Three millimeters, about one-eighth of an inch, may not sound like much. But when it’s the height water is steadily rising outside your doorstep every year, it may as well be three feet if it’s anything at all.
On the eastern shores of Maryland, ocean levels are climbing by at least this much — nearly two times the global historic average, according to the state’s Department of Natural Resources — and those waters are pushing several small fishing communities to the brink of extinction. Photographer Greg Kahn set out to capture what it’s like for these sinking towns in his new series “3 Millimeters.”
The Disaster That No One Is Talking About
US rendition survivors urge Obama to declassify torture report
Abou Elkassim Britel can’t sleep, or he sleeps too much; it varies. He backs out of commitments. The Islamic website he wants to publish from his Italian home remains unfinished.
“I would add,” he said through translation, “that I cannot think of the future.”
The doctors tell Britel that he has post-traumatic stress disorder, after a decade-long ordeal of imprisonment without charge or transfer and abuse. It began in 2002, when the United States packed him onto a contractor’s Gulfstream V in Pakistan and flew him to Morocco.
Third doctor in Sierra Leone dies from Ebola as death toll rises to 1,400
A senior adviser to Sierra Leone's president says a third doctor has died from Ebola, marking a setback in the country's fight against the virulent disease.
Presidential adviser Ibrahim Ben Kargbo said Wednesday that Dr. Sahr Rogers had been working in a clinic in the eastern town of Kenema when he contracted the virus.
News of his death came as a Senegalese epidemiologist working in Sierra Leone was evacuated to Germany for medical treatment. He had been doing surveillance work for the World Health Organization.
IMF's Christine Lagarde investigated in French fraud case
International Monetary Fund Director Christine Lagarde has been placed under formal investigation for her role in a case from 2008, when she was France's finance minister.
Lagarde was placed under formal investigation for "negligence" for allowing arbitration to settle a dispute between the former state-owned bank Credit Lyonnais and businessman Bernard Tapie. A formal investigation does not automatically lead to trial.
Bob Alexander: Postcard From Another World
A friend recently wrote me:
Remember the realization back in the early 70's that the whole country was insane? Could it be true, could a whole country go insane?
Way back when, in the dim distant past, when dinosaurs ruled the Earth and pterodactyls swooped through the skies - You know - the 70s - my friend and I were trying to get a sense of What’s Going On. Here we are, millions of years later, still trying to map out a strange land. The only difference now is he still lives in that strange land, and my family escaped across the border into Beautiful British Columbia. In fact August 22nd, marked our Third Anniversary in Canada.
Global warming is already here and could be irreversible, UN panel says
Global warming is here, human-caused and probably already dangerous – and it’s increasingly likely that the heating trend could be irreversible, a draft of a new international science report says.
The United Nations’ Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change on Monday sent governments a final draft of its synthesis report, which combines three earlier, gigantic documents by the Nobel Prize-winning group. There is little in the report that wasn’t in the other more-detailed versions, but the language is more stark and the report attempts to connect the different scientific disciplines studying problems caused by the burning of fossil fuels, such as coal, oil and gas.
Fraud at the CDC uncovered, 340% increased risk of autism hidden from public
A top researcher at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) played a key role in helping uncover data manipulation by the CDC. This fraud obscured a higher incidence of autism in African-American boys.
The whistleblower, Dr. William Thompson, came forward after a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request for original data on an autism study was filed and these highly sensitive documents were received with the assistance of U.S. Representative Darrell Issa, Chairman of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee. The CDC documents and discussions with the whistleblower reveal widespread manipulation of scientific data and top-down pressure on CDC scientists to suppress a causal link between the MMR vaccine and later autism diagnosis, particularly in a subset of African-American males who received their immunization “on-time” in accordance with the recommended CDC schedule.
Seattle protesters aim to block Israeli cargo ship over Gaza siege
Palestinian rights activists in the Seattle area picketed the Port of Tacoma on Monday in an attempt to block a commercial Israeli cargo ship from unloading its merchandise.
The action follows a similar protest last week that managed to prevent the delivery of goods for days from a vessel seeking to dock in Oakland, California.
Block the Boat organizers said the ship, which is owned by Israel's Zim Shipping Services Ltd., one of the world’s largest container shipping companies, was schedule to arrive in the Port of Tacoma on Monday afternoon.
For Nuncio Accused of Abuse, Dominicans Want Justice at Home, Not Abroad
The case is the first time that a top Vatican ambassador, or nuncio — who serves as a personal envoy of the pope — has been accused of sexual abuse of minors. It has sent shock waves through the Vatican and two predominantly Catholic countries that have only begun to grapple with clergy sexual abuse: the Dominican Republic and Poland, where Mr. Wesolowski was ordained by the Polish prelate who later became Pope John Paul II.
It has also created a test for Pope Francis, who has called child sexual abuse “such an ugly crime” and pledged to move the Roman Catholic Church into an era of “zero tolerance.” For priests and bishops who have violated children, he told reporters in May, “There are no privileges.”
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