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I’ll be away this week, so despite all that’s going on in the world, I’ll have to wait until next week to write about it.  Good thing the rest of the FPA-o-sphere is doing such a good job of covering everything!  Until next week…

Not really sure what to make of this bizarre video of virtuoso guitar playing, North Korean six-year-olds. The skill level is amazing, though one has to dig deep in any attempt to understand the context that their training and performance must have taken place in. One commentator noticed that the physical features of the performers […]

(Poster in front reads: Fukushima warns: Pull the Plug on all Nuclear Power Plants. White banner behind reads : ‘Solidarity with the people in Japan.’  AP Photo/dapd/Roberto Pfeil) ************ I wrote last Fall about how the Germans get it:  that nuclear power, in a sane society, should not long endure.  Angela Merkel, the German Chancellor […]

The biennial Carnegie international conference on things nonproliferation convenes today at the Reagan Building here in Washington DC and anyone who’s anyone in the field converge on this auspicious confab. This year, topics will include the ongoing nuclear mess at Fukushima, the CTBT, safeguards and the nuclear renaissance, and the Nuclear Suppliers Group. Watch this […]

A new study from EBG Capital and the World Policy Institute may have the energy industry, policymakers and environmentalists going back to the drawing board. For years now, the debate about energy and the environment has been about carbon emissions, how green various forms of energy are. This study asks how much water is utilized […]

This week many celebrated at the centennial anniversary of the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire, the deadliest workplace accident in New York City’s history. The tragic fire shocked the country and become a turning moment for the American labor movement. On March 25, 1911, 146 garment workers, mostly young immigrant women, died after a fire broke […]

“Hundreds of millions in thousands of cities, towns and communities in a record 134 countries were expected to have participated …”  That’s the word from the Earth Hour folks.  Good on ya!  (See a slideshow here.)

by Stephenie Foster In the next two years, the world’s population will reach seven billion people. Today, approximately 925 million people, or 16 per cent of the developing world’s population, are chronically hungry due to extreme poverty. Despite some progress in alleviating hunger in 2010, world food prices rose 15 per cent between October 2010 […]

When I first entered into this field I was constantly shocked by the way people perceived and treated victims of sexual abuse, assault and trafficking…in fact it was one of the factors that drove me to seek for sustainable solutions and work for change.  However sad as it may sound there is little that shocks […]

The US-Canadian electrical grid is one of the main sources of carbon emissions on the planet. Decarbonizing it will be a major undertaking, although the goal of cutting emissions 80% by the year 2050 is feasible. The Center for Global Affairs at New York University’s School of Continuing and Professional Studies and the Consulate General […]

Four years remain in the quest to accomplish the eight Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) , and some countries have made great efforts to achieve the goal of eradicating extreme poverty and hunger. Through the Millennium Villages project, supported by the Millennium Promise, UN Development Programme, and The Earth Institute Columbia University, African villages are able […]

Accusations abound that the West’s intervention in Libya is all about oil.  Qaddafi has painted Western intervention as imperialist from the start of no-fly zone talks.  “The colonialist countries are hatching a plot to humiliate the Libyan people, reduce them to slavery and control the oil,” he has said.  But the Left is exploring this […]

It has been 12 days since Japan was rocked by a devastating earthquake and tsunami,   wiping out entire towns off the map and shifted the island nation eight feet. Since last Friday’s disaster was unleashed, aftershocks continued to shake residents through the weekend, some larger than the earthquake which nearly placed Haiti in ruins last […]

Today, March 22, 2011 is World Water Day, which is held each year to place global attention on the importance of clean and sustainable access to water, including the management of freshwater resources.  World Water Day was established to celebrate freshwater, following the recommendation of the 1992 United Nations Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED). […]