Strength from Grief

SUBHEAD: For Aborigines healing from trauma is a cultural and spiritual process tied to land.

By B. Williamson, J. Weir & V. Cavanagh on 23 Jan 2020 in Yes! -
(https://www.yesmagazine.org/environment/2020/01/23/australia-bushfire-aboriginal/)


Image above: Group of Australian aborigines who practice land management. From original article.

How do you support people forever attached to a landscape after an inferno tears through their homelands: decimating native food sources, burning through ancient scarred trees, and destroying ancestral and totemic plants and animals?

The fact is, the experience of Aboriginal peoples in the fire crisis engulfing much of Australia is vastly different from that of non-Indigenous peoples.

Colonial legacies of eradication, dispossession, assimilation, and racism continue to affect the lived realities of Aboriginal peoples. Added to this is the widespread exclusion of our peoples from accessing and managing traditional homelands. These factors compound the trauma of these unprecedented fires.

As Australia picks up the pieces from these fires, it’s more important than ever to understand the unique grief that Aboriginal peoples experience. Only through this understanding can effective strategies be put in place to support our communities to recover.

Perpetual grief

Aboriginal peoples live with a sense of perpetual grief. It stems from the as-yet-unresolved matter of the invasion and subsequent colonization of our homelands.

While many instances of colonial trauma were inflicted upon Aboriginal peoples—including the removal of children and the suppression of culture, ceremony, and language—dispossession of Country remains paramount. Dispossessing people of their lands is a hallmark of colonization.

Australian laws have changed to partially return Aboriginal peoples’ lands and waters, and Aboriginal people have made their best efforts to advocate for more effective management of Country. But despite this, most of our peoples have been consigned to the margins in managing our homelands.

Aboriginal people have watched on and been ignored as homelands have been mismanaged and neglected.

Oliver Costello is chief executive of Firesticks Alliance, an Indigenous-led network that aims to reinvigorate cultural burning. As he puts it:

Since colonization, many Indigenous people have been removed from their land, and their cultural fire management practices have been constrained by authorities, informed by Western views of fire and land management.

In this way, settler-colonialism is not historical, but a lived experience. And the growing reality of climate change adds to these anxieties.

It’s also important to recognize that our people grieve not only for our communities, but for our nonhuman relations. Aboriginal peoples’ cultural identity comes from the land.

As such, Aboriginal cultural lives and livelihoods continue to be tied to the land, including landscape features such as waterholes, valleys, and mountains, as well as native animals and plants.

The decimation caused by the fires deeply affects the existence of Aboriginal peoples and, in the most severely hit areas, threatens Aboriginal groups as distinct cultural beings attached to the land. As The Guardian’s Indigenous affairs editor Lorena Allam recently wrote:

Like you, I’ve watched in anguish and horror as fire lays waste to precious Yuin land, taking everything with it—lives, homes, animals, trees—but for First Nations people, it is also burning up our memories, our sacred places, all the things which make us who we are.


Image above: native Australians protest in support of their sovereignty. From original article.

For Aboriginal people then, who live with the trauma of dispossession and neglect and now, the trauma of catastrophic fire, our grief is immeasurably different from that of non-Indigenous people.

Bushfire recovery must consider culture

As we come to terms with the fires’ devastation, Australia must turn its gaze to recovery. The field of community recovery offers valuable insights into how groups of people can come together and move forward after disasters.

But an examination of research and commentary in this area reveals how poorly non-Indigenous Australia (and indeed, the international field of community recovery) understands the needs of Aboriginal people.

The definition of “community” is not explicitly addressed, and thus is taken as a single socio-cultural group of people.

But research in Australia and overseas has demonstrated that for Aboriginal people, healing from trauma—whether historical or contemporary—is a cultural and spiritual process, and inherently tied to land.

The culture-neutral standpoint in community recovery research as yet does not acknowledge these differences. Without considering the historical, political, and cultural contexts that continue to define the lives of Aboriginal peoples, responses to the crisis may be inadequate and inappropriate.

Resilience in the face of ongoing trauma

The long-term effects of colonization has meant Aboriginal communities are (for better or worse) accustomed to living with catastrophic changes to their societies and lands, adjusting and adapting to keep functioning.

Experts consider these resilience traits as integral for communities to survive and recover from natural disasters.

In this way, the resilience of Aboriginal communities fashioned through centuries of colonization, coupled with adequate support, means Aboriginal communities in fire-affected areas are well placed to not only recover, but to do so quickly.

This is a salient lesson for agencies and other non-government organizations entrusted to lead the disaster recovery process.

The community characteristics that enable effective and timely community recovery, such as close social links and shared histories, already exist in the Aboriginal communities affected.

Moving forward

The agency in charge of leading the recovery in bushfire-affected areas must begin respectfully and appropriately. And they must be equipped with the basic knowledge of our peoples’ different circumstances.

It’s important to note this isn’t “special treatment.” Instead, it recognizes that policy and practice must be fit-for-purpose and, at the very least, not do further harm.

If agencies and non-government organizations responsible for leading the recovery from these fires aren’t well-prepared, they risk inflicting new trauma on Aboriginal communities.

The National Disability Insurance Agency offers an example of how to engage with Aboriginal people in culturally sensitive ways. This includes thinking about Country, culture, and community, and working with each community’s values and customs to establish respectful, trusting relationships.

The new bushfire recovery agency must use a similar strategy. This would acknowledge both the historical experiences of Aboriginal peoples and our inherent strengths as communities that have not only survived, but remain connected to our homelands.

In this way, perhaps the bushfire crisis might have some positive longer-term outcomes, opening new doors to collaboration with Aboriginal people, drawing on our strengths and values, and prioritizing our unique interests.


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Australian Apocalypse

SUBHEAD: A vet's hellish diary of climate change. Cattle have stopped breeding, koalas die of thirst.

By Gundi Rhoades on 26 December s029 for Sidney Morning Herald -
(https://www.smh.com.au/environment/climate-change/cattle-have-stopped-breeding-koalas-die-of-thirst-a-vet-s-hellish-diary-of-climate-change-20191220-p53m03.html)


Image above:Australia has been battling devastating fires on the east coast for weeks. Now, rising temperatures in the south threaten to open a new fire front there. From (https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2019/11/front-opens-australia-fires-schools-closed-power-cut-191120061502306.html).

Bulls cannot breed at Inverell. They are becoming infertile from their testicles overheating. Mares are not falling pregnant, and through the heat, piglets and calves are aborting.

My work as a veterinarian has changed so much. While I would normally test bulls for fertility, or herds of cattle for pregnancy, I no longer do, because the livestock has been sold. A client’s stud stock in Inverell has reduced from 2000 breeders to zero.

I once assisted farmers who have spent their lives developing breeding programs, with historic bloodlines that go back 80 years. These stud farmers are now left with a handful of breeders that they can’t bear to part with, spending thousands keeping them fed, and going broke doing it.

Cattle that sold for thousands are now in the sale yards at $70 a head. Those classed as too skinny for sale are costing the farmer $130 to be destroyed.

They are all gone and it was all for nothing. The paddocks are bare, the dams dry, the grass crispy and brown. The whole region has been completely destocked and is devoid of life.

For 22 years, I have been the vet in this once-thriving town in northern NSW, which, as climate change continues to fuel extreme heat, drought and bushfires, has become hell on Earth.

Here, we are seeing extreme weather events like never before. The other day we had about eight centimetres of rain in 20 minutes. These downpours are like rain bombs. They are so ferocious that a farmer lost all of his fences, and all it did was silt up the dam so he had to use a machine to excavate the mud.

Most farmers in my district have not a blade of grass remaining on their properties. Topsoil has been blown away by the terrible, strong winds this spring and summer. We have experienced the hottest days that I can remember, and right now I can’t even open any windows because my eyes sting and lungs hurt from bushfire smoke.

For days, I have watched as the bushland around us went up like a tinderbox. I just waited for the next day when my clinic would be flooded with evacuated dogs, cats, goats and horses in desperate need of water and food.

The impact of the drought on wildlife is devastating to watch, too. Members of the public are bringing us koalas, sugar gliders, possums, galahs, cockatoos and kangaroos on a daily basis.

The koalas affect me the most. To see these gorgeous, iconic animals dying from thirst is too hard to bear. We save some, but we lose just as many.

The whole town is devastated. My business has halved. But with no horses to breed, no cattle to test and care for, what am I going to do? I have worked day and night to build a future for my family, but who would want to buy our property out here?

Who would want to buy a vet clinic in a town where there are no animals to treat because it’s too hot and dry? Where the cattle become infertile from the 40-degree heat. All this on black, baked ground.

I am 53 years old. Can I start again?

