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Popichil`O | "Hope U Have A Gud Lyfe"
New up and coming artist Popichil`O jumps on the Chicago scene with his premiere song and video, "Hope U Have A Gud Lyfe".
With a bunch of self made videos on YouTube, Popi introduces his self to the world officially with his first professional music video produced by: MADDMANN-PRODUCTIONZ. The video is directed by: S7NLEE of MMP/GS Entertainment. Music was composed by 5xL Beats/Black Beatz. Recorded @ theMADDLABB-STUDIOZ, Chicago IL.
"Value every moment of your life. Live, Love, Laugh, and appreciate your past. No one is promised another day or night. Enjoy your life before you take that fight."
| Popichil`O
- Rythmatic Soul
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aM4h-eXwITENew up and coming artist Popichil`O jumps on the Chicago scene with his premiere song... more-
- popichi
- added this
- 11 months ago
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Homosexuality, Reality and Facebook
http://www.thethinkingblue.com/kos/homosexualtruth.html
Today on facebook, someone posted this picture http://i933.photobucket.com/albums/ad179/thethinkingblue/godgay.jpg that sure created a commosion among those who rather accept (scripture) than think. A few examples of Facebook non-thinkers:
FIRST FACEBOOK MEMBER: Hogwash! There is no such thing as a "gay gene" It's a choice. Just like Adam and Eve CHOSE to disobey God and bring sin into the world, these people CHOOSE to be gay. God is pretty clear in His Word as to how He views homosexuality, greed, lust, etc, etc, etc.
SECOND FACEBOOK MEMBER: I don't think I have ever seen any real evidence that shows people are born gay. As far as I know it is a choice but there can well be conditions in their environment that helped them reach that place. E.g. a mother dressing her son in girls clothes even when he goes to school because she wanted a girl. E.g. A father making fun of his son for playing with GI Joes telling him over and over again that he is playing with dolls. I believe a person can be treated in such a way that he or she becomes gay but I have never seen any evidence to prove it is a gene or something that makes them gay.
FIRST FACEBOOK MEMBER: I think you have mistaken me for a hater. Nothing could be further from the truth. I just don't agree with the caption in the picture and if you read what God says in His Word, He doesn't either. You don't know me so don't "pre-judge" me either. You don't know who my friends are. The Bible is pretty clear what God calls sin and this is one which He clearly calls out. HE did not make someone gay, it's a choice. Just like someone chooses to lie, or steal, or hate--it's a sin and God does not MAKE someone gay. Problem with our society is we have become complacent to sin and our morality is going south at an ever increasing rate.
THIRD FACEBOOK MEMBER: sexuality is a spiritual choice....that is a human decision,...being born as a human being, made in the image of God is a God made act....to murder a fetus is a sin against God...to choose to be homosexual is a choice made under the influence of the evil one called Satan....I have homosexual friends that I pray for and love them as a person....I hate the sin that they have chosen....not the person....temptation is in all decisions of right or wrong...The BIBLE is a Basic Instruction Before Leaving Earth....I call it God's Word....Love the Sinner....Hate the Sin.
AND
THINKINGBLUE FACEBOOK MEMBER: You know, the pathetic ones, who hide behind scripture, KNOW NOT OF WHAT THEY DO (or say)... Where have I heard THAT before? The delusional "principles" (better known as dogma) in religion has delayed science for many hundreds of years if not thousands (A KNOWN FACT) and the brains of those who soak it up, STILL TO THIS DAY, wish they could stop it (SCIENCE) in its tracks and take us back to a time when Human Beings were mainly in the dark and because they did not or could not THINK, they were unmercifully cruel. (Like the days when the holy ones --scared of their own shadow-- use to burn old ladies at the stake because someone had seen a mole or wort growing upon their poor wrinkled up faces and finked on them.) Come on, get real... THINKING is FUN! Here’s a video for those who are not afraid to think or have no fear of being tuned into a pillar of salt if they do...
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2012/05/24/1094434/-Homosexuality-and-Realityhttp://www.thethinkingblue.com/kos/homosexualtruth.html Today on facebook, someone... more-
- thinkingblue
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- 12 months ago
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Climate related disasters on the rise in Asia Pacific
Is the Asia-Pacific region set to bear the onerous title of having become the disaster centre of the globe? So it would seem if one went by UNDP’s Asia-Pacific Development Report “One Planet to Share — Sustaining Human Progress in a Changing Climate”.
Climate-related disasters are on the rise and during the last two decades, 45 per cent of the world’s natural disasters, whether it be floods in Pakistan in 2010 or Cyclone Nargis which hit Burma in 2008, have occurred here, resulting in numerous deaths, massive human dislocations and severe economic losses.
The public here remain extremely vulnerable largely because while this region hosts half the world’s population, it also has two-thirds (900 million) of the world’s poor. India with its sizeable population hosts a sizeable chunk of this below the poverty line population whose access to social services remain limited and who, because of their limited means, will perforce bear the brunt of climate change.
Mountain communities, with a sizeable 140 million population, are vulnerable to food insecurity, especially those living above heights of 2,500 metres. Temperatures here are rising, snowfall is decreasing, springs are drying up as are other water sources. The communities living in India and Nepal complain against a proliferation of crop diseases and pests which is attributed to shrinking winter period and a decline in snow fall.
