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THE PRESIDENT: Good morning. Our nation was founded on a bedrock
principle that we are all created equal. The project of each generation
is to bridge the meaning of those founding words with the realities of
changing times -- a never-ending quest to ensure those words ring true
for every single American.
Progress on this journey often comes in small increments, sometimes two
steps forward, one step back, propelled by the persistent effort of
dedicated citizens. And then sometimes, there are days like this when
that slow, steady effort is rewarded with justice that arrives like a
thunderbolt.
This morning, the Supreme Court recognized that the Constitution
guarantees marriage equality. In doing so, they’ve reaffirmed that all
Americans are entitled to the equal protection of the law. That all
people should be treated equally, regardless of who they are or who they
love.
This decision will end the patchwork system we currently have. It will
end the uncertainty hundreds of thousands of same-sex couples face from
not knowing whether their marriage, legitimate in the eyes of one
state, will remain if they decide to move [to] or even visit another.
This ruling will strengthen all of our communities by offering to all
loving same-sex couples the dignity of marriage across this great land.
In my second inaugural address, I said that if we are truly created
equal, then surely the love we commit to one another must be equal as
well. It is gratifying to see that principle enshrined into law by this
decision.
This ruling is a victory for Jim Obergefell and the other plaintiffs in
the case. It's a victory for gay and lesbian couples who have fought
so long for their basic civil rights. It’s a victory for their
children, whose families will now be recognized as equal to any other.
It’s a victory for the allies and friends and supporters who spent
years, even decades, working and praying for change to come.
And this ruling is a victory for America. This decision affirms what
millions of Americans already believe in their hearts: When all
Americans are treated as equal we are all more free.
My administration has been guided by that idea. It’s why we stopped
defending the so-called Defense of Marriage Act, and why we were pleased
when the Court finally struck down a central provision of that
discriminatory law. It’s why we ended “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell.” From
extending full marital benefits to federal employees and their spouses,
to expanding hospital visitation rights for LGBT patients and their
loved ones, we’ve made real progress in advancing equality for LGBT
Americans in ways that were unimaginable not too long ago.
I know change for many of our LGBT brothers and sisters must have
seemed so slow for so long. But compared to so many other issues,
America’s shift has been so quick. I know that Americans of goodwill
continue to hold a wide range of views on this issue. Opposition in some
cases has been based on sincere and deeply held beliefs. All of us who
welcome today’s news should be mindful of that fact; recognize
different viewpoints; revere our deep commitment to religious freedom.
But today should also give us hope that on the many issues with which
we grapple, often painfully, real change is possible. Shifts in hearts
and minds is possible. And those who have come so far on their journey
to equality have a responsibility to reach back and help others join
them. Because for all our differences, we are one people, stronger
together than we could ever be alone.
That’s always been our story.
We are big and vast and diverse; a nation of people with different
backgrounds and beliefs, different experiences and stories, but bound by
our shared ideal that no matter who you are or what you look like, how
you started off, or how and who you love, America is a place where you
can write your own destiny.
We are a people who believe that every single child is entitled to life and liberty and the pursuit of happiness.
There’s so much more work to be done to extend the full promise of
America to every American. But today, we can say in no uncertain terms
that we’ve made our union a little more perfect.
That’s the consequence of a decision from the Supreme Court, but, more
importantly, it is a consequence of the countless small acts of courage
of millions of people across decades who stood up, who came out, who
talked to parents -- parents who loved their children no matter what.
Folks who were willing to endure bullying and taunts, and stayed
strong, and came to believe in themselves and who they were, and slowly
made an entire country realize that love is love.
What an extraordinary achievement. What a vindication of the belief
that ordinary people can do extraordinary things. What a reminder of
what Bobby Kennedy once said about how small actions can be like pebbles
being thrown into a still lake, and ripples of hope cascade outwards
and change the world.
Those countless, often anonymous heroes -- they deserve our thanks.
They should be very proud. America should be very proud.
THE PRESIDENT: Giving all praise and honor to God. (Applause.)
The Bible calls us to hope. To persevere, and have faith in things not seen.
“They were still living by faith when they died,” Scripture tells us.
“They did not receive the things promised; they only saw them and
welcomed them from a distance, admitting that they were foreigners and
strangers on Earth.”
We are here today to remember a man of God who lived by faith. A man
who believed in things not seen. A man who believed there were better
days ahead, off in the distance. A man of service who persevered,
knowing full well he would not receive all those things he was promised,
because he believed his efforts would deliver a better life for those
who followed.
To Jennifer, his beloved wife; to Eliana and Malana, his beautiful,
wonderful daughters; to the Mother Emanuel family and the people of
Charleston, the people of South Carolina.
I cannot claim to have the good fortune to know Reverend Pinckney well.
But I did have the pleasure of knowing him and meeting him here in
South Carolina, back when we were both a little bit younger.
(Laughter.) Back when I didn’t have visible grey hair. (Laughter.)
The first thing I noticed was his graciousness, his smile, his
reassuring baritone, his deceptive sense of humor -- all qualities that
helped him wear so effortlessly a heavy burden of expectation.
Friends of his remarked this week that when Clementa Pinckney entered a
room, it was like the future arrived; that even from a young age, folks
knew he was special. Anointed. He was the progeny of a long line of
the faithful -- a family of preachers who spread God’s word, a family of
protesters who sowed change to expand voting rights and desegregate the
South. Clem heard their instruction, and he did not forsake their
teaching.
He was in the pulpit by 13, pastor by 18, public servant by 23. He did
not exhibit any of the cockiness of youth, nor youth’s insecurities;
instead, he set an example worthy of his position, wise beyond his
years, in his speech, in his conduct, in his love, faith, and purity.
As a senator, he represented a sprawling swath of the Lowcountry, a
place that has long been one of the most neglected in America. A place
still wracked by poverty and inadequate schools; a place where children
can still go hungry and the sick can go without treatment. A place that
needed somebody like Clem. (Applause.)
His position in the minority party meant the odds of winning more
resources for his constituents were often long. His calls for greater
equity were too often unheeded, the votes he cast were sometimes lonely.
But he never gave up. He stayed true to his convictions. He would
not grow discouraged. After a full day at the capitol, he’d climb into
his car and head to the church to draw sustenance from his family, from
his ministry, from the community that loved and needed him. There he
would fortify his faith, and imagine what might be.
Reverend Pinckney embodied a politics that was neither mean, nor small.
He conducted himself quietly, and kindly, and diligently. He
encouraged progress not by pushing his ideas alone, but by seeking out
your ideas, partnering with you to make things happen. He was full of
empathy and fellow feeling, able to walk in somebody else’s shoes and
see through their eyes. No wonder one of his senate colleagues
remembered Senator Pinckney as “the most gentle of the 46 of us -- the
best of the 46 of us.”
Clem was often asked why he chose to be a pastor and a public servant.