Climate change for us is every day, and I am not suffering on the same level as my friends, my clients and the helpless animals I treat. As a veterinarian I am becoming more and more distressed, not just about the state of my town, but the whole world.

Personally, I have had weeks when I just cry. It just bloody hurts me. I also have times when I get really angry and I start to swear, which I have never done in my life.

I also have times when I think about the potential this country has to create a renewable future with clean, green energy, and end our reliance on fossil fuels.

You only have to look at how resilient our farmers are in the face of devastating, extreme weather conditions to understand that we can make a powerful, meaningful difference to our future.

The government has no idea what it’s like for us. It has no empathy. Its members don't know how much it hurts when they just say yes to another coal mine.

I would invite Scott Morrison to come and see what life in Inverell is like. In case he chooses not to, I'll paint this picture for the country and hope people can start to realise and understand the devastating impact climate change is having.

I hope they will take a stand for the people, the places and the animals whose voices are too small for him to hear.

Australia ignores climate risks

FSUBHEAD: The country's government  has shirked responsibility to its people's health and future.

By Ian Dunlopon 26 June 2107 for Resilience -
(http://www.resilience.org/stories/2017-06-26/australia-ignores-risks-shirks-moral-responsibility-on-climate/)


Image above: Uncontrolled bushfire in 2015 burns among the hills of Adalaide, Australia. From original article.

The first responsibility of a government is to safeguard the people and their future wellbeing.

The ability to do so is increasingly threatened by human-induced climate change, the accelerating impacts of which are driving political instability and conflict globally. 

 Climate change poses an existential risk to humanity which, unless addressed as an emergency, will have catastrophic consequences.

An existential risk is an adverse outcome that would either annihilate intelligent life or permanently and drastically curtail its potential.

In military terms, Australia and the adjacent Asia-Pacific region is considered to be “Disaster Alley”, where the most extreme impacts are already being experienced.

These risks are either not understood or willfully ignored at the leadership level in Australia, which is a profound failure of imagination, far worse than that which triggered the Global Financial Crisis in 2008.

The management of existential risk cannot be handled with conventional, reactive, learn-from-failure techniques. We only play this game once, so we must get it right first time.

This should mean an honest, objective look at the real risks to which we are exposed, guarding especially against the more extreme possibilities which would have consequences damaging beyond quantification, and which human civilization as we know it would be lucky to survive.

Instead, the climate and energy policies adopted by successive Australian governments over the last twenty years, largely driven by ideology and corporate fossil fuel interests, have deliberately refused to acknowledge this existential threat to our future well-being, as the shouting match over the wholly inadequate reforms proposed by the Finkel Review demonstrates only too well.

Our leaders have access to the best possible scientific advice and to the overwhelming evidence that we have badly underestimated both the speed and extent of climate change impact.

 In such circumstances, to ignore this threat is a fundamental breach of the fiduciary responsibility with which political, bureaucratic and corporate leaders are entrusted by the community they are supposed to serve.

A hotter planet has already taken us perilously close to, and in some cases over, tipping points which will cause profound changes in major climate systems: at the polar ice-caps, in the oceans, and the large permafrost carbon stores.

Physical impacts of global warming include a hotter and more extreme climate, more frequent and severe droughts, desertification, increasing insecurity of food and water supplies, stronger storms and cyclones, and coastal inundation.

Climate change was a significant factor in triggering the war in Syria, the Mediterranean migrant crisis and the “Arab Spring”, albeit this aspect is rarely discussed.

Our current global carbon emission trajectory, if left unchecked, will drive increasingly severe humanitarian crises, forced migrations, political instability and conflicts.

Australia is not immune, domestically or regionally.

We already have extended heat waves above 40oC, catastrophic bushfires, intense storms and flooding. The regional impacts do not receive much attention but they are striking hard at vulnerable communities in Asia and the Pacific, forcing them into a spiral of dislocation and migration. 

Impacts on China and South Asia will have profound consequences for employment and financial stability in Australia.

In the absence of emergency action to reduce Australian and global emissions far faster than currently proposed, the level of disruption and conflict will escalate to the point that outright regional chaos is likely.

Militarized solutions will not be effective. Australia is failing in its duty to its own people, and as a world citizen, by downplaying these implications and in shirking its responsibility to act.

Yet people understand climate risks, even as political leaders wilfully underplay or ignore them. 84% of 8000 people in eight countries recently surveyed for the Global Challenges Foundation consider climate change a “global catastrophic risk”.

The figure for Australia was 75%. Many people now see climate change as a bigger threat than other concerns such as epidemics, weapons of mass destruction and the rise of artificial intelligence threats.

So what is to be done if our leaders are incapable of rising to the task?

First, establish a high-level climate and conflict task-force in Australia to urgently assess the existential risks of climate change, and develop risk-management techniques and policy appropriate to that challenge.

Second, recognise that climate change is now a global emergency which threatens human civilization, and contribute to building practical steps internationally for a coordinated global emergency response.

Third, launch a domestic emergency initiative to decarbonise the economy no later than 2030 and build the capacity to drawdown carbon dioxide from the atmosphere.

Fourth, build more resilient communities domestically, and also in the most vulnerable nations regionally by high-level commitments and development assistance; build a flexible capacity to support communities in likely hotspots of instability and conflict; and rethink refugee governance accordingly.

Fifth, ensure that Australia’s defence forces and government agencies are fully aware of and prepared for this changed environment; and ensure their abilities to provide humanitarian aid and disaster relief.

Sixth, establish a national leadership group, outside conventional politics, drawn from across society, charged with implementing the national climate emergency program.

A pious hope in current circumstances? Our leaders clearly do not want the responsibility to secure our future.

So “Everything becomes possible, particularly when it is unavoidable”.

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Australia suspends Syria overflights

SUBHEAD: Australia became the first coalition member to suspend flights in Syria, claiming it's too dangerous for its planes.

By Tyler Durden on 20 June 2017 for Zero Hedge -
(http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2017-06-20/australia-halts-flights-syria-citing-potential-threats-russia)


Image above: Royal Australian Air Force flying American made F18 Hornets began making their first strike on Islamic State forces in Syria in September 2015. From (http://www.sbs.com.au/news/article/2015/09/09/first-raaf-strikes-syria-within-week).

Russia’s Monday decision to suspend a memorandum of cooperation with the US-led coalition in retaliation after a US jet shot down a Syrian Army plane has rattled some US allies, who fear escalating tensions between Russia and the coalition. In what it called a "precautionary measure," Australia became the first coalition member to suspend flights in Syria, claiming it's too dangerous for its planes to fly without the agreement, according to BBC.

“As a precautionary measure, Australian Defense Force (ADF) strike operations into Syria have temporarily ceased,” Australia’s Department of Defense said in a statement, adding its operations in Iraq would continue as part of the coalition.”

“ADF personnel are closely monitoring the air situation in Syria and a decision on the resumption of ADF air operations in Syria will be made in due course.”

“Australian Defense Force protection is regularly reviewed in response to a range of potential threats,” the Department of Defense said.

Australia has deployed about 780 military personnel as part of the US-led coalition fighting the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria

The BBC notes that Australia has a small but highly capable contingent of six F/A-18 strike aircraft; a tanker; and an E-7A Wedgetail early warning aircraft, all based at Al Minhad in the United Arab Emirates.

Most of the Australian strikes have been in Iraq, though its aircraft do also operate over Syria. Australian commanders will reassess the situation in due course. The more fundamental question is what the Russian threat actually amounts to. Is it just rhetoric or does Moscow want to deny certain areas of Syrian airspace to US-led coalition aircraft?

Australian aircraft will continue to fly missions in Iraq.As reported yesterday, Russia suspended cooperation under the “Memorandum on the Prevention of Incidents and Ensuring Air Safety in Syria” on Monday after the US shot down a Syrian Army fighter jet. 

The Russian Defense ministry called the attack “an act of aggression,” on the part of the US-led coalition. The US military neglected to use a communication line with Russia concerning this attack, despite the fact that Russian warplanes were also on a mission in Syrian airspace at the time, the Russian Defense Ministry alleged, conflicting with the Pentagon's explanation of events.

The bilateral memorandum of understanding was signed between the United States and Russia signed in October 2015 to ensure the safety of flights during combat missions over Syria.

In retaliation for the US attack, the ministry warned that Russian missile defense would intercept any aircraft in the area of operations of the Russian Aerospace Forces in Syria.

The Russian Defense Ministry announced, quoted by Sputnik;

"In areas where Russian aviation is conducting combat missions in the Syrian skies, any flying objects, including jets and unmanned aerial vehicles of the international coalition discovered west of the Euphrates River will be followed by Russian air and ground defenses as air targets."

