $10/day.  The answer is a clear political vision rooted in the idea that there is enough for all of us.  While the Democrats could use this moment to talk about comprehensive, human-rights based immigration policy or the ways shutdown policies have been shifted to serve the rich, they aren't doing much other than condemning Trump for shutting down the government, while countering his proposal for a wall with negotiations focused on other forms of border security.  We should applaud the Democrats for not caving to Trump's wall demand, but we should also acknowledge that they have failed to raise the bar. A party that is trying to present itself as the only progressive alternative to Trump and his allies should have done a lot more. By reinforcing myths about the "threats" on our border, Democrats like Pelosi are not conducting political diplomacy, but instead casting long term damage to everyday people's understanding of what our problems are and what solutions should be put forth.  The majority of Americans don't support the border wall or Trump's family separation policy. Seventy-five percent of Americans say immigration is good for our country. So why aren't Democrats using this moment to be visionary, pushing demands rooted in the basic idea that everyone has the right to move across borders as freely as money does in this society? Why aren't they calling out Trump's IRS policy shift for the rich, while food stamps are being cut?  We need to use this moment to not only end the shutdown but to push out big ideas like the green new deal, wealth redistribution, medicare for all, abolishment of ICE and repeal of the 1994 crime bill. Policies like the conservative-austerity paygo measure that House Democrats approved in their rules package, which requires new spending to be offset with equivalent savings, should be abandoned. This policy will make it virtually impossible to pass any of the reforms mentioned above but only three Democrats voted no  - Ro Khanna of California, Tulsi Gabbard of Hawaii, and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York. This is unacceptable.  We must reject the small, limited point of view shared by many prominent Democrats that sees unfettered capitalism and austerity measures as natural law. We need a clear, big-picture agenda that creates opportunities for working class people to organise and build bridges between our communities so we can expand the political imagination of the public to get behind big demands.  We can't wait for someone else to organise people during the shut down - the likely result of inaction would be more division and fascism. Without political clarity, we run the risk of people getting so tired and fed up that they give in and move to the right. "Fine, build the wall" is the other potential pathway we walk down.  Trump is making very intentional plays to pit working class people against one another. However, the experiences and grievances of poor people, whether they are immigrants or not, are not opposing, but shared. After 40 years of neoliberal economic policy, which has devastated communities all across the country and around the world, people are desperate and turning to xenophobia, white nationalism and fascism as a result. At this moment, when Trump's support is waning - and people are falling into an even more vulnerable state - we must present an alternative. We cannot rely on mainstream Democrats' play-it-safe approach.  The path we are headed down will only get darker if we do not fight for a drastic reorganisation of our communities rooted in a new political vision that values the freedom of people over the profits of a few. We can live in a society where everyone has enough food to eat, a safe place to live and where parents and children have what they need to take care of each other. But this won't happen while our political system is drowning in dark, dirty corporate money and when politicians refuse to take a stand.  From the Right of Return protests in Gaza, to the immigrant caravan at the US-Mexico border, to the LA teachers strike and calls for TSA worker strikes - we have a real a opportunity to help people see the connections across our experiences and to rally behind a vision of solidarity rooted in the idea that our fates are tied, that we are in a shared battle against the corporate class and that if we come together to take them down, we can live in a society where there is enough for all of us.  The views expressed in this article are the author's own and do not necessarily reflect Al Jazeera's editorial stance.