But the person who asked probably didn’t know the history of the AME
church. (Applause.) As our brothers and sisters in the AME church
know, we don't make those distinctions. “Our calling,” Clem once said,
“is not just within the walls of the congregation, but…the life and
community in which our congregation resides.” (Applause.)
He embodied the idea that our Christian faith demands deeds and not
just words; that the “sweet hour of prayer” actually lasts the whole
week long -- (applause) -- that to put our faith in action is more than
individual salvation, it's about our collective salvation; that to feed
the hungry and clothe the naked and house the homeless is not just a
call for isolated charity but the imperative of a just society.
What a good man. Sometimes I think that's the best thing to hope for
when you're eulogized -- after all the words and recitations and resumes
are read, to just say someone was a good man. (Applause.)
You don’t have to be of high station to be a good man. Preacher by 13.
Pastor by 18. Public servant by 23. What a life Clementa Pinckney
lived. What an example he set. What a model for his faith. And then
to lose him at 41 -- slain in his sanctuary with eight wonderful members
of his flock, each at different stages in life but bound together by a
common commitment to God.
Tywanza Sanders. Daniel L. Simmons. Sharonda Coleman-Singleton. Myra
Thompson. Good people. Decent people. God-fearing people.
(Applause.) People so full of life and so full of kindness. People
who ran the race, who persevered. People of great faith.
To the families of the fallen, the nation shares in your grief. Our
pain cuts that much deeper because it happened in a church. The church
is and always has been the center of African-American life -- (applause)
-- a place to call our own in a too often hostile world, a sanctuary
from so many hardships.
Over the course of centuries, black churches served as “hush harbors”
where slaves could worship in safety; praise houses where their free
descendants could gather and shout hallelujah -- (applause) -- rest
stops for the weary along the Underground Railroad; bunkers for the foot
soldiers of the Civil Rights Movement. They have been, and continue to
be, community centers where we organize for jobs and justice; places of
scholarship and network; places where children are loved and fed and
kept out of harm’s way, and told that they are beautiful and smart --
(applause) -- and taught that they matter. (Applause.) That’s what
happens in church.
That’s what the black church means. Our beating heart. The place
where our dignity as a people is inviolate. When there’s no better
example of this tradition than Mother Emanuel -- (applause) -- a church
built by blacks seeking liberty, burned to the ground because its
founder sought to end slavery, only to rise up again, a Phoenix from
these ashes. (Applause.)
When there were laws banning all-black church gatherings, services
happened here anyway, in defiance of unjust laws. When there was a
righteous movement to dismantle Jim Crow, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
preached from its pulpit, and marches began from its steps. A sacred
place, this church. Not just for blacks, not just for Christians, but
for every American who cares about the steady expansion -- (applause) --
of human rights and human dignity in this country; a foundation stone
for liberty and justice for all. That’s what the church meant.
(Applause.)
We do not know whether the killer of Reverend Pinckney and eight others
knew all of this history. But he surely sensed the meaning of his
violent act. It was an act that drew on a long history of bombs and
arson and shots fired at churches, not random, but as a means of
control, a way to terrorize and oppress. (Applause.) An act that he
imagined would incite fear and recrimination; violence and suspicion.
An act that he presumed would deepen divisions that trace back to our
nation’s original sin.
Oh, but God works in mysterious ways. (Applause.) God has different ideas. (Applause.)
He didn’t know he was being used by God. (Applause.) Blinded by
hatred, the alleged killer could not see the grace surrounding Reverend
Pinckney and that Bible study group -- the light of love that shone as
they opened the church doors and invited a stranger to join in their
prayer circle. The alleged killer could have never anticipated the way
the families of the fallen would respond when they saw him in court --
in the midst of unspeakable grief, with words of forgiveness. He
couldn’t imagine that. (Applause.)
The alleged killer could not imagine how the city of Charleston, under
the good and wise leadership of Mayor Riley -- (applause) -- how the
state of South Carolina, how the United States of America would respond
-- not merely with revulsion at his evil act, but with big-hearted
generosity and, more importantly, with a thoughtful introspection and
self-examination that we so rarely see in public life.
Blinded by hatred, he failed to comprehend what Reverend Pinckney so
well understood -- the power of God’s grace. (Applause.)
This whole week, I’ve been reflecting on this idea of grace.
(Applause.) The grace of the families who lost loved ones. The grace
that Reverend Pinckney would preach about in his sermons. The grace
described in one of my favorite hymnals -- the one we all know: Amazing
grace, how sweet the sound that saved a wretch like me. (Applause.) I
once was lost, but now I’m found; was blind but now I see. (Applause.)
According to the Christian tradition, grace is not earned. Grace is
not merited. It’s not something we deserve. Rather, grace is the free
and benevolent favor of God -- (applause) -- as manifested in the
salvation of sinners and the bestowal of blessings. Grace.
As a nation, out of this terrible tragedy, God has visited grace upon
us, for he has allowed us to see where we’ve been blind. (Applause.)
He has given us the chance, where we’ve been lost, to find our best
selves. (Applause.) We may not have earned it, this grace, with our
rancor and complacency, and short-sightedness and fear of each other --
but we got it all the same. He gave it to us anyway. He’s once more
given us grace. But it is up to us now to make the most of it, to
receive it with gratitude, and to prove ourselves worthy of this gift.
For too long, we were blind to the pain that the Confederate flag
stirred in too many of our citizens. (Applause.) It’s true, a flag did
not cause these murders. But as people from all walks of life,
Republicans and Democrats, now acknowledge -- including Governor Haley,
whose recent eloquence on the subject is worthy of praise -- (applause)
-- as we all have to acknowledge, the flag has always represented more
than just ancestral pride. (Applause.) For many, black and white, that
flag was a reminder of systemic oppression and racial subjugation. We
see that now.
Removing the flag from this state’s capitol would not be an act of
political correctness; it would not be an insult to the valor of
Confederate soldiers. It would simply be an acknowledgment that the
cause for which they fought -- the cause of slavery -- was wrong --
(applause) -- the imposition of Jim Crow after the Civil War, the
resistance to civil rights for all people was wrong. (Applause.) It
would be one step in an honest accounting of America’s history; a modest
but meaningful balm for so many unhealed wounds. It would be an
expression of the amazing changes that have transformed this state and
this country for the better, because of the work of so many people of
goodwill, people of all races striving to form a more perfect union. By
taking down that flag, we express God’s grace. (Applause.)
But I don't think God wants us to stop there. (Applause.) For too
long, we’ve been blind to the way past injustices continue to shape the
present. Perhaps we see that now. Perhaps this tragedy causes us to
ask some tough questions about how we can permit so many of our children
to languish in poverty, or attend dilapidated schools, or grow up
without prospects for a job or for a career. (Applause.)
