Does Biden's Climate Plan Include Cutting 90% of Red Meat From Our Diets?
On April 22, 2021, U.S. President Joe Biden gave remarks at the "Virtual Leaders Summit on Climate" in which he framed a nationwide effort to curb greenhouse gas emissions as an opportunity for "millions of good-paying, middle-class, union jobs." By investing in these new jobs, Biden said, he hopes the United States can cut its greenhouse gas emissions in half by 2030:  Joe Biden remarks The United States isnt waiting. We are resolving to take action  not only the  our federal government, but our cities and our states all across our country; small businesses, large businesses, large corporations; American workers in every field. I see an opportunity to create millions of good-paying, middle-class, union jobs. I see line workers laying thousands of miles of transmission lines for a clean, modern, resilient grid. I see workers capping hundreds of thousands of abandoned oil and gas wells that need to be cleaned up, and abandoned coal mines that need to be reclaimed, putting a stop to the methane leaks and protecting the health of our communities. I see auto workers building the next generation of electric vehicles, and electricians installing nationwide for 500,000 charging stations along our highways. I see  engineers and the construction workers building new carbon capture and green hydrogen plants to forge cleaner steel and cement and produce clean power. I see farmers deploying cutting-edge tools to make soil of our  of our Heartland the next frontier in carbon innovation. By maintaining those investments and putting these people to work, the United States sets out on the road to cut greenhouse gases in half  in half by the end of this decade. Thats where were headed as a nation, and thats what we can do if we take action to build an economy thats not only more prosperous, but healthier, fairer, and cleaner for the entire planet. At no point in this speech did Biden announce any initiative to impose a limit on red meat consumption. At no point in his presidency has Biden suggested policies aimed at limiting red meat consumption. Despite these facts, right-wing news outlets and politicians began aggressively repeating the claim that Biden's plan included "cutting 90% of red meat from our diets by 2030." This false notion stems from the British tabloid the Daily Mail, which  in lieu of actual details the Biden administration has not yet provided  took it upon themselves to speculate about what terrible things "could" be theoretically included in the plan: to speculate   The Daily Mail cited a report published by the University of Michigan Center for Sustainable Systems that looked, in extremely simplified terms, how much of a reduction would result from various dietary changes. As reported by the Center for Biological Diversity, the researchers concluded: reported That replacing half of all animal-based foods with plant-based alternatives would reduce diet-related emissions by 35%. And if half of all animal-based foods were replaced with plant-based alternatives and beef consumption fell by 90%, dietary emissions would drop by 51%. If American diets remain unchanged, emissions associated with producing the food we eat will climb 9% by 2030. The University of Michigan exercise is, in their words, "reliant on a number of simplifying assumptions" and designed to show the impact of various diet change scenarios on climate. It is not, in any way, a policy suggestion or proposal. As you may recall, the Biden announcement was about green jobs and did not once mention initiatives to change the diet of Americans. Despite this, Biden's critics used the Daily Mail's baseless speculation as if it were actual scientific analysis of a plan whose details Biden has not yet released. their words Former Fox News pundit Todd Starnes argued on his show that the January 2020 Michigan study was actually an analysis of a Biden plan that, at the time of this reporting in April 2021, has not been released: argued   The claim that Biden's plan includes this 90% red meat reduction is often paired with a Fox News screen capture: often paired   As it is clear by the citation, this information comes from the same University of Michigan study the Daily Mail relied on to speculate about potential paths to carbon emission reductions. It is not, as suggested, a "requirement" for Biden's climate plan. Fox's reporting made it all the way to the halls of Congress. On April 24, 2021, Rep. Lauren Boebert, R-Colo., asserted in a viral tweet that the Daily Mail's speculation was an actual policy proposal by Biden: viral tweet   Because the Daily Mail is a British tabloid and not involved in American climate policy discussions, and because Biden's plan has not yet been released, claims that it includes a policy that requires a 90% reduction in red meat are
Snopes is still fighting an infodemic of rumors and misinformation surrounding the COVID-19 pandemic, and you can help. Find out what we've learned and how to inoculate yourself against COVID-19 misinformation. Read the latest fact checks about the vaccines. Submit any questionable rumors and advice you encounter. Become a Founding Member to help us hire more fact-checkers. And, please, follow the CDC or WHO for guidance on protecting your community from the disease.  fighting Find out Read Submit Become a Founding Member CDC WHO On May 4, 2020  as federal leaders debated how to respond to an unprecedented interruption to the U.S. economy due to the COVID-19 coronavirus pandemic  a conservative provocateur tweeted that U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said she wanted the country's next economic relief package to establish "guaranteed minimum incomes" for "illegal aliens." COVID-19 Suggesting that only legal U.S. residents should benefit from federal stimulus packages, Charlie Kirk  who's the founder of the conservative political group Turning Point USA and social media ally of U.S. President Donald Trump  said in the tweet to his roughly 1.7 million followers:   To investigate the validity of his claim, we examined Pelosi's public statements and media appearances to determine if, or when, she used the phrased "guaranteed income"  and under what circumstances. While Kirk provides no explanation for where or when or to whom Pelosi made the remarks in the above-displayed tweet  aside from the tweet's indication with the word "BREAKING" that the House Speaker had made the comments shortly before he composed the post  we considered statements by Pelosi since the beginning of the COVID-19 U.S. outbreak in early 2020 for our investigation. Within that timeframe, she used or referenced the phrase "guaranteed income" in three public statements, two of which were televised interviews. First, the House Speaker spoke the words on HBO's "Real Time with Bill Maher" on April 24. In light of the federal government's approval of the $2.2 trillion Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) Act in March 2020 (and stimulus bills totaling about $500 billion since then), Maher asked Pelosi if the federal government could afford similar economic relief packages for Americans should the pandemic keep businesses closed and systems locked down in the coming months. She responded: April 24 CARES I think that it should be clear that this (COVID-19 stimulus spending so far) is not doing the job that it is set out to do completely, that we may have to consider some other options. Others have proposed a sovereign fund  profits of which go to these unemployed people  or guaranteed income, other things that may not even be as costly as continuing down this path. She provided no further details on the so-called proposals for "guaranteed income," which generally refers to a government-imposed system so that every citizen receives a minimum income  a central idea of the 2020 presidential campaign by former Democratic candidate Andrew Yang. Also in the conversation with Maher, Pelosi did not explicitly state that she wanted the system implemented via Congressional legislation. Andrew Yang Three days later, however, the House Speaker again said the words "guaranteed income" in a televised interview, this time with more specificity on her openness to the social welfare system. In the April 27 segment of MSNBC's "Live with Stephanie Ruhle," while explaining federal leaders' next steps to help small businesses survive the financial crisis, Pelosi said: MSNBC As we go forward, let's see what works: what is operational and what needs other attention. Others have suggested a minimum income for  a guaranteed income for  people. Is that worthy of attention now? Perhaps so, because there are many more people than just in small business and hired by small business, as important as that is to the vitality of our economy. And other people who are not in the public sector, you know, meeting our needs in so many ways, that may need some assistance as well. Soon after she made the statement on live TV, news outlets including CBS News and CNBC published stories with headlines such as, "Pelosi says 'guaranteed income' for Americans is worth considering for coronavirus recovery." In a story by Business Insider about the televised comments, an aid to Pelosi said the House Speaker was referring to proposals that would guarantee worker paychecks  not a sweeping system for universal basic income. CBS News CNBC Business Insider guarantee worker paychecks Then, on May 1, the House Speaker and the Congressional Hispanic Caucus made themselves available to journalists via a conference call to discuss provisions within the CARES Act that exclude immigrants without Social Security numbers from receiving one-time stimulus checks.  