Corporate welfare is just infuriating, especially when so many of these companies are involved in lobbying against climate change while they’re polluting this country and others.  This list was compiled by Senator Bernie Sanders, an independent from Vermont. While regular workers are facing inflation, loss of their jobs, foreclosure, and frozen wages, our international corporations are evading taxes. No wonder there’s supposedly no money for the EPA or education or health care  — it’s all going to Exxon and other corporate thieves.  Some of them don’t just avoid paying taxes, they actually get huge refunds!  From Sanders’ website. 10 worst corporate income tax avoiders 1)      Exxon Mobil made $19 billion in profits in 2009.  Exxon not only paid no federal income taxes, it actually received a $156 million rebate from the IRS, according to its SEC filings. 2)      Bank of America received a $1.9 billion tax refund from the IRS last year, although it made $4.4 billion in profits and received a bailout from the Federal Reserve and the Treasury Department of nearly $1 trillion. 3)      Over the past five years, while General Electric made $26 billion in profits in the United States, it received a $4.1 billion refund from [...]

President Obama is giving new energy speeches around the country recently.   Unfortunately, Obama still considers something called “clean coal” to be a reality, and he’s still actively talking about it.  Actually “clean coal” is a PR phrase dreamed up by the coal industry, and it’s a product that doesn’t exist, so it is not something we should hear Obama talking about. (The U.S. can’t afford to help the poor with their heating costs, making up all kinds of excuses why that is, but it can and will spend billions pursuing the greenwashed  myth that coal might some day be “clean”.) Good thing Obama talks about other things that will really help the environment and somewhat delay climate change.  One of Obama’s more positive messages involves prodding businesses to buy and use more hybrids and electric cars. President Obama called on major U.S. companies Friday to purchase electric and hybrid vehicles, “part of a broad effort by the administration to reduce the country’s dependence on oil.” Note they no longer say “Oil and gas.” Gas used to be a fossil fuel too, but thanks to T. Boone Pickens and Sarah Palin, it’s now . . . something else. Something vaguely more [...]

From eenews:  Environmentalists filed a lawsuit today against Montana, claiming its Department of Transportation failed to conduct the necessary environmental review before approving an oil company’s request to transport heavy loads to Canada’s tar sands region. The approved project allows Imperial Oil Ltd. to move 207 oversize-load trucks through the state to the Kearl oil sands in Alberta. The company is also authorized to carry out certain road improvements. Known as the Kearl Module Transportation Project, the proposal would allow the oil company to transport heavy equipment on the final part of its journey from South Korea, where it is manufactured. The parts will be shipped to Vancouver, British Columbia, then up the Columbia River and Snake River to Lewiston, Idaho, before being transferred to tractor-trailers. Various environmental groups, including the National Wildlife Federation and the Sierra Club, have joined Missoula County in challenging the decision to allow the project to go ahead. The groups have sued under the Montana Environmental Policy Act, the state-law equivalent of the federal National Environmental Policy Act. The lawsuit alleges that the state issued approval “without adequately identifying and analyzing all relevant impacts of the project and with analyzing a broad range of alternatives” [...]

Congress is considering a number of very bad proposals on the environment and the EPA that threaten the lives of all Americans.  Some of these proposals have come up recently on the floor of Congress and the Senate, but action on them is being delayed until next week.  Part of the story from eenews: (subscription only) “Senate leaders have delayed until next week votes on up to four amendments to limit U.S. EPA’s carbon regulatory powers. Leadership has been attempting to work out a deal on amendments to a small business assistance bill. It is still unclear whether the upper chamber will vote on only one amendment by Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) that would permanently strip EPA of its power to regulate carbon dioxide, or whether there will be votes on less stringent Democratic alternatives, as well. “It’s definitely not outside the realm of possibilities that McConnell would be the only amendment,” said Reid spokesman Adam Jentleson. He said conversations were ongoing between leadership and the three sponsors of the Democratic alternatives: Sens. Jay Rockefeller (D-W.Va.), Max Baucus (D-Mont.) and Debbie Stabenow (D-Mich.)” Bottom line: The Republican party works for corporations and does not care about the health [...]

