Welcome to Sunday OND, tonight's edition of the daily feature. The Overnight News Digest crew consists of founder Magnifico, regular editors jlms qkw, Bentliberal, wader, Oke, rfall, and JML9999, alumni editors palantir and ScottyUrb, guest editors maggiejean and annetteboardman, and current editor-in-chief Neon Vincent.
You are all welcome to read and comment, share links and news, and spend some time winding down this evening with the day's news.
Wildfires, fallout from SCOTUS & ACA domestically. Elections around the world in Mexico & Libya.
No obvious insight tonight on next week. ;-)
WAR AND WAR-LIKE CONFLICT
Donor nations pledge $16bn to Afghanistan
US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has made a pledge to continue Afghan aid at its current levels until 2017, as some 70 countries gathered in Tokyo to announce a four-year civilian assistance plan.
Altogether, the countries promised on Sunday to give $16bn to Afghanistan through to 2015.
The White House will ask Congress to sustain US assistance for Afghanistan near the average amount it has been over the last decade through 2017 as part of the international effort to stabilise the country, even as most international forces pull out over the next two years.
The funds would help Afghanistan build its economy and make necessary reforms, Clinton said.
"We have to make the security gains and the transition irreversible,'' Clinton told officials, including Afghan President Hamid Karzai.
She said Afghan security "cannot only be measured by the absence of war".
These statements at the Tokyo summit came shortly after roadside bombs killed 35 people, including seven Nato soldiers, in Afghanistan's southern Kandahar province close to the Pakistan border.
$16B. 35 deaths, 11 death the prior 24 hours.
Symbolic Afghan highway 'useless and poorly built'
A flagship multimillion-dollar highway linking Afghanistan's main cities is of no use to most of the population and at risk of crumbling during the winter, a report to British ministers has warned.
The 2700km Highway 1, largely bankrolled by American and Saudi millions, was seen as a symbol of Afghanistan's emergence as a modern democratic nation. But senior figures within the British Foreign Office have questioned the priority given to the project - and the standard of the road.
A confidential paper under discussion in the department claims the road is not completely "metalled" and has a layer of tarmac too thin to last an Afghan winter, leaving long stretches in danger of disintegration.
West Wing Reports @WestWingReport
Also important to note that since 2008, U.S. military suicides have outnumbered combat fatalities. Averaging about one a day this year
Difa-i-Pakistan begins ‘long-march’ to Islamabad
Prominent Pakistani hardliners who oppose their country’s anti-terror alliance with Washington led thousands of people in a protest Sunday against Pakistan’s decision to allow the US and other Nato countries to resume shipping troop supplies through the country to Afghanistan.
The demonstration in the eastern city of Lahore was organized by the Difa-i-Pakistan Council (DPC), a group of right-wing politicians and religious leaders who have been the most vocal opponents of the supply line.
Thousands of people joined a convoy of buses, trucks and cars, many carrying the black and white striped flags of the Defence of Pakistan coalition, on the 275-kilometre journey from the eastern city of Lahore to Islamabad.
DRC rebels advance over state forces
The rebels, known as M23, are mutinous Tutsi troops who abandoned the regular army earlier this year in a dispute over pay and conditions.
They said they took the Nord-Kivu province towns of Rutshuru, Ntamugenga and Rubare, less than 10km by road from the provincial capital Goma, shortly after midnight.
According to M23 spokesperson Lieutenant Colonel Vianney Kazarama, the rebels faced no opposition from the Congolese army, known as the FARDC.
"Our men have just taken the town of Rutshuru. On Saturday evening the FARDC came down to our position at Mbuzi.
We decided to pursue them and they lost Ntamugenag, then we came down to Rubare," Kazarama said.
Sporadic gunfire was later heard in Rutshuru but it may have been celebratory shots fired into the air.
Syria: UN envoy Kofi Annan to hold talks with Assad
The UN and Arab League's envoy to Syria, Kofi Annan, is due to meet President Bashar al-Assad in Damascus for talks on his six-point peace plan.
The meeting comes after Mr Annan acknowledged that the plan has so far failed to end the violence.
A week ago, a meeting of major powers called for a transitional unity government in Syria.
Mr Assad has accused the US of trying to destabilise Syria by giving "gangs" in his country political protection.