May 1 receiving one-time stimulus checks.  In the call, Pelosi expressed support for legislation that would guarantee COVID-19 economic relief to not only people with Social Security numbers but also immigrants and their families who use Individual Taxpayer Identification Numbers (ITINs), which the IRS assigns to workers without Social Security numbers, to pay annual taxes. According to the IRS, the federal agency issues the numbers "regardless of immigration status, because both resident and nonresident aliens may have a U.S. filing or reporting requirement under the Internal Revenue Code." In other words, some immigrants who use the identification numbers (ITINs)  not social security numbers  to pay taxes may be "undocumented." According to a transcript of the May 1 call, at one point a reporter asked Pelosi: transcript Pretty recently you said that Congress should consider adding some form of guaranteed monthly income into the next coronavirus relief package. So I was wondering if you would extend that form of guaranteed income to undocumented immigrants and non-citizens who file taxes with tax ID numbers, ITINs, instead of Social Security numbers? In her response, Pelosi reiterated that she thinks federal leaders should consider guaranteed income and that she would talk to chairs of House committees about exploring the idea further. Additionally, as they consider future economic benefits for Americans during the pandemic, she said: Any way we go down the path that [ITINs] should apply, whether its direct payments, whether its participation in PPP (the federal Paycheck Protection Plan loan program)... I said it [guaranteed income] should be considered. And, why it should be considered, in my view, is because there is a lot of money, federal taxpayer dollars, going out the door. Whether its PPP, whether its Unemployment Insurance, whether its direct payments ... But, whatever we do, I think the tax number is an easy entre to many more people who deserve it, who should get this, but are being cut out now, in whatever it is that we are putting out there.  Given the nature of and circumstances surrounding the May 1 call, and considering the fact that Pelosi did not mention "guaranteed income" in any other public statements after the U.S. COVID-19 outbreak and before Kirk's viral posting, we determined it to be the most likely source of inspiration for his May 4 tweet. However, though Pelosi said she wants people who use ITINs to receive economic relief from the federal government during the pandemic  a group that would include "undocumented" immigrants  she did not say she wants the government to provide stimulus payments to all "undocumented" immigrants. Additionally, the House Speaker said she wanted federal leaders to consider, not implement, "guaranteed income" for Americans, unlike what Kirk's tweet implies. In sum, given those reasons  as well as the lack of clarity for what Pelosi means by the phrase "guaranteed income," the context in which she made the comments analyzed above, and the fact that she did say she wanted future stimulus money to help foreign people without Social Security numbers  we rate this claim as "false."   Rosenberg, Mattew and Rogers, Katie. "For Charlie Kirk, Conservative Activist, the Virus Is a Cudgel."
 The New York Times. 19 April 2020. Ruhle, Stephanie. "Pelosi says guaranteed income may be worth considering amid coronavirus hardships."
 MSNBC. 27 April 2020. Real Time with Bill Maher. "Speaker Nancy Pelosi | Real Time with Bill Maher (HBO)."
 YouTube. 24 April 2020. Silverstein, Jason. "Pelosi says 'guaranteed income' for Americans worth considering for coronavirus recovery."
 CBSNews. 28 April 2020. Zeballos-Roig, Joseph. "House Speaker Nancy Pelosi opens the door to guaranteed income for Americans, saying it's 'worthy of attention.'"
 Business Insider. 27 April 2020. Pelosi, Nancy. "Pelosi Remarks on Press Call with Congressional Hispanic Caucus and Mixed-Status Families on Denial of COVID-19 Stimulus Checks."
 Newsroom. 1 May 2020. Pelosi, Nancy. "Transcript of Pelosi Interview on MSNBC's Live with Stephanie Ruhle."
 Newsroom. 27 April 2020. Pelosi, Nancy. "Transcript of Pelosi Interview on HBO's Real Time with Bill Maher."
 Newsroom. 24 April 2020. Internal Revenue Service. "Individual Taxpayer Identification Number."
 Accessed 11 May 2020. Claim:  Opinion piece expresses columnist Charles Krauthammer's thoughts on Chief Justice John Roberts and the Supreme Court's decision on Obamacare. INCORRECTLY ATTRIBUTED Example:  [Collected via e-mail, June 2012] I would like to know if the following email attributed to Charles Krauthammer has been correctly  attributed.  Circulated under the subject line: Health Care Decision: From Charles Krauthammer.  To all my friends, particularly those conservatives who are despondent over the searing betrayal by Chief Justice John Roberts and the pending demise of our beloved country, I offer this perspective to convey some profound hope and evidence of the Almighty's hand in the affairs of men in relation to the Supreme Court's decision on Obamacare. I initially thought we had cause for despondency when I only heard the results of the decision and not the reason or the make-up of the sides.  I have now read a large portion of the decision and I believe that it was precisely the result that Scalia, Alito, Thomas, Roberts and even Kennedy wanted and not a defeat for conservatism or the rule of law.  I believe the conservatives on the court have run circles around the liberals and demonstrated that the libs are patently unqualified to be on the Supreme Court.  Let me explain. First let me assure you that John Roberts is a conservative and he is not dumb, mentally unstable, diabolical, a turncoat, a Souter or even just trying to be too nice.  He is a genius along with the members of the Court in the dissent.  The more of the decision I read the more remarkable it became.  It is not obvious and it requires a passable understanding of Constitutional law but if it is explained anyone can see the beauty of it. The decision was going to be a 5-4 decision no matter what, so the allegation that the decision was a partisan political decision was going to be made by the losing side and their supporters.  If the bill was struck down completely with Roberts on the other side there would have been a national and media backlash against conservatives and probably strong motivation for Obama supporters to come out and vote in November. With today's decision that dynamic is reversed and there is a groundswell of support for Romney and Republicans, even for people who were formerly lukewarm toward Romney before today, additionally Romney raised more than 3 million dollars today. Next, merely striking the law without the support of Democrats and libs would have left the fight over the commerce clause and the "necessary and proper" clause and the federal government's role in general festering and heading the wrong way as it has since 1942.  As a result of the decision the libs are saying great things about Roberts; how wise, fair and reasonable he is.  They would never have said that without this decision even after the Arizona immigration decision on Monday.  In the future when Roberts rules conservatively it will be harder for the left and the media to complain about the Roberts' Court's fairness.  