The John James Newsletter 87
24 October 2015
Believe nothing just because a so-called wise person said it.
Believe nothing just because a belief is generally held.
Believe nothing just because it is said in ancient books.
Believe nothing just because it is said to be of divine origin.
Believe nothing just because someone else believes it.
Believe only what you yourself test and judge to be true
The Buddha
Nobody made a greater mistake than he who did nothing because he could do only a little
Edmund Burke
Dalai Lama video calls for action on climate change.
There is no other planet where we may move. This is our only home.
Two degree Celsius warming locks in sea level rise for thousands of years
The long reaction time of the Antarctic ice-sheet — which can take thousands of years to fully manifest its response to changes in environmental conditions — coupled with the fact that CO₂ lingers in the atmosphere for a very long time means that the warming we generate now will affect the ice sheet in ways that will be incredibly hard to undo
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2015/10/151018213808.htm
Nearly 90% of those killed by US drone strikes in Afghanistan were not the intended targets.
US, China brace for stand-off over disputed islands sail-by as Aussies fence-sit
China’s Global Times, a newspaper considered close to the Chinese Communist Party, published an editorial on Wednesday, saying sailing a warship this close to Chinese territory could be “breach of China’s bottom line.”
https://www.rt.com/news/318738-china-islands-australia-us/
Massive Booing of Chancellor Merkel By German Crowd
Contempt for policy of welcoming floods of migrants from the Middle East and Africa. Hundreds of thousands have been arriving iin recent months, with no end in sight. Merkel’s approval ratings have fallen drastically as Germans increasingly reject her government’s seemingly incoherent immigration policy.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=trLY2flrJ0I&feature=youtu.be
Germany To Deport Refugees In Military Cargo Planes
Mmilitary transport planes to deport nearly 200,000 people who have been declared by the German state to be “economic migrants” and ineligible for asylum.
http://www.countercurrents.org/damon231015.htm
Killing Palestinians ‘a religious duty’:
Rabbi Rav Benzion Mutzafi: “It is not only desirable to do so, but it is a religious duty that you hold his head down to the ground and hit him until his last breath.”
Junker Throws in the Towel: “We Can’t Go On” Fighting Russia
The EU chief says Europe can no longer afford to have a policy dictated by the US.
http://russia-insider.com/en/politics/junker-throws-towel-we-cant-go-fighting-russia/ri10463
Methane – the highest levels from ice-cores have been less than half this for as far back as we can measure.
Ship laden with nuclear waste heading to Australia despite safety concerns
On its way to Port Kembla from the French port of Cherbourg 25 tonnes of waste originally generated by the Australian Nuclear Science Organisation and sent to France in 2001 for reprocessing. The BBC Shanghai has been blacklisted due to its record.
Heffernan said the southern Murray-Darling basin would suffer a 15% decline in rainfall
Pollies promising everyone more water was like promising everyone free beer, it only made you popular until you couldn’t do it.
What has happened to democracy in the US?
How Chicago police ‘disappeared’ 7,000 people
A massive warehouse between two of the most crime-filled areas in the city of Chicago, equipped with floodlights, cameras, razor-wire – this near-paramilitary wing of the government – the demographics speak for themselves.
http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2015/oct/19/homan-square-chicago-police-disappeared-thousands
An interactive portrait
“It’s easy to just go grab someone, throw ’em somewhere – no food, no water, no access to the outside world, intimidating and threatening ’em.”
http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/ng-interactive/2015/oct/19/homan-square-chicago-police-detainees
Sheldon Adelson Is Ready to Buy the Presidency
He just hasn’t decided which Republican candidate to back.
http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2015/09/sheldon-adelson-is-ready-to-buy-the-presidency.html
Australia to Green-Light Medical Marijuana
This government is incredibly sympathetic to the suffering of Australians with debilitating illnesses, and wants to enable access to the most effective medical treatments available
“http://www.telesurtv.net/english/news/Australia-to-Green-Light-Medical-Marijuana-20151019-0006.html
Permafrost warming in parts of Alaska is accelerating
It was assumed it would be stable for this century but it seems that’s not true any more
http://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-34540414
US-led alliance attacks power plant in Aleppo in violation of international law
US violated Syrian airspace and attacked a power plant that feeds Aleppo city, causing a blackout in the city.
