This is hard to capture in a headline — at least a headline different than the one I used. What's happening to bees is not unknown, but there's much more to learn.
Bottom line — bees are stressed from many quarters, and getting the flu and dying (yes, the flu). Not only that, but "Colony Collapse Disorder" is only part of the problem, since not all bees are part of a colony, yet all bees are stressed.
I found the following interview both accessible and fascinating. But that's me; I like stuff like this. From Sam Seder at Majority.fm, an interview with a plain-talking bees academic who's on top of this stuff.
GP
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Wednesday, May 25, 2011
Democrats should thank Paul Ryan
E.J. Dionne:
There is no way for Republicans to spin away Democrat Kathy Hochul’s victory in New York’s deeply red 26th congressional district. This is a big setback for Paul Ryan’s budget and a warning for Republican incumbents everywhere. This is simply not a district a Republican should have lost. Conservative overreach has clearly woken up Democrats and has gone down badly with independents.Read the rest of this post...
Senate just defeated Paul Ryan's Medicare-killing Budget : 57 - 40.
The day after the GOP lost the NY-26 House seat because of Paul Ryan's Medicare-killing budget, the Senate took a vote on Ryan's budget proposal.
Ryan lost by a vote of 57 - 40. Yep, 40 GOPers got on that sinking ship, voting yes to kill Medicare.
Good move to force this vote today. Read the rest of this post...
Ryan lost by a vote of 57 - 40. Yep, 40 GOPers got on that sinking ship, voting yes to kill Medicare.
Good move to force this vote today. Read the rest of this post...
Members of Congress enjoy unusually high returns with stock
Who would have guessed? More from Dan Froomkin at Huffington Post:
Four university researchers examined 16,000 common stock transactions made by approximately 300 House representatives from 1985 to 2001, and found what they call "significant positive abnormal returns," with portfolios based on congressional trades beating the market by about 6 percent annually.Read the rest of this post...
What's their secret? The report speculates, but does not conclude, it could have something to do with the ability members of Congress have to trade on non-public information or to vote their own pocketbooks -- or both.
A study of senators by the same team of researchers five years ago found members of the higher chamber even better at beating the market -- outperforming it by about 10 percent, an amount the academics said was "both economically large and statistically significant."
GOP unsure about giving disaster relief to Missouri
Via ThinkProgress:
Firefighters and rescue workers who arrived in Joplin, MO, found that the deadly tornado that hit the state Sunday had left a “barren, smoky wasteland” in its path. Rescue workers worked through more storms in an effort to find potential survivors, even as the death toll rose to at least 119. President Obama pledged full support to the state Monday, telling survivors, “We’re here with you. We’re going to stay by you.”So the next time you're in a restaurant and you see someone choking, go over to him and ask to see his checking account balance before give him the Heimlich maneuver. After all, it isn't fair to let folks live if they can't balance a budget. Read the rest of this post...
House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-VA), however, said that before Congress approved federal funds for disaster relief, it had to offset the spending with cuts to other programs.
Don’t say "Medicare"
Everyone in politics today is talking about how last night's huge loss by the Republicans in the 26 congressional district in New York is due to the GOP plan to cut Medicare. It's Medicare, Medicare, Medicare - from the DNC to all the media.
The only person who isn't talking about Medicare when discussing NY-26 is the President of the United States. It's a bizarre missed opportunity that's led at least one of our readers to ask whether it's a "tell" from the White House that Medicare cuts are on the table, as far as the President is concerned, and thus he doesn't want to box himself in by saying he's against such cuts because the only good that could come of it would be saving Medicare and guaranteeing his re-election and Democratic control of the House and Senate. And who would want that?
Now for everyone else who thinks it's important to mention Medicare, then the President's non-statement.
DNC:
The only person who isn't talking about Medicare when discussing NY-26 is the President of the United States. It's a bizarre missed opportunity that's led at least one of our readers to ask whether it's a "tell" from the White House that Medicare cuts are on the table, as far as the President is concerned, and thus he doesn't want to box himself in by saying he's against such cuts because the only good that could come of it would be saving Medicare and guaranteeing his re-election and Democratic control of the House and Senate. And who would want that?
Now for everyone else who thinks it's important to mention Medicare, then the President's non-statement.
