Saturday, July 23, 2022

Stingless bees

I did not know until this morning that there were stingless bees.  From AFP:


Long overlooked, Brazil's native bees are making a comeback, with people such as Lustosa, a 66-year-old public servant, getting in on the movement to boost their profile.

Of 550 stingless bee species known to exist in tropical and sub-tropical areas of the world, some 250 are found in Brazil, according to Cristiano Menezes of Brazil's Embrapa Agricultural Research Corporation.

Yet they are little known outside of rural and Indigenous communities, having been relegated to a lesser place by European and African honeybees brought to Brazil over the centuries for their more prolific honey- and wax-producing skills.

Most of Brazil's honey today comes from non-native, stinging bees.

- 'Here to help us' -

Lustosa is president of the Native Bee Institute, a non-profit organization that plants trees to expand the habitat of native bees and educates people about their important role as pollinators.

"We explain to children that the bees don’t sting, that they are necessary for the environment and nature, and they are there to help us," Lustosa told AFP at the institute's premises in Brasilia, where he runs workshops and sells native honey.

 

On Brazil's bees, MONGABAY reports:

The importance of Brazil’s stingless bees is increasingly being acknowledged, since agricultural crops of high economic value depend on pollination by these insects. And beekeeping helps conservation: Keepers of Melipona, a genus of stingless bees, usually preserve local ecosystems and restore areas used in their activity, since native Brazilian bees depend on a healthy habitat to reproduce.

“Their appreciation is on the rise. Places that maintained the culture of native beekeeping can now make this an alternative for income generation,” says Jerônimo Villas-Bôas, author of a manual that addresses practices associated with stingless beekeeping in Brazil.

In the fine dining sector, Brazilian honey has already reached the kitchens of well-known chefs, including Alex Atala, whose São Paulo restaurant has two Michelin stars.

 

And here's a little from WIKIPEDIA:

Geographical distribution

Stingless bees can be found in most tropical or subtropical regions of the world, such as Australia, Africa, Southeast Asia, and tropical America.[1][2][3][6] The majority of native eusocial bees of Central and South America are stingless bees, although only a few of them produce honey on a scale such that they are farmed by humans.[7][8] They are also quite diverse in Africa, including Madagascar,[9] and are farmed there also; meliponine honey is prized as a medicine in many African communities, as well as in South America.[2][10]

Behaviour

Being tropical, stingless bees are active all year round, although they are less active in cooler weather, with some species presenting diapause.[2][11][12] Unlike other eusocial bees, they do not sting, but will defend by biting if their nest is disturbed. In addition, a few (in the genus Oxytrigona) have mandibular secretions, including formic acid, that cause painful blisters.[13] Despite their lack of a sting, stingless bees, being eusocial, may have very large colonies made formidable by the number of defenders.[14][5]

 

And here's a video about stinger-less bees in the Amazon.

 

 

 

 

"Iraq snapshot" (THE COMMON ILLS):

Friday, July 22, 2022.  The President of the United States has COVID, the Turkish government and Stephen King caught lying, and much more.


ADDED: I was asked in an e-mail Martha read why I hadn't commented on NYT's "I Was Wrong" series?  Because it's garbage and nonsense.  It's impossible to pick just one but I'll go with the ridiculous Gail Collins.  She's apologizing for bringing up Mitt Romney's dog -- repeatedly -- in 2012 -- Bob Smmerby called her out for this nonsense in real time.


That's b.s. and crap.  She's making a joke of the dog again.


Does Gail think she has nothing to apologize for?  Nothing she was wrong about?


Because I am still in possession of the e-mail she wrote in 2003 where she attacked a NYT subscriber for stating that with Maureen Dowd -- the paper's sole female columnist -- on vacation, why didn't Gail -- then over the opinion and editorial section, hire a woman instead of offering more male voices.  If Gail's forgotten  the e-mail maybe this will help, "It is not important to have a woman represented on the pages, it is important to have a variety of opinions represented."


Okay.  Help you any, Gail?  Of course, you'd promoted your useless (and pathetic) book in 2003 and posed as a feminist.


