HERE

Sen. Schumer, gasbag

The EPA is finally moving towards requiring large industrial greenhouse gas emitters to monitor and report their emissions. Despite the fact that factory torture-and-death farms — excuse me, “industrial livestock producers” — are the biggest contributors to climate change, Senator Chuck Schumer (D-NY) has introduced bill S. 527 to exempt them from the EPA’s rules.

The rationale here is to protect these corporations — they’ll play up the “family farm” language, but don’t be fooled — from ever having to pay for the damage they cause to everyone, which could put them out of business. You see, the problem is not that they’re polluting so much; it’s that if everyone finds out how much they pollute — i.e., how truly unsustainable their activities are ecologically and economically — then they might have to shut down. And (gasp!) people might even find themselves cutting back on their artery-clogger intake.

It’s clear from the evening news that Schumer is a gasbag, but until now all we had to do was listen to him speak. Call his office at 202-224-6542 to register your opposition to S. 527.

(info via Mary Max)

Conan O’Brien gets shafted

The Times has a piece on Conan O’Brien’s impending move to the Tonight Show, currently helmed by Jay Leno and starting at 11:35. This seems the natural progression: The late late nighter puts in his dues (hilarity ensues for 16 years), and then gets promoted to late night.

But there’s a complication: Leno, instead of gracefully exiting the stage, is taking the 10pm slot, effectively continuing Conan’s run as second fiddle. As Warren Littlefield, “NBC’s top program executive when Mr. Leno began in 1992,” stated:

“Sure, Conan is still getting the ‘Tonight Show,’ but who are we kidding? Call it what you will. But if NBC hasn’t done it yet, you know they are going to at some point be saying: ‘Late night begins at 10 o’clock.’”

Meanwhile, Leno certainly isn’t doing anything to keep that from happening. According to the article, “Mr. Leno made clear in an interview in December that he envisions his show as another late-night entity, despite the prime-time location.”

Relevant question: Does anyone deny that Conan O’Brien is the funniest late night host? No, wait - does anyone deny that Conan is by far the funniest late night host? I wish Leno (and NBC) would get out of the way.

Many happy returns

Via the Times of London, Zimbabwe President Robert Mugabe’s 85th-birthday-celebration wish list:

KFC’s secret recipe, part deux

A while back I posted a quote from KFC President Roger Eaton:

I don’t want to be the president who loses the recipe. Imagine how terrifying that would be.

This quote was in the context of updates KFC was making to the security protections in place for their secret, original handwritten fried chicken batter recipe. In that post, I pointed out that Roger Eaton presides over a company that causes more terror than Mr. Eaton will ever have to worry about experiencing in his entire life.

Well, it looks like KFC’s security updates are complete, and thus the AP must write an article informing us about it. Hilariously, it turns out that security consultant Bo Dietl — yes, this Bo Dietl (it’s worth watching to the end):

— is their security guru. I hope he’s put a lot of thought into how they ought to protect the recipe.

Because then they would surely lose it, and I would take great satisfaction in that.

Another “solution” fails to live up

From The Times:

The parasite that causes the deadliest form of malaria is showing the first signs of resistance to the best new drug against it.

Combination treatments using artemisinin, an antimalaria drug extracted from a plant used in traditional Chinese medicine, have been hailed in recent years as the biggest hope for eradicating malaria from Africa, where more than 2,000 children die from the disease each day.

Now a series of studies, including one recently published in The New England Journal of Medicine and one due out soon, have cemented a consensus among researchers that artemisinin is losing its potency here and that increased efforts are needed to prevent the drug-resistant malaria from leaving here and spreading across the globe.

We have every reason to fear that we will approach this escalating malaria problem in familiar ways: Someone will find a new drug to which malaria is less resistant, and to which it will become more resistant. Malaria will become a stronger, deadlier disease. Meanwhile, global warming, caused by our “solutions” to so many other “problems,” will allow malaria-bearing mosquitoes to spread in number and geography, endangering previously safe human and non-human animal populations.

As David Ehrenfeld so persuasively argues in The Arrogance of Humanism, man’s “solutions” are nearly always larger problems waiting to happen. That is why, despite all our self-congratulating talk of “progress” — social, scientific, medical, technological — we have more and larger problems today than ever before.

