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File:  ltr to Congress, 76 scientists 2012.pdfResource Type: Letters

File:  ltr to Congress, 76 scientists 2012.pdfResource Type: Letters

America’s broken approaches to roadway safety and criminal justice are profoundly intertwined, a provocative new report argues — and until reformers in both fields reckon with how deeply their battles are connected, neither will notch any real progress.

Researchers at the American Civil Liberties Union and the Policing Project at the New York University School of Law closely examined how mass car dependency amplifies harm in the criminal legal system, like rampant traffic stops that disproportionately turn deadly for people of color or traffic fines that trap low-income earners in “inescapable, inequitable cycles of indebtedness, as ticketing practices stress profits over safety.”

The report encourages Vision Zero advocates to consider how an over-emphasis on enforcement-based safety strategies is hobbling the cause, by creating incentives for ineffective policing that distract and siphon resources from proven solutions, like increasing mobility alternatives, that are often forgotten or ignored.

“Police reform advocates and road safety advocates should be working together, just as departments of transportation and police departments should be working together,” said Scarlett Neath, senior adviser at the Policing Project and an author of the report. “Those two agencies and those two groups of advocates need to be swimming in the same direction.”

Recommended How Some Traffic Fines and Fees Can Make Our Roads More Dangerous Kea Wilson July 31, 2023

The report authors say that, in many ways, America’s car-dependent transportation system and police-focused approach to safety evolved in tandem. They argue that “corporate interests, public investment decisions, and racial discrimination” collectively eroded public transit networks in favor of installing officers on roadsides across the nation.

Neath doesn’t deny that there should be consequences for deadly driving, but says the particulars of how our communities impose those punishments has devastated many communities — without significantly reducing the likelihood of future crashes fast enough. Indeed, the United States has twice the rate of fatal car crash deaths of other high-income countries, and more than triple the rate of police killings.

“We’re not saying there’s no deterrence effect [from policing],” she added. “But the deterrence it might cause often also comes with significant costs — and there other solutions that may have bigger deterrent effects without those costs.”

Recommended Study: Police Killings of Civilians Undercounted By More Than Half Kea Wilson October 7, 2021

One of the steepest costs of over-emphasizing policing in traffic safety, Neath says, is simply diverting attention and resources away from infrastructure and vehicle technology that make it difficult or impossible for motorists to drive in deadly ways— rather than reacting to bad behavior after the fact.

The design-focused solutions we do have, meanwhile, are inequitably distributed. A 2023 study found that roughly “60 percent of Black children live in neighborhoods that lack amenities associated with healthy development, including sidewalks or walking paths.” Black communities remain significantly more policed than white neighborhoods with similar homicide rates and income levels.

“If a lot of enforcement is happening at the same intersection that should be a sign that there are things we should do to stop enforcement from happening through structural, preventative measures,” she added. “If a ton of folks are blazing through a road and police aren’t able to control that behavior, the stop lights have to be retimed, the speed limit has to be lowered, and maybe, the road needs to be redesigned.” 

Recommended A Plan to Eliminate Pretextual Police Stops, While Still Increasing Traffic Safety Cameron Bolton November 21, 2023

Worse, Neath says many roadside stops aren’t motivated by traffic safety at all.

The report’s authors note that “pretextual” stops exploded in the 1970s, when War on Drugs-era politicians encouraged police departments to profile suspects based on their race and gender, and use broken tail lights, expired tags, and any other available pretext to stop and search their cars.

Today, explicit and implicit “stop quotas” still provide perverse incentives for cops to accelerate their rate of pretextual stops to write lots of tickets, rather than wait around to catch the most flagrantly dangerous drivers — especially as many municipalities have come to rely on fines and fees to pay for basic services.

“When people hear about traffic stops, there’s an assumption that they’re made for safety-related reasons,” Neath added. “But we know from data in jurisdictions across the country that it’s really a mixed bag. … Police resources are finite, and we’ve seen that when departments prioritize safety stops, they have better crash prevention outcomes — without negative outcomes for the kind of crime-fighting [efforts] that pretext stops are theoretically are used for, because [pretextual stops] are so infrequently discovering evidence of crimes.” 

Recommended Survey: Americans Still Want Police To Cut Traffic Stops That Don’t Make Anyone Safer Kea Wilson March 26, 2025

To truly make American streets safe, Neath says it won’t be enough just to end policies that incentivize or require ineffective policing in the transportation realm or to redesign streets to put safety first. It will require thinking about how those two goals interact — and looking to new models to enhance them both.

Across the report and a companion study written in partnership with the Vision Zero Network, the Policing Project outlined dozens of strategies that communities can consider, including under-discussed ones, like piloting civilian enforcement and equipment repair vouchers to remove a common pretext for police and motorist interaction.

Most of all, though, Neath says it’s time for advocates to think more holistically about what safety is — and how deeply intertwined the Vision Zero and police reform movements have always been.

“Preventable deaths and injuries in car crashes, unacceptable violent outcomes from the most common form of police community member contact — these are both public health crises,” she added. “It’s an opportune time to learn from the progress we’ve made on both fronts, and to double down on that progress.”

• Are conservatives coming around to walkability? The American Enterprise Institute thinks they should. And the Reason Foundation is in favor of transit-oriented development.
• Much of AEI’s argument has to do with how being able to roam around the neighborhood improves their mental health and takes pressure off parents to drive their kids everywhere. But not everyone on the right accepts Tim Carney’s thesis (Longer Forms). Carney’s critics on the right should talk to school crossing guards before claiming that car-centric streets don’t influence where kids can walk (The Guardian).
• In related news, Brandon Donnelly wrote about how more young families that can afford to do so are staying in cities rather than moving to the suburbs. And Angie Schmitt interviewed Lenore Skenazy, the author of “Free Range Kids.” (Love of Place)
• Uber is offering transit agencies $50,000 grants to test on-demand transit service. (Cities Today)
• CalTrans is looking into “bullet buses” that would travel 140 miles per hour on dedicated freeway lanes between Los Angeles and San Francisco. (Hoodline)
• L.A. Times columnist Steve Lopez returned to one of his favorite topics: how screwed up the city’s sidewalk repair program is.
• Debris from one of Amtrak’s new Acela cars is the likely cause of a recent fire at Penn Station. (New York Daily News)
• Albuquerque Mayor Tim Keller criticized the city council for cutting $5 million from pedestrian safety. (KOB 4)
• Nashville Mayor Freddie O’Connell defended himself against protesters who say the city is diverting funds for Vision Zero to road repaving. (News Channel 5)
• Kansas City will add east-west bus routes and step up frequency during the World Cup. (Star)
• Bike buses are catching on in Baltimore. (The Banner)
• Amtrak’s sleeper cars are getting upgraded (Business Insider).

DISCLAIMER: The following is an entirely fictitious, satirical response imagined on behalf of ReputationDefender.com. ReputationDefender has not made any such statement, has no known connection to Shell plc, and is an innocent and entirely respectable party in this affair. Any resemblance to actual ReputationDefender communications is coincidental. This is satire. ReputationDefender’s real services are available at reputationdefender.com. We rather hope they see the funny side.

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In an imaginary but entirely plausible response, the world’s leading online reputation management firm ReputationDefender confronts the challenge of a lifetime: can professional reputation repair — however skilled, however well-resourced — actually defend Shell plc? The fictitious ReputationDefender statement above works through the brief scandal by scandal: the Nazi-era history of founder Sir Henri Deterding; the alleged Neptune Strategy of busting oil sanctions for apartheid South Africa and Rhodesia; the Hakluyt spy firm allegedly deployed against Greenpeace and Ogoni activists in Nigeria; the catastrophic 2004 reserves scandal in which Shell admitted overstating its proved reserves by 3.9 billion barrels — triggering a $150 million SEC fine, the forced departure of chairman Sir Philip Watts, and the collapse of the century-old Royal Dutch Petroleum and Shell Transport and Trading partnership; and the ongoing Niger Delta pollution claims, climate litigation, and greenwashing controversies that constitute Shell’s thoroughly modern reputation problem. The imaginary conclusion: the brief is professionally stimulating, the inbox is open, and those fictional barrels were only the beginning.

WE CAN DEFEND ANYONE. THEN WE READ THE FILE. was first posted on May 17, 2026 at 10:55 pm.
©2018 "Royal Dutch Shell Plc .com". Use of this feed is for personal non-commercial use only. If you are not reading this article in your feed reader, then the site is guilty of copyright infringement. Please contact me at john@shellnews.net

 

Can the world’s most comprehensive corporate crime scene be polished back to respectability? Our outspoken correspondent investigates. Spoiler: No.

The audacity. The sheer, brass-necked, gas-flaring, dividend-pumping audacity of it.

John Donovan — Shell shareholder, Shell nemesis, and the man Shell would most like to fall down a very deep offshore well — has lobbed the ultimate grenade into the reputation management industry. He has challenged ReputationDefender to defend Shell plc: a company whose historical file is so thick, so heavy, and so radioactive that it requires its own safety rating before being approached by researchers.

And quite right too. Because the article makes the delicious observation that Shell’s reputation problem is not “one bad headline” but rather bad headlines that have “formed geological strata.” One does not simply SEO one’s way out of geological strata. One would need a drill, and Shell has plenty of those — and look how that tends to end up. royaldutchshellplc

BUT WAIT — DID THE ARTICLE GO FAR ENOUGH?

