Chomsky: Nuclear Terror at Home

Hér

There’s a document called The Essentials of Post Cold War Deterrence that was released during the Clinton years by the Strategic Command, which is in charge of nuclear weapons. It’s one of the most horrifying documents I’ve ever read. People haven’t paid attention to it.

The Strategic Command report asks how we should reconstruct our nuclear and other forces for the post-Cold War period. And the conclusions are that we have to rely primarily on nuclear weapons because unlike other weapons of mass destruction, such as chemical and biological, the effects of nuclear weapons are immediate, devastating, overwhelming—not only destructive but terrifying. So they have to be the core of what’s called deterrence.

Everything means the opposite of what it says. Deterrence means our offensive stance should primarily be based on nuclear weapons because they’re so destructive and terrifying. And furthermore just the possession of massive nuclear forces casts a shadow over any international conflict, like people are frightened of us because we have this overwhelming force.

We have to have a national persona of irrationality with forces out of control, so we really terrify everybody, and then we can get what we want. And furthermore they’re right to be terrified because we’re going to have these nuclear weapons right in front of us, which will blow them all up—in fact, blow us all up if they get out of control.

Hreðjatak Bandaríkjamanna á Írak

The Handover That Wasn't

Before his departure, CPA chief Paul Bremer issued 100 Orders to dramatically restructure Iraq's economy to fit free-market ideals. And no Iraqi, including future elected officials, can undo them.

...

The most important tools being used by the Bush administration to maintain varying degrees of economic and political control in Iraq are the 100 Orders enacted by L. Paul Bremer, III, head of the now defunct Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA) before his departure. It was thought that the "end" of the occupation would also mean the end of the Orders. Instead, in his final Order enacted on his last day in the country, Bremer simply transferred authority for the Orders over to the new Prime Minister, Iyad Allawi. For his part, Allawi – a thirty-year exile of Iraq with close ties to both the CIA and British Intelligence Services – is considered America 's new man in charge of Iraq .

...

Order #39 allows for the following: (1) privatization of Iraq's 200 state-owned enterprises; (2) 100 percent foreign ownership of Iraqi businesses; (3) "national treatment" of foreign firms; (4) unrestricted, tax-free remittance of all profits and other funds; and (5) 40-year ownership licenses. Thus, it allows the U.S. corporations operating in Iraq to own every business, do all of the work, and send all of their money home. Nothing needs to be reinvested locally to service the Iraqi economy, no Iraqi need be hired, no public services need be guaranteed, and workers' rights can easily be ignored. And corporations can take out their investments at any time.

...

Order #49 drops the tax rate on corporations from a high of 40 percent to a flat rate of 15 percent. The income tax rate is also capped at 15 percent.

...

Order #17 grants foreign contractors, including private security firms, full immunity from Iraq 's laws. Even if they do injure a third party by killing someone or causing environmental damage such as dumping toxic chemicals or poisoning drinking water, the injured third party can not turn to the Iraqi legal system, rather, the charges must be brought to U.S. courts under U.S. laws.

Tengist:
Írak rís upp úr öskunni í eldinn

Nóg komið af góðri trú

1. “Ósýnilegt, óskilgreinanlegt, ógeðslega öflugt, kolbrjálað yfirnáttúrulegt furðufyrirbæri er Drottinn guð þinn, þú skalt ekki aðra Guði hafa.”

Barnatrúboð er að mínu mati glæpur gegn mannkyninu (og Jörðinni ef út í það er farið), hvort sem það er framið í góðri trú eður ei.

Séra Sigurður Árni er augljóslega ekki sammála mér, finnst barnatrúboð náttúrulega hið besta mál, enda væri hann atvinnulaus án þess.

Gjarnan hefur verið sagt að í skólum megi fræða en ekki iðka trú. Fræðslan eigi að vera hlutlaus. En ég efast meira og meira um þessa aðgreiningu og að hún standist. Ég held ekki, að uppeldi barna verði nokkurn tíma hlutlaust í trúarefnum eða gildamálum. Ég held ekki, að neinum foreldrum takist eitthvert hlutleysi, sem verði til að börnin taki ákvörðun síðar, sem verði án áhrifa frá fjölskyldunum. Ég held að allt frá meðgöngu sé uppeldi hlaðið gildum, tilfinningum, afstöðu og “trú.”

