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ET, I suppose I should have answered ‘yes’ to whether Monbiot’s piece was “just more posturing from the Guardian”. Monbiot does excellent “environmental” journalism, but geopolitically he’s a useful idiot. I really think he means well and has no idea of the damage he does. His thinking is just compartmentalised i.e. reductionist, so he fails to fit the pieces together. Here’s a relevant article from 2011 by Jonathan Cook:
The Dangerous Cult of the Guardian
And here is Nafeez Ahmed’s account of being sacked by the Guardian:
How I was censored by The Guardian for writing about Israel’s war for Gaza’s gas
An excerpt from the first link:
– George Monbiot, widely considered to be the Guardian’s most progressive columnist, has used his slot to attack a disparate group on the “left” who also happen to be harsh critics of the Guardian.
– In a column in June he accused Ed Herman, a leading US professor of finance and a collaborator on media criticism with Noam Chomsky, and writer David Peterson of being “genocide deniers” over their research into events in Rwanda and Bosnia. The evidence was supposedly to be found in their joint book The Politics of Genocide, published last year, and in an online volume, The Srebrenica Massacre, edited by Herman.
– Implying that genocide denial was now a serious problem on the left, Monbiot also laid into journalist John Pilger for endorsing the book and a website called Media Lens that dedicates itself to exposing the failings of the corporate media, including the work of the Guardian and Monbiot. Media Lens’ crime was to have argued that Herman and Peterson should be allowed to make their case about Rwanda and Bosnia, rather than be silenced as Monbiot appeared to prefer.
– Monbiot also ensnared Chomsky in his criticism, castigating him for writing a foreword to one of the books.
Just seen your post Clark re Robert Hunziker, and I must admit that it didn’t even cross my mind that his articles weren’t totally factual what with them being posted on Counterpunch. As you probably noticed, there’s a contact email address at the end of his articles, so why don’t you email him and put your points/criticisms to him, or I can do so if you prefer.
Anyway, from Counterpunch to Counterfire (in more ways than one):
Canada faces another grim wildfire season
Canada’s 2023 wildfire season was unprecedented in its scale and devastation, and there are strong indications that this year may also be extremely severe. Speaking at a press conference, the Trudeau government’s Natural Resources Minister, Jonathan Wilkinson, warned that we ‘are preparing for the worst … Early projections for 2024 indicate the potential for early and above-normal fire activity over the spring months as a result of ongoing drought forecasts.’
A government press release amplified this warning, declaring that ‘Canada may be at risk of another “catastrophic” wildfire season due to extreme temperatures boosted by El Niño.’ Wilkinson also noted that widespread regional drought conditions create the prospect of ‘early and above-normal fire activity over the spring months.’
As the prospect of another disastrous wildfire season looms, we must appreciate that this situation is but one manifestation of the rapidly intensifying climate crisis. The link between carbon emissions and global warming has long been understood, but the rapidity and volatility of the process are much greater than was previously imagined, and wildfires are a case in point. Last September, the Guardian noted, with regard to Canada’s fires, that this ‘summer, however, as flames devoured one of the largest contiguous stretches of woodland on the planet, 2bn tonnes (2.2bn tons) of carbon dioxide were released into the atmosphere….
https://www.counterfire.org/article/canada-faces-another-grim-wildfire-season/
It just occurred to me to check out the wikipedia entry for George Monbiot, and it’s quite interesting. I interacted with George on a few occasions about fifteen/twenty years ago in respect of the anti-camera propaganda outfits SafeSpeed and the Association of British Drivers, as it was known back then. George wrote a number of articles on the topic, and I’m pretty sure it was me that drew his attention to a great big porky that Jeremy Clarkson dissembled in a Sun article, which George refers to in the following article:
The anti-speed-camera campaign is built on twisted truth and junk science
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2007/nov/13/comment.transport
As for the wikipedia entry, it says that he endorsed Jeremy Corbyn’s leadership election campaign in 2015, and:
Monbiot made an unsuccessful attempt to carry out a citizen’s arrest of John Bolton, a former US ambassador to the United Nations, when the latter attended the Hay Festival to give a talk on international relations in May 2008. Monbiot argued that Bolton was one of the instigators of the Iraq War, of which Monbiot was an opponent.