Why Is The U.S. Silently Bombing Syria’s Electricity Network?
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article43195.htm
MSF says bombing of Afghan hospital no mistake
The extensive, quite precise destruction of the bombing raid casts doubt on US assertions that it was a mistake.
Everyone wrote off the Syrian army. Take another look now
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article43184.htm
China is making a new 5-Year Plan — and it will decide where the global economy will go next
Over the last 5 years, China has promised to deliver growth of around 7%. But growth has slowed and many suspect that China’s self-reported GDP numbers are lies. China’s real growth rate may be as low as 3%.
http://www.businessinsider.com.au/china-5-year-plan-global-gdp-recession-2015-10
They Came to Fight for Ukraine. Now They’re Stuck in No Man’s Land.
When separatists started a war in eastern Ukraine, hundreds of foreigners came to Kiev. Now they’ve been abandoned.
http://foreignpolicy.com/2015/10/19/ukraines-abandoned-soldiers-russian-belarusian-volunteers/
America is a Bomb Waiting to Explode
In the past, people were in rural communities. They could grow food. They had real communities. They also had self-control and a conception of morality. Today, if the supply lines go down, you are stuck in a house you can’t heat surrounded by millions of FDA-approved drug addicts who are going psycho because they have run out of juice and people who would murder their own grandmother to get a cut-price iPhone.
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article43174.htm
Inequality at its Ugliest
According to new Credit Suisse data, nearly 50 million American adults are part of the world’s poorest 10%.
http://www.commondreams.org/views/2015/10/19/new-2015-wealth-data-us-inequality-its-ugliest
Global One Percent Owns Half of World’s Wealth
Syrian War Forces First-Ever Withdrawal from Global Seed Vault
After armed conflict destabilized Aleppo gene bank, scientists withdraw seeds from Arctic repository in order to safeguard critical research. ICARDA managed to move its headquarters from Syria in the early days of the war, while some of its workers remained at the gene bank in Aleppo in an attempt to save the collection.
3rd refugee shelter torched in Sweden in 6 days
https://www.rt.com/news/318996-sweden-refugee-center-fire/
The creation of Mayhem
A country-by-country analysis
What If They Gave a War and Everyone Came?
A not-so-concise (but relevant) history of the Middle East .
Obama is now the fourth American president in a row to have ordered the bombing of Iraq and his successor will almost certainly be the fifth. A quagmire.
Europe Secretly Starts Imposing TTIP Despite The Public’s Overwhelming Opposition
The terms of the proposed TPP trade treaty with Asian countries won’t be made public until the treaty has already been in force for at least four years. The terms of the proposed TISA (Trade In Services Agreement) with 52 nations won’t be made public until at least five years. The proposed TTIP treaty with European countries has been so successfully hidden, that even the number of years it will be kept from the public isn’t yet known. All in secret, until too late for the public to do anything.
Genetically modified crops and chemically washed beef carcasses were being allowed into the EU.
http://www.countercurrents.org/zuesse201015.htm
Vietnam: From National Liberation to Trans-Pacific Vassal (1975-2015)
An interesting analysis
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article43183.htm
How Australia can become a renewable energy superpower
only if it seizes three key areas of opportunity, based heavily on innovation; and only if it acts quickly.
http://reneweconomy.com.au/2015/how-australia-can-become-a-renewable-energy-superpower-35215
Feeding people on our stressed planet will require a “revolution”
Feeding people will require cleaner energy, smarter farming and women’s rights, but also a “fundamental cultural change,” Ehrlich said a good start in addressing population growth would be full women’s rights, including access to contraceptives and abortions. For agriculture, it’s a “big shift” toward organic farming, getting rid of large industrial farms that rely on pesticides.