WASHINGTON — The Trump administration on Monday finalized its plan to open up part of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge in Alaska to oil and gas development, a move that overturns six decades of protections for the largest remaining stretch of wilderness in the United States.
Trump Opens ANWR to Oil Drilling
Monday, August 17, 2020
Tuesday, April 7, 2020
Trump guts NLRB workers' protection
Under Trump the NLRB Has Gone Completely Rogue
An agency founded to defend workers’ rights is dismantling them just when workers need them most.
Trump Undermines of Reverses NLRB Labor Protections
An agency founded to defend workers’ rights is dismantling them just when workers need them most.
Trump Undermines of Reverses NLRB Labor Protections
Wednesday, July 18, 2018
The Fermi Paradox ... paradoctered
Possible explanations for the Fermi Paradox:
• Sufficiently advanced alien civilizations would be very good at hiding. They’re doing exactly that due to threats from other sufficiently advanced alien civilizations.
• Sufficiently advanced alien civilizations get the f**k out of the cramped confines of our 4-D bubble of spacetime as soon as inhumanly possible.
• Sufficiently advanced, starfaring, alien civilizations wouldn’t communicate with EMF broadcast.
• The speed of light is absolute. Period. Their ain’t no interstellar travel, except for exceedingly rare generation ships or research vessels hopping to nearby star systems. Due to this limitation, there is zero possibility of interstellar civilization, let alone interstellar communication. The universe is filled with intelligent life. But each species is an island unto itself.
• Everything’s alive. The entire cosmos is one big organism—an ocean of emerging self-awareness. The whole damn thing is “intelligent life.”
• Blinkered species that we are, humanity doesn’t recognize intelligent life that doesn’t look like humanity. There are other intelligent life forms on Earth. We eat them, cut them up in labs, and put them in cages.
• Something really, really bad happened on a cosmic scale and wiped out all the sufficiently advanced alien civilizations in our immediate galactic vicinity. Earth is like a remote island in the South Pacific whose inhabitants somehow survived WWIII.
• There are umpteen different templates for life (including intelligent life) aside from the carbon-based model. Humanity wouldn’t recognized a typical alien life form if it bit us in the collective ass.
• The bulk of the cosmos is comprised of dark matter. We’re utterly blind to it—including any dark matter species.
• We’re living in a computer simulation. Earth is the main event. Aside from a few broad strokes, the lazy designer didn’t bother filling in the details of the so-called "Universe" outside the Earth.
• Powers unknown have burned our brains with a mental blind spot that prevents us from seeing evidence of intelligent alien life. We see it—and don’t see it. “It doesn’t look like anything to me,” is our conditioned response.
• 99.999999999% of intelligent life forms evolve into industrial civilizations which relentlessly grow—and refuse to stop growing until they devour and destroy their planetary ecologies and, after a period of cannibalism and degeneracy, destroy themselves. (Props to Piers Anthony.)
• They’re lying to us. The truth is out there, oh yes. But an evil “X-Files”-type conspiracy is covering up the evidence, blah-blah-blah.
• Earth is the alien equivalent of a game preserve. We’ve been deliberately isolated and blocked from contact with other intelligent life forms. Sure, every now and then, some alien pervert breaks through the barrier and gives a redneck in Alabama an anal probe. But, most of the time, we're on our own.
1
Manage
• Sufficiently advanced alien civilizations would be very good at hiding. They’re doing exactly that due to threats from other sufficiently advanced alien civilizations.
• Sufficiently advanced alien civilizations get the f**k out of the cramped confines of our 4-D bubble of spacetime as soon as inhumanly possible.
• Sufficiently advanced, starfaring, alien civilizations wouldn’t communicate with EMF broadcast.
• The speed of light is absolute. Period. Their ain’t no interstellar travel, except for exceedingly rare generation ships or research vessels hopping to nearby star systems. Due to this limitation, there is zero possibility of interstellar civilization, let alone interstellar communication. The universe is filled with intelligent life. But each species is an island unto itself.
• Everything’s alive. The entire cosmos is one big organism—an ocean of emerging self-awareness. The whole damn thing is “intelligent life.”
• Blinkered species that we are, humanity doesn’t recognize intelligent life that doesn’t look like humanity. There are other intelligent life forms on Earth. We eat them, cut them up in labs, and put them in cages.
• Something really, really bad happened on a cosmic scale and wiped out all the sufficiently advanced alien civilizations in our immediate galactic vicinity. Earth is like a remote island in the South Pacific whose inhabitants somehow survived WWIII.
• There are umpteen different templates for life (including intelligent life) aside from the carbon-based model. Humanity wouldn’t recognized a typical alien life form if it bit us in the collective ass.
• The bulk of the cosmos is comprised of dark matter. We’re utterly blind to it—including any dark matter species.