Syria's Foreign Ministry spokesman, Jihad Makdissi, told the AFP news agency that the talks would focus on the six-point plan for peace mediated by Mr Annan earlier this year.
Because it's worked so well before.
Juba's bitter anniversary
On Monday, the world's youngest country celebrates its first birthday. After four decades of war, the Republic of South Sudan won independence last year on 9 July, in a burst of celebratory gunfire that resonated across the African continent. A year on, the independence dream of peace and prosperity lies in tatters. As of this month, the dusty international airport is the scene of a humanitarian airlift operation to feed 5 million people. Outside of the capital, Juba, the wooden markets are shuttered and bare. The newly minted currency is worth less every day as inflation soars. Salva Kiir, the new president, has demanded the return of £2.6bn stolen by public officials since independence.
Meanwhile, the streets that last July smelled of fresh paint are choked with NGO vehicles headed for a refugee crisis in the north-east – an influx of 120,000 people displaced by war raging across the border in Sudan's Blue Nile state. Oxfam, Médecins Sans Frontières and others say the country is facing its worst humanitarian crisis since the end of the north-south war in 2005. There is not enough clean drinking water to support the refugees, who are poised precariously on a floodplain as seasonal rains lash the powdery dust to thick mud. Surrounded by filthy water, families face the mortal irony of dying of thirst.
"We are safe here from bombs, but our children are sick," Adam Narser, a 25-year-old market trader told us at a transit camp known as Kilometre 18. "Water is running out."
AROUND THE WORLD
Investigation ordered after dozens die in flash floods
Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered investigators to find out if enough was done to prevent 144 people being killed in floods in southern Russia after flying to the region to deal with the first big disaster of his new presidency.
Putin, who was criticised for his slow reaction to disasters earlier in his career, also ordered money to be put aside late on Saturday for building new homes for victims of the worst flooding in decades in Krasnodar, a relatively rich area with thriving agriculture and tourism industries.
An Interior Ministry crisis centre said 144 people had been killed in the flooding after two months' average rainfall fell in a few hours on Friday night. Most of the dead were drowned, many of them elderly people caught unawares as they slept.
Police said survivors climbed into trees and onto roofs to stay above the waters, which flooded entire ground floors of some buildings and created driving torrents in some streets.
Carbon tax burial price hike a 'complete figment', CEO says
A Melbourne cemetery is on the back foot after claims by a grieving family that they were slapped with a $55 "carbon tax" fee on a burial plot last week.
Erica Maliki, whose father-in-law died on June 30, claims staff at Springvale Botanical Cemetery told her the cost of a burial had risen $55 because the carbon tax had increased the price of running grave-digging machinery. Ms Maliki described the price rise as an "absolute disgrace" in a post on Facebook.
The head of the Southern Metropolitan Cemeteries Trust has been forced to clear the air over the price rise. Jonathan Tribe, chief executive of the trust, said this morning he could not rule out that a staff member had told the Maliki family that the price rise was linked to the carbon tax. However, he said a policy of increasing prices because of the tax was a "figment of somebody's imagination".
"I can never absolutely say that it was not said," Mr Tribe told radio station 3AW. "But what I can tell you is that is has never been discussed by me, the management committee or the sales staff and therefore if it was said it's a complete figment of somebody's imagination."
A skirmish in the battle for Australia's carbon tax system in the war on climate change.
China takes aim at rotten regions
It is safe to say that China has a local governance problem. How the central government deals with this problem - or fails to deal with it - may be decisive in determining how ugly political life can get in the People's Republic of China (PRC) over the next few years.
The latest local disturbance, in the mountain municipality of Shifang in southwestern Sichuan province, has apparently given the government and party considerable food for thought.
On July 2, the call went out over social media for the city's inhabitants to "take a stroll", ie engage in an unapproved and unorganized protest march to oppose a mammoth molybdenum and copper project that had just begun construction in the economic development zone.
Perhaps 10,000 people showed up to chant slogans and sign anti-project petitions.
Mujica proposes to blend Mercosur and Unasur into an only `more flexible group
“I favour and have proposed my peers to transform Mercosur in Unasur or the other way around, so that they become an only group. I don’t know how it would be called but we need to open other institutional paths, which are more flexible and more realistic”, said the Uruguayan leader.
