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<p><font size="+2"><i><b>April 4, 2022</b></i></font><br>
</p>
<i>[ </i><i>Where is it? </i><i>Promised</i><i> Sunday -</i><i>The
IPCC SPM (Summary for Policymakers) </i><i> </i><i> ] </i><br>
<b>Political wrangling delays release of U.N. climate report</b><br>
By Maxine Joselow - research by Vanessa Montalbano<br>
Today at 8:15 a.m. EDT<br>
The U.N. Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change was originally
scheduled to unveil a report on the sweeping societal changes needed
to stave off catastrophic warming at 5 a.m. Eastern this morning.<br>
<br>
That didn't happen. Instead, the negotiations over the final text
were the longest in the IPCC's 34-year history, delaying the
report's release until 11 a.m. Eastern today to the frustration of
many journalists and observers.<br>
Scientists and officials from nearly 200 countries haggled late into
Sunday night over thorny questions such as how much funding wealthy
nations should provide for developing countries to tackle climate
change, and what emphasis to give policies such as phasing out
subsidies for fossil fuels, the Guardian's Fiona Harvey reports.<br>
<br>
India demanded key changes on issues including climate finance,
according to the Guardian.<br>
Saudi Arabia, the world's largest oil producer, sought changes
related to ensuring a continued role for fossil fuels as governments
transition to renewable energy.<br>
Russia, which has faced international condemnation over its invasion
of Ukraine, played a more muted role than some scientists and
officials had feared.<br>
“Every statement is loaded with implications for countries,” a
person familiar with the report told our colleague Sarah Kaplan,
speaking on the condition of anonymity because they were not
authorized to publicly discuss the negotiations.<br>
<br>
Seemingly simple language about the need for renewable power sources
can be fraught with consequences for low-income countries struggling
to guarantee energy access for their citizens, as well as wealthier
nations that might be asked to provide financial and technical
support for the transition, the person said. ...<br>
- -<br>
“Countries were looking deep inside, into their own policies, to
contrast them with what this report says must be done,” Perez told
our colleague Sarah.<br>
<br>
<b>The role of policymakers</b><br>
The report itself, which will stretch hundreds of pages, was largely
settled on Sunday night. The last-minute haggling was over the
“summary for policymakers,” which will be about 40 pages and will
serve as the key document for governments...<br>
- -<br>
But Jean-Pascal van Ypersele, a Belgian climatologist who
participated in the approval process, took to Twitter to defend the
IPCC process and its outcomes.<br>
<br>
“The scientists authoring the report always have the last word on
what is in the [summary for policymakers], even if they don’t on
what is not in it, because we work by consensus,” he said. “The
strong, and sometimes tense discussions between country delegates
and the authors have a big advantage over a report that would be
written by scientists alone, in their ivory tower: a common sense of
ownership.”<br>
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2022/04/04/political-wrangling-delays-release-un-climate-report/">https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2022/04/04/political-wrangling-delays-release-un-climate-report/</a><br>
<p>- -<br>
</p>
<i>[ has to be produced by consensus ]</i><br>
<b>Scientists urge end to fossil fuel use as landmark IPCC report
readied<br>
</b>Talks stretch past deadline as governments are accused of trying
to water down findings<br>
Fiona Harvey Environment correspondent<br>
Sun 3 Apr 2022<br>
The world must abandon fossil fuels as a matter of urgency, rather
than entrusting the future climate to untried “techno-fixes” such as
sucking carbon out of the air, scientists and campaigners have
urged, as governments wrangled over last-minute changes to a
landmark scientific report.<br>
<br>
Talks on the final draft of the latest comprehensive assessment of
climate science, from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change
(IPCC), stretched hours past their deadline on Sunday.<br>
<br>
Scientists and governments were locked in disagreement on questions
such as how much funding was likely to be needed for developing
countries to tackle the climate crisis, and what emphasis to give
policies such as phasing out fossil fuel subsidies.<br>
Governments have been accused of trying to water down the
scientists’ findings, originally due to be published early on Monday
but – after delays and disagreements on Sunday – postponed by six
hours to later the same day.<br>
<br>
The Guardian understands that India has demanded key changes on
issues including finance, along with Saudi Arabia which wants to see
affirmation of a continued role for fossil fuels, while other
countries including China and Ecuador also held out on some points.