Perhaps it causes us to examine what we’re doing to cause some of our
children to hate. (Applause.) Perhaps it softens hearts towards those
lost young men, tens and tens of thousands caught up in the criminal
justice system -- (applause) -- and leads us to make sure that that
system is not infected with bias; that we embrace changes in how we
train and equip our police so that the bonds of trust between law
enforcement and the communities they serve make us all safer and more
secure. (Applause.)
Maybe we now realize the way racial bias can infect us even when we
don't realize it, so that we're guarding against not just racial slurs,
but we're also guarding against the subtle impulse to call Johnny back
for a job interview but not Jamal. (Applause.) So that we search our
hearts when we consider laws to make it harder for some of our fellow
citizens to vote. (Applause.) By recognizing our common humanity by
treating every child as important, regardless of the color of their skin
or the station into which they were born, and to do what’s necessary to
make opportunity real for every American -- by doing that, we express
God’s grace. (Applause.)
For too long --
AUDIENCE: For too long!
THE PRESIDENT: For too long, we’ve been blind to the unique mayhem
that gun violence inflicts upon this nation. (Applause.) Sporadically,
our eyes are open: When eight of our brothers and sisters are cut down
in a church basement, 12 in a movie theater, 26 in an elementary school.
But I hope we also see the 30 precious lives cut short by gun violence
in this country every single day; the countless more whose lives are
forever changed -- the survivors crippled, the children traumatized and
fearful every day as they walk to school, the husband who will never
feel his wife’s warm touch, the entire communities whose grief overflows
every time they have to watch what happened to them happen to some
other place.
The vast majority of Americans -- the majority of gun owners -- want to
do something about this. We see that now. (Applause.) And I'm
convinced that by acknowledging the pain and loss of others, even as we
respect the traditions and ways of life that make up this beloved
country -- by making the moral choice to change, we express God’s grace.
(Applause.)
We don’t earn grace. We're all sinners. We don't deserve it.
(Applause.) But God gives it to us anyway. (Applause.) And we choose
how to receive it. It's our decision how to honor it.
None of us can or should expect a transformation in race relations
overnight. Every time something like this happens, somebody says we
have to have a conversation about race. We talk a lot about race.
There’s no shortcut. And we don’t need more talk. (Applause.) None
of us should believe that a handful of gun safety measures will prevent
every tragedy. It will not. People of goodwill will continue to debate
the merits of various policies, as our democracy requires -- this is a
big, raucous place, America is. And there are good people on both sides
of these debates. Whatever solutions we find will necessarily be
incomplete.
But it would be a betrayal of everything Reverend Pinckney stood for, I
believe, if we allowed ourselves to slip into a comfortable silence
again. (Applause.) Once the eulogies have been delivered, once the TV
cameras move on, to go back to business as usual -- that’s what we so
often do to avoid uncomfortable truths about the prejudice that still
infects our society. (Applause.) To settle for symbolic gestures
without following up with the hard work of more lasting change -- that’s
how we lose our way again.
It would be a refutation of the forgiveness expressed by those families
if we merely slipped into old habits, whereby those who disagree with
us are not merely wrong but bad; where we shout instead of listen; where
we barricade ourselves behind preconceived notions or well-practiced
cynicism.
Reverend Pinckney once said, “Across the South, we have a deep
appreciation of history -- we haven’t always had a deep appreciation of
each other’s history.” (Applause.) What is true in the South is true
for America. Clem understood that justice grows out of recognition of
ourselves in each other. That my liberty depends on you being free,
too. (Applause.) That history can’t be a sword to justify injustice,
or a shield against progress, but must be a manual for how to avoid
repeating the mistakes of the past -- how to break the cycle. A roadway
toward a better world. He knew that the path of grace involves an open
mind -- but, more importantly, an open heart.
That’s what I’ve felt this week -- an open heart. That, more than any
particular policy or analysis, is what’s called upon right now, I think
-- what a friend of mine, the writer Marilyn Robinson, calls “that
reservoir of goodness, beyond, and of another kind, that we are able to
do each other in the ordinary cause of things.”
That reservoir of goodness. If we can find that grace, anything is
possible. (Applause.) If we can tap that grace, everything can change.
(Applause.)
Amazing grace. Amazing grace.
(Begins to sing) -- Amazing grace -- (applause) -- how sweet the sound,
that saved a wretch like me; I once was lost, but now I’m found; was
blind but now I see. (Applause.)
Clementa Pinckney found that grace.
Cynthia Hurd found that grace.
Susie Jackson found that grace.
Ethel Lance found that grace.
DePayne Middleton-Doctor found that grace.
Tywanza Sanders found that grace.
Daniel L. Simmons, Sr. found that grace.
Sharonda Coleman-Singleton found that grace.
Myra Thompson found that grace.
Through the example of their lives, they’ve now passed it on to us.
May we find ourselves worthy of that precious and extraordinary gift,
as long as our lives endure. May grace now lead them home. May God
continue to shed His grace on the United States of America.
(Applause.)
A new study finding an "unfair," rich-poor balance in
state and local taxes has been getting big traction on the Web this
week.
The study,
from the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy, found that
"virtually every state's tax system is fundamentally unfair, taking a
much greater share of income from low- and middle-income families than
from wealthy families." It added that state and local tax systems are
"indirectly contributing to growing income inequality by taxing low- and
middle-income households at significantly higher rates than wealthy
taxpayers."
In other words, it said the tax systems are
"upside down," with the poor paying more and the rich paying less.
Overall, the poorest 20 percent of Americans paid an average of 10.9
percent of their income in state and local taxes and the middle 20
percent of Americans paid 9.4 percent. The top 1 percent, meanwhile, pay
only 5.4 percent of their income to state and local taxes.
hington state had the most regressive state tax system, taxing the
poorest residents at 16.8 percent while taxing the top 1 percent at only
2.4 percent, the study said. Florida ranked number two, with the poor
paying 12.9 percent of their income to taxes, while the top 1 percent
pay 1.9 percent. Texas ranked third, with the bottom playing 12.5
percent and the top 1 percent paying 2.9 percent. The main reason: None
of those states have personal income taxes, which tend to be
progressive.
California is the most progressive state, with the
poorest residents paying 10.5 percent and the top 1 paying 8.7 percent.
(You can check your own state here.)
Among the other most progressive states are Delaware, Minnesota,
Montana, Oregon and Vermont, which all have progressive state income
taxes. Read MoreWhich religion holds the largest share of wealth?
Yet while the report is sure to spur calls for
higher taxes on the rich, its findings paint a misleading picture of the
broader taxes paid by Americans, rich and poor included.
First off, Americans pay federal, state and local
taxes. Federal taxes account for two-thirds of the taxes that Americans
pay. So while it's true that state and local taxes by themselves are
regressive, Americans pay far more in federal taxes, which are far more
progressive with the rich paying a higher share—both of their own
incomes and of total taxes.