aljazeera--2019-01-21--Taiwan School Bank Experiment Money Lessons for Life

Taiwan School Bank Experiment: Money Lessons for Life

A school in Taiwan uses a controversial social experiment to teach students the value of money.  A counting machine flips through a stack of bright pink-coloured paper money - bills destined for children at an elementary school in Taiwan.  The notes are either passed out by teachers for a job well done, exchanged by children at a student-run grocery store, or - if the experiment is a success - carefully saved up and responsibly spent.  The idea for this school bank experiment was conceived by Lai Hao-wei, an education specialist at Wenlin Elementary School in Taipei, who was tasked by the school's principle to teach students the value of money.  Taiwanese are no strangers to the hardships of recession given their export-reliant economy which fluctuates according to global demand, and Lai himself knows what it is like to misspend and run into debt as a young adult.  "When I first entered the real world, I had no understanding of finance whatsoever. I spent everything I earned every month. I even had credit card debt once. It took me a long time to pay that off," Lai remembers.  Inspired by the popular board game, Monopoly, Lai hopes that his "Wenlin dollars" can teach students how to better manage their finances and prepare them for adulthood.  "Students will be able to learn about earning and spending," Lai says. "The children can earn their own money and take full responsibility. By doing this, I believe they can really experience matters of finance."  Lai's first challenge is to get teachers on board, which is not easy at the traditional school.  "It's quite an old school which makes it difficult to change things," he says. "I have no idea whether this whole thing will work."  And as Lai gets the programme going he encounters some unexpected challenges. He has angered some members of the Parent-Teachers Association, who accuse him of violating Taiwan's Labor Standards Act by "employing" children.  But Lai pushes onward with the programme to prove that his "Wenlin dollars" truly have value.  At some point early in life, we all realise that everything in our possession comes from somewhere - the stationeries we use, the backpack we carry, the food we put in our mouth.  But most schools don't teach children how these items are acquired or how to earn money to be able to afford them.  Financial education is virtually non-existent in Taiwan's curriculum; schools cover only the glossaries at best.  When it comes to finance management, children either get their ideas from the family or the mass media. So, instead of being taught theories and techniques, the children might be poorly informed on how the system really works. And the lack of awareness and knowledge could lead to social problems later on in their lives.  When I was younger, I didn't think this would be a problem. I thought once you start working, you'd know how to manage money, but it turned out that's not the case.  More and more young adults end up with credit card debt, being declared bankrupt, and completely devoid of any concept of finance management. By being part of the society, they might contribute to the functioning of the system, but how it really works, or on what principles it is built on, remains a mystery to most of them.  In response, Lai Hao-wei, the director of student affairs in an elementary school in northern Taiwan, thought of an innovative experiment where he'd set up a school bank and circulate a currency that is unique to the school.  Essentially, he's set up a system modelled after the real world where financial rules are applied within the confines of the school walls - teaching students how to earn wages and use the money to buy the items they desire.  This programme strikes many people as controversial and it's not easy to convince teachers and parents of the programme's validity. They worry the children might become too utilitarian being exposed to the concept of money at such an early stage, and thus be groomed into a person who would only work when a reward is guaranteed.  Despite the incessant controversies surrounding the programme, I believe that when adults and daily life fail to provide children with the correct sets of skills or knowledge, schools have to carry out this particular task.  This idea extends far beyond what's discussed in the film; any skill that would be required in society should be taught, step by step, when children are still at school.  Many students feel lost once they are out of the safe school environment. Education neither gives them the skills to perform the task of their choosing nor prepares them for the financial principles on which the real world runs on. There are pros and cons to every programme, but I believe that programmes like this could have a profound influence on the students' future.


aljazeera--2019-04-05--Why Iranian students in US are crowdfunding to pay their tuition