Contrary to the earlier statement by the US, according to which it "contacted its Russian counterparts by telephone via an established "de-confliction line" to de-escalate the situation and stop the firing", Russia claims the US-led coalition command didn't use the deconfliction channel with Russia to avoid an incident during an operation in Raqqa:

"Russian Aerospace Forces' jets were conducting operations in Syrian airspace that time. However, the command of the coalition forces didn't use the existing channel between the air command of the Qatari airbase al Udeid and the [Russian] Hmeymim airbase to avoid incidents over Syria."

We now wait to see which other US allies – Germany, Denmark, the Netherlands, France, Jordan and the UK also are contributing men and arms to the task of "liberating" Syria  – will announce that they're temporarily pulling out of the conflict until tensions once again de-escalate.


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Protecting Country

SUBHEAD: Organization Seed explained to banks impact to Aboriginal communities if mining projects went ahead.

By Staff on 2 September 2016 for Future Perfect -
(http://www.goethe.de/ins/cz/prj/fup/en15848645.htm)


Image above: Seed co-founder Larissa Baldwin at center. From original article.

Climate change affects everyone — but not everyone evenly. If nothing is done to stop the impact of climate change, some of the oldest living cultures in the world could die out. An all-Indigenous youth activist group in Australia has risen to the challenge. 

When Larissa Baldwin first heard about Australia’s first youth summit for climate change activists, she thought she had found her people. She bought a ticket, planned which talks and workshops to attend, then travelled down to Brisbane for PowerShift 2011.

“When I walked through the doors and looked around the foyer, I nearly just walked straight back out again. I couldn’t see anyone like me. It was a sea of white.”

Larissa is an Aboriginal woman of the Bundjalung nation, one of over 500 nations that make up present day Australia. “I took a seat at the back of the room. But before the opening speech had finished, I was out of there.”

But Larissa’s mark on climate activism didn’t end that day. Rather than turn her back on the group that organised the summit, the Australian Youth Climate Coalition (AYCC), she joined them.

Larissa volunteered with the AYCC to help coordinate PowerShift 2013 and make sure there were more ‘black fellas’ like her in the room. It was at PowerShift2013 that AYCC agreed it needed more than a handful of Aboriginal voices: it needed an exclusive sister organisation run for and by young Aboriginal activists.

And so, Seed, Australia’s first all-Indigenous youth climate network, was founded and Larissa was appointed National Co-Director.

Planting the seed for a movement
Larissa, now 29, studied a combined degree in Media Communications and Health Science at Queensland University of Technology, and after graduating was appointed Communications Relations Officer at the Stronger, Smarter Institute, an organisation that promoted Indigenous leadership in schools around Australia.

Larissa’s Co-Director is 22-year-old Amelia Telford who is also a Bundjalung woman. Amelia turned down a placement to study at UNSW Medical School to take up the reigns at Seed. “When I learnt that climate change was not only affecting the places I loved, but also people and our cultural heritage, I knew I had something to do about it,” says Amelia.

When the pair founded Seed, they made clear, “We want Aboriginal people to be able to continue to live on country.” Aboriginal people use ‘country’ to refer to the traditions of the region where an Aboriginal person lives or where their ancestors came from. Climate change is threatening the ancient way of life for Aboriginal people.

Bush fires now flare nearly all year round, draughts are more frequent, and floods are more catastrophic. And the 7,000 people who live in the Torres Strait Islands – between Australia’s north coast and the South of Papua New Guina – already have to reckon with rising sea levels.

“It's not a new concept that our people are the first environmentalists or the first conservationists," says Amelia. “It's always been a part of our culture and a part of who we are.”

How does Seed sprout change?
More than half of all Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people are under 25. And with young Aboriginal activists right across Australia joining the network, Seed is continuing to grow.

Today, Seed employs a staff of 15 across fundraising, campaigning and an education team that tours high schools. But the network’s real power are thousands of volunteers across Australia, including in remote Indigenous communities. Among them are around 100 core volunteers who commit regular hours.

Seed teaches young Aboriginal people how to organize a demonstration, run a campaign, stage a media stunt, and start conversations about the need to act on the climate crisis. The organization’s effect branches out much further than climate activism, however.

“Seed doesn’t have the capacity to work on every issue facing young Aboriginal people,” says Larissa. “That’s why we make sure the training we deliver is transferable. If they can learn the skills to make change, they can use these skills to tackle: aboriginal youth suicide, housing issues, Aboriginal health, land rights, you name it.”


With so many abstract numbers and with its distant consequences, climate change can be hard to grasp and easy to dismiss. “Talking about the science of climate change is a really ‘white’ way of tackling climate change,” says Larissa Baldwin. “It doesn’t really work in Aboriginal communities where there’s a lower level education base and English might be someone’s fourth or fifth language.”

Larissa has a grasp of her native language, Widjabul, but there are around 150 Indigenous languages spoken throughout Australia.

“So we don’t talk about ‘climate change’, we talk about ‘protecting country’. And when you talk to Aboriginal people about it, they start listing off all these things that are impacts of climate change. We don’t have to convince them that climate change is real. They live on country. They see what most Australians don’t.”

Going out on a limb
Larissa says Seed learns a lot from AYCC, but many of the tactics the Australian Youth Climate Coalition use don’t work in Aboriginal communities. Just last year, for instance, AYCC’s campaign Dump Your Bank tried to persuade people to change banks if their bank was funding the expansion of fossil fuel mining. However, a lot of people in Aboriginal communities are on basics cards (social welfare) so they can’t move their money.

So Seed took a different approach. “We sent an email to 5,000 employees at all the major banks. We explained what it would mean to Aboriginal communities if mining projects went ahead on our land – mining projects funded by their employer.

We included a survey so we could gauge what bank employees cared about and the responses were incredible: there were people willing to quit their jobs if their banks didn’t stop funding the mines.

The banks couldn’t ignore their own employees, so they issued statements saying they would not fund the mines. That was a really successful campaign.”

 Seed is funded entirely by donations, including small cash donations, monthly donors, and major private donations. It is a founding principal of the organization to not accept any corporate or government sponsorship. This way they are free to put pressure wherever it’s needed.

Ancient roots, not holes in the ground
Australia is one of the world’s largest exporters of fossil fuels. Larissa argues that Australia’s mining industry is not just the source of carbon emissions, but it is also a site of structural racism. “We reject that the only way for Aboriginal communities to gain economic advantage is to sell off our land to these companies.

And the only government investment that goes into our communities is earmarked for mining. We think that’s wrong. Mining is what people end up doing when they don’t have options.” To Seed, the climate crisis is also an opportunity to create a more just and sustainable world.

Larissa spoke in Borroloola in the Gulf of Carpentaria recently. “We ran some workshops around employment options with the local people. Education and eco-tourism were the biggest interest areas we identified.” She went on, “The reason we are so well received in Aboriginal communities like Borroloola is because we never go in there trying to get something out of people.

We don’t actively discourage Aboriginal people from working in the mines or signing land use agreements.

We just try to make sure they have the knowledge to make the best choice. We go there to inform, to empower people to make their own choices.”


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Participation in RIMPAC 2016

SUBHEAD: The countries participating in largest naval war exercise reach record number and include NATO.

By Juan Wilson  1 June 2016 for Island Breath  -
(http://www.stripes.com/news/pacific/27-nations-set-to-join-rimpac-exercise-in-hawaii-california-1.412494)


Image above: Teaser poster for "Pacific Rim II" film being produced now and ready for 2018. Mashup by Juan Wilson. Click to embiggen.

Note below the two recent articles  (5/31 and 6/1) in Stars and Stripes and Naval Today respectively that are puff pieces more than actual news stories. They both concern RIMPAC 2016 - the international naval war exercises that will begin toward the end of this month.

Both of these articles seem to have been "crafted" from the same US Navy public relations announcement. They cover the same points with about the same amount of detail in the same order.

The gist of the pieces are:

One: To congratulate the US Navy for convincing four new non-Pacific nations (Brazil, Denmark, Germany and Italy) for joining the Rim of the Pacific nations involved with Pacific Naval warfare. Three out of four of them are allies in the North Atlantic Treaty Organization.

Two: To dampen criticism, from the likes of Sen John McCain, that the Chinese Navy should be disenvited from participating as observers in RIMPAC 2016 as they were in 2014. Obviously, the US wants China to see what they would face in and conflict in the South China Sea if they continue to build up they Naval presence in the Western Pacific.

Three: The public relations effort  invokes “The Great Green Fleet” using conservation efforts and alternative fuels; and focusing on rescue and disaster relief operations is a screen for deadlier activities that even in "practice" mode are lethal to the life in the ocean..

