Old Fucking Punk @lwriemen@librem.one

I mean, seriously, how many places out there have engineers who develop an M.2 breakout board to debug their phone and then release the schematics so you can make one for your own phone? It's basically Hogwarts over here @purism -- I'm surrounded by wizards.

https://source.puri.sm/eric.kuzmenko/librem5-m2-breakout

CAP Publicly Distanced Itself From the UAE. 8 Months Later, It Was Still Meeting with UAE Lobbyists.

This January, the Center for American Progress (CAP) declared it would no longer accept funding from the United Arab Emirates (UAE). “With a rising undemocratic tide around the world, and serious questions about which side of that struggle our own president stands on, it seemed clear that all Americans should take extra steps and leave no doubt where they stand,” a spokesperson for CAP told the Guardian.

The pledge came amid public outcry over Saudi Arabia’s murder and dismemberment of Jamal Khashoggi, a columnist for the Washington Post, in the Saudi consulate in Istanbul on October 2, 2018. Since 2014, CAP had received between $1.5 million and $3 million from the UAE, a close ally of Saudi Arabia. CAP, founded by Clinton staffer John Podesta, is widely seen as the think tank that wields the most influence on the Democratic Party. During this time, the group had been conspicuously silent on the U.S.-UAE-Saudi war on Yemen, which was condemned by human rights groups.

But CAP appears not to have taken all steps to rid itself of UAE influence. According to Foreign Agents Registration Act (FARA) records, which disclose lobbyists’ financial relationships with foreign governments, a high-level CAP staffer continued meeting with a UAE lobbyist for at least eight months after CAP pledged to stop taking UAE donations.

FARA filings show that Harbour Group, a lobbying firm, received $2,863,574.34 from the UAE and $160,008.09 from Saudi Arabia during the six-month period ending on March 31, 2019.

That same filing shows that, during this time period, Richard Mintz, managing director of Harbour Group, had “multiple contacts” with Brian Katulis, a senior fellow at CAP known for his close relationship with the UAE. These meetings extended from October 1 to March 30, indicating they continued for two months after CAP pledged it would stop taking UAE money. While the record does not disclose details of these meetings, it says the topic of their discussions were “UAE foreign policy.”

It didn’t stop there. A newly released FARA filing shows that, from April 1 to September 30, Harbour lobbyists repeatedly met and communicated with Katulis. During that time period, the lobbying firm received $3,558,776.35 from the UAE (no U.S. lobbying payments from Saudi Arabia were listed).

While FARA documents are scant on details, frustrating transparency advocates, the filing notes that Richard Mintz, managing director of Harbour Group, met with Katulis from April 1 to September 30. Under "subject matter," the filing merely states “Iran/Yemen/Red Sea”—three topgeopoliticalconcerns of the UAE.

The same filing notes that two other Harbour Group lobbyists had contact with Katulis: Adam Sharon who had a “lunch, catch-up meeting” with him on August 22, and Matthew Triaca, who sent Katulis an email on August 29.

The two FARA documents only list meetings up to the end of September, so the meetings may be ongoing.

While these meetings do not contradict CAP’s statement that it is no longer receiving UAE money, it does raise questions about ongoing UAE influence.

Asked for comment, CAP spokesperson Sam Hananel told In These Times via email, “The Center for American Progress no longer accepts funding from the United Arab Emirates. Following the conclusion of the grant period, CAP staff finalized and submitted reports associated with past work.”

CAP declined repeated requests to comment on the content of the meetings between Mintz and Katulis. The refusal is notable, given that CAP has called for increased transparency on lobbying disclosures, citing the threat of Russian interference.

Harbour Group, Katulis and Mintz declined a request for an interview.

Think tanks meet with all sorts of people, and a meeting alone does not prove undue political influence. However, a large number of meetings over a significant time span suggests a closer relationship, and one more likely to be mutually beneficial.

CAP and Katulis’ relationship with UAE lobbyists goes back further. A recent report by Ben Freeman of the Center for International Policy found that UAE “foreign agents,” most commonly Harbour’s Richard Mintz, contacted Katulis “at least 11 times according to their 2018 FARA filings, primarily regarding a ‘CAP group trip to UAE/KSA’ in late April and early May 2018,” writes Freeman (who also provided In These Times the FARA documents for this article.). The records show that then, as now, Mintz was the main contact for Katulis.

