Impacts on humanity
Although about 1 billion poor people worldwide derive at least some part of their livelihood from domesticated animals, the rapid growth of commercialized industrial livestock has reduced employment opportunities for many, according to the report. In developing countries, such as India and China, large-scale industrial production has displaced many small, rural producers, who are under additional pressure from health authorities to meet the food safety standards that a globalized marketplace requires.
Harold Mooney, professor of biology and senior fellow at the Woods Institute for the Environment, is co-editor of the report comments
Consider the piece of ham on your breakfast plate, and where it came from before landing on your grocery shelf. First, take into account the amount of land used to rear the pig. Then factor in all the land, water and fertilizer used to grow the grain to feed the pig and the associated pollution that results.
Finally, consider that while the ham may have come from Denmark, where there are twice as many pigs as people, the grain to feed the animal was likely grown in Brazil, where rainforests are constantly being cleared to grow more soybeans, a major source of pig feed.
“I don’t care what the educational political lobby and their allies on the left say,” he declared at one point. “Evolution is hooey...The secular humanists may argue that we are a secular nation,” McLeroy said, jabbing his finger in the air for emphasis.Don McLeroy Republican member of the Texas State School Board
"But we are a Christian nation founded on Christian principles. The way I evaluate history textbooks is first I see how they cover Christianity and Israel. Then I see how they treat Ronald Reagan—he needs to get credit for saving the world from communism and for the good economy over the last twenty years because he lowered taxes."
"But this switch to web-based government, just like the switch to web-based flight reservations and banking, means better service to clients at lower cost to the service provider. Not too good to be true."
But once records become electronic, they're wherever you need them to be. It doesn't matter whether they're in a corporate data center, on a disk in a state office. or somewhere off in a huge computer center operated by Google or Amazon (technically this is called being "in the cloud"). When you need access to them, they're where you are. You can withdraw money from any ATM (at least if you don't mind fees); you can charge at any store; and you ought to be able to go into any government office to do whatever government business you need to do.
“They are private landfills. We can’t force them to take a waste, and we can’t not allow them to take something that isn’t hazardous,” he said.
News reports say ...All but one member of the group were held at the Hennepin County Adult Detention Center for two nights; the minor in the group was taken to a juvenile detention center.
Jail officials confiscated Sternberg's prosthetic leg, explaining that he might use it as a weapon.
The group members were initially booked on charges of displaying simulated weapons of mass destruction, a charge punishable by up to 10 years in prison. But a sergeant reviewing the case determined that none of the sound equipment seized fit the definition of a simulated WMD.
Authorities returned the property, including [Zombie] Sternberg’s prosthetic leg, and released the group without filing a formal criminal complaint.
The St. Louis-based appeals court reversed on the Fourth Amendment claims, saying the plaintiffs "were engaged in protected expressive conduct."
"[A]n objectively reasonable person would not think probable cause exists under the Minnesota disorderly conduct statue to arrest a group of peaceful people for engaging in an artistic protest by playing music, broadcasting statements, dressing as zombies, and walking erratically in downtown Minneapolis during a week-long festival," the three-judge panel wrote.
Nor was there probable cause to arrest the plaintiffs for displaying simulated WMDs, the court added.
Financing has always been one of the biggest obstacles to a renaissance of nuclear power. The plants are expensive, and construction tends to run late and over budget. …
So utilities have turned to state legislators and regulators to help contain capital costs. In states such as Georgia, Florida and South Carolina, utilities have won permission to charge customers for some of the cost of new reactors while construction is still in progress -- a financing technique that would save utilities a couple of billion dollars for each reactor. Previously, utilities had to wait until power plants were in operation before raising rates, as they still do in most states.
