2800 dead pigs in China's drinking water- just the tip of the soot covered iceberg?

How this horrendous story slipped past Chinas ministry of tourism is baffling…Or is this just too horrific to bury?

Over the weekend it was announced that Chinese officials were fishing the carcasses of 2,800 dead pigs out of the Huangpu River. This river bisects Shanghai and is a source of drinking water for the city's 23 million residents.

There was a recent outbreak of swine death in China's farms due to cramped and unhealthy conditions and tens of thousands of animals died from infectious disease..

Chinese officials had forbidden farmers from selling diseased pig parts and were told to dispose of the carcasses in landfills.  Evidently it was easier to dump almost 3,000 of these diseased carcasses into the river.

Of course Chinese officials say there is nothing to worry about, just move along…But China’s citizens give very little credibility to what they are told by their government. There is growing unrest among the population, due to deteriorating air and water pollution.

One resident summed it up with: "Have we been drinking dead-pig-polluted water? We are already panicked by the polluted air, now we have to worry about poisoned water too."

China’s growing industrialization has been done at the expense of its environment and those chickens are coming home to roost…for China and the rest of the world.

Massive amounts of air pollution fueled by unfiltered or poorly filtered power plants, not only cause some of the worst smog in the world, they also send millions of tons of ash into the atmosphere to settle upon ice sheets which can cause ice melt to glaciers and ice packs. See AMAC story: Why is polar ice melting?  The culprit is soot, not carbon dioxide. PG 42

Many 3^rd world countries want what the west has: Modern society, refrigeration, air conditioning, electric light, manufacturing, etc., but they can’t afford/won’t pay for the environmental protections the west has developed over the years.

Successful/heralded American companies like Wal-Mart and Apple, import and manufacture goods from these countries escaping our environmental/labor laws.

The problem is though, when Apple employs hundreds of thousands of Chinese workers to manufacture their I Pads and other products, the pollution doesn’t stay in China.

Ironically and dangerously, the very air pollution they help create in China, drifts over the Pacific to create air pollution in California. 

The elephant in the California living room, is some of the air pollution environmental zealots are trying to crush with many of the harshest controls in the nation…Aren’t stemming from California, but instead are wafting over the golden state from manufacturing done in China, for California based companies. 

How can American companies who manufacture products in the USA compete with companies like Apple and Wal-Mart, who don’t have to respect the environment in the host countries they set up shop in?

Can American companies compete with the almost antebellum labor practices (indentured servitude/slavery) practiced in countries of the 3^rd world, like China?  Workers basically live on site in barracks and work long hours with poor pay and they are forced to buy from the company store. See CNN story on Apple/Foxconn

Conditions were so bad in some of the factories making Apple products; workers staged mass suicides by jumping off of buildings to protest inhumane working conditions. Supervisors solved that problem by installing suicide nets to catch the jumping workers.

Apples manufacturer has also taken other steps to solve labor problem with the introduction of a million robots to do the work that humans once did.

Robots don’t complain, or throw themselves off buildings in protest…Robots also don’t mind if the air or water is polluted....The best of all worlds for corporations and totalitarian countries that only care for their bottom line.

A 20 ton dead whale ends up on a limousine liberal beach. Will they let nature take its course?

Barbara Streisand woke up to the smell of nature at work this morning. As she breathed in the usually refreshing salt air of the Pacific ocean lapping at the beach below her stunning beachside Malibu mansion……

Rolling in the surf line, just upwind, was the rotting carcass of a dead fin whale.

Wildlife authorities think the whale, on the endangered species list, might have had a collision with one of the ships that ply the coastline.  But the fact remained; this is a lot of nature to have going on in your front yard.

The exclusive surf side community is home to Streisand, Bob Dylan and many others in the Hollywood entertainment industry.  This is ground zero for those who embrace and fund every “green” cause and proudly drive their Prius to show how pious they are about it.

Of course Barbara and her family could shift residences into the adjoining and interconnecting two other seaside mansions she owns, to try to avoid the smell of nature at work.  But it seems the prevailing wind graces each residence equally.