Russia has played a more muted role than some feared.<br>
<br>
Kevin Anderson, professor of energy and climate the Tyndall Centre
for climate research at the University of Manchester, one of the
UK’s leading climate academics, called for the scientists to
prevail.<br>
<br>
“I hope Working Group 3 [the IPCC section about to be published] has
the courage to actually call for the elimination of fossil fuels
production and use within a Paris [agreement] compliant timeline,”
he said.<br>
<br>
This is the third part of the IPCC’s latest landmark assessment, and
the most contentious because it covers the policies, technologies
and finances needed to cut greenhouse gas emissions.<br>
<br>
The first part, covering the physical science of climate change, was
published last August showing the world had only a narrow chance of
limiting global heating to 1.5C; the second, published just over a
month ago, showed the catastrophic impacts heating of 1.5C would
have, but it was overshadowed by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.<br>
<br>
The report itself – hundreds of pages long and drawing on the work
of thousands of scientists over the past eight years – is settled,
but still in dispute is the crucial “summary for policymakers”, a
selection of key messages running to only about 40 pages.<br>
While the report is drafted by scientists, the summary – which is
the key reference document for governments – is edited with input
from every UN member state that wishes to be represented.<br>
<br>
The latest warning from the IPCC – the final instalment of its
mammoth comprehensive assessment, before a synthesis report in
October draws together its key messages in time for governments
meeting for the UN Cop27 climate summit in Egypt this November –
comes at a crucial time.<br>
<br>
Many countries, including the US, the EU and the UK, are
reconsidering their reliance on fossil fuels in light of the Ukraine
war, which has pushed already high energy prices to record levels.
Energy is now seen as a national security issue, and the crisis in
the cost of living in many countries is forcing governments to
rethink ways to protect their citizens, from high prices and climate
breakdown.<br>
<br>
Rachel Kyte, the dean of the Fletcher School at Tufts University in
the US, said: “We are at a moment of increasing tension around the
world, with every excuse possible for distraction and delay. We now
have to put our arms round a new form of energy security, one that
embraces everyone – a new kind of politics. We are at a moment of
reckoning and the IPCC report just puts an exclamation point at the
end of that.”<br>
<br>
Some governments are likely to stress the role the IPCC foresees for
techniques that remove carbon from the air, such as carbon capture
and storage, used to neutralise fossil fuel power stations, and
technologies such as “direct air capture” by which carbon is
chemically extracted from the atmosphere.<br>
<br>
The IPCC in its broader report is likely to warn that these
techniques are unproven and likely to be prohibitively expensive to
use quickly at the scale required, but governments may force more
favourable language into the summary.<br>
<br>
Nikki Reisch, the director of the energy and climate programme at
the Center for International Environmental Law, said governments
should be clear: “There is no room for more oil and gas full stop.
