tagged w/ Current News Brazil
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WASHINGTON (CNN) -- As President Obama presses the House and Senate to finalize their own versions of health care reform, the real battle over the issue is just heating up -- and it's about to get very personal.
From Jim Acosta
CNNWASHINGTON (CNN) -- As President Obama presses the House and Senate to finalize their... more
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Children and adults at risk of permanent hearing loss due to repeated exposure to loud music would turn down the sound or use ear protection if told to do so by a health care professional, a new Vanderbilt study performed in conjunction with MTV.com shows.
The study “Intentional Exposure to Loud Music: The 2nd MTV.com Survey Reveals an Opportunity to Educate,” from Vanderbilt’s Roland Eavey, M.D., is being released today in the Journal of Pediatrics.
By Craig Boerner,Children and adults at risk of permanent hearing loss due to repeated exposure to loud... more
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Betsy Smith and her husband, Robert El, have lived on Court Street for more than 20 years, and in all that time they thought their street near Martin Luther King Boulevard in Newark was zoned residential. They started to wonder one day recently when they saw workers on the roof of a commercial garage next door to their home.
by Barry Carter/Star-Ledger ColumnistBetsy Smith and her husband, Robert El, have lived on Court Street for more than 20... more
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BOGOTÁ, Colombia — Like most thoroughfares in booming cities of the developing world, Bogotá’s Seventh Avenue resembles a noisy, exhaust-coated parking lot — a gluey tangle of cars and the rickety, smoke-puffing private minibuses that have long provided transportation for the masses.
By ELISABETH ROSENTHAL
The New York TimesBOGOTÁ, Colombia — Like most thoroughfares in booming cities of the developing... more
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UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon has criticised leaders of the G8 industrial nations for failing to make deeper commitments to combat climate change.
Ban Ki-moon: "The policies stated so far are not enough"
By BBC News UKUN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon has criticised leaders of the G8 industrial nations... more
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Air fresheners, disinfectants, and cleaners found under your sink are more dangerous than you think.
By Staff , Sustain Lane.Air fresheners, disinfectants, and cleaners found under your sink are more dangerous... more
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Rua XV de Novembro
We've already written about Curitiba's great Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) system, but that's not all the Brazilian city has to teach us. Our friends at StreetFilms write: "In 1972 under the direction of then Mayor Jaime Lerner, it became the first major pedestrian street in Brazil. The first phase of closing the street took place in only 72 hours. At first the project was unpopular, but today is seen as a success and spans 15 blocks." Check out the video at the link above!Rua XV de Novembro
We've already written about Curitiba's great Bus Rapid Transit... more
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"Electric Vehicles" Mostly Means Electric Bikes, So Far...
Petrobras, the semi-public Brazilian oil giant (the government of Brazil owns 55.7% of Petrobras' common shares with voting rights), has just built the first of what it hopes will be many electric charging stations. It is located in the Barra de Tijuca neighbourhood of Rio de Janeiro because that area has the most electric motorcycles and bikes in circulation in the country.
by Michael Graham Richard, Ottawa, Canada"Electric Vehicles" Mostly Means Electric Bikes, So Far...
Petrobras, the semi-public... more
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Saving Fuel, Cleaning Up the Air, Reducing Traffic
Six new hybrid double deck buses will provide service on Route 141 in London.
by Michael Graham Richard, Ottawa, CanadaSaving Fuel, Cleaning Up the Air, Reducing Traffic
Six new hybrid double deck buses... more
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It sounds big, but it just isn't enough. Leaders of the G8 industrial nations meeting in Italy this week are likely to agree that the world must cut greenhouse gas emissions by 50 per cent by 2050. That means cuts of 80 per cent among the rich nations.
They will say that this is essential to keep global warming below 2 °C - widely regarded as the tipping point beyond which scary global feedbacks could wreck the climate system that keeps us fed and watered.
Sorry, guys, but this is scientifically illiterate. We might be lucky: if the atmosphere is less sensitive to those gases than most scientists suppose, it could be enough to keep us below 2 degrees, for a while at least. But the best estimate is that the world needs at least 80 per cent cuts in global emissions, and probably more like 100 per cent, to stay below two degrees.
The smart talk back at the climate lab is about negative emissions. We may need to construct a planetary air-conditioning system to keep us cool by sucking carbon dioxide out of the air.
Now I have been writing about climate change since the mid-1980s, when it was not much more than a scary thought among a few atmospheric chemists. Even at the end of the 80s, insiders say Greenpeace decided not to launch a campaign on climate change because they were not sure about the science.
So I am amazed at how far the world has come since, in admitting the need to control the emissions of gases fundamental to our economies. I know the 1997 Kyoto protocol was a bit of a damp squib, with the US bailing out and everyone else taking their cue. But even to be talking about 50 per cent emissions cuts today is, from the historical perspective, dazzling politics.