I believe most feminists would feel that your inability to provide opportunities for women was very anti-woman.  


I know all the feminists I've circulated the e-mail to over the years have agreed with me.  And, as I've noted for years here, when that e-mail was forwarded to me, I immediately began sharing it.


Gail Collins is an ugly woman who cries 'feminist!' when she needs something.  She does nothing to help other women.  Maybe Gale might explain why she REFUSED columns on Coretta Scott King when Coretta passed?  Maybe she might want to apologize for that and apologize for promoting her White friend (the minor playwright) who had died instead.  Exactly how many mentions did that playwright get?


And Coretta?  Gail turned down one column after another.  When I raised the issue with Bob Herbert, he finally did a column that noted Coretta had passed -- that wasn't the focus of his column but he agreed Gail's behavior was outrageous.


A Civil Rights activist who was known around the world passed away and Gail refused to publish columns on the passing.  MLK's widow.  


But Gail's White friend (who wasn't a great playwright) got how much coverage on the op-ed pages?


It was ourtageous.


Gail Collins is both sexist and racist.  I'd think she'd have quite a bit to cop to.


Is Kamala Harris in charge?  If not, should she be?  Those are the questions that people should be asking now that Joe  Biden has COVID 19.  While it can be mild, it can also be harsh and with Joe's advanced age and already questions about whether or not he's fit to be president, those are serious questions.  The President of the United States has an illness that can be very debilitating.  


At WSWS, Evan Blake writes:

The fact that Biden, who is surrounded by a level of security unknown to all but a handful of Americans, has contracted COVID-19 exposes the recklessness of his administration’s “living with COVID” policy. In recent weeks, Biden was made into the poster boy for this propaganda campaign, taking numerous maskless photo ops throughout the world.

Historically, an announcement that the president is ill, especially with a virus responsible for widespread death, would be taken with great seriousness, if for no other reason than it creates a political crisis. Instead, Biden’s bout with COVID-19 has been presented almost as a cause for celebration.

Typical of this trend is an op-ed in the Washington Post by Leana Wen, one of the chief minimizers of the Omicron variant who has supported all of the Biden administration’s unscientific policies. Wen writes, “President Biden’s covid-19 diagnosis is an opportunity for his administration to demonstrate the success of his leadership on the pandemic and what living with the coronavirus looks like.” She adds, “Biden should use his illness as an opportunity to inform the public that covid-19 is a manageable disease for almost everyone, so long as they use the tools available to them.”

Instead of reflecting on their disastrous mishandling of the pandemic—which has now killed over 600,000 Americans in just the first 18 months of his administration—the Biden White House is promoting this same line and stressing that he will continue working while sick with COVID-19, with the implication that all Americans should do the same when infected.


On the topic of viruses, Jeffrey St. Clair (COUNTERPUNCH) points out:


Ronald Reagan didn’t so much ignore AIDS as actively encourage and facilitate its spread. Reagan’s Surgeon General, C. Everett Coop, said that the view in the Reagan White House as that ‘they (homosexuals) are only getting what they justly deserve.” Biden seems to be taking the same tact for monkeypox, which is being written off as a homosexual disease spread by promiscuous gay sex. (It’s not.)


Meanwhile, at NEWSWEEK, Tom O'Connor observes:

Recent attacks in northern Iraq and Syria have sparked outrage in both countries as well as neighboring nations and have raised concerns for the United States, whose NATO ally, Turkey, has been named as a culprit by the targeted states.

Funerals were held across Iraq on Thursday after nine tourists were killed a day earlier in what Iraqi officials have described as a Turkish artillery attack on a resort in the northern village of Zakho, located in Iraq's semi-autonomous Kurdistan region. Iraqi Prime Minister Mustafa al-Kadhimi, who received the bodies of the dead in a ceremony, announced a national day of mourning as hundreds took to the street in protest.

In a statement released shortly after the attack, Kadhimi condemned the "brutal attack," which he said "underscores the fact that Turkey ignored Iraq's continuous demands to refrain from military violations against Iraqi territory and the lives of its people."


