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If we want to fail more beautifully, to make our predicament less ugly, we need to learn what it means to face it together.

Moving toward plant-based diets will not, by itself, solve the climate problem, but it is necessary for solving it.

The provisional application of the EU-Mercosur FTA without a vote from the European Parliament remains a democratic scandal.

The post Europe: Temporary ban on Brazilian meat and honey highlights EU-Mercosur risks, says ECVC appeared first on La Via Campesina - EN.

Tidak semua putaran pada sebuah game memberikan pengalaman serupa. Ada spin reguler dengan tempo normal, mode turbo untuk mempercepat animasi, putaran otomatis, sampai rangkaian bonus dengan aturan berbeda. Variasi tersebut membuat Situs Slot Maxwin hari ini terasa memiliki banyak lapisan, terutama ketika provider menggabungkan reel modern, simbol khusus, multiplier, serta free spin dalam satu permainan.

Istilah “memancing kemenangan” kemudian sering dipakai untuk menggambarkan kombinasi putaran tertentu. Namun, kombinasi tersebut lebih tepat dilihat sebagai pola penggunaan fitur, bukan formula untuk menentukan hasil berikutnya. Jika permainan memakai RNG, mengganti manual spin menjadi auto spin tidak otomatis membuat peluang kemenangan meningkat.

Kombinasi Putaran Membuat Slot Maxwin Hari Ini Lebih Variatif

Putaran reguler merupakan struktur paling dasar. Pemain menekan tombol spin, reel bergerak, kemudian sistem menampilkan hasil berdasarkan mekanisme game.

Perkembangan desain membawa variasi baru. Turbo spin mempercepat presentasi, sementara auto spin menjalankan sejumlah putaran secara otomatis. Beberapa judul juga menyediakan bonus round dengan karakter berbeda dari permainan dasar.

Perbedaan tersebut membuat satu game dapat mempunyai beberapa ritme tanpa perlu mengubah aturan matematisnya.

Kombinasi putaran umumnya dapat berupa:

• manual spin untuk menjalankan putaran satu per satu;
• auto spin untuk menjalankan rangkaian secara otomatis;
• turbo spin untuk memperpendek durasi animasi;
• free spin sebagai bagian dari fitur bonus;
• cascade untuk melanjutkan kombinasi dalam satu rangkaian;
• respin apabila mekanisme permainan memang menyediakannya.

Masing-masing memiliki fungsi berbeda. Tidak ada satu mode dengan status universal sebagai jalan pasti menuju maxwin.

Manual dan Auto Spin Berbeda pada Cara Pengoperasian

Perdebatan antara manual serta auto spin cukup sering muncul. Sebagian pemain merasa manual memberikan kontrol lebih besar karena setiap putaran dimulai secara terpisah.

Auto spin mengambil pendekatan berbeda. Pengguna menentukan jumlah putaran atau pengaturan tersedia, lalu permainan menjalankannya secara berurutan.

Perbedaan utama berada pada interaksi pengguna. Apabila aturan game tidak menyatakan perubahan probabilitas, pergantian tombol tersebut tidak dapat dianggap sebagai pemicu kemenangan di Situs Slot Maxwin.

Kemenangan di Situs Slot Maxwin Dipengaruhi Mekanisme Game

Kemenangan di Situs Slot Maxwin hari ini perlu dipisahkan dari cara tombol spin digunakan. Hasil permainan lebih berkaitan dengan konfigurasi matematis, paytable, simbol, serta fitur bawaan dari judul terkait.

Wild dapat membantu membentuk kombinasi sesuai aturan. Scatter mungkin membuka free spin. Multiplier memodifikasi nilai pembayaran ketika persyaratannya terpenuhi.

Dengan kata lain, fitur memiliki fungsi teknis. Tombol putaran lebih banyak mengatur bagaimana sesi dijalankan.

Kombinasi Fitur Lebih Penting daripada Urutan Tombol

Sebuah permainan bisa terasa semakin aktif saat beberapa fitur bertemu. Contohnya, cascade membentuk kombinasi pertama, wild muncul pada rangkaian berikutnya, kemudian multiplier ikut aktif.

Situasi semacam itu berbeda dari pola tombol seperti “10 manual, 20 turbo, lalu 10 auto”.

Urutan tombol merupakan keputusan pengguna. Sebaliknya, interaksi wild, scatter, cascade, serta multiplier merupakan bagian dari desain permainan.

Pemisahan ini penting agar istilah kombinasi putaran tidak berubah menjadi klaim seolah-olah ada kode tertentu untuk memaksa kemenangan.

Membaca Kombinasi Putaran Secara Lebih Rasional

Daripada mencari angka putaran sakti, pengguna dapat membaca setiap mode berdasarkan fungsi sebenarnya.

Beberapa hal lebih relevan untuk diperhatikan:

• Paytable, untuk melihat nilai simbol serta aturan kombinasi.
• RTP teoretis, untuk memahami parameter pengembalian jangka panjang.
• Volatilitas, untuk melihat karakter distribusi hasil secara umum.
• Aturan bonus, untuk mengetahui pemicu free spin atau fitur khusus.
• Batas maxwin, untuk memahami kemenangan maksimum sesuai konfigurasi game.
• Mode spin, untuk menentukan tempo interaksi sesuai preferensi.

Informasi tersebut memberikan konteks lebih kuat dibanding klaim pola putaran tanpa dokumentasi.

Situs Slot Maxwin Kini Memiliki Ritme Permainan Lebih Kompleks

Situs Slot Maxwin dengan katalog multi-provider dapat memperlihatkan betapa beragamnya desain putaran saat ini. Satu judul memakai reel konvensional, sementara game lain menawarkan cascade, respin, expanding reel, atau sistem Ways.

Akibatnya, pola penggunaan pada satu permainan belum tentu relevan untuk judul lain.

Bahkan dua game dari provider sama dapat memakai konfigurasi berbeda. Jumlah reel, volatilitas, struktur pembayaran, fitur bonus, serta batas kemenangan dapat berubah.

Inilah alasan istilah “kombinasi terbaik” perlu dibaca secara hati-hati. Tidak ada urutan manual, turbo, atau auto spin dengan kemampuan universal untuk bekerja pada seluruh permainan.

Slot Maxwin Hari Ini Lebih Banyak Bermain dengan Tempo

Perubahan paling menarik justru terlihat pada tempo. Provider menggunakan animasi, suara, transisi bonus, dan kecepatan reel untuk membuat setiap tahap terasa berbeda.

Turbo menciptakan tempo cepat. Free spin dapat membawa suasana baru. Cascade mempertahankan kontinuitas, sedangkan respin memberi satu tahap tambahan sebelum permainan kembali ke kondisi reguler.

Dari perspektif desain, kombinasi tersebut berhasil membuat sesi terasa lebih dinamis. Dari perspektif probabilitas, efek visual tetap tidak boleh dianggap sebagai sinyal bahwa kemenangan berikutnya sudah dekat.