According to the nonpartisan Tax Policy Center, the top 1 percent
of Americans paid 33.4 percent of their expanded cash income (a broad
measure of pretax income) in federal taxes. Middle class Americans—or
those in the middle 20 percent—pay 13.7 percent of their income to
federal taxes, while the poorest pay 3.1 percent.
So far, it doesn't appear that any study has
looked at the combined federal, state and local tax burdens as a share
of certain income groups. But Roberton Williams of the Tax Policy Center
said that combining all taxes would almost certainly show that the
wealthy pay more than the rest.
"Looking at state and local taxes gives you one
picture of the impact of taxes," Williams said. "But you can't look at
them in isolation."
The second problem with looking purely at state
and local taxes is that taxpayers can deduct state and local taxes from
their federal taxes. So some of that tax burden shifted to the middle
and lower class at the state level is given back by the federal
government. The federal tax system, in other words, rebalances or
cancels out some of the regressive structure of the state and local
taxes.
"There is an interaction between the federal,
state and local systems," Williams said. "The federal system offsets
some of the regressiveness of the state level."
In other words, saying the tax system is upside
down based on state and local taxes is like studying the estate tax or
mansion tax and saying millionaires pay all the taxes in America.
Nobody pays just one tax. Most Americans pay them
all, and deduct or offset some from others. And when you look at the tax
system as a whole, the rich pay more.
Does that mean the rich should pay more, or that the system is fair?
"That's subjective," Williams said. "To some
people, we should have a flat tax. Others say we're not nearly
progressive enough."
But any analysis of "fairness" should include the whole tax system, not just one part of it
President Barack Obama
Weekly Address
The White House
June 20, 2015
Hi, everybody. As President, I spend most of my time focused on what
we can do to grow the economy and grow new pathways of opportunity for
Americans like you to get ahead.
And we’ve made progress. More than 12 million new private sector jobs
in the past five years. More than 16 million Americans who’ve gained
health insurance. More jobs creating more clean energy. More kids
graduating from high school and college than ever before.
But in a relentlessly-changing economy, we’ve got more work to do. And
one of the things we should be doing, for example, is rewriting the
rules of global trade to benefit American workers and American
businesses. I think we should write those rules before China does.
That’s why I’ve been working with Congress to pass new, 21st century
trade agreements with standards that are higher and protections that are
tougher than any past trade agreement.
I believe it’s the right thing to do for American workers and families, or I wouldn’t be doing it.
I believe it’s what will give us the competitive edge in a new economy, or I wouldn’t be doing it.
Now, several Members of Congress disagree. That’s why it’s still tied
up there, along with a lot of other good ideas that would create jobs.
And eventually, I’m optimistic we’ll get this done.
But America doesn’t stand still. That’s why, on issue after issue
where Congress has failed to act, my administration has partnered with
mayors and governors across the country to advance economic priorities
that most working families in America are in favor of right now.
And we’ve had success. Over the past couple years, 17 states and six
major cities have raised the minimum wage for their workers. 19 cities
have enacted paid sick days, and five states have enacted paid sick days
or paid family leave. 34 states have increased funding for quality
Pre-K. And 19 cities and states have signed up for our new TechHire
initiative to train workers for the high-wage, high-skill jobs of
tomorrow – the kind of jobs that new trade deals would help create.
Some of these victories have been small. Some have been quiet. But
they’ve added up to a big difference for working families across
America. And that’s what matters to me. Because it matters to you. On
Friday, I talked about these initiatives and more in a speech to the
U.S. Conference of Mayors. Check it out at WhiteHouse.gov. Some of it
might matter to your city.
Source: The Wire Pope Francis already has a reputation for barnstorming. His positions on poverty, on gay priests, and liberation theology
would have been shocking enough on their own, but in contrast to the
more conservative positions of previous popes, they were downright
lefty.
Sure, Francis has his more traditional moments. Abortion and assisted suicide are still no-go
for the leader of the world’s Catholics. But Francis has been explicit
about links between capitalism, materialism, and threats to the world’s
poor. There’s a reason he named himself after St. Francis of
Assisi—famously poor, famously eco-conscious—after all.
Now the Pope is taking on science. Specifically, in a new encyclical—that’s
a letter laying out official Catholic doctrine—Francis
describes Earth’s problem with an increasingly messed-up climate, why
that’s the purview of religion, and who will suffer the most if people
don’t do anything about it. The encyclical, “On Care for Our Common
Home,” makes explicit the connection between climate change and
oppression of the poorest and most vulnerable. It’s well-argued, clear,
at times quite moving…and 42,000 words long. So here’s the good-parts
version.
The thesis statement
It is no longer enough to speak only of
the integrity of ecosystems. We have to dare to speak of the integrity
of human life, of the need to promote and unify all the great values.
Once we lose our humility, and become enthralled with the possibility of
limitless mastery over everything, we inevitably end up harming society
and the environment.
Nature isn’t a possession.
If we approach nature and the environment
without this openness to awe and wonder, if we no longer speak the
language of fraternity and beauty in our relationship with the world,
our attitude will be that of masters, consumers, ruthless exploiters,
unable to set limits on their immediate needs. By contrast, if we feel
intimately united with all that exists, then sobriety and care will well
up spontaneously. The poverty and austerity of Saint Francis were no
mere veneer of asceticism, but something much more radical: a refusal to
turn reality into an object simply to be used and controlled.
Rather than a problem to be solved, the world is a joyful mystery to be contemplated with gladness and praise.
The climate is messed up and people have to fix it.
The climate is a common good, belonging
to all and meant for all. At the global level, it is a complex system
linked to many of the essential conditions for human life. A very solid
scientific consensus indicates that we are presently witnessing a
disturbing warming of the climatic system. In recent decades this
warming has been accompanied by a constant rise in the sea level and, it
would appear, by an increase of extreme weather events, even if a
scientifically determinable cause cannot be assigned to each particular
phenomenon. Humanity is called to recognize the need for changes of
lifestyle, production and consumption, in order to combat this warming
or at least the human causes which produce or aggravate it.
The consequences of climate change are a social justice issue.
Even as the quality of available water is
constantly diminishing, in some places there is a growing tendency,
despite its scarcity, to privatize this resource, turning it into a
commodity subject to the laws of the market. Yet access to safe
drinkable water is a basic and universal human right, since it is
essential to human survival and, as such, is a condition for the
exercise of other human rights. Our world has a grave social debt towards the poor who lack access to drinking water, because they are denied the right to a life consistent with their inalienable dignity.
Each year sees the disappearance of
thousands of plant and animal species which we will never know, which
our children will never see, because they have been lost for ever. The
great majority become extinct for reasons related to human activity.
Because of us, thousands of species will no longer give glory to God by
their very existence, nor convey their message to us. We have no such
right.
Scientists are right, and this is about more than science.