DNC:
Yesterday voters in New York’s 26th Congressional District rejected the Republican Party’s plan to end Medicare as we know it and sent a Democrat to Washingtn to fight for seniors, working families and young people.AP:
“Corwin saw her early lead dissolve after coming out in favor of a Republican budget plan that would cut billions from Medicare”NYT:
“Voters... said they trusted Ms. Hochul... to protect Medicare."Washington Post:
“A Democratic triumph in a conservative district that many regarded a referendum on House Republicans’ efforts to reform Medicare.”CBS:
Kathy Hochul’s special election triumph sends Republicans ominous Medicare messagePolitico:
Democrat Kathy Hochul defeated Republican Jane Corwin in a western New York special election that emerged as a political testing ground for the ambitious GOP blueprint to reform Medicare.The Hill:
Democrat Kathy Hochul pulled off a victory in New York's special election Tuesday in a race that had been cast as a referendum on the GOP's Medicare proposal.MSNBC First Read:
There was a reason why Republican strategists convinced their House candidates last year not to support Paul Ryan’s budget “roadmap” (which included an overhaul of both Medicare and Social Security): Touching popular entitlement programs doesn’t make good politics.Buffalo News and the candidate herself:
And as a jubilant Hochul took the stage at her headquarters at the UAW Hall in Amherst at about 10:30 p.m., she reminded supporters about the core of her campaign — controversial proposals by the GOP to revamp Medicare.Finally, there's President Obama:
I want to extend my congratulations to Congresswoman-elect Kathy Hochul for her victory in New York's 26th Congressional District. Kathy and I both believe that we need to create jobs, grow our economy, and reduce the deficit in order to outcompete other nations and win the future. Kathy has shown, through her victory and throughout her career, that she will fight for the families and businesses in western New York, and I look forward to working with her when she gets to Washington.Read the rest of this post...
PPP: Voters would punish Obama over cuts to SS or Medicare
This is a great opening for Democrats. And I fear the President won't take it. It would mean taking advantage of a wedge issue. And he doesn't do that, because trying to win elections and policy disputes is "mean." Thus the reason he refused to mention Medicare last night when talking about our victory in NY-26, a race about Medicare.
Polling done in Ohio, Missouri, Minnesota and Montana shows significant resistance to cuts in benefits in these swing states. 58% of Ohio voters said they were less likely to vote for President Obama if he backed or signed cuts to Medicare, and 53% said they were less likely to vote for him if he altered the retirement age. Similar results were obtained in the other three states.Read the rest of this post...
GOP Sen. Snowe to vote "no" on Ryan budget because of Medicare "privatization"
GOP Senator Olympia Snowe (R-ME) says she'll vote against the Paul Ryan budget because it "privatizes" Medicare. Meanwhile, Senator Rand Paul (R-KY) will vote against the bill because it doesn't repeal the 64 Civil Rights Act (kidding, but only just) - Paul doesn't think the bill goes far enough.
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Volcano disrupts flights in Europe again
They keep saying that the problem will disappear soon and then the airspace somewhere else is closed. BBC News:
Germany is closing its northern airspace on Wednesday because of ash from an erupting volcano in Iceland, officials say.Read the rest of this post...
Bremen airport was closing at 0300 GMT and Hamburg at 0400 GMT, Germany's weather service said.
The airspace over Berlin and Hanover could also be affected.
Air traffic in Norway and Denmark has been disrupted but flights were expected to resume across the UK after some airspace in the north was closed.
More than 1,000 dead since Syrian uprising started
Compare the actions of the West in Syria to what we see in Libya and take a guess what is different between the two countries. The Libyan adventure now appears to be settling in to a protracted military engagement, like the others. Maybe it won't last for a decade, but it is hardly the walk in the park that many suspected at the beginning. Al Jazeera:
Syrian government forces are being blamed for the deaths of more than 1,000 civilians in a nine-week crackdown on nationwide anti-government demonstrations.Read the rest of this post...
Amar Qurabi, head of the Egypt-based National Organisation for Human Rights, said on Tuesday that his group has documented the names of 1,062 people killed since mid-March, along with the locations of where they died.
He also said more than 10,000 people have been arrested by authorities during the protests.
Meanwhile, Sawasiah, a Syrian human rights organisation, said on Tuesday that it had the names of 1,100 people who it reported were killed mostly in the southern Hauran Plain region, where the uprising first erupted.
Amazon rainforest activist killed in Brazil
What is even creepier is that he predicted this would happen not long ago.
Six months after predicting his own murder, a leading rainforest defender has reportedly been gunned down in the Brazilian Amazon. José Cláudio Ribeiro da Silva and his wife, Maria do Espírito Santo, are said to have been killed in an ambush near their home in Nova Ipixuna, in Pará state, about 37 miles from Marabá.Read the rest of this post...
According to a local newspaper, Diário do Pará, the couple had not had police protection despite getting frequent death threats because of their battle against illegal loggers and ranchers.
On Tuesday there were conflicting reports from about whether the killing happened on Monday night or Tuesday morning. A police spokesperson said there were reports of a "double homicide" at the settlement called Maçaranduba 2.
British Conservatives now promoting abstinence-only for sex education
First they went New World with higher education and now this. Haven't we seen these abstinence-only programs fail time after time? If they can hold their coalition together long enough, they may completely out flank the Teabaggers on the right and become the gold standard for modern right wing extremism. The Guardian:
A group which is opposed to abortion in all circumstances and favours an abstinence-based approach to sex education has been appointed to advise the government on sexual health.Read the rest of this post...
The Life organisation has been invited to join a new sexual health forum set up to replace the Independent Advisory Group on Sexual Health and HIV.
Stuart Cowie, Life's head of education, said: "We are delighted to be invited into the group, representing views that have not always been around on similar tables in the past."
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