The attack in Iraq killed 9 people -- three of which were were children.  IRAQI NEWS notes:


The United Nations International Children’s Emergency Fund (UNICEF) publish a press statement on Thursday condemning the use of explosive weapons in populated areas as three Iraqi children, among nine civilians, were killed on Wednesday in a Turkish bombardment targeting a summer resort in a hill village in Zakho district of Duhok governorate in Kurdistan region.

“UNICEF is deeply troubled by the killing of three girls, a 1-year-old, a 12-year-old and a 16-year-old, in the attack in Dohuk governorate in Iraq,” the UNICEF statement mentioned.

“UNICEF condemns all acts of violence against children and joins the families in mourning the killing of their children and wishes those wounded a fast recovery. Being a victim of, witnessing or fearing violence should never be part of any child’s experience,” the statement added.

All children in Iraq deserve to live their lives without the constant threat of violence exacerbated by the use of explosive weapons. UNICEF calls on all parties to fulfil their obligations, under international law, to protect children at all times and without delay, according to the UNICEF statement.


Ali Jassim Tweets:

🔺The Turkish bombing of northern Iraq claimed many victims. Does the world know what Turkey is doing in areas like Iraq? Is this not considered a form of terrorism? We need a real stand in front of the crimes Turkey is doing. #طرد_السفير_التركي #Turkish
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11:11 AM · Jul 20, 2022


REUTERS offers this video report.




Amberin Zaman (AL-MONITOR) reports:

Iraq said it would be taking its case to the UN Security Council, even as Turkey denied involvement in the artillery attack on a tourist resort in Iraqi Kurdistan’s Dahuk region and called for a joint investigation. Victims included a 1-year-old girl and a newly married man who had traveled there with his bride for their honeymoon.

The Council on National Security told the Foreign Ministry to recall its charge d’affaires in Ankara for consultations and to hold off sending a new ambassador.

Several Iraqi tourism companies said they were launching a boycott on Turkey, while the Iraqi government advised its citizens not to travel there. Protests continued outside the Turkish visa center in Baghdad today following demonstrations in the Shiite holy cities of Najaf and Karbala and in the southern city of Nasiriyah the night before. 

Turkey’s Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu kept up the denials today, saying that Iraqi authorities must not fall for “this trap.”



The denial of the Turkish government is as ridiculous as Stephen King's lie that he did not praise a Nazi War Criminal.



Stephen King was prank called by Vovan and Lexus. They asked him what he thinks of Bandera. His answer „I think Bandera was a great man“ Pure crap. Troll sh[*}it. No truth to it.
4:40 PM · Jul 20, 2022


In the comments, they mock him and make fun of him because video was released of  what he tried to deny happened.

Just like Turkey thinks it can deny what took place.  Journalist Renwar Najm Tweets many reasons why Turkey's denial is impossible to believe including:

For example, on June 25, 2020, a Turkish airstrike targeted Kuna Masi resort in Slemani province, six days before that attack, another Turkish airstrike killed 3 civilians in RKI. So If history is any guide, what happened in Zakho is a very Turkish thing.
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CNW
@ConflictsW
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Video from Kuna Masi, Iraq shows a family playing in the river who were narrowly missed by a Turkish airstrike today #Iraq #Turkey
Show this thread
5:33 AM · Jul 21, 2022


Iraq rejected Turkey’s denial of responsibility for the deadly artillery attack on an Iraqi tourist resort as families of the victims buried their loved ones on Thursday.

“The Iraqi state's narrative confirms that Ankara is behind the attack, which is not the first and comes in a series of continuous attacks,” Foreign Ministry spokesman Ahmad Al Sahhaf said on Thursday.

“Turkey's denial of responsibility is a sick joke that Iraqi diplomacy will not accept.”






Meanwhile, mourners carried the coffin of Abbas Abdul Hussein, a 30-year-old Iraqi killed in Zakho. Hussein had just been married five days earlier, his cousin Said Alawadi said, demanding the government “initiate deterrent measures against Turkey," even cut all political and economic ties.

