“MONSANTO PROTECTION ACT” BRINGS IMMUNITY TO REGULATION OF FOOD TO YOUR DINNER TABLE. It was done quietly last week, an obscure provision slipped into a congressional spending bill, the passage and presidential signing of which averted a government shutdown. The so-named provision allows Monsanto and other corporate food processors exemption from federal regulation by [...]
CUBA IN A TIME OF CHOLERA. The Raul Castro government tends to deny the scope of the outbreak of the disease and resist some of the public health measures required to deal with it. This denial seems to be based on a desire not to hurt Cuba’s “reputation” as a desirable tourist destination, but [...]
A decade-long sea change in the world’s largest retailer has transformed Wal-Mart from solely a purveyor of cheap Chinese goods into a behemoth whose business model and profits now rely on groceries, much of it sourced within our own borders. But while the shift towards what the company insists is “locally sourced” foods may sound [...]
‘STUDENTS-FIRST’ HAS AN AGENDA; AND IS A HARSH GRADER OF U.S. STATES ON THEIR COMPLIANCE WITH THAT AGENDA. Michelle Rhee, former Chancellor of Washington D.C. schools, heads the advocacy group that pushes an “education reform” movement based on downgrading of teacher tenure and promotion of teacher evaluation based on student performance on standardized tests. [...]
GARDENER ON THE ROOF: SINGAPORE’S “SKY GREEN” AGRI-BUSINESS SHOWS THE WAY TO FOOD SELF-SUBSISTENCE FOR A CROWDED CITY. Being that Singapore is a country of essentially one city of 5 million people, it has depended heavily on food imports from neighboring countries. Sky Green is project hoping to eliminate that situation, with a technology [...]
FOOD ABUNDANCE AND SCARCITY: FEEDING OUR FOOD TO OUR FOOD. Frances Moore Lappe enters a Thanksgiving reflection on the irony that the world produces enough food to feed world population, but much of it gets wasted in ways that prevent its consumption in nutritional forms. Among the ironies of the agri-business mode of [...]
MARRIAGE EQUALITY COMES OUT OF 2012 ELECTIONS A BIG WINNER Questions regarding gay marriage rights and marriage equality were victorious on four state ballots this past Tuesday in what LGBT activists are calling a crucial turning point in national recognition of same sex marriage. The wins in Maine, Maryland Minnesota and Washington represent a [...]
THE FORGOTTEN VICTIMS OF HURRICANE SANDY. While much of the media is focused breathlessly on the aftermath of winds and storm surge that battered New York and New Jersey during this week’s landfall of “super storm” Sandy, the hurricane’s first stop is generally ignored by the rest of the world. Before it threatened [...]
LONDON OLYMPICS MAY “INSPIRE A GENERATION” OF SPORTS ENTHUSIASTS—BUT WILL THEY INSPIRE THE BUILDING OF THAT BADLY NEEDED SWIMMING POOL IN EAST LONDON? Given the wild popularity of the Olympics with the British public, will the woefully inadequate sports facilities and sports organizations in the country be “inspired” to make athletes rather than couch [...]
Over half of the United States is in the grips of a historic drought that has hit the Midwestern agricultural belt of the nation especially hard, generating fears of food shortages, price spikes, and a dangerous “new normal” in what could be called America’s “climate change summer.” The recent increase in extreme and unusual weather [...]
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