...

Við ættum líklega að krefjast æ meira af skólanum varðandi trúfræðslu og jafnvel trúariðkun. Fræðsla um kristni er of lítil en ekki of mikil. Meirihluti þjóðarinnar vill örugglega að skólinn sé mótaður af kristilegum húmanisma og líka lágmarks trúariðkun.

...

Fyrsta boðorðið er: “Ég er [bla bla bla].” Þetta er stefna trúarinnar og þarf að verða ríkulegra í stofnunum samfélagsins

Verðum við 9 milljarðar árið 2050?

U.N.: Population to top 9 billion by 2050

The world's population will rise from 6.5 billion to 9.1 billion by 2050, according to a United Nations survey released Thursday.

Much of the growth will take place in the least-developed countries, where a high rate of mortality is outweighed by an even higher rate of fertility. Their current collective population of 800 million is projected to swell to 1.7 billion in 2050.

"It is going to be a strain on the world, but it seems feasible," said Hania Zlotnik, director of the U.N. Population Division. "It doesn't seem that there is a crisis coming, [but] that doesn't mean that some countries are not facing a crisis."

Populations will at least triple in some of the poorest nations -- Afghanistan, Burkina Faso, Burundi, Chad, Congo, Democratic Republic of Congo, East Timor, Guinea Bissau, Liberia, Mali, Niger and Uganda.

9.100.000.000!

Tengist:
Þegar neyðin er stærst er hjálpin...?

Átraskanir svarthola

NASA Observatory Confirms Black Hole Limits

These new results corroborate recent theoretical work about how black holes and galaxies grow. The biggest black holes, those with at least 100 million times the mass of the sun, ate voraciously during the early universe. Nearly all of them ran out of "food" billions of years ago and went onto a forced starvation diet.

On the other hand, black holes approximately 10 to 100 million solar masses followed a more controlled eating plan. Because they took smaller portions of their meals of gas and dust, they continue growing.

"Our data show some super massive black holes seem to binge, while others prefer to graze," said Amy Barger of the University of Wisconsin and University of Hawaii. Barger is lead author of the paper describing the results in the latest issue of The Astronomical Journal. "We understand better than ever how super massive black holes grow."

Tengist:
Meira um svarthol
Nýjasta nýtt um svarthol

Kirkjan klofin

Anglican church gay rift deepens

The U.S. Episcopal Church and the Anglican Church of Canada have withdrawn from a key body of the global Anglican Communion under pressure from conservative church leaders horrified by the election of a gay bishop in the United States and the blessing of same-sex unions in the two countries.

Hágæða stafræn list

Complexification.net

Þetta er nú bara næstum því of flott til að vera satt.

Skipulögð óreiða er nefnilega eitt af mínum uppáhalds fyrirbærum, t.d. tilviljanakennd tvígildisnet (Random Boolean Networks, sem tengjast rannsóknum á sjálfkviknun lífs), fraktalar og slíkt.

Kvótar og ofveiði valda erfðafræðilegum breytingum

Héðan

Veiðikvótar og ofveiði hafa mjög alvarlegar erfðafræðilegar afleiðingar fyrir fiskistofna. Þetta kom fram á ráðstefnu samtakanna American Association for the Advancement of Science í Wshington um helgina en þar voru kynntar skýrslur vísindamanna um áhrif veiða á fiskistofna. Þar kom fram að ofveiði á gömlum, stórum hrygnum hafi erfðafræðileg áhrif á stofninn, sem valdi því að hann minnki til lengri tíma litið. Hrognin úr stórum hrygnum séu stærri og fleiri seiði komist á legg. Nútíma sjávarútvegur leggi hins vegar áherslu á stóran fisk og það hafi alvarlegri áhrif en áður var talið að stærri og frjósamari fiskurinn hverfi. Steve Berkeley, líffræðingur við Kaliforníuháskóla segir að þessi þróun sé alveg í samræmi við kenningar Darwins um þróun dýrategunda. Þegar lögð sé áhersla á veiði á stórum fiski sé það erfðafræðilegur kostur að vera lítill og magur og það hafi svo neikvæð áhrif á frjósemina. Þetta skýri hvers vegna stofnar stækki ekki þrátt fyrir aðgerðir svo sem kvótasetningu og tímabundið veiðibann. Vísindamennirnir bentu á að þorskstofninn við Nýfundnaland hafi enn ekki náð sér á strik þótt þar hafi ekkert verið veitt frá því að hann hrundi fyrir hartnær 15 árum. Enginn hafi getað skýrt hvers vegna. Svona erfðafræðilegar breytingar af mannavöldum hafi líkast til átt sér stað við Nýfundnaland og þær taki langan tíma, áratugi, að laga. Vísindamennirnir leggja til að stór hafsvæði verði alveg friðuð til langframa og fiskistofnum þar leyft að vaxa eðlilega.

