ARCHIVES
"To be hopeful in bad times is not just foolishly romantic. It is based on the fact that human history is a history not only of cruelty but also of compassion, sacrifice, courage, kindness. And if we do act, in however small a way, we don't have to wait for some grand Utopian future. The future is an infinite succession of presents. And to live now as we think human beings should live in defiance of all that is bad around us is itself a marvelous victory." -Howard Zinn
Welcome.
E-mail me.
TAGS:
And while this story is breaking news around the world, certain political leaders in the Philippines are pushing for increased taxpayer funding of the Philippine Climate Change Act, a law based on a fraud. The US Congress is opening investigations about “ClimateGate” and English newspapers are calling it the greatest scandal in modern science.
And not a single newspaper here chooses to cover this story. So I will.
The CRU is widely recognized as a leading institution concerned with the study of climate change. It is the organization that supplied a good portion of the data and analysis used in various UN reports and, of course, Al Gore’s famous movie, An Inconvenient Truth.
In September, a striking revelation was made that the data used to create the “hockey stick” of suddenly increasing global temperatures in the last 20 years was manipulated. The basis of the “hockey stick” of global warming that has made Al Gore a multimillionaire was the growth of trees on the Yamal peninsula in Russia. One of the members of the climate group at CRU, Keith Briffa, is the author of the “hockey stick” data that have been used for 10 years to create the climate-change hysteria. It appears calling him an “author” is appropriate since the “hockey stick” and the hysteria may be based on fiction.
John Mangun
Read the entire article here: http://www.businessmirror.com.ph/home/opinion/18980-the-climate-change-fraud.html
It seems wrong, to keep silent and not write anything about the massacre, but it also feels wrong to write about it without being able to do anything about it. What can I do? What can we do?
In the short six months that I’ve been back home, frustrations and disappointments have crept up, along with inspiration, pride, and hope. We all do what we can, and the little things add up to form the big changes, but there is the nagging feeling that there is so much more to be done, and the frustrating feeling upon figuring out how to do them.
It breaks my heart everytime I think of how much power the government has to do good in this country, and how far it is at the opposite end of the spectrum of doing good. From the Filipinos it exports and does not protect, the children it does not educate, the sick people it does not heal, to the social services it does not substantially provide. The democracy it does not uphold.
I do what I do at work and find meaning in it. But at the end of the day, there are stories in this country that are left to unravel on their own, with much deprivation and disempowerment. Stories that need happy endings. Stories of which I would like to be a positive part. Stories that are untold, but are lived every single day, by the person sleeping on the sidewalk, the children tapping your car window at the stoplight, the jeepney driver who stops in the middle of the road to get an additional seven pesos worth of decent living.
What can I do? What can we do?
The elections are coming up, and it seems such a gargantuan task to choose my president and cast my vote. More so, it seems a much bigger task to campaign for a possible president and really influence the turnout of May 2010. What can I do? What can we do? Yes, there are voters workshops to attend and to eventually conduct, there are debates with friends and colleagues on the presidentiables and issues, there are the little things that add up to the big changes. But what happens if the machine that adds these all up is tweaked by the uglier force of corruption and greed? We hope for the best, and while Hope keeps the dream of a better Philippines alive, it is never enough. I want to do more than hope.
Imagine being one of the residents, and it is the night before the demolition team will come, and you know and anticipate the war you would have to fight tomorrow, in your own home. Imagine that you are a mother, fearing for your children, or a father, feeling helpless in your circumstance. Imagine you are one of them, thinking, wondering, How did it come to this?
Before you point your finger and say, “Well, they shouldn’t have squatted there in the first place,” think about our broken society and its imperfect structure and wonder in solidarity with them, How did it come to this?
soulspeaks:callmetaps:A member of demolition team uses a bolt cutter to open the gate of a tenement as residents try to fend him off, in Makati city, suburban Manila, on June 2. Hundreds of residents fought with the demolition crew that tried to evict them from the government housing to make way for a redevelopment project.
* Nuclear power is not the answer to climate change. Renewable energy and energy efficiency deliver much larger reductions in carbon emissions.
* Nuclear power is dangerous. From the mining of radioactive uranium fuel, to its transport and use for nuclear power, and finally up to its disposal, nuclear power creates a radioactive and toxic cycle, which up till now there are no solutions.
* Nuclear Power is expensive. Building, operating and maintaining nuclear power plants cost more than most renewable energy and energy efficiency technologies.
* Nuclear power is not the solution. The key to energy security and climate change is Renewable Energy and energy efficiency. And the best thing about it is: we already have a renewable energy law - so we don’t need to revive outdated technology like the BNPP!
I need to read up more on nuclear power, but an inevitable question is, “Why oh why would you build it near a fault line???”