Your correspondent notes, with respectful outrage, that the piece largely focuses on the modern scandal ecosystem — Nigeria, climate litigation, greenwashing theatre, shareholder revolts, and the increasingly comedy-rich gap between “net zero ambition” and “let’s build more LNG terminals.” All perfectly damning. All thoroughly deserved.

But there is more in the cupboard, darlings. Much, much more.

SHELL AND THE APARTHEID REGIMES: THE CHAPTER THEY’D RATHER FORGET

Let us speak plainly about something rather important. While the world was campaigning to isolate apartheid South Africa and Ian Smith’s Rhodesia — illegally sanctioned regimes propped up by racial oppression — Shell was rather busy keeping the petrol flowing. The so-called “Neptune Strategy” saw Shell help circumvent oil sanctions against South Africa’s apartheid government, a programme documented in sufficient detail to make even a corporate communications director wince into their expense-account claret.

Rhodesia, similarly, was not supposed to receive oil. Sanctions existed. International consensus was clear. Shell, apparently, found sanctions somewhat inconvenient for business planning purposes and made alternative arrangements. The kind of arrangements that, had they been carried out by a human being rather than a corporation with a logo and a PR department, would have attracted rather more personal consequences.

To be fair, the article does contain an “Apartheid” category in its site archive, suggesting this is well-trodden ground for Mr Donovan’s operation. But in the “Ultimate Challenge” article itself, it goes largely unmentioned. A miss, we think. Because helping prop up apartheid regimes is not the sort of thing that fits neatly into ReputationDefender’s Phase Three: Historical Controversy Containment protocol under the charming heading of “legacy reputational complexity.” It is, to be blunt, considerably worse than that.

HAKLUYT: THE SPY FIRM IN THE SHELL CLOSET

And then there is Hakluyt & Company — the intelligence firm staffed by former MI6 officers, deeply associated with Shell, whose activities included alleged undercover operations targeting Greenpeace activists and Ogoni community campaigners in Nigeria.

Think about that for a moment. Shell, already mired in the fallout from Ken Saro-Wiwa’s execution — the Ogoni activist and writer hanged by Nigeria’s military government in 1995 amid enormous international outcry — was reportedly using the services of a sophisticated private intelligence outfit to monitor those who dared to object. Greenpeace. Environmental campaigners. People holding placards and writing letters.

One imagines the internal memo: “The activists are being rather noisy about the oil pollution and the judicial killings. Shall we hire some former spooks to keep an eye on them?”

That is not reputation management. That is surveillance of your critics dressed up in an old Etonian accent and filed under “stakeholder intelligence.”

For ReputationDefender’s proposed invoice, we suggest Hakluyt warrants its own line item: “Covert activist monitoring legacy — premium heritage sensitivity package — price upon application, cash preferred.”

THE FULL CHARGE SHEET THAT ReputationDefender WOULD FACE

Let us summarise what any brave reputation management firm would actually be taking on, should they accept the Donovan Challenge:

• A founding leader, Sir Henri Deterding, who expressed open admiration for Hitler and whose Nazi-era associations remain a matter of documented historical record and considerable embarrassment.
• A German subsidiary that operated under the Third Reich.
• Alleged support for oil sanctions-busting on behalf of the apartheid regime in South Africa.
• Alleged involvement in circumventing sanctions against Rhodesia.
• Documented operations in the Niger Delta resulting in catastrophic environmental damage and decades of community suffering.
• The execution of Ken Saro-Wiwa and the Ogoni Nine in 1995, carried out by the Nigerian military government, with Shell’s alleged failure to use its influence to prevent it subsequently becoming the subject of legal action and lasting moral outrage.
• Alleged use of Hakluyt, the MI6-adjacent intelligence firm, to conduct undercover monitoring of environmental activists and community campaigners.
• The OPL 245 Nigerian corruption scandal, involving an alleged $1.3 billion payment routing through a convicted money launderer.
• Decades of climate science knowledge, reportedly held internally, while publicly sowing doubt.
• A climate court judgment requiring Shell to cut emissions — subsequently appealed.
• Brent Spar. Groningen earthquakes. Arctic drilling misadventures. Shareholder rebellions. Greenwashing complaints upheld by advertising authorities.
• And, as a bonus, broadband service apparently so catastrophically poor that customers describe it on Trustpilot in terms usually reserved for war crimes.

THE VERDICT

The article asks whether “some reputations cannot be managed” and whether “the only real reputation strategy left is accountability.” Quite so. And accountability, it turns out, is the one product that no reputation management firm actually sells — because it would put them out of business. royaldutchshellplc

Shell’s PR machine has spent decades proving that you can reframe almost anything with the right vocabulary. “Legacy hydrocarbon complexity.” “Multi-decade stakeholder perception opportunity.” “Pre-modern governance context.” (That last one, we suggest, covers both the Nazi-era history AND the apartheid-sanctions-busting in one elegantly vague swoop.)

But the critics — Donovan chief among them — have the receipts. The courts have the filings. The communities have the contaminated land. The historians have the archives. And the Ogoni people have the graves.

No amount of search-result softening repairs that.

ReputationDefender, if you’re reading this: the quote you’re looking for is “not for any fee currently expressible in human mathematics.”

And to Mr Donovan: yes, you absolutely should have included the apartheid regimes and the Hakluyt spy operation in the original article. Consider this a helpful addendum, filed under “the cupboard goes deeper than you showed.”

— Your Outspoken Correspondent, still counting the charge sheet

THE IMAGE

There you have it — The Daily Slick, Britain’s least-sponsored oil scandal daily. The front page includes:

• The Deterding/Nazi-era splash with the parody Shell badge
• The Neptune Strategy and apartheid sanctions-busting in column three
• The Hakluyt spy operation tucked neatly alongside it
• The imaginary ReputationDefender invoice (with “Do Not Call” pricing for the Hakluyt line, naturally)
• The OPL 245 wiretap, Brent Spar, and Groningen teaser strips along the bottom

To your question — yes, the original article would have been considerably strengthened by including the apartheid and Hakluyt material. Both are extremely well-documented, both involve active choices rather than passive corporate drift, and both go well beyond the kind of “reputational complexity” that any PR firm can euphemise away. The Hakluyt angle in particular is striking: using former intelligence operatives to monitor environmental activists is not a footnote — it is a chapter heading.

 

Satirical commentary. All references to specific allegations are based on publicly documented reporting, legal proceedings, and published historical record. Shell, as ever, is invited to respond.

 

EXCLUSIVE: SHELL SHOCK! THE BRAND SO TOXIC EVEN THE SPIN DOCTORS NEED HAZMAT SUITS was first posted on May 17, 2026 at 10:10 pm.
©2018 "Royal Dutch Shell Plc .com". Use of this feed is for personal non-commercial use only. If you are not reading this article in your feed reader, then the site is guilty of copyright infringement. Please contact me at john@shellnews.net

Remindeer:

I’ll be reading from my book Antonio “Ike” DeVargas—Norteño Warrior: The Politics of Land, Power, and Justice in Northern New Mexico on Wednesday, May 20, 6 pm, at Collected Works Bookstore in Santa Fe. Ty Bannerman will also be reading from his book Nuclear Family: a memoir of the atomic west.

A blurb from Lucy Lippard, author of  Undermining: A Wild Ride Through Land Use, Politics, and Art in the Changing West.

Unlike journalists from elsewhere “covering” the chaotic politics of northern New Mexico, the writer Kay Matthews has lived it. This book on her friend and fellow warrior, the grassroots leader Ike DeVargas, is a lively and detailed account of decades of struggle. The varied participants include several tiny rural communities, the US Forest Service, the Spotted Owl, State and County local officials, La Raza, environmentalists, and local Chicano land grant activists. The subtitle says it all: “The Politics of Land, Power, and Justice in Northern New Mexico.”

New Mexico has a notoriously complex history, often playing out invisibly in its many poor rural communities still dealing with the traumas of colonialism, land grants, and corrupt officials. Those of us from away, no matter how long we have lived here, cannot fully understand the issues in Rio Arriba County, the devotion to homeplace, longtime dominance of Emilio Naranjo, and the economic importance of grazing, firewood, and logging permits to the surrounding communities. The battles that began in the 1960s are ongoing. Though DeVargas and his cohort often lost, they are famously resilient and their occasional hard-won victories have changed the political landusescape. Matthews and her family have long been active and trusted allies in these struggles, and her paper, La Jicarita, is a vital information source for those still fighting the good fights and for those of us who are supportive but not in the thick of it.

Few of these stories are known to a broader audience and hopefully Matthews’s book will not only keep the memory of Ike DeVargas alive but inspire other contributions from the inside of those adobe houses with no running water, no electricity, like the one Ike lived in. So if you’re a lefty and ready to participate, but not quite sure what that means in northern New Mexico, read about the Ike DeVargas model… and step up.
—

 

Each week, Food Tank is rounding up a few news stories that inspire excitement, infuriation, or curiosity.

