Tutu Hockey

Percy Bysshe Shelley, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Lord Byron, and Elizabeth Barrett Browning were all familiar with, if not addicted to, laudanum.
Doctors had been alerted to the dangers of addiction starting in the 1870s.
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Boom crashed

My old Boom blog hit a critical error - someone hacked it or planted a bomb in it. I hate when that happens.

The insect apocalypse DW Documentary

How to See Palestine Whole

Louis Haghe after a drawing by David Roberts, “Gaza”(1839) lithograph, From The Holy Land, Syria, Idumea, Arabia, Egypt, & Nubia vol. 2, (1843) pl. 15; Royal Subscription edition (image courtesy Library of Congress Digital Collections)

To observe that images distort reality is nothing new. (John Berger and his collaborators reminded us of this in Ways of Seeing nearly 50 years ago.) What is more interesting and important is to see how and why this is done in European and, eventually, American images of Palestine.

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Illegal Gold Miners? Amazon Rainforest?

“A large part of the gold that’s commercialized in the world comes stained by blood and human rights abuses,” said Julián Bernardo González, vice president of sustainability for Continental Gold, a Canadian mining company with operations in Colombia that holds legal titles and pays taxes, unlike many smaller mining operations.

A map compiled by environmental group Amazon Geo-Referenced Socio-Environmental Information Network shows 2,312 illegal mining sites in 245 areas across six countries, which the group called an “epidemic.”

In Latin America, criminals see mining and trading precious metals as a lucrative growth business, carefully hidden from U.S. consumers who flaunt gold around their necks and fingers but have no idea where it comes from — or who gets hurt. The narcos know their market is strong: America’s addiction to the metal burns as insatiably as its craving for cocaine. NTR, for instance, was the subsidiary of a major U.S. gold refinery that supplied Apple and 67 other Fortune 500 companies, as well as Tiffany & Co., according to a Miami Herald analysis of corporate disclosures.

READ: https://www.miamiherald.com/news/local/community/miami-dade/article194187699.html#storylink=cpy

Hurricane Dorian to hit Florida as a category 4+ monster

Being offline is the new luxury - VPRO documentary

Power Struggle (the film)

David and Goliath battles always need to be documented so people understand the power they have to achieve a desired result even against ridiculous odds. POWER STRUGGLE documents the acts of ordinary people, many of them senior women, who brought down the Vermont Yankee nuclear power plant by focusing their energies, intellects and actions in a unified way. Infuriating, deeply moving, and ultimately uplifting, POWER STRUGGLE provides an important record of what it takes to successfully battle a nuclear reactor into shutdown.” — Libbe HaLevy, Producer/Host, NUCLEAR HOTSEAT Democracy prevails when a nuclear engineer turned whistle-blower, a 93-year old grandmother, and a scrappy new governor join forces with a dedicated array of citizen activists to accomplish a rare grassroots environmental victory in closing an aging nuclear reactor in Vermont.

Filmed over five years, this 86-minute feature-length documentary chronicles the heated political battle to close the aging Vermont Yankee nuclear power plant, located on the banks of the Connecticut River in southern Vermont.

POWER STRUGGLE follows the unfolding drama as citizen activists and elected officials – alarmed at increasing safety violations—took on the federal government and one of the biggest nuclear power companies in America to call for closure of the reactor when its original 40-year license expires. The film captures perspectives on all sides of the controversy, including from local residents both for and against nuclear power, elected officials (including U.S. Senator Bernie Sanders and Vermont Governor Peter Shumlin), nuclear engineer Arnie Gundersen, a Vermont Yankee spokesperson, and federal nuclear regulators.

A timely, inspiring story of democracy in action; about whether citizens’ voices will be heard against big moneyed interests, and what people are doing locally right now to make a difference for a sustainable energy future.

POWER STRUGGLE is also a warning about the toxic legacy of high-level radioactive waste that will remain at every nuclear power plant around the world indefinitely into the future.

Directed and produced by Robbie Leppzer and Turning Tide Productions based in Wendell, MA, in association with NHK (Japan Broadcasting Corporation). Original music composed and performed by John Sheldon. Running Time: 86 minutes.
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