Did Trump Betray The Kurds?

It is said that after a conversation with the Islamist dictator of Turkey, Erdogan, Trump decided to remove the small number of Americans that were assisting the Kurds on the Syrian side. Trump gave convoluted reasons for his decision, including some nonsense about the Kurds not being present during Normandy.

Defense Secretary Esper said that the 50 or so Americans that were with the Kurds were pulled out because the administration knew the Turks and their allied Arab militias were going to attack, and so the Americans were taken out of harms way.

What is the truth? Did Trump's conversation with Erdogan and Trump's decision to pull out the Americans embedded with the Kurds provide the green light for the invasion, and now the administration is covering its tracks?

If Trump knew Turkey was going to attack the Kurds, then what, if anything, did he do to stop the invasion? Trump said he is a masterful negotiator. Are we to assume he could do nothing to stop the Turkish invasion, assuming he did not green light it? Or that he plain did not care?

Why did Trump decide to pull out the small number of Americans, which is now followed up with the removal of the other 1000 or so American troops working with the Kurds?

The argument that Americans must stop being involved in overseas conflicts only makes sense if there was actually a conflict. While the Americans were with the Kurds in the Kurdish controlled zone, there was peace. The American presence deterred Turkey, Assad and Russia. 

If Trump gave the green light to Turkey, then Trump and his administration bear full responsibility for the harm that is now befalling the Kurdish population, for the ISIS Islamist prisoners that the Kurds were guarding and that escaped, and for throwing one of America's most dependable allies under the bus and into the arms of the Russians, Assad regime and Iran. 

Plastic Straw Ban: Helps Or Hinders Fight Against Plastic Pollution?

Reducing plastic pollution will not be helped by expending massive amounts of money and effort on what is not a significant source of plastic pollution - plastic straws. Such an effort may be justified by some that believe stopping plastic straws is the gateway to a greater awareness about plastic pollution. But the opposite is happening, in which plastic straw bans are the excuse by many to continue doing little to nothing about plastic pollution under the pretense that something important is being done.

There is a critical need to remove plastic pollution already in the environment. Nonprofits concerned about plastic pollution should immediately employ disadvantaged people in developing countries to remove plastic pollution from coasts and other areas.

In developing countries, the source of most plastic pollution, many people desperately need work. There is no excuse to not employ this motivated workforce. Technology and volunteer efforts can supplement their efforts but can never achieve anywhere near what motivated workers paid a decent wage can achieve in removing plastic waste from the environment.

Every single day that people in need of work in developing countries and elsewhere are not employed to remove plastic pollution from coasts and other areas is another day in which enormous amounts of plastic trash enter into the oceans that could have been stopped. It is inexcusable to not provide this employment, thereby helping people and significantly decreasing plastic trash already in the environment.

Plastic accumulates along coasts from lands and rivers. Oceans are full of plastic trash. Waves, tides, currents and storms returns plastic from oceans back to the coasts. Removing plastic from the coasts  protects the oceans and lands, and prevents plastic from breaking down into smaller pieces that never can be recovered once they enter or re-enter the oceans.

Ensure plastic is either properly burned, like in Sweden, or buried properly in secured landfills. Far too much plastic waste goes into open pits or garbage mountains in many developing countries, or is burned out in the open, exposing people and the environment to toxic gases and toxic ash.

Prioritize cleaning up the environment from the plastic waste already present. Fight for better collection and disposable of plastic and other oil based waste the world over. Fight to reduce the enormous amount of new plastic waste entering the environment daily. Lead the way to the use of alternative materials to wean humanity from the plastic addiction. There is so much that needs to be done, and this is only a partial list.

Do not allow plastic straws to be a diversion from seriously addressing the catastrophic plastic pollution problem before our oceans, wildlife and more are completely destroyed. If plastic straws cease to exist, it will not make a dent in the millions of kilos of plastic, Styrofoam and other oil based trash pouring into the oceans daily.

Ban the straws, but do so much more.

Rethinking Recycling And Plastic Pollution

An MIT researcher says we should trash all our recyclable plastic.