The trouble is the science has moved on even faster. The planet is not waiting for the diplomats. Climate chaos is coming down the tracks fast.
Even a decade ago, most scientists figured that we could probably cope with doubling the levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere from pre-industrial levels. That is, going from 275 parts per million to 550 ppm. Right now, we are at approaching 390 ppm and pushing up by around 2 ppm a year. So it seemed that we had a bit of time.
But five years ago, with growing concern about climate tipping points, scientists began to see 450 ppm as the threshold we should not exceed. That's a lot closer. We will be there in 30 years.
And more recently the talk has been about 350 ppm. In other words, because of the timelags involved in the whole global warming process, we will need to lower concentrations of greenhouse gases to below where they are now.
Either that or we may face the rapid breakup of the Greenland ice sheet, runaway African droughts, drowned cities and oceans so acid they dissolve coral reefs. As the cover story of New Scientist magazine eloquently put it last week: "It's worse than we thought".
But I won't despair when the G8 leaders walk away basking in the glow of having made a strong statement on climate change. Despair isn't really an option. And there is good news.
The White House is listening to its chief scientist, Nobel prize-winning energy campaigner Steve Chu, who certainly gets it. He tells Americans they will have to abandon California to the desert if they don't act fast. He and Obama believe there can be a worldwide revolution in how we generate energy: a low-carbon revolution within a generation.
I believe that too. There are tipping points in human society, as well as the climate system. But will we reach ours in time to prevent nature going over the edge? That I don't know.It sounds big, but it just isn't enough. Leaders of the G8 industrial nations meeting... more
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US researchers have proposed a new strategy to tackle the global climate dilemma: target the biggest polluters in a country, who also tend to be the wealthiest individuals.
Under the framework, a universal cap — rather than different caps for different countries — would be placed on carbon emissions and countries would then be tasked with getting individuals living beyond that cap to reduce their carbon footprint.
“Most of the world’s emissions come disproportionately from the wealthy citizens of the world, irrespective of their nationality,” said lead author Shoibal Chakravarty, a research scholar at the Princeton Environmental Institute.
“We estimate that in 2008, half of the world’s emissions came from just 700 million people,” he added, noting that many emissions owe to lifestyles that involve airplane flights, car use and the heating and cooling of large homes.US researchers have proposed a new strategy to tackle the global climate dilemma:... more
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In their heart of hearts, few in the Obama administration would have predicted late last year that they would be this well positioned by June to achieve a major victory on health care. As the economy tanked, and attention focused on Wall Street and Detroit, it seemed unthinkable that Congress would be ready to devote the summer of 2009 to the costly proposition of providing health coverage for all, a goal that has eluded presidents since Theodore Roosevelt.
http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/people/r/theodore_roosevelt/index.html?inline=nyt-per
By KEVIN SACKIn their heart of hearts, few in the Obama administration would have predicted late... more
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Amazon Watch joined fourteen human rights and environmental organizations in urging the United States to take immediate steps towards addressing recent political violence in Peru. The Peruvian Government's actions to quell two months of nonviolent protests by Amazonian indigenous communities have resulted in numerous deaths of both indigenous protesters and police and hundreds injured.
The protests are against the passage of controversial "legislative decrees", new laws created by Peruvian President Alan Garcia purportedly to implement the US-Peru Trade Promotion Agreement (TPA).
Today, a coalition of 15 environmental and human rights organizations is making public a letter sent last Friday to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and other high-level Obama Administration officials as well as key members of Congress, requesting that the U.S. Government immediately issue a formal response as to whether Peru would jeopardize the US-Peru TPA by repealing the contested decrees.
"The Garcia Administration has insisted that repealing the decrees would mortally wound the free trade agreement, opting for heavy-handed measures against protesters instead of good-faith dialogue." said Andrew Miller of Amazon Watch. "By clarifying the U.S. position on these decrees, the Obama Administration could help create the needed political space for a real dialogue between the Peruvian government and the Amazonian indigenous federation AIDESEP."
Last Thursday, the Peruvian Congress issued a 90-day suspension of legislative decrees 1090 and 1064, with the stated purpose of restoring dialogue with indigenous communities. However, the indigenous movement is demanding revocation of the decrees and is rejecting Congress's suspension as inadequate.
Beyond the indigenous federations, Peruvian legal scholars and Congressional committees have questioned the constitutionality of many of the controversial degrees. Congressional members of President Garcia's APRA party have maneuvered repeatedly to block discussions of the decrees' constitutionality on the floor of Congress.