Svona lagað kemur bara sköpunarsinnum á óvart.

Stjörnuþoka án stjarna

Astronomers find star-less galaxy

A dark galaxy is an area in the Universe containing a large amount of mass that rotates like a galaxy, but contains no stars.

It was found 50 million light years away using radio telescopes in Cheshire and Puerto Rico.

The unknown material that is thought to hold these dark galaxies together is known as 'dark matter', but scientists still know very little about what that is.

Hinn djúpvitri Páfi tjáir sig

Pope: Gay marriage is 'evil'

Homosexual marriages are part of "a new ideology of evil" that is insidiously threatening society, Pope John Paul says in his newly published book.

In "Memory and Identity," the Pope also calls abortion a "legal extermination" comparable to attempts to wipe out Jews and other groups in the 20th century.

Alltaf gaman að fylgjast með steingervingum reyna að fóta sig í nútímanum.

Falluja II: Ramadi

Fullujah part 2 - the horror never ends

Summary:

with the news on iraq dying like many of its people… we, the viewers, are given a sequel to the ‘blockbuster’ Falluja. the tragedy will re-invent itself in Ramadi, under the hoax of a democratic government…

we musn’t find have a defeatest attitude, we need to constant protest this illegal war.. not fall silent with time…

Chomsky um Írak

Hér (Real Audio)

Rottuungaróbottar

Robots That Act Like Rats

Seven to 10-day-old rat pups, blind and deaf, do not seem to do a whole lot. Videotaped in a rectangular arena in Schank's laboratory, they move about until they hit a wall, feel their way along the wall until their nose goes into a corner, then mostly stay put. Because their senses and responses are so limited, pups should be a good starting point for building robots that can do the same thing.

Illir andar allstaðar

Priests Sign Up for Exorcism 101

The Roman Catholic Church is facing a shortage you may not have heard about: qualified exorcists.

And so, on Thursday about 100 priests stood, prayed for protection, then sat down to begin an eight-week study of how to distinguish and fight demonic possession.

...


"When you're dealing with a reality like the devil," said 39-year-old Father Clement Machado of Canada, "you can't just learn the theoretical. You need the pragmatic experience…. It's such uncharted territory."

Þetta er geðveiki.

Er verið að heilaþvo bandaríska krakka?

Kids Say the Darndest, Most Stalinist Things

A new survey found that a majority of high schoolers think newspapers should not be allowed to publish without government approval. And almost one in five said that Americans should be prohibited from expressing unpopular opinions.

...

President Bush once asked, "Is our children learning?" No — they isn't. A more appropriate question might be, "Is our teachers teaching?" In four years, you can teach a gorilla sign language. Is it too much to ask that in the same amount of time a kid be taught what those crazy hippies who founded this country had in mind?

Bill Maher tjáir sig um kristindóminn

Bill Maher: Christians have neurological disorder

"When you were a kid and they were telling you whatever you believe in religion, do you think if they had switched the fairy tales that they read to you in bed with the Bible, you would know the difference?

"Do you think if it was the fairy tale about a man who lived inside of a whale and it was religion that Jack built a beanstalk today, you would know the difference? Why do you believe in one fairy tale and not the other? Just because adults told you it was true and they scared you into believing it, at pain of death, at pain of burning in hell."

Spurning dagsins

Ef ég benti afrískum töfralækni á lútherskan prest og segði honum að hann þjónaði í grundvallaratriðum sama samfélagslega tilgangi, með öðrum orðum, að hann gæti með góðri samvisku kallað sig prest, væri ég með því að móðga prestinn? Töfralækninn? Þá báða?