We must be grateful for the praiseworthy
efforts being made by scientists and engineers dedicated to finding
solutions to man-made problems. But a sober look at our world shows that
the degree of human intervention, often in the service of business
interests and consumerism, is actually making our earth less rich and
beautiful, ever more limited and grey, even as technological advances
and consumer goods continue to abound limitlessly. We seem to think that
we can substitute an irreplaceable and irretrievable beauty with
something which we have created ourselves.
Blame the media.
Real relationships with others, with all
the challenges they entail, now tend to be replaced by a type of
internet communication which enables us to choose or eliminate
relationships at whim, thus giving rise to a new type of contrived
emotion which has more to do with devices and displays than with other
people and with nature.
This lack of physical contact and
encounter, encouraged at times by the disintegration of our cities, can
lead to a numbing of conscience and to tendentious analyses which
neglect parts of reality….We have to realize that a true ecological
approach always becomes a social approach; it must integrate questions
of justice in debates on the environment, so as to hear both the cry of the earth and the cry of the poor.
But let’s not forget that technology is a wonderful thing.
Humanity has entered a new era in which
our technical prowess has brought us to a crossroads. We are the
beneficiaries of two centuries of enormous waves of change: steam
engines, railways, the telegraph, electricity, automobiles, aeroplanes,
chemical industries, modern medicine, information technology and, more
recently, the digital revolution, robotics, biotechnologies and
nanotechnologies. It is right to rejoice in these advances and to be
excited by the immense possibilities which they continue to open up
before us, for “science and technology are wonderful products of
God-given human creativity.”
…until it takes over people’s lives.
Our freedom fades when it is handed over
to the blind forces of the unconscious, of immediate needs, of
self-interest, and of violence. In this sense, we stand naked and
exposed in the face of our ever-increasing power, lacking the
wherewithal to control it. We have certain superficial mechanisms, but
we cannot claim to have a sound ethics, a culture and spirituality
genuinely capable of setting limits and teaching clear-minded
self-restraint.
Seriously, stop looking at your phone.
A constant flood of new consumer goods
can baffle the heart and prevent us from cherishing each thing and each
moment. To be serenely present to each reality, however small it may be,
opens us to much greater horizons of understanding and personal
fulfillment.
The richer are getting richer by screwing the world’s poor and the environment.
The foreign debt of poor countries has
become a way of controlling them, yet this is not the case where
ecological debt is concerned. In different ways, developing countries,
where the most important reserves of the biosphere are found, continue
to fuel the development of richer countries at the cost of their own
present and future.
God did not say people could do whatever they wanted to Earth.
We are not God. The earth was here before
us and it has been given to us. This allows us to respond to the charge
that Judaeo-Christian thinking, on the basis of the Genesis account
which grants man “dominion” over the earth (cf. Gen 1:28), has
encouraged the unbridled exploita- tion of nature by painting him as
domineering and destructive by nature. This is not a correct
interpretation of the Bible as understood by the Church.
When nature is viewed solely as a source
of profit and gain, this has serious consequences for society. This
vision of “might is right” has engendered immense inequality, injustice
and acts of violence against the majority of humanity, since resources
end up in the hands of the first comer or the most powerful: the winner
takes all.
The natural environment is a collective
good, the patrimony of all humanity and the responsibility of everyone.
If we make something our own, it is only to administer it for the good
of all. If we do not, we burden our consciences with the weight of
having denied the existence of others.
Mistreatment of the environment is as bad as a lot of really bad stuff, like child abuse and stem cells.
The culture of relativism is the same
disorder which drives one person to take advantage of another, to treat
others as mere objects, imposing forced labour on them or enslaving them
to pay their debts. The same kind of thinking leads to the sexual
exploitation of children and abandonment of the elderly who no longer
serve our interests. It is also the mindset of those who say: Let us
allow the invisible forces of the market to regulate the economy, and
consider their impact on society and nature as collateral damage.
Seriously, lay off the embryonic stem cell research.
There is a tendency to justify
transgressing all boundaries when experimentation is carried out on
living human embryos. We forget that the inalienable worth of a human
being transcends his or her degree of development.
And how about a little more open-mindedness for transgender people?
Learning to accept our body, to care for
it and to respect its fullest meaning, is an essential element of any
genuine human ecology. Also, valuing one’s own body in its femininity or
masculinity is necessary if I am going to be able to recognize myself
in an encounter with someone who is different. In this way we can
joyfully accept the specific gifts of another man or woman, the work of
God the Creator, and find mutual enrichment. It is not a healthy
attitude which would seek “to cancel out sexual difference because it no
longer knows how to confront it”.
The Pope wants to talk this out.
There are certain environmental issues
where it is not easy to achieve a broad consensus. Here I would state
once more that the Church does not presume to settle scientific
questions or to replace politics. But I am concerned to encourage an
honest and open debate so that particular interests or ideologies will
not prejudice the common good.
President Barack Obama
Weekly Address
The White House
June 13, 2015
Hi, everybody. My top priority as President is to grow the economy and
help more hardworking Americans get ahead. And after the worst
economic crisis in our lifetimes, our businesses have now created 12.6
million new jobs over the past 63 months.
That’s a record streak of job creation. And it’s come as we’ve been
working to reform our schools, revitalize manufacturing and the auto
industry, revamp our job training programs – and rework our health care
system, covering more than 16 million uninsured Americans so far.
We’ve done all of this to rebuild our economy on a new foundation, a
foundation for growth that benefits not only us, but our kids, and their
kids. Because we do live in a new economy. And we’ve got to adapt to
make sure America leads the way in this new century, just like we did in
the last.
Part of that means sparking new sources of growth and job creation that
keep us on the cutting edge. And one big way to do that is through
smart new trade agreements that level the playing field for our workers,
open new markets for our businesses, and hold other countries to the
kinds of high standards that Americans are proud to hold ourselves to
here at home.
Simply put, America has to write the rules of the 21st century economy
in a way that benefits American workers. If we don’t, countries like
China will write those rules in a way that benefits their workers.
Now, on Friday, Republicans and Democrats in the House of
Representatives voted to help the United States negotiate new trade
deals that are both free and fair – deals that expand opportunity for
our workers and our businesses alike. And that’s good. These kinds of
trade deals say no to a race for the bottom, for lower wages and working
conditions. They’re about starting a race to the top, for higher
wages, and better working conditions, stronger environmental
protections, and a smarter way to crack down on countries that break the
rules of the global economy.
But that’s not all we should be doing for our workers. Right now,
something called Trade Adjustment Assistance provides vital support,
like job-training and community college education, to tens of thousands
of American workers each year who were hurt by past trade deals – the
kind we’re not going to repeat again. Republicans and Democrats in the
Senate have voted to renew this initiative, but so far, the House of
Representatives has chosen to let it expire in just a few months,
leaving as many as 100,000 American workers on their own. For the sake
of those workers, their families, and their communities, I urge those
Members of Congress who voted against Trade Adjustment Assistance to
reconsider, and stand up for American workers.