And, earlier in his career:
Working as an investigative journalist, he travelled in Indonesia, Brazil, and East Africa. His activities led to his being made persona non grata in seven countries[18] and being sentenced to life imprisonment in absentia in Indonesia.[19] In these places, he claims he was also shot at,[20] brutally beaten up and arrested by military police,[20] shipwrecked[20] and stung into a poisoned coma by hornets.[21] He came back to work in Britain after being pronounced clinically dead in Lodwar General Hospital in north-western Kenya, having contracted cerebral malaria./p>
Afterthought: The funny thing is that about three or four days ago – for some specific reason that escapes me now – I was thinking to start a thread on here (the forum) about the anti-camera propaganda and speeding and the annual carnage on the roads etc, etc. And the odd thing is/was – and I can’t remember if it was in Craig’s current thread, or the one before – but a couple of posters (first one, and then another in a reply) referred to the number of kids who are killed and seriously injured on the roads a day or two after I had the idea to start such a thread. I spent many years on pretty much a daily basis ‘combatting’ the propaganda lies and falsehoods of the ironically named SafeSpeed and the pompous-sounding Association of British Drivers, AND, most of the MS newspapers. I could relate literally dozens of examples, but here’s just one, and one that undoubtedly cost the lives of thousands of people…. I think it was 2002… make that 2001, when there was a big debate about whether speed cameras should be hidden or visable, and most of the MS newspapers – and especially the right-wing papers – and the Tories ‘campaigned’ for cameras to be visable, and were successful. Needless to say, they did so knowing that if they were hidden and, as such, drivers prone to speeding didn’t know when and where they would encounter one, then they would be much more likely to drive within the given speed limit most of the time (as opposed to slowing down and then speeding up again in respect of visable cameras).
And just ONE obvious statistic: the reason the vast majority of people who would like to cycle but don’t, is because of their fear of being killed or seriously injured by fast-moving traffic/vehicles. And ditto in relation to parents letting their kids cycle.
Declaration: I was knocked down by a fast-moving vehicle when I was seven years old….. An ambulance!
Oops, I meant to post a link in relation to this at the end of my previous comment. I wonder if the half-million or so who signed the petition all lived in Wales?! I doubt it somehow:
‘Welsh government plans 20mph speed limit u-turn’
More than half a million people have signed a petition against the 20mph limit
Transport Minister Ken Skates is set to announce a change to the policy
https://www.msn.com/en-sg/news/other/welsh-government-plans-20mph-speed-limit-u-turn/ar-AA1nliya
And just one last final point/statistic – ie the number of people killed on the roads globally:
https://www.who.int/teams/social-determinants-of-health/safety-and-mobility/global-status-report-on-road-safety-2023
https://www.who.int/data/gho/data/themes/topics/topic-details/GHO/road-traffic-mortalityThis is no scientific magazine, it´s from the latest NEW YORKER:
The “Epic Row” Over a New Epoch
Scientists, journalists, and artists often say that we live in the Anthropocene, a new age in which humans shape the Earth. Why do some leading geologists reject the term?By Elizabeth Kolbert
April 20, 2024AG, I’m getting PR_CONNECT_RESET_ERROR on your link. It’s probably a temporary problem, but for now here’s the original:
https://www.newyorker.com/news/the-weekend-essay/the-epic-row-over-a-new-epoch
If the answer is battery cars, what is the question?
Probably battery cars are doing more damage to our environment that currently ice cars are doing.
Maybe twenty different metals required for battery cars, all mined using diesel machines, all open cast mining.
Massive fresh water usage.
Most Lithium comes from Deserts, ground water is extracted, ground water is used, that water then carries toxins.
That land will probably take hundreds of years to recover, long after battery cars are in a dustbin.
There is almost certainly not enough economically recoverable Copper on Earth to continue this lunacy.
That Copper, should be saved for making wind turbines and water turbines.
Most poor or working class people do not want battery cars, these people are being squeezed out of mobility.
Especially in London. Net Zero is being rowed back, in Scotland.
It is almost certainly not achievaeable, in the short term.Clark
for me the archive.is works…odd.
Thx for the original.
I just don´t trust original links any more for longer periods.
So I try post archived if possible here.
“So coming generations may blablabla….”p.s. lately I had a malfunction with archiving THE INTERCEPT.
Lets hope that was just me. Since it would be a pity. Despite the medium´s contradictions in reporting. But who´s perfect?
Wait…us!AG, archive.is is working now.
Good public transport would help a lot. I live five miles from the nearest town centre; my last bus home is at 17:57. On Sundays and various holidays it doesn’t run at all. The nearest Sunday and evening service is a forty minute walk on a 60mph road with no pavement.
Michael norton, I agree entirely about battery cars.