Transition Town Totnes (in the UK) aka TTT,  is a dynamic, community-led charity that is strengthening the local economy, reducing the cost of living and preparing for a future with less oil and a changing climate. TTT has sparked a global movement. . . . as one of the most-watched community projects about. Transition Town Totnes is something anyone from Totnes & District can be really proud of. See more on Transition Town Totnes here.  Transition towns and cultures have also emerged in the US.  See more on that here. Naomi Klein is an author and activist, and this is her talk in Totnes in late March, hosted at Transition Culture. From Youtube:  “Looking at the various crises going on around the world, what are the challenges ahead and the opportunities for us as a community? Can we meet these challenges skillfully? Klein is the author of ‘No Logo’ and ‘The Shock Doctrine’ and this talk occured on a rare visit to Totnes, UK.” This is a great talk by Klein and offers a lot to think about.  Normally I’d put something like this in a podcast, but as people who subscribe to Climate Files know, I’m having problems doing [...]

Helen Caldicott and George Monbiot debated about nuclear power today on Democracy Now and it was very interesting.   There is no doubt that the nuclear plant meltdown in Japan is very, very serious, and a threat to human health.  But it has led to many people deciding that nuclear power — none of it — is safe, without considering all the facts and ramifications of that.  Helen Caldicott is one of those people who thinks nuclear’s benefits are far outweighed by its dangers. In the interview Caldicott, a pediatrician, made her usual  claims and several times lapsed into her patented filibuster style of speaking.  She is 100% against nuclear power everywhere, for any reason at all.   Monbiot sounded like the reasonable person that he is. He’s not so much pro-nuclear as he is interested in ways to stop climate change, and he feels nuclear power will be a necessary part of solving the greater problem. It’s not like he’s a big proponent of nuclear but he seems to recognize that nuclear power has a unique ability to provide huge amounts of carbon-free power for decades, once new safe plants are built. No one wants the old nuclear plants [...]

Dead sea turtles and other wildlife are washing up on beaches near spring break vacationers along the Gulf coast and in growing numbers. Is this related to the BP oil leak of last year? Almost certainly. These dead wildlife “. . . . are part of a growing number of dead fish, animals and birds [that] Mississippi residents have photographed washing in with the tides in recent weeks. . . . . “ The Obama administration has also issued a gag order on data over the recent spike of dead dolphins, which are at 10 times the usual rate. It’s obvious this is not being caused by normal or natural causes, and the dead wildlife are being treated as evidence in a possible criminal case against BP. But isn’t the EPA itself partially culpable for the use of the dispersants in the Gulf in 2010? The EPA allowed BP to dump billions of gallons of dispersants into our ocean waters off the Gulf coast. There was no testing at the time to see if those enormous amounts of chemicals introduced into animal habitat would have a negative impact on wildlife, and now it seems that we know the answer. How could [...]

Another reason to end the bombing in Libya: It’s been admitted by officials that the U.S. government is now fighting to protect at least some al Qaeda fighters/sympathizers in Libya.  This has been written about recently by MSNBC and today at the Washington Post, and I just listened to Rand Paul, (Republican Senator) discuss it on the floor of the Senate).  I usually disagree with much of what Rand Paul talks about but on the topic of war and possibly arming another set of “freedom fighters” who may have ties to al Qaeda, I agree with him — the U.S. war in Libya should not have been started and should endas soon as possible.  (It’s not a NATO war, it’s a U.S. and apparently French war). According to the Washington Post, “ As the U.S. transfers leadership to NATO, intelligence experts are trying hard to sort out just who the rebels are. (March 30)”  A headline today says, “Libyan opposition includes a small number of al-Qaeda fighters, U.S. officials say“. So these are not rebels we want to help, much less arm. Shouldn’t we have figured this out before we started a war on their behalf? And oddly, the corporate [...]

For over a week now, the United States, France, and Britain have been bombing Libya with cruise missiles, B-2 stealth bombers, F-16 and F-15 fighter jets, and Harrier attack jets. There is no reliable estimate of the number of civilians killed. We know we have spent over $500 million dollars on this violence, and more is added to that total every day.  There is no estimate, as usual of the environmental damage and pollution being caused by these bombings either, but it must be a huge amount. Will the Libyan people who supposedly requested our intervention reimburse us for the use of our military? They should. In his New York Times last week, columnist Bob Herbert talked about these things and more in his final column, in which he decided to lay it all out for us. In the United States, we have some strange priorities. Our government feels that saving other people in other countries is more important than helping Americans who in many cases desperately need help. Cost of war is no object. Yet in America, unemployment is still high, people are still suffering from food insecurity, and thousands have lost their homes in the last few years [...]

