The 26th United Nations Conference of the Parties (COP-26), scheduled to open on 10/31/21 in Glasgow, Scotland. COP brings wealthy and developing nations together to discuss fighting climate change as one entity. The conference for this year will attempt to finish the rules for the carbon market, not completed at...
Science
Voting for the current crop of Republicans is like brushing your teeth with the water running. It is a waste of resources, has no purpose, but all your friends do it. Nothing was more symbolic than the displays of blubbering pique by Congressmen Matt Gaetz and Jim Jordan. The House...
The tens of tens who showed up in Washington, DC Saturday had a face, former Trump staffer Matt Braynard. Braynard, who presents himself as one of the many “voter fraud experts,” investigating the presidential election, was front and center Saturday afternoon in the Justice for J6 huddle. Braynard, who once...
“He's crazy. You know he's crazy,” said House Speaker Nancy Pelosi. “He's crazy and what he did yesterday [Jan. 6] is further evidence of his craziness,” Her words were reportedly transcribed from a phone call between her and the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs (JC) of Staff General Mark Milley....
Paraphrasing Pvt. Sam Watkins, 1st Tennessee, Co. H. ‘America has no north, no south, no east, no west,’ those words could apply to the pandemic. Watkins was lamenting brother against brother killing each other in the American Civil War. All of America is watching the unvaccinated kill each other and...
…suppressing your opposition with power; strong regimentation of society and economy, and dictatorial power- Fascism In the collegial setting, politics is taught as a science. It is meant to be an apolitical study based upon history or comparison, its global effects i.e. international implications, and accepted theory. Although modern fascism...
Let me start by saying no one—for or against—is in favor of abortion. Subjecting a woman and her partner to outside scrutiny from what is the most anguished-filled decision of their lives, is no business of any of ours to decide for any woman. One of the few tenets left...
“…wearing a mask while playing was no different from wearing a parachute while skydiving.” The above quote is purportedly from the late Jacques Plante, former goaltender for the Montreal Canadiens Hockey club when his bravery was questioned for wearing a mask. As absurd as it seems now, there was a...
As the grandfather of 12 grandchildren, I worry about their safety, health, and lives in this time of excessive gun violence, denial of history, and the life-destroying spread of the virus. Despite their vulnerability, the children of America who frighten me most are the so-called responsible adults who have decided...
Reminiscent of the unfounded fears spread around by conservatives about the Affordable Care Act and “death panels,” President Biden’s call for a door-to-door educational program about the coronavirus vaccine sent the GOP and conservatives into a paranoid tizzy. Republican members of Congress, fake news stations, and right-wing bloggers went into...
Florida bans its schools from teaching critical race theory On Thursday, Florida’s State Board of Education unanimously voted in favor of an amendment banning the teaching of critical race theory in schools throughout the state. The theory, according to PolitiFact, is a collection of ideas about systemic bias and privilege...
A couple of days ago, alleged congressperson Marjorie Taylor Greene sent a letter to Joe Biden. I read it; you don’t have to. Unless you read at a third-grade level or worse, it might be hard for you to follow. It essentially boils down to “Wuhan lab … Chinese-made virus...
Former President Trump ordered the Pentagon to release all of its information on “unidentified aerial phenomena” (UAP) within 18 days in his last coronavirus relief bill in December 2020. More inexplicable sightings of unidentified flying objects (UFOs) will be released for public scrutiny in June — including a UFO that broke...
A few years ago, a pro-choice science fiction author named Patrick S. Tomlinson challenged anti-choicers about their priorities when it came to protecting human life. He set up a straightforward thought experiment in which one is asked to make a snap value judgment about the competing needs of a 5-year-old...
Hello, My name is Saumya Gilra and I am a studying Law and Political Science at University at Buffalo. I was having some trouble registering so I have attached my essay. Please let me know if there is any other information you need. Thank you! Best, Saumya Sent from Mail...
The devolution of the Republican Party has been a sight to behold—but it’s been a particularly fraught experience for ex-Republicans. I know if the Democrats had nominated Charlie Sheen for president in 2016 and then proceeded to abandon all their previously held goals and principles in exchange for a chance...
I took my first shot of the Pfizer vaccine two days after my birthday. I had my second shot 21 days later, and I am well past the two-week waiting period to be considered fully vaccinated. Now that I have reached that milestone, I am ready for the next public...
I say “schaden,” you say “freude”! Schaden! … I can’t hear you! Okay, we’ll come back to that. This is all you need to know for the time being. Donald J. Trump’s “From the Desk of” blog (link not available) is a big dumpy pile of impotent derp. From NBC...