Most plastic material and oil based non biodegradable material, synthetic clothing included, is not recyclable. Of the plastic that is recyclable, it is important to ask if the benefit of recycling outweighs the environmental cost. In many places where people think there is recycling, there is in fact little to none, or the plastic gets shipped to developing countries already drowning in their own plastic waste.

Sweden generates energy by burning its plastic waste as efficiently and cleanly as is possible with today's existing technologies. This is far preferable to the open burning of plastic that is common in many places, which exposes people to harmful carcinogens and contaminates the environment.

Burying plastic waste in landfills is common, but properly burying plastic waste in landfills is not. Many places bury plastic waste in open pits or in improper sites where winds, rains, storms, waters and time bring it back into the larger environment.

Plastic waste is only getting worse. Recycling is often not working. Furthermore, most plastic waste cannot be recycled. The priority must be on keeping plastic waste out of the oceans and environment and ensuring this is achieved. This, not recycling, must be the goal. If recycling helps achieve this, then it has a role to play. The nonsense that has gone on for years in which developed countries ship their plastic waste to developing countries under the guise of recycling must stop.

The millions of kilos of new plastic trash entering the oceans daily must be stopped or at least slowed.

Effort must focus on cleaning up plastic pollution already in the environment. This cleanup effort must become the most massive anti poverty employment program the world has ever seen, supplemented by the use of technology and volunteers.

Money and resources must be devoted to ensuring plastic waste that does go into landfills is properly buried. The controlled burning that Sweden does must also be considered.

The plastic addiction must be fought. It is hard to understand how technology has come so far in so many fields, and yet the primitive reliance on plastic materials only gets worse. Imagine if the same effort that goes into designing ways to kill each other was instead directed towards finding affordable materials that do not harm oceans, rivers, lakes, wildlife, and people.

The Kurdish People Must Not Be Abandoned

The Kurds have been at the forefront of the fight against ISIS. They have been strong and reliable allies.

Bush attacking Iraq, followed by Obama's hurried retreat and meaningless red lines (which strengthened the hand of the ISIS Islamic fanatics), must not now be compounded by abandoning the Kurds.

More blood must not be shed from foolish, brash decisions.

Boyan Slat's Ocean Cleanup: Garbage Patch, Plastic Pollution And What Is Missing

First, the problem. Trillions upon trillions of plastic particles, pieces and fibers (fibers from synthetic clothing, polyester, nylon, acrylic, etc.) already are in the oceans. Every single day, millions upon millions of pounds and kilos of additional plastic enters into the oceans.
Much of the plastic breaks down and disperses. Waves, tides and storms brings a lot of the plastic already in the oceans back to coasts and rivers. Lands and rivers brings new plastic into the oceans. Meanwhile, plastic, Styrofoam and other oil based non biodegradable materials keep breaking down into smaller and smaller particles that eventually are impossible to capture or recover. Eventually these particles break down into pieces too small to be seen and that never degrade. And so, there they are, trillions upon trillions of plastic particles endlessly polluting the oceans, coasts, lands and rivers and other waters, and endlessly harming wildlife and humans.
A recent study of plastic waste collecting in the ocean garbage patches suggests this waste is coming from ships, and that it is not originating from the land. So where are all the millions of kilos of plastic entering into the oceans daily going? It disperses, and does not make it to the garbage patches.
Even if the garbage patches are completely cleaned, it will not help with the enormous amount of plastic already in the oceans, with millions of additional kilos entering every day.
Plastic pollution cleanup efforts need three strong approaches. Of the three, the one that is most effective and needed the most is the one least funded and least considered.
Volunteer cleanups, such as beach cleanups, receive a lot of attention and funding. These work best in developed countries where people can afford to be volunteers. But even in developed countries, these efforts are often sporadic and not consistent. Many under served areas receive no cleanups.
In developing nations, there is mass poverty. Few can afford to be volunteers.
Employing people in need of work - disadvantaged people - to cleanup coasts and other areas, an actual employment project that can and should employ millions, is near nonexistent.
The much advertised technology that Boyan Slat offers receives millions of dollars of funding.
Just to be clear, if his technology works, as he says it does or will in the future, then let us hope he cleans the garbage patches as he says he will.
But imagine if even one tenth of the millions of dollars his organization receives was directed at employing disadvantaged people to remove plastic from coasts and other areas. An employed force cleaning up plastic pollution from coastlines and other areas will remove far more plastic pollution than any technology or volunteer effort ever can, at far less cost than any technology.
This is not to say Boyan Slat should not continue his effort to cleanup the garbage patches.
But the failure to employ the low tech, far less costly simple approach of providing employment to disadvantaged people to do hands on cleanups means losing the critical opportunity to prevent trillions of kilos of plastic pollution already littering coastlines and other accessible areas from breaking down further into forever damaging unrecoverable pieces.
The plastic pollution cleanup portion of the plastic pollution disaster needs three things:
1. Employed workers doing the cleanups.
2. Volunteer cleanups.
3. Technologies that can clean areas that laborers cannot cleanup, such as ocean garbage patches.