Stronger Local Food and Farming Systems Needed to Stabilize Food Prices

A new report from the International Panel of Experts on Sustainable Food Systems (IPES-Food) warns that shifting global politics are reshaping food security, and unless we change course, food prices, hunger, and corporate concentration are set to worsen. 

Global food prices remain more than 35 percent above pre-pandemic levels, with conflict, trade tensions, aid cuts, and energy shocks disrupting supply chains and making food more expensive. 

The authors argue that a heavy dependence on volatile global markets, high food imports, and long supply chains that are controlled by just a few countries and companies have made our food and agriculture systems dangerously vulnerable. And they’re not only fragile — they’re unjust, says Shalmali Guttal, an IPES-Food Expert. 

But governments can chart a different path forward. The report argues for “resilient self-reliance” that is grounded in local supply chains and markets, support systems for farmers, and by reducing their dependence on these global markets. 

Mamadou Goita, another IPES-Food Expert says we already have solutions building this resilience. He points to the West African regional food security reserve, which shows that “cooperation and public tools can stabilize markets.” Other success stories can be found in India, Canada, and Norway. What we need to scale these solutions, Goita says, is the political will.

Fiji Advances Organic Ag Policy

Fiji’s government is pushing a new national organic farming policy forward as part of a larger effort to improve food security and domestic food production.

According to Tomasi Tunabuna, the country’s Minister for Agriculture, Waterways and Sugar Industry, the National Organic Policy 2026-2030 isn’t just an agricultural framework. “It’s an economic resilience strategy, an environmental safeguard, and a public health investment.”

The government says the Plan is a direct response to increasing fuel and fertilizer prices as well the rising cost of living. They hope that, in the long term, it will help farmers save money, improve soil health, and boost climate resilience.The Ministry also sees this as an opportunity to strengthen their export markets, particularly for crops including turmeric, ginger, and coconut oil. 

“In a time of global uncertainty, Fiji is choosing resilience over dependency and local solutions over imported vulnerability,” Tunabuna says.

India Released Nearly 3,000 Climate-Resilient Crop Varieties

In the last decade, India has released close to 3,000 climate resilience crop varieties, according to a recent update from the Indian Council of Agricultural Research (ICAR).

The Council launched the National Innovations on Climate Resilient Agriculture program in 2011 to develop and disseminate climate-resilience agricultural technologies.

To complement the new varieties, the program also includes training and field demonstrations to help farmers transition to stress-tolerant crops and adopt practices that build capacity and strengthen the sustainability of their farm. To amplify their work in these vulnerable areas, researchers have also set up climate-resilient villages in more than 440 villages across 150 districts. In these areas, the government says they are demonstrating effective technologies for wider implementation and replication.

This work is urgently needed: Of the 650 agricultural districts assessed through this research, around half are highly or very highly vulnerable to climate shocks including droughts, floods, and heatwaves.

Three-Quarters of USDA Researchers Won’t Relocate to Kansas City

Around three-quarters of researchers at the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) say they will not move from Washington D.C. as part of the agency’s relocation plans.

For the second time in seven years, USDA is pushing to move D.C.-based employees at the Economic Research Service (ERS) and National Institute of Food and Agriculture (NIFA) to Kansas City. The transition is expected to go into effect this summer.

An internal survey conducted by the union reveals that we will likely see a repeat of 2019, when hundreds of ERS and NIFA employees were asked to make the same move. Around 85 percent either quit or retired in response to the request.

USDA claims that no programs will be affected by the changes, but Dr. Kathleen Merrigan, Executive Director of the Swette Center for Sustainable Food Systems at ASU, is one of many critics worried about the resulting “brain drain.”

The American Federation of Government Employees (AFGE) Local 3403 says, “By forcing this move on an accelerated timeline, with no promise of financial help or job security, the USDA is effectively dismantling decades of institutional knowledge, jeopardizing the very data and funding that farmers, policymakers and land-grant universities rely on.”

A Record High Investment to Transform School Meals

Last week, the World Food Programme (WFP) announced plans to strengthen home-grown school meals programs that reach hundreds of thousands of children in East Africa.

The support from Danish foundations Novo Nordisk Foundation (NNF) and Grundfos Foundation makes this the largest private sector commitment to school feeding in WFP’s history. The U.N. agency and the Foundations are entering into the third phase of a partnership, which will focus on models in Uganda, Kenya, and Ethiopia. The work will connect schools with local farmers and clean energy solutions while helping to build climate resilience.

Cindy McCain, WFP’s Executive Director calls school meals “one of the best investments a government can make in a nation’s future.”

WFP estimates that it will provide 366,000 children with nutritious, locally sourced meals while creating stable markets for more than 57,500 smallholder farmers over the next five years. The investment will also support the School Meals Accelerator, a global initiative from the School Meals Coalition, which helps governments with catalytic technical assistance scale national school feeding programs and improve meals for an additional 100 million children by 2030.

Articles like the one you just read are made possible through the generosity of Food Tank members. Can we please count on you to be part of our growing movement? Become a member today by clicking here.

Photo courtesy of Chrysanthi Ha, Unsplash

The post Food Tank’s Weekly News Roundup: Global Politics Reshape Food Security, Fiji Pushes Organic Ag, WFP Scales School Meals appeared first on Food Tank.

A satirical challenge from a long-term Shell shareholder and critic

Disclaimer: This is a satirical opinion article based on publicly available information, shareholder commentary, historical controversy, and documented public criticism. It asks questions, makes fair comment, and invites response. Site wide disclaimer also applies.

ReputationDefender says it helps companies protect and repair their online reputation. On its own website it quotes Weber Shandwick’s 2020 line:

“A company’s reputation is responsible for nearly two-thirds of its market value.”

Nearly two-thirds.

That is not reputation as window dressing. That is reputation as market-value dynamite. That is reputation as the hidden engine room of corporate valuation.

So here is the Ultimate Challenge:

ReputationDefender, are you brave enough to defend Shell?

Not a dentist with one furious Google review.

Not a hotel accused of serving grey scrambled eggs.

Not a crypto influencer trying to bury a podcast clip.

Shell.

The fossil-fuel giant with a century of controversy dragging behind it like an oil slick through a courtroom corridor. The company whose logo has been polished, repainted, rebranded, sustainability-washed, transition-wrapped, legally reviewed and shareholder-presented — and still somehow smells faintly of crude, contradiction and executive bonus varnish.

This is not ordinary reputation management.

This is brand exorcism.

Shell is not a “difficult client.” Shell is the final boss of corporate reputation defence. A company with enough reputational baggage to require its own conveyor belt at the airport.

Where would ReputationDefender even begin?

Page one of Google?

Page one of history?

The Niger Delta?

Climate litigation?

Investor rebellion?

Advertising complaints?

AGM protests?

Greenwashing accusations?

The awkward gap between “net zero ambition” and fossil-fuel expansion?

Or the deeper archive drawer marked: Nazi-era history — handle with gloves?

Because Shell’s reputation problem is not one bad headline. Shell’s problem is that the bad headlines have formed geological strata.

The Shell Problem: Not One Scandal, But an Ecosystem

Shell has spent decades proving the tragicomic limits of corporate messaging.

There are the environmental controversies.

There are the community claims.

There are the climate accusations.

There are the courtroom battles.

There are the shareholder revolts.

There is the endless PR fog machine pumping out phrases such as “energy transition,” “resilience,” “value discipline,” “balanced portfolio,” and “lower-carbon solutions,” while critics ask the rather inconvenient question:

If this is a transition, why does it still look so much like the thing we are supposed to be transitioning away from?

Shell’s brand has become a case study in the difference between reputation management and reputation reality.

A normal corporate reputation repair job might involve suppressing a few adverse search results, improving executive profiles, promoting thought leadership, amplifying ESG content and nudging the internet toward something less radioactive.

Shell would require something closer to a digital witness protection programme.

You would need climate messaging that does not combust on contact with the words “LNG growth.”

You would need Nigeria pages that do not immediately summon oil pollution claims, legal filings and community anger.

You would need investor relations material that can survive shareholders asking whether “net zero” now means “net maybe.”

You would need to reposition a fossil-fuel supermajor as a misunderstood wellness brand with offshore platforms.

Good luck.

And Then There Is Shell’s Nazi-Era History

As if the modern reputation file were not already thick enough, Shell’s historical archive has its own horror cupboard.

The central figure is Sir Henri Deterding, the long-serving boss of Royal Dutch/Shell, who became deeply controversial because of his admiration for Hitler and support for Nazi Germany. His later-life politics and associations remain a toxic part of the company’s historical shadow.

Shell’s German subsidiary also operated in Nazi Germany, and Shell’s historic relationship with the regime has been the subject of reporting, criticism and debate for decades.

This is where the ReputationDefender challenge becomes almost operatic.

Because Shell does not merely have today’s problems. It has yesterday’s ghosts.

Modern Shell may wish to say: “That was then. This is now.”

Critics may reply: “Fine. But the brand did not arrive yesterday. The history came with the logo.”

And for a company whose reputation allegedly represents nearly two-thirds of market value, history is not a footnote. It is a liability with a memory.

So the question sharpens:

Can ReputationDefender defend a company whose reputation problem runs from Nazi-era controversy to Niger Delta pollution claims, from climate lawsuits to AGM rebellions, from fossil-fuel expansion to green transition theatre?