As to my opinion of these gists:

One:  The US Navy Pacific fleet in including three NATO navies from the Atlantic Ocean under its wing in the Pacific. Always remember that attacking any NATO nation is an attack on all. In my opinion the US Navy wants to make sure that if there is trouble in the Western Pacific that it will be the US Navy and not NATO doing the coordination.

Two: The US Navy wants the Chinese Navy to observe how mighty and dominant it is in command and control on the Pacific Ocean. They also want the Chinese available for public relations purposes. Also The relationship of a panoramic flotilla of 45 RIMPAC ships from 27nations in proportion to a couple of ships from the Chinese Navy in passive obervation makes a great photo opportunity.

Three: No amount of "Green Fleet" bullshit can obscure the deadly impact of high energy sonar, radar, amphibious operations and live ammo exercises on the Pacific Ocean and its denizens - live reefs, fish, birds, ocean mammals and to the the ecosystems that support them.

It should be noted that buried in the second story below is the detail that Japan Maritime Self Defense Force Rear Adm. Koji Manabe was named the vice commander of the RIMPAC 2016 Combined Task Force. This is interesting because his role was only enabled by an adjustment to Japanese law that disallows any military activity other than that needed for self defense - the old rules would not have allowed a leading role in such an activity as RIMPAC.

As the United States pushes militarily forward in Eastern Europe and the Middle East, it expands its already dominant role throughout the Pacific region. To me it looks like we are pushing for World War Three.  And that's a bad idea. As I have said before - the central role of our navy should not be to threaten live throughout the world, but to protect the oceans and those who live in it.

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Twenty 27 countries in RIMPAC 2016

By Wyatt Olsen  31 May 2016 for Stars & Stripes  -
(http://www.stripes.com/news/pacific/27-nations-set-to-join-rimpac-exercise-in-hawaii-california-1.412494)


Image above: Reporters and other visitors gather to inspect the bow of the Haikou, China's flagship destroyer, during the 2014 Rim of the Pacific exercise in Hawaii. From original article.

Four nations will join this summer’s Rim of the Pacific drills in Hawaii, increasing the number of countries participating in the world’s largest international maritime exercise to 27.

Brazil, Denmark, Germany and Italy will take part for the first time in the biennial RIMPAC, which is slated to begin June 30 and end Aug. 4, the Navy said Tuesday. China, which joined the exercise in 2014, will also participate.

This year’s U.S. Pacific Fleet-hosted drills – which will focus on disaster relief, maritime security, sea control and complex warfighting – will include 45 ships, five submarines, more than 200 aircraft and 25,000 personnel.

Participating nations include Australia, Brunei, Canada, Chile, Colombia, France, India, Indonesia, Japan, Malaysia, Mexico, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Peru, South Korea, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand, Tonga and the United Kingdom.

Drills will include amphibious operations, gunnery, counter-piracy, mine clearance, explosive ordnance disposal and diving and salvage operations. Defensive training against missiles, submarines and aircraft will also take place.

While most of the exercise is held in Hawaii, amphibious operations will take place in Southern California, featuring a harpoon missile shoot from a Navy littoral combat ship. A submarine rescue is new for this year, the Navy said.

Playing a major role in this year’s RIMPAC is the Navy’s “Great Green Fleet,” a yearlong initiative that uses energy conservation measures and alternative fuels to demonstrate how cutting energy costs can contribute to overall military readiness.

Almost all the vessels participating will use an approved alternate-fuel blend, the Navy said.

Some in Congress have called for China to be disinvited to RIMPAC, citing the country’s expansionist actions in the South China Sea, where it has enlarged small atolls through sand dredging.

The country has built facilities and runways on some, construction the U.S. characterizes as militarization.

Last month, U.S. Rep. Mark Takai, of Hawaii, a member of the House Armed Services Committee, asked Secretary of Defense Ash Carter to reconsider China’s invitation in light of its naval actions over the past two years.

“I guess my question is why then should we reward China for this aggressive behavior by including them in an event meant for allies and partners?” Takai said to Carter during a March hearing. He described China’s behavior as “the polar opposite of U.S. objectives in the region.”

In late April, China told the U.S. it would deny a Hong Kong port visit by the USS John C. Stennis aircraft carrier strike group planned for May 3-8. The denial likely came in response to the strike group’s recent presence near the disputed Spratly Islands close to the Philippines.

U.S. Pacific Fleet commander Adm. Scott Swift has said on numerous occasions he believes the path forward with China is to deepen relationships with military-to-military contact.

In 2014, China sent four ships to RIMPAC, including the destroyer Haikou and hospital ship Peace Ark. It also sent a spy ship, which remained in international waters off Hawaii.

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Record participation in RIMPAC 2016

By Staff 1 June 2016 for Naval Today -
(https://navaltoday.com/2016/06/01/record-number-of-countries-to-take-part-in-rimpac-2016/)

With four new participants, the number of countries taking part in RIMPAC, the world’s largest international maritime exercise, rose to 27.

45 ships, five submarines, more than 200 aircraft and 25,000 personnel will participate in the biennial Rim of the Pacific (RIMPAC) exercise scheduled June 30 to August 4, in and around the Hawaiian Islands and Southern California.

This is the first time that Brazil, Denmark, Germany, and Italy are participating in RIMPAC 2016. Additional firsts will involve flexing the command and control structure for various at sea events and incorporating a submarine rescue exercise.

Other participants will be forces from:

Australia, Brazil, Brunei, Canada, Chile, Colombia, Denmark, France, Germany, India, Indonesia, Italy, Japan, Malaysia, Mexico, Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, People’s Republic of China, Peru, the Republic of Korea, the Republic of the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand, Tonga, the United Kingdom and the United States.

This year will see amphibious operations in the Southern California operating area, feature a harpoon missile shoot from a U.S. Navy littoral combat ship and highlight fleet innovation during the Trident Warrior experimentation series.

RIMPAC 2016 is the 25th exercise in the series that began in 1971. Hosted by U.S. Pacific Fleet.
It will be led by U.S. Vice Adm. Nora Tyson, commander of the U.S. 3rd Fleet (C3F), who will serve as the Combined Task Force (CTF) Commander.

Royal Canadian Navy Rear Adm. Scott Bishop will serve as deputy commander of the CTF, and Japan Maritime Self Defense Force Rear Adm. Koji Manabe as the vice commander.

See also:
Ea O Ka Aina: Judgement Against RIMPAC 2016 5/29/16
Ea O Ka Aina: Prepare for RIMPAC War in Hawaii 5/22/16
Ea O Ka Aina: Navy to "take" millions of mammals 5/17/16
Ea O Ka Aina: US court RIMPAC Impact decision 4/3/15
Ea O Ka Aina: RIMPAC 2014 Impact Postmortem 10/22/1
Ea O Ka Aina: RIMPAC 2014 in Full March 7/16/14
Ea O Ka Aina: 21st Century Energy Wars 7/10/14
Ea O Ka Aina: RIMPAC War on the Ocean 7/3/14
Ea O Ka Aina: Voila - World War Three 7/1/14
Ea O Ka Aina: The Pacific Pivot 6/28/14
Ea O Ka Aina: RIMPAC IMPACT 6/8/14
Ea O Ka Aina: RIMPAC Then and Now 5/16/14
Ea O Ka Aina: Earthday TPP Fukushima RIMPAC 4/22/14
Ea O Ka Aina: The Asian Pivot - An ugly dance 12/5/13
Ea O Ka Aina: Help save Mariana Islands 11/13/13
Ea O Ka Aina: End RimPac destruction of Pacific 11/1/13 
Ea O Ka Aina: Moana Nui Confereence 11/1/13
Ea O Ka Aina: Navy to conquer Marianas again  9/3/13
Ea O Ka Aina: Pagan Island beauty threatened 10/26/13
Ea O Ka Aina: Navy license to kill 10/27/12 
Ea O Ka Aina: Sleepwalking through destruction 7/16/12
Ea O Ka Aina: Okinawa breathes easier 4/27/12
Ea O Ka Aina: Navy Next-War-Itis 4/13/12
Ea O Ka Aina: America bullies Koreans 4/13/12
Ea O Ka Aina: Despoiling Jeju island coast begins 3/7/12
Ea O Ka Aina: Jeju Islanders protests Navy Base 2/29/12
Ea O Ka Aina: Hawaii - Start of American Empire 2/26/12
Ea O Ka Aina: Korean Island of Peace 2/26/12   
Ea O Ka Aina: Military schmoozes Guam & Hawaii 3/17/11
Ea O Ka Aina: In Search of Real Security - One 8/31/10
Ea O Ka Aina: Peace for the Blue Continent 8/10/10
Ea O Ka Aina: Shift in Pacific Power Balance 8/5/10
Ea O Ka Aina: RimPac to expand activities 6/29/10
Ea O Ka Aina: RIMPAC War Games here in July 6/20/10
Ea O Ka Aina: Pacific Resistance to U.S. Military 5/24/10