Kombinasi Putaran Bukan Tombol Rahasia Kemenangan

Memancing kemenangan di Situs Slot Maxwin terdengar menarik sebagai konsep, tetapi kombinasi putaran tidak mempunyai dasar universal sebagai formula untuk menghasilkan maxwin. Manual spin, auto spin, turbo, respin, dan free spin mempunyai fungsi masing-masing berdasarkan desain game.

Slot Maxwin hari ini justru menarik untuk dibaca melalui hubungan antara mode putaran dan mekanisme permainan. Paytable menjelaskan pembayaran, volatilitas memberi konteks distribusi hasil, sedangkan fitur menerangkan bagaimana bonus bekerja.

Kemenangan di Situs Slot Maxwin hari ini tetap tidak dapat ditentukan hanya melalui urutan tombol. Kombinasi putaran paling masuk akal digunakan untuk mengatur ritme serta memahami fitur, bukan sebagai kode tersembunyi untuk memaksa hasil permainan.

'Store food for climate shocks' Channel News brendan 10th September 2026 Teaser Media

Industrial expansion, data centres, population growth and electrification are putting new pressure on a system already facing affordability, reliability and infrastructure challenges. Much of the public conversation focuses on how much new...

Waymo’s rollout of driverless taxis in Nevada must be halted because the company has violated state law by not lining up alternatives for disabled passengers, an emergency petition to state authorities claims.

Kelsey Maurine Brickl, who uses a powered wheelchair, filed her appeal in August, just days after the Nevada Transportation Agency permitted the autonomous taxi company to deploy 1,000 driverless vehicles in the Las Vegas area.

Kelsey Maurine Brickl

“We can’t [allow] this shiny new piece of convenient tech … to chip away at the rights of disabled people,” said Brickl, who initially founded Ghostlight Access to promote disability rights in theater. She is also a stockholder in Waymo’s parent company Google.

Nevada law requires driverless car companies to provide wheelchair-accessible vehicles for passengers upon request, but few companies have such capacity, so most merely contract with human-driven taxi companies, such as Uber and Lyft, to fulfill trip requests.

But for now, Waymo has no such contract in Nevada, likely because it has not had time to finalize such an arrangements, which one source told Streetsblog, is complicated. For now, all that Waymo would say on the record is that it intends to follow state law to provide wheelchair-accessible trips.

“We will comply with applicable Nevada accessibility requirements,” said Ethan Teicher, a spokesperson for Waymo. “We are committed to working with manufacturers, researchers, and the accessibility community toward a future where our fully autonomous vehicles can accommodate the diverse needs of all riders.”

Waymo is far from the only company that has been accused of failing disabled riders. Two other companies — Tesla and Uber’s Aviari — were permitted for driverless passenger service in Nevada in August, but it is unclear if either is providing wheelchair-accessible rides.

Recommended Report: Waymo Surpasses The Way-Too-Low Human Driver Safety Bar Ren Zaro Fitzgerald July 24, 2026

Brickl says that she directed her petition at Waymo because of Tesla’s recent announcement that it is developing compliant vehicles, and Uber’s relatively small share of the driverless car market. She says she has contacted Tesla for a timeline on the release of its new vehicles, but has not heard back.

Waymo is Brickl’s immediate target, but the problem of this basic civil rights violation is industry-wide, Brickl said, citing loopholes in Nevada, other states’, and federal law that allow taxi companies to provide alternative services instead of making fleets accessible. Even if providers do contract out an accessible operator, these rides can cost more and come with a longer-than-average wait, she added.

Truly equal access, in which fleets are accessible by default, is several years away at minimum. Currently, no cars meet Waymo’s specifications and are wheelchair accessible. Other brands face similar challenges, particularly as companies switch to fully electric vehicles, whose bulky, floor-stored batteries interfere with necessary loading ramps. For its Zoox fleet, Amazon opted to manufacture a bespoke car model – but it cannot accommodate wheelchairs.

The proliferation of driverless cars has threatened more-accessible forms of transportation. Multiple independent studies have confirmed that taxi companies, such as Waymo and Uber, are replacing sustainable modes in about half of trips. And many of those trips would have been on public transit, which is accessible. Those lost public transit trips mean that fare revenue is being shifted away from cash-strapped agencies, which will be less able to provide fully accessible service (not to mention that the added congestion of more cars on the road slows down the service).

“[Driverless cars are] taking something away, potentially damaging something that’s already there,” Brickl said.

The Nevada Transportation Authority claimed in an email to Streetsblog that it is not required to respond to petitions after a decision is made, but Nevada state law clearly allows petitions for a reversal within 15 days of decision — in this case, a clock that began ticking on Aug. 20. Brickl filed on Aug. 26, well within the appeal window. The Authority did not clarify why it considers itself exempt from state law.

In Brickl’s view, Waymo must be compelled to follow the law, or see its expansion put on hold.

“Disabled people already have civil rights, we just need them enforced,” she said. “If the rollout of Waymo is going to take those existing civil rights away, then it needs to be halted.”

I am a 12-year-old cyclist in New York City. I’m constantly wondering if I’ll make it to 13.

My mom and I ride all the time, but even though I’m allowed by law to ride on the sidewalk (well, maybe I am — more on that later), I ride on the same streets as she does. So every time we go anywhere on my bike, I review my hand signals, especially the ones I use to go around a car parked in a painted bike lane, and take a deep breath.

Nine times out of 10, there is a car or truck parked in a painted bike lane. Trucks are the worst because they have huge blind spots. Typically, my mom and I have a strategy discussion about going around these scofflaws, though sometimes we just pull over when we don’t feel safe. That’s not cycling. That’s walking with a bike between your legs.

Car-filled unprotected bike lanes are a problem for all cyclists, but especially for someone my age. In theory, I should just be riding on the sidewalk, as riders under 14 are allowed to do) — except that I’ve also seen rules that say that I must bike in the roadway because my wheels are 26 inches in diameter. That rule (that 12-year-olds and under can only bike on the sidewalk if their wheels are less than 26 inches) is quoted a lot in all sorts of places — summaries of bike rules, legal code — but the city Administrative code says that as a 12-year-old, I can bike on the sidewalk. So it may just depend on the cop — which then may subject the biker to police bias.

Even the cops are confused.

In any event, many kids stop biking once they graduate to an adult-sized frame. After all, the streets are a mess, and pedestrians frankly resent seeing middle-schoolers biking on the sidewalk. (As Streetsblog once reported, roads with schools are much more dangerous than roads without, so students have an especially unsafe biking experience.)

Many more middle-schoolers would bike if they had safe routes to school. And that can’t merely mean painted, car-filled bike lanes because if we want more tweens biking, we have to make the roadway safe for people who are still just learning to bike in the city. 

Of course, politicians don’t care because people like me can’t vote until we’re 18. That means that for six more years, I don’t have much of a say in the policymaking that could determine whether I get killed or seriously injured by a car driver. And it’s not just the driver’s fault — it’s the fault of a system that allows cars to dominate all the streets; menace cyclists, pedestrians, and air quality; and push kids to the curb.

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‘ALWAYS SCARED’: Dangerous Streets Outside City Schools Threaten Children
Jesse Coburn

May 24, 2022

I once attended a “biking class” (about traffic patterns, signals, that sort of stuff), and everyone besides me was an adult. The class emphasized avoiding crashes while staying on the good side of the law — and treated illegal, crash-causing car behavior as a fact of life. Who decided that crashes are normal? Other forms of murder certainly aren’t.