That's why he as Chief Justice went to the other side for this decision not Scalia, Alito, Thomas or Kennedy, all of whom I believe would have been willing to do it. Next let's look at the decision itself.  Thankfully Roberts got to write it as Chief Justice and it is a masterpiece.  (As I write this the libsdon't even know what has happened they just think Roberts is great and that they won and we are all going to have free, unlimited healthcare services and we are all going to live happily ever after.)  He first emphatically states that Obamacare is unconstitutional under the Commerce Clause saying you cannot make people buy stuff. Then he emphatically states that it is unconstitutional under the "necessary and proper" clause which only applies to "enumerated powers" in the US Constitution. Justices Ginsberg, Breyer, Sotomayor and Kagan all went along with these statements.  They never would have gone along with that sentiment if that was the basis for striking the law in total.  This is huge because this means that the Court ruled 9-0 that Obamacare was unconstitutional under the Commerce clause which was Obama's whole defense of the bill.  They also ruled 9-0 on the "necessary and proper" clause.  Even better both of these rulings were unnecessary to the decision so it is gravy that we got the libs to concede this and it will make it easier to pare away at both theories in the future, which we must do.  Well done.  Roberts, through very tortured reasoning, goes on to find that the taxing law provides the Constitutionality for the law.  Virtually everyone agrees that the Federal government has the power to do this as it does with the mortgage deduction for federal income taxes.  This too is huge because Obama assiduously avoided using the term "tax" and now he has to admit this law is a tax and it is on everyone even the poor.  That will hurt him hugely in the polls and will help Romney.  More importantly though is the fact that this makes this a budgetary issue that can be voted on in the Senate by a mere majority instead of 60 votes needed to stop a filibuster. That means that if the Republicans can gain a majority in the Senate, it can vote to repeal Obamacare in total. Finally the Court voted 7-2 to strike down the punitive rules that take away money from states that do not expand Medicare as required in Obamacare.  This too is huge because we got Kagan and Breyer to join this decision and it can easily be applied to many other cases of extortion the Federal government uses to force states to do things they don't want to. This is also amazing because Obamacare has no severability clause so by striking the Medicaid mandate portion as unconstitutional the whole bill should have been struck.  If that happened none of these other benefits would have been accomplished. I haven't read far enough to know how he did it but I am sure it is brilliant. So to recap the Roberts court through a brilliant tactical maneuver has: strengthened the limitations of the commerce clause and the necessary and proper clause by a unanimous decision, made Obama raise taxes on the poor and middle classes, converted Obamacare into a tax program repealable with 51 votes in the Senate, enhanced Romneys and Republicans' fundraising and likelihood of being elected in November, weakened federal extortion and got the left to love Roberts and sing his praises all without anyone even noticing.  Even Obama is now espousing the rule of law just two weeks after violating it with his deportation executive order. That is why I have decided this was a genius decision and that I did in fact get a great birthday present today not to mention U. S.Attorney General Eric Holder being held in contempt.  What a day.   Origins:  This opinion piece began circulating shortly after the June 2012 Supreme Court decision upholding the constitutionality of "Obamacare" health care legislation and has been attributed to  Pulitzer Prize-winning syndicated columnist Charles Krauthammer.  However, it was not written by Charles Krauthammer: the piece was not originally credited to him (his name was added later), it doesn't appear in his published writings, and he wouldn't refer to a late June event as constituting "a great birthday present" for himself (as he was born in mid-March).  His column on the court's Obamacare  decision, entitled Why Roberts Did It," is distinctly different from the opinion presented here.  Why Roberts Did It The earliest versions of this item that we received bore the signature block of Richard Bolen of the Bolen Law Firm in Lexington, South Carolina. Last updated:  8 July 2012 Dennis Kucinich became a lame-duck member of Congress after the 10th District he has represented since 1997 was redrawn out of existence and he lost a primary contest to another sitting Democrat, Marcy Kaptur, in the new Ohio 9th District.But Kucinich has not stopped working on the issues that have engaged him.He issued a news release and video on Nov. 2 supporting HR 4310, the bill he introduced to end the childhood obesity subsidy.Congress -- with your tax dollars -- subsidizes the marketing efforts of fast food and junk food companies by as much as $19 billion over 10 years, thereby subsidizing the childhood obesity epidemic, he said.Do fast food and junk food companies really enjoy an advertising subsidy? PolitiFact Ohio decided to dig in.Kucinich builds his case first by noting that childhood obesity -- which has more than tripled in the past 30 years, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention -- has been linked to the influence of targeted marketing, though partial blame does lie with a more sedentary lifestyle and a worsening diet.He cites several prominent studies in support, with the most recent study coming from the Institute of Medicine, the health arm of the National Academy of Sciences. It says: Aggressive marketing of high-calorie foods to children and adolescents has been identified as one of the major contributors to childhood obesity. (Others with the same conclusion included the American Heart Association, the American Journal of Public Health and the Rudd Center for Food Policy and Obesity at Yale University.) Kucinich's bill would prohibit any company from claiming a tax deduction for the expense of marketing that is directed at children to promote the consumption of food at fast food restaurants or of food of poor nutritional quality.Under current law, fast food marketers get the same break that other businesses do. The federal tax code allows companies to deduct reasonable and necessary expenses of marketing and advertising from their income taxes.How is that a subsidy?The way the federal funding system works, Kucinich said, is that if we give a tax break in one place, we need to replace that lost income from somewhere else, like with higher taxes from the rest of us. In other words, this tax break is a massive subsidy for the junk food and fast food industry.The question then is how much the deduction, or tax break, is worth.According to a report to Congress from the Federal Trade Commission, the most recent we could find, the fast food industry spent nearly $2 billion in 2006 on marketing and advertising specifically aimed at children. That would yield about $700 million in tax revenue at the top corporate tax rate of 35 percent.A report in the New England Journal of Medicine put the marketing budgets for kids' foods at $10 billion annually -- which would yield $3.5 billion in revenue.A study in the International Journal of Behavioral Nutrition and Physical Activity said it It is unclear how much money is spent on food advertising specifically directed at children and adolescents, but put the total for advertising, youth-targeted promotions and public relations and packaging especially designed for children at $10.5 billion.The Economic Policy Institute estimated 10-year tax savings of $15 billion through legislation to end subsidies for junk and fast food advertising to children to promote health.Kucinich relied on Congress nonpartisan Joint Committee on Taxation, which estimated on a very preliminary basis that his legislation could raise $15 billion to $19 billion in additional federal revenue over the 10-year budget period.That is as much as $19 billion, as Kucinich asserted, though the committee also noted that unsettled issues surrounding his bill would affect its impact and the revenue it would raise. Those issues primarily include defining fast food and determining what advertising is primarily directed at children.What's our take-home?PolitiFact examined Kucinich's legislation two years ago, when he made a statement about it that we found relied too firmly on a high-end estimate of its potential tax saving and implied a direct cash payout by taxpayers to the food industry. He chose his words more carefully this time.His assertion that the tax code provides a subsidy of as much as $19 billion needs additional information for clarification, but it is well supported.On the Truth-O-Meter, his claim rates Mostly True. Claim:  Robbers are flinging eggs at cars to impair drivers' vision and force them to stop.  