Einhverfan

A Startling Diary Reveals The Onset Of Autism

Mel Rutherford, assistant professor of psychology at McMaster University, says the diary provides a rare and unprecedented opportunity to observe the early development of autism. She says the mother of fraternal twins recorded her observations almost daily for about five years, beginning before the twins’ birth. She charted the children’s development in speech, social interactions, growth, and sleep disturbances, unaware that one twin was autistic until a diagnosis was made at three years of age.

“It appears that children with autism develop normally for six months, and then begin developing atypically,” says Rutherford. “As typical children begin to accelerate in social development, the child with autism makes only minor gains.”

Tengist:
Snilld

Trúir þú á Guð?

71% Evrópubúa segjast trúa á Guð

Sjö af hverjum tíu Evrópubúum segjast trúa á Guð, að því er fram kemur í nýrri könnun sem birt var í dag. Verulegur munur er þó milli landa á því hversu trúað fólk kveðst. Þannig segjast 97% Pólverja vera trúaðir en einungis 37% Tékka.

Hverjar ætli niðurstöðurnar hefðu orðið fyrir 150 árum? 99%?

Snilld

A genius explains

Daniel Tammet is an autistic savant. He can perform mind-boggling mathematical calculations at breakneck speeds. But unlike other savants, who can perform similar feats, Tammet can describe how he does it.

...

Tammet is creating his own language, strongly influenced by the vowel and image-rich languages of northern Europe. (He already speaks French, German, Spanish, Lithuanian, Icelandic and Esperanto.) The vocabulary of his language - "Mänti", meaning a type of tree - reflects the relationships between different things. The word "ema", for instance, translates as "mother", and "ela" is what a mother creates: "life". "Päike" is "sun", and "päive" is what the sun creates: "day". Tammet hopes to launch Mänti in academic circles later this year, his own personal exploration of the power of words and their inter-relationship.

...

Tammet is softly spoken, and shy about making eye contact, which makes him seem younger than he is. He lives on the Kent coast, but never goes near the beach - there are too many pebbles to count. The thought of a mathematical problem with no solution makes him feel uncomfortable. Trips to the supermarket are always a chore. "There's too much mental stimulus. I have to look at every shape and texture. Every price, and every arrangement of fruit and vegetables. So instead of thinking,'What cheese do I want this week?', I'm just really uncomfortable."

Fangelsi, trúarbrögð og endurhæfing

Decision to free felon haunts jurors

For two grueling weeks, the 12 jurors heard conflicting opinions about Curtis Shane Thompson.

Was Thompson still a vicious serial rapist who should be locked up indefinitely to prevent him from striking again? Or was he a felon who deserved another chance after finding religion and serving 17 years in prison?

The jury's answer on Oct. 3, 2003, stunned King County prosecutors.

Jurors unanimously refused to commit Thompson, the first jury in the state to take such action since Washington's sexually violent predator law took effect in 1990. Only three other sex offenders facing commitment have been freed, all by judges.

Thompson's second chance was short-lived. Five months ago, he was charged with 14 felonies, including attacking two women in a University District elevator last August and raping a woman after breaking into her Eastlake apartment. He is in jail awaiting trial.

Sýnir best hvað felst mikil endurhæfing í fangelsisvist og trúarbrögðum.

Talsmaður öfgaíhalds í USA talar

"We should invade their countries, kill their leaders and convert them to Christianity. We weren't punctilious about locating and punishing only Hitler and his top officers. We carpet-bombed German cities; we killed civilians. That's war. And this is war."

"When contemplating college liberals, you really regret once again that John Walker is not getting the death penalty. We need to execute people like John Walker in order to physically intimidate liberals, by making them realize that they can be killed, too. Otherwise, they will turn out to be outright traitors."

COULTER: I take the biblical idea. God gave us the earth.
PETER FENN (Democratic strategist): Oh, OK.
COULTER: We have dominion over the plants, the animals, the trees.
FENN: This is a great idea.
COULTER: God says, "Earth is yours. Take it. Rape it. It's yours."
FENN: Terrific. We're Americans, so we should consume as much of the earth's resources...
COULTER: Yes! Yes.
FENN: ... as fast as we possibly can.
COULTER: As opposed to living like the Indians.