• We’re living in a computer simulation. Earth is the main event. Aside from a few broad strokes, the lazy designer didn’t bother filling in the details of the so-called "Universe" outside the Earth.
• Powers unknown have burned our brains with a mental blind spot that prevents us from seeing evidence of intelligent alien life. We see it—and don’t see it. “It doesn’t look like anything to me,” is our conditioned response.
• 99.999999999% of intelligent life forms evolve into industrial civilizations which relentlessly grow—and refuse to stop growing until they devour and destroy their planetary ecologies and, after a period of cannibalism and degeneracy, destroy themselves. (Props to Piers Anthony.)
• They’re lying to us. The truth is out there, oh yes. But an evil “X-Files”-type conspiracy is covering up the evidence, blah-blah-blah.
• Earth is the alien equivalent of a game preserve. We’ve been deliberately isolated and blocked from contact with other intelligent life forms. Sure, every now and then, some alien pervert breaks through the barrier and gives a redneck in Alabama an anal probe. But, most of the time, we're on our own.
1
Manage
Saturday, July 7, 2018
July 7, 2018
Trump administration halts billions in insurance payments under Obamacare
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The Trump administration on Saturday halted billions of dollars in payments to health insurers under the Obamacare healthcare law, saying that a recent federal court ruling prevents the money from being disbursed.
The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, which administers programs under the Affordable Care Act, said the action affects $10.4 billion in risk adjustment payments.
Reuters: Trump halts billions in Obamacare insurance payments
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The Trump administration on Saturday halted billions of dollars in payments to health insurers under the Obamacare healthcare law, saying that a recent federal court ruling prevents the money from being disbursed.
The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, which administers programs under the Affordable Care Act, said the action affects $10.4 billion in risk adjustment payments.
Reuters: Trump halts billions in Obamacare insurance payments
Friday, July 6, 2018
July 6, 2018
US Army quietly discharging immigrant recruits
SAN ANTONIO (AP) — Some immigrant U.S. Army reservists and recruits who enlisted in the military with a promised path to citizenship are being abruptly discharged, the Associated Press has learned.
The AP was unable to quantify how many men and women who enlisted through the special recruitment program have been booted from the Army, but immigration attorneys say they know of more than 40 who have been discharged or whose status has become questionable, jeopardizing their futures.
AP: Army discharging immigrant recruits
SAN ANTONIO (AP) — Some immigrant U.S. Army reservists and recruits who enlisted in the military with a promised path to citizenship are being abruptly discharged, the Associated Press has learned.
The AP was unable to quantify how many men and women who enlisted through the special recruitment program have been booted from the Army, but immigration attorneys say they know of more than 40 who have been discharged or whose status has become questionable, jeopardizing their futures.
AP: Army discharging immigrant recruits
Thursday, July 5, 2018
July 5, 2018
Obama’s wetlands protection rule put ‘too much emphasis’ on science, Trump officials argue.
President Donald Trump’s administration is faulting its predecessor for overemphasizing science in writing a 2015 Clean Water Act rule aimed at defining what isolated wetlands and waterways deserve automatic federal regulatory protection.
At issue: the Obama-era Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and Army Corps of Engineers' 400-page review of research on how wetlands and small streams affect downstream rivers, lakes and estuaries.
Science: Trump faults EPA's science-based wetlands protection.
President Donald Trump’s administration is faulting its predecessor for overemphasizing science in writing a 2015 Clean Water Act rule aimed at defining what isolated wetlands and waterways deserve automatic federal regulatory protection.
At issue: the Obama-era Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and Army Corps of Engineers' 400-page review of research on how wetlands and small streams affect downstream rivers, lakes and estuaries.
Science: Trump faults EPA's science-based wetlands protection.
Saturday, June 23, 2018
June 23, 2018
Deepwater Horizon led to new protections for US waters. Trump just repealed them.
Trump’s executive order voids an Obama policy that aimed to prevent oil spills.
The Deepwater Horizon offshore drilling rig exploded on April 20, 2010, killing 11 workers. Gas erupted into a massive fireball, and then the rig gushed 4.9 million barrels of crude oil into the Gulf of Mexico. It soon became the largest and most expensive marine oil spill in history, with an estimated $17.2 billion in damages to properties, fisheries, and tourism across the Gulf Coast.
Vox: Trump voids Obama oil spill policy
Trump’s executive order voids an Obama policy that aimed to prevent oil spills.
The Deepwater Horizon offshore drilling rig exploded on April 20, 2010, killing 11 workers. Gas erupted into a massive fireball, and then the rig gushed 4.9 million barrels of crude oil into the Gulf of Mexico. It soon became the largest and most expensive marine oil spill in history, with an estimated $17.2 billion in damages to properties, fisheries, and tourism across the Gulf Coast.
Vox: Trump voids Obama oil spill policy
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