Although rare for California, this particular stretch of beach is private. According to Carol Baker from the Los Angeles County beaches and harbors commission, the homeowners have responsibility to the high tide line and the state has control of the tide lands.

According to Cindy Reyes, executive director of the California Wildlife Center,

Los Angeles County lifeguards planned to try to pull the 40,000-pound carcass out to sea.  

But fire Inspector Brian Riley said that won’t work.

"The carcass is embedded in the sand and impossible to tow free,"  "Burial at low tide will be difficult as well as land removal. It's in an area with bad access."

It will be interesting to see if red tape will be cut in order to facilitate this “rescue.”

Will these residents get special dispensation from the usual quagmire of interconnecting environmental agencies, coastal commissions, building departments, fish and game, harbor traffic safety and every other local, state and federal ABC agency you can think of?

Meanwhile, residents of La Jolla,  a community south of Malibu, have been petitioning the state and federal authorities for months, just to let them wash off rocks in the ocean near their community.  

The rock strewn shores have become home to large groups of protected species who deposit large amounts of their feces.  Evidently the stench is unbearable.  But environmentalists and government regulators are adamant about disrupting the natural order of things.  This part of the California coast is home to a more politically conservative group of residents.

With the violent death of the fin whale, a capital environmental crime has been committed.  The whale is an endangered species; shouldn’t a full scale investigation be conducted before the body is even remotely considered to be moved?  Where is the environmental CSI team?

This talk of bulldozing up a California beach in order to bury the carcass or move it is another assault on almost every environmental nerve ending.  Where is the moral outrage?

If this were a true “green community,” and the residents were really concerned for the environment, they would let the whale carcass stay where it washed up naturally and let nature take its course for the next year.  The whale would provide badly needed nutrition to the local marine animal/bird community. 

Letting the whale carcass stay and decompose naturally, would also make an environmental statement louder than any horn from a Prius could make. 

What are the chances? The answer is blowing in the wind.

On the eve of a momentous environmental debate, a key scientific player falls from grace

Just days before the McKibben vs Epstein environmental debate, November 5, at Duke University, a bombshell rocked the environmental community. Read more: "Michael Mann Retracts False Nobel Prize Claims in Humiliating Climbdown."

See the entire debate here

The Nobel Prize committee declared Penn States Professor, Michael Mann, has falsely claimed to be a recipient of the Nobel Prize; He never received an award from them.  Both he and Penn State  have been claiming for years, his Nobel status to boost his scientific prestige and credibility.

To Mann, the litigious creator of the climate “Hockey Stick” graph, this is an extreme blow to any scientific credibility he may have had.  The "hockey stick graph" was used by Al Gore  and others to convince us we were on the verge of climate catastrophe,  One critic stated: “Michael Mann is another black mark against anyone involved in “climate science.”

Penn State, still reeling from a sex scandal that threatened its accreditation, suffers another huge blow to its reputation. But the taint of Penn States scandal will  now waft over the environmental movement, which has used Manns science to further its war against fossil fuels.  This latest scandal throws into question the validity of the science behind the “climate change” movement.

There is a huge, well funded, well coordinated movement throughout the United States, set on the goal of completely killing our use of fossil energy.  One of the main public spokesman and virulent foes of fossil energy is Bill McKibben.  McKibben recently stated fossil fuel is public enemy #1 and has vowed to destroy our fossil based energy industry, source of 85% of our power.

But the fossil energy industry is not without its defenders and Alex Epstein has stepped up to the plate to defend what he calls “The foundation of our civilization: abundant and affordable energy.”

 When Epstein read an article in Rolling Stone Magazine,  declaring McKibben’s intent to declare fossil fuels public enemy #1 and his plan to mount a major campaign to make them practically illegal….Epstein decided to challenge him in a public debate. Epstein said; The war against fossil fuels is societal suicide.”

Epstein is an energy expert and President of the Center for Industrial Progress, a think tank that champions energy growth.  With scientific facts of its own to bolster its pro energy argument and history as a  guidepost to the beneficial use of fossil fuels for mankind…Epstein is a formidable spokesman to stand toe to toe with one of the lefts most high profile foes of fossil energy.

