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Educators Worry Palestine Censorship Could Reshape Public Education Entirely.

lawmakers who sponsored House Bill (HB) 937 seemed more committed to preventing teachers and pupils from criticizing Israel than preventing discrimination against Jewish students

New efforts to shut down honest discussion of Palestine could restrict everything from literature to science classes.

By Marianne Dhenin , Truthout, November 29, 2025

A wave of bills introduced this year in state legislatures across the country sought to censor Palestine-related education in public schools. Several passed with the support of pro-Israel Democratic lawmakers, a trend that educators and First Amendment advocates told Truthout reflects the alignment of pro-Israel groups with MAGA forces. As these efforts continue, many said they fear public education could be reshaped far beyond social studies classrooms and the topics of Israel and Palestine.

“The censorship of Palestinians is the same as the ‘Don’t Say Gay,’ and the anti-critical race theory attacks on Black history,” Nora Lester-Murad, an organizer with the #DropTheADLfromSchools effort, told Truthout. The Anti-Defamation League (ADL) is one of a number of pro-Israel groups supporting regressive public education legislation across the country. “Yes, it’s Zionist, and yes, it’s promoting Israel, but it’s also part of this right-wing effort to take public education in a direction that’s away from critical thinking and that’s anti-liberatory.”

This year, legislators in at least eight states — including Arizona, Arkansas, Kansas, Kentucky, Missouri, Nebraska, Oklahoma, and Tennessee — introduced bills that would directly adopt the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) definition of antisemitism in public schools. That definition equates criticism of Israel with antisemitism. Dozens of civil society and rights groups, as well as unions of educators, have warned against its adoption because of its power to chill or suppress speech critical of Israel or Zionism.

Michael Berg, an organizer with Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP) in Missouri, said lawmakers who sponsored House Bill (HB) 937 seemed more committed to preventing teachers and pupils from criticizing Israel than preventing discrimination against Jewish students. “They were attached to the IHRA definition, so it shows that it’s very specifically about speech about Israel,” he said. Organizers succeeded in stopping HB 937 in Missouri this year, but Berg told Truthout they are already preparing to fight a new iteration of the bill in the upcoming legislative session.

Other states have made similar efforts, including California, where Democrats hold a supermajority in the state assembly. There, this year’s Assembly Bill (AB) 715 was the latest in a series introduced under the guise of curbing antisemitism, but whose critics argue are censorship bills that undermine the implementation of earlier legislation mandating ethnic studies courses in public schools. AB 715 does not define antisemitism, but calls for using the Biden-era United States National Strategy to Counter Antisemitism as “a basis to inform schools on how to identify, respond to, prevent, and counter antisemitism.” That white paper claims that “the United States has embraced” IHRA’s definition as a “valuable tool” in countering antisemitism. Gov. Gavin Newsom signed AB 715 into law in October; the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee (ADC) filed a suit challenging the law in federal court in November.

Meanwhile, this August in Massachusetts, another Democratic stronghold, the state’s Special Commission on Combating Antisemitism approved recommendations meant to curb antisemitism in schools. The recommendations call on districts to teach IHRA’s definition of antisemitism in anti-bias trainings for teachers and school administrators. A statewide coalition of labor unions, civil rights groups, and progressive Jewish organizations warned that rather than countering antisemitism, the recommendations “pit some Jewish students against other marginalized populations” and will likely “undermine safe learning and working environments for students and teachers.”

These moves dovetail with a federal agenda to remake the nation’s public schools and historical programming at other public institutions, such as museums and national parks. Since his return to office, President Donald Trump has signed executive orders demanding an end to “radical indoctrination in K-12 schooling” and “restoring truth and sanity to American history.” The administration advocates teaching a whitewashed and aggrandizing version of the nation’s past that Trump, in one executive order, called “patriotic education.”…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………..

The recent wave of bills limiting Palestine-related speech in public schools also harms students. “We believe that antisemitism is being used to censor education on Palestine, and we believe that our students have a right to understand both sides of an issue,” Seth Morrison, spokesperson for JVP’s Bay Area chapter and an organizer with CCDPE, told Truthout. “We’re not saying don’t talk about Israel or don’t talk about the Holocaust. What we’re saying is that there are many open issues here and that Arab and Muslim students especially are being intimidated and censored because of IHRA and related activities.”…………………………………………………………………………………….. https://truthout.org/articles/educators-worry-palestine-censorship-could-reshape-public-education-entirely/

December 2, 2025 Posted by Christina Macpherson | Education, USA | Leave a comment

The mysterious black fungus from Chernobyl that may eat radiation

Mould found at the site of the Chernobyl nuclear disaster appears to be
feeding off the radiation. Could we use it to shield space travellers from
cosmic rays? In May 1997, Nelli Zhdanova entered one of the most
radioactive places on Earth – the abandoned ruins of Chernobyl’s exploded
nuclear power plant – and saw that she wasn’t alone.

Across the ceiling,
walls and inside metal conduits that protect electrical cables, black mould
had taken up residence in a place that was once thought to be detrimental
to life. In the fields and forest outside, wolves and wild boar had
rebounded in the absence of humans. But even today there are hotspots where staggering levels of radiation can be found due to material thrown out from the reactor when it exploded.

BB 28th Nov 2025, https://www.bbc.co.uk/future/article/20251125-the-mysterious-black-fungus-from-chernobyl-that-appears-to-eat-radiation

December 2, 2025 Posted by Christina Macpherson | radiation, Ukraine | Leave a comment

What Defeat Looks Like

Had the western powers acted in good faith to resolve these issues at Minsk, history might have taken a different course. Instead, European leaders did everything they could to scuttle the Accords.

On the battlefield, Russia is in no rush; it is defeating Ukraine in a grinding war of attrition that by now is irreversibly in Russia’s favour.

As in Potsdam at the end of the Second World War, the only path forward now is working out the terms of Ukraine’s defeat. And there is still time to save lives, writes Stefan Moore.

Stefan Moore, Consortium News, November 28, 2025, https://consortiumnews.com/2025/11/28/what-defeat-looks-like/

European leaders are in panic mode. They are scrambling to ensure that Trump’s 28-point peace plan that they believe favours Russia can be revised to give Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky an equal say alongside Russian President Vladimir Putin.

This is delusional thinking. Whether or not Zelensky and his U.S./NATO allies, who have poured hundreds of billions of dollars into this conflict care to accept it, Russia is the indisputable victor in this terrible 14-year war, beginning with the 2014 Ukrainian civil war, which Russia entered in 2022.

Moscow will call the shots when it finally ends. As in Potsdam at the end of WWII, the only path forward now is working out the terms of defeat.

Those terms include Ukraine losing all or most of the four eastern oblasts – Donetsk, Lugansk, Zaporizhzhia and Kherson (amounting to roughly a third of its territory and population); an ironclad prohibition from joining NATO, which Russia correctly views as a hostile alliance; the reduction of its armed forces (the size to be negotiated) and the denazification of its military and government.

For those who believe this is an intolerable capitulation, it’s time to review the historical record.

Since the end of the Cold War, despite promises to Russia that it would not move “one inch eastward”, NATO has pushed up to Russia’s borders from Poland to the Baltic states and in 2008 invited Ukraine and Georgia to become members. The potentially devastating consequences of this expansion were signalled by the most senior U.S. diplomats at the time.