The report, further, notes that CAP was among the top five think tanks most contacted by the UAE in 2018.

CAP has long exerted significant influence over the center of the Democratic Party, and played a tremendous role in shaping Obama administration policy, with Timereporting in 2008 that “not since the Heritage Foundation helped guide Ronald Reagan's transition in 1981 has a single outside group held so much sway.” Katulis’ bio boasts his political influence, noting that, “for more than a decade, he has advised senior U.S. policymakers on foreign policy and has provided expert testimony several times to key congressional committees.”

Katulis, meanwhile, wears another hat: He is a senior advisor to Albright Stonebridge Group, a “global business strategy firm” with offices in the UAE and Saudi Arabia. The UAE office is led by Jad Mneymneh, who previously served in the Crown Prince Court of Abu Dhabi’s Office of Strategic Affairs.

While a spokesperson for the firm said its does not lobby the U.S. government or take on “client work that involves activities covered by FARA,” journalist Lee Fang noted on Twitter that the group is an influence peddler.

While the firm may not partake in activities that warrent FARA reporting, its staffer—Katulis—does perform such activities at CAP, like testifying before Congress.

There is reason to think that Katulis’ relationships have had an impact. A January 16 Intercept report by Ryan Grim and Clio Chang found that, in the aftermath of the Khashoggi killing, Katulis objected to an initial statement from CAP condemning Saudi Arabia for the murder and calling for concrete consequences. Thanks to Katulis’ input, the statement was watered down and instead called for “additional steps to reassess” the U.S. relationship with Saudi Arabia.

CAP’s statement that it would no longer take UAE funding came amid public scrutiny fueled, in part, by these revelations.

The implications of these ties are not theoretical. The Yemen war has killed at least 100,000 people, and the U.S.-Saudi-UAE coalition is responsible for more than 8,000 of 12,000 known civilian deaths, according to the Armed Conflict Location and Event Data project. For more than four and a half years, the powerful think tank has tacitly supported the Yemen War through its silence. Even as the mainstream of the Democratic Party turned against the war under President Trump, the think tank stayed mum, despite weighing in on a number of other foreign policy issues, from Russian interference in the election to Trump’s decision to exit the Iran nuclear deal. During a heated -congressional effort to end U.S. support for the Yemen War by invoking the War Powers resolution, CAP was silent, coming out in support only after the resolution passed with broad Democratic backing. (It was ultimately vetoed by Trump in April.)

Some of Katulis’ own writing appears to contradict even CAP's belated statement of “full support” for U.S. withdrawal from the Yemen War. In March 2019, Katulis and CAP chief operating officer Gordon Gray co-authored an article that played down the importance of ending U.S. support for the war.

“Ending U.S. military support for the Saudi-led coalition will not stop the war or address the humanitarian crisis,” they wrote. “Successfully and comprehensively addressing the grave situation in Yemen will require patient diplomacy, which inevitably will see ups and downs given the nature of the conflict and the combatants inside and outside Yemen.”

Though no longer funding CAP directly, the UAE government was likely delighted to see such a statement come from a leading Democratic Party-aligned think tank.

The POST Act isn’t the end of the fight against privacy-invasive NYPD surveillance. It is a crucial first step. https://www.gothamgazette.com/opinion/8909-surveillance-and-the-city-past-time-post-act-nypd

New ice river detected at Arctic glacier adds to rising seas

Geologists, examining the desolate Vavilov ice cap on the northern fringe of Siberia in the Arctic Circle, have for the first time observed rapid ice loss from an improbable new river of ice, according to new research.

November 2019 was 2nd hottest on record for the planet
https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2019/12/191216151506.htm #climatechange #climatecrisis

Effects of natural gas assessed in study of shale gas boom in Appalachian basin

A new study estimated the cumulative effects of the shale gas boom in the Appalachian basin in the early 2000s on air quality, climate change, and employment. The study found that effects on air quality and employment followed the boom-and-bust cycle, but effects on climate change will likely persist for generations to come. The study, which also considered how to compensate for these effects, provides insights for long-term decision making in this field.

#FarSide creator #GaryLarson launches #website with promise of new work | #Books | The Guardian

https://www.theguardian.com/books/2019/dec/17/far-side-creator-gary-larson-launches-website-with-promise-of-new-work

#Art #Cartoons

Birds' seasonal migrations shift earlier as climate changes

In what the authors believe is one of the first studies to examine climate change impact on the timing of bird migration on a continental scale, researchers report that spring migrants were likely to pass certain stops earlier now than they would have 20 years ago. Also, temperature and migration timing were closely aligned, with the greatest changes in migration timing occurring in the regions warming most rapidly. Timing shifts were less apparent in fall, they add.