The attack catapulted into the spotlight Turkey's ongoing military operations against Turkey's Kurdish insurgents in northern Iraq, an issue that has long divided Iraqi officials. With deep economic ties between the two countries, many hesitate to damage relations with Ankara.

Baghdad and Ankara are also divided on other issues, including the Kurdish region's independent oil sector and water-sharing. But in the aftermath of the attack, anger against Turkey is mounting on the Iraqi street.

In April, Turkey launched its latest offensive in northern Iraq, part of a series of cross-border operations that started in 2019 to combat the PKK.

The Iraqi government condemned Wednesday's attack as a “flagrant violation of Iraq's sovereignty,” convened an emergency national security meeting and ordered a pause in dispatching Iraq's new ambassador to Ankara.

Iraq's parliament was also to meet on Saturday to discuss the Turkish attack. Kadhimi accused Turkey of ignoring “Iraq’s continuous demands to refrain from military violations against Iraqi territory and the lives of its people.”  



Ruwayda Mustafah Tweets:


Some new developments: People storm the Turkish visa office in Najaf and take down Turkey’s flag in response to the bombardment earlier today in Duhok, #Kurdistan. Muqtada Al-Sadr suggests reducing diplomatic ties between Baghdad-Ankara, and filing a complaint with UN.
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10:50 AM · Jul 20, 2022


The Iraqi people are very upset about what happened.

Campaign to boycott Tirkish products by Iraqi businesses.. ‘national duty’ in response to Turkey bombing of Iraqi civilians in northern Iraq
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5:22 AM · Jul 22, 2022







Turkey’s pro-Kurdish Peoples’ Democratic Party’s (HDP) holds the Justice and Development Party (AKP) government “politically and legally responsible” for shelling that killed nine civilians in northern Iraq’s Kurdistan region on Wednesday, Turkish Minute reported.

Nine people including children were killed and 23 wounded in the Zakho district village of Parakh on Wednesday, when artillery shells hit a park in an attack that local officials blamed on neighboring Turkey. The majority of the casualties were domestic tourists seeking respite from the heat of the plains in the mountains of the Kurdish north.

The HDP in a statement on Thursday called for an urgent meeting of the General Assembly of the Turkish Parliament following the attack, saying it would go down in history as “the second Roboski massacre.”

The incident commonly known as the Roboski massacre refers to the killing of 34 male Kurdish civilians, most of them teenagers, on Dec. 28, 2011, when military jets bombed them after receiving intelligence on terrorists from the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) in the Uludere district of Şırnak province near the Turkish–Iraqi border.

“Bombing civilian settlements is a crime against humanity and a war crime. Turkey is a direct party to international conventions prohibiting it. … This massacre is also an attack on the sovereignty of another country. The perpetrators and decision-makers must be prosecuted,” the HDP said.

The Diyarbakır Bar Association also announced in a series of tweets that they would file a complaint regarding the shelling blamed on Turkey in order to “identify and punish those responsible” for the attack.

“As it did in Roboski, humanitarian law [again] becomes worthless when it comes to the Kurds,” the association stated.

In an unusually strong rebuke, Iraqi Prime Minister Mustafa al-Kadhemi on Wednesday warned Turkey that Baghdad reserves the “right to retaliate,” calling the artillery fire a “flagrant violation” of sovereignty — a line echoed by Iraq’s Kurdish administration.

Iraq said it was recalling its chargé d’affaires from Ankara and summoning Turkey’s ambassador, and demanded an official apology from Turkey along with “the withdrawal of its armed forces from all Iraqi territory.”

But Turkey’s foreign ministry denied responsibility for the bombardment, saying these “kinds of attacks” were committed by “terrorist organizations,” and inviting Baghdad to avoid making statements influenced by “terrorist propaganda.”