The river deltas of India, Bangladesh, China and Vietnam are being threatened by rising sea levels. River bank erosion, the report suggests, is displacing 500,000 people every year. Rising sea levels, one report suggests, will reduce land area by 21 per cent, thereby affecting 16 million people.
Erratic weather patterns have been found to adversely affect indigenous tribal populations who comprise 240 million with more than 500 ethnicities. Their problems may vary as is the case of tribal women in the Khuti district of Jharkhand who complain that rising temperatures has meant a decrease in the harvest of lac, a natural polymer from an insect, used to polish handicrafts and help maintain freshness of fruit.
More at the linkIs the Asia-Pacific region set to bear the onerous title of having become the disaster... more-
- JanforGore
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- 1 year ago
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Religion is the Problem ! Behold Reality, stop living in the 15th Century, I (God) command you!
It's Sunday, time to crucify Religion.
I am borrowing some words of importance, cause the time is at hand we have big problems to face and ignorance on a epic scale confront us all. Civilization as we know it will cease to exist if rational thinking is not accepted as the word instead of mythical words from dead ideas thousands of years ago.
Let's start by asking a question: Does it matter? God is imaginary. God does not answer prayers, God did not write the Bible and Jesus is not God. In other words, the God of popular religion is completely imaginary.
But does it really matter? What difference does it make if half of the people in the United States want to believe in an imaginary being? What does it hurt?
Let's ignore the danger that can be found in the ashes of 9/11/2001, and the subsequent events in Afghanistan, Iraq, Madrid and London. There are many zealous and misguided Muslims who believe that, through Jihad, they must kill non-Muslims -- Christians and Jews in particular. And there are many Christains who, ignoring Jesus' teachings, wish to retaliate in kind. Let's ignore that.
Let's ignore the ill effects of religion around the world over the last several decades. We have Muslims killing Christians (and vice versa), Jews killing Muslims (and vice versa), Protestants killing Catholics (and vice versa), Shiites killing Sunnis (and vice versa), etc., etc. All of it is completely pointless, because all human gods are imaginary. But let's ignore all of that killing and destruction.
Let's also ignore all of the insanity that religion has brought us through the ages -- the crusades, the witch hunts and all the rest.
And let's ignore all the people that religion oppresses -- the women, the people who have been enslaved, the people who happen to be homosexual, etc. Let's ignore it because it is all water under the bridge.
Even today in the United States -- a modern, advanced nation -- religion creates problems. The delusion created by Christianity is so extreme and so pervasive at the moment that we have Supreme Court justices and politicians who publicly claim that God handed down the Ten Commandments to us in the Bible. These justices and politicians are speaking about a book that openly advocates slavery and misogyny along with many other notions that are beyond absurd. Yet no one can question their claims in public because it is far too dangerous.
To have otherwise intelligent Americans babbling on about an imaginary God like this is dangerous, if for no other reason than this one: If so many people are this delusional in the area of religion, it makes you wonder where else they harbor equally significant delusions in their thinking. In addition, religion in America is now actively restraining scientific research and social progress. The problem that American scientists are having with stem cells is just one of the many manifestations of the problem today.
There is also growing evidence that the delusion of religion causes significant social dysfunction. Statistical research is revealing the problems that go with religious delusion. For example, a recent article in the Journal of Religion and Society points out that religion is correlated to the significant social difficulties that we can see in America:
In general, higher rates of belief in and worship of a creator correlate with higher rates of homicide, juvenile and early adult mortality, STD infection rates, teen pregnancy, and abortion in the prosperous democracies . The most theistic prosperous democracy, the U.S., is exceptional, but not in the manner Franklin predicted. The United States is almost always the most dysfunctional of the developed democracies, sometimes spectacularly so, and almost always scores poorly. The view of the U.S. as a “shining city on the hill” to the rest of the world is falsified when it comes to basic measures of societal health.
The prevailing view is that religion is harmless even if it is delusional. That turns out not to be the case. America is the most religious country of those studied in the developed world. America also has the biggest problems in terms of things like homicide, juvenile and early adult mortality, STD infection rates, teen pregnancy, and abortion.
Religion is delusion. A planet full of delusional people is not healthy.
A secondary problem
Religion causes a secondary problem as well. Religion creates significant free-speech and free-thinking issues both here in the United States and around the world. Let me help you to understand what I mean when I say that, and offer a solution to the problem.
Let's imagine that any normal, intelligent American were to stand up in public today and say something like this: "I do not believe that an all-powerful, all-loving, all-knowing God wrote the Bible or the Ten Commandments. The reason why I don't believe it is because the Bible openly advocates slavery and misogyny in both the Old and New Testaments. God could not love slavery or hate women."
It is time for Americans, both religious and non, to openly discuss the evidence showing that God is imaginary. Let's stop hiding the discussion, or attacking it. Let's talk openly. Let us have an honest, open, rational, civil conversation about all of the evidence that we have seen in this book. If we have that debate in an open forum, the majority of us will reach agreement that God is imaginary.
Within seconds of making this honest, completely rational statement, that American will be branded as an atheist.
In today's America, being branded as an atheist is poisonous. It is as poisonous as being branded during the McCarthy era in the 1950s. Imagine someone who has been branded as an atheist trying to run for public office in America today. Many christians are so polarized and so sensitive right now that they will crush anyone with an opinion contrary to their own. Once branded as an atheist, the candidate is attacked in the public forum.