William Burns, the U.S. ambassador to Russia in 2008 warned in a cable published by WikiLeaks that Ukraine becoming a NATO member could lead to war with Russia in Ukraine, a prediction that eventually came true.

The architect of America’s Soviet containment policy, George Kennan, presciently warned as early as 1997 that “expanding NATO would be the most fateful error of American policy in the entire post-Cold War era.”

Not only were these words not heeded, but the West set out to weaken Russia in every way possible.

The Coup

In 2014, the U.S. helped engineer a coup (revealed here, here, and here) to overthrow Ukraine’s democratically elected, Russia-friendly president Victor Yanukovych and install a Western-friendly regime. Billed in the Western media as a popular uprising for democracy, it led Ukraine on the path to civil war between the European-aligned west and the east which had closer ties to Russia.

The biggest losers in this adventure were the ethnic Russian people of Ukraine’s eastern region who opposed the coup and called for the creation of separate autonomous states. In response, Ukraine’s armed forces and its virulently anti-Russian neo-Nazi battalions went on the attack.

In what turned out to be a disingenuous attempt to resolve the conflict, Ukraine and Russia took part in the Minsk Accords (mediated by France and Germany with U.N. support).

Among other things, Minsk proposed autonomy of the ethnic-Russian regions of Donetsk and Lugansk within a federated state of Ukraine, and an understanding that Ukraine could not join NATO, an alliance that Russia correctly sees as an existential threat.

For those who fail to comprehend Russia’s insistence on the latter point, it would be equivalent to Mexico or Canada entering a security alliance with Russia that allowed them to station nuclear capable missiles on the U.S. border. One only has to recall the Cuban Missile Crisis to see how that worked out.

Had the western powers acted in good faith to resolve these issues at Minsk, history might have taken a different course. Instead, European leaders did everything they could to scuttle the Accords.

Later, former Germany’s Angela Merkel and then ex-French president Francois Hollande would publicly admit that they were just playing along to give NATO more time to arm Ukraine to defeat Russia – a battle they have been willing to fight to the last Ukrainian.

Between the time of the Minsk Accords in 2015 and Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022, on behalf of the besieged population in the east, nearly 14,000 ethnic Russian civilians had been killed by Ukraine’s forces, teaching the Russian language had been prohibited, Russian churches had been outlawed and Russian language media had been severely restricted.

The Istanbul Denial

Yet, despite the setback following Minsk and just two months into Russia’s invasion, another opportunity to end the war was being negotiated between Russia and Ukraine in Istanbul.

The terms were similar to Minsk, but just as Ukraine was about to sign the agreement, U.K. Prime Minister Boris Johnson descended on Kiev on behalf of NATO to tell Zelensky to pull the plug — the U.S. and Europe would provide Ukraine with all the weapons it needed to continue to fight Russia.

So, four years on, here we are. Putin, fooled twice, has lost all trust in Western leaders and has no more time for their games. On the battlefield, Russia is in no rush; it is defeating Ukraine in a grinding war of attrition that by now is irreversibly in Russia’s favour.

Contrary to European leaders’ tough talk, Ukraine has nearly run out of trained soldiers, the U.S. has run out of ground war arms to give to Ukraine and, despite its belligerent rhetoric, Europe has run out of money to send to Kiev. (Meanwhile, revelations of corruption close in on Zelensky’s inner circle, claiming the resignation today of his chief of staff.)

The tragedy is that all of this – the loss of over a million lives (mostly young Ukrainian and Russian men thrown into the meatgrinder of trench warfare), the fleeing of over 7 million Ukrainian refugees who are unlikely to ever return and the widespread destruction of Ukraine’s infrastructure – could have all been avoided.

The notion that the West came to the aid of Ukraine to defend democracy in the most corrupt and neo-Nazi infested country in Europe is as deceptive as it is laughable. This has always been a battle initiated by the U.S./NATO alliance to weaken Moscow, overthrow Putin and return the West to dominance over Russia like in the 1990s, with Ukraine as the unfortunate willing proxy.

It was sheer hubris and stupidity for the neocons in Washington and Brussels, pumped up with triumphalism after the fall of the Soviet Union, to think they could mould the post-Cold War world including Eurasia in their interests without disastrous consequences.

In the end, Ukraine will be defeated but there are no real winners.

Both Ukraine and Russia will take years to recover from the human and economic cost of this devastating war; Europe’s economy is in tatters with near negative growth, energy prices three times higher than before the destruction of Russia’s Nord Stream pipeline, and companies fleeing to produce offshore.

As for the U.S. , it has nothing to show other than public anger over the war, soaring national debt and increasing isolation as a global power.

As always, the biggest prize-winners are the global defence contractors whose profits have skyrocketed since the start of the war in Ukraine and Israel’s genocidal war in Gaza.

Stefan Moore is an American-Australian documentary filmmaker whose films have received four Emmys and numerous other awards. In New York he was a series producer for WNET and a producer for the prime-time CBS News magazine program 48 HOURS. In the U.K. he worked as a series producer at the BBC, and in Australia he was an executive producer for the national film company Film Australia and ABC TV.

December 1, 2025 Posted by Christina Macpherson | Ukraine, weapons and war | Leave a comment

UK energy bill payers will hand £2bn a year to EDF for new power stations

COMMENT. Here is a prime example of the crookedness of the UK Labour government, in pretending that the nuclear industry is beneficial to people and the environment:

“The chancellor, Rachel Reeves, has promised to cut energy bills by an average £150 for each household from April by slashing green levies.“

UK green levies are taxes imposed by the government on sources of pollution, which contribute to about 8% of a household’s energy bill. These levies raise funds for various energy-efficiency schemes and have generated £5.9 billion from household energy bills in 2024. They are essential for supporting energy-saving measures in homes and for expanding renewable energy sources, ultimately improving energy security in the UK

French government-owned company to receive funding for Hinkley Point C and Sizewell C

Rob Davies, Guardian 28th Nov 2025

UK energy bill payers will hand over £2bn a year in subsidies to EDF, the French company building two nuclear power stations, according to government figures.

EDF, owned by the French government, will be entitled to £1bn in annual payments as soon as Hinkley Point C, in Somerset, comes on to the grid in 2030. The sum is due under the contracts-for-difference system that guarantees low-carbon energy companies a fixed price for the electricity they generate..

Separately, £1bn will be added to bills through a separate nuclear levy scheme to fund Sizewell C, in Suffolk, a 3.2 gigawatt (GW) project also led by EDF.

The result is an increase of about £2bn in bills, funding the cost of two plants that together will generate about a sixth of the electricity that Britain was using during peak demand so far this year, equivalent to 6m homes.

A government spokesperson said: “We are reversing a legacy of no new nuclear power being delivered to unlock a golden age of nuclear, securing thousands of good, skilled jobs and billions in investment.”

The government hopes the extra cost of new nuclear reactors could be offset in the future by the stable “baseload” output they offer, which can rein in the rising cost of balancing volatile output from energy sources such as solar and wind.

That balancing cost is expected to hit about £2bn this year, according to the Nuclear Industry Association. The government said Sizewell alone could save £2bn a year in future, adding that the impact on bills over the construction period was likely to be about £1 a household each month.

