Sanctions on American businessmen:
The foul men – they are mainly men – burning the planet should have access to as little of it as possible. Trump’s own name should not adorn the gates of his golf courses in Scotland and Ireland, and his minion Lee Zeldin, who leads the ironically named Environment Protection Agency (EPA), should not be flown to Munich to lecture Europe about its destructive policies. No billionaire in Trump’s orbit should be able to ski in the Alps, nibble vintage jamón in Mallorca, be served champagne at the Cheval Blanc, or splash out upwards of €100,000 a week for luxury villas in the Algarve or the Côte d’Azur if they are complicit in an active ecocide that threatens the very existence of all these places.
As ever it’s the defiition of the claimed crime that is a problem:
Putin’s world has been constrained and shrunk by an international criminal court (ICC) warrant to face justice for alleged war crimes. But as the Democratic Republic of the Congo’s environment minister, Marie Nyange Ndambo, wrote in the Financial Times recently, “ecocide is a crime against humanity” and should be recognised as such. And make no mistake, ecocide is exactly what the Trump administration is perpetrating. In just the past few months alone, it has pursued the destruction of millions of acres of US east coast forests through logging and a million acres of what is known as the American Serengeti in Alaska to drilling; a seabed mining rampage across who even knows how many millions of miles of underwater ecosystem (despite the global moratorium imposed by 40 countries); and creating the conditions for the entire Gulf of Mexico to suffer the consequences of a second oil-drilling catastrophe like 2010’s Deepwater Horizon.
Do anything a Guardianista doesn’t like and go to prison, basically. Growing cows is ecocide, off you go etc…..
Democratic Republic of the Congo’s environment minister, Marie Nyange Ndambo, wrote in the Financial Times recently, “ecocide is a crime against humanity”
By any standard the DRC is an economic basket case (mind you, the word economic is superfluous) but let’s see what their main exports are:-
Export goods
gold, diamonds, copper, cobalt, coltan, zinc, tin, tungsten, crude oil, wood products, coffee
I wonder where all these largely irreplaceable natural resources (as in “ecocide is a crime against humanity” to use the good lady’s own words) are going?
Main export partners
China 68.9%
United Arab Emirates 7.02%
Who’d have guessed? So Marie can STFU with her preaching about the USA.
I fear you are misinterpreting Ms Ndambo’s words. What she means is: “Gimme”.
Let’s hope neither Starmer of King Tampon hear her then. Both of them seem convinced that the country can always borrow a few more tens of billions and give it away to third world grifters in order to look good on the world stage.
I don’t often have such terrible thoughts but I do rather hope that in this instance the ol’ prostate problem gets on with its usual work. Unfortunately we’ll then have his gormless son. Sadly, his still-fit wife will be little consolation.
Is “ecocide” something only Americans can do? China, India, South Africa, Indonesia and Vietnam (to name just 5 but with a combined population of 3.5 billion) all rely on coal for more than 50% of their power.
Is “ecocide” something only Americans can do?
Yes, because this is, as always, about capitalism and the is just the excuse.
No – because other whities can do it as well. Just like racism.
Does he mean The Gulf of America?
They’re fascists. And not the good sort.
Mankind, even rich American bastard mankind, is part of the ecology and will adapt it to suit itself. Like trees do, or grass or beavers. That’s taking a shithole like DRC and turning it into the prosperous civilized USA where there’s so much favourable ecology that some people can spend massive amounts in their own self-interest and lots of other people end up getting their dinner thereby.
Does the Guardian reserve its pages exclusively for such emotionally incontinent fools?
(Question expecting the answer “yes”.)
This guy made and quickly lost over a million dollars on high-risk options trading. But I’m sure that has nothing to do with being miffed at other people getting the vintage jamon.
My desire is that all these doom goblin disciples adopt the lifestyle mandated by their religion. I can understand a Graunista not playing golf -competition, how disgusting and primitive, but show me one who has never quaffed a glass of Bolly or flown in a jet and I’ll find you a flying octopus…
Who the fuck is this raving cretin?
The wealthy can escape condemnation by condemning wealth in others.
the embodyment of Billy Joel’s Angry Young Man…
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lbBWVN62C1s
(this version from the Moscow concert in ’87)
That did make me ROFL Norman – a very apt description!
I’d actually flip it and begin sanctioning any environmentalists or ‘journalists’ still peddling either the Climate crisis narrative or Net Zero ideology. These things aren’t cost free!
The American Government has a logging operation? I thought the Trump administration was fanatically small-state. Why on earth is the government doing logging (mining, drilling) instead of leaving it to the private sector.
Much of the land in the west belongs to the feds. They license those operations. I still look in vain through the constitution to find the bit where the federal government can own land within the states. Why don’t they do the taxpayers a favour and sell it? To Americans of course not China.
You’ll look in vain through the constitution to find the bit where the federal government can buy “Louisiana” from France. Yet after some drama-queening from Jefferson, it did.
The western states were mostly formed out of land owned by the Feds. The Feds kept much of it. As for selling it: the idea is floated from time to time but it turns out that many conservative hunters and fishermen like accessing those lands, and ranchers like cheap grazing rights.
“that many conservative hunters and fishermen like accessing those lands”
That’s what the previous inhabitants wanted but their wishes were over-ridden. I don’t even think there was a public consultation before the acquisition either.
True, they did not get a say. Happened all over the world.
So that’s “the government allowing logging on their land and charging due rent for it”, not the government logging.
The bits of Marx and Engels I enjoy the most are their pamphleteering rants, with veins bulging at the temples and spittle flying, and I don’t think they even had anything like a thesaurus then, certainly not in German. I often think that the Anguish Languish is suffering a decline, and it is a joy to see the full range of figures of speech and rhetorical devices being employed by an impassioned orator. Demagoguery: A focus on anger, fear, and prejudice over rational debate. Priceless.
“Ecocide”. Another word used only by green lefty morons. They’re coming thick and fast today.
So, half the world wants the other half off the planet or barring that, imprisoned. What else is new?
Ooooooo! We’re skeert. Impotent twerp. WTF do you think you are?
Therefore, Iran should be allowed to have nukes.
He’s skeert, too. How many divisions does this ‘international criminal court’ have?
This is a joke, right? Right?
. . . followed by long list of crimes against humanity.
This is Hurst inciting violence against officials of the US. This is the Guardian inciting violence against officials of the US.
Lawsuit pending. Wouldn’t be surprised if Trump owns Guardian soon. He doesn’t suffer fools gladly. Little shit Hurst hears other people talking this way and thinks he can to. It will end badly for him.
Europe punished Russian billionaires over the war in Ukraine.
By stealing their football clubs?
“should not be flown to Munich to lecture Europe about its destructive policies”
Well, someone has to do it. They are destructive policies after all. Is this a case of jobs Europeans won’t do?
Unlike young Hewitt who can be relied on to say the right things at such events and therefore gets a pass for all those first class flights. Destroying the planet to save the planet.
As usual, not a single mention of China or the rest of Asia.