12/04/2018 | UPONSOFT

UN Chief Calls for Momentum at 2019 Climate Summit

By Uponsci | 12/04/2018 | No Comments | Science

The U.N. secretary-general on Tuesday urged world leaders to use a climate change summit he will host in 2019 to explain how they plan to ratchet up their efforts to reverse worsening global warming that is leading to a “very dramatic situation.”

Antonio Guterres said the gathering at the United Nations in New York in September would be an “essential piece” in raising ambition to cut heat-trapping emissions, and helping countries cope better with wilder weather and rising seas.

The summit also will seek to raise more funding to ensure wealthy governments keep a 2020 promise to deliver $100 billion annually to help poor countries develop cleanly and adapt to a hotter planet, the U.N. chief added.

“We all know the massive scale of the climate challenge we face,” he told reporters at climate talks in Poland. “And we all know we are not on track.”

In 2020, countries are due to submit to the United Nations updated national climate action plans that are the lynchpin of the Paris Agreement adopted in 2015.

Under that accord, nearly 200 governments have committed to limit the rise in global temperatures to between 1.5 and 2 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial times.

There has already been an increase of about 1 degree C, and current pledges to reduce emissions are still likely to lead to warming of about 3 degrees C this century, scientists have said. In the coming year, U.N. agencies will work with governments to strengthen their climate action plans covering the decade to 2030, as well as their long-term strategies, Guterres said.

Climate experts said on Tuesday they expected countries to issue a political declaration at the end of the December 2-14 climate talks in Katowice that would firmly signal their intention to do more to cut emissions from 2020.

They should then “sharpen their pencils” and consult with government authorities, businesses and civil society back home to work out how to achieve that, said Alden Meyer, director of strategy and policy for the Union of Concerned Scientists.

The world has seen “a technology revolution since Paris,” he said, with renewable energy generation and storage now far cheaper — something countries must make the most of in revising their 2020 plans to cut emissions.

In Katowice, government officials are hammering out rules on how to measure and track emissions reductions under the Paris deal, seeking a formula to achieve widespread and ambitious cuts that is fair to countries with fewer resources.

There are also complex discussions on how rich states should track the funding they have provided and indicate the amount they will contribute in future years — a touchy subject with some governments reluctant to make promises.

Guterres said a central objective of his 2019 summit would be to provide a “transparent approach” to delivering $100 billion to vulnerable countries each year from 2020-2025, when a new target is due to kick in.

He urged donors to replenish the coffers of the flagship Green Climate Fund by the time of the summit, a process the fund’s board has said it aims to complete by October 2019.

The summit, designed to spur political commitment to action, will also involve different groups tackling climate change, from cities and companies to young people, the U.N. said in a briefing note.

The summit aims to win promises for on-the-ground change in polluting industries from oil to cement, and target how supply chains and technology can cut emissions and waste, particularly from farming and food systems.

It also wants cities to make new commitments on low-emission buildings, mass transport and green urban infrastructure, as well as protection for poor communities such as slum dwellers.

“The summit is not an end in itself,” Guterres said. “It is … a tool to leverage unprecedented ambition, transformation and mobilization.”
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Trump: Trade Talks With China Underway

By Uponbiz | 12/04/2018 | No Comments | Business

U.S. President Donald Trump said in a series of tweets Tuesday that talks to secure a trade deal with China “have already started” and if a “fair deal” is reached, “I will happily sign it.”

Trump’s comments come after leaders of the world’s two biggest economies agreed Saturday in Argentina to not impose any new tariffs on each other’s exports for the next 90 days while they negotiate a detailed trade agreement.

Trump declared himself Tuesday “a Tariff Man” who wants “people or countries” with intentions to “raid the great wealth” of the U.S. “to pay for the privilege of doing so.”

White House economic adviser Larry Kudlow said earlier this week the U.S. won Chinese commitments to buy more than $1 trillion in American products.

The U.S. had a $335.4 billion trade deficit with China in 2017. Trump said on Monday, however, “We are dealing from great strength, but China likewise has much to gain if and when a deal is completed. Level the field!”

The U.S. leader said U.S. farmers “will be a very BIG and FAST beneficiary of our deal with China. They intend to start purchasing agricultural product immediately. We make the finest and cleanest product in the World, and that is what China wants. Farmers, I LOVE YOU!”

Late Sunday, Trump tweeted that “China has agreed to reduce and remove tariffs on cars coming into China from the U.S. Currently the tariff is 40 percent.

On Monday, Kudlow said there was an “assumption” that China would eliminate auto tariffs, not a specific agreement.