What we need is a complete change of lifestyle. Trying to do more and more, faster and faster is the root of unsustainability. Economic growth has to stop.
this is a google transl from LE MONDE DIPLOMATIQUE on costs of highways in France:
“Concrete monster – About the fatal triumph of the motorway”
by Nelo Magalhaes
https://monde–diplomatique-de.translate.goog/artikel/!5987040?_x_tr_sl=auto&_x_tr_tl=en&_x_tr_hl=de&_x_tr_pto=wapp
or
https://archive.is/TjXOl
(no idea why its dark)Breaking news: the government’s prosecution of protestor Trudi Warner has been thrown out by the High Court. Mr Justice Saini stated:
– “The Solicitor General’s case does not not disclose a reasonable basis for committal … It is fanciful to suggest that Ms Warner’s amounted to common law contempt.”
But why was it ever brought in the first place? Why have judges been censoring protestors’ motivations, imprisoning them for contempt, and nullifying defence arguments that have prevailed for centuries?
– “…questions are increasingly being asked about the influence of fossil fuel money on the justice system. Last year it emerged that City law firms have supported nearly £1.5 trillion in fossil fuel transactions since 2018, generating profits which permeate the system as a whole. Investigative journalism suggests it may be the fossil fuel companies themselves who are driving the crackdown on protest, via ‘think-tanks’ such as Policy Exchange.”
I read a recent article from a retired high court judge in Ireland relating to this. I went to school with her brother and her family were very involved in the local legal scene. Only ‘paupers and multimillionaires’ can sue in Irish courts, says retired judge. I have also got other family members who worked for big law firms in the UK and what she says about “billable hours” rings true. She says that said State policies had changed the legal landscape “significantly” in the past 10-20 years and have made smaller firms an “endangered species”. The vast majority of citizens do not have proper access to law under the system as it currently operates, said Ms Justice Deirdre Murphy. To vindicate the rights of the citizen, it is “certainly arguable” that the State has a constitutional duty to provide a legal system that gives everyone access to the law.
“A ruling by the Competition Authority preventing restrictions on entry to the Bar has resulted in about 2,500 barristers for whom there is insufficient work, she said. “When survival is the primary goal, the pursuit of fairness and justice will not be a priority.” When I was towards the end of my uni days the entrance exams to barrister and solicitor post grad schools were limited by a system that raised the pass mark of the entrance exams to whatever fit only the numbers they wanted to allow through. This was deemed in a court judgement to be unfair and they were forced to set a pass mark and anyone who attained that level of pass mark could go through. At the time I thought that was a fair and equitable decision but in light of what this former high court judge says perhaps there were unintended consequences. I wasn’t involved with any law studies but knew a lot of people who were finishing their law degrees at the time and were looking to get into either solicitor training roles or the barrister route.
“Another major factor is increasing corporatisation and commercialisation of law, she said. Law, instead of a vocation, has been reduced to a “business”, to be transacted on the basis of “billable hours”.” She also says ” If smaller firms and independent barristers disappear, there will be no one left to take cases to challenge the power of the State “because the big corporate firms have no interest in doing that”.”
It’s a good article. I guess even law can’t escape commoditization – or ‘enshitification’ being the more modern term.
“This international business, she said, is of “no benefit” to any Irish citizen other than a “small cohort” of top-earning barristers and solicitors.
The Government and IDA (industrial development authority) should explain how it is proposed to accommodate this business, including whether it will diminish the capacity of the High Court to perform its “core function” of upholding the law and determining and vindicating the rights of citizens.”I guess much the same thing has happened in the UK and everywhere. Big corporate law firms just are not interested in bread and butter legal issues of the average citizen because it doesn’t pay them.
AG – “(no idea why its dark)”
Firefox’s “Reader View”, the page icon at the right of the address bar, sorts it out 🙂
Michael norton – “If the answer is battery cars, what is the question?”
Er,
- “How do we distract the public with more false solutions?”
- “How can we keep richer people feeling more virtuous than the poorer people who have much lower overall emissions?”
- “How can we make it look like we’re addressing the emissions problem while stimulating economic growth?”
- “How can we suck up to billionaires like Elon Musk?”
These valuable minerals that a battery car uses, some of these minerals will run out, in less that one hundred years.
Although Elon Musk talks about recycling, you always lose some of the weight.
Recycling will be rather expensive and could be dangerous.
I can see mostly downsides to E.V.’s.In the final analysis the problem is Capitalism, and the only solution is a sustainable global economy. Just did a quick search and found this (from October 2021):
Solving the Climate Crisis Requires the End of Capitalism
It’s time to face the fact that resolving the climate crisis will require a fundamental shift away from our growth-based, corporate-dominated global system.
