To start the day …. “Climate Change: Open Letter to World Leaders”!!

~~December 7, 2015~~ 

OPEN LETTER TO WORLD LEADERS

2015 United Nations Climate Change Conference

The 2015 United Nations Climate Change Conference, COP 21 or CMP 11 is being held in Le Bourget, Paris, from November 30 to December 11.

It is the 21st yearly session of the Conference of the Parties to the 1992 United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) and the 11th session of the Meeting of the Parties to the 1997 Kyoto Protocol. The conference objective is to achieve a legally binding and universal agreement on climate, from all the nations of the world.

“As it appears in … full read/full credit”

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2015_United_Nations_Climate_Change_Conference

2498 academics from 75 countries signed this Open Letter calling for world leaders meeting in Paris to do what is necessary to prevent catastrophic climate change.

Prominent signatories include Noam Chomsky, Naomi Oreskes, Kwame Anthony Appiah, Michael E. Mann, Ursula Oswald Spring, Bill McKibben, David Suzuki, and Peter Singer.

Open Letter from Academics to World Leaders ahead of the Paris Climate Conference 2015

Some issues are of such ethical magnitude that being on the correct side of history becomes a signifier of moral character for generations to come. Global warming is such an issue.

Indigenous peoples and the developing world are least responsible for climate change, least able to adapt to it, and most vulnerable to its impacts. As the United Nations Climate Conference in Paris approaches, the leaders of the industrialized world shoulder a grave responsibility for the consequences of our current and past carbon emissions.

Yet it looks unlikely that the international community will mandate even the greenhouse gas reductions necessary to give us a two thirds chance of limiting global warming to 2 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels. At the moment, even if countries meet their current non-binding pledges to reduce carbon emissions, we will still be on course to reach 3 degrees Celsius by the end of this century.

This is profoundly shocking, given that any sacrifice involved in making those reductions is far overshadowed by the catastrophes we are likely to face if we do not: more extinctions of species and loss of ecosystems; increasing vulnerability to storm surges; more heatwaves; more intense precipitation; more climate related deaths and disease; more climate refugees; slower poverty reduction; less food security; and more conflicts worsened by these factors.

Given such high stakes, our leaders ought to be mustering planet-wide mobilization, at all societal levels, to limit global warming to no more than 1.5 degrees Celsius.

~~GRAPHICS SOURCE~~ 

Google Images

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We undersigned concerned academics, researchers and scientists from around the world recognize the seriousness of our environmental situation and the special responsibility we owe our communities, future generations, and our fellow species.

We will strive to meet that responsibility in our educational and communicative endeavors.

We call upon our leaders to do what is necessary to prevent catastrophic climate change. With just as much urgency, we call upon our fellow citizens to hold their leaders responsible for vigorously addressing global warming.

For the full list of signatories please see below.

“As it appears in …. full read/full credit”

http://globalclimatechangeweek.com/open-letter/

~~SOURCES~~ 

https://www.climaterealityproject.org/

https://twitter.com/ClimateReality

https://www.facebook.com/ClimateReality?_rdr=p

https://www.instagram.com/ClimateReality/

#ToStartTheDay #ClimateChange #OpenLetter #WorldLeaders #UnitedNationsClimateChangeConference #COP21 #CMP11 #UnitedNationsFrameworkConvention #EthicalMagnitude #CorrectSideHistory #MoralCharacter #GenerationsToCome #GlobalWarming #PlanetWideMobilization

#WeAllAreOne #ItIsWhatItIs #DrRex #hrexachwordpress

~Open Letter to World Leaders~

~Published on Sep 24, 2015~

Around the world, people from all walks of life are standing together to demand a strong climate agreement in Paris and a healthy future for the planet. When the world speaks with one voice, our leaders have to listen.

So we’ve put together this Open Letter with one very clear message: DEAR WORLD LEADERS: TAKE CLIMATE ACTION NOW.

People from around the world are affected by climate change today – right now. And they’re calling out to world leaders to demand real action this year at the UN climate talks in Paris.

We ALL are ONE!! 

 

Thoughts for today, #296 .… “We ARE one”!!

~~December 3, 2015~~ 

WE ARE ONE

“later that night
i held an atlas in my lap
ran my fingers across the whole world
and whispered
where does it hurt?

it answered
everywhere
everywhere
everywhere.”

~Warsan Shire~

Warsan Shire (born 1988) is a Somali–British writer, poet, editor and teacher. Shire was born in 1988 in Kenya to Somali parents. She immigrated to the United Kingdom aged 1. Shire has a . As of 2015, she primarily resides in London.

“As it appears in … full read/full credit”

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Warsan_Shire

~~GRAPHIC SOURCE~~ 

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Lightworker’s Academy

Kate Spencer

https://www.facebook.com/thelightworkersacademy/

#ThoughtsForToday #296 # #WhereDoesItHurt #Everywhere #Atlas #World #Quote #WarsanShire #SomaliBritishWriter #Poet #Editor #Teacher #Kenya #SomaliParents #Immigrated #UnitedKingdom #London #YoungPoetLaureate #PowerWrittenWord #LoveLightHealing #ShineLight #LightworkersAcademy #MariaJordan #Coach #KateSpencer

#WeAllAreOne #ItIsWhatItIs #DrRex #hrexachwordpress

We ALL are ONE!! 

LAB ProLib: Crisis in Puerto Rico …. here are some facts!!

~~June 23, 2015~~ 

13 THINGS YOU NEED TO KNOW ABOUT THE CRISIS IN PUERTO RICO

Any Latino on social media knows one thing:

There’s a crisis in Puerto Rico.