McKibben is recognized as one of the key people influencing President Obamas decision to delay the building of the Keystone Pipeline.  When he publicly states he wants to make the use of fossil fuels illegal, it is a reflection of an overall strategy to fundamentally transform our society. 

In a Bill McKibben world, our energy would be supplied mainly by windmills and solar. Historically and at present technological levels, these forms of energy could not put a dent in the energy needs of our advanced society.  This means civilization would have to become more primitive and a large segment of our population would revert to manual labor focused on farming.

Alex Epstein totally disagrees with this vision.

“In this debate, I want the public to know the truth about what will benefit their lives and what will harm it.  My goal is to put a stop on the attack on fossil fuels & reverse this fight.  I want to create a new generation of energy champions.”

The militancy of the war on fossil energy, brings a huge price tag with it.  Already there are job losses in coal which is under assault.  Gasoline is double the price it was 4 years ago and utility rates will skyrocket as rate payers are forced to pay the subsidies given to "green energy," which McKibben and his allies want to force on society.

Epstein says:  "The last thing true scientifically is, we need to destroy our energy supply. That is the least scientific statement a human could make and is the most suicidal statement a human could make."  “Bill McKibben and his movement are free to make us an offer in the free market of ideas…. let them convince us.  But they don’t have the right to force us, or give us an order.”

This debate is a rare opportunity for the public to witness the clash of powerful ideas that are being used to re-shape our civilization.  With professor Manns  loss of stature in the scientific community, the climate change movement has a lot to answer for and we will expect answers November 5.

 

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Democrats threw God and Israel under the Obama campaign bus, then got second thoughts

 Obama's Canadian manufactured campaign bus had more company under its crowded undercarriage.  Joining Reverend Wright, Officer Crowley, ACORN, Poland, Van Jones, David Patterson and Grandmother Dunham, were two new additions, God and Israel…. It’s getting grisly under there.

Surely the Democrats who crafted this years political platform, must have known someone would notice they erased all mention of God in the Democrat mission statement, besides members of their targeted special interest groups they sought to appease.  In their zeal to placate atheists, agnostics, the environmentalists and the rest of the secular humanist movement, they probably estranged a huge percentage of Americans who believe in God …But perhaps the crafters of the democrat road map prayed it wouldn’t be noticed by those who would take offense at the absence of God in their platform?

But the awkward and inconvenient truth hidden in the document didn’t escape the hawk eye of Fox News anchor Bret Baier, who confronted Illinois Senator Dick Durbin during an interview yesterday. Durbin, clearly on the defensive when asked why, after years of having God mentioned in the Democrat platform, is this years platform devoid of the Deity’s name?

Durbin chose to turn the argument around and attack Baier and claim it was only a word left out, no big deal…”Nothing to see here now move along.”  But veteran newsman Baier isn’t one to be intimidated by a bloviating Senator and persisted in asking the question.  Durbins final answer was a belligerent, bizarre, nonsensical answer, that was a non answer.

The truth is, and Durbin and the rest of his party know it, leaving God out of the Platform would be offensive to many Americans and there is no way to squirm out of it.

As if to drive home the point the new Democrat party is going into a radical new direction and jettisoning old friends, the platform was devoid of mention that Jerusalem is the recognized capital of Israel.  Perhaps this was done to pick up the Muslim/anti Israel vote, with the calculation American Jewish voters will vote Democrat anyway, as they seem captivated by the Stockholm Syndrome.

Leaving out Jerusalem as the capital of Israel, further drove a public wedge between Obama and our ally Israel, at a most critical time for the Obama campaign. My recent interview with Israels Danny Danon magnified the feelings Israeli leadership has towards the Obama administration.  They say Obamas failure to provide strong leadership in the Mideast, jeopardizes their nations security. 

But later this afternoon, the Democrats quickly reinserted God and Jerusalem as the capital of Israel, back into their platform. The news announced on the floor of the Charlotte convention was met with a chorus of boos.  But the guess is that those boos, were tiny compared to the sighs of relief from Democrat leaders who know what the majority of voting Americans still hold dear to them. 