Then look at the rest of the world. In many Islamic countries, women cannot freely choose how they dress, much less what they do, where they work or how they behave. They often cannot even drive a car. The repression of women's freedom in Islamic countries is well known, and ridiculous.
There really is only one solution. It is time for Americans, both religious and non, to openly discuss the evidence showing that God is imaginary. Let's stop hiding the discussion, or attacking it. Let's talk openly.
If we have that debate in an open forum, the majority of us will reach agreement that God is imaginary.
If we can understand the reasons and deal with them rationally rather than through the silliness and mythology that is religion, we actually can do ourselves a great deal of good.It's Sunday, time to crucify Religion. I am borrowing some words of... more-
- kennymotown
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- 1 year ago
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Inside Mexico's climate revolution
Following a vote in its Senate on Thursday evening, Mexico is poised to become just the second country in the world to enshrine long-term climate targets into national legislation.
The margin of the vote was huge - 78-0 - indicating that all political parties have found common ground on this issue.
Now all that's needed is the signature of President Felipe Calderon, which is expected to materialise next week.
The bill enshrines a number of measures in law, including:
30% reduction in emission growth measured against a "business as usual" pathway by 2020, and 50% by 2050
35% of energy to come from renewable sources by 2024
obligation for government agencies to use renewables
establishment of a national mechanism for reporting on emissions in various sectors
The targets look pretty demanding at first sight - especially for a country where the population is growing and the economy expanding, and where oil makes a significant contribution to the national coffers.
So why is it taking steps that to the eyes of many will probably look like economic suicide?
Tlajomulco, on the outskirts of Guadalajara, recently saw a major oil pipeline fire
I had a chance to ask three Mexican parliamentarians recently when they came to London to look at how the UK, the first country in the world with this sort of national legislation, is doing it.
The views of Eric Luis Rubio Barthell, Nicolas Bellizia Aboaf and Porfirio Munoz Ledo were quite diverse - perhaps not surprising, as they come from different political parties.
"Mexico has a long tradition in multilateral politics," said Mr Munoz Ledo, a founder member of the centre-left Democratic Revolution Party (PRD) who now chairs the Foreign Affairs Commission.
That tradition re-asserted itself at the UN climate summit in Cancun in 2010, he said - and "this legislation is a strong commitment coming out of Cancun" to reflect that international commitment on climate change in national legislation.
For Mr Bellizia Aboaf, a member of the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI), which despite its name is considered more of a centrist party these days, it was more about practical issues.
"My state of Tabasco has suffered quite heavily the consequences of climate change," he said.
Low-lying Tabasco has traditionally suffered from flooding but the events of 2007, when water covered 80% of the state, were especially severe.
Yet Tabasco also has nearly 1,000 oil and gas wells in operation - a microcosm of Mexico in general, which is the sixth largest oil exporter in the world.
Traditionally, big hydrocarbon-producing countries have fought tooth and nail against action on climate change; and Mr Rubio Barthell, also of the PRI, said Middle Eastern oil-exporting countries have repeatedly asked Mexico to take this stance too.
But as the country has developed, oil and gas have become progressively less important to the economy as a whole.
That's why a more green economic vision makes sense for a number of politicians.
"I personally think this climate change topic should be an economic and energy issue, not an ecological issue, though I recognise that opinions are divided on this," said Mr Rubio Barthell.
And for Mr Munoz Ledo, the transition implied by a 35% renewable energy target is necessary and absolutely achievable.
The 2010 summit in Cancun put the UN climate convention's journey back on the road
"Mexico is aware this is the end of the oil era, so we need to implement this fiscal reform - and if we go through it, we'll be able to do without this oil," he said.
Solar energy, hydro-electricity, geothermal, biofuels and nuclear are options that are going to be explored.
The irony is, of course, that Mexico has traditionally been a younger and poorer cousin of the giant to its north, the United States, which has repeatedly declined to establish legislation of anything like this strength, citing impacts on economic growth.
"Power for the US is based on the army and energy and oil," Mr Munoz Ledo said.
"In 1989 you had [George] Bush senior coming into office from an oil background; if you go through Clinton and Obama, they serve the oil interest first.
"We're talking about the politics of neo-liberalism here which is based on oil interests and indebtedness - this is why so many in the US don't accept climate change, even though it's based on scientific evidence."
More at the linkFollowing a vote in its Senate on Thursday evening, Mexico is poised to become just... more-
- JanforGore
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- 1 year ago
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A president who doesn't even try
by Ted Rall
The President's progressive critics blame him for continuing and expanding upon his Republican predecessor's policies. His supporters point to the obstructionist, Republican-controlled Congress. What can Obama do? He's being stymied at every turn.
The first problem with the it's-the-GOP's-fault defense is that it asks voters to suffer short-term memory loss. In 2009, you probably recall, Democrats controlled both houses of Congress. By a sizeable majority. They even had a filibuster-proof 60-seat majority in the Senate. His approval ratings were through the roof; even many Republicans who had voted against him took a liking to him. The media, in his pocket, wondered aloud whether the Republican Party could ever recover. "Rarely, if ever, has a President entered office with so much political wind at his back," Tim Carney wrote for the Evans-Novak Political Report shortly after the inauguration.
If Obama had wanted to pursue a progressive agenda—banning foreclosures, jailing bankers, closing Guantánamo, stopping the wars, pushing for the public option he promised in his healthcare plan—he could have. He had ample political capital, yet chose not to spend it.