[Some businesses] want to perpetuate the myth that we can carry on
using fossil fuels. But we need a just transition away from fossil
fuels, not techno-fixes.”<br>
<br>
Anderson said this was a key dilemma. He warned the report could
“pull its punches, hiding behind billions of tonnes of carbon
dioxide removal … [If that is what emerges], then the academic
community will have abdicated its responsibility and opted for
realpolitik over real physics. The climate responds only to the
second.”<br>
<br>
Stephen Cornelius, the head of delegation for WWF, defended the IPCC
process against charges that governments could use it to water down
scientific warnings. He said that as governments played a role in
writing the summaries, they could not shirk responsibility for
heeding the warnings they contain.<br>
<br>
“The IPCC is a useful process,” he said. “It is cumbersome, there is
a long time between the outlines and the report, but … the reports
have political buy-in, and that’s why they are taken seriously.”<br>
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2022/apr/03/scientists-urge-end-to-fossil-fuel-use-as-landmark-ippc-report-readied">https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2022/apr/03/scientists-urge-end-to-fossil-fuel-use-as-landmark-ippc-report-readied</a><br>
<p><br>
</p>
<br>
<i>[ says the Financial TIme$ ] </i><br>
<b>Biden doing more harm to renewables than Trump, says solar boss</b><br>
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="https://www.ft.com/content/cd913f13-27b3-45a4-aee8-62359b36d32c">https://www.ft.com/content/cd913f13-27b3-45a4-aee8-62359b36d32c</a><br>
<br>
<br>
<i>[ Australia movie video ] </i><br>
<b>Regenerating Australia | Trailer</b><br>
Feb 20, 2022<br>
Cinema Australia<br>
The official trailer for award-winning filmmaker Damon Gameau’s
(That Sugar Film, 2040) new documentary short, Regenerating
Australia...<br>
- -<br>
Featuring Kerry O’Brien, Sandra Sully, Gorgi Coghlan, Tim Flannery,
David Pocock and other well-known voices, REGENERATING AUSTRALIA
follows on from solutions explored in 2040 and, with another unique
format, asks the question, ‘What would Australia look like by 2030
if we simply listened to the needs of its people?’ Based on a
four-month interview process with Australians from all walks of life
who shared their hopes and dreams for the country’s future, it is a
new story for our nation: a story of empowerment. A story of
solutions. A story of regeneration.<br>
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="https://youtu.be/JOqOBOOyzFg">https://youtu.be/JOqOBOOyzFg</a>
<p><br>
</p>
<br>
<i>[ the dirty divide ] </i><br>
<b>Florida Republican bill ‘basically erases’ state’s only pro-solar
energy policy</b><br>
Republican-led Senate passes bill that could hamper growth of solar
energy by removing popular financial incentive<br>
Aliya Uteuova<br>
1 Apr 2022 <br>
In one of America’s sunniest states, a Republican-led Senate
recently passed a bill that could hamper the growth of solar energy
by removing a popular financial incentive among consumers.<br>
<br>
Environmentalists are decrying the measure, arguing that the
expansion of rooftop solar is a necessary step in the fight against
the climate crisis. The bill was passed in Florida, as another
extremely sunny state, California, considered a similar update to
its solar policies.<br>
<br>
“This is a bill that basically erases the only pro-solar policy in
Florida,” said Heaven Campbell, state program director of the
non-profit Solar United Neighbors.<br>
The new legislation in Florida would impact a policy known as net
metering, through which solar power users who sell excess energy
back to the grid in exchange for a billing credit. If signed into
law, HB-741 would cut this incentives for rooftop solar owners, and
allow utilities to charge fees that would raise the cost of
switching to renewable energy...<br>
- -<br>
Another potential revision to net metering is underway in
California, the nation’s leading solar power state. The state
utility commission proposed reducing subsidy rates for rooftop solar
and adding a monthly charge for new solar owners. Some
environmentalists have supported changes to California’s net
metering policy, calling them “cost-effective and equitable”. As is
the case in Florida, the California proposal is backed by the
state’s utility companies Pacific Gas and Electric, Southern
California Edison and San Diego Gas and Electric. In 2016, following
similar net-metering legislation in Nevada, many solar companies
ceased their business in the state.<br>
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2022/apr/01/florida-solar-energy-bill-financial-incentive">https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2022/apr/01/florida-solar-energy-bill-financial-incentive</a><br>
<p><br>
</p>