China’s ministry of foreign affairs said Monday the Chinese and U.S. president had agreed to work toward removing all tariffs.

Trump said he and Xi “are the only two people that can bring about massive and very positive change, on trade and far beyond, between our two great Nations. A solution for North Korea is a great thing for China and ALL!”

At his political rallies and news conferences, Trump often praises the increase in U.S. military spending during his nearly two years in the White House.

But he tweeted that “at some time in the future,” Xi, Russian President Vladimir Putin and he “will start talking about a meaningful halt to what has become a major and uncontrollable Arms Race. The U.S. spent 716 Billion Dollars this year. Crazy!”

The 90-day truce in the escalating trade war between the U.S. and China came during a dinner meeting between the two presidents following the G-20 summit of the world’s biggest economies in Buenos Aires. For months, the two countries have engaged in tit-for-tat increases in tariffs on hundreds of billions of dollars of exports flowing between the two countries.

Trump, speaking to reporters on Air Force One after the plane departed Argentina, said his agreement with Xi, will go down “as one of the largest deals ever made. … And it’ll have an incredibly positive impact on farming, meaning agriculture, industrial products, computers — every type of product.”

Trump agreed he will leave the tariffs on $200 billion worth of Chinese products at 10 percent, and not raise it to 25 percent as he has threatened to do Jan. 1, according to a White House statement.

“China will agree to purchase a not yet agreed upon, but very substantial, amount of agricultural, energy, industrial and other product from the United States to reduce the trade imbalance between our two countries,” said White House Press Secretary Sarah Sanders. “China has agreed to start purchasing agricultural product from our farmers immediately.”

Trump and Xi also agreed to immediately begin negotiations on structural changes with respect to forced technology transfer, intellectual property protection, non-tariff barriers, cyber intrusions and cyber theft, services and agriculture, according to the White House statement.

“Both parties agree that they will endeavor to have this transaction completed within the next 90 days. If at the end of this period of time, the parties are unable to reach an agreement, the 10 percent tariffs will be raised to 25 percent,” the statement said.

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Congo’s Worst Ebola Outbreak Hits Women Especially Hard

By Uponsci | 12/04/2018 | No Comments | Science

The Democratic Republic of Congo is in the throes of its worst-ever Ebola outbreak, with more than 420 cases in the country’s volatile east, and a mortality rate of just under 60 percent. But this outbreak — the nation’s tenth known Ebola epidemic — is unusual because more than 60 percent of patients are women.

Among them is Baby Benedicte. Her short life has already been unimaginably difficult.

At one month old, she is underweight, at 2.9 kilograms. And she is alone. Her mother had Ebola, and died giving birth to her. She’s spent the last three weeks of her life in a plastic isolation cube, cut off from most human contact. She developed a fever at eight days old and was transferred to this hospital in Beni, a town of some half-million people in the east of the Democratic Republic of Congo.

More than 400 people have been diagnosed with Ebola here since the beginning of August, and more than half of them have died in a nation the size of Western Europe that struggles with insecurity and a lack of the most basic infrastructure and services. That makes this the second-worst Ebola outbreak in history, after the hemorrhagic fever killed more than 11,000 people in West Africa between 2013 and 2016.

This is 10th outbreak to strike the vast country since 1976, when Ebola was first identified in Congo. And this particular outbreak is further complicated by a simmering civil conflict that has plagued this region for more than two decades.

Guido Cornale, UNICEF’s coordinator in the region, says the scope of this outbreak is clear.

“It has become the worst outbreak in Congo, this is not a mystery,” he said.

What is mysterious, however, is the demographics of this outbreak. This time, more than 60 percent of cases are women, says the government’s regional health coordinator, Ndjoloko Tambwe Bathe.

“All the analyses show that this epidemic is feminized. Figures like this are alarming. It’s true that the female cases are more numerous than the male cases,” he said.

Bathe declined to predict when the outbreak might end, though international officials have said it may last another six months. Epidemiologists are still studying why this epidemic is so skewed toward women and children, Cornale said.

“So now we can only guess. And one of the guesses is that woman are the caretakers of sick people at home. So if a family member got sick, who is taking care of him or her? Normally, a woman,” he said.

Or a nurse. Many of those affected are health workers, who are on the front line of battling this epidemic. Nurse Guilaine Mulindwa Masika, spent 16 days in care after a patient transmitted the virus to her. She says it was the fight of her life.

“The pain was enormous, the pain was constant,” she said. “The headache, the diarrhea, the vomiting, and the weakness — it was very, very bad.”