Now that Congress is controlled by a Republican Party in thrall to its radical-right Tea Party faction, it is indeed true that Obama can't get routine judicial appointments approved, much less navigate the passage of legislation. Oh-so-conveniently, Obama has turned into a liberal-come-lately. Where was his proposed Buffett Rule (which would require millionaires with huge investment income to pay the same percentage rate as middle-class families) in 2009, when it might have stood a chance of passage?
Team Obama's attempt to shore up his liberal base also falls short on the facts. Progressives were shocked by the U.S. Supreme Court's 5-4 ruling, along party lines, that legalized strip-searches and body cavity rapes by police and private security firms who detain people suspected of any crime, even minor traffic infractions.
"What virtually none of this…commentary mentioned," reported Glenn Greenwald in Salon, "was that that the Obama DOJ [Department of Justice] formally urged Court to reach the conclusion it reached…this is yet another case, in a long line, where the Obama administration was able to have its preferred policies judicially endorsed by getting right-wing judges to embrace them."
"Liberals don't blame Obama for not winning. They blame him for not trying. When he does crazy things like authorizing the assassinations of U.S. citizens without trial, progressives have to ask themselves: Is this guy kowtowing to the Right? Or is he one of them?"
No wonder Obama stayed mum.
Which brings us to the biggest, yet least discussed, flaw in the attempt to pin Obama's inaction on the heads of Congressional Republicans: the bully pulpit.
Whether Donald Trump likes it or not, Barack Obama is still president. If he calls a press conference to call attention to an issue, odds are that reporters will show up. But he's not walking tall or even talking big.
Responding to fall 2011 polls that indicated softening support among the younger and more liberal voters who form the Democratic base, Obama's reelection strategists began rolling out speeches inflected with Occupy-inspired rhetoric about class warfare and trying to make sure all Americans "get a fair shot." But that's all it is: talk. And small talk at that.
Instead of introducing major legislation, the White House plans to spend 2012 issuing presidential orders about symbolic, minor issues.
Repeating Clinton-era triangulation and micro-mini issues doesn't look like a smart reelection strategy. The Associated Press reported: "Obama's election year retreat from legislative fights means this term will end without significant progress on two of his 2008 campaign promises: comprehensive immigration reform and closing the military prison for terrorist suspects at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba. Piecemeal presidential directives are unlikely to make a sizeable dent in the nation's 8.6 percent unemployment rate or lead to significant improvements in the economy, the top concern for many voters and the issue on which Republican candidates are most likely to criticize Obama. In focusing on small-bore executive actions rather than ambitious legislation, the president risks appearing to be putting election-year strategy ahead of economic action at a time when millions of Americans are still out of work."
Of course, Obama may prevail. Romney is an extraordinarily weak opponent.
For progressives and leftists, however, the main point is that Obama never tries to move the mainstream of ideological discourse to the left.
Obama has been mostly silent on the biggest issue of our time, income inequality and the rapid growth of the American underclass. He hasn't said much about the environment or climate change, the most serious problem we face—and one for which the U.S. bears a disproportionate share of the blame. Even on issues where he was blocked by Congress, such as when Republicans prohibited the use of public funds to transport Gitmo detainees to the U.S. for trials, he zipped his lips.
It isn't hard to imagine a president launching media-friendly crusades against poverty or global warming. FDR and LBJ did it, touring the country, appointing high-profile commissions and inviting prominent guests to the White House to draw attention to issues they cared about.
In 2010, Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez invited flood victims to move into his presidential palace. Seven years after Katrina, Gulf Coast residents are still waiting for help. What if Obama opened up the Lincoln Bedroom to a homeless family? The media couldn't ignore a PR stunt like that.
Obama has mostly shunned the time-honored strategy of trapping your opposition by forcing them vote against your popular ideas. In 2009, for example, it would have been smarter politics—and better governance—to push for real socialized medicine, or at least ObamaCare with the public option he promised. He would either have wound up with a dazzling triumph, or a glorious defeat.
Liberals don't blame Obama for not winning. They blame him for not trying. When he does crazy things like authorizing the assassinations of U.S. citizens without trial, progressives have to ask themselves: Is this guy kowtowing to the Right? Or is he one of them?
~~~~~by Ted Rall The President's progressive critics blame him for continuing and... more-
- JanforGore
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- 1 year ago
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As extreme weather events increase so does acceptance of climate science
Severe droughts in Texas and the Great Plains. Hurricane Irene sweeping the Eastern Seaboard. Tornadoes in the Midwest, and floods in Mississippi. Record-breaking temperatures across the U.S. With such widespread madness, it's no surprise that the majority of Americans say they have personally experienced an extreme weather event or natural disaster in the past year.
According to NOAA scientists at the National Climatic Data Center (http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/sotc/), record and near-record breaking temperatures dominated the eastern two-thirds of the nation and contributed to the warmest March on record for the contiguous United States, a record that dates back to 1895. This animation shows the locations of each of the 7,755 daytime and 7,517 nighttime records (or tied records) in sequence over the 31 days in March. That's according to a new nationally representative survey that also found a majority of Americans say U.S. weather is getting worse. Furthermore, a large majority of Americans think global warming made several high-profile weather events even worse.
The results, which are part of a long-term project at Yale, suggest global warming is becoming less of a "down the road" and "out of sight" issue and more of a "here and now" problem in the minds of Americans.