Nonetheless, I’ve stuck with biking because, I suppose, I’m just a contrarian: I want to spite the cars. I want to defend the environment from today’s politicians. And biking is fun.

But it’s not so fun to navigate around wheeled boxes of death on a regular basis, thinking something along the lines of, “Am I going to die today?”

The Mamdani administration is implementing Sammy’s Law through a patchwork of short, disconnected stretches, some as short as about 100 feet.@NYC_SafeStreets is calling on the mayor to think bigger and lower speed limits across entire neighborhoods to save lives. pic.twitter.com/HZra34RRRm

— Transportation Alternatives (@TransAlt) September 8, 2026

• Cleaner air equals smarter children. That was the result of a Columbia University study that found that a reduction in tailpipe pollution, among other sources, in New York City improved toddlers’ cognitive development by 26 percent. Other studies have also shown respiratory benefits when measures like low-emissions zones are implemented. (NY Times)
• Jake Boyles provides hard proof that interstates are homogenizing the country, at least when it comes to the businesses that lie just beyond them. (Strong Towns)
• Robotaxis would be much more useful in rural areas that lack transit than in big cities. (Bloomberg CityLab; paywall)
• Human backup drivers in robotaxis might not be worth much if they lose their skills while observing most of the time. (The Conversation)
• Electrek lays out how it’s possible to replace a second car with an e-cargo bike.
• Lyft was able to convince California voters to classify rideshare drivers as independent contractors, and now CEO Logan Green wants to take Prop 22 nationwide. (Mashable)
• Chicago’s new regional transportation authority overseeing the CTA, Metra and Pace is up and running. (Eno Center for Transportation)
• How many bike-riding children have to die before Michigan stops designing roads solely for drivers? (WLNS)
• At least one Atlanta city council member is onboard with a new plan for light rail along the 22-mile Beltline. (CBS News)
• Cincinnati’s Connector streetcar has not quite lived up to early expectations, but it’s still carried 7.5 million riders in 10 years, and the numbers are trending up. (Axios)
• In addition to cutting bus routes and early morning service, Miami-Dade could start charging for the Metromover. (Miami Times)
• Japanese architects are going to great lengths to provide parking for single-family homes with limited space. (Design Boom)
• Clearly Ottawa mayoral candidate Alex Lawson hasn’t read “The High Cost of Free Parking.” (CBC)
• Montreal, too, is in danger of backsliding as Mayor Soraya Martinez Ferrada puts bike projects under renewed scrutiny. (Momentum)

The far-right AfD was the undoubted winner of the closely watched state election in Germany’s Saxony-Anhalt on 6 September. Still, the party fell short of an outright majority, in part thanks to a surprisingly strong performance by the Greens. The question now is, can the AfD form a government at all, and if not, what coalition of rivals could possibly agree to govern in its place?

On 6 September, voters cast their ballots in the Saxony-Anhalt widely watched and publicised state election. More than anything, the results have led to a climate of uncertainty and shown a desire for fundamental change. The outcome amounts to a political earthquake whose shockwaves extend far beyond the state’s borders.

43.8 per cent of voters opted for the “confirmed far-right”  Alternative für Deutschland (Alternative for Germany, AfD) state branch (+23 percentage points). The ruling conservative party (CDU/Christian-Democratic Union) was punished; with 17.2 per cent, its share more than halved (-19.9). The liberal party (FDP/Free Democratic Party), which had previously been part of the coalition government, was ousted from the state parliament in Saxony-Anhalt, whilst the social democrats (SPD/Social Democratic Party), also part of the coalition, made a slight gain but remained at a low level (9.3/+0.9).

On the other hand, the Greens made a surprisingly significant gain, achieving their best result to date with 8.9 per cent (+3.0). They were the strongest force in terms of second votes in the Halle III constituency (33.7 per cent; lowest second-vote result: Eisleben constituency, 3.8 per cent). The Left lost ground again (8.6/-2.4), but managed to win three constituency seats outright (Halle II, III; Magdeburg II). The newly formed BSW (Alliance Sahra Wagenknecht/Bündnis Sahra Wagenknecht; a party positioned towards the left economically and towards the right culturally) cleared the 5 per cent threshold.

The election results and accompanying opinion polls reveal a highly politicised, deeply divided state. Voter turnout soared to a record high of 77.8 per cent (+17.5), continuing the trend of rising participation. The previously ruling coalition of the CDU, the SPD, and the FDP has been voted out of office. In the new parliament, forming a government will prove exceedingly difficult, and the BSW is expected to play a key role in any possible coalition.

Chart: Heinrich Böll Foundation. Source: State Returning Officer of Saxony-Anhalt

The new normal?

Although just over 1.7 million people were eligible to vote in Saxony-Anhalt, the vote was closely monitored in and outside Germany. The reasons for this extraordinary attention are clear: polls indicated that the AfD would become by far the strongest force, as had already been the case in the 2024 Thuringia state election and in the 2024 local elections in Saxony-Anhalt. What was new, however, were the poll figures for the AfD and, consequently, the question of whether the AfD’s state branch – classified as “undoubtedly far-right” – would provide the Minister-President with an absolute parliamentary majority.

This possibility of a government with a far-right character, unprecedented in Germany since 1945, led to an intense media, political and societal debate about the potential consequences for democracy in the country. As a result, the election was subject to unusually extensive scrutiny. At the same time, however, the consequences of the election were discussed in an unusually broad and multifaceted manner, which at least gave voters the opportunity to reflect on the significance and consequences of their voting decisions far more deeply than usual.

However, for two reasons it would be unrealistic to view the state election as essentially an exceptional case. On the one hand, whilst the scale of targeted disinformation, fake news, and defamation – extending even to the acceptance of politically motivated threats and acts of violence from the far right – has indeed risen once again, it is no longer an exceptional case: whether through hybrid attacks and campaigns from abroad (particularly from Russia) or targeted delegitimisation from within (by AfD politicians and right-wing influencers), the aim was to influence the elections directly and to gradually undermine democracy as a whole. The authoritarian playbook for delegitimising democracy has now found its way into the German federal system.

On the other hand, from a sociological perspective, there is much to suggest that the election result, whilst differing in scale, follows the same underlying pattern as a broader societal trend. The AfD has long been a nationwide phenomenon; it is merely the structural conditions and social stabilisers that differ. This explains the variations between the federal states, particularly in times of global uncertainty (e.g. party loyalty, economic structures, collective bargaining coverage, etc.).

Social divisions

The state election in Saxony-Anhalt took place against a backdrop of general pessimism. Whilst this is not unusual in itself, this election year is also characterised by widespread dissatisfaction with the state government and persistent, deep-seated dissatisfaction with the federal government, which goes beyond the negative assessment of the “traffic light” coalition.

