The Big Squeeze: Steven Greenhouse on Tough Times for the American WorkerDemocracy Now - 29 Jul 2008A new book by New York Times labor reporter Steven Greenhouse examines how much of the American workforce is working more but earning less. Wages have stagnated, health and pension benefits have grown stingier, and job security has shriveled. Greenhouse joins us to talk about The Big Squeeze: Tough Times for the American Worker. [includes rush transcript]
Newspapers Suffer Spate of Layoffs, Decline in Circulation, Ad Revenue, Stock Price: A Roundtable Discussion on the State of the IndustryDemocracy Now - 29 Jul 2008We take an in-depth look at the state of the newspaper industry. In recent months, more than 6,000 print journalists have lost their jobs, newspaper circulation is down, and so is advertising revenue, page counts and stock prices. We host a roundtable discussion with Bernard Lunzer, president of the Newspaper Guild; former New York Times correspondent, Chris Hedges, now at the Nation Institute; and Linda Jue, director of New Voices in Independent Journalism. [includes rush transcript]
Headlines for July 29, 2008Democracy Now - 29 Jul 2008At Least 60 Killed in Baghdad Suicide Attack, 6 Die in US Missile Strike in Pakistan, Iran Seeking ?Common Ground? with US, Israel Won?t Negotiate on Jerusalem, Spain Issues Arrest Warrants for Israelis over 2002 Gaza Bombing, Admin to Leave Behind Record Deficit, Probe: Justice Dept. Vetted Applicants for Political Views, Sexual Orientation, EPA Imposes Gag on Employees, Assailant Attacked Tennessee Church for Liberal Views, Blackwater Awarded Millions in Small Business Contracts, Audit: Millions Wasted on Unfinished Iraqi Prisons, Courts, 2 More Banks Close as Crisis Widens, La. Prosecutors Seek Indictment of Officer in Taser Death
Acts of WarCampaign Against Sanctions and Military Intervention in Iran (CASMII) - 29 Jul 2008Summary: Scott RitterOne day, in the not-so-distant future, Americans will awake to the reality that American military forces are engaged in a shooting war with Iran. Many will scratch their heads and wonder, ?How did that happen?? The answer is simple: We all let it happen. We are at war with Iran right now. We just don?t have the moral courage to admit it. source: Truthdigread more
Whitehall Farce over Nuclear Clean-upUKWatch.net - 29 Jul 2008Well, what do you know? Another news story has broken which demonstrates that the UK’s nuclear industry is not the robust, well-managed machine our ministers would have us believe. The government has sneaked out a report assessing the working practices of the Nuclear Decommissioning Authority (NDA) which is managing the clean-up of existing power stations and waste. They were clearly hoping no one would notice as there’s no doubt that many people have been caught with their pants anklewards. Setting aside the spiralling costs of nuclear waste management (which are now about the same as the bill for the Apollo moon landings), we find the NDA in a sorry state of mismanagement. Staff apparently lack basic financial skills and were confused about accountancy terms, leading to severe errors in the balance sheets. I’m happy to report that employees in the finance team have been sent for retraining to brush up on their times tables. It’s not just specialised knowledge that’s lacking. Simple tasks like taking notes at meetings seem to have been overlooked, to the extent that major decisions made between the NDA and the Treasury have gone unrecorded, leading to gross misunderstandings over budgets. Everyone has since agreed that it would be a good idea to write these things down and put them somewhere safe. Like a filing cabinet. The audit goes on to say that there are "inherent risks" in the way the NDA operates, pointing out that half of its income is dependent on unreliable sources such as fuel reprocessing at Sellafield’s Thorp plant (closed since a leak was discovered in 2005) so perhaps a more stable financial model might be in order. Given all this, investing in less volatile and more reliable sources of energy might seem appropriate. But oh dear, it looks like the government is still set on knobbling those in favour of its twin obsessions, nuclear and coal. The proposed EU renewables directive – legislation designed to set minimum levels of energy generated from renewable sources across Europe – wants to see the UK getting 15 per cent of its energy from clean sources by 2020. A section has been included in the directive to ensure that "member states shall also provide for priority access to the grid system of electricity produced from renewable energy sources", but British ingenuity has been focused on changing "shall" to "may". A teeny tiny change, you might think, but in practice it would remove any obligations on our government to make sure renewable sources were given access to the National Grid before others such as, well, nuclear power and coal. And it’s a stance at odds with the energy strategy launched by Gordon Brown last month which promised to "[remove] grid access as a barrier to renewables deployment". But then maybe someone didn’t take minutes at that meeting. And I can’t finish without mentioning the fourth leak from a French nuclear power station in just two weeks. Safe, reliable energy, no doubt about it.
