October, 09 2018, 12:00am EDT
Carbon Tax Schemes Will Not Save Us from Climate Chaos
“Market-based carbon pricing schemes are a false solution, and a dangerous distraction from the urgent transition society must undertake.”
WASHINGTON
Today, ExxonMobil announced a $1 million donation to an effort backing carbon taxes. The announcement follows a devastating IPCC report revealing society has a mere 12 years to start rapidly phasing out fossil fuels to limit the worst of the climate chaos ahead.
In response, Food & Water Watch Executive Director Wenonah Hauter released the following statement:
"The alarming findings of the latest IPCC report validate an aggressive approach to deepening climate chaos that scientists, advocates and elected officials across the country are steadily endorsing: a rapid transition off fossil fuels that would make our society almost entirely reliant on clean, renewable energy in the next ten years.
"It comes as no surprise that ExxonMobil and other oil companies are calling for anything and everything short of moving off fossil fuels entirely--most notably, the unwieldy and unproven concept of carbon taxes. The IPCC report acknowledges that carbon taxes would have to be incredibly high to make even a dent in the crisis. Market-based carbon pricing schemes are a false solution to climate change, and a dangerous distraction from the urgent transition to a truly clean, renewable energy future we must undertake now.
"While individual actions are laudable, no amount of lifestyle changes are enough to solve this planetary crisis without strong policies that will transform our society. This not only means how we provide energy, but also, how we provide food. We must tackle industrial animal agriculture, a huge piece of the puzzle, by implementing policies that promote sustainable livestock operations, not factory farms.
"As Hurricane Michael bears down on Florida this week, we can't forget that climate chaos doesn't just unfold in number-filled charts in a report--it has real world consequences and costs lives. The IPCC report reinforces what we already know: we have to move Off Fossil Fuels if we want to solve climate chaos. Congress must pass the Off Fossil Fuels for a Better Future Act, the most ambitious climate legislation ever introduced, which provides a just and equitable roadmap for how to proceed."
Food & Water Watch mobilizes regular people to build political power to move bold and uncompromised solutions to the most pressing food, water, and climate problems of our time. We work to protect people's health, communities, and democracy from the growing destructive power of the most powerful economic interests.
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The Amsterdam 'Pogrom' That Wasn't: Corporate Media Fails To Tell the Whole Story
'The Israeli fans instigated the violence after arriving in the city and attacking Palestinian supporters before the match'
Nov 09, 2024
Thursday night, Israeli soccer fans clashed with Amsterdam residents before and after a Europa League soccer match between their team Maccabi Tel Aviv and Ajax in Amsterdam.
Clashes occurred outside the Johan Cruyff Arena and across the city on Thursday night. Police on Friday said five people had been taken to hospital, and 62 arrests had been made.
The violence reportedly started when the far-right Israeli soccer hooligans began chanting racist and violent anti-Arab slogans, attacked Arab and Muslim residents, and vandalized houses and businesses with Palestinian flags.
Al Jazeerareported:
In one video, Israeli supporters were heard singing: “Let the IDF win, and f*** the Arabs!” referring to the Israeli army’s offensive on Gaza. Another video captured a fan screaming: “F*** you terrorists, Sinwar die, everybody die,” in reference to the Hamas leader who was killed last month.
The Israeli fans instigated the violence after arriving in the city and attacking Palestinian supporters before the match, an Amsterdam city council member said.
“They began attacking houses of people in Amsterdam with Palestinian flags, so that’s actually where the violence started,” Councilman Jazie Veldhuyzen told Al Jazeera on Friday.
“As a reaction, Amsterdammers mobilised themselves and countered the attacks that started on Wednesday by the Maccabi hooligans.”
Yet the corporate media - both in the US and abroad - portrayed the events as one-sided "anti-semitic" attacks on helpless soccer fans:
US President Joe Biden, his Secretary of State Tony Blinken, and Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer were quick to echo Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's claim that the events in Amsterdam were unprovoked anti-semitic attacks reminiscent of pogroms or the Kristallnacht.
However many social media posts reported the context of the violence that was missing from corporate media reporting:
@martydoesnotplay On request: a recap of what has been happening in Amsterdam the past few days in which Zionist hooliguns from Tel Aviv attacked people on our streets and sang songs about burning Gaza down. But where only the response from clashes with them were caught up by the media. Placed within a narrative by the devil himself that this was anti-semitism 🍉
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'Ready to Fight' for Climate, Students Walk Out Over Trump
"We won't stand by while Donald Trump's dangerous agenda threatens everything we believe in," said one student.
Nov 08, 2024
Students with the youth-led Sunrise Movement walked out of over 30 high schools and universities across the United States on Friday to stand against U.S. President-elect Donald Trump's "extreme agenda" and promote "the fight for climate justice, workers' rights, and democracy."
The protesters carried signs and banners with messages including "This Is a Climate Emergency," "Protect Our Futures," "People Not Profit," "Fuck Trump," "Together We Rise," and "The Dems Failed, The People Won't."
"Students from every corner of the country came together to send a powerful message of solidarity. We won't stand by while Donald Trump's dangerous agenda threatens everything we believe in," said Aster Chau, a 16-year-old from Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. "This movement is about hope—hope that when we stand together, we can push our leaders to take bold action. We won't back down. This is our future, and we're taking it back."
Students in New York City joined nationwide walkouts on November 8, 2024. (Photo: Mahtab Khan/Sunrise Movement)
Trump's first presidential term featured a wide range of attacks on the Earth. This cycle, he pledged to "drill, baby, drill," provoking warnings about how his return to power would lead to a surge in planet-heating pollution, and vowed to roll back Biden-Harris administration climate policies if Big Oil poured just $1 billion into his campaign.