<p><br>
</p>
<i>[ News media is a generic term ]</i><br>
<b>Network news devoted just 22 hours of programming to climate
change last year</b><br>
April Siese - -Friday April 01, 2022 <br>
Daily Kos Staff<br>
<br>
Media Matters for America recently released its annual report on how
major broadcast networks, including ABC, CBS, NBC, and Fox, handled
climate change coverage. There are some encouraging figures in the
report, including the fact that climate coverage overall tripled
from 2020 to 2021, including on morning news shows. CBS Mornings led
the pack when it comes to such programming, running 387 minutes’
worth of climate coverage in 2021 that included an entire program
devoted to climate on Earth Day. The network (where I used to work)
dedicated overall nine-and-a-half hours to climate change across its
shows, accounting for 43% of all climate coverage across broadcast
news networks in 2021. Nearly a quarter of those segments can be
attributed to Jeff Berardelli and Evelyn Taft, who were part of 29
of CBS’ 137 climate segments last year.<br>
<br>
I had the pleasure of working with Berardelli a bit during my tenure
with CBS, and, as both a climate specialist and meteorologist, his
expertise and passion for the issue are unparalleled—which is why
I’m concerned that next year’s Media Matters numbers will reflect
his absence, as he left CBS News to join WFLA as its chief
meteorologist at the beginning of 2022. There are very few
correspondents who approach climate change with the rigor and
devotion Berardelli displayed, though Media Matters notes that
networks clearly had their favorites, including NBC’s Al Roker and
ABC’s Ginger Zee and Rob Marciano. Though Fox’s climate coverage
increased, the news network unsurprisingly did a piss-poor job of
devoting any substantial time to climate change—save for two
severe-weather-related segments on its Fox News Sunday show last
year. Fox News especially continues to push climate change denial
and outright false segments about this crisis.<br>
The fact that so little about climate change is covered reflects a
cognitive dissonance between news broadcasters and the audience they
claim to serve. Recent Pew Research polls suggest that most
Americans want the U.S. to play a role in a net-zero future and want
the country to hit zero emissions by 2050. Though a Pew Research
poll from last year saw most Americans voice their opposition to the
way the country is handling climate change, the poll also showed
that an overwhelming amount of people in advanced economies took
climate change seriously enough to be willing to alter their very
habits to mitigate its worst effects. However, a network news viewer
wouldn’t know any of these things when tuning into morning shows or
evening newscasts. Media Matters notes that climate change made up
just 1.2% of overall coverage across the four researched networks.<br>
The climate crisis isn’t getting any better the more network news
turns a blind eye to it. And it’s not getting any better if the U.S.
similarly ignores calls to pivot away from fossil fuels amidst the
ongoing Russia-Ukraine conflict and worries of skyrocketing gas
prices. The only folks coming out ahead at this juncture are oil and
gas companies and their shareholders. With extreme weather events
already occurring and the looming threat of both wildfire and the
Atlantic hurricane seasons, now is the time to take action. Call on
President Biden to declare climate change an emergency under the
National Emergencies Act. This will ensure that the U.S. not only
meets the moment when it comes to climate change mitigation, but
helps lead the way as the world moves toward a greener, more
equitable future.<br>
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2022/4/1/2089551/-Network-news-devoted-just-22-hours-of-programming-to-climate-change-last-year">https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2022/4/1/2089551/-Network-news-devoted-just-22-hours-of-programming-to-climate-change-last-year</a><br>
<p>- -<br>
</p>
<i>[ Closer to original sources ]</i><br>
<b>How broadcast TV networks covered climate change in 2021</b><br>
PUBLISHED 03/24/22<br>
2021 was a stand-out year for climate coverage on corporate
broadcast TV networks. In our annual analysis of climate coverage,
Media Matters found that approximately 1,316 minutes — nearly 22
hours — were spent discussing climate change on morning, evening,
and Sunday morning news shows on ABC, CBS, NBC, and Fox Broadcasting
Co., more than a threefold increase from 2020. However, all those
hours of climate coverage on corporate broadcast TV networks
represented roughly 1% of overall news programming in 2021, a figure
that is still far too small in the face of a worsening climate
crisis...<br>
- -