Ég segi nú bara, svona í anda Ann Coulter; Það þarf að sko lóga þessari tík.

http://www.anncoulter.org/
http://www.anticoulter.com

Bush, Fish and Wildlife

U.S. Scientists Say They Are Told to Alter Findings

More than 200 scientists employed by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service say they have been directed to alter official findings to lessen protections for plants and animals, a survey released Wednesday says.

...

More than half of the biologists and other researchers who responded to the survey said they knew of cases in which commercial interests, including timber, grazing, development and energy companies, had applied political pressure to reverse scientific conclusions deemed harmful to their business.

Bush administration officials, including Craig Manson, an assistant secretary of the Interior who oversees the Fish and Wildlife Service, have been critical of the 1973 Endangered Species Act, contending that its implementation has imposed hardships on developers and others while failing to restore healthy populations of wildlife.

Along with Republican leaders in Congress, the administration is pushing to revamp the act. The president's proposed budget calls for a $3-million reduction in funding of Fish and Wildlife's endangered species programs.

Þetta er svosem ekkert nýtt:
Preeminent Scientists Protest Bush Administration's Misuse of Science

Tilvitnanir fundnar á áhugaverðu vefsetri

Atheism Central for Secondary Schools

"It is very beautiful for the poor to accept their lot. The world is much helped by the suffering of poor people"

Mother Teresa

"We should always be disposed to believe that that which appears white is really black, if the hierarchy of the Church so decides."

St. Ignatius of Loyola, 'Exercitia spiritualia'

"Nothing is so much to be shunned as sex relations."

St. Augustine

"Clearly the person who accepts the Church as an infallible guide will believe whatever the Church teaches."

St. Thomas Aquinas, 'Summa Theologica'

"Question with boldness even the existence of God; because if there be one, He must approve the homage of Reason rather than that of blindfolded Fear."

Thomas Jefferson

Gullmoli af þessum vef: Mr. Bean Speaks to the Lords 25.1.05 2005

Halldór Ásgrímsson, maður eða mús?

Enn deilt hart á Alþingi um stuðning við Íraksstríð

Fyrst segir Halldór eitt, svo annað, svo eitthvað allt annað og á endanum segist hann í raun ekki hafa sagt nokkurn skapaðan hlut.

Svona illa innrættur stríðsherra á ekki að fá að stjórna sandkassa á róló, hvað þá heilli þjóð.

Tengist:
Guðni Ágústsson sýnir hvað í honum býr
Eru virkilega engin gjöreyðingarvopn í Írak?
Davíð rembist eins og rjúpa við staur
Gallup: 84% landsmanna vilja af lista staðfastra
Hverjir mata krókinn hvað mest í Írak?
Írak rís upp úr öskunni í eldinn
Öllu snúið á hvolf eins og þeim einum er lagið
Er stuðningurinn við Íraksstríðið flókið og viðamikið mál?

Vetrarbrautin kvödd

Outcast star quits the Milky Way

The so-called "outcast star" is heading for the emptiness of intergalactic space after being ejected from the heart of the Milky Way following a close encounter with a black hole, said Warren Brown, an astronomer at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics.

It is going so fast -- over 1.5 million mph (2.4 million km/h) -- that astronomers believe it was lobbed out of the galaxy by the tremendous force of a black hole thought to sit at the Milky Way's center.

That speed is about twice the velocity needed to escape the galaxy's grip, Brown said by telephone.

"We have never before seen a star moving fast enough to completely escape the confines of our galaxy," he said.

Hún skilur eftir sig 6 plánetur.

Frelsið í USA eykst með hverjum deginum

Bill sets fine for low-riding pants

[Virginias] House of Delegates passed a bill Tuesday authorizing a $50 fine for anyone who displays his or her underpants in a "lewd or indecent manner."

Spurning hvort þetta væri skilgreint sem annað hvort "lewd" eða "indecent" hjá henni frú Anderson?

