On the last day of the year 999 A.D., old St. Peter’s basilica in Rome was packed with panicky worshippers, convinced that the world would end on the stroke of midnight. Many had given away all their possessions to the poor. Many had spent weeks doing final penance for their sins. Many had journeyed to Rome in sackcloth and ashes in order to meet God and his angels within the holy precincts of St. Peter’s.
Category Archives: Environment
Apocalypse When?
Also posted in Culture, Economy, General, International, Media, Science, U.S. Tagged apocalypse, doomsayers, end of the world, Fiscal Cliff, global warming, William Faulkner 1 Comment
Government Responds to Sandy with “HUGS” and Kisses
The White House
Office of the Press Secretary
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
November 19, 2012
Ongoing Response to Hurricane Sandy
“OPERATION HUGS” UNVEILED
On his third trip to New York City since Hurricane Sandy made landfall, President Barack Obama announced a new federal program, Operation HUGS, to ensure an immediate response following any natural or man-caused disaster.
Operation HUGS (Holistic Ubiquitous Government Services) is a joint partnership between FEMA, the United States Coast Guard, and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. Within 24 hours of a disaster, a senior government official will be safely escorted and placed in the impact zone to interact with citizens.
Read MoreGasland, Promised Land, Never-Never Land
First, there was Gasland, a 2010 movie documentary that purported to show how producing natural gas through fracking would contaminate drinking water to the point that you could set it on fire at the tap. This claim was subsequently debunked by the Colorado Oil and Gas Conservation Commission.
Next, coming up in December, is a feature film starring Matt Damon called Promised Land. This movie, too, purports to show – despite all scientific evidence to the contrary – that fracking will turn America’s pleasant farm country into a chemical dump.
Why is the environmental community out to stop fracking?
Read MoreAlso posted in General, Media, Science, U.S. Tagged Alternative energy, Fracking, Gasland, Hydraulic fracking, Matt Damon, Natural Gas, Promised Land 2 Comments
Tired of Chest-Thumping Patriotism
From the July Fourth season through the fall election, the American people will be hearing nothing but uber-patriotic rhetoric coming from their politicians and national leaders.
They will be telling us how America is a great nation and how Americans are a good people, and they will be lathering praise on us as hard-working, self-sacrificing, charitable, fair and just.
I don’t know about you, but all of this cheerleading and backslapping rhetoric strikes me as a bit ingratiating and self-serving. Flattery is not patriotism.
Read MoreAlso posted in Campaigns & Elections, Culture, Economy, Education, General, Health, Political Rhetoric, Politics, U.S. Tagged American dream, American People, chest-thumping patriotism, China, Constitution, July Fourth, Paul Ryan, Politicians, poverty, right to drive an SUV, uber-patriotic rhetoric, World War II Leave a comment
WENDELL BERRY’S SPEECH SHOWS WASHINGTON’S DISCONNECT
Tom Brokaw is worried that Washington is out of touch. People feel politics “is a closed game that doesn’t address what their real concerns are,” he told Howard Kurtz of the Daily Beast. “It has its own language, it has its own culture.”
Right thought, wrong target. The elder statesman of broadcasting was referring to the White House Correspondents’ Association dinner held on April 28. A more telling and troubling example of this disconnect occurred earlier that week, when author Wendell E. Berry gave the 41st annual Jefferson Lecture for the Humanities.
Read MoreShovels to Anguissa
I had just moved into the Public Affairs Office in the embassy in Yaoundé. Public Affairs offices build links to the civil society, deter youth from terrorism, and highlight values consistent with the U.S. versions of democracy, human rights, and free markets.
Read MoreAlso posted in Culture, International, Politics, U.S. Tagged Africa, Anguissa, Cameroon, Churchill, Fondation Conseil Jeune, Public Affairs, public diplomacy, Yaoundé Leave a comment
Christmas in Lunel
December 4, 2004, night flight Paris-Bamako. Malian journalists await for a week of training and encouragement to affirm, with an outsider, a free press in a country so poor it cannot even really falter. Sleep mask, ear stops, ambien, and I take my contrived sleep position so as to function for next day’s press sessions.
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Over the Energy Cliff?
That was the grim warning conveyed yesterday afternoon by veteran energy executive John Hofmeister at a meeting of the Houston chapter of the American Petroleum Institute. Mr. Hofmeister, former president of Shell Oil Company, currently heads a public advocacy group called Citizens for Affordable Energy, devoted to educating the American people and our leaders on the need for responsible energy policies.
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