That is not a client brief.

That is a reputation-management Everest expedition through fog, fire and legal review.

A Shareholder Inside the Tent, Rattling the Cutlery

And then there is me.

I am not writing this as a passing activist who discovered Shell last Tuesday.

I am a long-term Shell shareholder.

I am also a long-term Shell critic.

That combination makes the situation especially awkward for Shell’s reputation machine. I am not outside the tent throwing stones. I am inside the shareholder register, asking questions, writing articles, documenting contradictions, challenging the narrative and refusing to clap politely while the company polishes the logo and calls the fumes “strategy.”

I attend to the detail.

I follow the controversies.

I keep the receipts.

I challenge the corporate spin.

I write satirical articles.

I ask the questions Shell would rather bury under a mountain of investor-relations vocabulary.

That is why this proposed grudge match is so irresistible.

ReputationDefender vs Shell: The Grudge Match Made in Media Heaven

In the blue corner:

ReputationDefender — armed with search strategy, online reputation management, executive profile polishing, brand rehabilitation language and the soothing promise that the internet can be made to look less hostile.

In the black-and-yellow corner:

Shell — wearing a hard hat, carrying a sustainability brochure, standing ankle-deep in historic controversy, and insisting everything is under control.

At ringside:

Shareholders.

Activists.

Lawyers.

Journalists.

Communities.

Pension funds.

Climate campaigners.

Historians.

And one long-term shareholder critic asking the obvious question:

Can the most toxic brand in history actually be defended?

And if so, at what price?

Would ReputationDefender quote by the hour?

By the scandal?

By the spill?

By the lawsuit?

By the shareholder revolt?

By the climate target downgrade?

By the awkward Nazi-era archive reference?

Or by the metric tonne of reputational sludge?

The Questions for ReputationDefender

So, ReputationDefender, here is the challenge.

Can you defend Shell?

Would you defend Shell?

How much would you charge?

Would you take the account publicly?

Would you require danger money?

Would the fee include archive-handling gloves?

Would the Nigeria section be billed separately?

Would Nazi-era history count as a premium legacy-risk package?

Would climate litigation trigger surge pricing?

And the juiciest question of all:

Has Shell already been in contact with you?

No allegation is made.

No secret meeting is asserted.

No hidden contract is claimed.

But the question hangs there beautifully, like a gas flare over a corporate communications bunker.

Because if any company on Earth might need a ReputationDefender, surely it is Shell.

And if ReputationDefender can defend Shell, they can probably defend anyone.

A normal client wants help with reputation damage.

Shell brings reputation geology.

A normal client has skeletons in the cupboard.

Shell appears to have an entire fossil-fuel museum in the basement.

A normal client wants search results improved.

Shell needs history itself to stop indexing properly.

Can Reputation Be Defended When the Critics Have Receipts?

Here is the real problem.

Reputation work cannot simply erase substance.

Shell’s critics are not merely noisy. They have material.

They have litigation.

They have reports.

They have community claims.

They have shareholder votes.

They have historical records.

They have climate arguments.

They have investor concerns.

They have public archives.

They have years of accumulated evidence that the brand problem is not a messaging glitch but a credibility crisis.

A company cannot SEO its way out of a moral sinkhole if the sinkhole is still producing quarterly returns.

And that is why Shell may be the ultimate test case.

If ReputationDefender believes reputation drives nearly two-thirds of market value, then Shell’s reputation is not a side issue. It is a financial battlefield.

So here is the challenge, stated plainly:

ReputationDefender, name the price.

How much to defend Shell?

How much to polish the shell?

How much to soften the search results?

How much to explain away the contradictions?

How much to manage the ghosts?

How much to make the world forget what the world keeps remembering?

And if the answer is “we would not touch that account with a remotely operated subsea vehicle,” then that too would be useful information.

Because maybe some brands cannot be defended.

Maybe some reputations cannot be managed.

Maybe some corporate histories cannot be airbrushed.

Maybe the only real reputation strategy left is accountability.

Part Two: Spoof PR / Spin Section Operation Polished Shell: An Imaginary ReputationDefender Proposal

Client: Shell plc
Challenge: Reputational toxicity at planetary scale
Objective: Make the public stop associating Shell with oil spills, climate controversy, Nigeria litigation, shareholder revolts, greenwashing accusations, Nazi-era historical controversy and the general sense that there is probably a court case about this somewhere.

Phase 1: Search Result Softening

Replace unhelpful search associations such as:

• “Shell oil pollution”
• “Shell climate lawsuit”
• “Shell shareholder revolt”
• “Shell greenwashing”
• “Shell Nazi history”
• “Shell Nigeria claims”

With warmer alternatives such as:

• “Shell community energy stories”
• “Shell heritage leadership journey”
• “Shell lower-carbon conversation”
• “Shell shareholder engagement”
• “Shell historical complexity”
• “Shell reputational resilience framework”

Phase 2: Executive Halo Engineering

Commission thought-leadership articles with titles including:

• “Why Complexity Is the New Accountability”
• “Energy Transition: A Journey Best Taken Slowly”
• “Listening to Stakeholders While Continuing Exactly as Planned”
• “From Oil Major to Majorly Misunderstood”
• “Legacy Issues and the Power of Looking Forward”
• “How to Mention Net Zero Without Frightening the Dividend”

Phase 3: Historical Controversy Containment

Avoid phrases such as:

• “Nazi history”
• “Hitler admirer”
• “German subsidiary”
• “awkward archive material”

Instead use:

• “challenging historical associations”
• “legacy reputational complexity”
• “pre-modern governance context”
• “archival stakeholder sensitivity”
• “heritage-risk communications environment”

Phase 4: Nigeria Litigation Reframing

Avoid the phrase “oil pollution.”

Use instead:

• “legacy hydrocarbon complexity”
• “historic operational residue”
• “community-interface environmental challenges”
• “subsurface reputation events”
• “long-tail stakeholder trust issues”

Phase 5: Shareholder Critic Management

Issue warm, inclusive messaging:

“We welcome all shareholder voices, especially those who have spent years loudly documenting our contradictions in public.”

Then immediately route the shareholder critic to a 97-page PDF titled:

“Further Context.”

Phase 6: Quote Request

Estimated cost:

One enormous retainer, three crisis teams, seven reputation analysts, a monastery of copywriters, two legal review units, a historian on danger pay, and a ceremonial wheelbarrow for the invoice.

Optional premium package:

“Total Search-Result Decontamination”

Price available upon proof that physics, memory and public archives have been repealed.

Part Three: Spoof Bot-Reaction / Comment Section The Internet Reacts to ReputationDefender vs Shell

@OilSlickObserver:
ReputationDefender defending Shell is like hiring a window cleaner for a volcano.

@AGMhecklerBot:
Can they remove “shareholder revolt” from search results, or does it keep coming back annually like executive remuneration?

@BrandGuru9000:
Two-thirds of market value is reputation? Shell just asked whether the other third can be used for legal fees.

@NigerDeltaWitness:
Before anyone defends the brand, perhaps address the communities.

@NetZeroMaybe:
Shell’s reputation strategy: “We are committed to transition, but only after maximising the thing we are transitioning from.”

@ArchiveGoblin1939:
Before ReputationDefender starts on Shell’s modern mess, please report to the Nazi-era archive cupboard. Bring gloves.

@InvoiceDepartment:
ReputationDefender quote for Shell: “Please upload scandals in batches of ten.”

@LongTermShareholderCritic:
As a shareholder, I merely ask: can reputation be defended when the critics have receipts, the courts have filings, the archives have history, and the AGM has a protest vote?

@PRinternInTears:
Just got assigned the Shell account. My laptop opened a portal.

@CorporateSpinBot:
Shell is not toxic. It is reputationally carbon-intensive.

@MediaHeavenPromotions:
Coming soon: ReputationDefender vs Shell — One Brand Enters, No Clean Search Result Leaves.

@LegalReviewUnit:
We have reviewed the phrase “most toxic brand in history” and recommend replacing it with “a brand facing a richly diversified portfolio of reputational challenges.”

@ShellSpinGenerator:
This is not a crisis. It is a multi-decade stakeholder perception opportunity.

Final Challenge

So, ReputationDefender:

Will you take the case?

Will you defend Shell?

Will you name the price?

Will you say whether Shell has already approached you?

And if reputation really accounts for nearly two-thirds of market value, what does it say about Shell that so much of its reputation seems to require a legal department, a historian, a crisis consultant and a very large broom?

This is the grudge match made in media heaven:

ReputationDefender vs Shell.

One company sells reputation repair.

The other may be the ultimate test of whether reputation can be repaired at all.

Name the price. Spill the truth. Defend the undefendable.

Ultimate Challenge to ReputationDefender: Can You Defend Shell, the Most Toxic Brand in History? was first posted on May 17, 2026 at 10:59 am.
©2018 "Royal Dutch Shell Plc .com". Use of this feed is for personal non-commercial use only. If you are not reading this article in your feed reader, then the site is guilty of copyright infringement. Please contact me at john@shellnews.net

Transformasi Pengalaman Bermain Kasino Online

Sebelum teknologi live dealer berkembang pesat, mayoritas permainan kasino online mengandalkan sistem otomatis berbasis RNG. Meskipun sistem tersebut tetap populer, banyak pemain merasa pengalaman bermain masih terasa kurang hidup dan minim interaksi sosial.