For the afflicted, the road to recovery is long and lonely. Masika and her cured colleagues face weeks of leave from work to ensure the risk of infection is gone. In the main hospital in the city of Beni, families who have recovered live together in a large white tent, kept four meters from human contact by a bright orange plastic cordon. They yell hello at their caretakers, who must don protective gear if they want to get any closer.

And for Baby Benedicte, who is tended to constantly by a nurse covered head to toe in protective gear, the future is uncertain. Medical workers aren’t entirely sure where her father is, or if he is going to come for her.

She sleeps most of the day, the nurse says, untroubled by the goings-on around her. Meanwhile, the death toll rises.

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Uber Announces New Minibus Service in Traffic-mad Egypt

By Uponbiz | 12/04/2018 | No Comments | Business

Uber launched a new minibus service on Tuesday in traffic-mad Cairo, Egypt’s capital and one of the U.S. ride-sharing giant’s fastest-growing markets.

A part of an aggressive push into emerging countries, the company hopes to draw millions of Egyptians into ride-sharing from chronically congested, pollution-filled urban landscapes and replace personal automobiles. It is already investing $100 million into a Mideast and North Africa customer support center in Cairo.

At a news conference with the famed Pyramids at Giza in the background, CEO Dara Khosrowshahi said the company wants to grow its global number of users from 100 million to 1 billion, and that the new Uber Bus service was part of this plan.

“This is a product that we built for Cairo. It will now be the most affordable way to use Uber technology to get around the city,” he said. “I’m especially proud to add that Cairo is the first city globally to be rolling out Uber Bus.”

Microbuses — such as the ones Uber plans to use — are notorious in Cairo.

Often over-packed, speeding and veering across traffic lanes with little concern for safety and other drivers, the vehicles are the only affordable method of travel for millions of people in Egypt, where public transport is massively overloaded.

The company hopes that its safety features and feedback model will improve the popular mini-bus form of transport, allowing users to select the closest, quickest routes from convenient pick up spots. It also is introducing a smaller version of its application to run on less advanced mobile phones.

Uber’s regional rival, the Dubai-based Careem, said it also launched a microbus service in Cairo similar to Uber’s and that it is planning to offer similar services in Saudi Arabia and Pakistan in the future.

Uber drivers have come into conflict with taxis in Egypt, as in other countries. But many in this country of 100 million people say the service provides cleaner vehicles and driver accountability.

Egypt’s government also welcomes the company as it helps generate tax revenue by bringing in drivers from the informal economy. Uber says previous regulatory issues have been overcome, as have questions over data privacy raised by reports of Egypt’s infamous intelligence agencies seeking continuous access to user information and locations.
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Congo’s Worst Ebola Outbreak Hits Women Especially Hard

By Uponsci | 12/04/2018 | No Comments | Science

Rockers Hootie & the Blowfish Return with New Album, Tour

By Uponent | 12/04/2018 | No Comments | Entertainment

Twenty-five years after “Cracked Rear View” launched their careers, Grammy-winning rock band Hootie & the Blowfish will release a new album and launch an official tour next year after a decade-long break.

The Southern pop-rockers, featuring lead singer Darius Rucker, Mark Bryan, Jim Sonefeld and Dean Felber, broke out with their major label debut in 1994, which has been certified 21-times platinum and made the Recording Industry Association of America’s list of the top-10 most popular albums of all-time.

With Top 10 hits like “Hold My Hand,” “Let Her Cry” and “Only Wanna Be With You,” the South Carolina-based band went from playing college bars to selling out arenas and winning best new artist at the Grammy Awards in 1996. The band put out five studio albums and other live albums, never coming close to the popularity of the first, with the last one in 2006. Their last official tour was in 2007.

But with a big anniversary approaching in 2019, the four musicians who still play together a couple times a year for annual charity events decided it was time to go out on the road and bring with them some new music.

“Nothing has changed,” insists Rucker, who is now a major country star in his own right with several country radio hits like “Wagon Wheel.” “When the four of us get back together, we fall into the same dynamic of the band that’s always there. We’ve been a band for pretty much 30 years now. We’re just older now. There’s a lot less alcohol.”

Rucker said they hope to have a single out in the spring with a full album next summer. The Group Therapy Tour starts May 30, 2019, in Virginia Beach, Virginia, and will hit 44 cities, including the Hollywood Bowl in Los Angeles, T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas, Madison Square Garden in New York and Bridgestone Arena in Nashville, Tennessee. The tour ends in Columbia, South Carolina on Sept. 13.

The band talked to The Associated Press from Columbia, where they all met as students at the University of South Carolina, to discuss why their album was so successful, deciding to go dormant as Rucker explored his solo career and returning to their hometown on tour. The answers have been edited for brevity.