Washington, DC - Thirteen years ago, when Shayan Karimi was 11 years old, he begged his parents for a guitar. Around the same time, a relative introduced him to Elton John and Pink Floyd. From that point on, Karimi knew he wanted to be a musician.       In late 2016, his dream moved closer to reality when he was awarded a partial scholarship to study music at Berklee College of Music in Boston.       Owing to the absence of a US embassy in Iran, Karimi travelled to Dubai to apply for a visa later that year. He arrived in the United States in January 2017, bringing with him a financial plan for the next four years.  But months of renewed US sanctions and US President Donald Trump's travel ban have made life challenging for Iranian students at American universities.  Trump’s decision last May to formally withdraw from the Iran nuclear agreement triggered a currency crisis that hammered the value of the Iranian rial.  More pain followed in November after the re-imposition of oil and financial sanctions ushered in banking restrictions that have made direct wire transfers to and from the country all but impossible.  Many students, including Karimi, have struggled to afford tuition and living expenses.  "I came to Berklee with a financial plan for a four-year programme, and it made sense with the exchange rate when I left Iran," he told Al Jazeera, but "with this devaluation, it doesn't make sense any more."  Karimi added, "It has been very challenging and frustrating. The money we had in Iran isn't worth much any more".  Karimi, who said he was already working the maximum number of hours permitted under his F1 visa, found himself stretched thin. He struggled to find the money to pay his living costs and tuition expenses not covered by his partial scholarship.       With no other options, Karimi did what many others like him have had to do: He turned to crowdfunding his education on GoFundMe.  So far, he has raised about $8,000, less than one-third of his intended goal. Despite this, he said he remains hopeful about the campaign, especially after several Iranian celebrities shared his page on their social media accounts.  Karimi is not alone.  Leila Austin, president of the Public Affairs Alliance of Iranian Americans (PAAIA), said her organisation has received a surge of requests from students looking for help.  "We had students reaching out to us, calling and explaining the situation of struggling to pay tuition because of devaluation of currency and the difficulties in transferring money from Iran to the US because of the re-imposition of sanctions," she told Al Jazeera.  "If they don't have the money to pay for their tuition, they will no longer be enrolled at a US university and would then have to go back to Iran," she added.  Hedieh*, an undergraduate engineering student in New York City, has made handmade hats and gloves to raise money for her tuition.      "Before the [reimposition of] sanctions, my parents were sending me money, but they can't any more," she told Al Jazeera.  "Ever since the [reimposition of] sanctions, my father said he can't send dollars any more. It is a really high conversion rate," she added.  Studying in New York had been Hedieh's dream her entire life. She wanted to follow in the footsteps of her mother, who had studied in the US in the 1970s. "Because of her stories, I wanted to follow her path and experiences - she always spoke highly about being in America."  If Hedieh cannot pay for her tuition to keep her full-time student status, she risks the possibility of having to return to Iran before finishing her degree.  Hedieh said the financial situation has caused her immense anxiety, affecting her ability to focus and maintain her grades. "How can students focus on their studies and do well with this amount of stress?" she asked.       "I feel hopeless and worried. I had so many hopes but now I don't feel confident any more. It's an emotional rollercoaster," Hedieh said.  There is no data showing how many students have been forced to leave the US due to insufficient funds, but according to the Institute of International Education's 2018 report of Open Doors, 12,783 Iranian students are currently studying at US institutions.  In addition to the financial challenges, students faced another hurdle after Trump included Iran in a travel ban order, barring nationals from several Muslim-majority countries from entering the US.  In June 2018, in a 5-4 ruling, the US Supreme Court upheld the third iteration of the ban, which has suspended entry to nationals from Iran, Libya, Somalia, Syria, and Yemen, as well as North Korea and Venezuela.  Currently, the only visas being issued to Iranians are for students entering on F1 or J1 visas. Many receive only single-entry visas, meaning they must reapply if they leave the US.  Students have expressed frustration and disappointment that their parents could not visit during their studies and attend their graduation.  When Ali Taleghani left Iran in September 2016 to study in the US, he promised his mother he would return to visit her soon.  He had been accepted into a PhD programme in bioengineering at the University of Missouri.  "When I left Iran, I told my mother to not be upset, that I would be able to see her soon and come during the summer break," the 32-year-old student told Al Jazeera, but Taleghani has not been able to go home or have his mother visit because of the challenges in place.  There were already several barriers to Iranian students attending American universities: application fees, test fees for entrance exams like the SAT or TOEFL, and the need to visit a consulate outside of Iran to obtain a visa.       These issues have not just affected students in the US, but also in Canada, the UK, and other countries.  In December 2018, the University of Reading in the UK told Iranian student Parsa Sadat to retrun to Iran to obtain $6,898 in cash to pay his tuition.  Meanwhile students like Karmimi do their best to try and navigate the geopolitical storm that threatens to derail their studies.  "This is out of our control. There is nothing we can do to save ourselves from this," Karimi said.  "We wouldn't be struggling if it weren't for [the sanctions] - it has completely changed our lives."       *The individual's name has been changed at her the request to protect her privacy.