Enn einn týndur hlekkur fundinn

UC Berkeley, French Scientists Find Missing Link Between The Whale And Its Closest Relative, The Hippo

"The problem with hippos is, if you look at the general shape of the animal it could be related to horses, as the ancient Greeks thought, or pigs, as modern scientists thought, while molecular phylogeny shows a close relationship with whales," said Boisserie. "But cetaceans – whales, porpoises and dolphins – don't look anything like hippos. There is a 40-million-year gap between fossils of early cetaceans and early hippos."

In a paper appearing this week in the Online Early Edition of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, Boisserie and colleagues Michel Brunet and Fabrice Lihoreau fill in this gap by proposing that whales and hippos had a common water-loving ancestor 50 to 60 million years ago that evolved and split into two groups: the early cetaceans, which eventually spurned land altogether and became totally aquatic; and a large and diverse group of four-legged beasts called anthracotheres. The pig-like anthracotheres, which blossomed over a 40-million-year period into at least 37 distinct genera on all continents except Oceania and South America, died out less than 2 and a half million years ago, leaving only one descendent: the hippopotamus.

Er ástin ekki öll þar sem hún er séð?

Elated? Depressed? Obsessed? You may be suffering lovesickness

Falling in love used to be fun. Now doctors are warning that the throes of passion should be seen as a potentially fatal medical disorder.

Psychologists say that "lovesickness" is a genuine disease that needs more awareness and diagnosis.

And those little actions that are normally seen as symptoms of the first flush of love - buying presents, waiting by the phone for a call or making a bit of an effort before a date - may actually be signs of deep-rooted problems to come.

R.I.P. Ernst Mayr (1904-2005)

Ernst Mayr, 1904-2005: Harvard biologist 'was Darwin of the 20th century'

He was known as an architect of the evolutionary or modern synthesis, an intellectual watershed when modern evolutionary biology was born. The synthesis, which has been described by Dr. Stephen Jay Gould of Harvard as "one of the half-dozen major scientific achievements in our century," reconciled Darwin's theories of evolution with new findings in laboratory genetics and in fieldwork on animal populations and diversity.

One of Mayr's most significant contributions was his persuasive argument for the role of geography in the origin of new species, an idea that has won virtually universal acceptance among evolutionary theorists. He also established a philosophy of biology and founded the field of the history of biology.

Vantrú.net: Hryðjuverkamenn hugans

Hryðjuverkamenn hugans

Lesist!

Meirihlutinn ræður, öllu, alltaf

Kröfu um að trúnaði verði aflétt af Íraksmáli hafnað

Meirihluti utanríkismálanefndar Alþingis hafnaði í gær kröfu Guðmundar Árna Stefánssonar, fyrir hönd Samfylkingarinnar, um að aflétta trúnaði af fundargerðum utanríkismálanefndar, þar sem Íraksmálið svonefnda var rætt.

...

"Ég tel að það væri mjög varhugavert að aflétta trúnaði af fundargerðum nefndarinnar, því það gæti haft alvarlegar afleiðingar á störf nefndarinnar í framtíðinni," segir Sólveig. Nefndarmenn og gestir hennar mættu þannig eiga von á því síðar meir að krafa yrði höfð uppi um afléttingu trúnaðar á því sem fram hafi farið á fundum nefndarinnar. Í viðkvæmum málum, eins og öryggis- og varnarmálum, gæti hugsast að menn hefðu síður látið ummæli falla, t.d. skoðanir sínar á afstöðu annarra ríkja, ef þeir ættu von á að trúnaði yrði síðar meir aflétt.

Eiga skoðanir ráðamanna okkar í utanríkismálum að vera leyndarmál? Ég hélt við kysum þetta lið vegna skoðana þeirra.

ALCOA er besti vinur barnanna

NEWS: ICELAND UNDER ATTACK. THREATENED PROTESTORS RAISE STAKES, CALL FOR INTERNATIONAL PROTEST.

[ALCOA (Aluminium Company of America)] has a long-term track record of toxic pollution and social destruction.

