Mining Director Fingered for Elephant Poisonings

As if habitat loss and relentless ivory poaching were not enough to destroy Africa's surviving elephants, the adverse effect of government corruption highlighted by Zimbabwe when a mining director was busted for being behind the cyanide poisoning of 300 elephants between 2013 and 2014 in Hwange National Park.  Death by cyanide is horrifically gruesome and painful way for an elephant to meet an unnatural end.  Godfrey Nayakudya was charged with responsibility responsible for the poisonings.  Dilute sodium cyanide is used in mining operations to separate gold from ore.  Four tons of undocumented cyanide was imported from south Africa to How Gold Mine near Bulawayo according to an employee informant.  The chemical was shipped at night across the border without proper documentation.  Some of it was diverted to Hwange where the only mining activity is for coal which does not require the chemical.

In a related development, a US antiques dealer pled guilty to importing elephant tusks from Canada in violation of the Lacy Act.  Ferdinand Krizan faces five years in prison and a $250,000 fine.  The tusks he purchased from Canadian auction house, IEGOR Hotel, are worth about $141,000.  The Canadian firm was under investigation by Canadian authorities when Krizan's name surfaced in purchase records.  Krizan once held a permit to trade in ivory--now illegal in the state of New York--but it was expired.  He admitted in court documents he knew his transaction and transportation of the tusks into the US was illegal. Krizan awaits sentencing.  It is illegal trading like this- much of it in the United States, that fuels the demand for ivory and kills 30,000 or more elephants a year.

DNC Vice-Chair Resigns to Support Bernie

Congresswoman and veteran Tulsi Gabbard resigned her position Sunday as a vice-chair of the Democratic National Committee so she can support Bernie Sanders in his campaign to win the Democratic nomination.  Gabbard admitted there was tension in the party's establishment over Sanders' insurrectionist campaign including disagreement over the debate schedule that may favor their candidate, Hillary Clinton.  Gabbard also cited her disagreement with the interventionist foreign policy agenda supported by Clinton.  According to author Gail Sheehy, Hillary urged her husband president to bomb Kosovo during the air war against Serbia.  Gabbard said Sanders has the foresight and judgment to keep us out of "these failures that have resulted in chaos in the Middle East and so much loss of life."  Gabbard served in a medical unit during her first deployment overseas.

'Toontime: Donald, the Inevitable

The mathematics of the primary season are in Donald Trump's favor.  It may be too late for an astounded Republican establishment to unseat his coronation without a nasty, counterproductive floor-fight at the convention.  The exit of a clueless Jeb Bush and the ineffectual campaign of junior salesman Marco Rubio has put the party controllers into panic mode.  Trump has an eighty-one delegate lead in a splintered field and is bound to come out of "super Tuesday" with a lot more since he appeals to southern white populists with his bigoted anti-Washington rhetoric.  He is ahead by comfortable  poll margins in all eleven states holding Tuesday primaries.  Even so "the Donald's" candidacy is a god-send for the Democrats; socialist Sanders performs better than Clinton in national polls when paired against the reality-TV star.

credit: Steve Sack, Minneapolis Star Tribune
Wackydoodle sez:  Evil fish, I will strike at thee and send thee back to Hell!

Why Flint Has Water Problems

Flint is a like other northern American cities it's size (about 100,000).  So its water quality problems could happen elsewhere in America.  Flint uses a lot of salt in the winter to keep its roads passable during snow and frigid temperatures, about an incredible 135 pounds per person.  All that road salt has to go somewhere; it is flushed by rain and runoff into the rivers and lakes--in this case the Flint River.  What it does there is increase the waters' acidity and therefore its corrosive effect on things like lead pipes.  Flint River water the corrosive index rose from 0.54 to 2.3 after the city switched its water supply from Detroit to the river to save money.

What local and state officials did not do was to comply with federal water quality rules, specifically the Lead and Copper rule passed in 1998 by installing a corrosion control system when they switched water sources.  They did use more chlorine to purify the river water, so together with salt runoff contributions, chloride concentrations soared from 11.4mg/l to 92mg/l.  Unfortunately that condition played havoc with the city's aging lead pipe distribution system.  Twenty-seven thousand children in the city have been exposed to toxic levels (more than 200-1300 times the WHO standards) of lead contamination.  Lead poisoning is particularly damaging to children's developing brain and nervous system.  Despite the clear threat to public health, the MDEQ downplayed the problem, saying the water quality controversy was "near-hysteria".  At one point a state official even lied to investigating EPA official, saying that Flint "has...an optimized corrosion control program".  Propaganda is usually cheaper than action.
 