AP: How different does the campus look now from when you went there?

Felber: The university has changed a lot. The dorm where we actually met is now in the dump (the university demolished the dorm several years ago). It’s improved and grown massively.

Bryan: One interesting fact is we’re going to be doing our first Columbia, South Carolina, show in probably 20 years. The town that we came out of, that we played a million shows in when we were young, we haven’t played here in 20 years or almost.

AP: Are you expecting a lot of old college friends to start texting you again?

Rucker: We’re changing our phone numbers.

AP: Looking back at “Cracked Rear View,” the crazy amount of success and attention must have been a big change for you?

Rucker: We probably toured seven years before we got a record deal.

Felber: We did two cassettes and a CD before we got signed and did “Cracked Rear View,” and had been on the road for four years pretty solid. By the time we got there, we were pretty ready and pretty busy.

Bryan: But we also jumped to the big stages really quick, which we weren’t used to. So, it was kind of interesting trying to take our set from like a club show to these big arenas and that sort of thing. So, there was definitely a period of transition there.

AP: That album came out when the dominant sound in rock was grunge. Did that set you apart?

Sonefeld: Our music was going against the grain of what was popular on radio at the time. It was more of the angst-driven, harder-edged rock and I think we brought back melody and brought back some of the harmony sounds that weren’t really in the middle of rock radio at the time.

AP: Was there a conscious decision to put the band on hold?

Sonefeld: The idea of going dormant for an unknown period of time can be daunting or scary. But we felt like going away for a while, getting back to our families and a little bit more of a sedentary lifestyle might be a good experiment. We didn’t say we were going away for six months or six years. We just said, ‘Let’s go dormant.’ And Darius was releasing his first (country) single at the same time. So, he really got the opportunity to put a great effort, a full effort into country music. And when that blew up, it helped in some ways to secure that we would be dormant for more than six months.

AP: Where are you in the recording process?

Felber: We have a bunch of songs, and so now we are just working on it and getting them together and deciding which ones are going to be good and which ones aren’t going to be good. And then just kind of playing and writing in the studio.

AP: Beyond Columbia, are there certain venues or cities you’re excited about playing again?

Rucker: The Garden. The last time we played Madison Square Garden we played two nights and it was awesome. I haven’t been in there since to play a show. That’s exciting to know that we cannot play for 10 years and get to play those places again.

AP: Darius, are you ready to rock again after a decade in country music?

Rucker: I am looking forward to rocking again. Gonna be fun.
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Brian Tyree Henry: ‘I Feel Everything’

By Uponent | 12/04/2018 | No Comments | Entertainment

When Brian Tyree Henry filmed his scenes in “If Beale Street Could Talk,” he wept. When he saw the finished film, he wept again.

In Barry Jenkin’s lyrical adaptation of James Baldwin’s celebrated novel, Henry plays Daniel Carty, the just-out-of-jail friend of Fonny (Stephan James). When Fonny and Tish (KiKi Layne) run into Daniel on the street, they retreat to Fonny and Tisch’s apartment to catch up. The intimate conversation aches with the pain of incarceration: Daniel’s past, Fonny’s future. It’s a devastating but beautiful crescendo: two vulnerable black men, contemplating a world pitted against them.

“I was sobbing. I was like: Why am I crying at myself? Is that weird that I’m crying at myself?” says Henry. “It really, really, really sat with me. That could be me talking to my friend, me talking to my nephews, me talking to my brothers.”

It’s no surprise that one of the most moving and profound scenes of the year happens to be one with Henry in it. On stage and screen, in big parts and small, the 36-year-old actor’s soulful sensitivity and vast range has been on display with remarkably regularity.

There is, of course, his aspiring, oft-irritated rapper Alfred Miles, aka Paper Boi, on “Atlanta”: the stony, eye-rolling face to the series’ surrounding absurdity. Its second season earned Henry his second Emmy nomination in two years. (His first was for a guest appearance on “This Is Us.”) The Broadway revival of Kenneth Lonergan’s “Lobby Hero,” in which he played a conflicted security guard, won Henry is first Tony nod. And a few weeks before “Beale Street” hits theaters, Henry made an equally potent, if far more menacing impression as a politician in Steve McQueen’s “Widows.”

“I just don’t want to lie on them,” Henry says during a recent interview. “These characters need a voice and I don’t want to be a person to lie on them. It’s sounding all deep but it’s true. I have a special connection to every single character that I’ve been blessed to touch and I just want to make sure that I don’t lie on their journey, that I don’t lie on who they are, that I don’t lie on their hearts.”

