Deforestation and the true cost of Europe's cheap meat
Cheap meat has become a way of life in much of Europe, but the full price is being paid across Latin America as vast soya plantations and their attendant chemicals lead to poisonings and violence. From the Ecologist, part of the Guardian Environment Network
Phi Beta Iota: “True Cost” of anything cannot be established without a holistic strategic analytic framework such as is shown below. No one does this. Until they do, no political policy and budget will be sensible or sustainable.
‘Not Evil, Just Wrong’: What’s really at stake with global warming
Point of View By CHARLES COLSON
BreakPoint October 15, 2009
Global warming is a fact of life. Not a fact in a scientific sense. Far from it. But a fact in that it is an issue—an issue that will shape public policy, international relations, and the economies of the world for decades to come.
An eye-opening documentary called Not Evil, Just Wrong: The True Cost of Global Warming Hysteria is being released this week by the Cornwall Alliance for the Stewardship of Creation—an outfit I endorse.
I dare say the film will be controversial because it tackles head on the sacred cows of the man-made global warming crowd.
The film points out that the British High Court ruled in a lawsuit that Al Gore’s movie, An Inconvenient Truth, “is scientifically flawed and has nine significant exaggerations and factual errors.” Among those exaggerations are the claims that sea levels could rise 20 feet by the end of the century, and that polar bears are disappearing because of global warming (in fact, they are not).
Not Evil, Just Wrong also presents a number of scientists and a founding member of the radical environmental organization Greenpeace, who are unafraid to challenge the chief scientific claims behind global warming.
Robert Baer, a former CIA field operative says, “The notion that we're in Afghanistan to make our country safer is just complete bullshit… what it's doing is causing us greater danger, no question about it. Because the more we fight in Afghanistan, the more the conflict is pushed across the border into Pakistan, the more we destabilize Pakistan, the more likely it is that a fundamentalist government will take over the army — and we'll have Al-Qaeda like groups with nuclear weapons.”
Senators diverted $2.6 billion in funds in a defense spending bill to pet projects largely at the expense of accounts that pay for fuel, ammunition and training for U.S. troops. . . . . . .
Full Story Online
Why Joe Biden Should Resign
Citing a Newsweek story: “Can I just clarify a factual point? How much will we spend this year on Afghanistan?” Someone provided the figure: $65 billion. “And how much will we spend on Pakistan?” Another figure was supplied: $2.25 billion. “Well, by my calculations that's a 30-to-1 ratio in favor of Afghanistan. So I have a question. Al Qaeda is almost all in Pakistan, and Pakistan has nuclear weapons. And yet for every dollar we're spending in Pakistan, we're spending $30 in Afghanistan. Does that make strategic sense?” The White House Situation Room fell silent.
The central problem of our time is the failure of human organization–its failure to scale, to adapt, to assimilate.
We believe the failure stems directly from a rejection of diversity and a falsification of feedback loops–the absence of integrity.
We've come to the conclusion that the discord between politics and intelligence is contrived–there is no inherent opposition between politics (choice of best path for all) and intelligence (presentation of best achievable truth for all) provided ONE condition is met: integrity among the majority of individuals engaged in each.
Extract from Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon Press Conference
“We are also creating a new Global Impact Vulnerability Alert System, giving us real-time data and analysis on the socio-economic picture around the world, so that governments can reach those who most need it.”
With Obama as President, Media Not Interested in Casket Coverage
So far this month, 38 American troops have been killed in Afghanistan. For all of 2009, the number is 220 — more than any other single year and more than died in 2001, 2002, 2003, and 2004 combined.
With casualties mounting, the debate over U.S. policy in Afghanistan is sharp and heated. The number of arrivals at Dover is increasing. But the journalists who once clamored to show the true human cost of war are nowhere to be found.
Phi Beta Iota: “True Cost” of anything cannot be established without a holistic strategic analytic framework such as is shown below. No one does this. Until they do, no political policy and budget will be sensible or sustainable.