The researchers found early on in this project, a decade ago, that for many Americans climate change was a problem distant in time and space, "a problem about polar bears and Bangladesh, but not in my state, not in my community, not for the people and places I care about," said study researcher Anthony Leiserowitz, director of the Yale Project on Climate Change Communication, referring to the public.
"What's interesting about these results is that it suggests Americans are beginning to internalize climate change, to bring it into the here and now," Leiserowitz told LiveScience. "The past two years have been filled with a seemingly endless succession of extreme weather events." [10 Surprising Results of Global Warming]
More at the linkSevere droughts in Texas and the Great Plains. Hurricane Irene sweeping the Eastern... more-
- JanforGore
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- 1 year ago
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Now you sea it now you don't: watch Arctic ice melt
Video Credit: NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center Scientific Visualization Studio
One of the most striking changes that has taken place in the Arctic since the start of satellite monitoring in 1979 is the rapid decline of the perennial sea ice cover. This ice is the sea ice that survives the summer melt season, and is typically the thickest part of the sea ice cover, sometimes spanning several years. Sea ice extent has declined as the globe has warmed, but the ice cover has thinned as well. Thinner sea ice melts more easily, and as multiyear sea ice is lost, Arctic sea ice has declined more rapidly.
This NASA visualization shows the perennial Arctic sea ice cover from 1980 to 2012. The grey disk at the North Pole indicates the region where no satellite data is collected. A graph overlay shows the area's size measured in million square kilometers for each year. The '1980', '2008,' and '2012' data points are highlighted on the graph.Video Credit: NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center Scientific Visualization Studio One... more-
- JanforGore
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- 1 year ago
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Biorhythms: Presidential candidates betray Americans on climate change
"Presidential" candidates of the two party system we have in place are perpetuating a climate catastrophe by not addressing it in their campaigns. As Americans we need to be demanding more openness, truth and transparency regarding this crisis that scientists have been warning us about for over thirty years, the effects of which we are now seeing globally particularly in the Arctic. Our voices must hold them accountable regardless of the letter after their names. We all have to share this planet. This is not about Democrats and Republicans, this is about humanity."Presidential" candidates of the two party system we have in place are... more-
- JanforGore
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- 1 year ago
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Sex Television 5 ft DJ Mona-Lisa
"Life and death are in the hands of sex." Watch this highly accredited video ft radio broadcaster, DJ Mona-Lisa: Sex discussion on a highly intellectual and spiritual level. http://youtu.be/tF6uq8LUcLw"Life and death are in the hands of sex." Watch this highly accredited video... more-
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Arctic sea ice may have passed crucial tipping point
The disappearance of Arctic sea ice has crossed a "tipping point" that could soon make ice-free summers a regular feature across most of the Arctic Ocean, says a British climate scientist who is setting up an early warning system for dangerous climate tipping points.
Tim Lenton at the University of Exeter has carried out a day-by-day assessment of Arctic ice-cover data collected since satellite observation began in 1979. He presented his hotly anticipated findings for the first time at the Planet Under Pressure conference in London on Monday.
Up until 2007, sea ice systematically fluctuated between extensive cover in winter and lower cover in summer. But since then, says Lenton, the difference between winter and summer ice cover has been a million square kilometres greater than it was before, as a result of unprecedented summer melting. These observations are in contrast to what models predict should have happened.
Permanent alteration
Despite fears of runaway sea-ice loss after summer cover hit an all-time low in 2007 – opening the Northwest Passage for the first time in living memory – modelling studies based on our best understanding of ice dynamics indicated the ice cover should fully recover each winter. "They suggest that even if the ice declined a large amount in one year, it should bounce back," says Walt Meier of the US National Snow and Ice Data Center in Boulder, Colorado.
Instead, Lenton's research shows a permanent alteration. According to data from the past five years, the Arctic sea ice has not recovered from the 2007 extreme low. "The system has passed a tipping point," he says.
What caused the change is still unclear. Lenton speculates that the exceptional low in 2007 (pictured, above right) might have allowed the ocean to absorb so much heat that a lot of the thicker multiyear ice, which used to persist through the summer, was melted. Alternatively, the loss of ice may have changed air circulation patterns above the Arctic in ways that have similarly "locked in" the change.
More at the linkThe disappearance of Arctic sea ice has crossed a "tipping point" that could... more-
- JanforGore
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Article: Rio 20 overlooking population-maybe?
is population going to be off the table at Rio?-
- frankpatton
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- 1 year ago
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Emissions set to rise by 50% by 2050-OECD
* Fossils seen supplying 85 pct of energy demand in 2050
* Financial, human and biodiversity costs all huge
* CO2 cut, global CO2 mkt delays make 2 degree limit harder
By Nina Chestney
LONDON, March 15 (Reuters) - Global greenhouse gas emissions could rise 50 percent by 2050 without more ambitious climate policies, as fossil fuels continue to dominate the energy mix, the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) said on Thursday.
"Unless the global energy mix changes, fossil fuels will supply about 85 percent of energy demand in 2050, implying a 50 percent increase in greenhouse gas emissions and worsening urban air pollution," the OECD said in its environment outlook to 2050.
The global economy in 2050 will be four times larger than today and the world will use around 80 percent more energy.
But the global energy mix is not predicted to be very different from that of today, the report said.
Fossil fuels such as oil, coal and gas will make up 85 percent of energy sources. Renewables, including biofuels, are forecast to make up 10 percent and nuclear the rest.