Henry has a deep reservoir of emotion that never feels very far from the surface, and he speaks volubly, sometimes nearing tears, about the fictional lives that people his brain. Henry simply feels a lot — maybe too much so.

“I feel everything,” he grants with a knowing grin. “These past two years have been a topsy-turvy thing for me. I never in a million years could have imagined something so fantastic happening in my career. But I need to let ’em go, these guys.”

“That’s been kind of a problem as of late,” Henry sighs. “I tend to wear them as badges of honor, which they are.”

Henry grew up the baby in a Fayetteville, North Carolina, family; his sisters were already adults. His parents divorced when he was young and after graduating sixth grade, he was sent to live his father, then in his 70s, in Washington D.C. After attending Morehouse College in Atlanta, he got his masters from the Yale School of Drama. Acting, he says, saved his life because he allowed him to express what he observed.

“Most of my life, at a very young age, I got to see what it was like to be surrounded by the lack of care – to see that people are human, that no one is impervious to pain, that pain hurts, that it takes time for things to heal,” says Henry. “I spent most of my life constantly trying to hold on to the things that mattered.”

His Broadway debut came in the original cast in “The Book of Mormon,” but it’s been “Atlanta” that catapulted Henry’s career. Along with lending his voice to the upcoming “Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse,” he’s already shot four films due out next year (including an action comedy alongside Melissa McCarthy). At the moment, he’s shooting the Brooklyn-set indie “The Outside Story.”

Henry’s ascendance has partly paralleled Alfred’s more humbling, fitful rise on “Atlanta” — a comparison not lost on Henry.

“Alfred, this season, I had a time. I was like: This prom date sucks right now. But I had to confront it,” says Henry. “It is imitating my life, in a way. That’s why I’m glad that Alfred found me.”

“Atlanta,” particularly in episodes like “Barbershop” and “Woods” (which was a tribute for Henry to his deceased mother), has given the broadest platform for his talent. But films like “If Beale Street Could Talk” have showed how much Henry can do with just a handful of scenes. His presence instantly adds depth and gravity.

“He came onto set, maybe he was there for a day and a half,” marvels James. “He was already a huge Baldwin fan, but what he was able to bring to that moment … You talk about black love; that’s another form of it. Black love between brothers. That brotherly bond where we’re sharing our deepest, most intimate fears, the things that have broken us, how do we maintain our strength through these moments.”

Jenkins has said those scenes solidified the whole project. For Henry, they capture the duality of life as a black man.

“There’s always a constant audition process, I call it, of having to prove to people that you belong where you are,” says Henry, burly and broad-shouldered, remembering when Yale students would assume he wasn’t a classmate. “I’ve been very fortunate to come to this point in my life where I’m done doing that.”

Henry lives in Harlem, just a few blocks from where “Beale Street” was filmed. It’s almost as if his characters are encroaching, ever closer, on the actor, despite his best efforts to leave them at the door. But he’s learning to live with his hypersensitivity.

“I wouldn’t change that because it means I’m present. It means that I see you,” says Henry. “But then at the same time I need to figure out how to flip it so I see myself too.”
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World Bank Ups Funds to Tackle ‘Existential Threat’ of Climate Change

By Uponbiz | 12/04/2018 | No Comments | Business

The World Bank will give equal weight to curbing emissions and helping poor countries deal with the “disastrous effects” of a warming world as it steps up investments to tackle climate change in the first half of the 2020s, it said on Monday.

The bank and its two sister organizations plan to double their investments in climate action to about $200 billion from 2021-2025, with a boost in support for efforts to adapt to higher temperatures, wilder weather and rising seas.

The latest figures on international climate funding for developing nations show barely a quarter has been going to adaptation, with the bulk backing clean energy adoption and more efficient energy use, aimed at cutting planet-warming emissions.

“We live in a new normal in which disasters are more severe and more frequent,” World Bank CEO Kristalina Georgieva told the Thomson Reuters Foundation at U.N. climate talks in Poland.

“We have to prioritize adaptation everywhere, but especially in the most vulnerable parts of the world,” she said, pointing to the Horn of Africa and the Sahel, coastal regions and small island states.

Of the $100 billion the World Bank plans to make available in the five years from mid-2020, half would go to adaptation measures, it said.

Those include building more robust homes, schools and infrastructure, preparing farmers for climate shifts, managing water wisely and protecting people’s incomes through social safety nets, Georgieva added.

The World Bank said the money would also improve weather forecasts, and provide early warning and climate information services for 250 million people in 30 developing countries.