themoscowtimes--2019-10-17--Russia’s Natural Resources Ministry Calls for Urgent Action to Save Wild Reindeer

Russia’s Natural Resources and Ecology Ministry has called for action to protect wild reindeer on the Taymyr Peninsula in the country’s Far North because the population has halved over the past two decades.  There are now 400,000-450,000 of the animals in the region, down from 1 million in 2000, the ministry said in a statement on its website.  “The situation requires the urgent adoption of comprehensive measures to preserve these animals,” the statement said. “I ask you to consider the possibility of introducing a ban on the hunting of wild reindeer in the areas the species migrates to,” Natural Resources and Ecology Minister Dmitry Kobylkin said in the statement.


thetelegraph--2019-02-01--The Great Southern Ark Australias bold new plan to save its native wildlife

The Great Southern Ark: Australia's bold new plan to save its native wildlife

Conservationists in South Australia have launched an ambitious project to turn a former mining region into a refuge for some of Australia’s most threatened wildlife.  The Great Southern Ark initiative will see an area the size of Hertfordshire fenced off and restocked with indigenous species, which have declined rapidly across the country due to predation by foxes and feral cats introduced from Europe.  The project in South Australia’s Yorke Peninsula – often described as “Little Cornwall” due to the many Cornish miners who settled in the region – officially launched yesterday, but work to eradicate invasive predators was already well underway.  Fence construction is expected to get underway in the next few weeks. This will seal off the peninsula from invasive predators and provide a sanctuary for soon-to-be reintroduced species, such as southern brown bandicoots, western quolls and red-tailed phascogales, which are all marsupials.  Australia has experienced the highest rate of mammalian extinction in the world over the last 200 years. Losses have been particularly acute in the Yorke Peninsula, where 27 of its 29 mammal species are reported locally extinct.  Intensive agriculture, invasive predators and the now-defunct gypsum mining industry have all been blamed for the decline, which conservationists will aim to reverse through the rewilding initiative.  Supporters claim the Great Southern Ark project – a collaboration between the WWF, Greening Australia, Naturally Yorke and the South Australian and federal governments – could boost the local tourist industry as well as biodiversity. The region is only 60 minutes by car from Adelaide.  The Yorke Peninsula accounts for 0.08 per cent of Australia’s landmass, a sobering statistic that highlights the limitations of the local initiative. Nevertheless, conservationists claim it is a necessary step in halting the decline of Australian wildlife.  “These are bold, risky projects, but we’re facing a species-extinction crisis in Australia,” Darren Grover, head of living ecosystems at WWF, told ABC News.  “We can’t keep going along doing what we've been doing because it’s not working. We need to take some risks.”


channel4uk--2019-09-01--Brazilian tribal chief world must do more to save the Amazon rainforest

Brazilian tribal chief: world must do more to save the Amazon rainforest

South American countries will meet later this week to discuss how they can work together in response to the fires raging in the Amazon Basin.  More than 80 thousand fires have broken out this year – the most intense blazes for more than a decade.  The meeting comes after the Brazilian President Jair Bolsanaro rejected an £18 million pledge from the G7 group of industrial nations to help fight the fires.  We spoke to Brazilian tribal leader and environmentalist Raoni Metuktire through a translator.


latimes--2019-09-12--Opinion California can help save the Amazon rainforest Do we have the guts to try

Opinion: California can help save the Amazon rainforest. Do we have the guts to try?

