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Pipelines, Propaganda, and Even More Protests

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Indigenous Tribes, Environmentalists, and Scientists Feel Trump’s Wrath

News roundup logoBy Doug Porter

The number one selling book on Amazon earlier this week was George Orwell’s ‘1984’ the classic story of a world of government surveillance, propaganda and “newspeak.” In the book, the “Ministry of Truth” actually delivers lies.

I suspect this uptick in sales (and the announcement of additional printing by Penguin Books) comes from the realization by Americans that lying is officially part of the new administration’s program.

Now it’s time to acknowledge ‘alternative facts’ are just one part of what’s going on. The tactics of this administration also include chaos, as proven by the rapid-fire attacks on institutions, humans, and the planet over the past couple of days.

Let’s take a deep breath and focus–for now–on the environment since much of the bad news over past 24 hours concerns the planet we live on.

(Since the official announcements on the border. immigration, etc., being discussed in the media haven’t actually been made as I’m writing this, I’ll hold off until more of the specifics become available. Trust me. I’ll get there.)

Trump Pumps Those Pipelines

The president signed executive actions on Tuesday to advance approval of the Keystone XL and Dakota Access oil pipelines. The documents are online now but were not provided directly to the tribes affected or their legal advocates.

From Indian Country Media Network:

The move drew immediate fire from tribal leaders and environmental advocates.

“President Trump is legally required to honor our treaty rights and provide a fair and reasonable pipeline process,” said Dave Archambault II, chairman of the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe. “Americans know this pipeline was unfairly rerouted towards our nation and without our consent. The existing pipeline route risks infringing on our treaty rights, contaminating our water and the water of 17 million Americans downstream.”

“These actions by President Trump are insane and extreme, and nothing short of attacks on our ancestral homelands as Indigenous Peoples,” said Dallas Goldtooth, Keep It In The Ground Organizer at the Indigenous Environmental Network. “The executive orders demonstrate that this administration is more than willing to violate federal law that is meant to protect indigenous rights, human rights, the environment and the overall safety of communities for the benefit of the fossil fuel industry. These attacks will not be ignored, our resistance is stronger now than ever before and we are prepared to push back at any reckless decision made by this administration.”

350.org, the Sierra Club, CREDO, and other groups immediately announced protests in cities around the United States.

According to CNN:

“The headsman council at the Oceti Sakowin camp, home to a large protest site during demonstrations last year, issued a call on Tuesday for “allies and people to stand up where they are” and engage in “mass civil disobedience as a showing of solidarity for Standing Rock.””

No pipelines

Tuesday night protest in downtown San Diego. Photo by Brent Beltran

In San Diego, more than 100 people demonstrated outside the Edward J. Schwartz Federal Building on Tuesday evening.

MECHA has issued a call for another public protest at San Diego City College on Friday, January 27, starting at 11:30am.

The Viejas Youth Leaders are calling for a Southern California NoDAPL Youth Rally in Mission Beach (the grassy area across from Belmont Park) on Sunday, February 5, running throughout the day starting at 9am.

A group called Defund DAPL is urging people to withdraw their money from banks financing the construction of the pipeline.

The banks behind DAPL

Facts Are Inconvenient, As Is Science

As the day unfolded Tuesday, we learned about Federal Agencies concerned with science and research being silenced by the Trump administration.

Government scientists were ordered not to talk about their research at the Environmental Protection Agency, sub-agencies of Health and Human Service (the Centers for Disease Control and Protection, the National Institutes of Health) and the US Department of Agriculture’s Food and Nutrition Service. (An early report, saying the entire department of Agriculture was on lockdown, was walked back later in the day.)  

From Vox.com:

Employees at the Department of Health and Human Services, which the CDC is a part of, were ordered this week to avoid “any correspondence to public officials,” like, say, members of Congress, the Huffington Post reports. “Instead, they have been asked to refer questions to agency leadership until the leadership has had time to meet with incoming White House staff about the new administration’s policies and objectives, according to a congressional official who was also informed of the communications freeze.”

That means staffers throughout the HHS won’t be able to communicate with congressional members on issues pertaining to regulations or legislation. The Huffington Post notes that the freeze may make it hard for congressional offices to relay the latest information about Medicare or the Affordable Care Act to constituents who call in for help.

According to a report at Reuters, the Environmental Protection Agency has been ordered to take down its web page on climate change.

Soon to be airbrushed from history

The employees were notified by EPA officials on Tuesday that the administration had instructed EPA’s communications team to remove the website’s climate change page, which contains links to scientific global warming research, as well as detailed data on emissions. The page could go down as early as Wednesday, the sources said.

“If the website goes dark, years of work we have done on climate change will disappear,” one of the EPA staffers told Reuters, who added some employees were scrambling to save some of the information housed on the website, or convince the Trump administration to preserve parts of it.

The sources asked not to be named because they were not authorized to speak to the media.