Why Kingsnorth?UKWatch.net - 29 Jul 2008Given how much CO2 you get when you burn coal, building a coal fired power station in the middle of a climate crisis would be really stupid. Really, really, stupid. But incredibly, down at Kingsnorth that’s exactly what power company E.ON and the Government plan to do. Here?s our top 10 reasons for not building Kingsnorth, or burning coal or digging it up or well, doing pretty much anything with it other than leaving it in the ground. You don’t have to read them all. Any one will give you reason enough to join us this summer. A new power station at Kingsnorth really is that daft. 1. Let’s build a coal-fired power station! If built, Kingsnorth will emit between 6 and 8 million tons of CO2 every year. That?s a hell of a lot of CO2, more even than the proposed third runway at Heathrow would produce. Scientists are usually a fairly reserved bunch but even they are starting to sound frantic about what?s happening with the climate. That?s not surprising given that, if we carry on treating the planet like a cheap boil in the bag dinner, we risk causing catastrophic climate change. That?s probably a bad idea. To avoid it we need to rapidly reduce emissions. So, in a world where we respect the ecology of the planet and the lives of those whose home it is, no Kingsnorth. 2. Kingsnorth is just the beginning. Six other similar power stations are planned. How do you multiply stupid? We’re not sure, but that?s what the power utilities want to do. Unless there?s a big fight over Kingsnorth these companies, with the backing of Government, want to build six more atmosphere-crunching coal fired power stations in the next few years. Collectively these power stations would emit around 50 million tons of CO2 a year. It?s hard to understand such a callous disregard for your fellow humans but if you want to, start by following the money. Power stations make lots of it and, given the amount of coal around, they’re a ?safe? long term investment. It?s an age-old story but the ending isn?t written yet. What happens at Kingsnorth is vitally important. When people get together determined to make the world a better place there is history-making potential. Look at the Suffragettes, the struggle for workers rights, the anti-roads movement. Kingsnorth can and will be stopped if enough of us get together to make it happen. 3. Because coal is the most polluting fossil fuel. Coal was a really cool idea for the convenient long term storage of a load rotting prehistoric forests but burning it to make electricity is a monumentally bad one. It might have made sense at the beginning of the industrial revolution but then so did child labour, slavery and woollen swimming trunks. Now we know burning coal is wrecking the climate. Of CO2 in the atmosphere from human activity around 50% has come from the burning of coal. Mainly this is from Western nations who industrialized first. Today burning coal is responsible for around one quarter of our global CO2 emissions. One of the great challenges for this generation is to find ways of living on this planet whilst leaving fossil fuels (especially coal) in the ground. We are quite literally the Power Generation. We have to change the ways we generate power and we need to find the power to make these changes happen. 4. Because coal is about as clean as an anthrax sandwich. Proudly brandishing the phrase ?clean coal?, the coal industry is confidently striding forth into our warming world. It?s a brilliant piece of PR greenwash. However, like ?friendly? fire or the ?great? war, it sounds kind of good but actually, when you get down to it, it really isn?t. Modern coal fired power stations are slightly more ?efficient? than old ones but the bottom line is: coal burning is responsible for one quarter of global emissions and those emissions are causing serious problems. Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS) is an important part of the ?clean? coal myth. It?s basically a method of capturing and compressing the waste CO2 from a power station and then pumping it into salt aquifiers and old oil wells for long term storage. There?s a few problems with CCS. The biggest one is that it doesn?t exist, it’s science fiction. Sure there?s the odd experimental trial but at the scale of large coal fired power stations even the industry themselves say it’s 10 years away at best. E.ON are saying that the power station they plan to build will be CCS ready. But ready for what exactly. We might be ready for the second coming but that isn?t going to help solve climate change that?s happening in reality in the here and now. Given that the next few years are crucial and that other ready-to-go alternatives exist, CCS is just a distraction. E.ON want to talk about CCS because they don?t want to talk about CO2 emissions. They want to obscure the truth: Kingsnorth power station will emit at least 6 million tons of CO2 every year and damn the lot of you. 5. Oh dear we’re running out of oil. Wahey there’s loads of coal! No need to worry about the coming oil crunch, there?s loads of tar sands and coal – we?ll burn that instead. If you?ve got big investments in fossil fuels or you?ve just bought a villa in Greenland then maybe this ?solution? to the oil crunch makes sense. To the rest of us it makes about as much sense as a petrol-filled fire extinguisher. Most of the geological evidence suggests that there is a lot of coal left, up to 200 years at current rates of consumption. But burning it really isn?t an option if we want a planet to live on (forget Greenland, those villas have sold out and the neighbours would be horrible). 