“Climate change is an existential threat to the world’s poorest and most vulnerable. These new targets demonstrate how seriously we are taking this issue,” World Bank Group President Jim Yong Kim said in a statement.

From 2014-2018, the World Bank spent nearly $21 billion on adaptation, which accounted for just over 40 percent of the climate benefits generated by the institution’s funding overall.

Former U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said the bank’s pledge to use half its climate finance to find solutions to deal with changing weather patterns was “important.”

“Climate change is already having a disastrous impact on people right around the world and we are nearing the point of no return,” said Ban. “So we must take bold action to adapt to the reality of the threat facing us all.”

A recently launched Global Commission on Adaptation, which Ban chairs with Georgieva and Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates, aims to put political muscle behind efforts to keep people safer in a hotter world.

The remaining $100 billion in promised World Bank Group funding will come from the International Finance Corporation (IFC), which works with the private sector, and the Multilateral Investment Guarantee Agency, as well as private capital the group raises.

“There are literally trillions of dollars of opportunities for the private sector to invest in projects that will help save the planet,” said IFC chief Philippe Le Houérou.

The IFC will identify opportunities, use tools to make investments less risky, and attract private-sector cash in areas including renewable energy, green buildings, clean transport in cities and urban waste management, he added.

Marshall Islands President Hilda Heine said her low-lying Pacific island state was struggling with fiercer storms and increasing seawater flooding that is contaminating fresh water with salt.

The new World Bank funds would “help to build resilience, make us safer, and improve lives,” she said.

“Global action needs to accelerate before it is too late,” she added.

The “Big Shift Global” coalition of aid agencies and climate justice campaigners said the World Bank Group’s new commitment signaled that developing countries should receive far more support to tackle climate change.

But it overlooked “the desperate need to radically scale up financing for off-grid renewable energy” to help the poorest gain access to electricity, they added.
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White House Seeks to End Subsidies for Electric Cars, Renewables

By Uponbiz | 12/04/2018 | No Comments | Business

White House economic adviser Larry Kudlow said on Monday the Trump administration wants to end subsidies for electric cars and other items, including renewable energy sources.

Asked about plans after General Motors announced U.S. plant closings and layoffs last week, Kudlow pointed to the $2,500-to-$7,500 tax credit for consumers who buy plug-in electric vehicles, including those made by GM, under federal law.

“As a matter of our policy, we want to end all of those subsidies,” Kudlow said. “And by the way, other subsidies that were imposed during the Obama administration, we are ending, whether it’s for renewables and so forth.”

Asked about a timeline, he said: “It’s just all going to end in the near future. I don’t know whether it will end in 2020 or 2021.”

The tax credits are capped by Congress at 200,000 vehicles per manufacturer, after which the subsidy phases out. GM has said it expects to hit the threshold by the end of 2018, which means under the current law, its tax credit scheme would end in 2020. Tesla said in July it had hit the threshold.

Other automakers may not hit the cap for several years.

Experts say the White House cannot change the cap unilaterally. U.S. President Donald Trump last week threatened to eliminate subsidies for GM in retaliation for the company’s decision.

Kudlow made clear any changes in subsidies would not just affect GM.

“I think legally you just can’t,” he said.

Democrats will take control of the U.S. House in January and are unlikely to agree to end subsidies for electric cars and many have been pushing for additional incentives.

Tesla and GM have lobbied Congress for months to lift the cap on electric vehicles or make other changes, but face an uphill battle make changes before the current Congress expires.

In October, Senator Dean Heller proposed lifting the current cap on electric vehicles eligible for tax credits but phase out the credit for the entire industry in 2022. Two other senators in September proposed lifting the per manufacturer credit and extending the benefit for 10 years.

Also in October, Senator John Barrasso a Republican who chairs the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, proposed legislation to end the EV tax credit entirely.
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Fed Chairman Powell Says Economic Challenges Remain

By Uponbiz | 12/04/2018 | No Comments | Business

Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell said Monday that despite solid economic progress, the country still faces a number of challenges ranging from slow wage-growth for lower-income workers to sluggish productivity and an aging population.

Powell said in remarks at a Fed award ceremony that these challenges remain even though unemployment is near five-decade low and the financial system has been bolstered since the 2008 financial crisis.

While there have been recent gains in wage growth, Powell said that wages for lower-income workers have grown quite slowly over the past few decades.

He also noted that a decadeslong decline in economic mobility has made it more difficult for lower-income Americans to move up the economic ladder.

In his remarks, Powell praised the work of the Fed’s community development staff and former Fed Chair Janet Yellen, who put a special emphasis on efforts to help disadvantaged communities during her 16 years at the Fed, including the last four as Fed chair.