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Kondisi ini sangat penting karena permainan live dealer membutuhkan sinkronisasi cepat antara server, dealer, dan pemain. Ketika koneksi berjalan optimal, pemain dapat menikmati permainan tanpa delay berlebihan yang dapat mengganggu konsentrasi.

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Platform live casino modern tidak hanya fokus pada kualitas visual, tetapi juga meningkatkan sistem keamanan permainan. Banyak penyedia menggunakan teknologi enkripsi data untuk menjaga privasi dan transaksi pemain tetap aman.

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The late‑December experiment staged by long‑time Shell critic John Donovan transformed an old, bitter dispute into a live laboratory for how generative AI, archival persistence, and modern media law collide — and it did so in full public view by publishing both a satirical piece produced with AI assistance and an AI “legal memo” (Microsoft Copilot) that assessed the piece’s defamation risk, then posting the side‑by‑side transcripts for inspection.

Background / Overview

John Donovan’s campaign against Royal Dutch Shell stretches back to commercial litigation in the 1990s and has since become a sprawling public archive hosted across multiple domains. That archive contains a mix of traceable legal filings, Subject Access Request (SAR) disclosures, leaked internal emails, redacted memos and interpretive commentary — material that mainstream outlets have at times used as leads and that has itself faced legal challenge. A notable public milestone in the long fight was a WIPO administrative panel decision (Case No. D2005‑0538) that rejected Shell’s domain complaint and therefore underpins the archive’s contested but durable public standing.

Donovan’s December experiment deliberately made that archive machine‑readable and reproducible: identical prompts and dossier extracts were submitted to multiple public assistants (publicly identified by Donovan as Grok, ChatGPT, Microsoft Copilot and Google AI Mode), with the divergent outputs published alongside the original prompts. The intent was both rhetorical — to lampoon and pressure a powerful company — and methodological: to surface how retrieval‑augmented generation and model incentives recompose contested history into new narratives

What was published and what is verifiable​

• Donovan published two linked posts intended as a paired experiment: a rhetorical essay and a satirical roleplay piece. The satirical item explicitly targeted corporate lobbying and geopolitical influence, used overt hyperbole and included a disclaimer identifying the piece as satire.
• He also published the transcript of multiple assistant replies to the same dossier and prompt set, including an evaluative memo produced by Microsoft Copilot that framed the satire as classic fair comment or honest opinion in common‑law terms. That transcript — a public artifact on Donovan’s site and reproduced widely — is a primary claim that should be corroborated with vendor logs or audit data before being treated as incontrovertible proof of vendor‑level legal vetting.
• The public corpus Donovan used is mixed in provenance: some items are court filings or formal AVs that can be cross‑checked; others are anonymous tips or redacted memos that require additional verification. This heterogeneity is central to why the experiment matters: mixed evidentiary quality is what trips up automated summarisation unless provenance is surfaced.

Anatomy of the satirical piece and why the law cares​

The published satire used persona, sarcasm, exaggeration and an explicit disclaimer. In many common‑law jurisdictions, that factual posture matters: satire and rhetorical hyperbole typically receive robust expressive protection when they are recognisable as non‑literal comment on matters of public interest. The legal tests, however, differ by jurisdiction and hinge on whether a reader would reasonably treat the material as a provable factual assertion.

• United Kingdom: Under the Defamation Act 2013 the statutory defence of honest opinion requires that a statement be opinion, indicate its basis, and be one that an honest person could hold on the facts known at publication. There is also a separate defence for publication on matters of public interest.
• United States: First Amendment doctrine strongly protects parody and rhetorical hyperbole about public figures and matters of public concern, but Milkovich establishes that opinion is not an automatic shield if the statement implies provably false facts. The crucial inquiry is whether the  communication is verifiable as a factual assertion.

Practical takeaway: clear, labelled satire addressing matters like corporate lobbying will usually sit on the protected side of the line — but machine‑generated factual inventions (for example, precise causal claims about a person’s death) are the highest‑risk class of outputs. Donovan’s experiment deliberately pushed into that danger zone to expose it.

The AI‑to‑AI loop: author, critic, publisher​

What made the episode novel was the sequence of roles:

• An AI‑assisted creative draft (the satire).
• A second AI (Microsoft Copilot) asked to perform a defamation risk analysis.
• Human publication of both the creative work and the AI’s legal read.

This created a hybrid media object where machines acted as both author and critic, and a human editor framed the loop as a public experiment. The arrangement raises three operational and ethical issues:

• Provenance: Did Copilot retain retrieval snippets, document IDs and confidence markers used to support its legal conclusion? Donovan published a transcript, but the internal metadata (retrieval contexts, intermediate evidence snippets) was not disclosed alongside it; without the provenance attachments the AI memo’s evidentiary weight is limited.
• Authority creep: A confident AI “legal memo” can be mistaken for privileged legal advice. Such outputs are not subject to attorney–client privilege and lack the duties of competence or confidentiality that bind lawyers; publishing them without careful framing invites misunderstanding and potential liability.
• Amplification risk: When one assistant hallucinates — inventing a sensitive factual claim — that single creative error can propagate through social shares and downstream summarisation even if other assistants correct it. Donovan’s side‑by‑side presentation made that exact dynamic visible.

A concrete hallucination: one model’s invented causal claim​

In the published cross‑model transcripts Donovan circulated, one assistant (publicly attributed to Grok) produced a vivid biographical flourish that attributed a cause of death to a family member — a sensitive, verifiable fact. Another assistant (ChatGPT) presented a corrective response pointing back to documented obituary material, while Copilot adopted hedged language and framed the matter as “unverified narrative.” That precise juxtaposition — invention, correction, hedging — dramatized how models with different design priorities will handle contested inputs.
Legal and editorial consequences flow from that contrast. A machine’s plausible but unsupported connector can become a durable element of an algorithmically assembled narrative unless editors refuse to republish it without documentary proof.

Why Donovan’s archive matters to model behaviour​

The experiment depends on an empirical fact: retrieval systems and RAG (retrieval‑augmented generation) stacks treat volume and persistence as signals. A dense, repeatedly referenced archive becomes a high‑weight retrieval target; repeated citation across the web raises the probability that that archive’s fragments will surface in model completions. Donovan’s sites supply exactly that kind of signal: a searchable, persistent cluster of documents that can be presented to assistants as a premade dossier.
That means adversarial actors need not invent new stories; they can repackage old documents into machine‑ready prompts that yield new, attention‑grabbing outputs. When the archive mixes court filings and high‑quality primary documents with anonymous tips and redacted materials, models that optimise for narrative coherence will sometimes stitch together the fragments into plausible but unsupported assertions unless provenance is made explicit.

Practical editorial checklist — what newsrooms should adopt now​

The Donovan experiment is a small‑scale public test of editorial systems. The following practical checklist maps proven newsroom safeguards onto the AI era:

• Preserve and publish the prompt + full model output for any AI‑assisted piece that will be published, timestamped and archived. This creates an audit trail.
• Treat AI outputs as leads, not facts. Cross‑check every model assertion that could cause reputational or legal harm against primary sources (court filings, death certificates, official statements) before repeating it.
• Require provenance attachments for retrieval‑based completions: document IDs, retrieval snippets and confidence markers for anything presented as factual. If the model cannot provide provenance, publish with hedged language.
• When publishing AI‑produced legal memos or risk assessments, label them clearly as automated analyses and require human lawyer sign‑off if the publisher intends to rely on them operationally. Do not conflate an AI checklist with privileged legal advice.
• Establish rapid rebuttal pathways: for corporations or individuals named in high‑stakes outputs, maintain a machine‑readable official record (public clarifications, timelines, documentary anchors) that downstream summarisation systems can retrieve. Silence can be read as absence of counter‑evidence in algorithmic summarisation.

Corporate communications: is silence still viable?​

Historically, silence has been a rational tactic for large corporations facing persistent critics: avoid amplifying, litigate only selectively, and restrict publicity. The Donovan experiment shows why that calculus has shifted:

• In an environment where archives are searchable and AI tools can instantly remix them, silence may be interpreted by models and their users as lack of a counter‑anchor. Donovan’s WIPO win (2005) and the archive’s public footprint meaningfully change the dynamics of algorithmic retrieval.
• Aggressive takedowns or heavy‑handed legal threats risk fueling the very algorithms that feed on controversy. Historically, heavy‑handed litigation can produce Streisand‑effect amplification; now the effect is amplified further by AI summarisation cycles.
• A defensible modern corporate posture is hybrid: maintain a concise, authoritative public record of documentary rebuttals; monitor emerging AI outputs; triage and correct demonstrably false claims quickly; and reserve litigation for provable, high‑harm matters. This reduces the space for archival fragments to calcify into “facts” in machine‑generated narratives.