A large majority of citizens in Saxony-Anhalt are concerned about the state of affairs in Germany (here and below: Infratest dimap: Saxony-Anhalt ahead of the 2026 election), both regarding the future of democracy and economic development. Concerns are widespread across the population and in all political circles, yet the differences in the details highlight the division within the state. Pronounced fears of inflation and social decline are a defining feature (feeling overwhelmed by price rises: 70 per cent; standard of living under threat: 58 per cent). These concerns are, in part, entirely justified: Saxony-Anhalt has many structurally weak rural areas struggling with an ageing population, and the “Chemical Triangle” in the south of the state is also in the throes of a deep crisis, whilst other plans for new industrial settlements, such as that involving Intel, have failed.

Combined with lower net worth and a lower uptake of transition support schemes, many employees therefore fear that their own jobs – and thus their livelihoods – are at risk, whilst a large share of (future) pensioners are critical of the federal government’s reforms. The survey data clearly show that this fear of loss – partly real, partly perceived – has been exploited politically, particularly by the Right. AfD supporters, in particular, fear they will no longer be able to pay their bills (89 per cent; overall: 70 per cent) or maintain their standard of living (80 per cent; overall: 58 per cent). Supporters of the Left share these fears roughly in line with the overall average, whereas supporters of the CDU, the SPD, and the Greens do so to a far lesser extent. This shows that the divide is clearly discernible along the lines of economic fears.

Furthermore, whilst concern for democracy and the rule of law is shared across all social groups and political currents, there are significant differences in the interpretation of exactly what the threats consist of: Only AfD supporters are more likely than average to see the country’s way of life as under threat or to complain about there being too many foreigners in the country. In addition, only a majority of AfD supporters do not see Russia as a threat. In other words, the perception of these issues among AfD supporters differs fundamentally from that of other parties’ supporters (BSW, FDP: not shown). Thus, whilst the vast majority of people in the country are concerned, their reasons vary greatly and clearly follow party lines (often pitting the AfD against the CDU, the SPD, and the Greens), suggesting that right-wing narratives and interpretative frameworks exert a strong persuasive influence in receptive circles.

This is also confirmed by the splitting analysis of the Infratest dimap post-election survey: neither did AfD first-vote voters cast their second votes for other parties to any significant extent, nor did the AfD list receive a significant number of additional votes from first-vote voters of other parties. The AfD’s voter base is therefore, on the one hand, clearly cohesive, but on the other hand, as the results show, broadly anchored in society: in Saxony-Anhalt, the AfD is the dominant force in almost all regions, social milieus and demographic groups. It won 38 out of 41 constituencies outright; only in three urban constituencies was the Left able to secure a direct mandate. In only one constituency is the AfD not the strongest force in terms of second votes, achieving less than 20 per cent, whereas the Greens became the strongest force by second votes in that constituency (Halle III).

With the exception of civil servants and older voters, the AfD was consistently the strongest force and recorded double-digit gains, particularly among young men and voters with a lower level of formal education (except among civil servants; data here and below: Infratest dimap: Election Analysis). The party has gained across the political spectrum, but most significantly from the CDU, the group of minor parties, and above all, through the mobilisation of former non-voters.

Voting motives continue to be characterised by protest voting (in particular as a protest against the federal government), but to a far greater extent than before also by conviction in the party, its ability to address issues and its policy platform, as well as, to a significant degree, in its lead candidate Ulrich Siegmund: according to their own statements, four in ten AfD voters chose the party because of him. AfD voters were almost unanimously in favour of a state government led by their party and its lead candidate.

Map: Heinrich Böll Foundation. Source: State Returning Officer of Saxony-Anhalt. Map data: © GeoBasis-DE / LVermGeo ST dl-de/by-2-0

Dizzying coalition arithmetic

The widely differing perceptions of the situation and the clear divide between the electorate ultimately also shape perceptions of the government’s work at the federal level and, above all, at the state level. Whilst the majority of supporters of the CDU, the SPD, and even the Greens were generally satisfied with their state government, supporters of The Left, and above all the AfD, express clear dissatisfaction. The extent to which these camps have solidified is also demonstrated by the massive shift in the attribution of competence and in preferences for the Minister-President: supporters of the AfD favour “their” party on these points and reject all others across the board, and vice versa.

This clear polarisation of the two blocs against one another is by no means new and is the reason why cooperation between the AfD and the CDU would most likely be to the detriment of the latter: the election in Saxony-Anhalt clearly shows how deeply the AfD has penetrated among the middle class with a charismatic lead candidate and a positive, mood-driven campaign in times of uncertainty. Whilst the AfD has recently focused primarily on mobilising its core electorate in the west, its support in the east – particularly in this election – has already broadened considerably, meaning it has become socially normalised.

Looking ahead to the formation of the next government, this means that the difficulties in securing a majority are not merely a matter of party tactics, but are clearly rooted in policy issues and voter preferences. Everything points to an extremely difficult process of forming a government. If one assumes the model of a majority government (rather than a minority government with shifting majorities), no simple solution is in sight. With 39 seats each for the AfD on the one hand, and the CDU, the SPD, the Greens, and the Left Party on the other, there is a deadlock; 42 votes are required for an absolute majority.

The AfD reversed course immediately after the election, saying it no longer regards an absolute majority of its own as a prerequisite to governing, and that, for the time being, it only sees the need for a reliable majority. This could be achieved through a coalition or at least a firm cooperation agreement with the BSW. A CDU-led coalition against the AfD, on the other hand, would require the involvement of all the other parties in the state parliament – namely the Left , the Greens, the SPD, the CDU, and the BSW – a highly unlikely scenario. Consequently, the idea of a cross-party Minister-President, which the BSW has once again brought into the discussion, takes on a certain relevance: assuming this person were acceptable to the entire democratic spectrum, the BSW could thus play a decisive role in the election of a democratically supported Minister-President.

That said, by being prepared to abstain in the third round of voting, the BSW also has the opportunity, for the first time, to help a Minister-President from a confirmed far-right party into office. This would not be without further complications: the five abstentions would help the AfD but would not break the deadlock. To do so, at least one further vote, one more abstention, or an absence from the vote by one of the other parliamentary groups would be required.

It is now up to the BSW to decide which side to support, but a minority government cannot be entirely ruled out. Saxony-Anhalt, in particular, is one of the few federal states with long-standing experience of this form of government, which is atypical in Germany (except for the “Magdeburg Model”, an SPD minority government from 1994 to 2002). Saxony-Anhalt is characterised not only by high volatility and low party loyalty, but also by a willingness to embrace new coalition models (the “Kenya Coalition” comprising the CDU, the SPD, and the Greens, or the “Germany Coalition” comprising the CDU, the SPD and the FDP).

Chart: Heinrich Böll Foundation Source: State Returning Officer of Saxony-Anhalt

What will the Greens do now?

There was a lot at stake for the Greens in this election, as they had recently been struggling, particularly in the eastern German federal states. In Thuringia and Brandenburg, the Greens lost their parliamentary status in 2024, and this election risked repeating that. However, the outcome – surprising to some extent – turned out differently: the Greens have achieved their best-ever result in a state election in Saxony-Anhalt. The structural patterns in electoral sociology are unremarkable, and the motives for voting also match expectations: for three-quarters of their voters, the decisive reason for voting for the Greens was policy-based considerations, coupled with a unanimous rejection of an AfD government and a clear preference for a CDU-led state government.