Fires burning in Brazil and the broader Amazon basin are shining a spotlight on the role of forests and land use in the climate change challenge. Next week, the California Air Resources Board will hold a hearing that could have a direct impact on such fires.  On Sept. 19, the board will vote on whether to endorse its proposed Tropical Forest Standard. California has been working on this standard for 11 years through a unique partnership with 37 other states and provinces from 10 countries around the world, including all of the states in the Brazilian Amazon. Full disclosure: I have served as the project lead for this effort since its inception.  At its core, the Tropical Forest Standard establishes a set of performance benchmarks for what a high-quality state or provincial approach to reducing deforestation should aim for. States or provinces that meet the standard might be eligible in the future to raise money to fund sustainable practices by participating in the California carbon cap-and-trade system. Emitters in California — an oil company, say — would purchase offsets tied to emissions reduction in the forest provinces. That then allows the oil company to meet part of its compliance obligations here. But even if these faraway forest offsets are never bought and sold in our carbon market, jurisdictions that meet the benchmarks could use the standard to access other opportunities.  Much of the proposed standard is technical, relating to quantification of emissions reductions, monitoring and verification. Some of it is focused on process and governance issues, establishing a robust set of principles for what constitutes proper collaboration between state and provincial governments and indigenous and local communities. These principles have been jointly developed and are now widely endorsed by governments, indigenous peoples organizations and civil society groups around the world. There is nothing in the world today like the Tropical Forest Standard, and we should not hold our breath waiting for the United Nations or national governments to fill that gap.  Critics have already decided that the Tropical Forest Standard cannot possibly work. They point out that it will be difficult to verify and enforce the benchmarks. They worry that because of that, the program may just make it easier for large emitters in California to buy dubious offsets and continue emitting.  And, of course, even if it does work, the Tropical Forest Standard cannot solve the problem of tropical deforestation by itself.  But the standard is worth trying. Like so much of California’s approach to climate policy, it is an experiment, one that has a lot of potential upside with very limited downside risk. The program contains multiple safeguards to protect the integrity of the California cap-and-trade program. Even if a jurisdiction can meet the standard, there is no guarantee that it would be able to link with California’s program. Before that could happen, it would have to gain further approval in Sacramento. It is quite possible that California could adopt the Tropical Forest Standard and never pursue a linkage with a tropical forest jurisdiction.  Why then move forward with it? Two reasons. First, the standard sends an important signal to California’s tropical forest partners that they are not in this alone. Abandoning the standard now would do the opposite. This is especially critical for forest states in Brazil now that the federal government has pulled back from forest protection. Governors in Brazil, Peru or Mexico might feel a little more comfortable taking some political risks to step up on forests and climate if they can point to an ongoing partnership with California. In a world of triage and tragic choices, every little bit of courage by a political leader is a precious resource.  Second, states and provinces that meet the standard’s criteria would be in a much better position to unlock more sources of public and private financing, even if the offsets aren’t part of our cap-and-trade market.  Without a doubt, many of these tropical forest jurisdictions are poor, with limited capacity and far too little support from national and international partners. And, yes, in many of these tropical frontiers, there are problems of corruption, illegal land grabs, narco-trafficking and violence against indigenous and local communities. We can’t solve these problems by ignoring them, and the standard is a way of engaging them.  The great risk is that leaders in those tropical forest provinces who are committed to sustainable efforts will give up or lose the next election. They need and deserve our support. They need to know that the world is watching and that if they stay on the path of forest protection their efforts will be recognized and rewarded. More than anything, they need to be able to make a compelling case to the people in their jurisdictions that forest protection can deliver meaningful economic opportunities.  California has a chance to do its part in this effort by staying in the fight alongside these states and provinces. This is what climate leadership looks like in a bottom-up world.  William Boyd is a professor at the UCLA School of Law and the UCLA Institute of the Environment and Sustainability. Since 2009, he has served as the project lead for the Governors’ Climate and Forests Task Force.


newsweek--2019-02-02--Genetically Engineered Biotech Trees Could Save Americas Forests

