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n2doc's JournalDNC Chair Joins GOP Attack On Elizabeth Warren's Agency
Zach Carter
WASHINGTON -- Payday lenders have been gunning for the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau since the day President Barack Obama tapped Elizabeth Warren to set up the new agency. They've had plenty of help from congressional Republicans -- longtime recipients of campaign contributions from the payday loan industry. As the CFPB has moved closer to adopting new rules to shield families from predatory lending, the GOP has assailed the agency from every conceivable angle -- going after it's budget, attempting to tie its hands with new layers of red tape, fomenting conspiracy theories about rogue regulators illegally shutting down businesses and launching direct attacks on payday loan rules themselves.
To date, the GOP blitz has resulted in a few close shaves for the young agency, but no actual defeats. But the industry has cultivated a powerful new ally in recent weeks: Democratic National Committee Chair Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D-Fla.).
Wasserman Schultz is co-sponsoring a new bill that would gut the CFPB's forthcoming payday loan regulations. She's also attempting to gin up Democratic support for the legislation on Capitol Hill, according to a memo obtained by The Huffington Post.
The DNC chair isn't the first Democrat to defend payday lenders. A handful of House Financial Services Committee members consistently join the GOP's payday loan boosterism. But support from such backbenchers has been politically impotent. Wasserman Schultz, by contrast, is the nominal head of the Democratic Party. Her support undercuts efforts by liberals in Congress to draw contrasts with Republicans on economic issues.
more
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/debbie-wasserman-schultz-paylenders-cfpb_us_56d4ce38e4b03260bf77e8fc
Will Louisiana Be the First Red State to Legalize Weed?
One of the harshest states on pot offenders is reportedly exploring the idea of a recreational marijuana program. Saddled with $850 million in state debts, experts say Louisiana’s move is less motivated by safety as it is by money.
The idea to offset a colossal deficit with legal pot was allegedly born out of concern from lawmakers backing two bills that may cause budget cuts. Combined with the news that Colorado raked in $900 million from its marijuana program in 2015, it may be enough to get conservative pot prohibitionists to change their tune.
“I think they’re looking at it strictly as a profit-driven, tax-based incentive,” Kevin Caldwell, Executive Director of Commonsense NOLA, a non-partisan organization fighting for legalization, says of the rumblings about legalizing. Caldwell is excited about the legalization talk, and says New Orleans, which decriminalized it in 2010, has been paving the way.
But even Caldwell, who has devoted his life to the cause, isn’t getting his hopes up yet.
“I think it is more likely next session, once the politicians get the real blowback from the budget cuts,” he says. “Once the state sees cuts to things like social services and universities…I think that will reawaken some of the populism from our past which, in this case, is a good thing.”
more
http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2016/03/01/will-louisiana-be-the-first-red-state-to-legalize-weed.html
30 years on, Norway’s radioactive reindeer are a stark reminder of Chernobyl legacy
Reindeer are perhaps not the first things which spring to mind when you think of nuclear fallout.
However, 30 years after the nuclear power plant explosion in Chernobyl, Ukraine, and more than a thousand miles away, the grazing animals are recording high levels of radioactivity.
Last September reindeer in Våga reinlag AS, Jotunheimen, had readings of 8,200 becquerel per kilo of radioactive substance Caesium-137, according to Norway's The Local.
Three years earlier reindeer in the same central Norwegian region had readings of 1,500 becquerel, less than a fifth of the concentration.
more
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/chernobyl-radioactive-reindeer-norway-a6903571.html
Monsanto Given Legal Shield in a Chemical Safety Bill
WASHINGTON — Facing hundreds of millions of dollars in lawsuits, the giant biotechnology company Monsanto last year received a legislative gift from the House of Representatives, a one-paragraph addition to a sweeping chemical safety bill that could help shield it from legal liability for a toxic chemical only it made.
Monsanto insists it did not ask for the addition. House aides deny it is a gift at all. But the provision would benefit the only manufacturer in the United States of now-banned polychlorinated biphenyls, chemicals known as PCBs, a mainstay of Monsanto sales for decades. The PCB provision is one of several sticking points that negotiators must finesse before Congress can pass a law to revamp the way thousands of chemicals are regulated in the United States.
“Call me a dreamer, but I wish for a Congress that would help cities with their homeless crises instead of protecting multinational corporations that poison our environment,” said Pete Holmes, the city attorney for Seattle, one of six cities suing Monsanto to help cover the costs of reducing PCB discharge from their sewers.
The House and the Senate last year both passed versions of legislation to replace the 40-year-old Toxic Substances Control Act, a law that the Environmental Protection Agency acknowledged had become so unworkable that as many as 1,000 hazardous chemicals still on sale today needed to be evaluated to see if they should be banned or restricted.
more
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/03/01/business/monsanto-could-benefit-from-a-chemical-safety-bill.html?_r=0
Bernie Sanders: 'After a lot of thought, I voted for me'
By NOLAN D. MCCASKILL 03/01/16 09:02 AM EST
Bernie Sanders voted — for himself, of course — on Tuesday in Vermont.
“I will tell you after a lot of thought, I voted for me for president,” the Vermont senator said, smiling at a man he had just taken a selfie with.
“Congratulations, Bernie. Good luck out there,” replied the man, who patted Sanders on the back and laughed.
The Democratic presidential candidate and his wife, Jane Sanders, cast their votes at a polling station in Burlington around 7:30 a.m., according to a pool report.
“Nice warm day,” a woman at the local community center where Sanders voted joked (it was about 12 degrees outside). “Nice Vermont day.”
Read more: http://www.politico.com/blogs/2016-dem-primary-live-updates-and-results/2016/03/bernie-sanders-super-tuesday-vote-220018
Amazing Volcano image
The Incredibly Real Beauty of Nature’s Explosive Power
Sergio Tapiro has been photographing the Colima volcano outside his home town of Colima, Mexico, for the past 14 years. “One of the lessons I have learned from this volcano is if you want to take a good picture you have to know your subject—you have to study, to read, to see, and learn to watch what the volcano is doing,” he says. “If you don’t study your subject your chances of having the greatest photo of your life are less. If you know perfectly what you are doing, the chances are huge.”
Tapiro’s collection of photos, taken over the years, shows the volcano in various states—emitting billowing plumes of smoke during the day, standing sentinel at night under swirls of stars. But the greatest photo of his life (so far) is the dramatic shot of ash, lava, and lightning above, which recently won a World Press Photo award.
Colima, also known as the Volcano of Fire, is one of the most active in Latin America, Tapiro says. He monitors the activity via a webcam, studies seismographs, and even owns a restaurant close by. He had been observing an uptick in activity at several points over the last year, when explosions and plumes of erupting ash charged the atmosphere, sparking lightning. Tapiro was on the lookout to capture this extraordinary activity.
When explosions began on the clear, starry evening of December 13, 2015, Tapiro was ready with his tripod-mounted DSLR and remotely triggered shutter set for eight-second exposures. One, two, three, four shots. And then, with the fifth, “I saw this marvelous lightning, the biggest lightning I have seen with this volcano.” The 1,600- to 1,900-foot strike was like a giant strobe, he says, illuminating the side of the mountain and clouds of ash.
“Volcanos have something that inspire and remind you about the power of creation and how the Earth makes marvelous things,” Tapiro says.
http://proof.nationalgeographic.com/2016/02/29/the-incredibly-real-beauty-of-natures-explosive-power/
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