The Guardian today reveals the 20 fossil fuel companies whose relentless exploitation of the world’s oil, gas and coal reserves can be directly linked to more than one-third of all greenhouse gas emissions in the modern era....
- Extinction Rebellion has won the first battle – now it must win the war – As protesters take to the streets again this week, the challenge is to force ‘green’ politicians into concrete proposals
- 'Everywhere we looked': trillions of microplastics found in San Francisco bay – Study of the Bay Area watershed turned up higher concentrations of microparticles than similar studies done in Europe, Japan and China.
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 Photo by author. Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren both have proposals to cancel student debt, a nearly $1.6 trillion burden on borrowers and a major drag on the economy. There is a major difference between the two plans: the Sanders plan, which is spearheaded in the House by Rep. Ilhan Omar, is likely to create at least one million more jobs than Warren’s, since it cancels roughly $1 trillion more in outstanding debt. Warren’s plan, unlike Sanders’, caps the amount to be cancelled at $50,000 per person. That figure is progressively reduced for income above $100,000 per year per household until it reaches $250,000, at which point no cancellation is offered. But households making $100,000 year aren’t necessarily prosperous. Because of its limits, Warren’s plan would have a significantly smaller stimulus effect and would therefore help all workers somewhat less. One Million Jobs Here’s why. A 2018 report from the Levy Economics Institute at Bard College used widely-accepted economic models to project the macroeconomic effect of cancelling all student debt, using a start date in 2017 for its hypothetical cancellation. As the graph below shows, these models show that several million jobs are created by the cancellation of all student debt (the exact amount varies, depending on the economic model used):... Richard (RJ) Eskow
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 Former national security adviser John Bolton described Rudy Giuliani’s actions in Ukraine as a ‘drug deal’. Photograph: Sergei Gapon/AFP/Getty Images The former US national security adviser, John Bolton, was reportedly so alarmed at a back-channel effort to pressure Ukraine to investigate Donald Trump’s political rivals that he told a senior aide to report it to White House lawyers. The revelation of Bolton’s involvement in the effort to block a shadow foreign policy aimed at Trump’s political benefit emerged from congressional testimony given by his former aide, Fiona Hill, the former top Russia expert in the White House. Hill, the British-born former senior director for Europe and Russia on the National Security Council, spoke to three House committees for 10 hours. According to the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal, Hill described a sharp exchange on 10 July between Bolton and the US ambassador to the European Union, Gordon Sondland, about the role played by Trump’s lawyer, Rudy Giuliani, to persuade the Ukrainian government to open investigations into Democrats, including former vice president Joe Biden. Hill said Bolton instructed her to tell the National Security Council’s attorney that Giuliani was acting in concert with White House chief of staff, Mick Mulvaney, in a rogue operation with legal implications.... Tom McCarthy in New York and Julian Borger in Washington | The Guardian
 BY CHIP SOMODEVILLA/GETTY IMAGES. For demoralized staffers, the former ambassador’s testimony felt like a turning point. It also raises existential questions for a diplomatic corps that serves at the president’s pleasure—including whether Mike Pompeo can salvage his credibility on the world stage after being exposed as another Trump stooge. ABIGAIL TRACY | Vanity Fair
....Poor water quality — exacerbated by the warming climate — is considered a significant cause of the sucker death. One key problem for the Upper Klamath is a low dissolved oxygen issue called hypoxia.... JES BURNS | NPR
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Donald Trump asks Turkey for ceasefire and orders sanctions as violence escalates [Related 3:36 video; We hope Erdoğan (or NSA patriotic whistleblower) releases recording of phone conversation that started this horror]
Donald Trump spoke directly to the Turkish president, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, on Monday to demand an immediate ceasefire in Syria while announcing a series of punishments for Ankara that critics saw as an attempt to save face. The US president’s conversation with Erdoğan was revealed by the vice-president, Mike Pence, who said he would soon be travelling to the Middle East. “The United States of America did not give a green light for Turkey to invade Syria,” Pence insisted to reporters at the White House. But Trump’s announcement just over a week ago that he was withdrawing US troops, who had served as an effective buffer against Turkish invasion, has been widely viewed as a historic foreign policy blunder and provoked an extraordinary backlash even from Republicans. As the situation in northern Syria spiralled out of control, and