Category Archives: environment

Following the money…

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(sigh)  In all the stories I’ve heard on Susan Rice and her failure to say what was going on in Benghazi, the bigger story is curiously tucked away.

…hmmm…I wonder why…?     /snarky

Here’s another report on members of Congress that own shares pushing for the XL pipeline.  Pushing their own self-interests over the ecological ramifications to the people, the animals, the land and water…

I’m thinking of the Cree proverb here (along with other wise sayings):

Only when the last tree has died
and the last river been poisoned and the last fish been caught
will we realise we cannot eat money.
~ Cree Indian Proverb ~

 

 

Taking the profit out of pollution

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…this has been my question all along–why not make polluting the environment a costly affair–so costly that it wouldn’t make sense to continue to pollute? Because the current myopic view is not to include the healthcare costs caused by the toxic environment.

The same goes for plastic crap–why not make using plastic so freaking expensive that glass would be the better and cheaper alternative?  Nobody mentions the ocean full of not only mercury but plastic bottles….

 

Silkwood

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My apologies, I meant to blog on this last week, at the anniversary of Karen Silkwood’s death, November 13th, 1976~

So now it’s been thirty-six years since her mysterious death after she had raised too many questions about the safety of the plutonium processing plant that employed her.  The TV movie “Silkwood” raised a stir when it was aired.  I remember watching it.  For some reason, my memory had Cher as the lead role…apologies to Meryl Streep.

The only complaint I have about the movie is the emphasis on Karen’s personal life…perhaps they didn’t want to leave stuff out to make an accurate portrayal, but it seems that whenever a woman makes noise about something, her morals are always questioned and if she is not a freaking saint, then she is not to be believed.

And I wonder if anything has changed…whether plutonium is still going missing–and where it’s going to…

Indiana is exploding…

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…You may have heard about the house exploding in Indy: http://www.local12.com/news/local/story/Faulty-Furnace-May-Be-To-Blame-For-Indy-Home/eDtvjY93zUyMEdrbWulCdw.cspx?rss=30

After they announced yet another house exploding somewhere in the area (didn’t catch the city)…I did a search on exploding houses to see what was out there.  I couldn’t find another house exploding listed in the news sites, but did find other troubling stuff.
Gees-o-pete.  Look what I’ve found: http://www.wthr.com/Global/story.asp?S=3813192  explosions propelling manhole covers…

 

 

(As a side note not related to this, they have been spraying the hell out of the skies the last two days.  I counted thirty chemtrails yesterday and twenty-five this morning just between 6:30 a.m. to 8:30 a.m. There were probably more, but I took a shower during this time period, and they likely were putting as much barium and aluminum as they could….)

FEMA temporarily closes relief centers

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I read a story featured on Yahoo on FEMA closing relief centers because of the nor’easter coming in…something about the story sent my “antenna” up… so I looked at other sites and found that they were rightwingers…the search continued and I also found this:  http://newyork.cbslocal.com/2012/11/08/fema-responds-to-criticism-of-closure-of-mobile-centers-due-to-noreaster/

So…the rightwingers would rather more people were endangered staying in tents that offered no protection to the staffers nor folks visiting them…?

Other thoughts on the disaster of the East coast–many are still without power and they said on the news this morning that it is going to be after the holiday…what is the problem?  We have had storms like this in the past and I don’t recall it taking so long to restore power?  Why is there such a long delay?  Could it be that the utility companies, in a quest for bigger profits, have scaled back their work force?  I mean, this happened here, albeit on a smaller scale, when the 90-mph winds hit here this past June…power was off for a week at some locations.  The only reason we got power back on in our building was because we had a generator…even then, we had to wait for fuel for that generator.

… and why on Earth aren’t they saying anything about off-grid power?  Why aren’t they supplying people with solar panels and batteries so they could at least power the basic stuff?  Here’s another site on off-grid products and instruction.

Feed the soil…

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…and the rest will follow. (hat tip to organic farmers’ group)

Here we are, 2012, and still rediscovering what wisdom has been known forever…nature can do a bang up job when we cooperate with her instead of fighting against her…

The cover crops angle is the missing link that nourishes the soil while preventing erosion.  As the article states, it puts back nutrients that create that rich compost responsible for holding the soil together, holding water when droughts hit, and feeding the worms, which add their own version of rich casings (fertilizer).  (A side story–someone told me of a woman who detested worms and requested a chemical fertilizer be applied to kill all the worms in her yard.  I kid you not.)  Also, the article doesn’t mention the beneficial microbes that eat e.coli –which helps keep it in check.