Rebellion Begins in the Badlands

Needless to say, the actions of the Trump administration, which went way beyond the normal ‘let’s all get on the same page’ process, made more than a few government employees unhappy.

From the Washington Post:

Badlands National Park tugged on Superman’s cape Tuesday. It spit into the wind. It pulled the mask off the old Lone Ranger, and it messed around with President Trump.

In tweets about climate change that lit up Twitter, the park ignored Jim Croce’s advice in his 1972 hit song and thumbed its nose at the president.

With the Trump administration placing a gag order on the Environmental Protection Agency, shutting down its Twitter feed, forcing employees off their individual accounts and dismantling Web pages with climate-change information, Badlands went rogue.

The now-deleted tweets were attributed to a former employee with access to the account.

New “Alt” government social media accounts are popping up including @AltUSNatParkService which described itself as

“The Unofficial “Resistance” team of U.S. National Park Service. Not taxpayer subsidised! Come for rugged scenery, fossil beds, 89 million acres of landscape”

The shadow account picked up over 350,000 followers on its first day.

Scientists Organizing for DC Protest

One group, calling itself March for Science, is organizing scientists and supporters for a Washington DC protest. While the date has yet to be set, over 60,000 people have joined the Facebook group in 24 hours in support of the idea.

From their webpage:

Welcome! We want to thank you all for your incredible outpouring of support for this march. We are working to schedule a March for Science on DC and across the United States. We have not settled on a date yet but will do so as quickly as possible and announce it here. Although this will start with a march, we hope to use this as a starting point to take a stand for science in politics. Slashing funding and restricting scientists from communicating their findings (from tax-funded research!) with the public is absurd and cannot be allowed to stand as policy. This is a non-partisan issue that reaches far beyond people in the STEM fields and should concern anyone who values empirical research and science.

There are certain things that we accept as facts with no alternatives. The Earth is becoming warmer due to human action. The diversity of life arose by evolution. Politicians who devalue expertise risk making decisions that do not reflect reality and must be held accountable. An American government that ignores science to pursue ideological agendas endangers the world.

Please bear with us as pull together our mission statement and further details. Many more updates to come on Monday.

Keep Calm: A Few Thoughts

I’ve gone from feeling great about the solidarity expressed at the Women’s March over the weekend to feeling overwhelmed by the rat-a-tat-tat of poisonous missives coming from the White House this week.

Mirah Curzer, writing at The Coffeelicious blog, has some sound advice to offer in an article entitled How to #StayOutraged Without Losing Your Mind.

From the intro (read the whom damned thing!):

This is not going to be an easy four years. We’re going to be subjected to constant gaslighting by the President and his administration. We’ll be dealing with a ferocious, multi-front attack on the entire progressive agenda, without exception, and a lot of it is going to succeed. We’re going to helplessly watch institutions we care about and depend upon destroyed. The Trump years are going to be emotionally exhausting and deeply traumatic for all of us, but particularly to those dedicated to protecting the vulnerable and preserving democracy.

Most of us are not ready to take on the mantle of the resistance. There are things we can do now to get ready, but if we don’t, the ranks of would-be activists and resisters are going to thin out very quickly.

Oh, and This…

Activism Alert- Feed Your Mind

#TheResistance: Women Leading the Way
What’s next for the progressive resistance to Donald Trump?

A Public Workshop by San Diego Democrats for Equality
Thursday, January 26, 7pm
Joyce Beers Community Center
3900 Vermont Street
For More Information

A panel discussion on what’s next for the progressive resistance to Donald Trump. Featuring:
– Jessica Hayes, Chair of the San Diego County Democratic Party
– Carol Kim, Director of Community Engagement with San Diego Building & Construction Trades Council
– Taisha Brown, Vice Chair (Central Area) of the San Diego County Democratic Party
– Katelyn Hailey, Regional Outreach Representative with NextGen

Don’t Agonize- Organize! Gender Justice in the Time of Trump

Hosted by the Women’s Resource Center at SDSU
Thursday, January 26, 7pm
Conrad Prebys Aztec Student Union Theater
For More Information:

Hear from local community leaders on the following issues:

Caroline Dessert, The San Diego LGBT Center
Claudia Huerta, Planned Parenthood Action Fund of the Pacific Southwest
Christy Hill, ACLU of San Diego and Imperial Counties
Becca Fielding-Miller and Becca Taylor, Democratic Party

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Doug Porter

Doug Porter

Doug Porter was active in the early days of the alternative press in San Diego, contributing to the OB Liberator, the print version of the OB Rag, the San Diego Door, and the San Diego Street Journal. He went on to have a 35-year career in the Hospitality business and decided to go back into raising hell when he retired. He won numerous awards for his columns from the Society of Professional Journalists in 2012, 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016 and 2017. Doug is a cancer survivor (sans vocal chords) and lives in North Park.

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