Chart of the Week: Leading Poverty Indicator

Food stamp usage has increased by about 10 million people in two years. The program now feeds 1 in 8 Americans and 1 in 4 American children. See this interactive chart that shows food stamp usage by county:
www.nytimes.com/interactive/2009/11/28/us/20091128-foodstamps.html

A recent study by a Washington University professor found that half of Americans receive food stamps, at least briefly, by the time they turn 20. Among black children, the figure was 90%. Obviously, the solution to this shocking amount of hunger is to send all those using food stamps to South Carolina where Lt. Gov.Andre Bauer(R) would have them sterilized.

Kill Them One More Time

It is an insidious maneuver that plagues politics at all levels: achieve a precedent so you can more easily repeat the bad policy later. So it is with the sale of elephant ivory confiscated from the illegal trade. Robert Mugabe was able to convince CITIES to allow Zimbabwe and three other south African nations with substantial elephant populations to allow a "one-time" sale of 50 tons of confiscated ivory in 1997. That was seven years after the banning of ivory sales worldwide. When the ban came into effect poaching levels across Africa dropped, and the crash of elephant populations halted (1.3 million individuals down to 625,000 in the decade of the 80s).  After the "one-time" sale in 1997, poaching levels rose, undoubtably stimulated by new demand for ivory.  In 2007-08 CITIES repeated the mistake and allowed another "one-time" sale of 100 tons.  To make matters worse, China was made an official ivory buyer, despite its terrible record of enforcing the ivory ban. In Kenya the number of elephants killed by poachers rose from 47 in 2007 to 98 in 2008 and 214 in 2009.  According to the Independent, at least 15 tons of tusks and pieces, equal to 1,500 elephants, were seized en route to Asia last year.

Now Tanzania and Zambia want to their turn to sell official stockpiles of ivory.  Their application will be voted on at the next meeting of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species in March.  Conservationist fear this sale could be the death knell of the African elephant.  Loosing habitat at a fantastic rate, and under extreme pressure from poaching, the large herbivores may disappear from the wild.  Allowing another "one-time" sale is simply bad conservation even if it appears unfair to the applicants.  Other African countries led by Kenya and Mali oppose more sales.  The concession to Robert Mugabe  should never have been allowed. It is now clear the official sales stimulate more demand for ivory.  There is no justification for repeating the mistake.  Are the ultimate sacrifices of dedicated rangers (100 a year die fighting poaching) trying to protect their heritage wildlife to be rendered meaningless?  We in the industrialized world have a moral obligation to protect what remains of the world's natural heritage for future generations to enjoy.  Urge Secretary of State Clinton to vote against more sales of ivory stockpiles.

[photo: Namib desert bull, US Person] 

Saving A Natural Gem

If US Person could scuba dive only one lake in the world, it would probably be Lake Niassa between Malawi and Mozambique. Known for its diversity of cichlids, it is a natural aquarium of beautiful fish.  Once connected to the sea, the clear waters of the lake are home to over 1,000 species of fish, 95% of which are unique to Lake Niassa.  But like most ecosystems, it is being adversely impacted by man.  Mosquito netting donated to villagers for malaria prevention is being used to catch fish. The netting is very fine so it removes even the tiniest fish and eggs, destroying fish life cycles. When the netting is used for seining from the beach, the long nets are dragged across the lake bottom, destroying algae that forms the basis for the lake's food chain. Catches declined as did fish size. In response to a potential disaster, local fishermen have formed fishing councils to ban the use of mosquito netting for fishing and promote sustainable fishing techniques. Now the government of Mozambique is preparing to announce the establishment of the Lake Niassa Reserve, one of the largest fresh water protected areas in Africa. The World Wildlife Fund worked with community organizations and the national government to bring about this conservation success story. As one fisherman said, "but now it's like magic has happened: we catch fish big enough for ourselves and to sell in big markets." Help WWF create more "magic" in the world by supporting the preservation of wildlife and wild places around the world.

[photo: mbunacichlids.com]

Creature Feature: The Storybook Wolf

The shot looked like something right out of "Little Red Riding Hood" or maybe "The Three Little Piggies".  The winner of the prestigious Wildlife Photographer of the Year award, Jose Luis Rodriguez was stripped of his title after the judging panel reconvened in response to disquiet about his image.  It looked to US Person too good to be true, or captured in a camera trap with extreme good luck allowing for a perfect exposure.  The judges decided the wolf is a model animal.  Models are not allowed under the rules. No new winner will be announced as the photographers and the details of their images are now known, making an impartial selection impossible.  Mr. Rodriguez denies using a model wolf.  Still, its a striking image even if Lobo brings it on cue.

