Petroleum

By Juan Cole | (Informed Comment) | – – A couple of years ago an oil tanker showed up off the Texas coast with cargo from Iraqi Kurdistan. The problem? Iraqi Kurdistan is a province of Iraq, and the central government in Baghdad claims that petroleum discovered in Iraqi Kurdistan is under the control of […]

Climate Change

In the shadow of Trump, a DAPL Victory and Global Protests against Fossil Fuels

Juan Cole

By Juan Cole | (Informed Comment) | – – The surprise announcement Sunday by the Army Corps of Engineers that they will not permit the Dakota Access Pipeline to go under the Missouri River, thus ending the threat to Standing Rock Sioux land and lives, marked a signal success for the environmental protest movement and […]

Climate Change

Too bad, Trump: As EVs take off, Dirty Petroleum in Death Spiral

contributors

The Tree | – – The renewable energy revolution is now well underway, but many continue to underestimate just how fast and transformative it is going to be. Despite a conservative approach to energy markets, the International Energy Agency (IEA) has just announced that ‘we are witnessing a transformation of global power markets led by […]

Iraq

Does Turkey’s Erdogan Dream of Neighboring Mosul?

contributors

By Lucy DerTavitian | (Informed Comment) | – – The battle over Mosul appears to have ignited Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s expansionist Ottoman era fantasies. He gained a few more adversaries recently when he claimed that Mosul, along with Aleppo, Western Thrace in Greece, and Kosovo, are part of Turkey. Erdogan’s comments come at […]

Climate Change

DAPL: This Thanksgiving, Time to Listen to Native Americans again on Climate & Survival

Juan Cole

Revised and updated. By Juan Cole | — The popular story about Thanksgiving is an environmental parable that we would do well to remember today. It was a harvest festival in 1621, participated in by the 50 (out of 100) survivors at Plymouth Plantation and 90 Native Americans. Some of these latter, such as Squanto, […]

Authoritarianism

N. Dakota Judge Laughs Riot Charges against Amy Goodman out of Court

contributors

TeleSur | – – A state prosecutor had sought to charge Goodman with participating in a “riot” for filming an attack on protesters. A North Dakota judge has dismissed the “riot” charges against Amy Goodman for covering the Dakota Access pipeline protests, Democracy Now! confirmed Monday. “This is a complete vindication of my right as […]

Climate Change

Hurricane Matthew a Herald of Man-Made Climate Change

Juan Cole

By Juan Cole | (Informed Comment) | – – If your tv isn’t telling you the below, turn it off and read more Informed Comment columns instead. Hurricane Matthew is unusually strong, and was for a while there a level 5 tropical storm. Level 5 hurricanes only form when the top layer of the ocean […]

Environmentalism

Native American Rights and Health versus Pipeline Cowboys

contributors

By Chip Ward | ( Tomdispatch.com ) | – – Americans who don’t live in the West may think that the historic clash of Native Americans and pioneering settlers is long past because the Indians were, after all, defeated and now drive cars, watch television, and shop at Walmart. Not so. That classic American narrative […]

Fracking

Native American Resistance Camp Fights Oil Pipeline

contributors

AJ+ | (video News Report) – – “We take you inside the resistance camp in North Dakota that’s protesting the Dakota Access pipeline, a 1,170-mile oil pipeline project that has been halted. The Standing Rock Sioux Tribe has sued the company, Energy Transfer Partners, and a decision on the lawsuit is expected Sept. 9. Until […]