Because these smart new trade deals aren’t just about growing our
economy and supporting good new American jobs. This is about the kind
of country we want to build for our kids and our grandkids. And if I
did not think that smart new trade deals were the right thing to do for
working families, I wouldn’t be fighting for it.
This is the right thing to do. Trade that’s fair and free and smart
will grow opportunity for our middle class. It will help us restore the
dream we share, and make sure that every American who works hard has a
chance to get ahead. That’s a cause worth fighting for – today, and
every day I have the honor of serving as your President.
Source:Democracy Now AMYGOODMAN:
We’re going to go to break and when we come back, I want to talk about
solutions, what is possible. Our guests or two climate scientists here
at Stanford University, Noah Diffenbaugh and Mark Jacobson. And after we
finish speaking to them, we’re going to Barcelona, Spain, for an
exclusive broadcast interview with the mayor-elect of Barcelona, a
leading anti-eviction housing activist who will be the first female
mayor of that Spanish city. Stay with us.
AMYGOODMAN:
We are broadcasting from Stanford University in California. California,
a state that is now in its fourth straight year of drought. This week
new mandatory water restrictions went into effect, with residents
required to cut back water use by a net total of 25 percent. Just
Thursday, the U.S. Drought Monitor said a wet May that led to greener
pastures in some areas failed to bring any relief and "the sprouting of
grasses will most likely provide extra fuel for early fall wildfires
once the vegetation dies off this summer." Meanwhile, a new study by the
University of California, Davis finds that in 2015 alone, the drought
will cost the state’s farmers and agricultural industry $2.7 billion and
more than 18,000 jobs. The study noted, "The socioeconomic impacts of
an extended drought, in 2016 and beyond, could be much more severe." All
this comes as the death toll from an ongoing heat wave in India has
topped 2300, making it the fifth deadliest in recorded history. India’s
earth sciences minister, Harsh Vardhan, said, "It’s not just an
unusually hot summer, it is climate change."
Well, for more, we’re joined by two guests. Noah Diffenbaugh is a
Senior Fellow at the Stanford Woods Institute for the Environment and an
Associate Professor here at Stanford University in Environmental Earth
System Science. He recently published a study that found a link between
global warming and California’s historic drought. Also joining us is
Mark Jacobson, Professor of Civil and Environmental Engineering at
Stanford and the director of its Atmosphere/Energy Program. Mark
Jacobson is also the co-founder of The Solutions Project, which combines
science, business, and culture to develop and implement science based
clean-energy plans for states and countries, and we’re going to talk
about what those plans are for all 50 states. But first, Noah
Diffenbaugh, the connection between the drought and climate change.
NOAHDIFFENBAUGH:
So we know that climate change can influence drought in a number of
ways, and drought — it’s important to keep in mind — is really the
effective moisture that is available. So, a people may think of drought,
they think of how much is it raining. But really it’s the effect of
moisture. And heat in the atmosphere can really affect that; how much
moisture is available for crops, how much is available for reservoirs
and in snowpack. And it does so in a few ways. It draws water out of
soils. The hotter it is, the more evaporation there will be, the more
transpiration from plants. That’s what we’re seeing with the U.S.
drought Monitor, is really the long-term effects over this drought of
high temperatures. It also affects snow. In California, about a third of
our water storage is reliant on snowpack as a natural reservoir. We
don’t have the concrete reservoirs to store enough water that California
needs. We rely on that snowpack. And the hotter it is, the more
precipitation falls as rain rather than snow and the snow that does fall
melts earlier in the year. And we are seeing those in California in
this drought. When we look over the long-term history of California,
we’re seeing increasing occurrence of years in which there is both low
rainfall and high temperature. And that’s when we know we have an
elevated risk of drought.
AMYGOODMAN: Have you ever seen anything like this before?
NOAHDIFFENBAUGH:
Well I was born in 1974, so I was alive in the much remembered
1976-1977 drought. Something that is interesting, a lot of our climate
indicators show that this drought is more severe than any drought that’s
happened in California’s recorded history. One hundred and twenty years
of recorded history, this is the most severe drought. And secondly, a
lot of people talk about population growth and development in California
and how these have been really large over the last 30 or 40 years, but
interestingly, statewide, our water use is pretty similar now compared
to in 1976-1977. So, we have actually become much more efficient at
using water in California. So, we have a much larger population, but our
total water usage is pretty similar. So it really is this is a more
severe drought from a climate perspective.
AMYGOODMAN:
Mark Jacobson, can you talk about the drought in California and this
record number of deaths in India? 2300 people in the latest heatwave.
MARKJACOBSON:
Well, there are a lot of impacts of climate change or what we also call
global warming. And global warming is really the increase in average
temperatures over the whole globe. Someplace you get lower temperatures
on average, but in more places, you will get higher temperatures, you’ll
get more extreme events, mostly because the average temperature is
higher, the extremes are mostly in the Mormon direction. So you’re going
to get some places where you’ll have much higher temperatures than you
will normally get. And in some of these places, you will have greater
heat waves and more deaths as a result. Or you’ll have more drought as
well. In some places you do get cool temperatures and, sort of, as some
people who don’t believe in global warming or climate change will say,
why is it cold outside if there’s global warming occurring?
That is
because you’re looking at the average over the globe when you’re talking
about global warming, and so you do get both lower temperatures and
higher temperatures, but you’ll get more cases of higher temperatures.
These higher temperatures will result in greater heat stress on people,
and that is one source of mortality. Another source of mortality is
enhanced air pollution. Higher temperatures on average increase air
pollution, but particularly where the air pollution is already bad. And
that is another source of mortality. Another source of mortality is
greater extreme storminess. You’ll get greater extremes in severe
weather such as more intense hurricanes, for example. And because you
just — hurricanes are driven by warmer sea service temperatures and the
ocean temperatures are warmer on average over the globe, and so you will
get greater intensity of the hurricanes, although, not necessarily
greater number.
AMYGOODMAN:
So what do you say, either of you, to Senator Inhofe who takes a
snowball and brings it onto the floor of the Senate and says, you call
this global warming?
NOAHDIFFENBAUGH:
Well I think this is really a question about risk. We are seeing that
in California. So one example is our drought here. When we look at the
120 years of observed record in California, what we see is temperature
goes up, temperature goes down, precipitation goes up precipitation goes
down. Drought indicators go up, they go down. But what we see clearly
is that there is a much higher risk of drought when temperatures are
high. So it takes low precipitation, but if that low precipitation
coincides with warm temperatures, the risk that that low precipitation
produces drought is about twice as high compared to cooler temperatures.