Of the three things needed for plastic pollution cleanups, the core of the effort must be on employed workers because that is what will achieve the most in terms of helping people and in removing the most amount of plastic.
Volunteerism and technology, instead of being the primary focus of the effort, as they are now, must be seen as the supplementation to the core effort.
How effective is Boyan Slat's technology?  There needs to be an objective determination and not rely only on his word or that of his organization. People also need to know clearly that even if the garbage patches of the world are completely cleaned, it will have only removed a small amount of the plastic already in the oceans.
Employed people glad to receive work and that are paid a decent, fair wage, will remove far more plastic pollution than any volunteer effort or technology can ever hope to achieve.
Instead of waiting for a technological miracle and allowing the oceans and coasts to get further destroyed, why not immediately implement what is most effective and works?  An army of people employed to remove plastic pollution from coastlines and other areas is needed now. Every day that passes without this army means another day of destruction to wildlife, oceans, people and more.

Animals,Wildlife, Voiceless Populations Suffer As Nonprofits Profit

The lack of accountability in far too much of the nonprofit world has meant decades of inefficiency, ineffectiveness and harm. This is especially true in the realm of unseen places and in services to voiceless populations.
Conservation, wildlife and animal related organizations are great at pointing out problems. Knowledge and expertise regarding problems and plights does not mean that the programs and services these organizations provide are effective and not harmful.
Regarding the efficacy of these nonprofits - scrutiny and accountability goes out the window, and they say and do whatever it is they want.
And so, they grow and become wealthier while the populations they are supposed to service diminish and suffer. The more there is suffering, the more these organizations capitalize on plights and problems and raise more money for themselves.
Raising awareness and pointing out problems and plights is not the same as concrete, effective action.
If for profit businesses operated the same way; good at talk, pointing out problems and raising awareness but weak at solutions and absent in efficacy, they would quickly go out of business.

Cats Killing Birds, Timidity, TNR, Microchips: Crashing Bird Populations

  A scientist from one well funded conservation oriented nonprofit organization wrote about the harm that cats inflict upon birds. The foundation he is employed by made sure to disassociate themselves from the scientist's findings and opinions. Too timid to take a stand, and not wanting to alienate cat loving donors, the foundation made clear their priorities: money, no boat rocking -  not birds and conservation.

   In the recent edition of a popular magazine, a man described as a bird watcher, writer and photography talked about cats and birds. If cats are microchipped, he suggests, abandoned cats can be traced back to those that dumped them. How will that help anything? Return a cat to the person that dumped it? A family dumped their kitten, who had grown too large in their opinion. They had their 12 year old son put the kitten in a plastic bag, and leave it in an empty lot, still in the bag, about a half mile from where they live. What decent person would return that kitten back to that family?
 
   Microchipping cats and dogs has its benefits, especially if a dog or cat is lost, but it does nothing for the cats kill birds problem.

    Is trap, neuter and release (tnr) the answer? Cats, even if they are fed, still kill birds and other wildlife.

     The hard choice has to be made, whether someone likes it or not. Doing nothing is also a choice, because ignoring the cats living or allowed outside means the certain death of birds and other wildlife.

     Cats living or allowed outside are in harms way from vehicles, sadistic people, and more. Cats outside certainly put birds in harms way.

      There is no feel good answer, no matter how many people want to pretend or believe that there is.
Leaving millions, even billions of birds to be slaughtered out of sight, out of mind, is the cowardly way out.