And yet something is different. The election result is largely attributable to the debates and initiatives promoting tactical voting: the aim was to prevent the AfD from securing an absolute majority – and thus taking power – by ensuring that the Greens and the SPD retained their seats in the state parliament. Whilst the former objective was achieved, the question of who will form the government remains unanswered.

Although up until July the polls gave little indication that the Greens would return to the state parliament, they managed to capitalise on the window of opportunity presented by this election. They benefited not only from CDU swing voters, but also from the mobilisation of former non-voters. This election campaign was underpinned by disciplined communication and unusually strong support from the entire party – from the party leadership and prominent figures, as well as from many members – but also from figures such as former Vice-Chancellor Robert Habeck and Baden-Württemberg’s Minister-President Cem Özdemir.

After the Saxony-Anhalt elections, Özdemir summed up the central responsibility of the Greens – and indeed of all parties – as follows: “What is required is honest and unsparing self-criticism from all democratic parties, leading to a dramatic change in the way we all conduct politics, both in form and substance. Less squabbling, fewer promises, more honest listening, and shared outcomes. Saying what is possible and saying what is not.”

This article was first published in German by the Heinrich Böll Stiftung. The English version is taken from the Heinrich-Böll-Stiftung Brussels.

Back in June, we asked you to submit preliminary scoping comments on a particularly ill-conceived oil and gas lease sale in Utah. The Bureau of Land Management (BLM) recently announced that it’s barreling ahead with this sale and is now accepting comments on the draft proposal, which would auction off some of Utah’s wildest places for fossil fuel development, including parcels in the Dirty Devil and Hatch Point regions. All told, the BLM’s Fourth Quarter Lease Sale would offer 43 parcels spanning more than 74,000 acres of public land in Utah.

The BLM is accepting public comments through Monday, September 21. Please tell the agency to keep oil and gas development out of these scenic, wild landscapes.

Hatch Point. © Ray Bloxham/SUWA

The Dirty Devil parcels are in a wild and remote region west of the Horseshoe Canyon unit of Canyonlands National Park and immediately north of the Dirty Devil Wilderness Study Area.

The Hatch Point parcels are located near the mouth of Trough Springs Canyon, south of Moab, and encompass Hatch Canyon and Kane Springs Canyon. These canyons are designated critical habitat for the threatened Mexican Spotted Owl in addition to supporting a wide array of other wildlife. The Hatch Point area also provides expansive views of the nearby Bears Ears region.

In its haste to fall into line with Trump administration priorities, the BLM prepared a draft environmental analysis that falls short of what the law requires. For example, many of the parcels—including those near Bears Ears—are in designated critical habitat for the Mexican Spotted Owl, a species listed as threatened under the Endangered Species Act (ESA). However, the agency failed to consult with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service about foreseeable impacts to the owl, as required by the ESA. Rather than consult now, the agency kicked the can down the road to the drilling stage when it claims that it may (but likely won’t) fulfill that requirement. This backwards approach is illegal and does nothing to ensure the owl is protected.

SUWA fully intends to hold the BLM accountable for its failure to follow the law. You can help by telling the agency to keep fossil fuel development out of Utah’s remarkable wild landscapes.

Click here to submit your comments by September 21

The post Tell BLM (Again) to Keep Fossil Fuel Development Out of Utah’s Wild Places appeared first on Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance.

In the wake of the recent flash flood that swept down from the Himalayas, Nepal is seeking immediate aid from a UN fund for climate loss and damage to help vulnerable families displaced by the disaster and rebuild destroyed schools and hospitals, the country’s foreign minister told Climate Home News.

“This is exactly the kind of climate-driven catastrophe the Fund was created to address,” Shisir Khanal said in an interview. He added that “stronger global solidarity and meaningful international support” are needed for countries like Nepal, which are facing increasingly severe climate-related disasters.

The floods were caused by a glacier collapsing and triggering a landslide that forced a torrent of water and debris to rush down the Bhote Koshi River valley, causing catastrophic impacts downstream. More than 1,300 people died and over 5,300 are still missing in the area.

Loss and damage fund urged to hold crisis meeting on Nepal

Khanal described the disaster as a “Himalayan tsunami”, telling Climate Home News that early assessments suggest the roads, bridges, hydropower stations, highways and settlements it wiped out could require billions of dollars to rebuild. Reconstruction estimates by the government range between $2.5 billion and $5 billion.

The minister of foreign affairs said Nepal would not be asking the UN’s new Fund for Responding to Loss and Damage (FRLD) “to write a single check for this total amount”, explaining that the government is finalising a post-disaster assessment “to guide our broader international donor appeals”.

Nepal disaster seen as test case for fledgling fund

In reality, if Nepal does receive rapid support from the FRLD, it is likely to be a fraction of the total bill because the fund has a cap of $20 million per project and has little more than $350 million available to hand out in its initial phase.

So far its board has not approved any projects as it is still working out how to allocate its scarce resources, nor does it have a process in place to respond to sudden climate disasters such as glacial lake outburst floods or powerful storms.

On August 31, Nepal’s government sent a direct appeal for emergency grant funding to the FRLD, emphasising that “a prompt response would… demonstrate that the fund can translate international solidarity into timely support for vulnerable countries and communities when it is most urgently needed”.

A couple of days later, eight developing-country board members – later joined by those from small island states – signed a letter, seen by Climate Home News, asking the fund’s board to hold an extraordinary meeting to respond to Nepal’s request.

The FRLD said in a statement that the devastating impacts on the ground “underscore both the urgency and scale of need and reaffirm the fundamental purpose for which the FRLD was established”.

It added that it is “committed to approaching Nepal’s request with the urgency, compassion, and careful consideration that these difficult circumstances require, while respecting the Fund’s governing instrument and established decision-making processes”. As of Wednesday, Climate Home News understands that discussions were still ongoing.

Designing infrastructure for extreme shocks

Khanal pointed to “the unprecedented scale” of the huge flood which occurred within a matter of minutes and swept away river gauges meant to provide early warning in Rasuwa and Nuwakot, near the border with Tibet.

“You cannot easily ‘plan’ against a mountain collapsing,” he said. But the lesson, he added in written responses in English, is that “our historical baseline for infrastructure engineering is no longer sufficient”.

Building resilient infrastructure means that “hydropower projects, roads and early warning systems must be designed for extreme, unpredictable climate shocks”, he said. Another key element will be plans to better understand and protect ecosystems, he added.

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The minister noted that Nepal, India and China share a common, interconnected Himalayan ecosystem and all three countries are affected by the impacts of climate change in the Himalayan mountain chain.

“Therefore, our call is for the three countries to work together to strengthen preparedness, resilience and regional cooperation,” he said.

New research from consultancy Systemiq, released on Wednesday, finds that Himalayan glaciers are losing mass 65% faster than a decade ago, and that only around 20 of the Himalaya’s estimated 40,000 glaciers are currently monitored. India alone has 56 glacial lakes rated very high risk, it warns.