Examples:   [Collected via Facebook, June 2015] Posted by Michelle Shel-lee Seibel on Monday, June 15, 2015 Michelle Shel-lee Seibel Monday, June 15, 2015   [Collected via e-mail, November 2009] Please take this seriously! If you are driving at night and are attacked with eggs, do not operate the wiper and  spray and water. Because eggs mixed with water become milky and block your vision up to 92.5% Then you are forced to stop at the road side and become a victim of robbers. This is a new technique used by robbers in Johor Bahru. Please inform your friends and relatives!!  If you are driving at night and eggs are thrown at your windshield. Do not operate the wiper and spray any water because eggs mixed with water become milky and block your vision up to 92.5% so you are forced to stop at the roadside and become a victim of robbers.  This is a new technique used by robbers.  Please inform your friends and relatives. This also happens on interstates near exits. Origins:  Breathless e-mailed warnings about the (usually false) latest ways in which thieves are purported to be getting motorists to pull over so they can be preyed upon are nothing new: a few we've previously documented include claims that gangs of robbers were placing tire-puncturing spikes in shopping mall parking lots, or affixing plastic baskets  spikes baskets  to the undersides of targeted vehicles (thereby prompting drivers to stop to investigate the noise), pouring sugar into gas tanks, festooning cars' windshields with flyers, and even acting drunk or as if they'd been struck by other cars.  sugar flyers drunk Our first sighting of this November 2009 warning about eggs being thrown at windshields was a 29 October 2009 YahooGroups mail list post. That earlier version, while it also asserted the claim of water mixed with raw egg's obscuring a windshield and bruited the (absurdly precise) 92.5% figure, differed from what has become the canonical form of the warning in that it stated motorists so attacked would become prey to "robbers/carnappers" and recommended those so assaulted instead drive to "a well lit place w/ many people or nearest police station" rather than stop. Later forms of the e-mail added further flourishes, such as "used by robbers" morphing into "used by robbers in Johor Bahru" (the capital city of Johor in southern Malaysia), the addition of the claim that these attacks "happens on interstates near exits," and most commonly the inclusion of this new paragraph which blames matters on the flagging economy: "Folks are becoming more and more cruel daily. But this is just the beginning of pangs of distress. With the decline in economy and job losses, we can expect anything. Just can't be too careful these days." Though we've queried our police contacts and scoured news reports looking for accounts of robberies and carjackings effected by disabling target  vehicles by pelting them with raw eggs, we weren't able to find any such occurrences in the U.S. Rather, we did locate news stories about police cars so pelted, with the officers retaliating by giving chase to the miscreants who'd thrown eggs at them. In various news accounts we found, officers not only were able to see well enough through their poultrified windows to go after the bad guys, they succeeded in running them to ground and bringing them to justice. Most tellingly, such accounts made no mention of the gendarmes so assaulted experiencing difficulty in seeing well enough through their egged windshields to give chase. While a mixture of raw egg and water vigorously stirred together in a glass will produce a somewhat milky-looking liquid (which might be the source of this tale), there's nothing about the interaction of egg and water that renders the resulting combination into a substance guaranteed to completely block a driver's vision. Egg alone or egg-and-water solutions are thin liquids and so are relatively easy to see through, with the vehicle's wipers generally sweeping away the worst of the mess fairly easily. Moreover, it would take a number of extremely well-placed eggs (a hen's typical offerings aren't that big) to splat a windshield so thoroughly as to completely impair the driver's view and force him to stop immediately  unless the visibility conditions were already poor, a motorist with a splattered windshield would generally still be able to see well enough to continue driving out of range of the egg-throwing hooligans to a safe stopping place. Certainly miscreants have long engaged in the practice of launching objects (rocks, eggs, firecrackers, paintballs) at moving cars in order to startle motorists into stopping and getting out of their automobiles (typically as a prank, but sometimes as a means of setting up the theft of a vehicle and/or the driver's possessions), but that information is neither new nor shocking. Variations:   A March 2010 version combined the "eggs baby  A November 2012 version included this photograph of a car's windshield that had some sort of white spatter upon it that looked to us to be white paint:  Barbara "pitched battle" Mikkelson Last updated:  17 June 2015    Hoober, John.  "Egg Tossed at Cruiser Leads to Chase, Crash."   Lancaster New Era.  3 December 2008  (p. A1). Claim:  On-line bookseller Amazon.com is partnered with the web site Intifada.com.   Not any more. Example:  [Collected on the Internet, 2001] A good friend of mine, while searching the Internet, ran across Intifada.com. OK. Then he sees a promotion right on their web page by Amazon.Com advising the readers that: "You can buy books about the Intifada and Palestine from Amazon.Com. All profits from the referral will go to developing Intifada.com." How great! I would assume that this pretty well eliminates Amazon.Com as a book seller, for those of us that understand that the Intifada is about killing Israeli civilians and driving Israel out of the land of their forefathers. And obviously Amazon.Com is not planning on receiving any more of our business! It would also be nice for us to notify Amazon.Com of our decision and how shocked we were at their evident lack of knowledge of the conflict and the terrorist activities and suicide bombings of civilians that have been the paramount focus of this Intifada. Origins:  Like many other web retailers, Amazon.com operates an associates program under which operators of qualifying web sites can earn commissions by directing visitors to purchase books and other products through Amazon.com's own site.  (We here at snopes.com participate in this program, offering links on our site  to various urban legend-related books which can be purchased through Amazon.com.) associates books An inquiry to Amazon.com about this issue drew the following terse response: Greetings from the Amazon.com Associates Program. Thank you for taking the time to write to us regarding the Web site www.intifada.com. Please note, this account has been suspended pending further investigation, and we have requested they remove all links to Amazon.com immediately. Thanks again for contacting us regarding this matter.  posted policy states that sites which may be found unsuitable for acceptance into their associates program include those that promote sexually explicit materials; promote violence; promote discrimination based on race, sex, religion, nationality, disability, sexual orientation, or age; promote illegal activities; include "amazon" or variations or misspellings thereof in their domain names; or otherwise violate intellectual property rights.  Intifada.com did have Amazon.com associate links on their site at one time (as confirmed by Amazon.com's statement that their account has been "suspended"), but we have no way of knowing whether Amazon.com took them on as an associate site because they didn't feel the site unsuitable under their guidelines, or because they simply didn't screen the site's application as thoroughly as they ordinarily do.  