Genetically Engineered ''Biotech' Trees Could Save America's Forests

Compared to gene-edited babies in China and ambitious projects to rescue woolly mammoths from extinction, biotech trees might sound pretty tame.  But releasing genetically engineered trees into forests to counter threats to forest health represents a new frontier in biotechnology. Even as the techniques of molecular biology have advanced, humans have not yet released a genetically engineered plant that is intended to spread and persist in an unmanaged environment. Biotech trees—genetically engineered or gene-edited—offer just that possibility.  One thing is clear: The threats facing our forests are many, and the health of these ecosystems is getting worse. A 2012 assessment by the U.S. Forest Service estimated that nearly seven percent of forests nationwide are in danger of losing at least a quarter of their tree vegetation by 2027. This estimate may not sound too worrisome, but it is 40 percent higher than the previous estimate, made just six years earlier.  In 2018, at the request of several U.S. federal agencies and the U.S. Endowment for Forestry and Communities, the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine formed a committee to “examine the potential use of biotechnology to mitigate threats to forest tree health.” Experts, including me, a social scientist focused on emerging biotechnologies, were asked to “identify the ecological, ethical, and social implications of deploying biotechnology in forests, and develop a research agenda to address knowledge gaps.”  Our committee members came from universities, federal agencies and NGOs and represented a range of disciplines: molecular biology, economics, forest ecology, law, tree breeding, ethics, population genetics and sociology. All of these perspectives were important for considering the many aspects and challenges of using biotechnology to improve forest health.  Climate change is just the tip of the iceberg. Forests face higher temperatures and droughts and more pests. As goods and people move around the globe, even more insects and pathogens hitchhike into our forests.  We focused on four case studies to illustrate the breadth of forest threats. The emerald ash borer arrived from Asia and causes severe mortality in five species of ash trees. First detected on U.S. soil in 2002, it had spread to 31 states as of May 2018. Whitebark pine, a keystone and foundational species in high elevations of the U.S. and Canada, is under attack by the native mountain pine beetle and an introduced fungus. Over half of whitebark pine in the northern U.S. and Canada have died.  Poplar trees are important to riparian ecosystems as well as for the forest products industry. A native fungal pathogen, Septoria musiva, has begun moving west, attacking natural populations of black cottonwood in Pacific Northwest forests and intensively cultivated hybrid poplar in Ontario. And the infamous chestnut blight, a fungus accidentally introduced from Asia to North America in the late 1800s, wiped out billions of American chestnut trees.  Can biotech come to the rescue? Should it?  Although there are many potential applications of biotechnology in forests, such as genetically engineering insect pests to suppress their populations, we focused specifically on biotech trees that could resist pests and pathogens. Through genetic engineering, for example, researchers could insert genes, from a similar or unrelated species, that help a tree tolerate or fight an insect or fungus.  It’s tempting to assume that the buzz and enthusiasm for gene editing will guarantee quick, easy and cheap solutions to these problems. But making a biotech tree will not be easy. Trees are large and long-lived, which means that research to test the durability and stability of an introduced trait will be expensive and take decades or longer. We also don’t know nearly as much about the complex and enormous genomes of trees, compared to lab favorites such as fruit flies and the mustard plant, Arabidopsis.  In addition, because trees need to survive over time and adapt to changing environments, it is essential to preserve and incorporate their existing genetic diversity into any “new” tree. Through evolutionary processes, tree populations already have many important adaptations to varied threats, and losing those could be disastrous. So even the fanciest biotech tree will ultimately depend on a thoughtful and deliberate breeding program to ensure long-term survival. For these reasons, the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine committee recommends increasing investment not just in biotechnology research, but also in tree breeding, forest ecology and population genetics.  