Since Trump beat Democratic Vice President Kamala Harris on Tuesday, critics including the Sunrise Movement have called out her party's leadership for failing to adequately prioritize the needs and demands of the working class.
"Millions of people are fed up after living through decades of a rigged economy and corrupt political system," the group said on social media Wednesday. "They are looking for someone to blame. It's critical the Dem Party takes that seriously."
Students at Bard College in New York state joined nationwide walkouts on November 8, 2024. (Photo: Sunrise Movement)
Sunrise said in a Friday statement that the "walkouts represent a call to action for both parties: If Democrats want to win, they need to stop pandering to big donors and corporations and instead focus on the bold policies that will ensure a livable future for all."
Manuel Ivan Guerrero, a student at the University of Central Florida, stressed that "today was just the beginning. We're angry and we're scared but we're ready to fight."
"We have the power to win and defeat Donald Trump, but our leaders need to be bold enough to fight for us," the 18-year-old added. "The time for empty promises is over. We are ready to do whatever it takes to win a better world."
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As DOJ Unseals Murder Plot Charges, Fears of Trump Iran Policy Mount
"Trump is inheriting a mess that he helped create," said the National Iranian American Council. "All parties need to focus not on threats but on dialogue to end these crises."
Nov 08, 2024
Amid growing concerns about what U.S. President-elect Donald Trump's return to the White House will mean for Washington's rocky relationship with Tehran, the Department of Justice on Friday announced charges against an Afghan national accused of plotting to assassinate the Republican at the direction of Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps.
Though Trump survived two shooting attempts during the campaign, neither appears to be tied to Iran's alleged plot to kill him.
"There are few actors in the world that pose as grave a threat to the national security of the United States as does Iran," U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland said in a Friday statement announcing the charges against Farhad Shakeri, "an asset of the Iranian regime who was tasked by the regime to direct a network of criminal associates to further Iran's assassination plots against its targets," including Trump.
"We have also charged and arrested two individuals who we allege were recruited as part of that network to silence and kill, on U.S. soil, an American journalist who has been a prominent critic of the regime," Garland added, referring to New Yorkers Jonathon Loadholt and Carlisle Rivera, who are both in custody—unlike Shakeri, who is believed to be in Iran. "We will not stand for the Iranian regime's attempts to endanger the American people and America's national security."
The department did not publicly identify the reporter but its statement "matched the description of Masih Alinejad, a journalist and activist who has criticized Iran's head-covering laws for women," Reutersnoted Friday. "Four Iranians were charged in 2021 in connection with a plot to kidnap her, and in 2022 a man was arrested with a rifle outside her home."
The Friday announcement about these three men follows another case related to Trump and Iran. As Politicodetailed: "In August, Brooklyn federal prosecutors charged a Pakistani man suspected of plotting on behalf of Iran to kill high-ranking U.S. politicians or officials—including perhaps Trump. The man is accused of trying to hire hitmen to carry out the plot."
The next month, after Trump was reportedly briefed about alleged Iranian assassination threats against him, he declared during a campaign rally that "if I were the president, I would inform the threatening country—in this case, Iran—that if you do anything to harm this person, we are going to blow your largest cities and the country itself to smithereens."
"We're gonna blow it to smithereens, you can't do that. And there would be no more threats," added Trump, whose comments were swiftly decried by the National Iranian American Council (NIAC) as "an outrageous threat" and "genocidal."
Responding to Reuters coverage of the Justice Department's Friday statement on social media, NIAC said that "threats of violence against political officials are unacceptable and only risk further opening Pandora's box of war and destruction. Trump is inheriting a mess that he helped create and reports like this demonstrate just how grave the stakes are. All parties need to focus not on threats but on dialogue to end these crises."
During Trump's first presidential term, he ditched the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, often called the Iran nuclear deal; ramped up deadly sanctions against the Middle East country; and ordered the assassination of Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps Gen. Qassem Soleimani in Iraq—actions that heightened fears of a U.S. war with Iran.
Such fears have surged since Trump's Tuesday win. He is set to return as commander-in-chief after more than a year of the Biden-Harris administration backing Israel's assault on the Gaza Strip and strikes on other countries including Lebanon and Iran.
NIAC Action executive director Jamal Abdi said in a statement after the U.S. election that "many in our community feared this day—worried about the return of the travel ban, attacks on our civil liberties, demonization of immigrant communities, and deepening militarism in the Middle East. But we have been here before and our resilience is unwavering in standing up for our community and our rights."
"In the coming weeks, Trump, along with his new vice president, JD Vance will select the advisers who will shape his policies," Abdi noted. "We will not stand down, disengage, or give up but will redouble our efforts for peace and justice by any means necessary. The resilience and unity of our community are more vital now than ever."
CNN and Politico have reported that Brian Hook is expected to lead Trump's transition team at the U.S. Department of State. As Drop Site News' Murtaza Hussain wrote, Hook is "known as a major Iran hawk who helped lead the 'maximum pressure' campaign of sanctions, sabotage, and assassinations that characterized Trump's approach to Tehran."
Speaking with Hussain, Trita Parsi, executive vice president of the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft, pointed out that Trump's previous Iran policy was largely guided by John Bolton, who spent over a year as his national security adviser, and Mike Pompeo, who served as secretary of state and director of the Central Intelligence Agency.
"The Trump administration's approach towards Iran depends very much on who he chooses to staff his administration. In his first term, he was sold on an idea by people like Pompeo and John Bolton that Iran could be sanctioned and pressured into oblivion, but that was an approach more likely to deliver war than an agreement," Parsi said. "The Iranian view is that Trump himself wants to make a deal, but it depends on whether he appoints the same neoconservatives as last time to his administration."
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