Ea O Ka Aina: De-colonizing the Pacific 5/21/10

Ea O Ka Aina: RIMPAC to Return in 2010 5/2/10
Ea O Ka Aina: Living at the Tip of the Spear 4/5/10

Ea O Ka Aina: Living at the Tip of the Spear 4/15/10

Ea O Ka Aina: Guam Land Grab 11/30/09
Ea O Ka Aina: Guam as a modern Bikini Atoll 12/25/09
Ea O Ka Aina: GUAM - Another Strategic Island 11/8/09
Ea O Ka Aina: Diego Garcia - Another stolen island 11/6/09
Ea O Ka Aina: DARPA & Super-Cavitation on Kauai 3/24/09
Island Breath: RIMPAC 2008 - Navy fired up in Hawaii 7/2/08
Island Breath: RIMPAC 2008 uses destructive sonar 4/22/08
Island Breath: Navy Plans for the Pacific 9/3/07
Island Breath: Judge restricts sonar off California 08/07/07
Island Breath: RIMPAC 2006 sonar compromise 7/9/06
Island Breath: RIMPAC 2006 - Impact on Ocean 5/23/06
Island Breath: RIMPAC 2004 - Whale strandings on Kauai 9/2/04
Island Breath: PMRF Land Grab 3/15/04

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Nuclear Power Zombies

SUBHEAD: Three Mile Island, Chernobyl, San Onofre, Fukushima, WIPP and Hanford should have taught us nuclear power is not an option.

By Juan Wilson on 12 May 2016 for Island Breath -
(http://islandbreath.blogspot.com/2016/05/nuclear-power-zombies.html)


Image above: South Australian demonstrators make their opinion known concerning making them the nuclear waste dump for the world. From (http://www.sbs.com.au/news/article/2016/02/15/sa-nuclear-waste-dump-proposal-contested-green-groups).

Publicity web searchbots scour the internet for places they think likely to take their promotional material.  Occasionally the stumble upon IslandBreath.org and into unintended consequences. Because we have had nuclear power as the (critical) subject of several articles we occasionally get automated email puff pieces from the propaganda agents of the nuclear industry.

A couple of days ago I got such a submission from David Hesse.  His email address is press@world-nuclear.org. The subject of his email was, "Royal Commission’s conclusions create middle-ground in the nuclear waste discourse".

It turns out that the "middle-ground" is sacrificing the continent of Australia to be the world's nuclear waste storage facility. It is conveniently isolated and located in the southern hemisphere far from most of the world's heaviest consumer population.

Now that the business of Australia supplying coal and other raw material to China for heavily polluting climate changing industry has gone belly up we might as well as use Australia for a higher purpose - being a radioactive toilet for the ever humming industrial north. Of course, any fearful Australians that wished to escape the harm they might face could be relocated to Africa or South America.

Here's is David Hesse's email message.

World Nuclear Association Press Release. Issue Date: 09 May 2016

The report of the South Australia Nuclear Fuel Cycle Royal Commission, made public today, has fundamentally changed the nature of the global nuclear waste discourse.

Agneta Rising, Director General of the World Nuclear Association remarked, “If constructed, a multi-national waste facility based in South Australia would grant a welcome option for countries operating nuclear facilities today. Far from it being the case that there is ‘no solution’ to nuclear waste, we are seeing lots of progress – with some countries developing national repositories and now the potential addition of this viable alternative” 

The Commission has concluded “that the disposal of used fuel and intermediate level waste (ILW) could be undertaken safely in a permanent geological disposal facility in South Australia. This would have the potential to deliver significant inter-generational economic benefits to the community.” It has recommended that the South Australian Government pursues this opportunity.

A large multi-national waste storage facility would be a world first and should offer advantages in terms of siting and economics when compared to smaller national approaches. There are significant benefits on offer to South Australia for hosting such a facility, which must now work on building robust public and political support if the plan is to proceed.

Regarding the future deployment of nuclear power plants in the state, the Commission has, in short, recommended that the Australian government discard its long-standing anti-nuclear policies. While the Commission noted that nuclear power plants are not viable in South Australia under current market rules, it recommended “the South Australian Government pursue removal at the federal level of existing prohibitions on nuclear power generation…” and further, “that the South Australian Government promote and collaborate on the development of a comprehensive national energy policy that enables all technologies, including nuclear, to contribute to a reliable, low-carbon electricity network at the lowest possible system cost.”

The report marks the end of a comprehensive review of the available opportunities in the fuel cycle. The process lasted for over a year and the Commission consulted extensively before proceeding onto site visits and interviewing experts on topics such as radioactive wastes, reactor technology, etc. There has been a sustained commitment to transparency throughout the process, with responses and interview recordings made publicly available via the Commission’s website.

Rising commented, “Other governments, both inside and outside of Australia, which are considering introducing nuclear energy could really benefit from the wealth of high quality information that has been collected through the rigorous South Australian Royal Commission process.”

Thank you David for demonstrating that there is a way for all to keep our Nissan Leafs fully charged and the Amazon drones in the air and delivering plastic electronic consumer items to our doorsteps. 

See also:
Ea O Ka Aina: Fukushima radiation damages Japan 4/14/16
Ea O Ka Aina: Indian Point Nuclear Accident 3/5/16
Ea O Ka Aina: Big Fat Radioactive Lie 12/6/15
Ea O Ka Aina: San Onofre left radioactive debris 9/30/15
Ea O Ka Aina: Nuclear is not alternative energy 8/7/15
Ea O Ka Aina: Fukushima - the end of atomic power 3/13/15
Ea O Ka Aina: Molten Salt Nuclear Reactors 9/25/14
Ea O Ka Aina: The false science of science 9/2/14
Ea O Ka Aina: Nuclear Wasteland 8/6/14
Ea O Ka Aina: WIPP Worse than you think 5/21/14
Ea O Ka Aina: Fukushima - What me worry? 11/29/13
Ea O Ka Aina: Nuclear Power on the Run 8/18/13
Ea O Ka Aina: Five reactors shutdown by Sandy 10/30/12
Ea O Ka Aina: Ten Chernobyls enter Pacific 5/27/11
.

November's architectural eyesore

SUBHEAD: It will never be renovated. It will have one generation of life and nobody will be able to repair it or maintain it.

By James Kunstler on 4 November 2015 for Kunstler.com -
(http://kunstler.com/eyesore-of-the-month/november-2015/)


Image above: Elevation view of UTS building in Sidney, Australia by Los Angeles architect Frank Gehry. From original article.

Behold the stylish new Dr Chau Chak Wing Building at the University of Technology Sydney (Australia) by starchitect Frank Gehry.

Every college has to have its Gehry. This one appears to be a stack of old-fashioned brown paper grocery bags, or something like that.

Here’s the catch: it will never be renovated. It will have one generation of life (or less) and then nobody will be able to repair it or maintain it.


Image above: Aerial perspective view of Frank Gehry UTS building showing more of its complications. From original article.

It’s a product of extraordinary complexity and hence enormous fragility. Do you assume that computer-aided fabrication will be available fifty years from now? Don’t bet on it.

The grid may be kaput. The server farms may be down.

The exotic metal alloys may not be available for the window sashes, not to mention the plate glass and the special brick (very energy-intensive).

All the curves, twerks, and weird angles detract from the building’s lifetime, not to mention its capacity for adaptive re-use (probably nil). Our attention-getting stunts-of-the-day represent stealing from our future ability to remain civilized.

G’day mates!


Image above: Frank Gehry and his son, in 1980, standing in front of his remodeled Santa Monica CA pink bungalow. Note the metal gate, corrugated metal siding, and cyclone fencing on roof (for security?).  This is the the work that brought him fame and eventually international prestige. From (http://architecture.about.com/od/houses/ss/Gehry-House-Inside-Out.htm).



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Trouble with the King's english

SUBHEAD: What ever language you speak should be spoken with some mastery and art. 

By Juan Wilson on 2 November 2015 for Island Breaeth -
(http://www.countercurrents.org/irwin021115.htm)


Image above: Graphic for Cab Calloway's "Are You Hip to the Jive" record set with 22 tracks.  From (http://region5.herbzinser08.com/dir/index.php/blog28/hydrocarbon-gasoline-asks-carbon-black).

I read the two articles below this morning with some amusement. Jerome Irwin and James Kunstler are both correct in thinking that using English without some mastery of grammar, vocabulary and pronunciation leads to weakened ability to communicate as well as think clearly. In Irwin's example it is the drunken slur of Australian whites, and in Kunslter's case it is the jive street talk of American blacks.