Radioactive Cloud To Reach Europe This Wednesday No need to panic if you live outside of Japan — the spreading nuclear material is so minute that it didn’t even set off alerts over North America. Tiny amounts of radioactive material is now headed over the Atlantic to Europe. However, if you live in Japan, you should probably evacuate immediately if you live within a 100 mile radius of the Fukushima nuclear plants. Plutonium has now been found in the soil around the reactors. “A very slightly radioactive cloud coming from Japan will reach France Wednesday but it presents no health risks to the population here, the Institute for Radiation and Nuclear Security (IRSN) said in statements Tuesday. The cloud, which is heading here from Japan which March 11 had a national catastrophe, hit by an earthquake, Tsunami and radiation leaks, has a “very feeble” radioactive content and is of no danger to “adults, children and even unborn children,” officials from the Institute said on “France Info” radio. Experts at the IRSN said that health risks from the cloud were “unimaginable.” They remarked that the cloud had already crossed the United States and the radioactive levels were so low they didn’t [...]

The following opinion piece was published in the Star Tribune on March 23rd, in response to a right-wing denier column scoffing at climate change,  from the previous week. Climate change: Respect science Ignore pundits. . . .  There are [science] websites that will help you assess the evidence if you are confused about climate change. (By Josh Leonard) Do you ever notice how climate-change deniers don’t use science? They seem to have an argument until you realize that it’s not scientific. A March 20 column by Jason Lewis (“Getting warm. Or cool. Let’s make policy!”) was an example. Whenever I encounter an argument denying global warming, I apply the following three-part filter: 1.Does it cite scientific research? 2.Does it look at long-range data? 3.Does it explain major global trends regarding: a.Global glacial retreat? b.The polar sea ice cap disappearing? c.The 10 hottest years on record occurring within the past 14 years? Deniers might pretend to address one or two of the above questions but can never fully address all three. They quote pundits like Rush Limbaugh or conservative think tanks like the Heartland Institute (which also advocates that secondhand smoke doesn’t affect your health). They look at short-term data. They [...]

UNION OF CONCERNED SCIENTISTS UPDATE ON JAPAN’S NUCLEAR POWER CRISIS Below is a partial excerpt from the March 25th conference with the Union of Concerned Scientists.  The UCS claims to not be either for or against nuclear power. “MR. [David]  LOCHBAUM:  Thank you, Elliott, and good morning. Yesterday, there were reports that three workers received radiation exposures from water that they were walking through in order to repower some equipment in the Unit 3 turbine building at Fukushima.  It’s not clear what the source of this radioactivity might have been. The turbine building is normally isolated from both the Unit 3 reactor core and the Unit 3 spent fuel pool. There were reports of damage to fuel in the Unit 3 reactor core, and also to damage to fuel in the Unit 3 spent fuel pool.  But it’s not clear at the moment from the data we’ve seen how the water in the basement of the Unit 3 turbine building became contaminated. We haven’t seen any clear signs whether it came from the reactor core or from the damaged fuel in the spent fuel pool.  They were adding water from above and from fire trucks to the spent fuel pool [...]

Enjoy.

• How to Write a Manifesto (Thanks Boing Boing)

• The Gastronomer: What if one futurist had made his ideas more delicious? (The Washington Post)

• New York Times review of the new Museum of the 20th Century in Milan

• Mimmo Paladino’s The City Rises (La città che sale) -  a salt and bronze horse installation and homage to Boccioni, opens in Milan March 31st to make the 150th anniversary of Italian unification

• Milan and Reggio Calabria in discussion about an Ancient Bronze exchange for work by Boccioni

• Malevich, Tatiln, Rodchenko discuss Futurism

• Missed this tv show Res – Personaggi on Rai Storia March 29th including a segment on Boccioni

• A note on the 1926 visit by Marinetti to Buenos Aires (in spanish)

• Review of Luciano Chessa’s intonarumori performance in Berlin

• Tour of Balla’s street, via Margutta, Rome

• Show review of my favorite restaurant ever: Lacerba

• Fun 6-degrees game using Marinetti + Futurism

• The Antipasti Mermaids -  “21st century futurist performers and thinkers”

• Side-by-side, Pictures of works by Dada artists Raoul Hausmann and Italian Futurist Fortuna Depero