The chancellor, Rachel Reeves, has promised to cut energy bills by an average £150 for each household from April by slashing green levies.

Assessments of the nuclear subsidy were revealed in documents released by the Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR), which assesses the impact of economic policy. The OBR said EDF would receive £1bn in the first year of operation at Hinkley, due to come on stream in 2030 after 12 years of construction.

“In 2030-31, contracts for difference (CfDs) are expected to generate £4.6bn in government receipts, including £1bn to fund subsidy payments to the Hinkley Point C nuclear power plant for its first year of expected generation,” the OBR said.

The subsidy is the result of an agreement struck between EDF and the Conservative-Liberal Democrat coalition government in 2013.

The then energy secretary, Ed Davey, now the leader of the Liberal Democrats, agreed a “strike price” guaranteeing that the French state-owned company would receive £92.50 for each megawatt hour (MWh) for electricity generated at the 3.2 GW plant.

The strike price has risen with inflation to about £133 and is projected to reach £150 in 2030, according to the Daily Telegraph, which first reported the Hinkley subsidy.

The wholesale cost of electricity is much lower, now about £80 a MWh, meaning EDF will be able to claim the shortfall from consumers and businesses that use its electricity, thanks to the CfD agreement…….

The construction of Sizewell C, which has yet to begin and is scheduled for completion in the 2030s, will also drive up bills.

From January, energy bills will be inflated by a levy supporting the plant’s construction, adding £10 a year. The levy is expected to raise £700m but will double to 2030 to fund Sizewell, whose price tag is projected to hit £100bn.

In practice, the cost of the power station could increase. Hinkley Point C was originally projected to cost £18bn but has been subject to several time and cost overruns; EDF predicted last year the final bill could hit £46bn. https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2025/nov/28/uk-energy-bill-payers-edf-hinkley-point-c-sizewell-c

December 1, 2025 Posted by Christina Macpherson | business and costs, UK | Leave a comment

Amnesty: So-Called Gaza ‘Ceasefire’ becoming Smokescreen for continued Israeli Genocide

Juan Cole11/28/2025, https://www.juancole.com/2025/11/ceasefire-smokescreen-continued.html

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – Amnesty International concludes that, over a month after a ceasefire was agreed upon in Gaza and all living Israeli hostages were returned, the Israeli authorities continue to pursue the textbook definition of genocide “by continuing to deliberately inflict conditions of life calculated to bring about their physical destruction.” Moreover, Israeli leaders continue openly to affirm that this course of action is intentional on their parts.

Dan Steinbock here at Informed Comment recently made a similar argument, calling what the Israelis are doing “ecocide.”

The Secretary General of Amnesty International, Agnes Calmard, observed that “Palestinians remain held within less than half of the territory of Gaza, in the areas least capable of supporting life, with humanitarian aid still severely restricted.” Amnesty says that the Israeli military continues to occupy on the order of 55% of the Gaza Strip. There has been no move to rehabilitate the farmland that has been deliberately destroyed by the Israelis over two years or rebuild livestock. The Israelis routinely shoot at Palestinian fishing boats, preventing them from harvesting protein from the sea. The report concludes, “Palestinians are left virtually totally deprived of independent access to forms of sustenance.”

Ms. Calmard warned that: “The ceasefire risks creating a dangerous illusion that life in Gaza is returning to normal. But while Israeli authorities and forces have reduced the scale of their attacks and allowed limited amounts of humanitarian aid into Gaza, the world must not be fooled. Israel’s genocide is not over.”

Amnesty observes that Israeli fighter pilots and troops have killed about 350 people in Gaza since the so-called ceasefire was trumpeted on October 9. Moreover, Israelis are deliberately obstructing the process of rebuilding “life-sustaining infrastructure.” This cruel behavior is also illegal, directly violating “multiple orders from the International Court of Justice (ICJ) for Israel to ensure that Palestinians have access to humanitarian supplies.”

Let me just say that Israeli authorities agreed as part of the ceasefire to allow 600 trucks of food and other aid into Gaza daily. It is only allowing in about 200 trucks per day, only a third of what was pledged. As a result, the World Food Program says it is only able to reach about 100,000 households with food parcels and wheat, and even then it can only get them 75% of full rations. Its target is 320,000 households or 1.6 million needy people.

Again, this is me speaking: These limitations are not natural. They are the result of deliberate Israeli policies. Israeli troops at checkpoints are deliberately slow-rolling the entry of aid into Gaza on orders from Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his extreme-right cabinet. They are restricting overall humanitarian throughput, creating “major bottlenecks, including de-prioritization of humanitarian cargo, low offloading rates, scanning capacity, and suspended

December 1, 2025 Posted by Christina Macpherson | Atrocities, Gaza, Israel | Leave a comment

Israel is violating ceasefires in Gaza and Lebanon, and Trump is allowing it

Mitchell Plitnick, Mondoweiss, Thu, 27 Nov 2025

In recent days, Israel has dramatically escalated its violations of the ceasefire in both Gaza and Lebanon, which have been met with utter silence from the United States. Could this mean a return to the full-scale atrocities of the past two years?

According to the Merriam-Webster dictionary, the word “ceasefire” means: “a suspension of active hostilities.” The so-called “kids’ definition” is: “a temporary stopping of warfare.” That all seems clear enough.

But Israel’s definition differs significantly. They understand “ceasefire” to mean: “they cease, we fire.”

This is not news to Palestinians, Lebanese, or any of Israel’s neighbors. Much like how Israel and its supporters like to say that there was “peace” before October 7, 2023, questions of violence are always defined not by whether there is shooting or bombing but by whether Israelis are getting hit with those bullets and bombs.

When the United States imposed or brokered ceasefires between Israel and Hamas and Hezbollah, it was well understood by all that Washington would have to keep Israel on a tight leash for the agreements to hold. It was not hard to anticipate that the attention to that task would not be sustainable under Donald Trump.

Recent events have proven that to be true. Israel has never held to either ceasefire, of course. But in recent days, it has dramatically escalated its violations in both Gaza and Lebanon, and these violations have been met with utter silence from the United States.

Are we about to see a return to the full-scale atrocities in Gaza and Lebanon that became so sickeningly familiar these past two years? And why did the U.S. go to the trouble of brokering these ceasefire agreements if they were just going to let Israel destroy them so flagrantly and easily?

Above all, what is Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu trying to achieve, as he seems to be calling all the shots, directly or indirectly?

Israel’s aims

Israel’s goals are clear enough: endless war.

After the United Nations Security Council shamefully voted to endorse Donald Trump’s colonialist plan to impose conditions on the Palestinians as the price for stopping Israel’s full-scale genocide in Gaza, Netanyahu reactednot like a leader who had gotten what he wanted, but like a man who just saw a development he needed to prevent.

He said in a series of posts on X:

“Israel extends its hand in peace and prosperity to all of our neighbors” and calls on neighboring countries to “join us in expelling Hamas and its supporters from the region.”

Expulsion of Hamaswas not part ofTrump’s plan or the Security Council’s resolution. Netanyahu obviously added this to prick Hamas, add fuel to his efforts to undermine the Trump plan, and to toss a bone to his right flank.