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="https://cloudfront.mediamatters.org/styles/scale_w1024/s3/static/D8Image/2022/03/21/2021%20climate%20broadcast%20study%20%281%29.png?VersionId=7Blkhaj9RIO7lYDVHCDVj0ZARySxqNT6&itok=JXZQh5W3">https://cloudfront.mediamatters.org/styles/scale_w1024/s3/static/D8Image/2022/03/21/2021%20climate%20broadcast%20study%20%281%29.png?VersionId=7Blkhaj9RIO7lYDVHCDVj0ZARySxqNT6&itok=JXZQh5W3</a><br>
<b>Key Findings:</b><br>
- - Total broadcast news climate coverage in 2021 tripled from 2020:
Morning news shows, evening news shows, and Sunday morning shows on
corporate broadcast TV networks aired nearly 22 hours of combined
climate coverage in 2021 — a total of 1,316 minutes across 604
segments. This is more than triple the amount of climate coverage in
2020, when these networks aired just 380 minutes across 221
segments.<br>
- -Every network significantly increased its 2021 climate coverage
from 2020: CBS led, with the most total coverage across its morning
news, evening news, and Sunday political shows, airing a combined
569 minutes (nearly nine and a half hours) across 220 segments in
2021, compared to just 125 minutes and 73 segments in 2020. NBC
aired 383 minutes (nearly six and a half hours) of climate coverage
across 196 segments in 2021, compared to just 159 minutes and 94
segments the previous year. ABC aired 323 minutes (nearly five and a
half hours) of climate coverage across 175 segments in 2021,
compared to 90 minutes and 50 segments the year before...<br>
- -<br>
- - A summer of global extreme weather, President Joe Biden’s
climate agenda, and the COP26 climate conference were major drivers
of climate coverage in 2021: <br>
Thirty-three percent of nightly news segments — 60 out of 181 —
included discussion of summer extreme weather events. In addition,
13% of segments (24) discussed COP26, while 9% of segments (16)
included discussion of the climate components of Biden’s “Build Back
Better” infrastructure plan.<br>
- - Twenty-three percent of morning news segments — 84 out of 363 —
included discussion of summer extreme weather events. COP26 was
discussed in 11% of segments (39), while the climate components of
Biden’s infrastructure plan were discussed in 7% of segments (24).<br>
- - Despite the increase in coverage from 2020, networks failed to
cover climate change consistently throughout the year — 66% of
climate segments aired in the last six months of 2021, with 42% of
all climate segments on broadcast news in 2021 airing in the months
of September, October, and November. ..<br>
- -
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="https://cloudfront.mediamatters.org/styles/scale_w1024/s3/static/D8Image/2022/03/21/2021%20climate%20broadcast%20study%20%282%29.png?VersionId=_puDbqh2b0zNU91ly8ShaT_TegKJHpp1&itok=hIiqXkRI">https://cloudfront.mediamatters.org/styles/scale_w1024/s3/static/D8Image/2022/03/21/2021%20climate%20broadcast%20study%20%282%29.png?VersionId=_puDbqh2b0zNU91ly8ShaT_TegKJHpp1&itok=hIiqXkRI</a><br>
However, some problematic trends continued to materialize in the
quality of corporate broadcast news coverage of climate change,
including, for at least the fifth year in a row, an overwhelming
proportion of white men featured as guests in climate coverage, even
though people of color are most impacted by the crisis. And while
broadcast networks did a decent job of covering key moments and
events in 2021 overall, their climate coverage throughout the year
was uneven...<br>
<p><a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="https://www.mediamatters.org/broadcast-networks/how-broadcast-tv-networks-covered-climate-change-2021">https://www.mediamatters.org/broadcast-networks/how-broadcast-tv-networks-covered-climate-change-2021</a></p>
<p><b>- -</b></p>
<i>[greater coverage of Media Matters studies ]</i><b><br>
</b><b>Over a decade of corporate broadcast TV news climate change
coverage</b><br>
Special PROGRAMS<br>
WRITTEN BY MEDIA MATTERS STAFF<br>
Corporate broadcast news’ reporting on climate change has waxed and
waned over the past 11 years, illustrating the challenge of keeping
the media's attention to the crisis elevated – and consistent.<br>
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="https://cloudfront.mediamatters.org/styles/scale_w1024/s3/static/D8Image/2022/03/21/Climate%20Change%20coverage.png?VersionId=8j4RpL0E8oSImIxoweKK841llmlcQQsP&itok=bCR2xcQo">https://cloudfront.mediamatters.org/styles/scale_w1024/s3/static/D8Image/2022/03/21/Climate%20Change%20coverage.png?VersionId=8j4RpL0E8oSImIxoweKK841llmlcQQsP&itok=bCR2xcQo</a><br>
The harmful practice of giving climate deniers a platform to cast
doubt about the existence of climate change or downplay the severity
of the crisis is seemingly gone from broadcast TV news. However, the
predominance of both white and male guests continues to mark a