And what we have seen is California has gotten warmer and warmer and
warmer. We have gone from a regime in which about half the years were
warm and half the years we are cool, and half years were wet and half
the years were dry to over the last two decades, 80 percent of the years
have been warm. And what that means is we’ve seen twice as many drought
years. We have seen double the percentage of low precipitation years
that end up producing drought. So that is really risk. It’s really about
the probabilities. And when we talk about the fingerprints of climate
change, the finger prints of climate change on extreme events, we’re
really talking about risk. What is the probability that these extreme
events occur.
AMYGOODMAN: And do you see this as a one off event in California, the drought, if it can be dealt with now?
NOAHDIFFENBAUGH:
Well our research shows very clearly that the conditions that are
producing this drought are becoming much more probable. We see that in
the historical record, the conditions are becoming more likely in the
historical record. We also see it when we look at climate model
experiments. We can talk about climate model experiments that if you
want. We would love to put the earth in a lab and run all kinds of
experiments on it like you can in a Petri dish. We’re not able to do
that. We use climate models to run those experiments. But we very
clearly that we are already on the cusp of really experiencing these
kinds of conditions much more frequently. And in fact, even that United
Nations’ target of two degrees Celsius that we have heard discussed in
Copenhagen and since then in the run-up to Paris this fall, even at that
two degrees level of global warming, California is likely to be in a
regime where year after year we are experiencing very warm or severely
hot conditions. What that means is we have a much higher risk that when
there is low precipitation that it is also going to be hot. And that is
exactly what we are experiencing in this drought.
AMYGOODMAN: And talk about, Mark Jacobson, in India. When we talk about hot. What are the temperatures we’re talking about?
MARKJACOBSON:
Well, and we look at it in terms of — well degrees Celsius most of the
world uses, but in Fahrenheit, the temperatures can get up to an extreme
heat. You’re getting up to — over 100 degrees in Fahrenheit for a
significant period time. And so it is sustained over a period of time
that is a problem, because if you just have a short, one day of hot
weather, it is not going to cause a problem, but many days in a row can
really increase mortality. And people most affected are already weak;
the elderly and those who are sick or otherwise are weak or have
illness. So, the temperatures, though, have been sustained over periods
of time and so this is the main problem with — that you’ll find in any
place where you are impacted. And other places that are impacted would
be like sub-Saharan Africa for example where, for example, you will have
extreme heat events where people already are on the verge of severe
weather and then you just increase the temperature just a little bit and
that causes a huge mortality as a result.
AMYGOODMAN:
A lot of politicians who are climate deniers say, this has been going
on for a very longtime. Professor Diffenbaugh, in 2013, you published a report that found climate change is on pace to occur 10 times faster than any change recorded in, what, 65 million years?
NOAHDIFFENBAUGH:
Well, so in that paper we were looking at global scale temperature
change. So we were looking at global warming and the rate of global
warming if we look at the two degree sea target that the United Nations
is putting forward, if we look at four degrees sea which is really where
we are likely to end up if we continue along the emissions trajectory
that we have been on as a globe. So four degrees in 100 years, we can
look back at the historical record —- when geologists look back at the
sediments in the ocean and the rock record on land, look at fossils,
what they find is that there certainly have been periods where there’s
been four degrees of warming or 10 degrees of cooling, but these have
happened over very long periods. So the most rapid warming that’s been
seen since the extinction of the dinosaurs 65 million years ago was a
period called the Eocene. It happened in the Eocene and it was about
about 55 million years ago, long time ago. And there was four or five
degrees forming, but it looked like it happened in about 10,000 years.
So we’re talking about doing in a century what Earth has done in
thousands of years. And that is really the big difference for the global
scale. We know, looking back at that period in the Eocene, that it was a
very different climate. The were alligators and palm trees inside the
Arctic Circle. So the palm trees kept up because they had 10,000 years
to do it. The alligators kept up, they had 10,000 years to do it. But
we’re talking about an ice-free Arctic with the temperatures that look a
lot like coastal Florida. So -—
AMYGOODMAN: Well wait. Say that again?
NOAHDIFFENBAUGH:
So in that period — the last time that we saw this four degrees
warming, it happened over thousands of years, and it created a very
different climate. So if we look at the Arctic Ocean, we know that it
was at least seasonally ice-free. No summer ice in the Arctic. And when
geologists reconstruct those temperatures using the chemistry and
looking at the fossils that were — of the plants that were there, they
see it looks a lot like coastal Florida does now. So people who say
Earth has been through this before, they are right in terms of the
magnitude of change, but the big difference is how rapid that change
was. And we know from looking at those periods in the past, that the
climate was really, really different. So we are are not saying that
Earth hasn’t experienced, change before. What we’re saying is that we
have very strong evidence that what we’re seeing now is due primarily to
human activities and that the pace of change is much more rapid than
what ecosystems have been exposed to in recent geologic past.
President Barack Obama Weekly Address The White House June 6, 2015
Hi everybody. One of the remarkable things about America is that
nearly all of our families originally came from someplace else. We’re a
nation of immigrants. It’s a source of our strength and something we
all can take pride in. And this month – Immigrant Heritage Month – is a
chance to share our American stories.
I think about my grandparents in Kansas – where they met and where my
mom was born. Their family tree reached back to England and Ireland
and elsewhere. They lived, and raised me, by basic values: working
hard, giving back, and treating others the way you want to be treated.
I think of growing up in Hawaii, a place enriched by people of
different backgrounds – native Hawaiian, Filipino, Japanese, Chinese,
Portuguese and just about everything else. Growing up in that vibrant
mix helped shape who I am today. And while my father was not an
immigrant himself, my own life journey as an African-American – and the
heritage shared by Michelle and our daughters, some of whose ancestors
came here in chains – has made our family who we are.
This month, I’m inviting you to share your story, too. Just visit whitehouse.gov/NewAmericans.
We want to hear how you or your family made it to America – whether
you’re an immigrant yourself or your great-great-grandparents were.
Of course, we can’t just celebrate this heritage, we have to defend
it – by fixing our broken immigration system. Nearly two years ago,
Democrats and Republicans in the Senate came together to do that. They
passed a commonsense bill to secure our border, get rid of backlogs, and
give undocumented immigrants who are already living here a pathway to
citizenship if they paid a fine, paid their taxes, and went to the back
of the line. But for nearly two years, Republican leaders in the House
have refused to even allow a vote on it.
That’s why, in the meantime, I’m going to keep doing everything I can
to make our immigration system more just and more fair. Last fall, I
took action to provide more resources for border security; focus
enforcement on the real threats to our security; modernize the legal
immigration system for workers, employers, and students; and bring more
undocumented immigrants out of the shadows so they can get right with
the law. Some folks are still fighting against these actions. I’m
going to keep fighting for them. Because the law is on our side. It’s
the right thing to do. And it will make America stronger.