Israel had never heeded the ceasefire to begin with. More than 340 overwhelmingly non-combatant Palestinians have been killed since the ceasefire was put in place, and over 15,000 more structures in Gaza have been destroyed, just as flooding, overflowing sewage, rains, and the cold weather of approaching winter start to hit the already battered population.

In just the past few days, though, Israel has killed more than 60 Palestinians in Gaza, a sign of escalation. It is no coincidence that this uptick comes on the heels of Saudi Crown Prince Muhammad Bin Salman’s (MBS) visit to Washington where he once again insisted, much to Trump’s annoyance, that if Donald Trump wanted to see a normalization deal between his kingdom and Israel, there would need to be a clear, committed path to a Palestinian state with a timeline. Whether MBS was sincere about that or not, Netanyahu has no intention of making even the slightest gesture in that direction, and the escalation in Gaza was, at least in part, his response to that part of the Trump-MBS confab.

Israel’s justifications for its attacks on Palestinians are threadbare and reflect how little Washington cares…………………………………………………………………………………………………………. https://www.sott.net/article/503226-Israel-is-violating-ceasefires-in-Gaza-and-Lebanon-and-Trump-is-allowing-it

December 1, 2025 Posted by Christina Macpherson | Israel, weapons and war | Leave a comment

The Seven Richest Billionaires Are All Media Barons.

“we all have to be concerned about the consolidation of huge billionaires getting control of nearly all of the major news outlets.”

No other period in history has seen such a rapid and overwhelming buy up of our means of communications by the billionaire class

Mint Press News, Alan McLeod, 25 Nov 25

Trump loyalist and CIA contractor Larry Ellison’s purchase of CNN appears imminent, and marks the latest venture into media for the world’s second-richest individual. But Ellison is not alone. Indeed, the world’s seven richest individuals are all now powerful media barons, controlling what the world sees, reads, and hears, marking a new chapter in oligarchical control over society and striking another blow at a free, independent press and diversity of opinion.

Media Monopoly

Paramount Skydance– an Ellison-owned company– is in pole position to purchase Warner Brothers Discovery, a conglomerate that controls gigantic film and television studios, streaming services like HBO Max and Discovery+, franchises like DC Comics, and TV networks such as HBO, TNT, Discovery Channel, TLC, Food Network, and CNN. This lead is largely due to Ellison’s proximity to President Trump, who will ultimately have to sign off on such a deal.

Ellison has already spoken to senior White House officials about axing CNN hosts and content that Trump is said to dislike, including anchors, Erin Burnett and Brianna Keilar. It is this willingness to completely reorientate the network’s political direction that has made him the White House’s preferred purchaser of Warner Brothers Discovery. He is reportedly so wealthy that he can afford to pay in cash

Under the planned arrangement, Oracle will oversee the platform’s security and operations, giving the world’s second-richest man effective control over the platform that more than 60% of Americans under thirty years of age use for news and entertainment. Trump himself stated that he was extremely pleased that Oracle would be controlling the platform. “It’s owned by Americans, and very sophisticated Americans,” he said.

Israel’s Biggest US Donor Now Owns CBS

Billionaire David Ellison just bought CBS with Trump’s blessing. His father, Larry Ellison—the top US funder of the Israeli military—backs the move. Bari Weiss is set to reshape the newsroom. Media independence is on life support.

The Ellison family’s sudden venture into the realm of media and communications has shocked many, with senior media figures sounding the alarm. Longtime CBS News anchor, Dan Rather, warned that “we all have to be concerned about the consolidation of huge billionaires getting control of nearly all of the major news outlets.” “It is a particularly tough time for anybody working at CBS News,” he stated, citing pressure to change coverage to be more pro-Trump. “I think if [the Ellisons] were to buy CNN, it would change CNN forever, and it might be another very serious wound to CBS News,” he concluded.

Billionaire Capture

Rather is correct. No other period in history has seen such a rapid and overwhelming buy up of our means of communications by the billionaire class – a fact that raises tough questions about freedom of speech and diversity of opinion. Today, the world’s seven richest individuals are all major media barons, giving them extraordinary control over our media and public square, allowing them to set agendas, and suppress forms of speech they do not approve of. This includes criticisms of them and their holdings, the economic system we live under, and the actions of the United States and Israeli governments.

Sitting on a fortune of over $480 billion, Elon Musk is the wealthiest person in world history, and is projected to, within the next decade, become the planet’s first trillionaire. In 2022, Musk purchased Twitter, in a deal worth around $44 billion. The South-African born tech magnate quickly set about turning the platform into a vehicle for advancing his own far-right politics. In 2024, for example, he was a key figure in promoting an attempt to topple Venezuelan president, Nicolás Maduro, spreading misinformation about the country’s election, and even threatening Maduro with a future in the notorious Guantánamo Bay prison camp.

He has also very publicly rewritten his generative AI chatbot, Grok, on multiple occasions, so it would produce more conservative responses to users’ questions. One result of this was that Grok began to praise Adolf Hitler.

Musk overtook Jeff Bezos last year to become the world’s richest man. And like Musk, the Amazon founder and CEO has made several moves into the world of media. In 2013, he bought The Washington Post for $250 million, and quickly began exerting his influence on the newspaper, firing anti-establishment writers and hiring pro-war columnists. This came just months after he bought a minority stake in Business Insider (now rebranded to Insider).

One year later, in 2014, Amazon paid nearly a billion dollars to purchase Twitch, a streaming platform which hosts around 7 million monthly broadcasters. Amazon also owns a wide range of other media ventures, including movie studio MGM, audiobook platform, Audible, and movie database website, IMDB.

French billionaire, Bernard Arnault, meanwhile, has been buying up large swaths of his country’s media outlets. The chairman of luxury conglomerate, Louis Vuitton Moët Hennessy (LVMH) and the world’s seventh-richest man now sits on a media empire that includes daily newspapers such as Le Parisien and Les Echoes, magazines such as Paris Match and Challenges, as well as Radio Classique.

The remaining three individuals rounding out the top seven list all owe their wealth primarily to their media empires. Google co-founders Sergey Brin and Larry Page are collectively worth over half a trillion dollars. Google has become the dominant force in today’s hi-tech economy, and is also a major player in social media, having bought YouTube in 2006 for $1.65 billion. Thirty-five percent of Americans use the video platform as a primary source of news.

Mark Zuckerberg, meanwhile, owes his $203 billion fortune to his social media and tech ventures, including Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp. Like YouTube, Zuckerberg’s companies are major players in the modern news landscape, with 38%, 20% and 5% of Americans relying on Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp for their news and views.

MAGA Mouthpieces

Many of these wealthy individuals have joined forces with President Trump, in an effort to support Republican policies and push a conservative worldview. Chief among these is the Ellison family, who quickly announced significant changes as CBS News, promising “unbiased” coverage and more “varied ideological perspectives”– widely understood as a shift towards right-wing, pro-Trump coverage.

Larry Ellison holds deeply conservative views, and became a top donor and fundraiser for the Republican Party, and a close Trump confident………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………

Pentagon Contractors

A key factor in the rise of many of the world’s top seven richest individuals is their proximity to the U.S. national security state, with many of their companies growing wealthy in part due to feeding from the trough of Pentagon contracts. Today’s wars and espionage rely as much on hi-tech computing equipment as tanks and guns, and in 2022, the Department of Defense awarded Amazon, Google, Microsoft, and Oracle a $9 billion cloud computing contract……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………..