dispiriting trend in climate coverage, neglecting the
disproportionate impacts that climate change has on both women and
people of color. The toll of historic extreme weather events and
unprecedented “code red” warnings from the scientific community have
finally started to erode broadcast TV news’ reticence to
characterize disasters like 2021’s Hurricane Ida as proof that
climate change is happening here and now – rather than portraying
the crisis as a far-off calamity. Though coverage of these events
still fails to point to the need to take climate action and hold
accountable those obstructing it...<br>
- -<br>
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="https://www.mediamatters.org/broadcast-networks/over-decade-corporate-broadcast-tv-news-climate-change-coverage">https://www.mediamatters.org/broadcast-networks/over-decade-corporate-broadcast-tv-news-climate-change-coverage</a><br>
<p><br>
</p>
<p><br>
</p>
<i>[ about anti-information - the destruction of information - how
does this apply to global warming? ]</i><br>
<b>“Disappeared”: Chris Hedges Responds to YouTube Deleting His
6-Year Archive of RT America Shows</b><br>
STORY APRIL 1, 2022<br>
YouTube has deleted the entire archive of “On Contact,” an
Emmy-nominated television show by Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist
Chris Hedges which was hosted on the Russian government-funded news
channel RT America. We speak with Hedges, who connects the YouTube
censorship of his show to a growing crackdown on dissenting voices
in American media. “There’s less and less space for those who are
willing to seriously challenge and question entrenched power,” says
Hedges, who says “opaque entities” like YouTube shouldn’t have the
power to take down outlets like RT America, despite the channel’s
source of funding. “Are we better off not hearing what Russia has to
say?” asks Hedges.<br>
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="https://www.democracynow.org/2022/4/1/on_contact_chris_hedges_youtube_russia">https://www.democracynow.org/2022/4/1/on_contact_chris_hedges_youtube_russia</a>
<p>- -</p>
<i>[ 10 min video segment ]</i><br>
<b>"Disappeared": Chris Hedges Responds to YouTube Deleting His
6-Year Archive of RT America Shows</b><br>
Democracy Now!<br>
YouTube has deleted the entire archive of "On Contact," an
Emmy-nominated television show by Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist
Chris Hedges which was hosted on the Russian government-funded news
channel RT America. We speak with Hedges, who connects the YouTube
censorship of his show to a growing crackdown on dissenting voices
in American media. "There's less and less space for those who are
willing to seriously challenge and question entrenched power," says
Hedges, who says "opaque entities" like YouTube shouldn't have the
power to take down outlets like RT America, despite the channel's
source of funding. "Are we better off not hearing what Russia has to
say?" asks Hedges. <br>
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V1LU-nV11dg">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V1LU-nV11dg</a><br>
<p>- -</p>
<i>[ This has not been widely reported in mainstream media, but is
shocking ]</i><br>
<b>Hedges: On Being Disappeared</b><br>
by EDITOR<br>
March 28, 2022<br>
<b>Hedges: On Being Disappeared</b><br>
The entire archive of six years of my show On Contact has been
removed by YouTube.<br>
By Chris Hedges / Original to ScheerPost<br>
<br>
The entire archive of On Contact, the Emmy-nominated show I hosted
for six years for RT America and RT International, has been
disappeared from YouTube. Gone is the interview with Nathaniel
Philbrick on his book about George Washington. Gone is the
discussion with Kai Bird on his biography of J. Robert Oppenheimer.
Gone is my exploration with Professor Sam Slote from Trinity College
Dublin of James Joyce’s “Ulysses.” Gone is the show with Benjamin
Moser on his biography of Susan Sontag. Gone is the show with
Stephen Kinzer on his book on John Foster Dulles and Allen Dulles.
Gone are the interviews with the social critics Cornel West, Tariq
Ali, Noam Chomsky, Gerald Horne, Wendy Brown, Paul Street, Gabriel
Rockwell, Naomi Wolff and Slavoj Zizek. Gone are the interviews with
the novelists Russell Banks and Salar Abdoh. Gone is the interview
with Kevin Sharp, a former federal judge, on the case of Leonard
Peltier. Gone are the interviews with economists David Harvey and
Richard Wolff. Gone are the interviews with the combat veterans and
West Point graduates Danny Sjursen and Eric Edstrom about our wars
in the Middle East. Gone are the discussions with the journalists
Glenn Greenwald and Matt Taibbi. Gone are the voices of those who
are being persecuted and marginalized, including the human rights
attorney Steven Donziger and the political prisoner Mumia Abu Jamal.
