(2 comments) SHARE        Thursday, September 30, 2010
The US Navy: War Games under Americans' Radar After the public comment period ends on October 11, 2010, the Navy will conduct a plethora of war exercises along 122,400 nautical miles of air, surface, and subsurface space in Northern California, Oregon, and Western Washington.

(1 comments) SHARE        Wednesday, August 11, 2010
Obama, Stop Building Nuclear Weapons Takashi Tanemori stands on a makeshift stage on the back of a truck near Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) in California. His formal traditional Japanese dress and his silver hair riffles in the chill morning breeze. His voice is clear over the roars of large trucks passing. "I came to the United States forty years ago to avenge the death of my family killed by the atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima."

(5 comments) SHARE        Friday, August 6, 2010
Confronting a Mindset: "Bombing Hiroshima was Right" Imagine the power to erase, in nine seconds, more than 200,000 human beings and everything surrounding them within a two mile radius. Then imagine that power magnified many times over. Then understand that We, the People, are represented by those who are capable of destroying far more people and property in less time. For, according to President Bill Clinton "nuclear weapons are the cornerstone of the policies" of U.S...

SHARE        Saturday, June 12, 2010
World Cup Soccer 2010: Shame on the Beautiful Game Soccer fever rises. A billboard on the East Bay side of the California's Oakland/San Francisco Bay Bridge displays an animated advertisement with the FIFA logo announcing "RSA vs. Mexico, Friday 6:30am." The growing excitement makes even someone who elects to live sans a television cast around for a place to watch the sport referred to as the "beautiful game."

(4 comments) SHARE        Friday, May 28, 2010
It is "Perfectly Safe: It just Kills Plants" The Fifth Agent Orange Justice Tour ended recently. It focused national attention on grass roots and legislative efforts to achieve comprehensive assistance to victims in Vietnam, to the children and grandchildren of U.S. veterans, and to Vietnamese-Americans.

(1 comments) SHARE        Monday, May 3, 2010
Confessions of a Military Mom In America, Mother's Day falls on May 9 this year. In Palestine, Iraq, Syria, and Lebanon it fell on March 21, and in Afghanistan it fell on March 8, where it is also celebrated as the first day of spring. Israel forgoes Mother's Day in favor of Family Day, celebrated on February 14 this year. I take an interest in these countries because, while my son served in the US Army, I visited them....

(3 comments) SHARE        Sunday, April 25, 2010
The Green Mayor has Toxic Sludge on his Hands Gavin Newsom's reputation as "the green mayor" is going down the drain, contaminated by the toxic sludge on his hands. With Mayor Newsom's blessing, San Francisco Public Utilities Commission distributed 80 tons of "organic biosolid compost" to city residents, community gardens, and the Parks and Recreation Department in 2007.

(1 comments) SHARE        Tuesday, April 13, 2010
Compost: the highest tech method to preserve our planet and our health Robert Reed of San Franciso's Recology, one of the largest composting and recycling employee owned organizations in the country, is with us for the first half of the show. Then soil scientist and agronomist, Bob Shaffer shares the known secrets of composting and recognizes the secrets of humus that no one really knows. Interviewed by Susan Galleymore for Raising Sand Radio: http://www.raisingsandradio.org

SHARE        Sunday, April 4, 2010
The World Bank and the Four Horsemen of Climate Change: Apocalypse Now? The World Bank votes on April 8 to loan South Africa parastatal, Eskom, $3.75 billion for a new coal-fired power plant. A look at the coal industry and the "four horseman of climate change" that influence it.

SHARE        Tuesday, March 2, 2010
Beauty and the Beast Settlers Primary School in Austerville, South Durban holds the Guinness world record for the highest rates of asthma in a primary school anywhere in the world. It is located between the Engen and SAPREF oil refineries south of the port of Durban, South Africa. Engen is the second largest integrated oil company in southern Africa, after Sasol, and came about when Mobil sold its southern African operations to Gencor. ...

SHARE        Tuesday, February 23, 2010
The Hotspot that is Not a "Hotspot" but a "Potential High Impact Zone" Assmang Cato Ridge Works goes through all the motions for responsible environmental clean up of its toxic waste but nothing ever gets done.

SHARE        Wednesday, February 3, 2010
A Dearth of Imagination Leads to Wasting Perfectly Good Waste Informal waste pickers fight for the right to recycle perfectly good waste from South Africa's dumps and landfill...and are abused for it. This is a lack of imagination on the part of governments. And ours in the US is part of the problem, not the solution.

SHARE        Saturday, January 30, 2010
Goodbye Guinea Fowl, Hello Truck Stop This week I learned that the land I grew up on in Cato Ridge, South Africa, will be a truck stop as of mid-February 2010. Each day after that up to 32 trucks with trailers, those eighteen wheelers that terrify motorists as they race along the N3, will drive over the land where once stood our horse stables, pigsties, and my grandfather's cow shed.

SHARE        Wednesday, January 27, 2010
The Seamy Side of Coal-fired Power South Africa has one of the heaviest carbon footprints in the world...and the World Bank is offering a US $5 billion loan -" the biggest ever to any African entity -" that ensures its footprint becomes even heavier. The World Bank, however, says the loan assists South Africa's electricity parastatal Eskom to "achieve financial stability, increase generation capacity and efficiency, and adopt a low carbon trajectory."

(3 comments) SHARE        Sunday, December 6, 2009
Global Connections and the Arc of War The lawsuit against KBR includes burn pits in Afghanistan. It is likely that the wave of deformities in Afghan newborns will go undetected for a longer period than they took to crest in Iraq since many Afghan babies are born at home and in remote regions. A new study by the U.S.-based independent charity Save the Children says 60 out of every 1,000 Afghan babies die; this is already one of the highest infant mortality rates...

(1 comments) SHARE        Saturday, December 5, 2009
Open your Heart to the System that is War We've come a long way, as a nation, toward a more sophisticated understanding of war.... We've also added a concept to our national consciousness that was all but missing eight years ago: Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. When Major Nidal Hasan pulled the trigger so many times in Ft. Hood on November 5, 2009 there was national outrage, shock, and horror. A picture slowly formed around the man who could do such a thing....

SHARE        Thursday, December 3, 2009
Wanted: Vaccine and a Cure December 1 is World AIDS Day. Populations of the United States and Europe no longer experience the panic that accompanied the HIV/AIDS pandemic in the 1980s. In sub-Saharan Africa, however, HIV/AIDS is an ongoing emergency that results in hundreds of thousands of deaths each year.

(3 comments) SHARE        Friday, November 27, 2009
A View from the Faultline I met a Birther! Here, in the San Francisco Bay Area. My small island town is a mix of people and, until 1997, was home port to one of the largest naval fleets in the Pacific. Many of those who worked on the naval base still live here. Nevertheless, I was surprised to find a real, live person who seriously believes that Barack Obama was born in Mombasa ...and that his presidency will last only one year.

(1 comments) SHARE        Sunday, November 22, 2009
The Tea Party as Good Beginning My "left-leaning" friends had persuaded me that "right-leaning" folk are successful at spreading their message because they know they how to tow the party line, how to follow, and how to obey. And that this is unlike those of us on the "left" who march to our own tune, squabble for meager media attention, and splinter off to form smaller and less effective groups when challenges arise.

(3 comments) SHARE        Saturday, November 21, 2009
Melissa - Raped! -- For Band of Buddies War Series MELISSA stopped drinking water in the early afternoon so she didn't have to walk to the latrines after dark. Women were being raped by members of their own battalion and she didn't want to risk that. She knew the risk of dehydration in 120 degree heat but " raped by fellow troops? Wasn't going to happen to her.