The mastery out English language leads to higher education, professional accreditation, solid employment. The lack thereof leads not only to fuzzy thinking, but poverty.

However, neither Irwin or Kunstler address issue of any cultural or social advantages to those populations that speak a dialect. Nor due they evaluate in any depth the culture identity of those who speak a dialect. Both the Briritish whites originally exiled to Australia and the African blacks brought to slavery in America have been   "associated with "violent criminality and other anti-social behaviors."

Both the Australian criminals and African blacks had a reason to have their own "secret" language.

Another point not mentioned is that other languages than English describe other realities for other cultures. Those who identify as Americans here in Hawaii often complain about Pigeon English spoken by Polynesians and their descendants.

A bit like Spanglish,  Pigeon English is a mixture of English and another language - here in Hawaii that language would be Hawaiian.

The Hawaiian culture was one carried by the spoken word - without a written language.  It was a rich culture that mastered sailing the Pacific Ocean a millennium before English the speaking British and Americans.

That meant that all their culture as well as technology was carried through the spoken word - navigation, engineering, agricultural practice, etc. The Polynesians thrived on the Pacific Ocean islands for centuries without bringing on the level of destruction we see today.

The little I know of the Hawaiian language has shown me that every word seems to have several meanings even in context, thus mixing the profane with the spiritual and the serious with the amusing.

It does pay to know your own language and speak it with some mastery and art.

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Linguistic Attack In Australia

SUBHEAD: Linguistic and Cultural Diversity Under Attack in Australia

By Jerome Irwin on 2 November 201 for Counter Culture -
(http://www.countercurrents.org/irwin021115.htm)

Dean Frenkel – a singer, voice coach and public speaking-communication lecturer at Melbourne Australia’s Victoria University – is on the hot seat for a controversial theory he recently put forth (“Australia, we need to talk about the way we speak”, The Age, October 26th, 2015).

The gist of Frenkel’s theory is that the by now infamous “G’Day Mate” drawl, that has come to embody the essence of Australian culture, is actually nothing more than a ‘lazy’ accent caused by the ‘alcoholic state’ of Australia’s heavy rum-drinking early settlers who regularly got drunk together on their new-found Down Under continent.

According to the laments of Frenkel, this original drunk-induced linguistic trait has since been passed down from generation to generation by all those descendants who, whether drunk or sober, have unknowingly added an alcoholic slur to the fact that they only use two-thirds of their mouth to speak and hence has become part of the Aussie national speech pattern.

Frankel contends that consequent sweeping effects have occurred as a result: poor communications is evident among all sectors of Australian society; a gaping hole in rhetorical training has been created in the Australian educational system; a subsequent diminishment has occurred in critical thought-processes, problem-solving, judgment and poor speech skills that have led to a lack of confidence and the internalization of emotions and thoughts that have contributed to difficulties in relationships, loneliness and stalled development.

In short, Frenkel’s theories hold that Australia’s linguistic accents, moulded by booze, have led to a general inarticulateness among the people as a result.

By contrast, Frenkel holds up the example of the ancient history of Australia’s aboriginal peoples spoken word and storytelling abilities that otherwise artfully uses rhetoric as an integral part of the recounting of the Australian Dreamtime to pass on to each generation their special spiritual and survival knowledge.

He contends that Australia’s western-centric civilization has instead created a “dumbing down” of speech in Australia that has “created holes in our education system that reflects holes in our culture.” Frankel declares, “Australia, It is time to take our beer goggles off. It’s no longer acceptable to be smarter than we sound.”

Yet whether Frenkel, as essentially a singer and voice coach, is qualified to theorize on such sweeping historical-sociological-psychological matters is a bone of contention.

In 2011, Aidan Wilson, a PHD graduate student at the University of Melbourne, challenged Frenkel’s qualifications to assess Australian politician’s qualities based upon their accents (“Beware of speech experts bearing science”, Crikey, Nov 2, 2011 & Oct 29th, 2015). At the time, this spawned a language blog debate between the two. (“A Reply from Dean Frenkel”, Crikey, Nov 7th, 2011).

Yet a far more important question exists behind such professed theories.

Is the ultimate objective in Australia, or wherever else in the world, to eventually get the entire world’s populace to speak in some uniform, standardized, sanitized “General Australian”, “General American”, or “General Whatever” way?

The obvious continuing mass disappearances of regional accents worldwide, and the negative attitudes of lower social class status and inferior traits that are often attributed to regional accents, symbolize what is a constant attempt by certain controlling forces in the world who are intent upon constantly reducing or utterly eliminating all such cultural human uniqueness or biological diversity on the planet.

During the 19th & 20th centuries, in Australia in particular, the attempt was made by still others to perpetuate an inferior cultural mentality in the people in relationship to their original British origins. Those who ever attempted to excel in whatever endeavour were shown resentment or ridicule with such pejorative terms as, “stop trying to be a tall poppy” or “you’re just another Plastic Brit.”

From the very beginning of the literary arts, Australian writers were decried as mere plagiarists of some Rudyard Kipling or Robbie Burns.

In 1950, A.A. Phillips, the Melbourne critic and social commentator, coined the term “cultural cringe” to describe the post-colonial literary arts in Australia as being deficient when compared to the work of their British and European counterparts.

Back then, Australia was being made out to be synonymous with failure, just as theorists like Frenkel now attempt to reduce Australian’s speech patterns down to the level of the hard-drinking drunkards of Australia’s early colonial days.

Apparently, as some would have us believe, the only way that Australian’s now can build themselves up in the eyes of the world, and especially in the ears of elocution experts like Frenkel who speak the British mother tongue, is to learn to pronounce proper “King’s English”. Is the intended net effect to encourage Australian’s to once again redefine their cultural heritage not only as convict stained but now as drunken stained?

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Good Little Maoists

SUBHEAD:American education does not put enough emphasis on teaching standard spoken English.

By James Kunstler on 2 November 2015 for Kunstler.com - 
(http://kunstler.com/clusterfuck-nation/good-little-maoists/)


Image above: From ().

ometimes societies just go batshit crazy. For ten years, 1966 to 1976, China slid into the chaotic maw of Mao Zedong’s “cultural revolution.” 

A youth army called the Red Guard was given license to terrorize authorities all over the nation — teachers, scientists, government officials, really just about anyone in charge of anything. They destroyed lives and families and killed quite a few of their victims. 

They paralyzed the country with their persecutions against “bourgeois elements” and “capitalist roaders,” reaching as deep into the top leadership as Deng Xiaoping, who was paraded in public wearing a dunce-cap, but eventually was able to put an end to all the insanity after Mao’s death.

America’s own cultural revolution has worked differently. It was mostly limited to the hermetically-sealed hot-house world of the universities, where new species of hierophants and mystagogues were busy constructing a crypto-political dogma aimed at redefining status arrangements among the various diverse ethnic and sexual “multi-cultures” of the land.

There is no American Mao, but there are millions of good little Maoists all over America bent on persecuting anyone who departs from a party line that now dominates the bubble of campus life. It’s a weird home-grown mixture of Puritan witch-hunting, racial paranoia, and sexual hysteria, and it comes loaded with a lexicon of jargon — “micro-aggression,” “trigger warnings,” “speech codes,” etc — designed to enforce uniformity in thinking, and to punish departures from it.

At a moment in history when the US is beset by epochal problems of economy, energy, ecology, and foreign relations, campus life is preoccupied with handwringing over the hurt feelings of every imaginable ethnic and sexual group and just as earnestly with the suppression of ideological trespassers who don’t go along with the program of exorcisms. 

A comprehensive history of this unfortunate campaign has yet to be written, but by the time it is, higher education may lie in ruins. It is already burdened and beset by the unintended consequences of the financial racketeering so pervasive across American life these days. But in promoting the official suppression of ideas, it is really committing intellectual suicide, disgracing its mission to civilized life.

I had my own brush with this evil empire last week when I gave a talk at Boston College, a general briefing on the progress of long emergency. The audience was sparse. It was pouring rain. The World Series was on TV. People are not so interested in these issues since the Federal Reserve saved the world with free money, and what I had to say did not include anything on race, gender, and white privilege.

However, after the talk, I went out for dinner with four faculty members and one friend-of-faculty. Three of them were English profs. One was an urban planner and one was an ecology prof. All of the English profs were specialists in race, gender, and privilege. Imagine that. You’d think that the college was a little overloaded there, but it speaks for the current academic obsessive-compulsive neurosis with these matters. 