The Pentagon is Recruiting Elon Musk to Help Them Win a Nuclear War

With billions in defense contracts, Musk’s SpaceX is helping turn Trump’s nuclear vision into reality, threatening to dismantle decades of global nuclear deterrence., AI hypersonic missiles, Castelion SpaceX connection, Elon Musk military contracts, Musk nuclear war plans, Pentagon missile defense, SpaceX Pentagon contracts, Starlink military applications, Trump AI warfare, Trump nuclear defense plan, U.S……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………

Arming and Supporting Israel

Another key attribute that many of the world’s richest individuals share is their passionate support for Israel and its expansionist project.

Nowhere is this more evident than with Ellison, who has made it his life’s goal to advance the Jewish State’s interests, both at home and abroad……………………………………………………………………………………. https://www.mintpressnews.com/the-seven-richest-billionaires-are-all-media-barons/290572/

December 1, 2025 Posted by Christina Macpherson | media | Leave a comment

Israel’s threat of nukes shows us who is running U.S. foreign policy.

And so what Israel is successfully doing is drawing Trump into a war with Iran which will be on a scale which no military expect could even imagine was possible………………..Worse, will be any scenario where the Israelis or the U.S. can justify using nuclear weapons if the conventional attack doesn’t quite go to plan.

Martin Jay, November 27, 2025, https://strategic-culture.su/news/2025/11/27/israels-threat-of-nukes-shows-us-who-running-us-foreign-policy/

Isn’t it a failure of both U.S. foreign policy and of Israel that a war with Iran is seen as a solution to America’s failing hegemony?

It is a long-debated subject. Whether it is the U.S. which controls Israel or the other way around. In the 70s, under President Nixon, many analysts firmly believed, despite the JFK assassination, that it was still the U.S. who called the shots and used Israel as a useful tool in the Middle East to keep a rowdy group of Arab states in check and subservient to America’s interests. But it is in recent years where we have to see if Israel has done that effectively and meticulously in America’s interests, given that most analysts agree that Israel and the U.S. are both preparing for war with Iran.

Given that Israel’s main task was to keep the region in order to serve America’s hegemony and its energy needs, one has to ask isn’t it a failure of both U.S. foreign policy and of Israel that a war with Iran is seen as a solution to America’s failing hegemony? And doesn’t this tail wagging the dog scenario show itself in the clear light once and for all?

Recently two startling revelations about Israel’s attacks on Iran in June – otherwise known as the ‘twelve-day war’ have surfaced which should worry Americans as it shows just how far this abusive relationship has become, with Israel playing the role of the spoilt child waving daddy’s pistol as its master. Former CIA whistleblower John Kiriakou and the formidable U.S. academic John Mearsheimer have both confirmed that it was Israel who basically threatened Trump that if he didn’t send ‘bunker buster’ bombs to Iran in a bid to destroy the country’s underground nuclear facilities that they, Israel, would bomb Iran with nuclear weapons. Trump rolled over of course and complied.

But this extraordinary act by Israel illustrates just how far this Nabokov-esque relationship between Lolita and her foster dad has got. To the point that world wars involving nukes is now on the table for any U.S. president who thinks he can play hardball with Israel. The twist to this story is that the bombing of Iran’s nuclear sites was not at all a success as it has become evident that the Iranians knew it was coming and moved out a lot of the nukes days beforehand. And even the bombing itself didn’t have anywhere near the impact that was expected. It was symbolic more than anything in that it sent a message to the Iranians that such an act was possible under the Trump administration.

In many ways the attack was a gift to the Iranians as it focused their minds and made them aware where they needed to improve their defensive capabilities. It was a test run and they learnt from it.

But for the Americans it certainly couldn’t be called a success.

If it were a success, even the laziest two-bit hack in Washington could arrive at the obvious question, when hostilities kick off again, why are we at war with Iran if we’ve taken out their nuclear capability?

The U.S. has been busy in recent weeks sending naval ships and preparing for air-to-air refuelling of Israel’s jets – crucial in any conflict with Iran given the distance between the two countries – which merely confirms two poignant points. Firstly, that Iran’s response the first time round had significant impact on Israel’s military arsenal (many military sites in Israel were taken out completely, barely mentioned by U.S. media); and secondly that even the U.S. had had its own stocks depleted – which is why a pause quickly came about after the twelve-days was. U.S. and Israel needed to rearm but also prepare themselves for the second phase, while Iran itself has improved its own air defences and reached out to Russia and China for rearming.

And so what Israel is successfully doing is drawing Trump into a war with Iran which will be on a scale which no military expect could even imagine was possible, given that this time around Iran is so much better prepared and that the surprise of using Azerbaijani airspace cannot be repeated. The Israelis don’t have any hit-n-run surprise tactics to rely on, which might lead some analysts to believe that a bigger, broader attack is in the making with the U.S. as a key partner rather than chief supplier. Worse, will be any scenario where the Israelis or the U.S. can justify using nuclear weapons if the conventional attack doesn’t quite go to plan. And all this under the watch of Donald Trump whose entire support base was about stopping ‘forever wars’ in the Middle East. How will he explain to his broader support base that he has nothing to do with U.S. troops being sent to their deaths in Iran, that it is Israel who controls such decisions?

December 1, 2025 Posted by Christina Macpherson | Israel, USA, weapons and war | Leave a comment

Star Wars redux: the false promise of space-based missile defense

by Najam Ul Hassan, November 24, 2025, https://spacenews.com/star-wars-redux-the-false-promise-of-space-based-missile-defense/?utm_source=ActiveCampaign&utm_medium=email&utm_content=Opinions%3A%20Is%20space-based%20missile%20defense%20a%20non-starter%3F&utm_campaign=Opinions%20-%202025-11-29

Star Wars is back in vogue with President Trump’s executive order to establish the “Golden Dome” missile defense shield. It will feature an ambitious space-based boost-phase interceptor program in addition to terrestrial systems. While admittedly the holy grail of defense against ballistic missiles, the obstacles that plagued its discontinued predecessor, “Brilliant Pebble,” under the Strategic Defense Initiative, remain unaddressed. The technological breakthroughs in launch capacity, decreasing costs of sending mass into space and faster data transfer have led to renewed hope for space-based missile defense, but the fundamental hurdle — physics, not technology — remains to be effectively overcome.

Recurrent interest in space-based missile interceptors (SBI) is driven by the motivation to neutralize the missile in the boost phase, contrary to the other air defense systems that intercept either in the mid-course or the terminal phase. This offers numerous advantages: it is substantially easier to detect and target as the booster has not detached yet, making the target bulkier; the plume from the burn makes it visible; its speed is slower compared to other phases; and the target has not hardened yet, making it more vulnerable. Once the missile enters the midcourse, it deploys decoys with a similar radar cross-section as the actual warhead, which float at similar trajectories, making it exponentially harder to achieve an effective kill. Additionally, the deployment of multiple warheads in case of a Multiple Independent Re-entry Vehicle or zig-zag moment of hypersonic glide vehicles adds another layer of complexity to successful interception.

