“We must never let the weight of this combination endanger our liberties or democratic processes. We should take nothing for granted. Only an alert and knowledgeable citizenry can compel the proper meshing of the huge industrial and military machinery of defense with our peaceful methods and goals, so that security and liberty may prosper together.”
Tag: Policy
Coal study names top 20 ‘climate killer’ banks
The NGOs have labelled the banks “climate killers” because their financing efforts have helped to expand coal in the past decade. Many of the banks on the list subscribe to environmental principles, such as cutting their own greenhouse gas emissions and conducting environmental impact assessments on projects they finance.
Source : The Guardian
Shell oil paid Nigerian military to put down protests, court documents show
“Confidential memos, faxes, witness statements and other documents, released in 2009, show the company regularly paid the military to stop the peaceful protest movement against the pollution, even helping to plan raids on villages suspected of opposing the company. – In 2009, in a New York federal court, that evidence never saw light during the trial. Shell had been accused of collaborating with the state in the execution in 1995 of writer Ken Saro-Wiwa and other leaders of the Ogoni tribe. Instead, Shell paid $15.5m (£9.6m) to the eight families in settlement.”
Source : Common Dreams
Occupy Wall Street: The Most Important Thing in the World Now
“I am talking about changing the underlying values that govern our society. That is hard to fit into a single media-friendly demand, and it’s also hard to figure out how to do it. But it is no less urgent for being difficult.” Read more
Source : Common Dreams
Less Work, More Living by Juliet Schor
“Earn less, spend less, emit and degrade less. That’s the formula. The more time a person has, the better his or her quality of life, and the easier it is to live sustainably.”
Source :Yes magazine
‘In Studio: Recipes for Systemic Change’, and Helsinki Design Lab
“I think, I hope, that it suggests one possible meaningful way forward for design itself, as well as suggesting new cultures for the public sector, for thinking about complex, interdependent problems, and for rapidly creating practical yet compelling visions built on a clear understanding of ‘the architecture of the problem’, as we call it.”
Source : City of Sound
Why Post-Riot London Should Look Beyond Broken Windows
“In the space of just two years, police in plain clothes were found to have stopped and searched 45,000 people “simply on suspicion based on dress, appearance, behavior, and – above all other indicators – skin color.” Over 37,000 of these arrests proved groundless, and 8,000 did not stand up in court, leaving only 4,000 legitimate arrests — a paltry return of 1 in 11.”
Source :Polis
Report highlights Obama’s broken environmental promises:
Is there any chance that Obama is unaware of what Oira is up to? Rena Steinzor, the law professor at the University of Maryland who wrote the report, doesn’t think so. She notes that Sunstein is a longtime friend of Obama, who has for years advocated against government regulations.
Source : The guardian
The shocking truth about the crackdown on Occupy
The mainstream media was declaring continually “OWS has no message”. Frustrated, I simply asked them. I began soliciting online “What is it you want?” answers from Occupy. In the first 15 minutes, I received 100 answers. These were truly eye-opening.
The No 1 agenda item: get the money out of politics. Most often cited was legislation to blunt the effect of the Citizens United ruling, which lets boundless sums enter the campaign process. No 2: reform the banking system to prevent fraud and manipulation, with the most frequent item being to restore the Glass-Steagall Act – the Depression-era law, done away with by President Clinton, that separates investment banks from commercial banks. This law would correct the conditions for the recent crisis, as investment banks could not take risks for profit that create kale derivatives out of thin air, and wipe out the commercial and savings banks.
No 3 was the most clarifying: draft laws against the little-known loophole that currently allows members of Congress to pass legislation affecting Delaware-based corporations in which they themselves are investors.
Source : The guardian
Quote of the week
“Neo-liberal pro-rich reform in the 1980s. According to World Bank data, the world economy used to grow in per capita terms at over 3 per cent during the 1960s and 70s, while since the 1980s it has been growing at the rate of 1.4 per cent per year”
– Ha-Joon Chang – Faculty of Economics and Politics, University of Cambridge
Collected Reading 