"Whether or not the U.S. intended it, the reality is that the U.S.-Peru Trade Agreement gave license to the Garcia Administration to roll back indigenous rights and has contributed to increasing social conflict and human rights abuses in Peru," said Amazon Watch's Andrew Miller. "The Obama administration should send a clear signal that it is not willing to accept the erosion of democracy, stability, and human rights in pursuit of free trade."
The signatories to the letter urge the United States Government to call for Peru to respect indigenous peoples' rights as established in the Peruvian Constitution, ILO Convention 169, and the United Nations Declaration of the Rights of Indigenous Peoples.
end of excerptAmazon Watch joined fourteen human rights and environmental organizations in urging... more
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I think most people are waking up to this fact. And here is another reason why we need single payer to avoid the health care insurers.I think most people are waking up to this fact. And here is another reason why we need... more
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My birthday's coming up towards the end o' the month. On April 30th my health insurance company sent me a lovely letter to let me know that to celebrate my big day they'd decided to up my premium by $35 from $191 to $226 starting July 1st.
Then, a month later, they sent me another letter explaining that they were raising my premium again, this time by a hefty $65, just because they can, you know, for the hell of it. What a gift!
That's a total premium increase of $100 effective July 1st.
Think about that. My premium was $191. It's going up to $291. That's an increase of over 50% in one year.
Can you think of any other product or service that's gone up by more than 50% this year? In this economy? Have health care costs increased by that much in the last twelve months? Really?
What do I want for my birthday? Universal health care please Mr. Obama.
Otherwise I can't afford to get any older.My birthday's coming up towards the end o' the month. On April 30th my health... more
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BBC World Service Presents - The Noisy Ape!
A look into today's noisy culture and its consequences to human life in the planet.
Manufacturing CD and MP3 players, radios, TV sets and all the rest of modern sound technology is big business, but there is just as much money to be made from fighting noise: noise-cancelling headphones, ear plugs and white-noise CDs all sell well.BBC World Service Presents - The Noisy Ape!
A look into today's noisy culture and... more
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BBC World Service Presents - The Noisy Ape!
A look into today's noisy culture and its consequences to human life in the planet.
In the town of Richmond, Virginia, a long-drawn battle is going on. On one side are lovers of boom cars and loud exhausts, on the other people who defend their right to quiet in their own homes.BBC World Service Presents - The Noisy Ape!
A look into today's noisy culture and... more
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BBC World Service Presents - The Noisy Ape!
A look into today's noisy culture and its consequences to human life in the planet.
Mankind has spent the entire last century making itself louder. A great deal louder. But why? And what are the consequences?BBC World Service Presents - The Noisy Ape!
A look into today's noisy culture and... more
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must admit that the nightmares I have about Burger King's regally creepy mascot already leave a bad taste in my mouth. But if the fast food industry's most famous underdogs are really taking a stand against global warming science, I'm breaking up with the oh-so-delicious Whopper for good. And I mean it this time.
Businesses usually don't court political controversy, but signs at (at least) two Memphis Burger King locations read: "Global Warming is Baloney." According to one employee at the Burger King on Union Avenue and Pauline, that's no mistake.
Care to eavesdrop on my incredibly strange conversation with a female BK employee who didn't identify herself? Read on.
Me: Hi, I'm calling from the Flyer about your sign. Does Burger King really think global warming is baloney?
BK: [Hangup]
Me:(calling back): Your sign out front says global warming is baloney.
BK: I don't see that sir.
Me: Well it does.
BK: I don't see that sir... I change the signs and that sign's been up for a week.
Me: Well, I have pictures that I took this afternoon [cross conversation ensuring I'm calling the correct BK. I am]
Me: So there's no question that your sign said it and so did one in Midtown. I want to know if it was on purpose or if it was a prank someone pulled on you.
BK: Let me get the manager. [several minutes of dead air then the same or very similar voice picks up.]
BK: Who were you holding for?
Me: A manager, about the sign. I have pictures of the sign and people have called me upset. I just want to know if it's a mistake or not so I can report it. [rehash of previous conversation]
BK: Let me go outside and look at the sign and I'll call you right back. [[phone rings, I answer]
BK: The sign was put up yesterday.
Me: And it's not a mistake?
BK: No.
Me: It reflects the opinion of BK international?
BK: Yes. Would you like to talk to the home office? I can give you a number.
Me: I've got the number, I've already contacted them. Thanks.
When it comes to climate change, BK doesn't have the best reputation. Climatecounts.org, a not-for-profit organization that rates companies based on attitudes toward global warming, describes Burger King as "A choice to avoid for the climate-conscious shopper." But there's certainly more to this story, and we'll let readers know what's up when we hear back from BK HQ.
And shouldn't the people who make lunch meat — the blue collar alternative to dining out — be miffed?must admit that the nightmares I have about Burger King's regally creepy mascot... more
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