the White House scrambled to catch up, the president said he had issued an executive order to impose sanctions on current and former Turkish officials and was immediately freezing negotiations on a $100bn US-Turkey trade deal. Trump said he was also reimposing tariffs of 50% on Turkish steel – one of a series of measures taken last year to win the release of the American pastor Andrew Brunson from detention, which triggered a record-breaking 30% slide in the Turkish lira, sending inflation soaring and damaging living standards. In May, Trump scaled tariffs back to 25%. “I am fully prepared to swiftly destroy Turkey’s economy if Turkish leaders continue down this dangerous and destructive path,” the president said on Monday.... David Smith in Washington and Bethan McKernan in Istanbul | The Guardian
Top investment banks provide billions to expand fossil fuel industry [Financing earth's extermination gas chamber!] Exclusive: analysis reveals lenders provided $700bn to expand sector since Paris climate pact  Guardian graphic. Sources: Bloomberg and company data compiled by Rainforest Action Network The world’s largest investment banks have provided more than $700bn of financing for the fossil fuel companies most aggressively expanding in new coal, oil and gas projects since the Paris climate change agreement, figures show. The financing has been led by the Wall Street giant JPMorgan Chase, which has provided $75bn (£61bn) to companies expanding in sectors such as fracking and Arctic oil and gas exploration, according to the analysis. The New York bank is one of 33 powerful financial institutions to have provided an estimated total of $1.9tn to the fossil fuel sector between 2016 and 2018. The data shows the most aggressively expanding coal-mining operations, oil and gas companies, fracking firms and pipeline companies have received $713.3bn in loans, equity issuances and debt underwriting services from 2016 to mid-2019. Other top financiers of fossil fuel companies include Citigroup, Bank of America and Wells Fargo.... Patrick Greenfield | The Guardian
Goldman Sachs released a 34-page analysis of the effects of climate change. And the results are terrifying. [TAKING THE HEAT Report (pdf); Has Wall Street woken up?] Goldman Sachs this month released a report on the effects of climate change on cities around the world, and it makes for grim reading. The bank's Global Markets Institute, led by Amanda Hindlian, warned of significant risks to the world's largest cities, which are especially vulnerable to more frequent storms, higher temperatures, rising sea levels, and storm surges. "Cities generate roughly 80% of global GDP and are home to more than half of the world's population today, a share that the United Nations projects will reach two-thirds by 2050," the report said. About 40% of the population lives within 100 kilometers of a coast, and one in 10 people live in areas less than 10 meters above sea level, it said. Goldman highlighted three cities that could be subject to storm surges and could face harmful flooding: New York, Tokyo, and Lagos. It said several others that are less than 11 meters above sea level — including Miami, Florida; Alexandria, Egypt; Dhaka, Bangladesh; and Shanghai, China — also faced major flood risks.... Yusuf Khan | Markets Insider
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"The establishment tells us there is no alternative to unfettered capitalism, that this is how the system and globalization work and there's no turning back. They are dead wrong." Jake Johnson, staff writer | Common Dreams
By contrast, "I'm not," Sanders explained. "We need a political revolution." Jake Johnson, staff writer | Common Dreams
Here is how we can reform the political appointments process to protect government decision-making from political patronage or nepotism Preet Bharara | The Guardian
IDEA: Virtual Nations could replace nation-states, allowing everyone to be agents for a better world Marc Cherbonnier | The Baltimore Chronicle | Ref.
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The US president was warned about the consequences of betraying the Kurds. Now he can see them, and he still doesn’t care Editorial | The Guardian
Kurds Strike Deal With Syrian Government to Battle Turkey's Offensive After Trump Orders Evacuation of Remaining US Troops [The region could stabilize if Kurds become integral part of a new Syrian government] About 130,000 people have been displaced in Syria... with at least 60 civilian casualties in Syria and 18 dead in Turkey." Jessica Corbett, staff writer | Common Dreams
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Having squandered the last crisis, we cannot make the same mistakes again. A Green New Deal is the only reasonable response Yanis Varoufakis and David Adler | The Guardian
The IMF’s proposed $75-per-ton tax would exacerbate rampant inequality. There are better ways to fund decarbonization Kate Aronoff | The Guardian
State Street chief says it could use shareholder powers to force boards to act on climate Patrick Greenfield | The Guardian
Bank of England governor warns of financial collapse linked to climate emergency Damian Carrington Environment editor | The Guardian
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