6. But if we don?t burn coal the Chinese will. Blimey. Where do you start? Yes the Chinese are building coal fired power stations but… 1. Climate change is a global problem and nearly every country is going to have to reduce emissions – the British, the Chinese, the Americans – we all have to get our shit together and change the way our societies make and use energy. If we’re going to do it fairly (which in our view is essential), that means countries like the UK will have to cut a lot more than the Chinese. If you’re burning coal you’re making the problem worse. We’re burning it here in the UK so that?s where we?ve got to stop it. 2. Not only are average emissions for each person significantly lower in China than in Britain, a large percentage of Chinese coal is burnt so that Chinese factories can make the throwaway consumer items that fill the shopping centres and refuse dumps of the west. 3. We?ve got to start somewhere. The very ecological systems we rely on for life are in jeopardy. If someone doesn?t wake up and try to turn off the gas we’ll probably fry sleeping. Arguing about who should set the alarm is as pathetic as it is suicidal. 7. Without these power stations there will be an energy gap. The old ones are the best ones. Problem: a load of companies want to make big bucks but can only achieve it by doing the rest of us over. Answer: come up with something scary so people are distracted and don?t notice what you’re up to. O?oo the energy gap. A frightener isn?t it. It?s meant to be what happens if we don?t build new coal and nuclear power stations to replace the ones that are being decommissioned. We run out of energy, the Christmas lights go out , rubbish blows in the streets and we?re all transported back into the 70s and forced to listen to crackly Val Doonican records on pedal powered stereos. But the energy gap is a nonsense. Check out the Government’s own projections: ? The amount electricity generating capacity reduction by 2027 from closing old coal and nuclear power stations: 35% ? The amount of energy Gordon Brown has said we will generate from renewable sources by 2020: 40% On these figures there is no energy gap. In fact we’re up five percent seven years early. There are other gaps. A commitment cap, a vision gap, a take the bull by the horns and do something useful for a change gap. But no energy gap. 8. Because there is a growing movement against coal. It?s not just about Kingsnorth. In Wales and Derbyshire people are trying to stop new open cast mines. And from Bangladesh and the Appalachians to Columbia and Ecuador people are fighting against coal and fossil fuel extraction. This summer there are five other climate camps in other countries all focused on the issue of coal. This is an essential way of facing the energy and climate change crisis. It?s a call to get together and work for something better in solidarity with people across the globe. It might sound like an old fashioned idea but then these days so does a stable climate and hell, if flares can make a come back anything has to be possible. 9. Because we need to talk about work. Here?s a crazy idea. Instead of employing people to burn coal how about we build install and run an energy system based on renewables. They?ve started doing it in Germany and the industry already employs 250,000 people which is a lot more than work in our entire power sector. Here?s another one. We know that we need to make a transition from one energy system to another so what about building that transition around the workers in those industries, what about making it a just transition. And one final one. How about instead of working more and being exploited more so we can compete more just to produce more and more stuff, we work less to produce what we need and want, compete less and share more so we have more time and live better. Phew. 10. They don’t have to build Kingsnorth. There are a load of brilliant alternatives that would solve the energy issue without messing with the planet. If we’re serious about these other options then it’s crucial we stop the building of Kingsnorth and the other five power stations. We?ve probably already said it so sorry to go on, but if enough of us get together and say no, then Kingsnorth will never get built. Last year a new runway at Heathrow was seen as a done deal. The Climate Camp helped galvanise almost universal opposition to that stupid plan. With enough of us, we can do the same with building new coal-fired power stations. See you at Kingsnorth on August 9th.