 

The meningitis outbreak

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I’m waiting to see this entire story unfold, because there’s definitely more going on behind the scenes here.

Links here and here.

Here’s the CDC description of fungal meningitis:  http://www.cdc.gov/meningitis/fungal.html

(I thought the symptoms are what I experience every month with my migraines–stiff neck, low grade fever, nausea & vomiting, altered mental state….interesting.)

Indiana is now up to 32 cases:  http://www.wane.com/dpp/news/indiana/ind-agency-state-has-32-fungal-meningitis-cases

It’s interesting that the CDC says the Midwest is particularly susceptible to the causes of fungal meningitis, that we have all sorts of bugs floating around that will cause illness if our immune system is compromised.  I’m also curious about the mold that has begun growing on houses here for…say, at least the last two decades.  I’ve lived here all my life, and never saw this.

I found this interesting piece on Purdue’s website:http://www.purdue.edu/newsroom/releases/2012/Q3/poor-pollination-leads-to-moldy-growth-in-corn.html  Makes one wonder, doesn’t it?

My  “antenna” went up with compromised immune system, since I’m trying to fix my “leaky gut”–so….I went on a search to find more stuff on the connection between leaky gut and meningitis.  While I couldn’t find any articles directly linking it, I am suspicious this may be a factor in why these folks became ill–one of the big reasons is that we on the mercury support group talk about the fight against Candida and other fungal infections that take over because our immune systems are shot.  With the inflamed gut, that fungus enters the bloodstream, creating all sorts of health issues.

One of the cures, however, is a natural one:  coconuts.    It has lauric acid in it which naturally kills off fungal critters.  The group recommends taking a teaspoon of organic, non-refined coconut oil per day.  It has to be non-refined because the process of refining it takes away all the benefits.  You can also cook with it, as the health benefits are not destroyed by cooking.  I’ve also used it instead of shortening when I used to make oatmeal cookies <sigh> one of those things I won’t be able to have anymore….

It is supposed to be like breast milk, which also has lauric acid.  Dr. Natasha Campbell-McBride (GAPS doctor/author) has stated that breast milk is crucial for the first six months of life–babies are born with a sterile gut and the breast milk will provide the beneficial “good” bacteria.  I think that is why the Boomer generation is so screwed–the majority of us were bottle-fed, and exposed to chemicals unlike generations before–both of which will diminish and destroy the immune system.

Here’s a pretty good website on all the health issues mold/fungus can cause.  It’s stunning that birth defects and cancer can be caused by mold.  And that it is a neurotoxin.  Wow.  Why isn’t more attention paid to this? And does GM corn and other food multiply mold’s effects?

Albany Pro-Fracking Rally

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“Advocates” of the poisonous fracking practice were bused into Albany, NY.

In the book, Not in Our Backyards! by Nicholas Freudenberg (1984), the author notes the long history of corporate owners pitting unions (workers) against environmentalists.  Some union members saw the environmentalists as elitists.  They feared job loss if the company picked up and moved their jobs to another area or another country that would be more “friendly”.  This fear was not unfounded, as many companies did just that.  The threat was very real.

From this article, that blackmail is still at work–forcing people to choose having income or taking a risk with theirs and their family’s health.  It’s only after a tragedy occurs that they realize they gained a little at first, but lost their precious health or livestock or poisoned their land or water forever.

Artists Against Fracking website here. Yoko Ono and Sean Lennon beg Gov. Cuomo not to rush into allowing fracking.

Oh, and let’s not forget the resulting earthquakes linked to fracking…nobody seems to want to address that issue.

From Ohio. And Texas.

Here’s a good article from Bloomberg summarizing it.

It is stunning that energy companies who violate the rules over and over again, and again, are  allowed to continue.  Why?

Oh, and this just adds to the total picture of unethical behavior and lack of accountability.  And this stuff has been going on since the beginning of the oil industry—so why isn’t something done to correct it?