http://www.nbcnews.com/news/weather/filipinos-return-home-after-typhoon-hagupit-fear-future-storms-n263491

The Philippines has fallen victim to their second major hurricane since 2013, leaving millions in danger of flooding, high winds and further destruction of their homes. After watching the movie Disruption, which is about climate change and why people should care, it made me think about their claim that people of different socio-economic statuses feel the effects of climate change more so than others. The first thing that comes to my mind when combating this claim is that these people CHOOSE to live here and they could leave if they wanted to. The truth of it is that they cannot. They don’t want to leave their homes and the people that understand them.

I think about my own beach house and if someone had told me to just leave it behind and let it get washed away with Super Storm Sandy. People are not going to let go, regardless of how real climate change is. There are simply things people will always care about more.

http://www.thenews.pl/1/12/Artykul/188734,Poland-to-import-toxic-waste-from-Salvador

A shipment of 72 metric tons of toxic agricultural waste is on its way to be processed in Poland. Why? The prime minister of Poland’s response was that “other facilities in Europe are already overloaded.”

Lets take a step back here: El Salvador, which is located in Central America is shipping its waste across the Atlantic Ocean to Europe. Why send their toxic waste so far away? The deal is apparently worth $88 million euros. Poland’s facility apparently is the only available facility that meets international standards.

This all seems a little fishy to me, and the area’s residents are already protesting.The town’s City Hall has expressed concern and a lack of understanding for the decision by the Chief Inspectorate of Environmental Protection to allow the transport of waste into Poland. It also requested an in-depth analysis of the procedures issued by the Chief Inspector.

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/11/24/business/energy-environment/solar-and-wind-energy-start-to-win-on-price-vs-conventional-fuels.html?_r=0

This article makes renewable energy sources seem plausible in the price driven world we live in. The cost of providing electricity from wind and solar sources has plummeted over the last five years, so much so that in some markets renewable generation is less expensive than coal and natural gas in some instances.

However, it is only appears to be cheaper because of the government subsidies that exist. My question is whether government subsidies are actually a sustainable method to get people to live more greenly.

http://www.bostonglobe.com/opinion/editorials/2014/11/18/obama-should-tie-keystone-pipeline-approval-bigger-environmental-goals/87Nha5jDzdP4OULPU21a8N/story.html

The house has already to sent the pipeline project to the president’s desk for approval. The Senate, once it’s under Republican control come January, will most likely vote in the pipelines favor as well.

Supporters like to say that the 1,179-mile expansion of the pipeline, which would carry tar sands oil from Canada to Texas, will create thousands of jobs. Opponents reply “it as an environmental disaster, suggesting that refining tar sands is incredibly toxic while raising the alarm that greenhouse gases will increase dramatically. Landowners along the proposed route worry about potential leaks”.

Obama will most likely veto the bill, with the notion that the goal should be to reduce emissions and boost energy efficiency, rather than block pipelines per se.

http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2014/nov/03/india-air-pollution-cutting-crop-yields-by-almost-half

Scientists have found that air pollution in India has become so severe that yields of crops are being cut by almost half. “While temperature’s gone up in the last three decades, the levels of smog and pollution have changed much more dramatically,” says Jennifer Burney, an environmental scientist at University of California, San Diego. Comparing crop yields in 2010 to what they would be expected to be if temperature, rainfall and pollution remained at their 1980 levels, the researchers showed that crop yields for wheat yields were as much as 50% lower. Researchers that looked for wheat and rice production alongside pollution data, concluded significant decreases in yield could be attributed to two air pollutants, black carbon and ground level ozone.

What does this mean for the future of Agriculture in our world?

http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/top-democratic-strategists-acknowledge-challenging-environment-as-tuesday-looms/2014/11/02/2c4d2f28-629b-11e4-9fdc-d43b053ecb4d_story.html

This Article is of the opinion that the environmental issues have cooled, making it harder and harder for more liberal candidates to get elected with that issue on their side. Voters are just no longer as friendly as they once were to the environment.

So who is to blame? According to the author, President Obama. As said by one democratic consultant, “It’s not just anger at [the Affordable Care Act]. He has become, rightly or wrongly, the symbol of dysfunction in Washington. That has led to a demoralized Democratic base, energized Republicans. And those in the middle have an easy way of venting their frustration, and that is to punish the president’s party.”

Democratic Candidates made it obvious they wanted to distance themselves from the President’s politics.“President Obama isn’t the cause of this bad environment, but how candidates have chosen to handle his lower approval ratings has often compounded their problems,” as said by Erik Smith, a veteran Democratic operative.

Democrats remain hopeful, their more environmentally friendly party will still be able to have an influence in congress, even with the bad blood Obama has left in the halls of Congress.

4 Places Where Hunters Are Working to Protect Game Animals

In Washington State, North Dakota, South Carolina, and the western U.S., hunters and fishermen are working to ensure the survival of the very species they target.

While it might seem backwards, “people who seek to kill animals could take part in saving them, many hunters and fishers are committed to restoring natural habitats and maintaining America’s wild places”. Why is it that hunters are saving the animals that they hunt? Simply, because if they don’t there will be nothing  left for them to hunt. The attached video from National Geographic goes into a lot more detail about the logic of hunters as preservationists.

http://http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2014/10/141015-hunters-conservation-science-animals-hunting-environment/

For those of us who live in the Northeast, an eye should be glued to the people we put in power and their stance on environmental issues. In the gubernatorial  race in Connecticut, candidate Tom Foley’s lack of a position on the causes of climate change caused a great uproar. Foley is quoted saying “It doesn’t matter, it’s happened,” Foley said of climate change during a debate Thursday night in New London. Foley has also expressed that connecticut on its own will not be able to change global warming. But I, and most of the able minded people of this world believe that change has to start somewhere, so why not here? All I have to say is, choose wisely Connecticut.

http://www.courant.com/politics/capitol-watch/hc-environmental-groups-bash-tom-foley-on-climate-change-20141017-story.html

This video does a brilliant job of defining where the blame lies in the exploitation of our resources. There is no doubt there are more powerful forces at hand, but this a recurring theme in history.

The cunning men at the top use all sorts of tactics, whether it be fear, religion or media to get people to follow them.

People have given up what truly matters, and given into a religion of consumerism. They compensate their lack of values for STUFF. What people once owned, the stuff now owns the people.

How do we stop this system?

http://www.cbsnews.com/news/burning-rage/

This report offers a much different light in which we see the group Earth Liberation Front. This is the view main stream media offers, “the burning rage of a dying planet.” It does not even discuss the definition of terrorism and whether or not these people should be named as terrorists, it just comes out and labels them as so. 

The video also talks a lot about Animal Liberation Front, which is a sister group to the ELF. The ALF has been known to videotape themselves breaking into research labs, where they destroy years of painstaking work and free captive animals.  Even as they do these things, the ALF describes themselves as non-violent.

My question is what is violence to you? I always grew up thinking that violence was hurting anything, including property. The ALF and ELF however claim that arson is not a form of violence, as long as no living thing is getting hurt.