Our holiday #sale has begun 🎉 10% off Librem laptops, USB keys and the new Librem Server and 20% off annual Librem One plans https://puri.sm/posts/holiday-2019-sale/ #Purism #Librem #LibremServer #LibremOne

#Neolithic chewing gum helps recreate image of ancient Dane | #Science | The Guardian

https://www.theguardian.com/science/2019/dec/17/neolithic-dna-ancient-chewing-gum-denmark

#Biology #Zoology #Evolution #Anthropology #Denmark

Archaeologists find Bronze Age tombs lined with gold

Archaeologists have discovered two Bronze Age tombs containing a trove of engraved jewelry and artifacts that promise to unlock secrets about life in ancient Greece.

Centrist Pundits Assume Voters Agree with Them. Polling Tells a Different Story.

The 2020 primary has, so far, been great for progressives. The campaigns of both Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren have robust policy shops, churning out bold, comprehensive plans on issues from education to climate change to healthcare to immigration.

And voters are responding. Warren has seen her poll numbers rise, and is currently first in Iowa polling averages and tied for first in New Hampshire. And, after a brief dip following his heart attack, Sanders rebounded in the polls too, buoyed by the momentum of endorsements from Reps. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Rashida Tlaib and Ilhan Omar.

But not everyone is happy about the progressive ambition on display. And I’m not just talking about the Wall Streeters who regularly speak to the press about how much they don’t want a Warren or Sanders presidency.

No, I’m talking about those within the party as well. According to pundit Jonathan Chait, leading Democratic candidates are living in a “fantasy world” about how progressive the electorate is, setting themselves up for defeat. Former Chicago mayor Rahm Emanuel, launching a new career as a left-bashing commentator, thinks Democrats will alienate the suburbs if they push “pie-in-the-sky policy ideas” or a “smorgasbord of new entitlements.” Even House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has joined in on trying to temper the ambition of the presidential field, arguing, “What works in San Francisco does not necessarily work in Michigan.”

All three—along with countless other politicians and political observers—have been beating the drum that a progressive policy agenda is wildly out of step with the public.

Chait, for instance, laments that Democrats are abandoning an Obama-esque incrementalism. But there isn't much reason to believe that such incrementalism is an electoral winner given the shellacking Democrats faced amid cratering turnout in the 2010 and 2014 midterms. A political program needs to build a constituency to fight for it.

To be clear, not every voter will agree with you on every single issue. A candidate simply needs to convince voters that they are more trustworthy and more likely to fight on the voters’ behalf in the areas where they do agree.

Fortunately for progressives, the voters do agree on a lot.

Taxing the rich. Data for Progress recently polled the tax plans of Bernie Sanders, Elizabeth Warren, Joe Biden and Donald Trump. Sixty-five percent of voters chose either Sanders or Warren’s plan as their favorite. Even 50% of Republicans did.

A Green New Deal. The idea of a Green New Deal has become the hallmark of ambitious climate plans in 2020, recognizing the need for massive investment in decarbonizing infrastructure and good-paying green jobs. It’s a deal voters approve of: according to the Cook Political Report, 67% of swing voters say that a Green New Deal is a good idea.

Free College. Given the crushing impact of student debt on a generation of students and recent graduates, candidates like Sanders and Warren have been talking about eliminating tuition at public colleges and universities. In a New York Timespoll from this summer, three-fifths of voters, including 72% of independents, supported the idea.

Medicare for All. The idea of moving toward a healthcare system that isn’t reliant on private, for-profit insurers especially riles up the naysayers. Polling on healthcare reforms can vary a lot based on phrasing, so the best data on popular support is one that tests multiple framings at once. When the Progressive Change Institute tested support for Medicare for All, they found that as long as progressives offer counterarguments and don’t let Republican narratives dominate, Medicare for All commands majority support.

That’s why we’ve seen Democrats run on Medicare for All in purple districts and win. Katie Porter and Mike Levin, both supporters of Medicare for All, succeeded in the well-heeled suburbs of Orange County. And Medicare for All supporter Matt Cartwright, who represents Obama-Trump territory in northeastern Pennsylvania (think Scranton), won re-election by almost double digits over a well-funded Republican challenger.

