ENVIRONMENT CALIFORNIA– Take-out food and drinks in Palo Alto will come in either paper or plastic containers after the city council on Monday voted unanimously to ban expanded polystyrene, popularly but incorrectly called Styrofoam.

The ban will take effect next Earth Day — April 22, 2010 — despite calls for an earlier start from some on the council. A restaurant group thanked the city for the grace period, saying it will help small businesses use up existing supplies before making the transition.

As a concession to the trade group, the city offered an additional one-year “hardship” exemption to businesses that can show they would be hurt financially by the switch to other materials.

Palo Alto follows Oakland, San Francisco, Millbrae and several other cities in banning polystyrene foam, which is hard to recycle and often ends up as litter. Volunteers in Palo Alto have photographed bits of the foam in local creeks, where it can harm fish and other wildlife.

The ban will force businesses to shift to packaging made of either recyclable plastic, paper or other compostable materials. According to a city survey, more than two-thirds of Palo Alto restaurants already avoid polystyrene foam.

Continue reading about Palo Alto Bans Styrofoam. 

© Environment California, 2009 

Photo by flickr user Skyepeale

March 6. 2008

THINK PROGRESS– The Harris results reflect the findings of a Harvard University study conducted last year, which found “nearly two-thirds of Americans do not trust campaign coverage by the news media.” A few other recent surveys offer some explanation for the public’s distrust:

– Two thirds of Americans – 67% – believe traditional journalism is out of touch with what Americans want from their news.

– The harshest indictments of the press come from the growing segment that relies on the internet as its main source for news. The internet news audience is particularly likely to criticize news organizations for their lack of empathy, their failure to “stand up for America,” and political bias.

– Democrats, Republicans and independents have decreased confidence in the accuracy of media reports on the war.

These days, the slogan “most trusted name in news” doesn’t mean as much as it once did.

‘

© COPYRIGHT THINK PROGRESS, 2008

REUTERS– Nearly 70 percent of Americans believe traditional journalism is out of touch, and nearly half are turning to the Internet to get their news, according to a new survey. 

While most people think journalism is important to the quality of life, 64 percent are dissatisfied with the quality of journalism in their communities, a We Media/Zogby Interactive online poll showed.

“That’s a really encouraging reflection of people who care A) about journalism and B) understand that it makes a difference to their lives,” said Andrew Nachison, of iFOCOS, a Virginia-based think tank which organized a forum in Miami where the findings were presented.

Nearly half of the 1,979 people who responded to the survey said their primary source of news and information is the Internet, up from 40 percent just a year ago. Less than one third use television to get their news, while 11 percent turn to radio and 10 percent to newspapers.

More than half of those who grew up with the Internet, those 18 to 29, get most of their news and information online, compared to 35 percent of people 65 and older. Older adults are the only group that favors a primary news source other than the Internet, with 38 percent selecting television.

Howard Finberg, of the Poynter Institute in St. Petersburg, Florida, said the public often doesn’t understand that the sources they are accessing online such as Google News and Yahoo News pull stories from newspapers, television, wire services and other media sources.

“It’s delivered in a non-traditional form, that doesn’t necessarily mean there isn’t traditional journalism underneath it,” he explained.

But Finberg said the study does support the belief among many large media companies that focusing on local issues is important to their journalistic and economic survival.

© COPYRIGHT REUTERS, 2008

Photo by flickr user Adam Selwood

REUTERS– Federal agents detained and interrogated a U.S. college student at the Philadelphia airport simply because we was carrying a set of English-Arabic flashcards, a lawsuit alleged on Wednesday.

The American Civil Liberties Union said it filed the suit on behalf Nicholas George, 22, a language student at Pomona College in California who was held at Philadelphia International Airport for nearly five hours in August 2009.

George, a U.S. citizen from the Philadelphia suburb of Wyncote, was on his way back to college when airport security officers found him carrying the flashcards, each of which had an English word on one side and its Arabic equivalent on the other, the ACLU said.

The U.S. Transportation Security Administration questioned him, and a TSA supervisor asked him how he felt about the September 11 attacks, whether he knew “who did 9/11,” and whether he knew what language Osama bin Laden spoke, the ACLU said.

He was handcuffed and left in a locked cell for two hours before being “abusively” interrogated by two FBI agents, but was never told why he was being detained, the ACLU said.

The lawsuit, filed in U.S. district court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania, charges that officers from the TSA, FBI and Philadelphia police violated George’s constitutional rights of free speech and to be free from unreasonable seizure.

“As someone who travels by plane, I want TSA agents to do their job to keep flights safe,” George said in a statement. “But I don’t understand how locking me up and harassing me just because I was carrying the flashcards made anybody safer.”

Neither the federal agencies nor the Philadelphia police could be reached for comment.

© COPYRIGHT REUTERS, 2010

SAN DIEGO READER– Some of them have been seen suspending large banners from freeway overpasses. Others have been spotted at busy intersections waving signs that call for revolution. And groups of them have been heard on street corners in the Gaslamp and Pacific Beach discoursing on the need to end foreign military occupation, restore civil liberties, and dissolve the IRS and CIA.

They are San Diego’s soldiers in the grassroots army of presidential candidate Ron Paul, a ten-term Republican Congressman from Lake Jackson, Texas, and they are taking on the establishment one homemade sign and one commandeered street corner at a time.

With nearly 975 members, the San Diego branch of the Ron Paul campaign is the fourth largest in the country, behind those in New York City, Austin, and Chicago. The chapters are unaffiliated with Paul’s national headquarters in Arlington, Virginia, receiving neither aid nor direction. Local members shell out their own money to print stickers and campaign literature, and they can be seen making runs to the hardware store for paper and spray paint to make their signs. They sell buttons, shirts, and Ron Paul DVDs from the beds of their trucks: DVDs for 25 cents, a button for $1, and shirts for $5.

They also hold meetings at places like the Boll Weevil restaurant in San Marcos. On January 10, some of North County’s newest members cram into the Boll Weevil’s empty dining room to introduce themselves and share their efforts with others in the campaign. The excitement from the 31 in attendance overpowers the scent of the half-pound steerburgers.

The supporters span the political and age spectrums. They range from a politically disgruntled man in his late 60s wearing a checkered flannel shirt to a 20-year-old female law student.

Continue reading about The Ron Paul Posse. 

© San Diego Reader, 2008

Photo by flickr user Jayel Aheram