Due to such dependence on fossils, carbon dioxide emissions from energy use are expected to grow by 70 percent, the OECD said, which will help drive up the global average temperature by 3 to 6 degrees Celsius by 2100 - exceeding the internationally agreed warming limit of within 2 degrees.
Global carbon dioxide emissions from energy reached an all-time high of 30.6 gigatonnes in 2010, despite the economic downturn which reduced industrial production.
COST OF INACTION
The financial cost of taking no further climate action could result in up to a 14 percent loss in world per capita consumption by 2050, according to some estimates.
Human costs would also be high as premature deaths from pollution exposure could double to 3.6 million a year, the OECD said.
Demand for water could rise by 55 percent, increasing competition for supplies and resulting in 40 percent of the global population living in water-stressed areas, while plant and animal species could decline by a further 10 percent.
To prevent the worst effects of global warming, international climate action should start in 2013, a global carbon market be set up, the energy sector transformed to low carbon and all low-cost advanced technologies should be explored such as biomass energy and carbon capture.
However, a new international climate deal might not come into force until 2020 and carbon markets not linked until then, making it harder to achieve the 2 degree limit and requiring very rapid rates of emissions cuts after 2020 to catch up.
Current international emissions cut pledges fall short of what is required to limit temperature rises to safe levels so decisive action at the national level is needed, the OECD said.
More at the link* Fossils seen supplying 85 pct of energy demand in 2050 * Financial, human and... more-
- JanforGore
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- 1 year ago
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Dr. James Hansen's Must See TED Talk: Starting To Reduce CO2 In 10 Years Is Too Late
“It would be immoral to leave these young people with a climate system spiraling out of control.”
by Dan Miller
NASA climate scientist James Hansen gave a talk at the TED conference in Long Beach, CA on February 29th where he laid out the case for taking urgent action to reduce greenhouse emissions.
Dr. Hansen’s talk began by describing his personal journey, originally studying Venus under Prof. James Van Allen and then working at NASA on an instrument to study Venus’ atmosphere. But after being asked to do some calculations of Earth’s greenhouse effect, Dr. Hansen resigned from the Venus mission to work full time studying Earth’s atmosphere “because a planet changing before our eyes is more interesting and important – its changes will affect all humanity.”
Dr. Hansen and some colleagues published a 1981 paper in Science Magazine that concluded that “observed warming of 0.4C in the prior century was consistent with the greenhouse effect of increasing CO2, — that Earth would likely warm in the 1980s, — and warming would exceed the noise level of random weather by the end of the century. We also said that the 21st century would see shifting climate zones, creation of drought prone regions in North America and Asia, erosion of ice sheets, rising sea levels, and opening of the fabled Northwest passage. All of these impacts have since either happened or are now well underway.”
Dr. Hansen went on to explain that, after speaking out for the need for an energy policy that would address climate change, the White House contacted NASA and Dr. Hansen was ordered to not speak to the media without permission. After informing the New York Times about the situation, the censorship was lifted and Dr. Hansen continued to speak out, justifying his actions with the first line of NASA’s Mission Statement’: “To understand and protect the home planet”. But there were consequences… the reference to the home planet was soon struck from NASA’s Mission Statement, never to return.
Dr. Hansen then went on to describe some of the recent science, including a detailed look at the Earth’s energy imbalance that was made possible by data from 3000 “Argo” floats that measure ocean temperature at different depths. Dr. Hansen said that the current imbalance of 0.6 watts/square meter (which does not include the energy already used to cause the current warming of 0.8°C) was equivalent to exploding 400,000 Hiroshima atomic bombs every day, 365 days per year.
Favorite denier myths such as “it’s the Sun” and “CO2 lags temperature” were addressed by Dr. Hansen and shown to be wrong or irrelevant. He also discussed how amplifying feedbacks in the past took small changes in temperature due to slight changes in the Earth’s orbit and either initiated or ended ice ages. He then said these same amplifying feedbacks will occur today if we do not stop the warming. ”The physics does not change.”
Besides the impacts that are already occurring, Dr. Hansen said that if we do not stop the warming, we should expect sea levels to rise this century by 1 to 5 meters (3 to 18 feet), extinction of 20 to 50% of species, and massive droughts later this century. He said that the recent Texas heat wave, Moscow’s heat wave the year before, and the 2003 heat wave in Europe we “exceptional” events that now occur 25 to 50 times more often than just 50 years ago. Therefore, he concluded, we can say with high confidence that these heat waves were “caused” by global warming.
More at the link“It would be immoral to leave these young people with a climate system spiraling... more-
- JanforGore
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- 1 year ago
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Himalayan sherpas lament climate change devastation
Climate change is altering the face of the Himalayas, devastating farming communities and making Mount Everest increasingly treacherous to climb, some of the world's top mountaineers have warned.
Apa Sherpa, the Nepali climber who has conquered Mount Everest a record 21 times, said he was disturbed by the lack of snow on the world's highest peak, caused by rising temperatures.
"In 1989 when I first climbed Everest there was a lot of snow and ice but now most of it has just become bare rock. That, as a result, is causing more rockfalls which is a danger to the climbers," he told AFP.
"Also, climbing is becoming more difficult because when you are on a mountain you can wear crampons but it's very dangerous and very slippery to walk on bare rock with crampons."