Those Americans would have been very willing to express dissatisfaction with this “new party” in November if the platform wasn’t restored. But even though restorations were made, there are other troubling positions in the platform that alienate many traditional Democrats. The attempt to take God and the backing of Israel out of the platform might have been the last insult to push them away from the party.

 Read Mr. Danons excellent book:  "Israel, The will to Prevail"

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Richmond refinery fire puts the spotlight on what's wrong with America

The spectacular oil fire at the Chevron refinery in Richmond California, was still burning as cadres of lawyers blanketed the surrounding communities.   Wherever plumes of smoke drifted, you could find a lawyer knocking on doors and handing out cards.

As I watched the spectacle on nationwide TV and web news, it brought me back to the time when a minor bus accident occurred in San Francisco. The bus with no more than 15 passengers on it had a minor collision with a car.  As the passengers exited the disabled bus, they mingled with pedestrians on the sidewalk.  Pretty soon ambulances were dispatched to the scene and over 40 bus “passengers” were taken to local hospitals with assorted neck and back pains.

To be sure, each one of those “passengers” received some sort of settlement from the taxpayers of San Francisco, along with their lawyers.

The Northern California oil refinery at Richmond California has been in its present location for more than 100 years.  Perched next to the San Francisco Bay, it is in an excellent location to receive crude oil from ocean tankers where it can refine the oil into different blends of fuels to be used by consumers.   It is the largest refinery of its kind in this part of California and serves the needs of millions of cars, trucks and airplanes

When the refinery was first built,  it was in an isolated, rural location.  But over the past hundred years San Francisco’s urban sprawl has spread its tentacles around the facility. 

But this is just like the story of airports that get built on the outskirts of town eventually getting encased in urban sprawl.  When the occasional accident happens, there are calls for more stringent rules,  the inevitable call for the airport to be shut down, or moved and the prolific lawsuits filed.

But there hasn’t been a new oil refinery built in the United States for the past 30 years.  Environmental lawsuits, not in my back yard mentalities and a PR campaign by the far left to demonize fossil fuels have made it extremely difficult to build new ones.  So America has been at the mercy of fewer refineries to fulfill its growing energy needs and at the mercy of what a lack of competition does for price at the pump.

The entitlement mentality refuses to acknowledge self responsibility; it is a victim mentality looking for a cause and is aided and abetted by those who feed off of it.

Already the Chevron Refinery has set up a facility to process claims by those who say they were injured by the effects of the fire.  But the caveat is that the “victims” have to show they lost work because of the fire or show an expense from a Dr., pharmacy, or some other legitimate loss.

Since air testing showed levels to be healthy in 8 different samples, it is hard to fathom what sort of claims will be made. There was a shelter in place warning sent out to the community immediately when the fire first started. Perhaps some folks in the community lost work hrs. due to that.  No structures outside of the refinery were burned, or damaged, except with the exception of some soot that will have to be cleaned off.  So what possible claims will these pods of lawyers be able to conjure up?

The oil refinery is certainly a fat, juicy, target. The left would love to see it shut down and trial lawyers would love to get a piece of it.  But it is a major employer in the community and the economy of the whole west coast relies on its products.

What is a sure bet though, is hundreds, perhaps thousands of lawsuits will be filed against the refinery and this will cost the company millions in lawyer fees to defend, not to mention the costs if they lose or settle out of court. 

No matter what the eventual costs of this fire, the loser in this legal debacle will be the end consumer who pays for fuel in his gas tank, or buys products in the store that uses trucks to transport those goods.

To a normal person who looks at this from a purely logical point of view…Let the lawsuits emanate from those who were living in the area prior to the construction of the oil refinery.  They truly are the ones who wouldn't know there was going to be an oil refinery in the neighborhood they were living in.

There is no reason to be living near an oil refinery to not know they smell and have an occasional fire from time to time.  That is a fact,  if you don't like it, move.