Given how broadly popular such progressive ideas are, one would think that they would be a part of any concept of a political “center.” But they’re not.

That’s because the “center” pundits talk about isn’t actually the center of the electorate. It more often refers to the center of the elite class of major donors—upholding a corporate-friendly status quo.

“Centrist” Democrats in Congress are fighting to protect pharmaceutical monopolies, thus inflating the cost of prescription drugs. By contrast, three-quarters of voters in key swing districts, according to a recent poll, want to see such monopolies broken up.

“Centrist” Democrats have aided and abetted Donald Trump’s immigration policies, but polls show that voters overwhelmingly oppose family separation and a border wall. 

“Centrist” Democrats often flock to bills that roll back regulations on Wall Street, and yet cracking down on Wall Street is popular across the political spectrum.

“Centrist” Democrats push to increase military spending year after year, and yet only one-third of voters actually think that we are spending too little.

The fact that progressive policies are popular—and that policies branded “centrist” often aren’t—doesn’t mean that progressive candidates can rest on their laurels and be assured of victory. We’ve seen progressive ballot measures win in the same elections that more progressive candidates didn’t.

What it does mean is that you can run on progressive policies and values and win. And that you can change what we even mean by the “center” in the process.   

Resident orcas' appetite likely reason for decline of big Chinook salmon

Large, old Chinook salmon have mostly disappeared from the West Coast. A new study points to the recent rise of resident killer whales, and their insatiable appetite for large Chinook salmon, as the main driver behind the decline of the big fish.

#deletefacebook
https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2019/mar/02/facebook-global-lobbying-campaign-against-data-privacy-laws-investment

Cities Aren’t Waiting for a Federal Green New Deal

In 1992, recognizing that not all countries had contributed equally to the climate crisis, parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change codified the principle of “common but differentiated responsibilities.” This framework insists that developed countries “take the lead in combating climate change” by transitioning to clean energy more rapidly, in order to allow time for developing nations to catch up to the same standard of living.

But it’s not just countries that are disproportionately liable for decades of emissions. One hundred cities account for nearly a fifth of our global carbon footprint. Three of the top 10 are in the United States: New York (3), Los Angeles (5), and Chicago (8)—these cities alone make up nearly 10% of U.S. emissions.  

This may seem counterintuitive. Dense cities, after all, are more energy efficient and data suggests that per capita emissions actually decrease with urban population growth. But after analyzing the carbon footprints of over 13,000 cities around the world, one study found that combined high population and high income made cities disproportionately high emitters.

Within wealthy cities, high-consumption lifestyles drive emissions, and those lifestyles are shaped by the architecture of our urban environment. Everything from the shape of the city and the length of commutes to bike- and pedestrian-friendliness, robustness of public transportation (and/or highway) infrastructure, and the physical buildings themselves drive emissions. Rather than simply insisting people change their lifestyles to tackle the climate crisis, we need to insist on changing the cities that shape those lifestyles. And—with the federal government unlikely to pass a Green New Deal until at least 2021—a number of cities are starting to do just that.

Just ahead of Earth Day, the New York City Council passed a historic package of climate legislation that many have called a Green New Deal for New York City. At the center of the Climate Mobilization Act is a bill that mandates buildings over 25,000 square feet reduce emissions 40% by 2030 and 80% by 2050. Behind the scenes, grassroots organizers had been forming a diverse coalition that united low-income communities of color with predominantly white climate activists over a period of several years. “In the end we won because of the coalition building and campaign work that we did,” says Pete Sikora, Climate & Inequality Campaigns Director for New York Communities for Change.

Buildings account for nearly 70% of carbon emissions in New York City, which has the largest carbon footprint of any urban area in the country. The city plans on implementing the policy through the creation of a new Office of Building Energy and Emissions Performance which would set performance standards, monitor building energy use and emissions, and determine penalties for buildings that fail to comply. 

“There is no way to address the [energy] grid or the radical change needed to reach massive pollution cuts without prioritizing energy efficiency,” Sikora says. The goal is to reduce energy use to such a degree that large buildings, which often rely on fossil fueled-powered boilers and gas for heat and cooking, could be fully powered by the electric grid. 