Speaking after completing the first third of a gruelling 1,700-kilometre (1,100-mile) trek across the Himalayas, Apa Sherpa would not rule out the possibility of Everest being unclimbable in the coming years.
"What will happen in the future I cannot say but this much I can say from my own experiences -- it has changed a lot," he said an an interview with AFP in the village of Gati, 16 kilometres from Nepal's border with Tibet.
The 51-year-old father-of-three, dubbed "Super Sherpa", began his working life as a farmer but turned to the tourism industry and mountaineering after he lost all his possessions when a glacial lake burst in 1985.
He is on a 120-day walk dubbed the Climate Smart Celebrity Trek with another of the world's top climbers, Nepali Dawa Steven Sherpa, with the pair expected to reach the finish on May 13.
The expedition, the first official hike along the length of Nepal's Great Himalayan Trail since it opened last year, will take in some of the world's most rugged landscapes and see the duo ascending beyond 6,000 metres (19,600 feet).
"I want to understand the impact of climate change on other people but also I'd like tourism to play a roll in changing their lives as it has changed mine," said Apa Sherpa.
Research published by the Kathmandu-based International Centre for Integrated Mountain Development (ICIMOD) last year showed Nepal's glaciers had shrunk by 21 percent over 30 years.
A three-year research project led by ICIMOD showed 10 glaciers surveyed in the region all are shrinking, with a marked acceleration in loss of ice between 2002 and 2005.
Scientists say the effects of climate change could be devastating, as the Himalayas provide food and energy for 1.3 billion people living in downstream river basins.
Environmental campaigners refer to the mountain range as the "third pole" and say the melting glaciers are the biggest potential contributors to rising sea levels after the North and South Poles.
Scientists blame confusion and scepticism over climate change on a blunder in a 2007 United Nations report which falsely claimed that the Himalayan glaciers would disappear by as soon as 2035.
On the ground, however, mountain communities are already alarmed by dramatic shifts in weather patterns, two-time Everest summiteer Dawa Steven Sherpa told AFP as he and Apa completed the first 530 kilometres of their trek.
"Right from the beginning we saw the effects of climate change on tea plantations in Ilam district," he said.
"These areas would not normally get frost and it is destroying their entire crop. These are cash crops that employ thousands of people, even on one farm.
"From what the local people are saying, it's getting colder in the winter and hotter in the summer and it is the cold they are worried about."Climate change is altering the face of the Himalayas, devastating farming communities... more-
- JanforGore
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A Speculative Look into the Existence of Scientific Evidence for Life after Death
For millennia, empirical science has focused greatly on origin rather than destination in regards to understanding life. The latter has been reserved for religious superstitions and philosophy for the most part. In the spiritual traditions, the existence of life beyond our physical reality has perpetrated all. Worlds beyond this one, operating under what appears to be different laws, or a lack thereof, in reality are described. Any attempt to observe and identify the existence - let alone characteristics - of such other realities or experiences scientifically until the past century has been miniscule and insufficient at best.
Breakthroughs and major advancements in biology, chemistry, psychology, and neurology have led to science becoming capable of observing what occurs near and precisely at the time of death in various fields as well as during what are referred to as out of body experiences. Thus, new ideas and philosophical theories about what begins our transition into the afterlife have developed as a result. Such ideas have begun to reshape conventional wisdom when it comes to rationally considering the age-old mythical philosophies of consciousness and life. The Quantum Theory has begun to completely reshape our perspective of reality, paving the way for all new kinds of speculation on various aspects of it.
When studied separately, most of these findings seem to lead to nowhere other than further investigation into the natural processes that make up our physical, material reality. This paper will attempt to tie together scientific evidence that has been discovered with philosophies and concepts of consciousness to conceptualize a unique perspective on what the afterlife may be and how processes that occur here in this world at the time of death open the doors to it.
Continue at: http://scopicthoughts.blogspot.com/2012/02/speculative-look-into-existence-of.html?spref=twFor millennia, empirical science has focused greatly on origin rather than destination... more-
- JRBarilla
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Road to Damascus… and on to Armageddon? - Know faces of Syrian people being targeted by Imperialists
“Western politicians and media are not yet fighting World War III, but they are talking themselves into it.” What if pollsters put this question to citizens of the United States and the European Union : “Which is more important, ensuring disgruntled Islamists freedom to overthrow the secular regime in Syria, or avoiding World War Three?” ----------- I’ll bet that there might be a majority for avoiding World War III. ----------- But of course, the question is never framed like that. ------------ Who are Obama&Clinton's advisers? US&allies trying to destroy Syria&create a failed state.Whose interests do they repr?--- Media tends to depersonalize Syrians, unless they're opponents of "brutal Assad regime". Hope my images correct this. Know faces of Syrian people being targeted by militia,Al-Qaeda,Brit & Qatari forces http://www.makeahistory.com/index.php/recent-news/43055-road-to-damascus-and-on-to-armageddon-know-faces-of-syrian-people-being-targeted-by-imperialists-“Western politicians and media are not yet fighting World War III, but they are... more-
- worrg
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Degenerates Rule America
We now live in extraordinarily dangerous times in America. A majority of primary voters support three out of the four remaining Republican candidates for President who believe that the U.S. government may commit acts of aggression and start wars against foreign peoples who were of no threat to us, and who want to use the power of government and police to impose various social views onto others. Only Ron Paul wants to legalize freedom in America, and wants to end our government’s aggressions abroad.