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Decades of mismanagement have left our forests vulnerable to terrorism

Smokey Bear told us: “Only we can prevent forest fires.” But behind him was a vast and growing firefighting bureaucracy, equipped with fleets of heavy equipment, aerial tankers, helicopters and satellite guided workforces.

This firefighting juggernaut has not only crushed many would be disastrous fires over the years, but many beneficial ones as well.

Many of the forests protected by these fire fighting efforts have also been shielded from best forest management practices.  In the name of restoring our forests to their former pre-mankind condition, man was taken out of the equation. As a result, many of our forests are unnaturally overgrown with decades of underbrush, dry branches and millions of disease ridden trees.  

But the west is now on fire and reports say some of these fires have been caused by arson. This  leads many to believe that America's national security Achilles heel,  is it's tinder dry, over protected, overgrown forests, which can instantly be transformed into mega-fires with one match.

The Lake Tahoe basin which sits on the border of California and Nevada was managed by a maze of bureaucratic environmental agencies.  Through ineptitude, these agencies did not allow property owners to even hand clean brush on their property, in the fear that it would intrude on the "natural state" of the forest.

As a result of this idiotic forest management practice, the area was consumed by a mega fire which burned down 253 homes and consumed 3,100 acres……This is just 1 small forest area out of hundreds of thousands of square miles being subjected to the same or similar practices. 

But there is a solution to the madness which has proven over and over again to work.  When these rampaging fires reach privately managed forest land, they are checked.

Privately owned or leased forests, are maintained to produce a healthy vibrant environment which can in turn, be used to harvest timber and forest products.  They are in the business of having forests of healthy trees and do what’s necessary to make them that way.

I spoke to Tom Ray, vice president of northwest resources for Plum Creek Corporation. Plum Creek is the largest and most geographically diverse private timberland owner in the United States with approximately 6.6 million acres of timber in major timber producing regions of the country.

Tom helps manage his company’s land according to the Sustainable Forest Initiative, which looks out for the best long term care of their forests.  These practices include thinning-harvesting of timber and brush clearing as necessary. 

Managing the land in a healthy vibrant condition is good for the forests as well as for the owners of the property.

Tom said out of control fires on public lands that have swept into managed forests, have been stopped.  The fire intensity lessened due to the availability of less fuel and the presence of access roads on managed forests allowed personnel to reach the fires.

Much of Plum Creeks 6.6 million acres of land is open to the public for recreation purposes as well, showing that private forest land management is compatible with public use.

When you look at the ability of just one corporation to successfully manage 6.6 million acres of forest land, it doesn’t take much to wonder why some of these practices aren’t transferred to our national and state forestlands.  After all, the public can have access to these privately managed lands that are not dry diseased tinderboxes.

Peter Kolb, Associate Professor of Forest management at the University of Montana has been observing the effects of public policies affecting forests across the Northern Rockies for years.

Kolb has determined that forests can benefit from well planned and thoughtful tree harvesting in order to help revitalize forest landscapes that have become homogenized by a combination of past climatic phases and fire suppression, which produce mega fires. 

He feels it is best to create a forest with greater species and structural diversity using a combination of thinning and irregular sized” patch” cuts.   These types of mosaics in the forest have been shown to provide firebreaks, good habitat enhancement for wildlife and a birthplace for a new generation of trees. 

Such management emulates historic natural process and forests can be made more resilient and functional for the future…. This is the definition of conservation – “to keep “functioning” rather than “restoration” which is to bring back to the way it was.

But many conservation groups seem to be stuck with the outdated concept of bringing forests back to a snapshot of 200 years ago

Perhaps we should be focusing more on what it will take to keep forests healthy and functional in the future.  It seems obvious that the hands-off approach is not working all that well, and costing us an enormous federal bankroll we can ill afford. 

Private companies could provide active forest management more consistent with conservation, and at no cost.  But rather could provide tax revenue and jobs, in exchange for harvesting some timber across the vast national forests of the west.   

Forestry, logging and science, have come a long way over the decades, it’s time to move into the future and allow a different paradigm to take over.  It’s time to help our forests cope with changes in climate and the wildfires and insect outbreaks that come with them in unprecedented destructive waves.

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