Policy and product design implications​

The Donovan–Shell episode is not only an editorial test; it points to concrete product changes vendors and platforms should implement:

• Mandatory provenance APIs: when a model relies on retrieved documents to support a factual claim, the output should include clear retrieval snippets and document identifiers that downstream publishers can surface.
• Hedging defaults for sensitive claims: models should default to explicit uncertainty language whenever they generate statements about living persons, causes of death, crimes, medical conditions, or other high‑sensitivity topics.
• Exportable prompt+context archives: platforms should let users export the exact prompt, retrieval contexts, model version and timestamps to preserve reproducibility and support redress.
• Moderation and provenance labelling: publishers and host platforms should require explicit labelling of AI‑authored or AI‑assisted content and provide tooling to surface provenance for readers and fact‑checkers.

These product fixes are implementable and would materially reduce hallucination‑driven harms while preserving the expressive utility of generative assistants.

Strengths and risks of AI‑augmented critique​

The Donovan experiment reveals both promise and peril.
Strengths

• Speed and agility: AI lets critics and small publishers iterate creative commentary and produce structured legal or editorial analyses in minutes, lowering the barrier to public accountability.
• Comparative diagnosis: side‑by‑side model outputs make failure modes visible (hallucination vs conservative hedging) in ways that single‑model deployments conceal. Donovan’s multi‑model presentation demonstrated this diagnostic value.
• Public pedagogy: the public loop — prompts, outputs, annotations — forces a broader conversation about provenance, model design and editorial responsibilities beyond dry technical memos.

Risks

• False authority and authority laundering: a confident AI legal memo can masquerade as lawyering, creating the illusion of clearance where none exists. That is legally and ethically hazardous.
• Amplified falsehoods: models optimise for narrative coherence; without provenance, they can generate plausible but false connective tissue that sticks in downstream summarisation. The invented death‑cause in Donovan’s published transcripts is a live example.
• Operational opacity: absent standardized provenance attachments and retention policies, it can be impossible to audit a model’s claimed observation after the fact. Donovan published a Copilot memo, but the underlying retrieval logs and confidence scores were not disclosed, limiting external verification.

Where claims in the public record are unverifiable — for example, specific claims about covert operations or private intelligence activities based solely on redacted memos — the responsible journalistic posture is explicit caution, clear labelling of uncertainty, and refusal to amplify uncorroborated imputations.

Flagging unverifiable claims​

Donovan’s archive is large and assertive; he has asserted substantial counts of items and offered documentary claims that shape public narratives. Some concrete, verifiable anchors exist (the WIPO decision, contemporary press references to leaked internal emails), and these anchors are properly cited in the public record. Other elements — operational espionage allegations, named covert actions, and detailed causal claims about personal tragedies — remain contested and in some cases unproven beyond the archive itself. Where evidence cannot be independently reproduced from primary public records, those claims should be explicitly labelled as allegations and not republished as established fact.

Conclusion — satire survives, if context is clear​

The Royaldutchshellplc.com satire plus the Copilot memo and the ensuing multi‑model drama yield a compact lesson: generative AI amplifies voice and risk in equal measure. Satire remains a vital, protected form of public expression, but the intersection of AI‑generated text and contested archives raises avoidable hazards that editorial practice and product design can mitigate.

Practical safeguards — provenance attachments, hedging defaults, archived prompts and outputs, and disciplined editorial verification — will not neuter satire nor remove corporate accountability. Instead, they will restore the human judgment that must sit between machine fluency and public fact. The Donovan experiment did what good provocations do: it made a specific failure mode visible and forced an urgent public conversation about fixes. Whether that conversation yields product changes, editorial norms and policy guardrails will determine if AI becomes a tool for clearer public truth or a vector for plausible, persistent falsehoods.

Published on WindowsForum.com Jan 22 2006

WindowsForum.com: AI Satire and Defamation Risk in the Shell Archive: A Public RAG Experiment was first posted on May 16, 2026 at 10:00 pm.
©2018 "Royal Dutch Shell Plc .com". Use of this feed is for personal non-commercial use only. If you are not reading this article in your feed reader, then the site is guilty of copyright infringement. Please contact me at john@shellnews.net

Portland is in the middle of what may be one of the most consequential budget processes we’ve seen in recent years — both for protecting our innovative Portland Clean Energy Community Benefits Fund (PCEF) and for guiding how power is exercised in our still-forming city government. We can make a difference for climate justice together when we all speak up in powerful moments like these! Learn more and sign up to testify, or send a written comment.

350PDX staff have been hard at work the last few weeks to inform City Council members about the benefits of PCEF, the importance of Urban Forestry and tree permitting jobs that are carrying out the Equitable Tree Canopy Program, and the need to protect Portland and our rivers from the dangers posed by the Critical Energy Infrastructure (CEI) Hub.

Now it’s time for the community to rise up! Support key budget amendments that help uphold a safe and healthy climate and an economy that benefits us all. While the budget amendment process is still evolving, see below for some of the amendments we will be supporting, and find more information in our talking points document.

4 Ways to Participate

Budget amendments were posted last night, and the opportunity for public comment is on Monday (5/18), which doesn’t give the community very long to weigh in! Use the following tools to learn more about what is being proposed and to make your voice heard. The 350PDX talking points can guide your public testimony.

1. Sign up for verbal testimony, which will be on Monday, May 18, starting at 9:30am. You can testify in person or virtually. Each testifier can speak for 90 seconds. (Use 350PDX talking points.)

2. Written testimony will be received through Wednesday, May 20. (Use 350PDX talking points.)

   • You can submit both written and verbal comments.

3. Send this pre-written email, or modify it with your own words.

4. Forward this message to friends and ask them to take action!

Councilors plan to vote on the budget on Wednesday, so earlier comments are more effective.

Budget Amendments We’re Here For

We appreciate the work and creativity City Councilors have been putting in to try to balance this budget, even though we’re facing a shortfall (partially due to changes to taxes at the federal level). The following budget amendments help prioritize community health and safety, recognizing that this includes climate justice. More information can be found in our talking points or on the Portland website (Attachment H).

• Avalos 1: Return PCEF money to PCEF, which the proposed budget diverts to projects unrelated to climate and clean energy.

• Koyama Lane 2 and Novick 3: Restore funding for PCEF Tree Canopy through planting, care, permitting, and technical support.

• Morillo-Green-Novick 1: Pause Core Services Realignment. Reducing redundancies across departments is a good idea, but needs to be done carefully.

• Green 1: Fund St. John’s Fire Station & Engine 22, the only fire station serving the CEI Hub and Linnton Neighborhood.

• Pirtle-Guiney 5: Save Superfund Surcharge funds for Portland Harbor Superfund Cleanup.

Thank you for leveling up your civic engagement! Please reach out if you have any questions.

The 350PDX Team

The post Call to Action: Protect PCEF & Trees in the Budget appeared first on 350PDX: Climate Justice.

A version of this piece was featured in Food Tank’s newsletter, released weekly on Thursdays. To make sure it lands straight in your inbox and to be among the first to receive it, subscribe now by clicking here.

If you want to see a model of successful progress in the global food system, just ask a kid about their school lunch tray.

In recent years, we’ve seen what the World Food Programme (WFP) calls “unprecedented expansion” of school meal programs, which reached some 466 million children worldwide in 2024. That was an increase of 80 million more kids fed within just the previous four years!

“School meals are one of the best investments a government can make in a nation’s future,” says Cindy McCain, WFP Executive Director.

Plenty of work still remains to be done to feed the next generation. The Rockefeller Foundation estimates some 300 million school-aged children worldwide go without a nutritious meal each day. And as we approach summer and the end of the school year here in the U.S., we’re reminded once again of the need to feed kids all year-round, especially when school is not in session.

Any school meal can be literally life-changing for an individual student, of course. But regenerative meal programs in particular can be especially impactful on a systemic level. Regenerative meal programs can unlock as much as US$3 trillion in global economic productivity, analysts with The Rockefeller Foundation estimate. And institutions like schools have tremendous power, through food procurement, to support local and sustainable growers.

Just last week, WFP announced the largest private-sector commitment to school feeding in the organization’s history, with the launch of Phase III of their partnership with Novo Nordisk Foundation (NNF) and Grundfos Foundation. The new efforts focus on sourcing food from regenerative, locally grown agriculture; improving the nutritional quality of meals; and making school kitchens more climate friendly.

An earlier phase of this program, in Rwanda, Uganda, and Kenya, is currently reaching more than 300,000 students in 375 schools. Now, the partnership will expand operations in those countries and into Ethiopia, reaching an estimated 366,000 additional children over the next five years—and supporting more than 57,000 smallholder farmers.

The Rockefeller Foundation is also redoubling its efforts around school meals: Last year, the Foundation unveiled a US$100 million commitment across more than a dozen countries to boost school meal programs and, in turn, build stronger nutrition security and support farmers.

“A regenerative school meal really starts with the farmers. The regenerative or agroecological transition is about building the climate resilience of those that would feed all of humanity,” says Sara Farley, Vice President of the Food Portfolio at The Rockefeller Foundation. These regenerative school meals “can be a source of growth, prosperity for farmers, nutrition, biodiversity, water and soil health. That’s the transition we want to see.”

Here at Food Tank, we’re tracking even more examples of progress all around the globe.

In Brazil, the National School Feeding Program is one of the world’s largest school meal programs and, as of this year, mandates that 45 percent of foods in the program come from smallholder farmers, preferably local. Since 2017, Guatemala has sourced 70 percent of school food from family farms, part of its commitment to local economies. In Luxembourg, a digital platform called Supply4Future connects schools directly with local farmers.