None of the shows I did on mass incarceration, where I interviewed
those released from our prisons, are any longer on YouTube. Gone are
the shows with the cartoonists Joe Sacco and Dwayne Booth. Melted
into thin air, leaving not a rack behind.<br>
<br>
I received no inquiry or notice from YouTube. I vanished. In
totalitarian systems you exist, then you don’t. I suppose this was
done in the name of censoring Russian propaganda, although I have a
hard time seeing how a detailed discussion of “Ulysses” or the
biographies of Susan Sontag and J. Robert Oppenheimer had any
connection in the eyes of the most obtuse censors in Silicon Valley
with Vladimir Putin. Indeed, there is not one show that dealt with
Russia. I was on RT because, as a vocal critic of US imperialism,
militarism, the corporate control of the two ruling parties, and
especially because I support the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions
movement against Israel, I was blacklisted. I was on RT for the same
reason the dissident Vaclav Havel, who I knew, was on Voice of
America during the communist regime in Czechoslovakia. It was that
or not be heard. Havel had no more love for the policies of
Washington than I have for those of Moscow. <br>
<br>
Are we a more informed and better society because of this wholesale
censorship? Is this a world we want to inhabit where those who know
everything about us and about whom we know nothing can instantly
erase us? If this happens to me, it can happen to you, to any critic
anywhere who challenges the dominant narrative. And that is where we
are headed as the ruling elites refuse to respond to the
disenfranchisement and suffering of the working class, opting not
for social and political change or the curbing of the rapacious
power and obscene wealth of our oligarchic rulers, but instead
imposing iron control over information, as if that will solve the
mounting social unrest and vast political and social divides. <br>
<br>
The most vocal cheerleaders for this censorship are the liberal
class. Terrified of the enraged crowds of QAnon conspiracy
theorists, Christian fascists, gun-toting militias, and cult-like
Trump supporters that grew out of the distortions of neoliberalism,
austerity, deindustrialization, and the collapse of social programs,
they plead with the digital monopolies to make it all go away. They
blame anyone but themselves. Democrats in Congress have held
hearings with the CEOs of social media companies pressuring them to
do more to censor content. Banish the troglodytes. Then we will have
social cohesion. Then life will go back to normal. Fake news. Harm
reduction model. Information pollution. Information disorder. They
have all sorts of Orwellian phrases to justify censorship.
Meanwhile, they peddle their own fantasy that Russia was responsible
for the election of Donald Trump. It is a stunning inability to be
remotely self-reflective or self-critical, and it is ominous as we
move deeper and deeper into a state of political and social
dysfunction. <br>
<br>
What were my sins? I did not, like my former employer, The New York
Times, sell you the lie of weapons of mass destruction in Iraq,
peddle conspiracy theories about Donald Trump being a Russian asset,
put out a 10-part podcast called the Caliphate that was a hoax, or
tell you that the information on Hunter Biden’s laptop was
“disinformation.” I did not prophesize that Joe Biden was the next
FDR or that Hillary Clinton was going to win the election. <br>
<br>
This censorship is about supporting what, as I.F Stone reminded us,
governments always do – lie. Challenge the official lie, as I often
did, and you will soon become a nonperson on digital media. Julian
Assange and Edward Snowden exposed the truth about the criminal
inner workings of power. Look where they are now. This censorship is
one step removed from Joseph Stalin’s airbrushing of nonpersons such
as Leon Trotsky out of official photographs. It is a destruction of
our collective memory. It removes those moments in the media when we
attempted to examine our reality in ways the ruling class did not
appreciate. The goal is to foster historical amnesia. If we don’t
know what happened in the past, we cannot make sense of the present.