The Rasuwagadhi flood destroyed a friendship bridge, a road, a hydropower substation, and swept away vehicles in Rasuwa, Nepal in July 2025. (Photo: Ambir Tolang/NurPhoto via Reuters Connect) The Rasuwagadhi flood destroyed a friendship bridge, a road, a hydropower substation, and swept away vehicles in Rasuwa, Nepal in July 2025. (Photo: Ambir Tolang/NurPhoto via Reuters Connect) Early cross-border efforts on information-sharing

Since the same region of Nepal was hit by smaller-scale but still highly destructive flooding in 2024 and 2025, China and Nepal have stepped up efforts to cooperate in tackling glacier-related risks in the region.

In August 2025, Climate Home News reported that authorities in both countries had agreed to share cross-border information about the risks of glacial lake outburst floods across the Tibetan region, in a first step that could be expanded to the national level in an effort to reduce deaths and damage. 

This May, a delegation from China’s Ministry of Water Resources and the Water Resources Department of the Xinjiang Autonomous Region held talks with Nepalese officials in charge of water and disaster management about establishing a joint disaster information mechanism.

Then in August, a team from the Institute of Mountain Hazards and Environment under the Chinese Academy of Sciences also visited Nepal for scientific research and exchange, sharing China’s experience in monitoring glacial lakes.

Nepal and China agree to cooperate on glacial lake flooding, as warming hikes threat

However, experts told Climate Home News that progress on putting in place concrete measures has been slow. Narendra Khanal, a professor in the department of geography at Tribhuvan University, blamed that partly on Nepal’s traditional administrative system and bureaucratic delays.

“We have to share information with them, and they have to share information with us,” he said. “In my understanding, the Chinese side is also facing difficulties in making this cooperation work.”

Mohan Bahadur Chand, a Himalayan glaciologist and assistant professor at Kathmandu University, said China has the technology and human resources to provide significant information to its neighbour downstream.

But, to make that work, “we have to build trust between the two countries”, which is currently lacking but could be developed, he said. “As scientists, we are already working with them personally. If we create a trusted environment, cooperation should not be difficult.”

Nepal lacks monitoring and warning technology

Experts said Nepal – one of the world’s least-developed countries – does not have the technology or resources to install the sophisticated monitoring and warning systems needed to protect its population from growing threats linked to accelerating glacier melt in the Himalayas.

A senior meteorologist at the Department of Hydrology and Meteorology, who did not want to be named, told Climate Home News that the government had not invested enough in rainfall and weather monitoring stations, especially above 3,500 metres, and therefore lacks reliable data about what is happening at high altitudes.

“The stations we have are operated by different organisations, but many of them are not functioning properly,” the official added.

Comment: The loss and damage fund needs far more finance to deliver climate justice

This year, the UN’s Green Climate Fund released initial funding for a $50-million project to address the risks from four glacial lakes in other parts of Nepal, but has come under criticism for taking seven years to approve the proposal. The fund said this was due to efforts needed to strengthen and consult on the project, as well as administrative, institutional and COVID-related delays.

Foreign minister Khanal said Nepal was calling on the international community for support to tackle global warming impacts into the future.

“This disaster should not be viewed simply as a one-time event requiring one-time assistance,” he emphasised. “We need to recognise the longer-term consequences of rising temperatures and climate change, particularly for vulnerable communities and developing countries.”

The post Foreign minister: Nepal needs “meaningful” international support to face climate threats appeared first on Climate Home News.

When people initially asked me what I loved most about my Audubon Conservation Ranching (ACR) internship, I would always answer that I loved actually exploring California: racing down dirt tracts in...

Today, the United States and Mexico signed an important Colorado River Treaty agreement known as Minute 334, extending the modern, collaborative binational relationship through 2028. This is good...

The ecological crisis is upon us. It touches everywhere on the planet. Its character is complex, manifesting in floods, fires, disease, eradication of forests and fisheries. Interacting factors worsen globally connected catastrophes.

Ian Angus’s Metabolic Rifts: Capitalism Assault on the Earth System makes an important contribution to understanding and guiding a socialist response to these compounding ecological crises.

Angus is an ecological Marxist scholar and founding member of the Global Ecosocialist Network. Metabolic Rifts connects modern science, history, and Marxism’s metabolic rift theory.

Angus says that our ecosocialist politics

must be based on a concrete scientific understanding of how our world has evolved, how it is changing today, and where those changes may take us. The way we build socialism, and the kind of socialism that can be built, will be profoundly shaped by the state of the planet we must build it on. If our programs and activity don’t have a scientific basis, all our efforts to change the world will be in vain. (5)

The book accessibly explains metabolic rift theory, the key insight of Marxist ecology. For Karl Marx, Frederick Engels, and subsequent Marxists in this tradition, the Earth’s metabolism is not a metaphor but a material reality. Interacting social, biological, chemical, and geological processes make life possible.

Metabolism

Marx used the concept of metabolism in three related ways. First, there is universal metabolism, Earth’s life-support system. This refers to the biological, chemical, and geological cycles on which all life depends.

Social metabolism is the way human society relates to the rest of nature. Social orders change over time, and class society—and then capitalism marks a significant historical shift.

Finally, metabolic rift is capitalism’s tendency to disrupt Earth’s cycles. The key factor driving this disruption is the subordination of human needs to capitalism’s drive for profit and accumulation. This process breaks the metabolic connection between humans and the rest of nature. Capitalism cannot change the natural laws governing life itself.

Drawing on soil science, Marx first analyzed the rift between town and country. In England, working-class urbanization and the separation of agricultural production and people meant that the food and human wastes previously returned to the soil flowed as pollution into rivers. This process broke the nutrient cycle and undermined soil fertility.

The metabolism of the earth includes material and energy cycles operating on time frames ranging from hours to hundreds of millions of years. These include the water cycle, the carbon cycle, and the nitrogen cycle.

With the attention rightly given to global heating and disruption of the carbon cycle, which is mostly caused by fossil fuels, other disruptions, like with the nitrogen cycle, are less appreciated, although no less important. A handful of healthy soil contains hundreds of millions of microorganisms. Soils are the most species-rich habitat on Earth. Healthy soil is necessary for fertility and absorbing carbon, and for nutritious food.

Angus traces the history of soil destruction to the town-country rift, which then led to imperial struggles to secure nitrogen-rich guano deposits to restore fertility. Ultimately, there was the development of industrial production and its complex of cash crops and fossil-fuel-derived nitrogen fertilizer. Farmers grossly over-apply nitrogen fertilizer, wasting two-thirds of it, polluting water and air, and disrupting a key Earth System metabolic cycle.

Capital versus the Earth System

The main part of Angus’s book is titled “Capital versus the Earth System.” It traces the ecological revolutions, including photosynthesis and land-based organisms, through which life and the rest of the planet historically co-evolved. This evolution created the conditions for more life and, ultimately, the stable equilibrium of the Holocene epoch over the last 10,000 years. Historically, relatively small changes in temperature or oxygen levels supported large changes in the biosphere. This insight is important for understanding ecological tipping points, when incremental change exceeds a threshold and may cause major changes in the Earth System.

Holocene chart in Metabolic Rifts (108).