•In 2003, it was found guilty by the United States Justice Department and the EPA of violating the Clean Air Act at its Rockdale Aluminum smelter near Austin, Texas. The Rockdale smelter was producing 260,000 tons of aluminum a year, while emitting the largest amount of nitrogen oxide and sulfur dioxide of any single source in the country, with the exception of electric utilities. One hundred and four thousand tons of emissions (calculated from Alcoa's own estimates) were pouring annually from the plant; including 40,000 tons of smog-producing nitrogen dioxode and 60,000 tons of acid-rain-generating sulphur dioxide, as well as highly toxic metals such as mercury, copper, lead, and others, which eventually accumulated in Texas lakes and rivers.

•Alcoa's aluminium smelter at Massena, New York, was one of three plants which poisoned the St Lawrence river - a river which for centuries sustained the Mohawk indigenous community of Akwesasne. After being used as a dumping ground through much of the twentieth century, the river and its ecosystem became so contaminated that in 1986, the Mohawk community was advised to eat a minimal amount of fish from the river. Their traditional economy collapsed.

In addition, the PCBs, dioxins, heavy metals, and other pollutants left the Mohawk community with birth defects, miscarriages, and cancer. Mothers are advised not to breastfeed their children because of industrial contaminants in the food chain.

The slow process of environmental litigation and cleanup eventually revealed some of the scope of corporate abuse of the St. Lawrence. The Alcoa refinery eventually received a $3.75 million fine, the largest criminal penalty ever assessed in the history of the United States, for a hazardous waste violation.

•In the period between 1987 and 1999, more than 47 Alcoa facilities were cited by US state and federal anti-pollution regulators. In March 1999, Alcoa agreed to an $8.8-million settlement with the Environmental Protection Agency after being charged with illegally discharging inadequately treated wastewater from its Warrick County plant into the Ohio River between 1994 and 1999. In September 1999, Discovery Aluminas Inc., an Alcoa subsidiary, agreed to plea guilty to similar discharge violations and to pay more than $1 million in fines.

•On May 2, 2002, it was reported that Alcoa Inc. had offered to pay nine Australian workers $A350,000 each (US$187,337) in compensation for injuries allegedly caused by exposure to pollutants while working at the firm's Wagerup plant. The workers allege that their illnesses were caused by exposure to heavy chemicals and chemicals while working at the facility. Injuries alleged include multiple chemical sensitivity, reactive airways dysfunction and renal failure. Alcoa offered the settlement on the condition that the workers drop their lawsuits seeking compensation and damages. Eight of the workers accepted the settlement offer.

•In November 2004, Alcoa reported the eighth waste spill at its Western Australian Kwinana refinery in the space of five months.

•In Surinam, 6,000 people were recently forced to move from their ancestral communities in the tropical rainforest to make way for an Alcoa/Billiton dam and smelter. A proposed new dam for a smelter in Sarawak, Malaysia, could force the resettlement of 10,000 indigenous people. Dr. Kua Kia Soong, head of a non-governmental coalition in Sarawak asks: "Why do we want toxic and energy-hungry industries such as aluminum smelters? Aluminum smelting is one industry that the developed countries want to dump on suckers like us because it is environmentally toxic and it consumes voracious amounts of energy."

Æði.

Bandaríkin, vagga vestrænnar bilunar

Bill Moyers: There is no tomorrow

Remember James Watt, President Ronald Reagan's first secretary of the interior? My favorite online environmental journal, the ever-engaging Grist, reminded us recently of how James Watt told the U.S. Congress that protecting natural resources was unimportant in light of the imminent return of Jesus Christ. In public testimony he said, "after the last tree is felled, Christ will come back."

[Hér er að finna grein sem færir rök fyrir því að James Watt hafi alls ekki sagt þetta.]

Beltway elites snickered. The press corps didn't know what he was talking about. But James Watt was serious. So were his compatriots out across the country. They are the people who believe the Bible is literally true -- one-third of the American electorate, if a recent Gallup poll is accurate.

...

I read all this and look up at the pictures on my desk, next to the computer -- pictures of my grandchildren. I see the future looking back at me from those photographs and I say, "Father, forgive us, for we know not what we do." And then I am stopped short by the thought: "That's not right. We do know what we are doing. We are stealing their future. Betraying their trust. Despoiling their world."

And I ask myself: Why? Is it because we don't care? Because we are greedy? Because we have lost our capacity for outrage, our ability to sustain indignation at injustice?

What has happened to our moral imagination?