However, this lucrative promise is heavily outweighed by the drawback of what could be termed the absenteeism problem in physics. These satellites, carrying kill vehicles, must be stationed in low Earth orbit (LEO) to reach the target in the boost phase, which only lasts from three to five minutes after launch. The fundamental problem is that objects in LEO cannot be parked above one point on Earth; they revolve around Earth, completing a cycle between 90 and 120 minutes. To cover the entire stretch of potential launching points and establish a genuinely global air defense, a constellation of 950 satellites has to be deployed, according to conservative estimates. The estimated cost, according to the Congressional Budget Office’s estimates, is $542 billion as opposed to the $175 billion claim by President Trump.

Not only is the scaling dynamic flawed, but the system is also easy to defeat. The constellation is easily overwhelmed by simultaneous launches. Even if each satellite were to carry more than one interceptor, the system still saturates quickly. Once that happens, instead of a linear increase in required satellites to intercept additional hostile launches, the requirement jumps exponentially, which is untenable. Besides, the enemy can simply punch holes in the chain by employing anti-satellite missiles, as the satellites can be tracked.

Furthermore, attempts to field even a limited number of SBIs for tests could pose a security dilemma for other states. These SBIs can be effective ASAT vehicles as they would require high thrust and maneuverability, allowing them to potentially reach and attack satellites in geosynchronous orbits. This can trigger an arms race of satellite-based weapons as well as counter-space capabilities, resulting in a net effect of added insecurity for all, including the U.S. itself, which depends heavily on its space capabilities. Challenging the effectiveness of an adversary’s deterrent would have profound strategic implications, at least insofar as it would either find qualitative ways to evade the newly developed defense architecture, or increase the number of their missiles to overwhelm the systems, or both. Ultimately, durable security cannot be achieved alone but in concert with others, including the adversary, and perhaps the only way to prevent attacks and ensure long-term stability remains deterrence by punishment.

The proposal for SBIs has also triggered sharp international reactions. China has already fielded its own “Golden Dome” prototype, which is essentially an early warning system with enormous big data computation ability, that uses the present capabilities in a more integrated and efficient manner, rather than seeking new platforms for interceptors. Criticizing the American approach, Beijing has asserted that SBIs would disturb “global strategic balance and stability” and turn “space into a war zone”, while Moscow has called it “very destabilizing.”

The desire to secure the homeland drives this saga, undergirded by the belief that technology could fundamentally alter defense logics. Yet despite significant progress in almost all the technological components needed to improve the cost-benefit equation, the physical — and perhaps insurmountable — barriers remain as formidable as they were three decades ago. The return to space-based interceptors thus reflects a recurring faith in technological solutions to strategic problems that are, at their core, governed by physics and deterrence. Rather than investing in an orbit-based missile shield that risks instability and imposes exorbitant costs, pursuing balanced security arrangements may offer a sustainable path toward long-term stability.

Najam Ul Hassan is a Research Assistant at the Centre for Aerospace and Security Studies, Lahore.

December 1, 2025 Posted by Christina Macpherson | space travel, USA, weapons and war | Leave a comment

‘Deeply disappointing’: Experts slam Cop30 for ignoring climate’s impact on food supply

Food and nature experts have expressed dismay at the outcome of Brazil’s
recently-concluded Cop30 climate conference, after the final text failed to
make any mention of the impact of climate change on food systems. A plan to
address food systems emissions is critical to decarbonisation, with the
sector responsible for around one-third of overall emissions, which
originates from areas including livestock, waste disposal, food processing,
as well as rice paddy fields, which produce large quantities of methane.

Independent 28th Nov 2025,
https://www.independent.co.uk/climate-change/cop30-brazil-food-amazon-climate-b2871542.html

December 1, 2025 Posted by Christina Macpherson | Brazil, climate change | Leave a comment

Scottish National Party accuses UK Government of ‘swindle’ over energy bills.

The UK Government has been accused of a ‘shameful swindle’ over the reduction of energy bills after a think tank estimated savings could be significantly lower than pledged.

The SNP has warned the Chancellor’s latest announcement to reduce household energy costs by £150 was “already falling apart”.

The Treasury earmarked the savings by scrapping the
energy company obligation scheme – a home insultation programme. It comes after the Resolution Foundation warned energy bills could continue to rise – and the reduction will be lower than anticipated.

Figures from the think tank suggests the average saving on energy bills could be £60 per household by 2029-30. Analysis by the think tank also estimates savings to be £127 in 2026-27, falling to £115 in 2027-28 before reducing again the following year. But prior to the general election in 2024, Labour committed to reducing energy costs by £300 by 2030.

Herald 29th Nov 2025, https://www.heraldscotland.com/news/25658822.snp-accuses-uk-government-swindle-energy-bills/

December 1, 2025 Posted by Christina Macpherson | politics, UK | Leave a comment

He once said he was a genius. Now he wants to immortalise himself.

28 November 2025 John Lord, https://theaimn.net/he-once-said-he-was-a-genius-now-he-wants-to-immortalise-himself/

The only man I can think of who could rightfully claim the title of genius is Leonardo da Vince. Now you might dispute that, and you may be right. I don’t recall any research I have done into his persona, in which he refers to himself as a genius, but Donald Trump does.

In many countries that have dictatorial leaders, to satisfy their narcissistic desires, they erect large portraits of themselves on buildings for the populace to stare at. Some stare and worship, while others stare in terror.

In a striking announcement last week, it was reported that Donald J. Trump has instructed the U.S. Treasury to create a distinctive $1 coin adorned with his likeness on both sides. This bold initiative aims to celebrate America’s 250th birthday and to pay tribute to the presidency itself, as Treasury officials noted. The coin promises to be a unique memento, capturing a moment in time while intertwining the legacy of a nation with the persona of its leader.

So, is he placing himself on the same footing as other fascist dictators, who, when in power, like Stalin, Hitler, Mussolini and Marcos built monuments to glorify themselves so they’d be exalted in history?

In the meantime, the “Washington Commanders,” a prominent National League football team rooted in the heart of Washington, D.C., have received a rather audacious request from none other than Donald Trump himself: to adorn their brand-new stadium with his image, an impressive $3.7 billion marvel of modern engineering, with his name. Yes, engraved on the façade of every entry.

What the President wants, the President gets, and it likely will come to fruition, ensuring his legacy is forever linked to an edifice or token.

In another audacious endeavour to secure his place in the tapestry of history. Yes, he dreams of his name forever etched on lustrous coins, expertly engraved into the majestic façades of towering edifices, and artistically inscribed upon the enduring marble walls of the White House. He longs to elevate his stature in ways that resonate through the ages, yearning to revel in a luminescent glow of adoration that transcends the confines of time itself.

He now envisions the much-debated and extravagant $300 million ballroom that Trump is erecting at the White House to be officially named “The President Donald J. Trump Ballroom.” Senior officials within the administration propose that this audacious title is destined to become a prominent symbol linked to the ambitious project, forever etched into the legacy of one of the nation’s most opulent spaces.

Trump is burning to have his name immortalised on anything he can get his name on. So much flattery for a man of so little altruistic understanding.

Only fascist dictators seek to build monuments to glorify their names on teacups and granite to be exalted by the essence of time.