<br>
<br>
“The moment we no longer have a free press, anything can happen,”
Hannah Arendt warned. “What makes it possible for a totalitarian or
any other dictatorship to rule is that people are not informed; how
can you have an opinion if you are not informed? If everybody always
lies to you, the consequence is not that you believe the lies, but
rather that nobody believes anything any longer. This is because
lies, by their very nature, have to be changed, and a lying
government has constantly to rewrite its own history. On the
receiving end you get not only one lie—a lie which you could go on
for the rest of your days—but you get a great number of lies,
depending on how the political wind blows. And a people that no
longer can believe anything cannot make up its mind. It is deprived
not only of its capacity to act but also of its capacity to think
and to judge. And with such a people you can then do what you
please.” <br>
<br>
I am not alone. YouTube regularly removes or demonetizes channels,
which happened to Progressive Soapbox, without warning, usually by
arguing that the content contained videos that violated YouTube’s
community guidelines. Status Coup, which filmed the January 6
storming of the Capitol, was suspended from YouTube for “advancing
the false claims of election fraud.” My video content, by the way,
primarily consisted of book covers, quotes from passages of books
and author photos, but it got disappeared anyway. <br>
<br>
The deplatforming of voices like mine, already blocked by commercial
media and marginalized with algorithms, is coupled with the
pernicious campaign to funnel people back into the arms of the
“establishment” media such as CNN, The New York Times, and The
Washington Post. In the US, as Dorothy Parker once said about
Katharine Hepburn’s emotional range as an actress, any policy
discussion ranges from A to B. Step outside those lines and you are
an outcast. <br>
<br>
The Ukraine war, which I denounced as a “criminal war of aggression”
when it began, is a sterling example. Any effort to put it into
historical context, to suggest that the betrayal of agreements by
the West with Moscow, which I covered as a reporter in Eastern
Europe during the collapse of the Soviet Union, along with the
expansion of NATO might have baited Russia into the conflict, is
dismissed. Nuance. Complexity. Ambiguity. Historical context.
Self-criticism. All are banished. <br>
<br>
My show, dedicated primarily to authors and their books, should have
been, if we had a functioning system of public broadcasting, on PBS
or NPR. But public broadcasting is as captive to corporations and
the wealthy as the commercial media, indeed PBS and NPR run
commercials in the guise of sponsorship acknowledgements. The last
show on public broadcasting that examined power was Moyers &
Company. Once Bill Moyers went off the air in 2015, no one took his
place. <br>
<br>
A few decades ago, you could hear independent voices on public
broadcasting, including Martin Luther King, Malcolm X, Howard Zinn,
Ralph Nader, Angela Davis, James Baldwin, and Noam Chomsky. No more.
A few decades ago, there were a variety of alternative weeklies and
magazines. A few decades ago, we still had a press that, however
flawed, had not rendered whole segments of the population,
especially the poor and social critics, invisible. It is perhaps
telling that our greatest investigative journalist, Sy Hersh, who
exposed the massacre of 500 unarmed Vietnamese civilians by US
soldiers at My Lai and the torture at Abu Ghraib, has trouble
publishing in the United States. I would direct you to the interview
I did with Sy about the decayed state of the American media, but it
no longer exists on YouTube.<br>
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="https://scheerpost.com/2022/03/28/hedges-on-being-disappeared/#comments">https://scheerpost.com/2022/03/28/hedges-on-being-disappeared/#comments</a><br>
<p><br>
</p>
<p><br>
</p>
<i>[The news archive - looking back]</i><br>
<font size="5"><b>April 4, 2002</b></font><br>
The New York Times reports:<br>
<blockquote>"President Bush signed an executive order last year that
closely resembles a written recommendation given to the
administration two months earlier by the American Gas Association,
according to documents released by the Bush administration.<br>
<br>
"The executive order called for the creation of an interagency
energy task force to accelerate the time it takes for government
agencies to review corporations' applications for permits for
energy-related projects, like power plants and the exploration of
oil and natural gas on public lands. Mr. Bush signed the order
last May.<br>
<br>
"The language in Mr. Bush's executive order is similar to a
passage in a proposed energy bill sent in March 2001 to the Energy
Department by officials at the American Gas Association, the trade
group that represents large natural gas companies and has given
more than $500,000 to the Republican Party since 1999."<br>
</blockquote>
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="http://www.nytimes.com/2002/04/04/politics/04ENER.html">http://www.nytimes.com/2002/04/04/politics/04ENER.html</a><br>
<br>
<br>
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