Angus summarizes the distinctive anti-ecologic logic of capitalism as being characterized by “generalized production of commodities: profit maximization; competition among multiple capitalist; short-termism, and unending accumulation” (115).

These are inter-related dynamics that, among other outcomes, lead to uncontrolled growth. Ecologically, this means an ever-increasing linear flow of material and energy through the system that is in direct conflict with the universal metabolism. Angus writes,

The growth imperative is not, as liberal environmentalists often argue, just a mistaken policy or a false ideology. It is a fundamental structural feature of capitalism. Uncontrolled growth is an inevitable result of the profit system, of capitalism’s inherent drive to accumulate ever more capital. (122)

The Anthropocene epoch

Angus has been an important proponent of the theory that we have entered into a new Anthropocene epoch. On this view, the Earth has transitioned from a period of temperature and ecological stability known as the Holocene and is now in the capitalist-driven and unstable period of the Anthropocene, a qualitatively new geological epoch where human activity has fundamentally reshaped the Earth.

The reference point for this thesis is the post-World War II period known at the Great Acceleration. This marks an unprecedented era of fossil fuel enabled economic growth.

The charts below show the general trends.

The Great Acceleration: Socio-Economic Trends Since 1750. Image credit: A Planetary Health Check. The Great Acceleration: Earth Systems Trends Since 1750. Image credit: A Planetary Health Check.

In an Earth Systems framework, the result of capitalist production is that key planetary boundaries for maintaining a stable biosphere are being exceeded.

The ecological crisis is much more than about global heating and the need for green energy at scale. Exceeding boundaries also risks creating new tipping points, producing even worse outcomes. In one global heating scenario, for example, after a certain point of warming, a cascade of factors could set in to produce Hot House Earth, an environment inhospitable to human society and many existing forms of life.

Rough Guide to Planetary Boundaries. Image credit: A Rough Guide to Planetary Boundaries.

Scientists share with socialists and millions of oppressed and exploited workers a sense that we need a radical break with the status quo to resolve escalating crises and deteriorating living conditions. Angus quotes from the 2018 landmark earth science article “Trajectories of the Earth System in the Anthropocene,” published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences:

Incremental linear changes to the present socioeconomic system are not enough to stabilize the Earth System. Widespread, rapid, and fundamental transformations will likely be required to reduce the risk of crossing the threshold and locking in the Hothouse Earth pathway: these include changes in behavior, technology and innovation, governance, and values. (215)

Ecosocialist strategy

While revolution must be the goal of ecosocialists, this doesn’t mean we have no options for immediate political struggle.

Ecosocialists need to help elaborate necessary non-incremental and revolutionary social and ecological changes. But we must also contribute politically and practically to immediate fights for reforms.

Angus makes the case that our collective goal can’t be to govern nature, as capitalists and ecomodernists urge, but to democratically govern our dynamic interaction with the Earth. For Metabolic Rifts, a guiding goal is expanding the commons—the democratically regulated and accessible provisioning of our basic needs. Housing, education, healthcare, and food shouldn’t be commodified but freely available to all.

The original expropriation of direct producers from the land was integral to early capitalist development. Solving the general metabolic rift requires overcoming the social rift between workers and their communities from the means of livelihood.

The long process of original expropriation, of evicting peasants from the country and forcing them into cities, was a long, extremely violent, and contested process in Europe. Ian Angus’s earlier book The War Against the Commons: Dispossession and Resistance in the Making of Capitalism chronicles this history and points to the role of popular resistance and the need to reestablish a conception of the commons.

Other goals—from closing fossil fuel corporations and expropriating agribusiness, to banning single-use plastic and other chemicals that nature cannot absorb and recycle, to paying international ecological debts and abolishing the U.S. military empire—would be part of the revolutionary transformation to ecosoicalism.

Immediate reforms are challenging—and will not immediately affect the global crisis. But we must engage in struggles that people can learn from and that can have real-world impact. The expansion of the global commons can only come about through the mass struggle of the global working class, indigenous communities, and colonized peoples.

From halting fossil fuel infrastructure, closing data centers, taking back public water supplies, and demanding public housing and transit to the struggle for a free Palestine and end to genocide, everything has an ecological dimension.

Our challenge is to bring the broad scope of ecological breakdown and the need for democratic social and ecological renewal into all our struggles. Metabolic Rifts helps us do this.

Opinions expressed in signed articles do not necessarily represent the views of the editors or the Tempest Collective. For more information, see “About Tempest Collective.”
Featured Image credit: Monthly Review; modified by Tempest.

The post Confronting the ecological crisis appeared first on Tempest.

Nearly 45 million acres of the nation’s most intact forests—an area larger than Oklahoma—could soon open to logging and road building under a proposal from the U.S. Forest Service. The plan...

By Zachery Suaco, Communications and Social Media Intern at the Chesapeake Climate Action Network (CCAN)

I grew up knowing what climate disaster looked like before I had a word for it. My family is Filipino, and Typhoon Haiyan in 2013 was not a news story for us. It consisted of phone calls we were afraid to answer. It was waiting to hear if people we loved were okay. I was in elementary school, and I already understood that the climate was not some future problem, but rather something that had already taken things from people I knew.

That understanding is what led me into climate advocacy. It felt like the most honest thing I could do with the anger and frustration I had been carrying. And I genuinely believed that my generation, Gen Z, was different. That we had grown up with enough awareness to actually do something about it.

But what I did not expect was to look at my utility bill and find out that I was part of the problem in a way I had never considered.

Data centers, part of the physical infrastructure behind every AI tool my generation uses constantly, are one of the biggest drivers of energy demand in the DMV right now. Virginia alone has over 600 data centers, more than any other state in the country, and those data centers already consume more than a quarter of the Commonwealth’s entire electricity supply. That’s not a national statistic spread thin across the country. That’s our grid, and our overall region. And when demand that big gets added to a system, the costs cannot be absorbed quickly or painlessly.

Virginia residents have already seen their monthly bills go up $11.24 in 2026 partly because of the infrastructure being built to support that demand. And regulators had to create an entirely separate rate class just for data center customers to stop the cost-shifting from getting worse. That’s how significant the footprint has gotten.

Here’s the part that is hardest to accept. Gen Z did not build these data centers. But we are the first generation to normalize using AI for everything — from generating images to answering questions we could have Googled to having full conversations with chatbots. And that usage has a physical cost that most of us have never once thought about. Every 20 to 50 queries to a large language model uses roughly 500 milliliters of water, about the size of a standard plastic water bottle, just for cooling the servers and powering the grid that runs them. And by 2028, the onslaught of AI data centers worldwide is projected to consume over a trillion liters of water annually. That’s eleven times what all data centers used just a year ago.

We are the generation that grew up going to climate strikes. But we are also the generation that made ChatGPT the fastest-growing consumer product in history. Those two things are in real tension, and I don’t think we talk about it enough.

Packed room at a Data Center Town Hall at Studio 2,3 in Richmond, VA.

I am not saying AI is irredeemably bad or that we need to stop using it. That is not a realistic or even useful approach. But I do think my generation has been sold a version of climate consciousness that is more about identity than behavior. We recycle, we carry reusable bags, we post in opposition to fossil fuel companies on platforms that run on fossil-fuel-powered infrastructure. And we have mostly gotten a pass on interrogating the digital habits that are now reshaping energy grids in our own backyard.

