Monday night, Rachel Maddow proudly hosted someone named Richard Muller, a scientist funded by the Koch brothers (petrochemical moguls who are also sponsors of the Tea Party and Romney campaigns). Muller, a former climate-change skeptic, has had an incredible revelation: global warming is real, and it’s being caused by humans. [See video here.]
He came out of the closet in an op-ed in The New York Times. Maybe it took a lot for Muller to catch up with the past 20 years of climate science, or maybe his position is a ruse, but then live on the Maddow show, he proposed a solution: burn natural gas instead of coal. Where would we get that natural gas? Fracking, of course! Or as he put it, “clean fracking,” which does not exist and is unlikely ever to exist except in the hallucinations of PR people.
Fracking, or hydraulic fracturing, is a way of violently extracting gas from miles below the ground. In the process, it consumes tons of water, injects toxins into the aquifer, causes flammable drinking water and destroys communities.
Notably, her program has been sponsored by fracking propaganda ads for years, and continues to be, as recently as the Thursday night edition. The ads state outright that fracking — which is not mentioned by the name everyone would recognize — is safe and protects both communities and drinking water supplies. It’s fair to say this is an outright lie, given the problems that have been exposed about fracking over the past few years. For most people who get dragged in, it becomes a living nightmare that is destroying their lives.
Muller thinks developing “clean fracking” is the answer to lure underdeveloped countries like India and China off of their coal dependence. Muller — a physicist at UC Berkeley and former MacArthur Genius Grant winner — and his awakening were touted by Maddow as evidence of the impossible.
Maddow noted that Muller’s recent research through his Berkeley Earth Surface Temperatures (BEST) study was funded by the infamous right-wing oil gazillionaires the Koch brothers, making Muller’s findings on global warming that much more surprising. More shocking still was Maddow’s failure to call him out on his support of fracking — a yet-to-be-developed clean version or otherwise.
Instead of calling Muller out on his claims, Maddow jokes about developing fracking that does not cause earthquakes or flammable drinking water (she shows B-roll video of someone who lives near a fracking well whose kitchen sink bursts into flames when they strike a match next to running water).
We think it’s time for her to get an earful and drop ExxonMobil. Fracking is a destructive, toxic process; “clean fracking” is a red herring. We already know where we can get clean energy; we’re orbiting it. If you want to let her know that what she’s doing is bad for the planet and bad for her credibility — and amounts to selling her soul for what she calls “the best job in the world” (her own) — please write to her at rachel@msnbc.com.
Pam, I will look around for the burdock as well. My dear friend Angel uses that in her detox packages and I keep forgetting to bring it on board.
Ginseng and I have an old history (long story, another time), but I can’t use it. Instead I just pack in the nutritional yeast.
As for wildcrafting the dandelion, I most certainly intend to do just that around the Equinox. Hadn’t thought of selling it, just gathering enough to keep my friend/family in root. Will ponder. Thanks!!
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25 dollars! – can you hike out somewhere wild and collect them?
love to you mystes!
And burdock root with the dandelion as the big deep clean combo! and ginseng to add the immune ok-at-breaking-point counter balance to buy time to come down from!
Paola, at your service. I posted that just in case it resonated with anybody else on the list. Best wishes resolving your issue. BTW, check this out, she’s the real deal: drmonalisa.com
Thank you Cara, your comment made me make interesting discoveries about a possible health related matter. 🙂
It’s the iodized salt. When I’m getting enough iodine, I don’t crave salt. Apparently all along, my familial salt addiction has really been iodine deficiency…we have non-iodized salt here (himalayan, celtic etc), but the normal kind from the grocery store is iodized.
CaraS,
I’m curious to know – your cravings are for iodized salt or just for salt in general? (Or you can’t tell, because in the US you have only iodized salt?)
Thank you,
Paola
Pam… thank you for the nettles recommendation. Inexpensive is always helpful. I’ve been detoxing for the last 7 weeks – the last 10 days most intensively – and dandelion root is now $25. a pound here in Texas. Dandelions!
And nettles (miso not always available). I dry nettles and put them in bread, pizza dough, sprinkled on food. Nettle tea is inexpensive. When I run out I supplement with that. Rich in nutrients, cleans the body of heavy metals and radiation, nourishes.
And beans. Dried beans cooked, at least 5 times a week at least a cup (measure), as good over time as chemotherapy and brings the cells back to normal (Susan weed, ‘breast cancer? breast health!’)
And green smoothies – all that roughage and completeness cleaning the body, regenerating, building.
Perhaps RM will go independent?
I can wonder how it happened that all those laws I learned about in law school that had to do with monopolies, anti-trust, limitations on ownshership of media companies, voter rights, abortion rights and a whole consitition-load more seem to be no more. In the last thirty years, those laws have disappeared or been repealed or superceded or aren’t enforced or have been overtaken by other laws (legislation and SCOTUS decisions).
And I would agree, Eric, that the very base of the problem is the control of media, information and news. All the media does now is try to keep us distracted with simplistic, disingenuous sound bites that have no depth – bites without teeth.
Amen, Eric. You have a great employer.
JannKinz
“…….which is why I work for the company that I do…”.
which is why I am the subscriber that I am and will continue to be,
lovingly
the iosol testing i do periodically, the salt craving is an interesting tip-off; thanks, carasusanetta
Well she had to drop Fukushima like a hot rock because it’s the parent corporation, General Electric, which designed the Mark I reactor. GE is still involved NBC as a joint venture with Comcast.
So this is what happens to the truth. I maintain that our single biggest structural problem in the world right now is that the people who the news should be reporting on control the news outright, which is why I work for the company that I do.
Dr Christiane Northrup suggests an iosol test. Paint a square of iosol on your arm and see how much of it absorbs through the skin in 12 hours. If it’s gone, you might need to supplement. Amazon sells it. My sign is a salt craving. Even with thyroid medicine, I need to supplement, and I can tell I’m at the right level by no craving, or how much I need based on how long I can go between cravings.
I haven’t been quite sure of her since I listened to the “Expert” she interviewed after the Fukushima meltdown. …who told us we did not need those iodide tablets, that this was just not a big deal to Americans. Any way to stave of another blast of exposure to radiation that humans are constantly under since the first test started littering the atmosphere is something we have to do if we can. Miso for starters. Maybe we didn’t “need” the tablets, but we needed an “expert” to say. yes, now there is a little more exposure to everyone and this is what we CAN do….(and there was really a LOT of exposure to some areas of North America.)
Thank you for writing this Eric. Thank you for posting her email address. I wrote to her expressing my concerns. Please folks, take a minute and voice an opinion, this is important. This may not be going on in your backyard, but it is. We are one and that includes the planet’s water.