Anyway, on the way to restaurant I was chatting in the car with one of the English profs about a particular angle on race, since this was his focus and he tended to view things through that lens. The discussion continued at the dinner table and this is what ensued on the Internet (an email to me the next morning):  On Oct 29, 2015, at 4:37 PM, Rhonda Frederick wrote:

Jim— This is what I posted on my social medias, am sharing with you and your agent. Yesterday, novelist/journalist James Howard Kunstler was invited to give a talk at BC (see his bio at http://www.bc.edu/offices/lowellhs/calendar.html#1028). At the post-talk dinner, he said “the great problem facing African Americans is that they aren’t taught proper English, and that … academics are too preoccupied with privilege and political correctness to admit this obvious fact.” No black people (I presume he used “African American” when he meant “black”) were present at the dinner. I was not at the dinner, but two of my friends/colleagues were; I trust their recollections implicitly. Whether Kunstler was using stereotypes about black people to be provocative, or whether he believed the ignorance he spouted, my response is the same: I cannot allow this kind of ignorance into my space and I am not the one to cast what he said as a “teachable moment.” I do think there should be a BC response to this, as the university paid his honorarium and for his meal. Here’s some contact information for anyone interested in sharing your thoughts on how BC should spend its money: Lowell Humanities Series at Boston College (http://www.bc.edu/offices/lowellhs/about.html)

Rhonda— That is not quite what I said. I said that teaching black Americans how to speak English correctly ought to be the most important mission of primary and secondary education for blacks in order for them to function successfully in our economy. Moreover, I said that anyone mounting an argument against this was hurting the very people they pretend to help. I stand by those statements. Your attempt at Stalinist thought policing is emblematic of something terribly wrong in higher education, especially since you were not present. James Howard Kunstler “It’s All Good”

So I was subjected to attempted character assassination via social media by this Rhonda Frederick person — faculty or student, she did not say — who admits to not having been present at the incident in question. This is the new fashion in academia: slander by Twitter and Facebook. It is fully supported by the faculty and administration. While they have been super-busy constructing speech codes and sex protocols, it seems they haven’t had any time for establishing ethical norms in the use of the Internet. 

As it happened, I offered to come back and publically debate my statements about the benefits of teaching spoken English to black primary and secondary students — they’d have to pay me, of course — but received no reply on that from Rhonda Frederick. I also received no reply from James Smith (smithbt@bc.edu), director of the Lowell Lecture Series, when I emailed my objection to being vilified on the Web by his colleague.

Now, as to the substance of what I said to this table of college professors. I’ve written before in books and blogs about the issue of spoken English and the black underclass, but for the record I will try to summarize some of my thoughts about it (trigger warning).

True, there are various dialects of English among us, but it must be obvious that they have different merits and disadvantages. There is such a thing as standard grammatical English. It evolves over generations, for sure, but it shows a certain conservative stability, like the rule of law. It tends to be spoken by educated people and by people in authority. 

This implies people in power, of course, people who run things, but also people at large in the professions (medicine, engineering, etc.) and the arenas of business and government. Standard grammatical English tends to be higher status because competence in it tends to confer the benefits of higher living standards.

It also must be self-evident that there is such a thing as a black English dialect in America. With perhaps a few lingering regional differences, it is remarkably uniform from Miami, Florida, to Rochester, New York, to Fresno, California. It prevails among the so-called black underclass, the cohort that continues to struggle economically. 

Despite its verve and inventiveness, this black dialect tends to confer low status and lower standards of living on those who speak it. In popular mythology and culture, it is associated with violent criminality and other anti-social behaviors. If you don’t believe this, turn on HBO sometime.

I argue that black people who seek to succeed socially and economically would benefit from learning to speak standard grammatical English, not solely because it is associated with higher status and living standards, but because proficiency with grammar, tenses, and a rich vocabulary helps people think better. 

After all, if you employ only the present tense in all your doings and dealings, how would you truly understand the difference between now, tomorrow, and yesterday? I submit that it becomes problematical. You may not be able to show up on time, among other things.

Some of my auditors have argued that “code switching” allows black Americans to easily turn back and forth for convenience between two modes of speech, black and “white” (i.e standard grammatical English). I’d argue that this is not as common as it is made out to be. 

Not everybody has the skill of entertainer Dave Chapelle, a master amateur linguist (whose parents were both college professors).

It’s my opinion that American primary and secondary education does not put enough emphasis on teaching standard spoken English to those deficient in it. The pedagogues have been hectored and browbeaten by the hierophants in higher ed not to press the matter. It is not regarded as important (probably because the task seems too painful and embarrassing and may hurt some feelings). The results are plain to see: academic failure among black Americans. (Not total but broad.) 

Instead, we concoct endless excuses to explain this failure and the related economic failures, the favorite by far being “structural racism” (despite having elected a black president who speaks standard grammatical English).

Now to the touchier question as to why this is. After all, other ethnic groups in America are eager to fully participate in the national life. For example, I gave a talk to a large honors freshman class at Rutgers University a year ago. 

Due to the current demographics of New Jersey, the class was overwhelming composed of Indian (Asian, that is) youngsters, many of them as dark-skinned as Americans of African ancestry. They had uniformly opted to speak standard grammatical English. 

They were all succeeding academically (it was an honors class, after all). They were on a trajectory to succeed in adult life. What does this suggest? To me it says that maybe some behavioral choices are better than others and the color of your skin is not the primary determinant in the matter.

Here’s what I think has happened to get us where we are today (second trigger warning). I think the civil rights victories of the mid 1960s generated enormous anxiety among black Americans, who were thereby invited to participate more fully in the national life after many generations of hardship and abuse. (If you argue that this was not the sum, substance, and intention of the Voting Rights Act and Public Accommodations Act of 1964-65, then you are being disingenuous.) 

However, they were not comfortable with the prospect of assimilating into the mainstream culture of the day. They either didn’t believe in it, or feared it, or despised it, or worried about being able to perform in it.

Many would attribute this anxiety to the legacy of slavery. Can a people get over a particular historical injury? American blacks are not the only group traumatized by circumstance. 

When do you decide to move forward? Or do you nurse a grievance forever? Anyway, it was not a coincidence that in the mid 1960s a new wave of black separatist avatars arose around the time of the civil rights legislative victories. Malcolm X, Stokely Charmichael, the Black Panthers, to name a few. 

That was the moment when much of the black population slid into what has become essentially an oppositional culture, determined to remain separate. Language is part of that picture.

The diversity cult of the day is a smokescreen to disguise this fundamental fact of American life: much of black America has simply opted out. They don’t want to assimilate into a common culture — so common culture has been deemed dispensable by the confounded keepers of the common culture’s flame, the university faculty. 

Much of black America doesn’t want to play along with the speech, manners, rules, or laws of whatever remains of that common culture after its systematic disassembly by the professors, the deans, and their handmaidens in progressive politics — heedless of the damage to the basic social contract. We remain very much a house divided, as Lincoln put it, and he could see clearly what the consequences would be.

Is it racist to try to air these abiding quandaries in the public arena? Apparently so. And why is that? Because of the awful embarrassment of political progressives over the disappointing outcome of the civil rights project. 

Black news pundits such as Charles Blow of The New York Times constantly call for “an honest conversation about race,” but they don’t mean it. Any public intellectual who ventures to start that conversation is automatically branded a racist. 

Hey, I couldn’t even have a conversation at a private dinner on the merits of speaking standard English with three college professors whose life-work centers on race. They had a melt-down and used a proxy (who wasn’t even there) to slander me on the Internet.

They are cowards and I am their enemy.
.

Solar Power in Australia

SUBHEAD: I would say the government in some sense has done its best to kill the solar industry and failed.

By Jo Chandler on 15 June 2015 for e360 Yale -
(http://e360.yale.edu/feature/despite_hurdles_solar_power_in_australia_is_too_robust_to_kill/2884/)


Image above: Nyngan solar array in Australia built in 2014 has 1.4 million photovoltaic panels. From (http://www.solarsunwerx.com.au/latest-news/new-nyngan-solar-plant-is-ten-times-bigger-than-anything-weve-seen).

[IB Publisher's note: Solar PV may never reach the goal of fully replacing fossil fuels for our energy "requirements", but it will one of the few sources left after we're on the downward backslope of Peak Oil. The more in place soon the better for a smooth transition away from industrialized capitalism. See Ea O Ka Aina: Cautionary Solar Tale 6/8/15]

No nation has as high a penetration of residential solar as Australia, with one in five homes now powered by the sun. And while the government has slashed incentives, solar energy continues to grow, thanks to a steep drop in the cost of PV panels and the country’s abundant sunshine.

When her latest electricity bill arrived, Melbourne homeowner Roslyn Guy framed it for proud display. Her $5,000 (Australian) investment in a rooftop solar system on her beachside home on Australia’s southeast coast had covered her steep quarterly bill and then some, banking $157 in credit for the power fed into the grid over the system’s first three months of operation.