The global conversation regarding climate change has, for the most part, ignored the elephant in the room. That’s strange, because this particular elephant is so large, obvious, and all-encompassing that politicians and executives must contort themselves to avoid naming it publicly. That elephant is called capitalism, and it is high time to face the fact that, as long as capitalism remains the dominant economic system of our globalized world, the climate crisis won’t be resolved……
(Clark, thx! On the darkness of the page: I think something happens to the LMD site during the archive-process. But only if it´s a previously google-translated page. I am having various issues with archiving translated sites. This one is new and so far only with LMD. But switching info on the page icon did the trick and made it more readable.
AG, it is good to use archived copies because pages sometimes get changed, which can make quotes and commentary confusing or obsolete. Pages can get moved or deleted causing links to fail; this is called “link rot”. Wikipedia pages change frequently so I now link to the latest revision, which is the top entry in the page’s History.
frankly I did not know of archive.is untill a year ago.
One of the super-duper skills I acquired thx to our world dancing around WWIIIp.s. however I would not be surprised if in a future point of time archive.is and everything with it will be wiped out by some attorneys, laws, bill… and then it´s all gone. So eventually either hard copy or personal saved files are the only real thing. But to keep that up is impossible.
AG, there’s also The Wayback Machine at archive.org; they know a lot about licensing and copyright law, and they’ve been going for decades. There’s a Wikipedia editors’ guide with a list of archives; editors are encouraged to support citation links with archived copies. And there’s a browser extension, definitely for Firefox and probably for other browsers, that finds archived copies from lots of archives.
A free and open source distributed archive would be very robust. There may well be such a thing but I’ve never looked.
China is still increasing how much coal it burns to make electricity and steel.
China consumes four and a third billion tons a year.
Overall, the World is using more coal now than before the Pandemic?
Even Germany is using loads of brown coal – the worst kind of coal.Yes, I know I should probably start a new thread, but then it’s not entirely unrelated, and slower speed limits – and especially 20mph speed limits in towns and villages and cities – encourage more people (including motorists) to walk and cycle. Anyway, I was just doing some research about the latest development in Wales re the 20mph limit (one of the things I’m trying to determine is who got the petition together) and, as such, came across the following article from September 25th last year:
New research details ‘astonishing’ impact of Wales’ 20mph speed limit after first week
A new analysis of traffic data, released one week after Wales introduced a default 20mph speed limit, has revealed what researchers described as an “astonishing” impact on traffic speeds across the nation.
The data compiled by transport safety specialists Agilysis explored the impact of the new speed limit on traffic speeds over hundreds of miles of roads in Wales.
The headline statistics show a 2.9 mph drop in speeds on the surveyed roads, averaging 19.77 mph compared to 22.67 mph the week before the change.
I don’t know about ‘astonishing’, and it does seem odd that the average speed was only 22.67mph the week before the change, when the speed limit was 30mph. Anyhow, it also says the following:
Sample analysis of two routes has indicated a journey time increase of between 45-63 seconds along the two 2.5km routes in Cardiff and Wrexham.
As I recall it, that’s around the average car/vehicle journey distance in towns and cities. But getting back to the petition…. until I read the article – and having only heard about the petition for the first time about a week ago – I assumed it was got together at some point AFTER the new 20mph limits came into force. But I was wrong, and under the sub-heading Backlash, it says the following at the end of the article:
The introduction of the new speed limit has sparked a fierce backlash among some members of the public in Wales.
A petition launched calling for the repeal of the laws has passed 400,000 signatures, making it the most popular Senedd petition of all time.
On Saturday, a march against the speed limit’s introduction attracted over one hundred protesters.
Presumably the other 399, 900 odd thought fcuk THAT for a lark.
The comments section is quite interesting (59), and here’s several examples:
What any sane person would have said, without the evidence, now the proof is there, 20 mph is good.
As a cyclist with almost 60 years of survival on mostly English roads, I cannot wait to come home to Wales. Best action by the Senedd in I don’t know how long.
I was very close to being taken out on zebra crossing yesterday by a cyclicst who was going hell for leather in a new 20mph zone…. [fancy that, yes, just the day before]
Only problem is reckless cyclists cannot be identified if they crash into you or your car. No number plates etc. Cyclists in my area of Cardiff are going 30/40 mph with impunity, on pavements, footpaths and parks.
__________________________
So you see it’s not speeding motorists who are the problem, but cyclists whizzing around at 30/40mph on pavements etc endangering everyones’ lives!
And crashing into cars!