The committee found that the U.S. Coordinated Framework for the Regulation of Biotechnology, which distributes federal oversight of biotechnology products among agencies such as EPA, USDA and FDA, is not fully prepared to consider the introduction of a biotech tree to improve forest health.  Most obviously, regulators have always required containment of pollen and seeds during biotech field trials to avoid the escape of genetic material. For example, the biotech chestnut was not allowed to flower to ensure that transgenic pollen wouldn’t blow across the landscape during field trials. But if biotech trees are intended to spread their new traits, via seeds and pollen, to introduce pest resistance across landscapes, then studies of wild reproduction will be necessary. These are not currently allowed until a biotech tree is fully deregulated.  Another shortcoming of the current framework is that some biotech trees may not require any special review at all. The USDA, for example, was asked to consider a loblolly pine that was genetically engineered for greater wood density. But because USDA’s regulatory authority stems from its oversight of plant pest risks, it decided that it did not have any regulatory authority over that biotech tree. Similar questions remain regarding organisms whose genes are edited using new tools such as CRISPR.  The committee noted that U.S. regulations fail to promote a comprehensive consideration of forest health. Although the National Environmental Policy Act sometimes helps, some risks and many potential benefits are unlikely to be evaluated. This is the case for biotech trees as well as other tools to counter pests and pathogens, such as tree breeding, pesticides and site management practices.  The National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine report suggests an “ecosystem services” framework for considering the various ways that trees and forests provide value to humans. These range from extraction of forest products to the use of forests for recreation to the ecological services a forest provides – water purification, species protection and carbon storage.  The committee also acknowledged that some ways of valuing the forest do not fit into the ecosystem services framework. For example, if forests are seen by some to have “intrinsic value,” then they have value in and of themselves, apart from the way humans value them and perhaps implying a kind of moral obligation to protect and respect them. Issues of “wildness” and “naturalness” also surface.  Paradoxically, a biotech tree could increase and decrease wildness. If wildness depends upon a lack of human intervention, then a biotech tree will reduce the wildness of a forest. But perhaps so would a conventionally bred, hybrid tree that was deliberately introduced into an ecosystem.  Which would reduce wildness more—the introduction of a biotech tree or the eradication of an important tree species? There are no right or wrong answers to these questions, but they remind us of the complexity of decisions to use technology to enhance “nature.”  This complexity points to a key recommendation of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine report: Dialogue among experts, stakeholders and communities about how to value forests, assess the risks and potential benefits of biotech, and understand complex public responses to any potential interventions, including those involving biotechnology. These processes need to be respectful, deliberative, transparent and inclusive.  Such processes, such as a 2018 stakeholder workshop on the biotech chestnut, will not erase conflict or even guarantee consensus, but they have the potential to create insight and understanding that can feed into democratic decisions that are informed by expert knowledge and public values.  Jason A. Delborne is Associate Professor of Science, Policy, and Society in the Department of Forestry and Environmental Resources at North Carolina State University.  This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.  The views expressed in this article are the author's own.