Powell did not discuss the Fed’s current interest-rate policies in his appearance.

The central bank has raised rates three times this year and is expected to boost rates for a fourth time at its Dec. 18-19. Powell sent the stock market surging last week when he signaled that the Fed may decide to slow the pace of rate hikes next year.

Investors had been hoping to learn more about Powell’s current thinking in testimony he was scheduled to deliver Wednesday before the congressional Joint Economic Committee. However, that appearance was canceled because of the government closure for the funeral of former President George H.W. Bush.

Both Powell and Fed board member Lael Brainard praised the work that Yellen did to help disadvantaged communities.

“Chair Yellen was attentive to low- and moderate-income communities, recognizing that Americans on the most precarious rungs of the ladder often feel the impacts of a downturn soonest and the longest,” Brainard said.

Both officials spoke at a ceremony honoring Yellen’s work with the presentation of a newly established Janet L. Yellen Award for Excellence in Community Development.

This year’s award, which goes to a Fed staffer who has excelled in work to help disadvantaged communities, was presented to Ariel Cisneros of the Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City.
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First Global Women’s Disability Award Aims to Break Stereotypes

By Uponsci | 12/04/2018 | No Comments | Science

The first global award recognizing the achievements of women with disabilities aims to break through stereotypes to show their skills as leaders and problem solvers, its founder said Monday.

A filmmaker, a political campaigner and a public health expert were named the first winners of the Her Ability awards, which were announced to coincide with World Disability Day.

Its founder, Ethiopian campaigner Yetnebersh Nigussie, said she wanted to put a spotlight on disabled women’s achievements to combat the idea that they are passive victims.

“We really wanted to change that image and cherish their abilities and their victories,” Nigussie, who lost her sight at age five, told Reuters.

“In order to change things, people need to really see our abilities and our problem-solving skills that we have developed through life by overcoming attitudinal as well as physical and policy barriers everywhere.”

More than a billion people — about 15 percent of the world’s population — have some form of disability, according to the World Health Organization.

Women with disabilities have been recognized as doubly vulnerable by experts, who say they face additional barriers.

The first winners of the awards, which were set up by Nigussie and the global disability organization Light for the World, all came from the developing world.

They included Toyin Janet Aderemi, the first Nigerian wheelchair-user to study and practice pharmacy, who was recognized for her work on disability-inclusive health and as a lobbyist for disability rights.

She lost the ability to walk due to a childhood bout of polio and had to be carried on her mother’s back until she got her first wheelchair at age 15.

“Winning this award showcases what is possible and how society starts to benefit when you are able to educate a girl child with a disability,” Aderemi said.

“Attitudes are changing but very slowly. … We are just starting to educate our people to rid their minds of the misconceptions they have about disability.”

Ashrafun Nahar, who founded the Women with Disabilities Development Foundation in Bangladesh, won in the rights award category for her campaigns for inclusive policy and equal opportunities in education and work.

The arts winner was Zambian filmmaker Musola Cathrine Kaseketi, who suffered paralysis to a leg in childhood and now works to highlight social issues affecting women with disabilities both through her films and education work.
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Where Are Drones? Amazon’s Customers Still Waiting

By Uponsil | 12/04/2018 | No Comments | Silicon Valley

Jeff Bezos boldly predicted five years ago that drones would be carrying Amazon packages to people’s doorsteps by now.

Amazon customers are still waiting. And it’s unclear when, if ever, this particular order by the company’s founder and CEO will arrive.

Bezos made billions of dollars by transforming the retail sector. But overcoming the regulatory hurdles and safety issues posed by drones appears to be a challenge even for the world’s wealthiest man. The result is a blown deadline on his claim to CBS’ “60 Minutes” in December 2013 that drones would be making deliveries within five years.

The day may not be far off when drones will carry medicine to people in rural or remote areas, but the marketing hype around instant delivery of consumer goods looks more and more like just that — hype. Drones have a short battery life, and privacy concerns can be a hindrance, too.

“I don’t think you will see delivery of burritos or diapers in the suburbs,” says drone analyst Colin Snow.

Drone usage has grown rapidly in some industries, but mostly outside the retail sector and direct interaction with consumers.

The government estimates that about 110,000 commercial drones are operating in U.S. airspace, and the number is expected to soar to about 450,000 in 2022. They are being used in rural areas for mining and agriculture, for inspecting power lines and pipelines, and for surveying.

Amazon says it is still pushing ahead with plans to use drones for quick deliveries, though the company is staying away from fixed timelines.