The good news is that there is already pushback happening. In Virginia alone, 42 community groups and more than 12,000 people have signed petitions pushing back against unchecked data center expansion. People are paying attention. The question is whether my generation is going to show up to that fight the same way we showed up to the ones that felt easier.

Growing up Filipino and watching what Haiyan did taught me that climate change does not wait for people to feel ready. It just arrives, and it arrives when we least expect it. And the least we can do is be honest about where our own consumption fits into that picture, and then actually do something about it. That’s why I’m calling on my peers to show up to local hearings and demand a pause on new energy and water-guzzling data centers. Until we have the right solutions, “build first, figure it out later” is not an option.

About the author: Zachery Suaco (he/him) is a Communications and Social Media Intern at the Chesapeake Climate Action Network (CCAN) for spring/summer 2026. He is a recent graduate of Towson University where he received a bachelor’s degree in Communication Studies.

Zachery’s connection to climate justice is personal, rooted in his Filipino heritage and the devastation Typhoon Haiyan brought to his family’s home country in 2013. That experience shaped his belief that climate change is not a future problem but a present one, and drives his commitment to using communications as a tool for advocacy. In his free time, Zachery enjoys music, exploring DC, and finding new ways to blend creativity with strategy.

The post Your Feed Is Warming the Planet: Why Gen Z’s Next Climate Move Is Data Center Accountability appeared first on Chesapeake Climate Action Network.

Ask any birder to name their favorite birdsong, and you’ll get a variety of answers, from the cheery, rich tunes of the Baltimore Oriole and American Robin to the more musical notes of a Wood...

Young voters interrupted the United States Postal Service Board of Governors closed door meeting to request the Governors reject the administration’s plan to intercede in mail-in ballot efforts. They delivered ballots in USPS official mail boxes asking the Governors to deliver ballots uninterrupted like past election years.

"Postmaster General, Board of Governors, you get to decide, will millions Americans have their ballots tossed out or do Americans still get to pick their own leaders. Can you commit to us, to the public today, that you will mail every ballot out and not cave to Donald Trump's political demands?” asked 24 year old Georgia voter Alex Ames.

"Thank you for sharing your thoughts. We are in a private meeting. We appreciate the feedback,” said Board of Governors Member and Chair Amber F. McReynolds.

"We understand it’s a meeting but this is also an emergency. Ballots have already started getting mailed out..if all these ballots get tossed out potentially young voters, potentially millions of people might not have their ballots delivered,” continued Ames. “Can you commit to not tossing out people’s ballots?”

"Thank you for sharing this feedback but this is a different subject for meeting, " responded McReynolds.

Young voters carried ballots in USPS packages with the words “Let us vote,” “we love the USPS,” and “count my ballot” attached.

"I’m worried young people’s voices won't be heard in November because their ballots won't be delivered. Trump is threatening not just our ability to mail our vote but our right to decide our future and the direction of our country,” said 24 year old voter Stella Lovelady. “Young people, like all Americans, have a right to elect our leaders and have our voices heard. I confronted the Board of Governors because they made a commitment to the country–to not just deliver our mail but to honor our values, protect our constitution and fight for what is just. I have the right to vote, to elect my leaders and I expect the Board of Governors to reject this desperate attempt by the Trump administration to steal that from the people. Speak out Governors–please, fight for me.”

Sunrise Movement, the youth climate action organization, called on the USPS Board to reject Trump’s executive order, noting nearly 47 million Americans vote by mail and calling on the USPS to focus on delivering the mail and not deciding who is eligible to receive a ballot.

"Trump is desperate. He sees the writing on the wall and has decided the only way he can win is if possibly millions of people can’t vote,” said Sunrise Movement Executive Director Aru Shiney-Ajay. “The American people won't let that happen. We’ll defeat this wannabe dictator in November like we did in 2020–with our votes, our voices and our peaceful actions.”

Sunrise Movement is currently making millions of voter contact attempts to elect progressive, climate champions to Congress like Abdhul El-Sayed, Donavan McKinney, William Lawrence and Troy Jackson. These races currently face threats of electoral sabotage from the administration.

Responding to the announcement by Canada, Denmark, Finland, France, Iceland, Ireland, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Spain, Sweden and the UK that they plan to restrict trade with illegal Israeli settlements in the Occupied Palestinian Territory and are considering further measures, Amnesty International’s Senior Director for Research Advocacy, Policy and Campaigns, Erika Guevara Rosas said:

“The announcement that 12 states plan to introduce restrictions on trade with Israeli settlements, which are illegal under international humanitarian law, is a welcome, if long overdue, development that must pave the way for the adoption of further measures to bring an end to Israel’s unlawful occupation and institutionalized system of apartheid imposed against Palestinians.

“The measures announced so far, while important, fall far short of meeting the International Court of Justice’s July 2024 instructions to states ‘not to render aid or assistance’ in maintaining Israel’s unlawful occupation of the Palestinian Territory.

“Settlement creation and expansion – with state-backed settler violence now a central tool driving displacement and dispossession at unprecedented levels under the current Israeli government – are a core component of Israel’s policy and cannot be separated from its overarching system of apartheid.

“Entire Palestinian communities face the imminent risk of erasure in the West Bank amidst an ongoing ethnic cleansing campaign. Meanwhile Palestinians in the occupied Gaza Strip continue to battle for survival amidst Israel’s ongoing genocide.

To truly tackle the violations stemming from illegal settlements states must go further; they must target the very infrastructure that funds, sustains and supports Israel’s unlawful occupation.
Erika Guevara Rosas, Amnesty International

“To truly tackle the violations stemming from illegal settlements states must go further; they must target the very infrastructure that funds, sustains and supports Israel’s unlawful occupation. This requires imposing measures on key entities, including Israeli government ministries, implicated in establishing, maintaining and providing material support to illegal settlements and settlement infrastructure, as well as taking effective action to prevent and halt the forcible transfer of Palestinians.

“All states must make absolutely clear that they will no longer provide political, financial and military support that contributes to Israel’s serious and systematic violations of international law.

“They must also impose targeted sanctions, including travel bans and asset freezes, against Benjamin Netanyahu, Bezalel Smotrich, Itamar Ben-Gvir, Israel Katz and Orit Strock as Israeli officials directly implicated in the ethnic cleansing and forcible transfer of Palestinians in the West Bank, and in maintaining Israel’s unlawful occupation and apartheid. They must also ban the transfer of arms and security equipment that risk facilitating Israeli violations.

“For their part, EU states must now call on President of the European Commission Ursula von der Leyen to present them with a proposal for a comprehensive EU-wide ban on trade with settlements, and on key states to support it, including Italy and Germany. They must also take the next logical step and suspend the EU-Israel Association Agreement.

“There is no longer any room for excuses, delays or half measures. Failure to act decisively to tackle Israel’s mass violations against Palestinians sends a dangerous signal that states are unwilling to uphold their own legal obligations. It also emboldens the Israeli authorities to continue violating international law with impunity while denying Palestinians meaningful protection.”