theguardianuk--2019-01-15--To save the rainforest we need to work with the palm oil industry Jennifer Lucey

To save the rainforest, we need to work with the palm oil industry | Jennifer Lucey

Lots of academics worry that focusing too much on the real-world impact of research threatens pure, curiosity-driven science. But really the two go hand in hand, especially when it comes to solving the complex question of how we achieve sustainability despite increasing human pressures on our planet.  As a tropical field ecologist studying rainforest destruction in Borneo, I saw the impact of the expanding palm oil industry on tropical biodiversity first hand, and so it was always a high priority to ensure the research I was doing made a difference. I was driven by scientific curiosity about how nature responds to the most drastic human activity, but also by the motivation to find solutions.  A Natural Environment [Research](https://www.theguardian.com/education/research) Council-funded fellowship allowed me a rare opportunity to devote all my energies to using science to teach palm oil companies how to look after biodiversity. In just under four years I was able to translate the pure ecological research I had done for my PhD, studying the responses of ants and butterflies to the destruction of tropical forests, into practical knowledge which will actually save rainforests.  I worked with the industry to develop a practical toolkit for stopping deforestation in tropical commodity industries, by showing how big rainforest reserves need to be to conserve biodiversity in land dominated by plantations. The toolkit, spearheaded by Greenpeace and several key palm oil industry players, has so far been used to conserve half a million hectares of forest in multiple countries – not only in the palm oil sector, but also in rubber, pulp and paper, and cocoa. Last month the major certification standard for palm oil, the Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO), voted to use the toolkit to strengthen its “no deforestation” policy. Hopefully this will lead to larger areas of forest being protected from an industry that has been responsible for worrying levels of habitat destruction.  Work like this doesn’t just have an immediate impact on the environment; it has a multiplier effect on the wider research landscape. The government’s research excellence framework, the exercise that assigns universities funding, is coming up in 2021, and much discussion has focused on whether it’s fair that it places a lot of emphasis on research projects being able to demonstrate impact through case studies. My experience has confirmed their importance: work on the toolkit has secured nearly £2m in new research funding. An understanding of the knowledge needs of the industry has resulted in repeat funding from the RSPO for our [socially and ](http://www.sensorproject.net)[environmentally ](http://www.sensorproject.net)[sustainable ](http://www.sensorproject.net)[oil ](http://www.sensorproject.net)[palm ](http://www.sensorproject.net)[research programme](http://www.sensorproject.net) aimed at testing the impact of certification.  The work has also helped me forge new academic collaborations. My links with Indonesian academics resulted in a project with the [Universities](https://www.theguardian.com/education/universities) of York and Leeds and the Zoological Society of London to investigate the impacts of peatland restoration in Sumatra. This wouldn’t have come about without those critical local partner contacts.  These varied perspectives have also been a source of new routes of scientific enquiry. For me, questions about how to develop conservation policy changed the debate from “How do species respond to habitat fragmentation?” to “How big is big enough to support biodiversity?”.  So why aren’t we seeing more of this in UK academia? Positions in universities focused on building links between pure research and the industries, organisations and individuals that will use it tend to be short-term or administrative. To really make a difference, we need long-term networks led by academic staff who are experts in working with industry.  There is no reason why science with a social or environmental impact should compete with the need for pure research. As with my own example, applied science is usually generated from the building blocks of blue skies research. The presence of permanent knowledge exchange expertise in universities can help identify and translate unforeseen links between pure science and its applications, as well as generate funding from unexpected sources. Equally, a wider pool of ideas will produce more exciting research directions than academia can provide alone. This will bring the vital new thinking required to help balance the need to provide for our growing global population with the importance of protecting our planet for future generations.


theguardianuk--2019-07-24--Backward step for mankind man walks 800km in reverse to save Indonesias forests

Backward step for mankind: man walks 800km in reverse to save Indonesia’s forests

A man from a village in East Java has embarked on an unconventional mission to raise awareness about preserving forests: he is walking 800km to Indonesia’s capital, backwards.  Medi Bastoni hopes that, after taking thousands of steps backwards – and hopefully forwards for mankind – he will have the opportunity to meet President Joko Widodo so he can ask him for a symbolic tree seed, which he intends to plant on the slopes of Mount Wilis.  The 43-year-old set out from his village of Dono in East Java on Thursday last week and plans to make it to the State Palace in Jakarta for commemoration of the nation’s independence day on 17 August.  The father of four hit the road in an unusual ensemble: tracksuit pants, high-vis vest, and a rectangular contraption of piping around his body that holds a rear-view mirror in place above eye level, so that he can walk backwards unobstructed.  He plans to clock up to 30km a day, buy food from roadside stalls and sleep at mosques, police stations and security posts as he walks his way across Java.  By planting a symbolic tree, which he says will be named after the president, Medi hopes to raise awareness about preserving the forest around Mount Wilis, a volcanic mountain in East Java.  “Not only me, people on the slopes of Wilis and the younger generation, all must care about the nature of Wilis,” Medi told local news outlet Surya.co.id, “I hope that everyone is involved in caring for the sustainability of Wilis.”  Environmental activists are regenerating the area, he said, but a tree given by the president would support their efforts.  Asked why he is walking backwards, Medi gave the Indonesian press a philosophical answer, saying that in the lead-up to Indonesia’s 74th independence day he wanted Indonesians to “look back” and reflect on the nation’s history and “the service of heroes who have fought for the Indonesian state”.  Complete with a red and white Indonesian flag affixed next to his backpack, a sign on above his head bears Indonesia’s emblematic golden eagle with the words: “Tanda Bakti Anak Negri”, meaning “A tribute to the motherland.”