Ankara launched an offensive in northern Iraq in April called “Operation Claw-Lock,” which it said targets militants from the PKK, a militant group that has kept up a bloody war for Kurdish self-rule in southeastern Turkey since 1984 and is listed by Ankara and its Western allies as a “terrorist organization.”

For the past 25 years, the Turkish army has maintained dozens of outposts across Iraq’s Kurdish north as part of its campaign against the militants of the PKK. There have been sporadic calls for their removal.

Iraq and Turkey are key trade partners, but Ankara’s successive offensives against the PKK rear bases in the north have been a persistent thorn in relations.


We'll wind down with this:


 

Feminist Majority Foundation

 

Dear Common Ills,

Forget anger, disgust and worry. We won't restore Roe v. Wade protections by only wringing our hands.

We must fight back. Not just protest. Spring into action.

Here are 2 practical Actions to restore Roe and win permanent protection for women. 

Action #1: Maintain the Democrat's majority in the House and increase Democratic seats in the U.S. Senate. This will enable us to break the filibuster and pass the Women's Health Protection Act, a nationwide law to restore Roe in every state. 

Action #2: Place the Equal Rights Amendment in the U.S. Constitution. This is our only permanent insurance against the attacks by right-wing politicians whose power is protected by voter suppression and their majorities in state legislatures earned through gerrymandering. 

You see, Action #1—Federal restoration of Roe will protect women in every state while we work to enshrine the ERA in the Constitution. Action #2—the ERA—provides a permanent fix.

Both Actions are doable. In fact, very doable. 

That’s why holding Democratic control of the House and increasing the Democratic majority in the Senate by flipping just 2 Republican seats is possible. And when we succeed we can declare victory because we will have busted the filibuster and restored the protections of Roe v. Wade nationwide.

Together, we can do it--if we organize to get out the vote. Recent polls make clear that Women and Young Voters are likely to provide the winning margin for Democrats in key races for the House and the Senate.

I'm personally urging you to step up today and donate what you can--whether $5, $15 or $50 to mobilize for this year's mid-terms to achieve both GOAL #1 and GOAL #2.

Given the Feminist Majority’s history of organizing on college campuses  and widening and winning with the Gender Gap, the goal of our campaign is to mobilize the student vote in key battleground states where we can flip and hold U.S. Senate seats and elect pro-ERA, pro-abortion rights, pro-democracy Democrats and take away Mitch McConnell’s filibuster power.

Although younger Americans do vote at a lower rate than older groups, it was especially young people's votes, as well as the gender gap, that made the decisive difference in the close and victorious mid-term elections of 2018, and again in the elections of 2020.

That’s why through Feminist Majority Vote Equality ’22 mobilization we are activating teams of organizers to get out the college student vote in battleground states. We’ll do what we’ve successfully done before and turn out the college student vote in record numbers.

Please join me and Help Finish the Job

Nothing is as important to the future of all who believe in equality and democracy than defeating the right-wing extremists.  For this reason, nothing becomes more important in the months ahead than taking action to hold the Democratic majority in the House and take away Mitch McConnell’s filibuster power in Senate.

With all the preparation that’s gone into launching this year’s Feminist Majority Vote Equality ’22 Campaign I’m convinced this is a solid opportunity to not only help win a working majority control of the Senate, but to finish what we all have worked for so long and so hard for—placing the Equal Rights Amendment in the Constitution.

Please make your early money contribution today and help drive the student and women's vote to record levels.

Most importantly, thank you for always being strong for equality. 

For equality,

Ellie Smeal Signature

Eleanor Smeal
President

P.S. If we can add just two more Senate wins, we'll have a 52-48 Democratic majority that can stop Mitch McConnell's filibuster without Manchin and Sinema.

Contributions to Feminist Majority are not tax deductible as charitable contributions for Federal income tax purposes because of our lobbying and electoral work for women's rights. Donations may be used for political purposes. By contributing you confirm that you are a citizen or permanent legal resident of the U.S. and are donating your own funds. Feminist Majority is solely responsible for this communication. Feminist Majority does not engage in any electoral activity or make political expenditures in cooperation or coordination with any candidate or candidate committee.



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