Why are our “solutions” almost always problems? Because we humans by and large fail to consider the vastly larger stretches of reality extending beyond immediate human concerns. We fail to realize that, in the absence of much knowledge about the ramifications of our actions, we are very likely to do ultimate harm that is at least commensurate with the scope of our meddling. For when we fail to abide by reality, we are unable to account for the effects of what we do. (Incidentally, this is why the justification of ontological beliefs is essential for the justification of moral ones.)

If we are going to continue to meddle with nature, we need to significantly alter our criteria for calling things “problems” and “solutions.” We can begin by broadening the context within which we consider seeming problems and solutions, because — until we take into account long-term, encompassing issues and extensions — we simply aren’t dealing with reality, and are therefore likely to offend it.

PETA’s new campaign: Fish = “Sea Kittens”

Reporting from Unalaska, Alaska (that’s right: UnAlaska, Alaska), NPR’s Anne Hillman writes about PETA’s new campaign to re-brand fish as “sea kittens.” The campaign seeks to publicize the reality that fish have mental, social, and nervous capacities rivaling common household pets. As PETA campaign coordinator Ashley Byrne notes:

“Fish not only have the same ability to feel pain as a dog or a cat, but they also communicate with one another. They have complex social interactions; they form bonds; they express affection by gently rubbing against one another.”

Taking her journalistic integrity very seriously, Ms. Hillman can’t leave it at the facts; she must seek out the other side. So she asks some children what they think, and not just any children, mind you:

In the small fishing town of Unalaska, population just under 4,000, some people see the campaign differently.

“I don’t see fish as sea kittens; I see them as food,” says 12-year-old Chastity Haskins.

Haskins is looking at the PETA site with her friend, Harmony Wayner, 11.

“It just doesn’t look right,” Harmony says. Harmony, the fourth generation of a commercial fishing family, looks at the cartoon fish and reads through the information on the site. “They say that [fish are] intelligent, but they’re not really,” Harmony says. “They have tiny, tiny little brains. Very miniature.”

Of course, there are other factors besides brain size that determine mental capacity — for example, structural sophistication — so I really do wonder if little Harmony has her credentials in order. And I’m not sure Harmony would want to say that her smarter classmates should be able to exercise a certain degree of control over her life and well being, simply because they’re smarter.

Humorously, the kids sound about as smart as the adults, as quoted in the article:

“I don’t understand how it makes sense,” says fisheries observer Mary Powers, who works on fishing boats to collect data on the catches. She thinks the campaign, which encourages people to petition the Fish and Wildlife Service to stop the hunting of sea kittens, is misguided. “It seems like it’s discouraging Americans to buy our product, which I think is unpatriotic.”

One can easily imagine Ms. Powers as a devoted hockey mom, but I digress. There’s also National Marine Fisheries Service management biologist Brian Dixon, who doesn’t think the campaign will be effective:

“Well, it may raise some money for PETA, but I don’t think it’ll change the way we manage the fisheries,” Dixon says. “I think I may eat some sea kittens tonight.”

You’re a good person, Mr. Dixon. Thoughtful too.

Now, I don’t pretend to know that the SeaKittens campaign will be effective, but I have to admit PETA’s done an amazing job on the website, where you can build your own fish. Speaking of which, meet HEREball:

Get it? HEREball?

On the ground at the TVA spill

Dave Cooper details some of his experiences on the ground in the wake of the massive Tennessee Valley Authority coal ash spill.

It’s hard to comprehend the enormous size of this spill. TVA’s coal ash mountain was stacked over 50 feet high — as high as a 5 story building.

If a dump truck can hold 20 cubic yards of dirt and ash, it will take 265,000 truck loads to haul away all the ash (they are taking it back to the power plant). If they fill one dump truck trip every 5 minutes and work 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, it will take about 2.5 years to clean up the spill. TVA has been telling the media it will be cleaned up in about 6 weeks - this is a ludicrous claim.

Paul Weyrich dies

Paul Weyrich was the founder of the Heritage Foundation, a rightwing institution dedicated to advancing “liberty” — for individuals and corporations who wish to pollute, destroy, and usurp the commons for their own gain, and do it all behind closed doors.

According to Weyrich’s comrade-in-arms Grover Norquist:

Paul Weyrich created institutions and networks that incubated new and old powerful policies and strategies to advance liberty. … He brought leaders of various freedom impulses together. Most of the successes of the Conservative movement since the 1970s flowed from structures, organizations, and coalitions he started, created or nurtured. Paul also lived a balanced life with work, family and his faith. We will miss his puns and wisdom and hard work.

Gosh, I hope my friends mention a knack for puns when giving my eulogy.