If he is seeking to immortalise himself, then it should be for his character, his aplomb, his decency. Presidents do not usually seek to immortalise themselves with false claims of excellence.

Democracies have a unique way of honouring their heroes – only after their passing and only when the public advocates for such tributes. Donald Trump undeniably merits a place in our collective memory, but not for any noble or virtuous deeds; I struggle to recall even one.

Instead, he should be etched into our history for the numerous acts of offensiveness that have marked his tenure. Imagine a comprehensive list of his missteps plastered across the façades of every government building in the nation—not as a celebration, but as a stark reminder. It is our solemn obligation to ensure that he is remembered not as a champion but as a cautionary figure—a stark warning of the threats he has posed and will continue to pose to the very foundations of American democracy.

Suppose Trump is to be inscribed in the annals of history. In that case, it should be seen as a figure marked by the numerous atrocities against the United States – a betrayal of its cherished Constitution, a violation of its legal framework, and ultimately, an affront to its people.

In a shocking display of unfounded claims, he asserted to the American populace that a monumental election had been “stolen” from him. This incendiary rhetoric ignited a frenzy among his loyal supporters, culminating in an audacious coup attempt that included assembling false electors under duress and intimidating state officials. The harrowing insurrection that followed saw a violent clash at the U.S. Capitol, leaving a tragic toll of five lives lost and 174 police officers injured — a dark Day etched in the nation’s memory.

The American people should not forget that, after his re-election, he wielded the power of pardon to absolve 1,600 individuals who had been convicted for their roles in the Capitol attack, alongside 77 others who had conspired with him in this unprecedented attempt to subvert democracy. In a brazen act of defiance, he dared to label these individuals “patriots,” transforming the narrative of insurrection into a misguided celebration.

If that alone doesn’t suffice, he must also be etched in history as the President who boldly overstepped the boundaries of Congress, seizing power that was never meant to be his. He trampled on the fundamental rights of individuals, denying them the due process guaranteed by law. He orchestrated a campaign against his political adversaries, prosecuting them with fervency. He callously disregarded international norms, carrying out extrajudicial killings of those he branded as enemy combatants. He dispatched military forces into American cities, defying the urgent pleas of mayors and governors alike. And in a shocking display of corruption, he openly accepted bribes.

Whether cast in shimmering gold or lustrous silver, or carved from the finest marble and granite, the American people must never permit the truth of Trump’s misdemeanours to fade into obscurity behind hollow tributes to his legacy. Once he has departed from the stage of history, a striking monument should rise, a powerful testament to remind future generations of the treachery he embodied and the complicity of those officials who stood by him. This monument should stand as a stark reminder, echoing the lessons of the past, ensuring that the shadows of dishonesty do not cloud the nation’s narrative.

Inscribed on the façade of a stark, industrial edifice crafted from iron and cement would be a sombre chronicle of assaults on democracy, detailing the sinister manoeuvres of a leader and naming all those complicit in his transgressions.

Above the entrance, bold and unyielding, words would speak of “Trump’s Treason,” a chilling reminder of a fraught chapter in history. This striking structure should rise on the hallowed grounds of the White House lawn, where the elegant Trump ballroom is being built, which will replace a wing of the white house, that was much admired and captivated visitors with its grandeur. Facing Pennsylvania Avenue, the building will deliberately invite families exploring the nation’s capital to commemorate America’s 500th anniversary to witness the clout of the dictator. This imposing ballroom, a monument in Trump’s name only, will serve as a stark reminder of a dark epoch, ensuring his catastrophic legacy is etched in collective memory for generations to come.

Even his peace plans for the current world trouble spots are calculated to exert maximum pressure on the Nobel Peace Prize committee.

My thought for the Day

The Office of the American President was once viewed by its people as an office of prestige and importance. Trump has reduced it to one of ridicule and contempt.

November 30, 2025 Posted by Christina Macpherson | PERSONAL STORIES, Reference | Leave a comment

Visiting bombed nuclear sites is dangerous, Iran FM says.

Nov 27, 2025, https://www.iranintl.com/en/202511276616

ran Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi warned on Wednesday that approaching nuclear sites hit in recent strikes is unsafe and said inspections there can only resume under new security arrangements.

“It is now dangerous to approach nuclear installations because of security issues,” Araghchi told France 24 in Paris. “There are unexploded munitions, and there are also concerns regarding radioactivity and chemical contamination.”

He said inspections by the International Atomic Energy Agency continue at facilities that were not attacked, but access to damaged sites requires “a new framework and proper modalities.”

Araghchi called last week’s resolution by the IAEA’s 35-nation Board of Governors “a political and unilateral decision,” saying it ignored the reality that Iranian nuclear sites had been bombed. “If you do not include the realities on the ground, then you are committing an error,” he said.

The minister said the Cairo agreement reached earlier this year with IAEA Director General Rafael Grossi had acknowledged that conditions had changed after the attacks and that a new inspection protocol would be needed.

Further attacks possible

Asked whether more strikes could occur, Araghchi said Israel’s recent record suggested the risk remains. “The Israeli regime over the last two years has attacked seven different countries,” he said. “So it’s clear that another attack is possible.”

His comments came a day after IAEA Director General Rafael Grossi said in Manila that the agency wants to “fully reengage with Iran” to restore inspection access and verify enrichment activities. The IAEA’s 35-member Board of Governors last week passed a resolution calling on Tehran to inform it “without delay” about the status of its enriched uranium stock and sites hit in June’s strikes.

Iran condemned the vote as “illegal and unjustified,” saying it undermined the Cairo inspection accord that Grossi reached with Tehran in September through Egyptian mediation. Araghchi accused Western powers of “killing” that agreement, saying it had provided a framework for cooperation before Israel and the United States bombed enrichment facilities during the 12-day conflict in June.

No enrichment after attacks

Earlier this month, Araghchi said Iran was no longer enriching uranium at any site in the country, citing the destruction caused by the attacks. “There is no enrichment right now because our facilities — our enrichment facilities — have been attacked,” he said in response to a question from an Associated Press journalist at a conference in Tehran. “There is no undeclared nuclear enrichment in Iran. All of our facilities are under the safeguards and monitoring” of the IAEA.

Iran had previously enriched uranium up to 60% purity — just short of weapons-grade levels — after the United States withdrew from the 2015 nuclear deal in 2018. Tehran says its atomic program is entirely peaceful.

November 30, 2025 Posted by Christina Macpherson | Iran, safety | Leave a comment

Attacking nature protections with fudged figures is not the solution to slow growth: rivers charity responds to Hinkley Point C report

A statement from Mark Lloyd, Chief Executive of The Rivers Trust, https://envirotecmagazine.com/2025/11/26/attacking-nature-protections-with-fudged-figures-is-not-the-solution-to-slow-growth-rivers-charity-responds-to-hinkley-point-c-report/

Yesterday [(25 November)], several prominent newspapers published articles quoting a government-commissioned report into the spiralling costs of EDF’s Hinkley Point C nuclear power station. These articles focused on the report’s claims that a planned fish deterrent system for the power station’s water intakes cost £700m and would “save the lives of 0.083 salmon, 0.028 sea trout, six river lamprey, 18 Allis shad and 528 twaite shad per year”.

These figures, being used to deride the vital importance of the fish deterrent, cannot be taken seriously.

