But in the years since, our understanding of its effect on primates, as well as alternatives to it, have made great strides, to the point where I no longer believe such experiments make sense — scientifically, financially or ethically. That’s why I have introduced bipartisan legislation to phase out invasive research on great apes in the United States.
Today is the start of a two-day public hearing convened by the Institute of Medicine, which is examining whether there is still a need for invasive chimpanzee research. Meanwhile, nine countries, as well as the European Union, already forbid or restrict invasive research on great apes. Americans have to decide if the benefits to humans of research using chimpanzees outweigh the ethical, financial and scientific costs.
Stop Using Chimps as Guinea Pigs – NYTimes.com
11 Aug
New Exposé Tracks ALEC-Private Prison Industry Effort to Replace Unionized Workers with Prison Labor
10 AugFollow the link below transcript and video.
Many of the toughest sentencing laws responsible for the explosion of the U.S. prison population were drafted by the American Legislative Exchange Council, which helps corporations write model legislation. Now a new exposé reveals ALEC has paved the way for states and corporations to replace unionized workers with prison labor. We speak with Mike Elk, contributing labor reporter at The Nation magazine. He says ALEC and private prison companies “put a mass amount of people in jail, and then they created a situation where they could exploit that.” Elk notes that in 2005 more than 14 million pounds of beef infected with rat feces processed by inmates were not recalled, in order to avoid drawing attention to how many products are made by prison labor.
via New Exposé Tracks ALEC-Private Prison Industry Effort to Replace Unionized Workers with Prison Labor.
Guerilla SK8 Park in Jersey City, Part 2
9 AugWhere were we? Ah, the SK8park has been destroyed as preparation for construction that never happened, presumably because of the 2008 financial melt down that’s still just oozing along and seems like it’s going to raise the cost of crossing the Hudson, but . . . back to the story.
The park’s patrons were not happy:
“Someone shoot me,” it says, “used to be the fucking coolest place.” Then, a few days later, another sign appeared:
Could’a knocked me over with an aerosol blast. Who in City Hall, I asked myself, gives a crap about these kids and their illegal but hard-won park? I was curious, and went to the meeting. Four skaters, one councilman, Steve Fulop, and me, that was the meeting. Fulop asked the skaters if they could get more skaters to come to a rescheduled meeting. They said they could. Fulop scheduled another meeting for Monday 19 November. I told the councilman that I would donate photos of the site Jersey City’s library so that there would be a permanent record of the park, which I did a week or so later. Continue reading
Guerilla SK8 Park in Jersey City, Part 1
8 AugSometimes people just go ahead and create what they need without waiting for the government to act. That’s what a bunch of kids and young adults did in Jersey City a few years ago. At least, that’s what I surmise after the fact. I don’t actually know what they decided, when, and why. I just know what they did. I know, because I walked into it by chance. Here’s that story.
It was in November of 2006, about a month or so after I’d become interested in photographing local graffiti. I was walking in the neighborhood, or perhaps I was in the car on the way back from my Sunday AM grocery run. One of the other, it doesn’t much matter. Anyhow, I spotted some color:
That’s the stuff, says I, that’s the stuff. When I got closer, I noticed a ramp against a wall:
And then this:
Someone was obviously using this site—the floor slab of an abandoned industrial building of some sort—as a park for skateboarding and BMX bike riding. See:
I took this in July of 2007. Notice that the art on the walls has changed. It seems that some local, and not so local, graffiti writers used this site as something of an experimental gallery even as the skateboarders and BMXers used it to hone their athletic skills. Continue reading
Tainted Water Well Challenges Claim of Fracking’s Safety – NYTimes.com
4 Aug“I still don’t understand why industry should be allowed to hide problems when public safety is at stake,” said Carla Greathouse, the author of the E.P.A. report that documents a case of drinking water contamination from fracking. “If it’s so safe, let the public review all the cases.”
via Tainted Water Well Challenges Claim of Fracking’s Safety – NYTimes.com.
The Great Hiroshima Cover-up | The Nation
4 AugThe suppression on which the nuclear industrial complex was built?
In the weeks following the atomic attacks on Japan sixty-six years ago this week, and then for decades afterward, the United States engaged in airtight suppression of all film shot in Hiroshima and Nagasaki after the bombings. This included vivid color footage shot by U.S. military crews and black-and-white Japanese newsreel film.
Fatal Radiation Level Found at Fukushima Daiichi Plant – NYTimes.com
2 AugLet’s not forget, the Fukuskima reactors are still leaking radiation into the environment.
TOKYO — The operator of the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant said Monday that it measured the highest radiation levels within the plant since it was crippled by a devastating earthquake. …
The operator, Tokyo Electric Power, said that workers on Monday afternoon had found an area near Reactors No. 1 and 2, where radiation levels exceeded their measuring device’s maximum reading of 10 sieverts per hour — a fatal dose for humans.
Next year, maybe, they’ll be able to shut it down:
The plant has continued to spew radiation since the disaster, though levels have been dropping. The operator is working to install a new makeshift cooling system by early next year that will allow it to finally shut down the plant’s three damaged reactors.
That effort includes removing thousands of tons of highly contaminated water from the reactor buildings. On Monday, Tokyo Electric also said it will begin constructing a new wall that will extend some 60 feet underground to prevent radioactive groundwater from seeping into the nearby Pacific Ocean.
via Fatal Radiation Level Found at Fukushima Daiichi Plant – NYTimes.com.
Cruel Isolation of Prisoners – NYTimes.com
2 AugWho’s the Tomás de Torquemada of the California prison system? Has the US Prison system passed the Inquisition in cruelty? Has it reached the gulag level?
Once used occasionally as a short-term punishment for violating prison rules, solitary confinement’s prevalent use as a long-term prison management strategy is a fairly recent development, Colin Dayan, a professor at Vanderbilt University, said in a recent Op-Ed article in The Times. Nationally, more than 20,000 inmates are confined in “supermax” facilities in horrid conditions.
Ambitions as Deep as Their Pockets – NYTimes.com
1 AugIf anyone thinks of the new explorers as grown-up children playing with expensive toys, ocean veterans reply that there is ample scientific justification for creating new technologies that can regularly plumb the full depth of the ocean, which covers more than 70 percent of the planet yet remains poorly explored.
Truth and Traditions 