Squandering the Planet’s Increasingly Scarce Fossil Fuels for our Amusement
Dr Gary Kohls
In 1825, long before anybody even thought about air flight, the US Navy began operations in the Pensacola, Florida area, when the federal government built a naval yard on Pensacola Bay.
90 years later, in 1914, the naval yard became home to the Navy’s first permanent air station.
Since that time, NAS (Naval Air Station) Pensacola has served as the primary training base for naval aviators and has housed the Blue Angels aerobatic programs, which will be giving 61 shows at 32 locations from March through November of 2019. The two Blue Angel shows in Duluth are scheduled for July 20 – 21, 2019.
The US Navy pilots that came back in one piece from World War II returned flush with pride for doing their part in winning the war in the Pacific.
16 July 2019 (FAO)* — The world is more connected than ever: economies, travel, media. Unfortunately, this also holds true for the world’s challenges. Plastic and pollution in our ocean harm the global fish supply. Water scarcity, rising sea levels, air pollution, deforestation … all of these affect the entire world.
UNITED NATIONS, Jul 15 2019 (IPS)* – The world’s two most populous nations-– China and India—have been making steady progress in eradicating extreme poverty, but have fallen short in their attempts to eliminate extreme hunger, according to the Bangkok-based UN Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (ESCAP).
In an interview with IPS, Armida Salsiah Alisjahbana, UN Under-Secretary-General and Executive Secretary of ESCAP said Asia-Pacific is on track to eradicate extreme poverty, which still afflicts 285 million people in that region, but that goal would be successful only “if current progress is maintained until 2030”.
“Both China and India are reducing extreme poverty faster than the regional average. And half the population lifted out of extreme poverty globally, since 2000, comes from China,” she said.
After nearly a decade of progress, the number of people who suffer from hunger has slowly increased over the past three years, with about one in every nine people globally suffering from hunger today, the United Nations said in a new report released on Monday [15 July 2019].
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FAO/Manan Vatsyayana | Local school children eat their meals at the Ban Bor Primary School in Xay District, Lao People’s Democratic Republic. (14 May 2019)
Proper nutrition for newborn babies into early childhood is key to development and good health in later life, according to the Regional Director of the United Nations World Health Organization (WHO) in Europe, as she launched two new studies on Monday [15 July 2019].
The studies from WHO Europe show that a high proportion of baby foods are incorrectly marketed as suitable for infants under the age of six months, when in fact much of it contains inappropriately high levels of sugar.
Before the UN Conference on a Nuclear Weapons [WMD] Free Zone in the Middle East
Edward Hicks, Peaceable Kingdom, c. 1834, oil on canvas – Lion with Lamb
In the spirit of TRANSCEND co-founder and friend Dieter Fischer, I’ll start with a joke. When Arafat and Rabin die they ask God, “When will there be peace in the Middle East?” God says, “Not in my lifetime.”
15 July 2019 (UN Environment)*— Today is Youth Skills Day. There are 1.2 billion young people aged 15 to 24 years in the world, accounting for 16 per cent of the global population.
Engaging young people in sustainable development efforts is central to achieving the Sustainable Development Goals.
And, to averting the worst threats and challenges to sustainable development, including the impacts of climate change, unemployment, poverty, gender inequality, conflict and migration.
How developing countries lose $3 billion every day through an accounting trick that allows corporations to avoid paying tax.
Image: Kurtis Garbutt, CC by 2.0
10 July 2019 (openDemocracy)* — Amazon.com Inc. was brought to court by the U.S. Internal Revenue Service (IRS) in 2017 for transfer pricing discrepancies. In 2005 and 2006, the multinational tech company had transferred $255 million in royalty payments to its tax haven in Luxembourg, but according to the IRS these royalty payments should have amounted to $3.5 billion. This transfer pricing adjustment would have increased Amazon’s federal tax payments by more than $1 billion.
(Wall Street International)*— This conversation is not an easy one and I ask you all to bear with me as I open a subject that seems if not politically incorrect, at least forbidden in polite company…
Some of you may not have even heard it; others may have firm and serious opinions… It involves individual choice, once a basic American principle that has morphed into the extreme control over our lives of late stage capitalism.
12 July 20193 (Norwegian Refugee Council)* — Imagine you’re a refugee in a foreign country. You have no income and few possessions. You desperately need transport so you can earn money to feed your family. But the nearest town is 20km away and the bus fare is expensive. What do you do?
Photo: Qhubeka
Bicycles are a lifeline for many refugees. Cheap, quick and efficient, they are a vital tool on the road to self-reliance.
In an interview with IPS, Armida Salsiah Alisjahbana, UN Under-Secretary-General and Executive Secretary of ESCAP said Asia-Pacific is on track to eradicate extreme poverty, which still afflicts 285 million people in that region, but that goal would be successful only “if current progress is maintained until 2030”.