The importance of addressing buildings in general cannot be overstated. Globally, building operations, materials and construction account for nearly 40% of energy use. According to Architecture 2030, the global building stock will double by 2060. “This,” they say, “is the equivalent of adding an entire New York City every month for 40 years.”

While the federal government can set national emissions targets and provide federal funds to cities, much will be left to local governments to monitor and enforce energy efficiency standards—a task too big for the federal government to handle alone.

In July, Berkeley, Calif., became the first city in the United States to ban natural gas use in new buildings. Thirteen other cities across California followed shortly after, enacting new building codes that either require or encourage new construction to be run completely on electricity. In Philadelphia, organizers are pressuring the city council to pass similar legislation. This marks a significant first step towards long-term, government-enforced emissions standards. These progressive cities across the country are beginning to establish what will hopefully become a new normal.  

Even with fossil fuel use eliminated within buildings, though, electricity is still only as clean as the grid that supplies it. In New York state, a grassroots organizing coalition successfully pushed for a recent state law requiring the grid to be 70% powered by renewable energy by 2030 and emissions-free by 2050. And around the country, local progressive groups are hard at work trying to put electric utilities under public ownership. The Chicago chapter of the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) has been waging a fierce campaign, in collaboration with some of the city’s six socialist city council members, to bring their main electric utility company, ComEd, under municipal control. Similar DSA campaigns to take back the grid have appeared in New York City; Boston; New Haven, Conn.; East Bay, Calif.; and Providence, R.I.

“Our main campaign is energy democracy and we see that as a key aspect of winning a Green New Deal” say Sydney Ghazarian, who serves on the steering committee of DSA’s National Ecosocialist Working Group, which she helped found in 2017. (Full disclosure: This author is a member of DSA, though not involved with the ecosocialist working group.)

She and a few other members, Ghazarian says, “realized that [the climate crisis] was going to be the ultimate contradiction of capitalism” and would “require massive restructuring so socialists needed to be on the forefront of this issue.” The first priority for the Ecosocialist Working Group was infrastructure to implement municipal-level climate campaigns in local DSA chapters. 
“We can’t wait until 2021 to start,” Ghazarian says. “What we can do is actually make real changes at the city level and the local level to start [the transition].” While supporting candidates like Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), who is pushing for a national Green New Deal, DSA chapters have also been on the ground organizing a working-class base of supporters by engaging with people where they are: overwhelmingly, in cities. 

There is an additional political advantage to organizing at the city-level: dense urban areas, to a great degree, are more inclined to vote blue than their rural counterparts. And enough large cities, accounting for much of the country’s population, taking serious climate action can put pressure on the federal government to pass decisive legislation. 
Over 1,200 cities around the world have already declared a state of “climate emergency,” Oxford Dictionary’s 2019 word of the year. It’s a necessary first step and one national governments have been disinclined to take. “We have to shift into emergency mode,” says Laura Berry, research and publications director at The Climate Mobilization (TCM), which has helped lead this movement through their Climate Emergency Declaration campaign. 

The goal of the organization is to catalyze a World War II-scale mobilization to reverse the climate crisis. In 2016, Bernie Sanders embraced TCM’s demand, and helped introduced it to the Democratic Party platform. But when Trump won the election, the organization shifted its focus to the local level. With Republicans holding the White House, Senate and a majority of state legislatures, cities are proving the best option for short-term change.  

The organization has laid out a template for local government to declare a state of emergency with the hopes of “building upward.”  “Federal and international negotiations have been incredibly ineffective in addressing the crisis that we are facing,” Berry says. “We see local governments as playing a really important role in advocating and pushing for stronger action at the state and national level.” 

Nothing can substitute the need for international cooperation or a federal Green New Deal. But without municipal efforts to cooperate and enforce climate legislation, many of these policies, to borrow a pun from Sikora, will just be blowing a lot of hot air.

Mix and Match

The British had an election. But more importantly: What does it mean for OUR election?

You Have Been Defeated By Logic

More case files of Donald Trump, Detective-in-Chief.

Ad Busters

The Hallmark channel says it will “reinstate” its ad featuring Lesbian brides.

Trump’s North America Trade Deal Is Poised to Worsen Climate Change—But Dems Don’t Seem To Mind

While Congressional Democrats made clear that they would not bring the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement (USMCA) to a vote until it had the backing of the AFL-CIO, support they finally secured last week, Democrats appear comfortable voting on the replacement trade deal that has virtually no support from leading environmental groups.