Although Guy’s motives in going solar were more long-term environmental than short-term financial, she’d done the numbers and figured the system would pay for itself within 10 years — maybe earlier given rapidly emerging battery technologies, which would allow her to bank energy captured during the day to draw on in the evening, when grid power is most in demand and most expensive. Her plan was to lock in a clean, cheap power supply in time for her looming retirement, but at this rate she’d break even quicker than she’d bargained.

She was, therefore, a bit deflated by the next piece of correspondence from the power company, a note advising that it had mistakenly paid her — and an undisclosed number of other momentarily happy customers — 33 cents per kilowatt-hour for the energy they had generated, when the rate had been lowered to a mere 8 cents as over-subscribed incentive schemes were pared back. Guy got to keep the bungled bonus, but braced for much more modest returns in future bills.

The episode provides an apt footnote to the wild ride of Australia’s vibrant domestic solar scene since it started powering up in 2008. A decade ago, only a few thousand homes in the country had solar systems. Today, 1.4 million Australian homes have photovoltaic panels on their roofs; 182,000 new solar PV systems were installed last year alone. “The rollout of residential power in Australia is unparalleled in the world,” says Ric Brazzale, a renewables analyst at Green Energy Markets.

It’s a landscape experts say is potent with lessons about how to make — or break — a renewables market, as illustrated in these graphs tracking solar energy growth against various incentive schemes. In the end, solar power technology has seized its place in the sun as a serious and sustainable player in Australia. But analysts disagree furiously about what the Australian experience teaches about the merits of how best to get to a renewable energy future.

A report published last month by a respected public policy think tank argued that the costs of Australia’s solar boom will outweigh the benefits to the tune of $9 billion by the time solar incentives are phased out in 2028. Most of that money will come from other consumers in the form of financial incentives for solar power. “It’s true the schemes have reduced emissions but at a very high price — we could have found much cheaper ways to tackle climate change,” co-author and Grattan Institute Energy program director Tony Wood said in a statement launching the report.

His analysis ignited scathing critiques, with University of Queensland economist John Quiggin arguing it was so “totally wrong” it should be retracted, and solar champions dismissing it as desperate old energy railing against the inevitable.

The heat and fury is unsurprising given the stakes. Although the total capacity of the solar sector in Australia is still modest — 5,000 gigawatts, or 2.1 percent of total electricity generation — the sheer numbers of household players makes it a proving ground for innovations in solar technology, design, and marketing. As these developments begin to empower citizens — even entire rural communities — to wean off the centralized grid, it offers a glimpse of the next chapter of the solar story.

Unlike many international markets, the Australian solar photovoltaic scene is predominantly residential, with commercial and large-scale solar installations only now gaining traction.

Household enthusiasm for solar in Australia boomed courtesy of a two-year windfall era, beginning in late 2009, of generous feed-in tariffs, under which the states and territories agreed to purchase renewable energy produced by homeowners at up to 60 cents per kilowatt-hour.

“The initial setting of feed-in tariffs, at a time when solar PV installations were minimal, was deliberately generous,” explains Quiggin. He said that the tariffs, designed to encourage households to invest in renewables, led to far more homeowners installing PV panels than anticipated. As a result, one in five Australian homeowners has installed solar energy panels, the highest penetration of PV panels in the world. In the states of Queensland and South Australia, aggressive policy support has pushed saturation levels of home solar in suitable owner-occupied dwellings to as high as 40 percent.

By 2012 the various states were scrambling to scale back the incentives. One equitable step, says Quiggin, would have been to reduce the feed-in tariff to the retail price of grid energy — around 22 cents. But the utilities had overinvested in grid expansion in anticipation of customers continuing to buy coal-generated electricity. Saddled with those expenses, the utilities lobbied successfully to reduce the feed-in tariffs to the wholesale price paid to generators, Quiggin said.

Australia has so much coal — more than 86 per cent of the nation’s power still comes from fossil fuels — that it has some of the lowest wholesale electricity prices in the world. Yet the retail price of electricity ranks among the highest, chiefly as a consequence of the network costs required to maintain its expensive and expansive old coal-dominated power grid. It’s the fallout of “the catastrophic mess made of electricity policy, bad decisions back in the 1990s when no one was thinking about solar at all,” says Quiggin.

So it is that now solar owners get paid 5 to 8 cents per kilowatt-hour for their power, far less than the retail price of grid energy. The boom cycled into a bust, with small-scale solar installations slowing significantly, last year finishing at half what they were at the 2011 peak. “We’re now just getting to some sort of equilibrium,” Brazzale says.

The readjustments mean that the gap between what a customer gets paid for the solar power they export to the grid compared to what they pay for Australia’s high-priced centralized electricity is the largest in the world. Recognizing that solar system owners now have little incentive to sell their power, a wave of companies are starting to roll out affordable batteries and storage to encourage homeowners to keep and consume the energy they collect.

Brazzale is betting that by 2030, half of Australia’s homes will have solar power, and that solar energy installations this year will be the highest ever — 1,058 megawatts — as utility-scale solar power stations and commercial players pick up the domestic market slack.

This comes despite 14 months of inertia in the renewable sector as a consequence of the conservative federal government’s ambivalence on resetting renewable energy targets, a delay that Quiggin estimates killed off 8,000 kilowatt-hours of renewables before a lower, revised target for 2020 was finally set last month.

The current government of Prime Minister Tony Abbott has a record of being cool on climate action. It axed the nation’s unpopular carbon pricing system — introduced by the previous Labor government — and dismantled the expert Climate Commission and slashed funding for the Australian Renewable Energy Agency. Abbott once opined that human-induced climate change was “crap,” though he says he now takes it “very seriously.”

Prevailing political winds aside, it’s hard to imagine a country with a more auspicious set of conditions for solar power: plentiful sunshine (Australia has the highest average solar radiation per square meter of any continent) and sprawling, wealthy cities populated with detached housing.

High home electricity bills have also been a potent driver of Australia’s domestic solar boom, particularly in struggling rural and regional areas and in new suburbs. The solar industry got another boost, even as government incentives closed down, when the price tags on PV systems crashed, largely courtesy of developments outside Australia. Incentives in pace-setting nations like Germany and Spain produced economies of scale that have fueled the Australian boom, with renewables experts declaring the domestic solar market was well beyond grid parity three years ago.

Melbourne-based solar impresario Jeremy Rich, who last year sold his successful installation business to U.S. giant SunEdison, says “when we started the business 12 years ago, solar was $12 a watt, now it’s $2 a watt.” Premium-grade domestic systems have a price tag in the $5,000-$6,000 range. Payback times vary with state incentives and geography, from just over four years in the hot and steamy Northern Territory, to almost 11 years in temperate, southernmost Tasmania.

“People feel it is more expensive now to go solar because they’re not getting the [government] rebate,” says Rich. “But who cares? It’s [still] cheaper.” His business, Energy Matters, a major installer of solar PV systems, is now marketing solar leasing schemes in which customers buy the power generated on their roofs, but don’t own the panels. It’s a common practice in parts of the U.S., but a novelty in Australia, and representative of the kind of seismic shakeup being predicted by solar power analysts.

“Consumers here don’t understand this yet,” says Rich. “We’re trying to educate the market, and people are stuck in the mindset that they need to buy the panels. We put the panels on your roof, but we own them and we sell you the power for 20 or 30 percent cheaper than on your [old energy] bill. The risk is all on us.” Rich says SunEdison’s venture onto the Australian scene signals confidence in its potential despite all the political uncertainty and the muscular posturing of old-school energy.

In April, a report by the World Wildlife Fund, in collaboration with the Australian National University, argued that with the prices of solar and wind technology falling so dramatically, Australia was well placed to reduce emissions at low cost — sourcing 100 percent of its energy from renewables by 2050 without depressing economic growth.

A new survey identifies solar energy as the most popular source of electricity in Australia, with solar panels gaining support from 87 percent of respondents. “There are a bunch of feel-good factors that go with solar,” says Quiggin. “You have more than a million people out there thinking they are doing the right thing. It’s made the politics of attacking renewables much more difficult than the current government anticipated.”

Giles Parkinson, editor of the clean technology and climate website Reneweconomy.com.au, wrote in The Guardian last month that Australia’s old-energy powerhouses were signaling a shift in attitudes and are talking of a future dominated by solar and microgrids.

“Where once [leading power retailer] AGL energy demonized solar tariffs as a ‘scam,’” wrote Parkinson, “it is now offering to buy a solar system for its customers and stick it on their roof … even buy you a battery system. ... Solar has won. It’s just that some people don’t know it yet.”

Quiggin is also optimistic, he says:

“You can never tell with policy. But I would say the government in some sense has done its best to kill the industry and failed.”