Fracking for natural gas is perceived as an issue east of the Rocky Mountains - Texas, North Dakota, and the Marcellus Shale. California runs on natural gas and hydropower. Fracking is happening in California, but it's a secret.
Speakers talk about the likely effects of climate change on the world economy, environment, and health. They discuss possible scientific and governmental solutions.
A new study warns of unlabeled and potentially cancer-causing chemicals in many consumer products. Hear about some of the products scientists are the most concerned about. These scientists talk to Tom Ashbrook: Julia Brody, executive director of the Silent Spring Institute, which studies the link between environmental chemicals and our health, Ruthann Rudel, director of research at the Silent Spring Institute and Lynn Goldman, dean of the School of Public Health and Health Services at George Washington University.
Source: Household Cancer Hazards Download or Play - Part 1 Download or Play - Part 2
2011 has been marked by extreme weather. In the U.S. alone, a record dozen disasters caused more than $1 billion in damage. One area acutely threatened by climate change is food production, where decades of steady gains could be reversed.
Speakers are Chris Field, Director, Department of Global Ecology, Carnegie Institution for Science Dave Friedberg, Founder & CEO, The Climate Corporation Karen O'Brien, Professor of Sociology and Human Geography, University of Oslo Michael Oppenheimer, Professor of Geosciences and International Affairs, Princeton Greg Dalton is the moderator and Vice President of The Commonwealth Club of California and founder of Climate One
Source: Wild Weather
Pulitzer Prize-Winning Journalist Seymour Hersh is interviewed by Steve Scher
Pulitzer Prize–winning journalist Seymour Hersh is responsible for exposing many of the biggest stories in the 20th century, and he is still hard at work. Hersh alleged that senior officials were waging a crusade overseas, protecting Christianity from the Muslim.
Source: Pulitzer Prize-Winning Journalist Seymour Hersh
The natural gas business is booming, sometimes with deadly results. Host Bruce Gellerman sniffs out the cracks in the nearly two million miles of pipeline that run under our cities.
Source: Rampant City Gas Leaks
There are more than a third of a million miles of natural gas transmission pipelines in the U.S., and more to come. But sometimes they rupture, devastating homes and lives. Bruce Gellerman speaks with investigative blogger Frank Gallagher, editor of NaturalGasWatch.org, about the hazards of this vast system.
Source: The Explosive Growth of Natural Gas Networks
Think economic crisis meets the environmental crisis. Economic growth as we’ve known it is over says Paul Gilding and Richard Heinberg. Paul Gilding is a Professor at Cambridge University Program for Sustainability Leadership. Richard Heinberg is at the Post Carbon Institute and he is journalist and educator.
Source: The Great Disruption
Kevin Bales talks about slavery. He is an anti-slavery advocate and the president of Free the Slaves. He is also a Professor of Sociology at Roehampton University in London.
A lengthy article, but worth the read. If you don't have time to read the whole article right now, at least read the final paragraph - "But the arc of history does not bend toward justice through capitulation cast as compromise."
What Happened to Obama?
By DREW WESTEN - NYTimes.com
Drew Westen is a professor of psychology at Emory University and the author of “The Political Brain: The Role of Emotion in Deciding the Fate of the Nation.”
Atlanta
IT was a blustery day in Washington on Jan. 20, 2009, as it often seems to be on the day of a presidential inauguration. As I stood with my 8-year-old daughter, watching the president deliver his inaugural address, I had a feeling of unease. It wasn’t just that the man who could be so eloquent had seemingly chosen not to be on this auspicious occasion, although that turned out to be a troubling harbinger of things to come. It was that there was a story the American people were waiting to hear — and needed to hear — but he didn’t tell it. And in the ensuing months he continued not to tell it, no matter how outrageous the slings and arrows his opponents threw at him.
The stories our leaders tell us matter, probably almost as much as the stories our parents tell us as children, because they orient us to what is, what could be, and what should be; to the worldviews they hold and to the values they hold sacred. Our brains evolved to “expect” stories with a particular structure, with protagonists and villains, a hill to be climbed or a battle to be fought. Our species existed for more than 100,000 years before the earliest signs of literacy, and another 5,000 years would pass before the majority of humans would know how to read and write.
The Declaration of Independence is best remembered as a declaration of war, a war declared on the grounds that we wanted our own flag. The sheer stupidity and anachronism of the idea serves to discourage any thoughts about why Canada didn't need a bloody war, whether the U.S. war benefitted people outside the new aristocracy to whom power was transferred, what bothered Frederick Douglas so much about a day celebrating "independence," or what the Declaration of Independence actually said.
When you read the Declaration of Independence, it turns out to be an indictment of King George III for various abuses of power. And those abuses of power look fairly similar to abuses of power we happily permit U.S. presidents to engage in today, either as regards the people of this nation or the people of territories and nations that our military occupies today in a manner uncomfortably resembling Britain's rule over the 13 colonies.
Or perhaps I should say, a large portion of us take turns being happy or outraged depending on the political party with which the current president is identified.
Independent journalist Anand Gopal discusses why counterinsurgency strategy works better in theory than in practice. He explains how the "denying al-Qaeda sanctuary" justification for U.S. military deployments ignores the real reasons the 9/11 attacks succeeded.
Eric Margolis discusses Egypt’s fake revolution. He comments on the criminal charges against former Pakistani president Musharraf and reminds us of the still unsolved mystery of who really killed Benazir Bhutto.
As food prices rise, and civil unrest builds throughout the Middle East, Lester Brown wonders if these two could be connected.
Music includes Earth Anthem, Subterranean Homesick Blues, In A World Gone Mad..., brother can you spare a dime, Diamonds & Rust, climate change, We'll Meet Again
If the true costs of the full lifecycle of coal were taken into account, this form of energy would be extremely expensive.
Extraction, processing, transportation and combustion of coal create large tolls on the environment and human health. We hear from poet and farmer Wendell Berry who slept in the Kentucky governor’s office to protest mountaintop removal. Host Bruce Gellerman also talks with Dr. Paul Epstein from Harvard University’s Medical School about his new study measuring the true costs of coal.
Source: Costs of Coal
Juan Cole
The Corruption Game
Juan Cole, a professor of history and director of the Center for South Asian Studies at the University of Michigan, talks about U.S. government backing of corrupt dictatorships around the world.
Source: The Corruption Game
Bill McKibben
Pressure Cooking
Bill McKibben discusses the U.S. government's apathetic attitude toward global warming and that this forces the public to lead the fight against global warming.
Source: Pressure Cooking
Music includes Earth Anthem, La Rosita, Janis Joplin Me And Bobby Mcgee, Love Peace, Requiem For A Dream, Sweet Sir Galahad, Don't Let Me Down, We'll Meet Again