I want us to remember people like Ann Dermody from Alexandria,
Virginia. She’s originally from Ireland and has lived in America
legally for years. She worked hard, played by the rules and dreamed of
becoming a citizen. In March, her dream came true. And before taking
the oath, she wrote me a letter. “The papers we receive…will not change
our different accents [or] skin tones,” Ann said. “But for that day,
at least, we’ll feel like we have arrived.”
Well, to Ann and immigrants like her who have come to our shores
seeking a better life – yes, you have arrived. And by sharing our
stories, and staying true to our heritage as a nation of immigrants, we
can keep that dream alive for generations to come.
Source: Time
Sepp Blatter, who proclaimed to the world that he was “president of
everybody” after winning a fifth term as head of FIFA on Friday, will
soon be nobody’s president.
In a stunning turn, Blatter, who seemed to hold so firm to the stance
that he, and he alone, could clean up the corrupt organization that he
presided over, announced on Tuesday that he would step down as FIFA’s
leader, a position he has held since 1998. An extraordinary FIFA
congress will meet to elect a new president: the head of FIFA’s audit
committee said the timing of the election is “likely to be between
December and March.”
Was it pending legal trouble that helped bring down Blatter? He painted
his resignation as a selfless act, an attempt to give FIFA a fresh
start. But his troubles could just be starting. A New York Timesreport
said that Blatter’s top lieutenant made a $10 million bank transaction
that puts the bribery trail that much closer to Blatter himself. The New
York Daily Newsreported
that Aaron Davidson, one of the sports marketing executives arrested in
the U.S. probe into FIFA’s business practices, is trying to cut a plea
deal. Will he, and other indicted
officials, be singing about Blatter? “Let me be clear,” Kelly Currie,
acting U.S. attorney for the eastern district of New York, said last
week. “This indictment is not the final chapter of our investigation.”
The president’s defiant words on Friday — “Why would I step down? That
would mean I recognize that I did wrong” — may yet come back to haunt
him.
But Blatter is nothing if not tenacious. “I am a mountain goat that
keeps going and going and going,” he once said. “I cannot be stopped, I
just keep going.”
Joseph S. Blatter was born in Visp, a remote Swiss Alpine town, and
was sportswriter, PR rep, and reportedly a wedding singer before he rose
up the ranks at FIFA, where he has worked since 1975. Since he took
over as FIFA president in 1998, corruption has tainted his reign. During
his first presidential election, there were allegations that some votes
were bought. One month before his 2011 re-election, Blatter pledged $1
million in FIFA money at an assembly for CONCACAF, the regional soccer
governing body for North America, Central America and the Caribbean at
the center of the current scandal.
Almost immediately after FIFA decided in December 2010 to award World
Cups to Russia in 2018 and Qatar in 2022, bribery allegations began
surfacing. Last week, the Swiss government announced a criminal
investigation specific to the bidding process for these events. The
Qatar decision has also sparked a humanitarian crisis. Migrant workers
have toiled in triple-digit heat building the stadiums and
infrastructure needed for the tiny Gulf nation to host the world’s most
popular sporting event. According to a 2014 report from International
Trade Union Confederation, 1,200 migrant World Cup workers from India
and Nepal have died.
Under Blatter, FIFA has operated with little real transparency. This
is an organization that produced a $27 million propaganda film in which
Blatter was the hero.
His few supporters will point to his achievements; he did disperse
money to many poor countries, where amenities like soccer facilities
provided real benefits. The women’s World Cup, and women’s soccer
overall, grew in popularity, though Blatter was a clumsy steward. The
self-proclaimed “godfather” of women’s soccer once suggested that women
wear tighter outfits to attract more fans, and before this year’s
women’s World Cup, which kicks off June 6, top players sued FIFA for
gender discrimination.
FIFA’s revenues ballooned under Blatter: FIFA currently has $1.5
billion in cash reserves. But how much was the president himself
responsible for this business success, given the entrenched popularity
of the World Cup, and an environment where media outlets are paying
record rights fees across many sports to broadcast big events?
Whoever FIFA elects as its next president will have to grapple with
Qatar – can a World Cup conceivably be staged there, given the human
toll? — and cleaning up the disgraced organization. Tough times are
ahead. But Blatter’s resignation offers hope, for many soccer fans
around the globe, that the game’s organizing body can start to reform
itself.
“Have a nice day,” a FIFA flack said at the end of the stunning press
conference that ended the Blatter era. For soccer fans around the
globe, indeed, it was.
President Barack Obama Weekly Address The White House May 30, 2015
Hi, everybody. As President and Commander in Chief, my
greatest responsibility is the safety of the American people. And in our
fight against terrorists, we need to use every effective tool at our
disposal -- both to defend our security and to protect the freedoms and
civil liberties enshrined in our Constitution.
But tomorrow -- Sunday, at midnight -- some important
tools we use against terrorists will expire. That’s because Congress has
not renewed them, and because legislation that would -- the USA Freedom
Act -- is stuck in the Senate. I want to be very clear about what this
means.
Today, when investigating terrorist networks, our national
security professionals can seek a court order to obtain certain
business records. Our law enforcement professionals can seek a roving
wiretap to keep up with terrorists when they switch cell phones. We can
seek a wiretap on so-called lone wolves -- suspected terrorists who may
not be directly tied to a terrorist group. These tools are not
controversial. Since 9/11, they have been renewed numerous times. FBI
Director James Comey says they are “essential” and that losing them
would “severely” impact terrorism investigations. But if Congress
doesn’t act by tomorrow at midnight, these tools go away as well.
The USA Freedom Act also accomplishes something I called
for a year and a half ago: it ends the bulk metadata program -- the bulk
collection of phone records -- as it currently exists and puts in place
new reforms. The government will no longer hold these records;
telephone providers will. The Act also includes other changes to our
surveillance laws -- including more transparency -- to help build
confidence among the American people that your privacy and civil
liberties are being protected. But if Congress doesn’t act by midnight
tomorrow, these reforms will be in jeopardy, too.
It doesn’t have to be this way. The USA Freedom Act
reflects ideas from privacy advocates, our private sector partners and
our national security experts. It already passed the House of
Representatives with overwhelming bipartisan support -- Republicans and
Democrats. A majority of the Senate -- Republicans and Democrats -- have
voted to move it forward.
So what’s the problem? A small group of senators is
standing in the way. And, unfortunately, some folks are trying to use
this debate to score political points. But this shouldn’t and can't be
about politics. This is a matter of national security. Terrorists like
al Qaeda and ISIL aren’t suddenly going to stop plotting against us at
midnight tomorrow. And we shouldn’t surrender the tools that help keep
us safe. It would be irresponsible. It would be reckless. And we
shouldn’t allow it to happen.
So today, I’m calling on Americans to join me in speaking
with one voice to the Senate. Put the politics aside. Put our national
security first. Pass the USA Freedom Act -- now. And let’s protect the
security and civil liberties of every American. Thanks very much.