The fish deterrent system at Hinkley is in fact priced at £50m, not £700m. The tiny numbers of fish the report claims it would save are based on EDF’s own modelling, and are preposterously small given that 3.5bn litres of water a day will be sucked into the power station. This is more than the flow of all the rivers flowing into the Severn Estuary.

Such a vast amount of water will undoubtedly contain huge quantities of fish and other marine creatures, many of which are on the verge of extinction. The water intake at Hinkley will come from the most densely populated part of the estuary, killing not just fish but lots of other wildlife, and the knock-on effects on breeding would be catastrophically felt for generations. The abundance of species in the Severn Estuary and their vulnerability is why the area has the highest levels of protection in environmental law.

EDF included the fish deterrent system in the plans it submitted to get this project approved. Instead of disingenuously blaming spiralling construction costs on perfectly reasonable measures to reduce damage to the environment, EDF should honour its commitment. Within a total budget of £45bn to build a nuclear power station at Hinkley, £50m is little more than a rounding error.

This report seems to be another. Within a total budget of £45bn, £50m is little more than a rounding error, and this story is another ridiculous attempt to frame nature as the one and only blocker to growth and prosperity, a narrative that the government seems intent on pushing as we build up to today’s Budget.

The truth is that growth and prosperity are utterly dependent on the health of our natural world. Whilst we recognise the urgent need for new energy infrastructure, the processes being proposed to remove or bypass environmental protections should concern us all. Development and nature can thrive together, but only if the safeguards designed to protect our wildlife, and communities remain in place.

November 30, 2025 Posted by Christina Macpherson | environment | Leave a comment

China releases arms control white paper in new era; ‘document injects positive energy, safeguards developing nations’ rights

Global Times By Liu Xuanzun and Guo Yuandan, : Nov 27, 2025

China’s State Council Information Office on Thursday released a white paper titled “China’s Arms Control, Disarmament, and Nonproliferation in the New Era.” An expert told the Global Times that at a time when the existing international arms control mechanisms are facing challenges, the white paper issued by China injects positive energy into the global arms control and nonproliferation process and fully safeguards the rights of developing countries.

Apart from the preface, conclusion, and annexes, the white paper has five sections: “Grim Realities: International Security and Arms Control,” “Position and Policies: China’s Arms Control in the New Era,” “Playing a Constructive Role in International Arms Control,” “Leading International Security Governance in Emerging Fields,” and “Strengthening International Cooperation on Nonproliferation and Peaceful Uses of Science and Technology.”

The white paper reiterated that China upholds a firm commitment to a policy of no-first-use of nuclear weapons and a nuclear strategy of self-defense. It said that China was compelled to make the strategic choice to develop nuclear weapons at a particular point in history to deal with nuclear threats and blackmail, break the existing nuclear monopoly, and prevent nuclear wars. China’s nuclear weapons are not intended to threaten other countries, but for defense and self-protection. China has never used nuclear weapons to threaten other countries nor deployed nuclear weapons outside its own territories, and has never provided a nuclear umbrella for other countries.

CHINA / MILITARY

China releases arms control white paper in new era; ‘document injects positive energy, safeguards developing nations’ rights’

Liu Xuanzun and Guo YuandanPublished: Nov 27, 2025 10:25 PM latest news

latest news
China’s State Council Information Office on Thursday released a white paper titled “China’s Arms Control, Disarmament, and Nonproliferation in the New Era.” An expert told the Global Times that at a time when the existing international arms control mechanisms are facing challenges, the white paper issued by China injects positive energy into the global arms control and nonproliferation process and fully safeguards the rights of developing countries.

Whether confronted with nuclear threats or blackmail during the Cold War, or in a complex international security environment with growing strategic security threats at present, China has always committed to its policy of no-first-use of nuclear weapons, firmly upheld a nuclear strategy of self-defense, and promoted the modernization of its nuclear forces to safeguard China’s own strategic security and overall global strategic stability, according to the white paper………………………………………

…………….China previously issued white papers on arms control in 1995 and 2005. Pointing out new highlights in the new version, Guo told the Global Times that this white paper, for the first time, puts forward China’s vision for arms control – justice, cooperation, balance and effectiveness – emphasizing the balance of rights and obligations. It explicitly opposes abusing the concept of national security and export control measures, and exerting restrictions on developing countries’ rights to peaceful use of technology, Guo said.

Second, it is the first time to specifically address international security governance in emerging fields, detailing governance in the areas of outer space, cyberspace, and artificial intelligence, Guo said, noting that China advocates for strengthening the construction of a global governance system that takes into account the positions and interests of developing countries.

Third, the white paper summarizes China’s arms control policies and practices since the 18th National Congress of the Communist Party of China, highlighting many new practices and approaches. For example, in the field of nuclear arms control, in 2024, China submitted a working paper to the second session of the Preparatory Committee for the Eleventh Review Conference of the Parties to the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT), calling on the five nuclear-weapon states to conclude a treaty on mutual no-first-use of nuclear weapons, and also maintaining that nuclear-weapon states should undertake not to use or threaten to use nuclear weapons against non-nuclear-weapon states, Guo said. ………………..

…………………..The white paper said that China upholds a firm commitment to a policy of no-first-use of nuclear weapons and a nuclear strategy of self-defense, stressing that China’s greatest contribution to international nuclear arms control lies in the fact that it has the most stable, consistent and predictable nuclear policy among all nuclear-weapon states. “China’s nuclear weapons policy has remained remarkably consistent since 1964, consistently keeping its nuclear capabilities at the minimum level required for national security,” the expert noted………………………………………

…………………… n the chapter “Playing a Constructive Role in International Arms Control,” the white paper urged Japan to thoroughly destroy the chemical weapons it abandoned in China. During World War II, in flagrant violation of international law, invading Japanese troops used chemical weapons on a large scale in China. A total of 1,791 instances of chemical weapon use have been documented with confirmed dates, locations, and casualty records. The resulting casualties exceeded 200,000. After its defeat, Japan abandoned a large quantity of chemical weapons in China to cover up its crimes. Since the end of World War II, these abandoned chemical weapons have resulted in more than 2,000 poisoning casualties, gravely endangered the lives and property of the Chinese people as well as the environment.

“The Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC) clearly stipulates that a state party which has abandoned chemical weapons on the territory of another state party shall provide all necessary financial, technical, expert, facility as well as other resources for the purpose of destroying these weapons. After the CWC entered into force, the governments of China and Japan signed two memorandums, in 1999 and 2012, on destroying the chemical weapons abandoned by Japan, to advance the destruction process. However, due to insufficient attention and input from the Japanese side, the destruction plan has missed four deadlines. To date, the Japanese side has not yet provided comprehensive, detailed and accurate information on the whereabouts of its abandoned chemical weapons.

…………………………..Introducing the white paper, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Guo Jiakun said at a regular press conference on Thursday that this year marks the 80th anniversary of the victory in the Chinese People’s War of Resistance against Japanese Aggression and the World Anti-Fascist War, as well as the 80th anniversary of the founding of the UN. ……………………………………………………………………… https://www.globaltimes.cn/page/202511/1349241.shtml

November 30, 2025 Posted by Christina Macpherson | China, politics | Leave a comment

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