Year of the Tiger

It is the year of the Tiger on the Chinese calendar.  This new year finds the tiger in tough shape.  There may be as few as 3,200 individuals still living in tiger range.  Dr. Eric Dinerstein of the World Wildlife Fund is still optimistic about the future of Panthera tigris in the wild.  According to Dr. Dinerstein there is about 425,000 square miles of tiger habitat remaining in the world, enough to support 20,000 to 30,000 wild tigers.  WWF and its partners have successfully brought back other species from the edge of extinction.  At the turn of the last century there were only 100 southern white rhino clinging to survival in a reserve.  Now because of conservationists' direct intervention more than 17,000 live in the wild, albeit still under threat from ivory poachers.  Tigers breed much more robustly than white rhinos.  Developing countries in tiger range must consider the needs of their remaining tigers when making plans for human infrastructure.  Poaching is one of the greatest threats facing wild tigers.  Education and law enforcement in the field are the two best ways to counter this threat to the tiger's existence.  There are around 5,000 captive tigers in the United States.  Allowing captive tiger parts to reach the black market also poses a threat to wild populations because the supply stimulates further consumer demand, leading to more poaching in the wild.  You can help protect the wild tiger by asking our government to close loopholes in protected species regulations, and prevent the use of captive tiger products.  Take action and go to www.worldwildlife.org/tigerpolicies

The Polluters' End Run

Pay for play politics has the upper hand in Washington.  Democrats are reeling from the defeat in Massachusetts, so conservatives and their corporate sponsors are taking advantage and moving to gut the Clean Air Act {04.02.07}.  Since the debacle of the Copenhagen climate conference, the EPA's rule making concerning greenhouse gas emissions as a pollutant that endangers public health, is the best hope for doing something to curb global warming.  Senator Lisa Murkowski (R-AK) is fronting for a bill written by the coal lobby that curtails the EPA's authority to regulate carbon dioxide.  The two lobbyists involved are former members of the Regime that overturned a Clinton era rule to regulate CO2.  Jeffery Holmstead now works for the law firm of Bracewell & Gulliani as a registered lobbyist.  He has lobbied for Arch Coal and Duke Energy, an electrical utility company.  Roger Martella is a partner at Sidley Austin LLP.  Martella has lobbied for the National Alliance of Forest Owners.   Murkowski received $389,313 in political contributions from the electrical utilities industry, while the oil and gas industry has donated $365,813 to her campaign fund.  Holmstead also represents the Southern Co. which owns three power plants that topped the list of U.S. coal fired sources of carbon dioxide.  The nexus is there for any person--not just an alleged "doctrinaire Marxist"-- to see. Fight back against this gentile form of bribery by calling their representatives and demand that Murkowski's amendment be defeated.

Who is Alan Frumin?

He is the Senate parliamentarian. Martha Coakley lost Ted Kennedy's seat in Massachusetts, so his role in the Senate may become critically important to passing a health care bill. The unsurprising* loss in Massachusetts ends the Democrats' feeble sixty Senate seat majority, but it also makes Ben Nelson and Joe Lieberman's votes thankfully irrelevant. Democrats will now be forced to either try to pass a bill over a filibuster before the Republican is seated or use the reconciliation process to pass the House bill which would only require 51 votes. The House is rightfully objecting to passing the Senate's bill because frankly its plan is better.  President Clinton wanted to use reconciliation to pass his 1993 health care plan, but Senator Byrd objected.  In 1996 Republicans created a precedent to apply reconciliation to any legislation affecting the budget, even if it would increase the deficit.  They used reconciliation to pass tax cuts, oil drilling, and trade authority among other things.  This route is less fraught with failure, and would give progressives a chance to resurrect the public option contained in the House bill. Washington wonks say reconciliation is not appropriate because important provisions like the national insurance exchange could be declared out of order since, in their narrow rule interpretation, the exchange is not budget related. But the key to this impasse is that parliamentary order is maintained by the presiding chair. Whoever is in the chair at the critical moment, and I have to assume it would either be the Vice-President or the Majority Leader, would rule on the issue, advised by Mr. Frumin and his staff sitting on the dais.  Sixty votes are then required to overturn the presiding officer's ruling.  Saving lives is worth some liberal rule interpretation, ancient Byrd's insistence on procedural purity notwithstanding.

*Coakley ran a pitiful campaign.  She was willing to rest on the laurels of Ted Kennedy's forty-seven years in office. The defeat can be seen as a rebuke of Obama caused by his repeated disappointment of the party's progressive base, or alienation of the state's largest voting block: independents. Whether her defeat is a referendum on health care legislation is not so clear, since Massachusetts essentially has the scheme being proposed for the nation.  But it may be indicative of dissatisfaction with the pending proposal.  Massachusetts' plan requires residents to buy coverage and the plan does not have a public option.  Health care costs have escalated in the state despite the 'reformed' system.  Given the new state of play, it may be easier simply to extend Medicare coverage through the reconciliation process, and make critical changes in the regulation of private health insurance.  Near universal coverage will have to wait yet another Democratic administration.  Giving up is not a solution as Ted Kennedy said, "Hope still lives..."