Either way, Intifada.com no longer has any links to Amazon.com that we can find. Last updated:  7 March 2008 Claim:  A man listed a wedding gown on eBay via a hilarious offer of sale that included photos of him posing in the dress. Status:  True. Example:  [Collected on the Internet, 2004] For Sale: One Slightly Used Size 12 Wedding Gown. Only worn twice: Once at the wedding and once for these pictures. Make: Victoria Style: 611 Size: 12 Divorce forces sale I found my ex-wife's wedding dress in the attic when I moved.  She took the $4000 engagement ring but left the dress.  I was actually going to have a dress burning party when the divorce became final, but my sister talked me out of it.  She said, "Thats such a gorgeous dress.  Some lucky girl would be glad to have it. You should sell it on EBay. At least get something back for it."  So, this is what Im doing.  Im selling it hoping to get enough money for maybe a couple of Mariners tickets and some beer.  This dress cost me $1200 that my drunken sot of an ex-father-in-law swore up and down he would pay for but didnt so I got stuck with the bill.  Luckily I only got stuck with his daughter for 5 years. Thank the Lord we didn't have kids. If they would have turned out like her or her family I would have slit my wrists. Anyway, its a really nice dress as you can see in the pictures.  Personally, I think it looks like a $1200 shower curtain, but what do I know about this.  We tried taking pictures of this lovely white garment but it didnt look right on the hanger as you can see, so my sister says, "You need a model."  Well, quite frankly my sister isnt exactly small, (like a size 12 is?) so she wouldnt pose for the picture. Seeing as I have sworn off women for the time being and I aint friends with any, it left me holding the bag.  I took the liberty of blacking out my face - not to protect the ex-wife but to protect me from my bar buddies and co-workers finding out about it.  I would never live it down.  Actually I didnt think my head would fit in the neck hole, but then I figured she got her Texas cheerleader hair through there I could get my head in it.  Though, after looking at the pictures, I thought it made me look fat.  How do you women wear this crap? I only had to walk 3 feet and I tripped twice. Dont worry ladies - I am wearing clothes on underneath it.  I gotta say it did make me feel very pretty.  So if it can make me feel pretty, it can make you feel pretty, especially on the most important day of your life, right?  Anyway, I was told to say it has a train and a veil and all kinds of shiny beady things.  I think it's funny that one picture makes it look like the chest plate off an Imperial Storm Trooper.  Did I mention that all I want is a ball game and beer?  Cheap at twice the price.  Ladies, you wont regret this.  You may regret the dude you marry but not the dress. Just a little side note - As I was putting this ad in EBay, it asked me for a color.  Is a wedding dress any other freaking color than white or ivory??!!  If it is it wouldn't be a wedding dress, now would it??  I suppose black would work...  On Apr-26-04 at 10:38:31 PDT, seller added the following information: Well, the auction is a little over half over and I am just amazed.  This thing has taken more hits than that pothead that lives in the next building.  Man, oh man, if hits were bucks Id be getting a suite at Safeco.  I also have received TONS of email.  I dont have the time to reply to all of them but I just want to let everyone know that I appreciate the well wishes.  Of the email I received:  Five or so were invitations to ball games in other states.  Two of those were for little league games.  Do they have those cushy executive boxes with the free chicken wings at those?  One email was from Scotland.  Its a good thing he wrote it because I wouldnt be able to understand a word he said.  Never did get through Braveheart.  Most were thanking me for the laugh. Youre entirely welcome.  Five years of misery was well worth the hearty guffaw that was my pleasure to give you. Oh, yeah.  I also got three marriage proposals.  Yes, you read it right - three marriage proposals.  I feel like one of those mass murderers on death row.  I never understood how the hell they got more chicks than I did.  Now I know.  They sold crap on eBay.  On Apr-26-04 at 23:45:56 PDT, seller added the following information: Holy Moly!  The hit counter is starting to look like the odometer in my truck! Not the new shiny black full-size 4-wheel-drive American pick-up that I had to part with, but the somewhat older, multicolored, lumpy, tiny, 2-wheel-drive foreign pick-up that belches smoke. A little something about that vehicle, though: its absolutely amazing! When I get inside it to go to the store, I am all depressed. But when I arrive at the store, Im so freaking loopy from inhaling the fumes, I forget why I went there in the first place. Im saving buckets of money. Of course, I will probably have to spend it all on the tuberculosis I will acquire, but hey, you cant have everything. I felt compelled to update this ad once more due to all of your emails. The first thing I have to say is thank you all for your support in my time of need. It was a truly harrowing experience. Some of you men know exactly what I mean. Seeing as this has turned into my little public forum, I just want to address a few of the emails that kind of left me scratching my head. I now have five marriage proposals. You would think my speaking of the ones I already got yesterday would have put a damper on it, but you women sure are persistent. One woman actually said she doesnt want to marry me, but wouldnt mind being my ex-wife. Hmmm. Let me think about that. Nope. No thanks, already got one. (Pssst. Didnt I mention I had one? Who wants an ex-wife that cant read? Now, I know what you guys are thinking - "If she cant read, then the divorce would be smooth sailing." Well, that would be all well and good but I didnt say her ATTORNEY couldnt read. You following me on this?) Other emails are serious buyers asking about the dress. "How long is the train?" and "Does the gown come with the headdress and veil?" Yes, headdress and veil are included, but the do-rag stays with me. And if the train was long enough for my exs caboose, its long enough for yours. You will have to supply your own baggage, though. I gave mine to Goodwill. There was this one woman who wrote, "You should have covered your tattoos. People will be able to recognize you, like on Americas Most Wanted." HELLO!!! Im a guy selling a dress. Im not wanted for war crimes. Some of your emails made me laugh. Like the bitter woman that wished she had her exs testicles to sell on eBay. Im not too sure theres a market for that, though. Then there was the guy that gave his wifes wedding dress to the Salvation Army by mistake, thinking it was a Christmas tree. Guess he didnt have any Christmas balls that year. This has also been a learning experience for me. I got a lot of messages correcting me about the color of wedding dresses. For Russian Orthodox, they are blue. For Chinese they are red. Mexico has multi-colored ones. All I know is, for my next wedding I will be wearing a hairy, flesh-toned ensemble because I will be buck naked with a toe tag lying on a slab in the morgue because I would have killed myself. A lot of folks were asking me if I wear womens dresses a lot. I can honestly say that this is the first time I have ever donned female attire. Its also the first time Ive been inside something feminine that didnt nag me to take out the garbage. It seems a few people have taken offense to my inferring a size 12 is big. One male even pointed out that Marilyn Monroe was a size 14. Now, I would agree with you that size 12/14 is small if I lived elsewhere. But I live right here in the good old 48 Contiguous, where binging and purging is a way of life. American women do not want to be double digits in size. Just ask any woman what size they want to be. Invariably they will say five or seven. Wealthy will be the person that opens a store for Lane Bryant-sized women but sews size 7 tags on all the clothes.  