In a recent article on LewRockwell(dot)com, human rights advocate William Grigg highlighted an Iraq War veteran who can’t comprehend that people in foreign countries don’t like invaders and occupiers on their lands, and why they try to defend themselves, their families and their territories from the U.S. military aggressors.
This veteran is like most Americans, apparently, who believe in American “exceptionalism,” in which our government may commit aggressions and trespass on foreign territories, including placing its military bases there despite the objections of the actual people living there, but foreign governments may not trespass on American lands.
For a century the ruling regime in Washington has abandoned the rule of law, and has acted aggressively overseas and provoked foreigners and murdered countless innocents. They have gotten away with their crimes via rationalization and manipulative, emotionalistic propaganda. Currently, Washington’s degenerate rulers are claiming, falsely, that Iran is a “threat,” despite Iran being surrounded on all sides.
But Americans have naively believed the propaganda, as they did with Iraq.
The professional career politicians and bureaucrats have thus been making Americans less safe and more vulnerable because of the blowback of their government’s own aggressions.
Such a narcissistic attitude of the aforementioned exceptionalist-minded veteran is contrary to the American Declaration of Independence. The Declaration asserts “that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.”
By “men,” the Declaration is really referring to all of humankind, and that all human beings are created equal, and have an inherent right as human beings to life, liberty and the right to sustain and protect their lives.
I think the narcissistic exceptionalists want to suggest that only Americans have a right to life and liberty, but not foreigners. Many people are just incapable of seeing a situation from the point of view of those outside their own personal territories. Believe it or not, the millions of people of Iraq and Afghanistan – the civilians who are just trying to live their lives and who have nothing to do with terrorism – see our government as an invading aggressor (which it is) and for the past ten years they have been trying to defend their lives, families, homes, businesses and sovereignty.
A comparison regarding the self-centered exceptionalists can be made with an entirely unrelated subject, the same-sex marriage issue, which has been in the news again. It is hypocritical of the Republicans and conservatives to object to President Obama’s forbidding private institutions from opting out of the birth control/abortion mandate, while those same opponents support governmental forbiddances of private marital contracts to occur.
Now, if you believe that you own your own life (as opposed to your neighbors' or the State owning your life), and that you have a right to establish voluntary contracts with anyone else who is also doing so voluntarily, then you have a right to have a marital contract with whomever you want, as long as it’s voluntary, and it’s nobody else’s business.
If it’s none of your neighbors’ business, then it’s none of the government’s business, I like to say.
But if you believe that the State owns you or that your neighbors own you, then you agree with regressive neanderthals that the neighbors and/or the State should have the power to control your private contract-making decisions, and your private relationships and associations. And thus they should dictate to you whom you may or may not marry.
Selfish collectivists and communitarian reactionaries believe in the latter example of collective/State ownership of the individual and one’s private relationships and contracts.
And the same goes for the exceptionalists who believe that they have a right to seize ownership of the lives and property of innocent human beings in Iraq or Iran who have harmed no one. Selfish, narcissistic exceptionalists believe that they have a right to break into the private homes and businesses of foreigners, search and ransack them, and assault, beat, torture and murder their people and get away with it.
That is the primitivism to which America has sunk over the past century, thanks to criminal politicians from Wilson and FDR to Bush and Obama, and the dumbed-down, submissive, gullible and subservient sheeple who support them.
America is characterized now by a severe moral decay and massive, widespread corruption, from banksters and foreclosure fraudsters, to drug-warrior police Nazis on the take, college and high school students and teachers in widespread cheating scandals, FDA and Big Pharma corruption, and TSA perverts and child molesters.
And now, Obama has encouraged local police departments to hire Iraq and Afghanistan War veterans to continue the growing militarization of the police. (It is reassuring that many police departments are only hiring those of lower intelligence levels!) They need their degenerate neanderthal S.W.A.T raids to further terrorize, assault and murder innocent civilians, in order to enforce laws by the nanny State which dictate to private individuals what chemicals they may or may not consume into their own bodies (which the State owns, of course).
And thank goodness Obama has signed into law the National Defense Authorization Act that now includes giving the military (and probably any armed agent of government, including local police) the power to arrest and detain indefinitely any civilian American for any reason according to what the President says, without charges, without evidence brought forward against the accused. (I feel safer now.)
It looks like Dick Cheney and Barack Obama have taken some lessons from the new Sharia-ruling Iraqi regime, as well as the repressive Iranian government, on how to treat their own people. But make sure everyone marries only those the government permits you to marry, and make sure that everyone must support and pay for someone else’s abortion.
Degenerates rule America. (Is there any way to correct this situation?)
http://www.activistpost.com/2012/02/degenerates-rule-america.htmlWe now live in extraordinarily dangerous times in America. A majority of primary... more-
- Anonmaly
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Expectations vs Reality (12 pics)
Expectations vs Reality (12 pics) -
DJ Mona-Lisa (Chariots of Fire) ft Skyscraper by Demi Lavato
Famous broadcaster, DJ Mona-Lisa features hit single, Skyscraper by Demi Lavato as she calls on her God to save herself and family... a rampant stalker seeks to completely destroy her. Motivational video portraying beautiful photos of a woman who refuses to become dormant: http://youtu.be/-yoi2K0ALO0Famous broadcaster, DJ Mona-Lisa features hit single, Skyscraper by Demi Lavato as she... more-
- DJMonaLisa
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