Sea Levels Rising Faster than Previous 28 Centuries

Not since the founding of Rome have the globes seas risen faster than they are now according to scientists.  Human carbon emissions are too blame for the increased rate they said in a report this week.  Coastal flooding is expected to become more severe over time. Already some island communities are being cut-off from the mainland during flood events.  The international team of  scientists, who published their findings in Proceeding of the National Academy of Sciences, confirmed that the oceans could rise by as much as 3 or 4 feet by 2100.  That is enough increase to cause problems for major coastal cities like New York and Miami.  Flooding may become so severe thereafter that coastal cities would have to be abandoned.  Deny that, Goonies!

De-listing Proposed for Island Foxes

The Channel Islands off Southern California's coast are home to six subspecies of the island fox.  The US Fish & Wildlife Service, under pressure from conservative critics that it is not removing enough recovered species from the federal list of threatened and endangered wildlife, proposed to remove three fox subspecies from San Miguel, Santa Rosa and Santa Cruz islands while upgrading the status of Santa Catalina's fox from "endangered" to "threatened". The current administration has de-listed more species from the Act due to official recovery than any previous administration. The latest de-listing proposal is justified says the agency because the foxes have made "the fastest recovery for any [listed] animal in the United States."  In the nineties four of the subspecies suffered catastrophic population declines due mostly to golden eagle predation.  By 2000 only 15 remained on San Miguel and Santa Rosa island leading to their listing under the Endangered Species Act in 2004. 

The US Park Service, United States Navy, and Nature Conservancy launched a recovery program for the foxes in which feral pigs were removed, resident but non-native golden eagles replaced with fish-eating bald eagles, vaccinated them against distemper, and bred foxes in captivity for re-release on the islands.  Not surprisingly, the intensive management worked.  Now the foxes enjoy an 85% survival rate with more than 4000 foxes alive in 2011.  However, Santa Catalina foxes remain at risk from canine distemper introduced by dogs and raccoons.  The island populations will be monitored for their continued success.  The agency is accepting public comments of their proposal until April 18th. (FWS–R8–ES–2015–0170)

The Democrats' State of Play

Hillary pulled off a narrow victory against Bernie Sanders after leading in Nevada by double digits.  Once again the black bloc voted overwhelmingly for Ms. Clinton.  A bright spot for Sanders is that he polled a majority of Latino voters.  After three primaries the two candidates are tied for pledged delegates to the convention: 51 each.

But that unexpected situation does not tell the whole story.  Clinton has a large advantage in money since she is funded by Super Pacs not subject to limitations under Citizens' United (Mourning Nino?  Not so much!)  As the process wears on, money plays a crucial role in buying advertising intended to lure undecided voters.  The Sanders campaign has got to find a way to connect with minority voters.  It got off to a bad start when the candidate walked off the stage at a rally commandeered by a black activist group (Hillary supporters?).

That is not the only card the former Secretary of State has to play.  The Democratic Party establishment made up of big donors like George Soros, and elected Democratic officials and former officials are solidly behind Madam Secretary.  Superdelegates hold the balance of power in a convention deadlocked by elected delegates; this is an intended circumstance in a political party free to make its own rules of procedure and fearful of a runaway convention in which a presumed unelectable candidate is chosen in a moment of democratic excess.  US Person thinks this influential support that controls the party's superdelegates may go beyond the Beltway, across the river and into the Pentagon and Langley, the so-called "deep state".  The timing of a US air raid against ISIS-Libya was just about perfect in order to influence a tight race in Nevada.

Socialist Sanders is viewed as suspect by professional militarists.  Clinton, with her votes for the wars in the Middle East, a disastrous regime change in Libya, and her cover for the Benghazi fiasco has proven she is not unreliable.  Her past is no liability either; she supported Barry Goldwater in 1964.  Sanders was just one of sixty-six congressmen who had the courage to vote against the Patriot Act. Being a socialist in the right wing's opinion is just a person who does not have the cojones to admit being a communist.  And you know how godless they are!