On the flip side of that, I have taken offense to some of the people that told me Im ugly and a loser. All I have to say is youd be ugly too if you had a huge white blotch on your face. And as far as being a loser, I think you have it all wrong. I am such the winner. It isnt every day an average guy can make 50,000 people laugh. Thanks to each and every one of you from the heart of my bottom. Origins:  The online auction powerhouse eBay has been the setting of many strange come-ons, some seriously meant and some far less so. In addition to a throng of earnest sellers and determined bargain hunters that frequent this popular online bazaar, it is also populated by its share of crazies intent upon sneaking   their hoax listings into the marketplace. Consequently, one can't always tell fish from fowl at first glance. Over the years, our readers have queried us about various eBay auctions because they harbored suspicions about particular listings, either due to the nature of the goods being tendered or because something about the pitch struck them as not quite right (e.g.; an offer of a tea kettle, which displayed additional wares of the seller). Yet few of the auctions so doubted have been asked about as often as the April 2004 proffering of a size 12 Victoria wedding gown, an item that isn't in and of itself all that unusual. But it wasn't the dress that set people to wondering; it was the seller's comments, which appeared to afford a hilarious look into one man's private hell. The seller wasn't so much advertising a dress as he was proclaiming from a public soapbox how awful his wife had been. The auction listing was just as much about getting even as it was about unloading an item he had no particular use for. tea kettle Or was it?  Had a gal with "Texas cheerleader hair" really so turned a man against marriage that he swore that "for my next wedding I will be wearing a hairy, flesh-toned ensemble because I will be buck naked with a toe tag lying on a slab in the morgue because I would have killed myself"? Herein rested the listing's appeal: The story was entertaining, but was it real? The solicitation was on the up and up, at least in regard to the nature of the merchandise being vended  there was such a dress, and the offer of sale was genuine. However, some (if not all) of the gown's backstory was the stuff of fairy tales. The original eBay listing posted by 42-year-old Larry Star wasn't provoking much interest among those shopping for a wedding dress, so he rewrote it to make it amusing  resulting in the posting that has served to make him famous. The tale of marital woe posted by this Brooklyn native both contained invented details and omitted key bits of information. Though he has a sister, she didn't talk him out of the dress burning party he had his heart set upon by suggesting he list the  gown on eBay and so get something out of it. He also had an ex-wife prior to the one whose dress he supposedly was selling. (Star and his first missus were married in 1994, separated in 1996, and were divorced in 1998.) And contrary to his statement, "Thank the Lord we didn't have kids. If they would have turned out like her or her family I would have slit my wrists," he and his second wife did indeed have a son together during their short-lived marriage. The unhappy couple wed in 2000, separated in 2001 after a domestic kafuffle (which reportedly resulted in Star's being charged with domestic violence assault in the fourth degree and interfering with the reporting of domestic violence), and divorced in 2003. Though "five years of misery" might well have been worth the hearty guffaw he says was his pleasure to give the online community, those years weren't spent "stuck" with the "drunken sot's" daughter; his time cohabitating with Wife #2 amounted to just a bit more than a year. It's not known if the gown in question even belonged to his ex-wife, as she hasn't surfaced to speak publicly about the matter. Also, according to the Houston Chronicle, when asked if the dress had really been hers, Mr. Star sidestepped the question, instead replying, "I got the wedding dress, I wanted to get rid of it. I was going to burn it and had the idea of selling it on eBay. I needed to sell it on eBay with all the other dresses on there, and I needed to make it stand out." And stand out it did. The auction of the fabled wedding gown ended 28 April 2004 with a buyer using the online handle of "absolutsth" placing the winning bid of $3,850. Yet all is not coming up roses for the intrepid seller who one would assume to be realizing a profit of $2,650 on the gown he says cost originally $1,200, as the sale has fallen through. According to Star, the buyer has backed out, claiming "I left my computer on and somebody made the bid for me." The folks at eBay have told Star he can either accept the second-highest bid or re-list the dress and hold the sale again. As of 7 May 2004, he had not decided whether he would accept the next highest legitimate bid (if there even was a legitimate bid). By the time the auction ended, Star's listing on eBay had been viewed more than 5.8 million times. Some of those visitors, possibly caught up in the frenzy of it all, placed bids they did not intend to honor. (Officials at eBay had to weed out many phonies  at one point the bidding reached $99 million.) How many of the remaining bids were legitimate is not known. And, even if all those bids were meant seriously at the time they were placed, some of those prospective buyers may now be having second thoughts, particularly those who offered more than $1,000 for a used, stained dress that was only worth $1,200 when it first came off the hanger.  The ultimate fate of the frock may take it in a far different direction than down the aisle on the back of a budget-conscious bride. Its listing (which has now been viewed 11 million times) has brought recognition to its owner and has possibly opened the way to a new career for this software test designer and part-time musician. Thanks to the dress, Larry Star has twice been a guest on both MSNBC's Countdown and NBC's Today Show, each time wearing the unsold gown. Also thanks to the dress, he has made his debut as a stand-up comedian at the Punchline Comedy Club in Atlanta. He has said he would like to pursue a comedy writing career, and all this attention might well work to get that going.  Though there are many stand-up comedians on the circuit, we know of none that perform their schtick outfitted in wedding regalia. Could this gown do for Star what a sledgehammer and a watermelon did for Gallagher? Barbara "smash hit" Mikkelson Additional Information:   Weddingdressguy.com  (Larry Star)  Last updated:  3 July 2007    Sources:   Brodeur, Nicole.  "Fact Is, There's Some Fiction to Man's Pitch to Sell His Ex-wife's Wedding Dress on eBay."   The Seattle Times.  29 April 2004  (p. B1).     Curry, Ann, Matt Lauer and Katie, Couric.  "Today."   NBC.  30 April 2004.     Eldredge, Richard.  "Wedding Dress Guy Jilted by eBay Bidder."   The Atlanta Journal-Constitution.  7 May 2004  (p. E2).     Kelso, John.  "Best of eBay: A Wedding Dress Tale."   Cox News Service.  2 May 2004.     Olbermann, Keith.  "Countdown."   MSNBC.  30 April 2004.     Olbermann, Keith.  "Countdown."   MSNBC.  28 April 2004.     Parks, Louis.  "On eBay, Wedding Dress for Success."   The Houston Chronicle.  30 April 2004  (Houston; p. 1).     Weiss, Tara.  "A Star is Born, Selling Wedding Dress on eBay."   Hartford Courant.  30 April 2004  (p. D2).     Associated Press.  "Man Who Sold Ex's Wedding Dress on eBay Earns Instant Fame."   30 April 2004.     The Atlanta Journal-Constitution.  "15 Minutes Still Ticking for Wedding Dress Guy."   4 May 2004  (p. E2). On 14 April 2018, a Facebook page "America - Love It Or Leave It" shared a meme proclaiming that Article 54 of Obamacare would soon be diverting 30 percent of seniors' social security payments to pay for insurance for undocumented immigrants: shared meme   However, the full text of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act does not include an Article 54, nor does it include any provision for using 30% of seniors' Social Security payments to cover the funding of insurance of undocumented immigrants. full text Moreover, this claim originated solely with "The "America - Love It Or Leave It" Facebook page, which is part of a network of fake news sites and Facebook pages that engage in political trolling under the guise of providing "satire." network On 1 October 2017, pseudoscientific alternative health website NaturalNews.com, which is geared primarily toward supplement enthusiasts with a discerning taste for deep state conspiracy theories, posted an article ("Dont Look Now, But Arctic Sea Ice Mass Has Grown Almost 40% Since 2012") that attempts to cast doubt on the scientific veracity of global warming by first presenting the following grotesque caricature of a straw man argument: article straw man One of the most popular pieces of "evidence" that climate alarmists just love to bring up to prove the global warming narrative is the "all the ice is melting in the Arctic and the polar bears are dying" line. Weve all seen the documentaries where a polar bear is desperately