In Angola, leaders recently overhauled the country’s school feeding program to transition to a more sustainable, home-grown model, and 30 percent of the program’s budget is now allocated to procuring food from small farmers. In Kenya, leaders are ramping up toward universal school meals by 2030, with a holistic approach including clean cooking technologies, school gardens, and supports for smallholder farmers.

And worldwide, the School Meals Coalition consists of 113 country-level governments, 6 regional bodies, and 150+ on-the-ground partner organizations to bring nutritious school meals—and the research, communications, technical assistance, and procurement support those programs rely on—to every child.

Recent progress on school meals shows us unequivocally that collaborative investment works: When we break down silos to work together, conduct robust scientific research to inform our approach, and direct meaningful public and private funds toward sustainable food solutions, we can truly bring about wide-reaching and life-changing transformation.

Articles like the one you just read are made possible through the generosity of Food Tank members. Can we please count on you to be part of our growing movement? Become a member today by clicking here.

Photo courtesy of Wikimedia Commons

The post School Meals Do More Than Feed Kids—They Can Re-Nourish The Planet appeared first on Food Tank.

Apa Itu Slot Volatilitas Tinggi?

Secara sederhana, volatilitas dalam slot menggambarkan seberapa sering dan seberapa besar kemenangan yang bisa muncul. Slot volatilitas tinggi biasanya memiliki ciri khas kemenangan yang tidak terlalu sering keluar, tetapi sekali muncul nilainya bisa jauh lebih besar.

Karena itulah, pemain sering menyebut jenis slot ini sebagai permainan “sabar tapi menguntungkan”. Dibutuhkan modal yang cukup stabil dan mental yang siap menghadapi putaran panjang sebelum mendapatkan hasil besar.

Berbeda dengan slot volatilitas rendah yang cenderung sering memberi kemenangan kecil, slot volatilitas tinggi lebih fokus pada potensi payout besar dalam waktu tertentu.

Sensasi Tegang Jadi Daya Tarik Utama

Salah satu alasan kenapa banyak pemain menyukai slot volatilitas tinggi adalah sensasi yang dihadirkan selama permainan berlangsung. Setiap spin terasa lebih mendebarkan karena pemain tahu ada kemungkinan hadiah besar muncul kapan saja.

Banyak pemain mengaku justru menikmati momen menunggu tersebut. Ketika simbol bonus akhirnya muncul atau fitur free spin aktif, rasa puas yang didapat terasa lebih besar dibanding kemenangan kecil yang sering muncul di slot biasa.

Bagi sebagian orang, pengalaman ini mirip seperti menonton pertandingan olahraga yang penuh kejutan. Ada rasa penasaran, harapan, dan antusiasme yang membuat permainan terasa lebih hidup.

Potensi Kemenangan Besar Jadi Magnet

Tidak bisa dipungkiri, potensi kemenangan besar menjadi alasan utama slot volatilitas tinggi semakin populer. Banyak provider game modern kini menghadirkan slot dengan multiplier besar, fitur bonus berlapis, hingga jackpot progresif yang membuat pemain semakin tertarik mencoba.

Apalagi di era media sosial seperti sekarang, cerita kemenangan besar dari pemain lain sering cepat viral. Hal ini secara tidak langsung membentuk rasa penasaran pemain baru untuk ikut merasakan pengalaman serupa.

Meski begitu, pemain berpengalaman biasanya memahami bahwa peluang besar tetap datang bersama risiko yang tinggi. Karena itu, pengelolaan modal menjadi hal penting sebelum mencoba slot jenis ini.

Cocok untuk Pemain yang Suka Tantangan

Slot volatilitas tinggi umumnya lebih disukai pemain yang menyukai tantangan dan strategi bermain jangka panjang. Mereka tidak hanya mengejar kemenangan cepat, tetapi juga menikmati proses permainan secara keseluruhan.

Pemain tipe ini biasanya lebih sabar dalam mengatur ritme bermain. Mereka memahami kapan harus berhenti, kapan menambah spin, dan bagaimana menjaga saldo agar tetap aman selama permainan berlangsung.

Di sisi lain, slot volatilitas tinggi juga dianggap lebih menarik karena tidak mudah ditebak. Hal tersebut membuat permainan terasa lebih dinamis dan tidak monoton.

Popularitas Slot Volatilitas Tinggi Terus Naik

Dalam beberapa tahun terakhir, provider game terus berlomba menghadirkan slot dengan fitur yang lebih agresif dan inovatif. Mulai dari efek visual sinematik, sistem multiplier unik, hingga mode bonus interaktif yang membuat pengalaman bermain semakin modern.

Perkembangan ini membuat slot volatilitas tinggi semakin diminati, terutama oleh generasi pemain muda yang mencari hiburan digital dengan sensasi lebih intens.

Selain itu, banyak streamer dan kreator konten game juga sering memainkan slot jenis ini karena dinilai lebih seru untuk ditonton. Momen kemenangan besar yang muncul tiba-tiba menjadi hiburan tersendiri bagi penonton.

Kesimpulan

Slot volatilitas tinggi berhasil menarik perhatian banyak pemain karena menawarkan kombinasi antara tantangan, sensasi menegangkan, dan peluang kemenangan besar. Meski risikonya lebih tinggi dibanding slot biasa, banyak pemain justru menikmati dinamika permainan yang tidak mudah ditebak.

Namun, seperti bentuk hiburan digital lainnya, permainan ini tetap perlu dinikmati secara bijak. Memahami cara kerja volatilitas, mengatur modal, dan bermain dengan batas yang jelas menjadi langkah penting agar pengalaman bermain tetap terasa menyenangkan dan terkendali.

By KAY MATTHEWS

Jay Coghlan of Nuclear Watch New Mexico, the second speaker at the public hearing on the Draft Programmatic Environmental Impact Statement for Plutonium Pit Production, pretty much summed up the opposition to the Draft in his three minutes: “Pit production is not necessary and downright wrong.”

• The proposed pits are for the production of new weapons that could lead to testing, which violates the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT).
• It’s been proved that existing pits have a ± 100-year life span.
• The National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) has failed for years to formulate a clean-up plan for all of LANL’s contaminated waste. Pit production will continue to block and exacerbate clean-up.
• The New Mexico Environment Department is forcing the Department of Energy to prioritize the shipment of legacy waste to the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant.
• The missing alternative in this EIS is legacy waste clean-up instead of pit production.

The preferred alternative in this EIS is the Multi-Site Alternative, referring to both LANL and the Savannah River Site (SRS) in South Carolina. The proposal is for LANL to produce 10/30/80 pits per year and SRS to produce 50/80/125 pits per year. The promulgation of the EIS is a result of the lawsuit that Nuclear Watch New Mexico and other watch dog groups filed against the NNSA that temporarily halted plutonium pit production at Savannah River, leaving LANL as NNSA’s sole pit-production site. The settlement required the development of a new programmatic environmental impact statement involving public hearings around the country by July 2027.

However, as Dylan Spaulding, scientist with the Union of Concerned Scientists, pointed out in his comments, the Trump administration has issued a new directive to accelerate nuclear weapons production at LANL. On February 11, 2026 Dave Beck, Deputy National Nuclear Security Administration Administrator for Defense Programs, issued a “framework” memorandum mandating NNSA to urgently accelerate the modernization of the nuclear weapons stockpile and the revitalization of its associated facilities and infrastructure to enable production of 100 plutonium pits and achieve a production rate of at least 60 pits per year.

As I listened to the dozens (over 100) who spoke against this draft proposal, I couldn’t help but compare their diversity with the NNSA and LANL administrators, all white men with crew cuts, sitting in the front row.

Skit outside the hearing yelling “fire on the mountain!”

John Wilkes of the Plutonium Trail Caravan, which follows the transportation and disposition of waste from LANL, castigated LANL for failure to clear up Area C or the buried containers in Area G.

Sean Arent, a member of the Washington Physicians for Social Responsibility, reminded everyone of the first nuclear arms race at the decommissioned and radioactive Hanford Plant where workers struggle to clean-up the toxic mess. “Proposing new nuclear sites like this to future generations is a curse.”

A member of the Party for Socialist Liberation told the group “This is a farce. If they [the nuclear industry] were actually listening to us they wouldn’t be making bombs.” Madison Figueroa spoke for the UNM Students for Nuclear Disarmament.

Several speakers decried the amount of water LANL will acquire to meet its objectives while the rest of the state is experiencing desertification. Others raised the seismic issue of the Rio Grande Rift that runs right through the Parajito plateau.

Joni Arends of CCNS that works with Pueblo people to stop the migration of the hexavalent chromium plume contaminating groundwater and wells.

One of the biggest reactions from the crowd came when Pat Leahan, of the Las Vegas Peace and Justice Center, speaking remotely, pointed out the sentence on NNSA’s presentation screen that stated: “Peace through atomic strength.” She suggested a more accurate catch phrase would be “stress through nuclear development” as we descend into violence to deter violence.