Mujica said he shared his proposal with the presidents from Argentina, Cristina Fernandez; Brazil, Dilma Rousseff; Chile, Sebastián Peñera and Peru’s Ollanta Humala during the recent Mercosur summit in Mendoza which was followed by an emergency meeting of Unasur, Union of South American Nations.
“The region must think and look twenty years ahead and forget the short sightedness, the short terms”, Mujica told his peers.
The president said that with Venezuela inside Mercosur “it’s a three giants match against two weaklings (Uruguay and Paraguay) but with Unasur we can open to other strong countries from the Pacific such as Colombia, Peru and Chile”.
There is a bit of macro finance activity, re: Euro and US$, going on also. Apparently.
Seeking an Alternative to Two States: European Right Wing Stirs Up Middle East Peace Process
European right-wing populist parties are widely vilified back home. Deeply wary of the euro, extremely -- and vocally -- suspicious of Muslim immigrants and virulently opposed to the center-left multicultural ideal, they are broadly seen as little more than dangerous makers of mischief on the political stage. Often, they are conflated with neo-Nazi groups even further to the right.
Overseas, however, particularly among Israeli right-wing politicians and West Bank settlers, they are often viewed more favorably. On Thursday, representatives from several European right-wing political parties joined senior settler leaders, second-tier Israeli politicians, Orthodox Jewish leaders and a number of Palestinian clan leaders at the home of Sheikh Farid al-Jabari in Hebron. They came together with no less than the goal of establishing an alternative to the two-state, Israeli-Palestinian peace process.
"First and foremost, we are interested in achieving peaceful coexistence in the region. I think that needs to be the goal of all efforts," Heinz-Christian Strache, head of the right-wing populist Freedom Party of Austria (FPÖ), told SPIEGEL ONLINE. "To that end, it is important to begin a dialogue. I am convinced that a solution can be found in the near future that is acceptable to all sides."
Decaying concrete raising concerns at Canada’s aging nuclear plants
Decaying concrete at nuclear power plants is the latest concern for nuclear safety authorities.
At Quebec’s sole atomic power station, Gentilly-2, eroding concrete has prompted federal licensing officials to suggest that any provincial attempt to refurbish and re-license the 30-year-old plant must satisfy federal concerns over the aging concrete’s ability to stand up to another two or three decades of service.
The move comes as economic pressures force nuclear utilities to consider refurbishing their nuclear plants and operating them well past their 25- to 30-year initial lives.
With Gentilly-2 at the end of its service life, the Quebec government is under pressure to decide soon whether to order a refit or shut down the plant permanently.
Refurbishment estimates range from $2 billion to $3 billion. A shutdown is pegged at $1.6 billion.
IN THE USA
GOP Aims to Sink Navy's "Great Green Fleet"
The economics aren't much better at the moment, at least not in the military programs. The Navy's Green Fleet excursion required 450,000 gallons of biofuel from a contractor for $12 million—a cool $26.67 a gallon, according to Reuters. And that's one hell of a value compared with what the DOD spent on 20,055 gallons of algae-based biofuel three years ago: $8.5 million, or $423.83 per gallon. Put that in your Prius!
Mabus acknowledged last month at a climate and security conference that the costs sound pretty staggering, but noted that it's a developing technology. "If we didn't pay a little bit more for new technologies, we'd still be using typewriters instead of computers." He's convinced that demand from the military—which amounts to 300,000 barrels, or 12.6 million gallons, a day—could drive the creation of cheaper, more agile bio markets. That's drawn enthusiastic support from some quarters, at least. "We believe they can in fact create that market," said a VP from Northrup Grumman (America's second-biggest defense contractor, the one behind the stealth bomber boondoggle.)
But budget hawks are rather alarmed by the Great Green Fleet. "I don't believe it's the job of the Navy to be involved in building…new technologies. I don't believe we can afford it," Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) told reporters last week. (That's the same McCain who once granted an interview and head shot for the inaugural issue of a contractor trade magazine titled Military Training Technology.)
I love it when the GOP House interferes with the military's strategy and tactics.
How Fire Could Change the Face of the West
“These transitions could be massive. They represent the convergence of several different forces,” said Donald Falk, a fire ecologist at the University of Arizona. “There is a tremendous amount of energy on the landscape that historically would not have been there. These are nuclear amounts of energy.”