Headlines about the island’s almost decade-long recession, credit rating cuts and its residents’ mass migration into the U.S. mainland, fill Facebook newsfeeds, Tumblr dashboards and Twitter timelines alike.

It can be difficult to keep up, especially when this news involves complicated issues like taxes and investments. To help keep you in the loop, here’s 13 things on the critical matters happening right now on that tropical island just 1,150 miles from Florida’s waters.

FACTS

1. Puerto Rico is struggling to emerge from its recession. While the rest of the U.S. is experiencing economic growth, La Isla del Encanto has not been able to draw itself out of a 9-year recession. The U.S. territory has a 15.4 percent unemployment rate, with per capita income around $15,200 (that’s half of Mississippi’s, the poorest state in the U.S.).

2. This harsh economy is pushing thousands off of the island every year. Puerto Rico is experiencing the largest migration wave since the 1950’s. Rampant crime and a dwindling economy have pushed so many people out of the island that, for the first time in history, there are more Puerto Ricans living in the U.S. mainland than there are on the island.

3. Economists fear that this mass migration leaves little hope for the island’s economic recovery. Orlando Sotomayor, an economist at the University of Puerto Rico, told the New York Times that “the phenomenon is highly uncommon and underscores the lack of hope that the ship can or will be righted.”

4. The Caribbean island is more than $72 billion in debt. To put that in perspective, this is the U.S.’ third-largest municipal debtor, behind California’s and New York’s, though the island is both significantly smaller and poorer than both states.

5. Another major difference: Puerto Rico, unlike U.S. cities, cannot file for bankruptcy. To restructure debts, Puerto Rico must negotiate with investors.

6. Standard & Poor’s, a U.S. financial services company, slashed Puerto Rico’s rating to B, a non-investment grade. This has essentially frozen Puerto Rico out of the bond market. Over the last few years, investment companies like AllianceBernstein have sold their Puerto Rico holdings, with others hesitant to invest without a signpost of increased revenue.

7. The recent passing of a sales-tax bill can be that sign. Unfortunately, while the 4.5 percent hike in sales tax is expected to bring in $1.2 billion in new revenue, and generate more investments for the island, it’s bad news for the people of Puerto Rico, especially the poor, who will now have to pay a whopping 11.5 percent sales tax.

8. In an effort to pay the island’s utility investors, Puerto Rico is negotiating a restructuring of its public power company. The plan, which is likely to be approved by the end of the month, would definitely increase the electric rate for the island’s residents. Critics of the overhaul, like Puerto Rico’s delegate to Congress, Pedro Pierluisi, believe the increase “will not benefit anyone.”

9. Puerto Rico’s Gov. Alejandro Garcia Padilla also planned to implement a $166 million cut to public university budgets, but the decision was later reversed after thousands of Puerto Rican students protested the proposal. Go, millennials!

10. However, there still remains a healthcare crisis on the island. The Center for Medicaid and Medicare services will soon execute an 11 percent cut in Medicare Advantage reimbursements, which will cost Puerto Rico’s health-care system nearly $500 million. About 60 percent of the island’s population relies on Medicare, Medicare Advantage or Medicaid to pay for their health care. Last month, the Washington Post reported that doctors practicing in Puerto Rico are forced to get by with much smaller Medicare and Medicaid reimbursement rates than those received by others on the continental U.S.

11. Puerto Rico’s recession has also injured the island’s housing market. According to Fox News Latino, call for sales are expected to be just 15 percent of what they were a decade ago. President of the Puerto Rico Home Builders Association (ACH), Roberto Trapaga, said “when the time comes to buy a house, people don’t have the money,” adding that banks, which have also been hit by the crisis, have tightened the requirement to obtain a mortgage loan.

12. Whether Puerto Ricans own a home or not, water-rationing measures in San Juan have left thousands of islanders without water. The measures, imposed because of an ongoing drought that has lowered Puerto Rico’s main reservoirs, have limited access to water to just every other day for more than 160,000 people living in and near the capital.

13. Good news (kinda): Puerto Rico’s tax hikes and budget cuts are expected to assuage the island’s economic woes. Writing for NPR, economic reporter Greg Allen reminds us that both New York City and Washington, D.C. saw similar fiscal problems and eventually found stability. Unfortunately, fiscal recovery for both cities also brought along with it the process of gentrification, which has displaced much of the areas’ impoverished communities of color, a fate we are already seeing in Puerto Rican barrios like Santurce.

“As it appears in …. full and total credit of information and main graphic”

https://www.facebook.com/LABPROLIB/

~~GALLERY~~

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#LAB ProLib #CrisisInPuertoRico  #SomeFacts #DecadeLongRecession #LaIslaDelEncanto #HarshEconomy #LargestMigrationWave #RampantCrime #DwindlingEconomy #MassMigration #CaribbeanIsland #CannotFileBankruptcy #Puerto RicosDelegateCongress #PedroPierluisi #GovAlejandroGarciaPadilla #HealthcareCrisis #HousingMarket #WaterRationingMeasures #Gentrification

#WeAllAreOne #ItIsWhatItIs #DrRex #HortyRex #hrexachwordpress 

~Puerto Rico’s Financial Crisis: Is The Island The New Greece?~

~Published on Mar 12, 2014~

The island is in dire financial conditions and it is thousands of U.S. mom-and-pop investors that might lose a big part of their savings if the small territory goes bankrupt.

We ALL are ONE!!