clinging to a tiny piece of ice and you just know hes going to die soon. They article then presents two observations that make the generally factual point that there has been relatively more sea ice in the Arctic and glacial ice on Greenland in 2017 than there have been at specific times in the recent past: The latest figures from the National Snow and Ice Data Center, located at the University of Colorado, show that sea ice extent has increased by 40 percent since 2012. [...] [The Danish Polar Portal reports that]: If we rank the annual surface mass balance since 1981 from low to high, the lowest on record was 2011-2012 (38 Gt) and this year is the 5th highest out of the 37 year record. Danish Polar Portal To be clear, the primary data scientists use to document global warming are records of Earth's temperature over time, not doomed polar bear imagery. Zeke Hausfather, a research scientist for the independent, nongovernmental Berkeley Earth research group told us in an e-mail that, in this area, pretty much "all groups who provide estimates" of global temperature unequivocally point to nearly uninterrupted temperature rises since the 1970s, as shown in this comparison of various estimates produced by the climate and energy policy website Carbon Brief: Zeke Hausfather produced   "People interested in global warming are best-served looking at actual global temperatures," Hausfather said. While this temperature trend is uncontroversial and clear, the climate system as a whole is a complex beast with numerous entangled parts. The basic approach to writing a blog post that "debunks" the concept of global warming is to highlight without explanation various parts of that system at a single point in time. NaturalNews.com is no exception to that basic strategy here. Arctic Sea Ice Natural News cites a climate change denial blog called ClimateDepot.com as evidence of the claim that sea ice has grown 40 percent since 2012. In reality, the claim made by this website was more specific and less useful. In a post dated 18 September 2017, Climate Depot stated: stated Arctic sea ice extent is up 40% from this date five years ago. "Sea ice extent" is one of many different metrics used to characterize the presence of sea ice, and is generally defined as "the area of ocean [based on pixels in satellite imagery] where at least 15 percent of the surface is frozen". On the day of 17 September 2017, sea ice extent was indeed higher than it was on 17 September 2012: defined   This does not mean, however, that sea ice has grown almost 40 percent since 2012, nor does it mean that the overall trend in arctic sea ice is toward growth  it hasn't and it isn't. The issue here is that sea ice extent is quite variable from year to year, and thus looking at two discrete points is a fairly useless exercise without the full context. "We don't expect it to monotonically decrease every year," Hausfather told us.  This chart (using data from the National Snow and Ice Data Center) shows September sea ice extent compared against the same average used in the maps cited by Climate Depot, showing both this aforementioned variability but also an overall trend of reduced ice extent. Note that the year 2012 was no random year to select for comparison; it is actually the record lowest year in terms of Arctic sea ice extent  making anything compared to it necessarily higher: from   The overall trend of declining sea ice is even clearer when you look at a different measure: sea ice volume (presented by the Polar Science Center, below). Not only do such records show a clear negative trend, they also show just how anomalous 2012 was as a data point: Polar Science Center   In reality, 2017 was the eighth lowest year on record for Arctic sea ice extent since satellite measurements began in 1978. But in no world but the pseudo-scientific fringe internet would the concept of global warming rely on every single year breaking the previous year's record for sea ice minimum. eighth Tom Karl, the former director of NOAAs National Centers for Environmental Information, told us that 2017's sea ice extent was still much lower than the 1980-2010 average (by two standard deviations), and that, despite claims to the contrary, "one can't look at a trend over 5 years and say much about the impact of global warming as other factors are also important on these short time scales." director Glacial Ice on Greenland The NaturalNews.com approach for glacial ice on Greenland was similarly lacking scale and context. The main source for these arguments was a completely legitimate end-of-year report put out by the Danish Polar Portal, a website run by the Danish Meteorological Institute. In that report, the organization makes this factual statement: report Heavy snow and rain in winter with a relatively short and intermittent summer melt season have left the Greenland ice sheet with more ice than has been usual over the last twenty years  in fact we have to go back to the 1980s and 90s to see a year similar to this one in terms of snow fall and ice melt. This statement, and the figures presented by NaturalNews.com, are referring to a metric known as Surface Mass Balance (SMB), which Polar Portal describes: describes Each year glaciers gain ice from snow and freezing rain and lose ice by melt that runs off. Adding these together gives the surface mass budget (SMB) in Greenland, the ice sheet typically gains mass from around September to May and loses more mass than it gains in the ablation [melting] season of June, July and August. Importantly, however, this measurement only presents half the picture in terms of how much mass is being lost from year to year from Greenland's glaciers. That's because it does not include the rather significant portion of ice that breaks  or calves  off into the ocean to melt elsewhere. On average this accounts for about 500 Gt [gigatons] of further ice loss. This, as stated in the Polar Portal post, nearly matches the estimated gain in SMB reported by Natural News, effectively canceling it out. In a post on Carbon Brief, analysts with the Danish Meteorological Society put this years measurement in context: post While the Greenland ice sheet has seen a neutral, or small positive, change in ice for this year, it should be noted that Greenland has lost approximately 3,600bn tonnes of ice since 2002. Like the record of Arctic sea ice earlier, when put in the context of the entire trend of Greenland's ice mass over time (presented by Polar Portal below), 2017's measurement does nothing to change larger and completely unambiguous trends of overall melting: Polar Portal    Further, in the case of Greenland's ice sheet, there is not much of a mystery surrounding the lackluster amount of melting this year; a massive storm  the remnants of Hurricane Nicole  parked itself atop the continent, dumping a large amount of snow on the ice-covered continent: Hurricane Nicole dumping Heavy rain and snow in October in especially eastern Greenland gave record totals of precipitation in the main east coast town of Tasiilaq as the remnants of former hurricane Nicole passed by and, much as with Harvey in Houston this year, got lodged over eastern Greenland for some days. However, after Nicoles extreme precipitation, the rest of the winter was actually pretty average in terms of the amount of snow that fell. Because neither the higher-than-2012 arctic sea ice from 17 September 2017 nor the neutral amount of ice loss in Greenland in 2017 do anything to disrupt the overall trends of decreasing ice, and because climatological science does not require (nor does it expect) ice or temperature records to be broken every single year, we rank the claim that these observations are reasons to doubt the tenets of climate change as false. Watson, Tracey.  "Dont Look Now, but Arctic Sea Ice Mass Has Grown Almost 40% Since 2012."
  Natural News.  1 October 2017. Mottram, Ruth, et al.  "Guest Post: How the Greenland Ice Sheet Fared in 2017."
  Carbon Brief.  1 September 2017. Polar Portal.  "End of the SMB Season Summary 2017."
  12 September 2017. Morano, Marc.  "Massive Arctic Ice Gain (Up 40%) Since Low Point of 2012.
  Climate Depot.  19 September 2012. Hausfather, Zeke.  "State of the Climate: Warm Temperatures and Low Sea Ice Mark First Half of 2017."
  Carbon Brief.  21 July 2017. National Snow and Ice Data Center.  "Arctic Sea Ice at Minimum Extent."
  19 September 2017. Polar Science Center.  "PIOMAS Arctic Sea Ice Volume Reanalysis."
  Accessed 4 October 2017. NASA.  "End-of-Summer Arctic Sea Ice Extent Is Eighth Lowest on Record."