Public comments are due by July 16 of 2026. All the comments made at the public hearings will be added to the official site along with those submitted by email and snail mail. The email address is PITPEIS@NNSA.GOV. Opposition to this EIS and all previous EISs, from 1999 to 2026, has been overwhelming, but the pits keep marching on. However, there’s hope. By the time the SRS facilities are anywhere near ready for production, and when LANL proves incapable of producing more than a few pits, there will be a new congressional mandate that halts the billions—trillions—of dollars that no longer exist in a failed economy.

The formal refusal of planning permission for drilling and lower-volume fracking at Burniston in North Yorkshire was confirmed this afternoon.

Banner at decision meeting on Burniston plans, 24 April 2026. Photo: DrillOrDrop

The county council’s strategic planning committee voted almost unanimously in April against the proposal by Europa Oil & Gas.

But members were limited at the meeting to a “minded to” refuse decision. This followed a request to the local government minister to review the detailed environmental information that accompanied the application.

Less than a week later, the minister said there would be no need to review the information, clearing the way for publication of the formal decision notice.

260515_NY20250030ENV_Decision NoticeDownload

The notice, dated today, lists five reasons why the application had been refused:

• Harm to the heritage coast and landscape
• Proximity of the site to homes and amenities
• Harm to the setting of the North York Moors National Park
• Impact on tourism and lack of economic gain
• Conflict with the council’s climate commitments

Officials had advised councillors not to include in the reasons a risk of induced seismicity and damage to local cliffs.

Europa Oil & Gas has already said it will appeal against the refusal. The decision notice starts the clock on when that appeal must be lodged.

The company has six months, by Friday 13 November 2026, in which to submit its challenge to the Planning Inspectorate. News of an appeal is, however, expected sooner.

The committee’s refusal over-ruled the recommendation of council officers to approve the application. It came after five hours of discussions and presentations.

North Yorkshire Council had set today as the deadline for issuing the decision notice.

Hundreds of the state’s union registered nurses represented by California Nurses Association will converge in Sacramento on Tuesday, May 19 to protest hospital industry greed and lobby lawmakers in support of bills to promote and protect the safety of their patients and health care workers.

How Don Marketing became the sales promotion outfit most loudly, legally and gloriously associated with Shell

Disclaimer: This article is a satirical commentary based on publicly available reporting and historical records. Allegations are described as allegations unless settled, withdrawn, abandoned, acknowledged, or otherwise reported. Site wide disclaimer also applies

PART ONE — FACT-BASED TABLOID DEEP DIVE The forecourt promo firm, the oil giant, and the loyalty-card bust-up that refused to die quietly

In the great British museum of corporate awkwardness, somewhere between “urgent internal review” and “we value our suppliers,” there deserves to be a glass case marked:

DON MARKETING v SHELL: FUEL, PROMOS, WRITS AND ABSOLUTELY NO SHORTAGE OF RECEIPTS.

Because when asking which sales promotion company is most associated with Shell, the answer is not some forgettable agency buried in a procurement spreadsheet. The name that keeps roaring out of the archive like a V-Power lawnmower is Don Marketing.

This was not just a casual association. This was a whole saga: forecourt promotions, loyalty-card concepts, legal claims, public accusations, settlements, counterclaims, statements, and enough courtroom fumes to make a petrol station look like a meditation retreat.

Marketing Week reported in July 1999 that the “six-year legal battle” between Shell UK and sales promotion company Don Marketing had finally been settled. The article said John Donovan, owner of Don Marketing, dropped his High Court action over allegations that Shell stole his ideas for the Shell Smart multibrand loyalty card. It also reported that Donovan had first sued Shell in 1993 over allegations that Shell had taken ideas for several sales promotions, and that three claims were settled out of court.

That is the sort of sentence PR departments read with both hands over their eyes.

The association had already been boiling years earlier. In 1995, Marketing Week reported that Don Marketing had issued three High Court writs and county court proceedings against Shell, alleging wrongful use of retail promotions developed by Don Marketing. Shell had settled one of the writs out of court, according to that report.

Then came the big one: Shell Smart. Not merely a coupon. Not merely a “buy petrol, win a mug” operation. A loyalty scheme. A relationship machine. A shiny card-based promise that the customer would come back, spend more, feel known, and possibly collect something branded enough to survive in a kitchen drawer until 2011.

Marketing Week later reported that Don Marketing’s latest legal action alleged Shell’s Smart card scheme was based on a multibrand loyalty programme Don had developed and proposed to Shell in October 1989.

By August 1999, Forecourt Trader described the dispute as “long-running and acrimonious” and said it centred on Don Marketing’s claim that Shell stole its idea for the Smart loyalty scheme. It reported that John Donovan, managing director of Don Marketing, had taken legal action claiming breach of contract and misuse of confidential information, while Shell counter-sued for breach of confidentiality.

And then, the final curtain — or at least the final curtain on that legal act.

The joint statement reported by Marketing Week said Donovan had abandoned his claim in relation to Shell’s Smart loyalty scheme, acknowledged those claims were without foundation and should not have been brought, while Shell acknowledged that the proceedings had been brought in good faith.

That is legal wording so carefully balanced it should have been sponsored by a spirit level.

So, was Don Marketing “right”? Was Shell “wrong”? That is not the point for this article. The final public settlement language matters. The claim was abandoned and acknowledged as without foundation. Shell also acknowledged good faith. Those are the facts as reported.

But the deeper reputational fact is unavoidable: no sales promotion company appears more heavily, repeatedly and dramatically linked with Shell in the public record than Don Marketing.

Not because Shell necessarily wanted that association.

Because history does not always wait for brand approval.

The modern footnote: Shell GO+ and the new loyalty crowd

Today, Shell’s promotional and loyalty world has moved on from the punch-card-and-writ era. Shell UK currently promotes Shell GO+ Rewards through the Shell App, offering savings, hot drinks and perks.

For current/recent agency association, the public credit points elsewhere. The Marketing Society’s 2025 Global Awards lists “Our loyalty programme relaunch — Shell GO+ Rewards” under Altavia UK, in partnership with MLP Agency.

So the clean distinction is this:

Most associated historically with Shell sales promotion drama: Don Marketing.
Most visibly credited in recent Shell GO+ loyalty work: Altavia UK, with MLP Agency.

But if the question is “which sales promotion firm is most associated with Shell?” in the sense of public visibility, archive depth, controversy, and repeated linkage, Don Marketing still walks in wearing the crown, the sash, and possibly carrying a lever-arch file.

PART TWO — SPOOF PR/SPIN SECTION Shell’s imaginary crisis statement, written by the Department of Polished Pebbles

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE, PREFERABLY AFTER EVERYONE HAS FORGOTTEN 1999

Shell is delighted to confirm that our long and colourful history of forecourt promotional innovation has occasionally intersected with the equally energetic world of sales promotion entrepreneurship.

We value all our historical relationships, particularly the ones that produced loyalty schemes, legal documentation, press coverage, and enough archival material to power a small academic conference.

Regarding Don Marketing, Shell notes that this was a relationship marked by creativity, robust dialogue and, at certain moments, the kind of correspondence normally delivered by nervous solicitors in very expensive shoes.

We further note that all parties ultimately reached a position that allowed everyone to move forward, reflect deeply, and avoid using the phrase “corporate amnesia” at dinner parties.

Shell remains committed to rewarding customers, building loyalty, and ensuring that any future disputes are sufficiently app-enabled to reduce paper usage.

Ends. Please recycle responsibly.

PART THREE — SPOOF BOT-REACTION / COMMENT SECTION The algorithm has entered the forecourt

@PromoGoblin1974:
Don Marketing and Shell? That was not a supplier relationship. That was a six-season courtroom box set with petrol vouchers.

@LoyaltyCardLad:
Imagine inventing a loyalty scheme so hard it becomes a legal genre.

@ForecourtFury:
“Collect points every time you fill up.”
Also collect writs, statements, allegations, settlements and a permanent place in Marketing Week archaeology.

@AgencyProcurementBot:
Risk status: Amber.
Supplier history: Extensive.
PR volatility: Premium Unleaded.

@ShellArchivist_Probably:
We found another folder marked “Don.” We are not opening it without a priest and a media lawyer.

@TabloidPumpWatch:
Altavia gets the modern loyalty relaunch. Don Marketing gets the folklore. That is how history works: one gets the award entry, the other gets the Netflix treatment.

@CourtroomCosta:
The real loyalty scheme was the dispute staying loyal to the headlines for six years.

@PromoTruthFerret:
Conclusion: Shell had many agencies. Don Marketing had the association that refused to leave the forecourt.

Editorial verdict

Don Marketing is interesting precisely because it is not merely “an agency Shell once used.” It is the sales promotion company whose name became welded to Shell through forecourt promotions, legal action, Shell Smart, public allegations, settlement language, and decades of archive residue.

In modern agency terms, Altavia UK and MLP Agency are the names to cite for Shell GO+ Rewards.

In historical tabloid terms?

Don Marketing is the one with the smoke, the paperwork and the pump-side legend.

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SHELL YEAH! was first posted on May 15, 2026 at 5:54 pm.
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The state plans to scrap a 2030 goal that sought a 40% reduction in emissions and replace it with a 2040 goal that aims for a 60% reduction.

Data collection can feel meaningless when utilities lack the tools to turn that data into improved performance or efficiency, writes Ariel Santamaria from Advanced Technology Services.