“We are committed to making our goal of delivering packages by drones in 30 minutes or less a reality,” says Amazon spokeswoman Kristen Kish. The Seattle-based online retail giant says it has drone development centers in the United States, Austria, France, Israel and the United Kingdom.

Delivery companies have been testing the use of drones to deliver emergency supplies and to cover ground quickly in less populated areas. By contrast, package deliveries would be concentrated in office parks and neighborhoods where there are bigger issues around safety and privacy.

In May, the Trump administration approved a three-year program for private companies and local government agencies to test drones for deliveries, inspections and other tasks.

But pilot programs by major delivery companies suggest few Americans will be greeted by package-bearing drones any time soon. United Parcel Service tested launching a drone from a delivery truck that was covering a rural route in Florida. DHL Express, the German delivery company, tested the use of drones to deliver medicine from Tanzania to an island in Lake Victoria.

Frank Appel, the CEO of DHL’s parent company, Deutsche Post AG, said “over the next couple of years” drones will remain a niche vehicle and not widely used. He said a big obstacle is battery life.

“If you have to recharge them every other hour, then you need so many drones and you have to orchestrate that. So good luck with that,” he told The Associated Press.

Appel said human couriers have another big advantage over drones: They know where customers live and which doorbell to ring. “To program that in IT is not that easy and not cheap,” he said.

Analysts say it will take years for the Federal Aviation Administration to write all the rules to allow widespread drone deliveries.

Snow, the CEO of Skylogic Research, says a rule permitting operators to fly drones beyond their line of sight — so critical to deliveries — is at least 10 years away. A method will be needed to let law enforcement identify drones flying over people — federal officials are worried about their use by terrorists.

While the rules are being written, companies will rely on waivers from the FAA to keep experimenting and running small-scale pilot programs.

“People like DHL and the rest of them (will say), ‘Hey, we can deliver via drone this parcel package to this island,’ but that’s not the original vision that Amazon presented,” Snow says.

There is a long list of FAA rules governing drone flights. They generally can’t fly higher than 400 feet, over many federal facilities, or within five miles of an airport. Night flights are forbidden. For the delivery business, the most biggest holdup is that the machines must remain within sight of the operator at all times.

In June, the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine said the FAA’s was being overly conservative in its safety standards for drones. The group said FAA’s risk-averse attitude was holding back beneficial uses, such as drones helping firefighters who are battling a fierce blaze.

Even before the criticism by the scientific panel, the FAA had begun to respond more quickly to operators’ requests for waivers from some rules, says Alan Perlman, founder of the Drone Pilot Ground School in Nashville, Tennessee. He said it is also getting easier and cheaper to buy liability insurance.

Bezos was mindful of the safety issues, telling “60 Minutes” back in 2013, “This thing can’t land on somebody’s head while they’re walking around their neighborhood.”

That didn’t stop him from predicting that drones fed with GPS coordinates would be taking off and making deliveries in “four, five years. I think so. It will work, and it will happen.”

To Perlman, the billionaire’s optimism made perfect sense.

“When you’re in his world you think more about technology than regulations, and the (drone) technology is there,” Perlman said.
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‘Misinformation’ Named Word of the Year

By Uponent | 12/04/2018 | No Comments | Entertainment

Dictionary.com, an online English dictionary, picked its word of the year – Misinformation. Michelle Quinn talks to the linguist who decided that word best summed-up 2018.
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WHO Looks at Standards in ‘Uncharted Water’ of Gene Editing

By Uponsci | 12/04/2018 | No Comments | Science

The World Health Organization (WHO) warned Monday that gene editing may have “unintended consequences” and said it was establishing a team of experts to set clear guidelines and standards after studying ethical and safety issues.

The Chinese government last Thursday ordered a temporary halt to research activities for people involved in the editing of human genes, after a Chinese scientist said he had edited the genes of twin babies.

Scientist He Jiankui said he used a gene-editing technology known as CRISPR-Cas9 to alter the embryonic genes of the twin girls born this month. He said gene editing would help protect them from infection with HIV, the virus that causes AIDS.

“Gene editing may have unintended consequences, this is uncharted water and it has to be taken seriously,” Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, WHO director-general, told a news briefing.

“WHO is putting together experts. We will work with member states to do everything we can to make sure of all issues — be it ethical, social, safety — before any manipulation is done.”

He’s announcement, which has not been verified, sparked an international outcry about the ethics and safety of such research.

“We are talking about human beings, editing should not harm the welfare of the future person,” WHO’s Tedros said. “We have to be very careful, the working group will do that with all openness and transparency.”
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Day: December 4, 2018