  19 September 2017. NASA.  "NASA Sees Tropical Storm Nicole Going Extra-Tropical."
  18 October 2016. Early on the morning of June 6, 2023, at around the time residents reported hearing explosions, the Nova Kakhovka Dam in the Kherson region of Ukraine failed, leading to catastrophic flooding in several downstream towns and cities. Ukrainian authorities have blamed Russia for the collapse. Russian authorities have denied involvement, blaming Kyiv. Nova Kakhovka Dam failed have blamed denied The city of Nova Kakhovka, directly below the dam, experienced extreme flooding shortly after its failure. As images of the town's administrative center under several feet of water went viral, claims soon emerged that a large portion of a local zoo's animal population had perished in the floodwaters. These reports concern "a recreation complex for children and adults" named Kazkova Dibrova  which roughly translates to Fairytale Dibrova  that contained, along with sculptures and other attractions, a small zoo. On the morning of the dam's failure, the Facebook page of that park reported the death of its animal population: Kazkova Dibrova Facebook page This morning, the recreation complex "Kazkova Dibrova" was completely flooded with water after the explosion of the Russian Kakhovskaya HPP. About 300 animals that our Novokakhov residents knew and loved died. Monkeys Anfisa and Charlik, pony Malysh, donkey Osya, raccoons Mishka, Lolya, Dinka, parrot Venya, crow Roma, marmots, Cameroonian goats, sheep, parrots, guinea pigs, ferrets and many other small pets of ours. Only a couple of swans and ducks survived. A small swan chick, born only 5 days ago, also died. Already at 6 in the morning, when Dibrova's workers arrived, everything was flooded with water. A video shared on Telegram appeared to show the park as workers arrived that morning. While Snopes can verify that these videos showedthe entrance of the Kazkova Dibrova, we cannot independently confirm the time when the video was filmed: the entrance  As viral headlines reported that "300 zoo animals drown in floodwaters," Russian media was quick to deny any aspect of the claim whatsoever, asserting in the English language version of the state-owned news agency TASS that the story couldn't be true because there was no zoo in the town: viral headlines no zoo Ukrainian media reports about animals who were killed by a flood at a zoo in the city of Novaya Kakhovka are untrue, because the city has no zoo at all, a spokesperson for the city's emergencies services has told TASS. "Earlier, the Ukrainian media reported that beavers, swans and dogs were killed in Novaya Kakhovka. Some media said that a zoo with around 300 animals was allegedly flooded," the spokesperson said. "No animals were killed, because our city has no zoo." As tourist guides and years of Instagram and other social media posts predating the war can attest, Kazkova Dibrova is a real place with a real zoo that was, indeed, a home to the animals described in the zoo's viral Facebook post. The park has been around since 1992, and is only meters away from the administrative center that flooded in the immediate wake of the dam collapse. tourist guides   (Bing Maps / Snopes) Russian language editions of TASS later reported a slightly narrower denial that accepted the existence of a zoo in Novo Kakhovka (via Google Translate): narrower denial All animals from the zoo in the city of Nova Kakhovka in the Kherson region were taken out last year, Mayor Vladimir Leontiev told reporters. "Even last year, all the animals from the Kazkova Dibrova Zoo were evacuated and transported, there was no one left, not a single animal. Volunteers took custody of these animals," he said. According to a TASS correspondent, now it is impossible to get to the place where the zoo was previously located due to the fact that it is flooded. This area is cordoned off for security purposes. Employees and volunteers associated with the zoo deny that narrative, but they did state that their earlier assertion that all the animals perished failed to account for the fact that some animals had been in the care of volunteers. As explained on the park's Facebook page: explained  The information on the animals of Kazkova Dibrova, which were saved, is being clarified. Yesterday, the workers, being in a state of shock, gave me inaccurate information. Some animals were not on the territory of Dibrova, but were at home [with a volunteer] That's why they stayed alive! Our favorite parrot Venya, flying squirrels, ferrets, parrots, chinchillas and guinea pigs are protected from the flood. Volunteers had been working to keep many of the animals alive during the war. "A year back, we all raised funds as a group to buy feed for the year. Farmers, entrepreneurs, and many people helped by bringing vegetables and sending money to help animals," the park wrote on Facebook. Two volunteers, according to the zoo, had been risking their lives and taken fire in an effort to feed the animals as fighting intensified. on Facebook Some animals were, indeed, brought to zoo employees' homes during the winter, but  the zoo said - these had been returned to the park. "Dibrova survived a terrible winter without light and heating," the park's Facebook page wrote, explaining that their park director "took home all the warm-loving animals" before they were "returned back to Dibrova." wrote The assertion that there were no animals at all present at the zoo at the time of the flooding is hard to support. For one thing, one of the earliest viral images of post-dam-collapse flooding showed two swans  matching the description swans from the zoo next door  swimming in front of the Novo Khakovka administrative center:  The struggle posed by mines and shelling made the full-scale evacuation of all the animals impossible, zoo officials said. These assertions are supported by posts on Facebook by the zoo in late 2022. in late 2022 Because Kazkova Dibrova is a zoo in the city of Nova Kakhovka and because at least a large portion of animals were at that zoo at the time of the catastrophic flooding, the claim that many if not most of the animals died at a zoo following the dam's failure are  CNN. "Kremlin Denies Allegations That Russia Attacked Nova Kakhovka Dam, Accuses Ukraine of 'Sabotage.'" CNN, 6 June 2023, https://www.cnn.com/europe/live-news/russia-ukraine-war-news-06-06-23/h_5988282ee9df7ca66979a76cb7b45107. ---. "Live Updates: Ukraine Blames Russia for Critical Dam Collapse." CNN, 6 June 2023, https://www.cnn.com/europe/live-news/russia-ukraine-war-news-06-06-23/index.html. Kazkova Dibrova, Nova Kakhovka: Information, Photos, Reviews. https://travels.in.ua/en-us/object/1104. Accessed 7 June 2023. Yerushalmy, Jonathan. "Nova Kakhovka Dam: Everything You Need to Know about Ukraine's Strategically Important Reservoir." The Guardian, 6 June 2023. The Guardian, https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/jun/06/nova-kakhovka-dam-everything-you-need-to-know-about-ukraines-strategically-important-reservoir. "   ,        2022 ." TACC, https://tass.ru/obschestvo/17951039. Accessed 7 June 2023.    ... https://www.facebook.com/permalink.php?story_fbid=pfbid025tTJj5kHXLp4ry9R8jSupoJBZtZxpr3mWyCJBeNkMCetXaJRPN3qf1RfKWon8fcJl&id=100063905471298. Accessed 7 June 2023.       ,   .  ,    ,     ... | By " " . " | Facebook. https://www.facebook.com/100063905471298/videos/%D1%83%D1%82%D0%BE%D1%87%D0%BD%D1%8E%D1%8E%D1%82%D1%8C%D1%81%D1%8F-%D1%96%D0%BD%D1%84%D0%BE%D1%80%D0%BC%D0%B0%D1%86%D1%96%D1%8F-%D0%BF%D0%BE-%D1%82%D0%B2%D0%B0%D1%80%D0%B8%D0%BD%D0%B0%D0%BC-%D0%BA%D0%B0%D0%B7%D0%BA%D0%BE%D0%B2%D0%BE%D1%97-%D0%B4%D1%96%D0%B1%D1%80%D0%BE%D0%B2%D0%B8-%D1%8F%D0%BA%D0%B8%D1%85-%D0%B7%D0%BC%D0%BE%D0%B3%D0%BB%D0%B8-%D0%B2%D1%80%D1%8F%D1%82%D1%83%D0%B2%D0%B0%D1%82%D0%B8-%D0%B2%D1%87%D0%BE%D1%80%D0%B0-/1319108985624200/. Accessed 7 June 2023.