Falk’s specialty is fire dynamics in the American Southwest, a region where record fires have become routine. Fueling the infernos is a combination of fire suppression, livestock grazing and logging.
Because small, low-intensity blazes are usually prevented from spreading, dead wood has accumulated, especially in arid and semi-arid regions where decomposition occurs slowly. Without these fires, dense shrubs and small trees proliferate, as they also do in gaps opened by harvesting of large trees. Grazing removes grasses that traditionally carried small fires and causes erosion that reduces soil’s ability to hold water.
Donors arrive at Hamptons fundraisers with advice for Mitt Romney
As protesters assembled on a beach in advance of Mitt Romney's evening event at the home of conservative billionaire David Koch, the candidate slipped to East Hampton for his first of three fundraisers on this tony stretch of Long Island.
The line of Range Rovers, BMWs, Porsche roadsters and one gleaming cherry red Ferrari began queuing outside of Revlon Chairman Ronald Perelman's estate off Montauk Highway long before Romney arrived, as campaign aides and staffers in white polo shirts emblazoned with the logo of Perelman's property -- the Creeks -- checked off names under tight security.
They came with high hopes for the presumed Republican nominee, who is locked in a tight race with President Obama. And some were eager to give the candidate some advice about the next four months.
Add Revlon to your d0-not-buy for political reasons? Also, this is the event that talks about "commoners" etc.
HAPPENING IN UTAH
Zion Park Private Map Will posh subdivision spring up in Zion National Park?
This rocky sanctuary’s wild side is showing signs of civilization — and park managers don’t like it.
Multistory scaffolding, stucco and ground-to-ceiling windows have risen this summer on a tawny patch of earth off of Kolob Terrace Road, setting up a private view across a slope of native grasses and shrubs to Zion’s famed towering rock cathedrals.
For years Zion National Park officials have warily eyed private lands inside the park's boundaries — islands left over when Congress added the Kolob Canyon segment — and occasionally bought up a parcel when offered. Now big homes are starting to spring up on Kolob Terrace Road, and the park is powerless and penniless to stop them.
It’s the second large home in the past five years to spring up on this road, a backcountry portal to canyon trails that few but the hardy rope-wielders among this park’s 2.8 million yearly visitors ever see. Federal officials fear it’s just a harbinger of hundreds more to come inside Zion’s boundaries.
"You could have thousands," park Superintendent Jock Whitworth said.
How does Love stack up against previous Matheson challengers?
Democratic Rep. Jim Matheson knocked off some of Utah's most conservative Republicans in his six previous congressional campaigns.
Mia Love, his 2012 GOP challenger, is fond of saying the six-term congressman hasn't seen a candidate like her. True, but in terms of politics how much different is she than Matheson casualties John Swallow or LaVar Christensen or Morgan Philpot?
Except for Philpot, they all preceded the rise of the tea party but certainly would have worn that label. Though Love tries to avoid the tag, she identifies with the movement and has the national tea party organization FreedomWorks in her corner.
"Mia Love is right in line with the other challengers. If anything, she is probably politically right of those challengers," said University of Utah political science professor Tim Chambless, who has closely watched each of Matheson's elections.
I think the D-News is trying out some "fair and balanced" reporting!
Sign of the Times Page 1: Salt Lakers' obsession with nostalgia
You know that guy—or maybe you are that guy—who occasionally has to push-start his old Volkswagen bus before it goes sputtering down the road. Even though a brand-new car is just a measly down payment and a small monthly installment away from your driveway, you refuse to relegate that VW to the salvage yard because the odometer reflects so much of you and your epic road trips—plus, you just like the way you feel when driving it.
Or maybe you dust off your mother’s old green electric frying pan once in a while for a taste of her fried chicken that she whipped up when you were a kid. For you, it’s less about filling your gut with a piece of deep-fried chicken than it is about keeping alive that particular dying culinary process and recapturing, in a single meal, the memory of your mother.
It’s called nostalgia—people clinging white-knuckled to the past.
Many of us desire to stay connected to the past in some way. For some, that connection nourishes an emotional need, often associated with a time or place in life when the living was simpler, easier and sunnier.
Click through for photo of bonnet-style hair dryer. LOL.
OTHER LINKS
Pat Bagley - Salt Lake Tribune
You’ve never seen a seafloor like this! Under the sea. P.S. The Antarctic Ocean tweets.
Quilt of the Month