He’s got a new book, so a conservative Niall Ferguson appeared on TV this morning whitewashing the Trump administration’s competence, or lack thereof, as if the fault lies with more systemic faults, despite the deliberate Trump sabotage of Obama-era pandemic planning. Catastrophes of politics, in pricey Ted-like talks. As if there no...
Remember hydroxychloroquine? It’s the anti-malarial, anti-lupus drug that people started taking last year because a sweaty, out-of-shape ball of malignant insecurities and congealed ghee saw a tweet about it, envisioned a miracle cure that could save his flailing presidency, and decided, oh, what the heck? Let’s get this in as many Americans’ bodies...
There is a capitalist propaganda battle at work, with the Wall Street Journal claiming that “ Biden has sent a signal around the world that nobody’s intellectual property is safe in America.”. The National Review now claims that “Profit Margins Save Lives”. “The administration believes strongly in intellectual property protections, but in service...
Yesterday was a very busy day for me so I’m playing catch up today. Received this e-mail yesterday from former Air Force Pilot and U.S. Senate candidate, Amy McGrath (D. KY) on behalf of her new organization, Democratic Majority Action PAC: RoJo The Traitor Since I told you about my...
More elephants will get killed as trophies. Cash-short countries do have to think about revenue, and carrying capacity is but a rationalization when eco-tourism is crippled by a pandemic. What’s worse is that killing bushmeat remains always remains an option beyond the poaching for ivory. x “We can expect not...
Dr. Anthony Fauci is on a roll. First, he went after this clown: x “You can get infected, and will get infected, if you put yourself at risk.” -Dr. Anthony Fauci responding to podcast host Joe Rogan’s suggestion that young people not get the COVID-19 vaccine pic.twitter.com/6E02GI31VV— TODAY (@TODAYshow) April...
Fail: REALITY BITES: That didn’t take long. Reality TV star and political neophyte Caitlyn Jenner was about 24 hours into the rollout of her California gubernatorial campaign this weekend when she posted her first major campaign gaffe on social media. Jenner, expressing outrage about a San Francisco Chronicle story involving SF DA Chesa...
I was raised Lutheran i.e. by the doctrine of Sola Gratia, Sola Fide, and Sola Scriptura. The only part of which spoke to me was that my neighbour needed more of my “good” deeds than god, being omnipotent that made sense, the rest not so much. I was aware of...
A new book suggests now the necessity of reexamining the historical materialist project of Walter Benjamin recognizing those moments of historical contact as acts of recognizing the constructed historical object. “Historicism tends to be hermeneutic because it values cautious, rigorous, and contextualized interpretation of information; or relativist, because it rejects notions of universal, fundamental...
According to new findings from the University of California San Diego and Scripps Institution of Oceanography, primarily in summer, unprecedented quantities of heat from the Pacific are pouring into the Arctic Ocean through the Bering Strait. This likely explains the rapid decimation of sea ice in the region. The decline has...
Not very much has changed with the disinformation being generated by the usual external players. Russia Studied How to Get Americans to Make Mistakes…(how Americans take the Russia disinformation bait) – The Atlantic https://t.co/n5TIn3mf77 — Jennifer Griffin (@JenGriffinFNC) March 20, 2021 For decades now, Russian security services have studied a concept...
One of the more despicable senators in the US Senate now acknowledges that climate change is real after four years of kissing Trump’s ass as the know-nothing did all he could do to derail the fight against climate change and kill life on the planet. Better late than never, but words...
Received this e-mail today from Governor Tony Evers’ (D. WI) re-election campaign: As someone who believes in science and keeping Wisconsin safe, I have trusted public health experts to guide our decision-making since the beginning of COVID-19. As a result, we’re leading the nation in vaccine distribution and next week...
Many times during his reign, Trump could have saved his presidency by taking moderate positions and co-opting the Democrats. He felt, however that he should obey his benefactors like a beta, whether it was the evangelicals and Russia, or Steve Bannon, Paul Manafort, and Mike Flynn. Even in the pandemic,...
I check off a day every morning on my calendar because I am counting down to the day of my second Covid-19 vaccination. I, like a lot of other Americans, especially black Americans, have expressed skepticism over the speed, effectiveness, and side effects of the vaccines. I wrote about a...
Like Martin Luther objecting to Pope Leo X selling indulgences to raise money for a variety of excesses, the environmental costs of carbon markets far exceed the benefits. Austerity would have denied us Renaissance art which is less at risk in an age of non-fungible tokens. Today the consequences for the planet...
We remain weary about the callow stupidity of the GOP/GQP but we must not patronize or condescend about how superfluous their grievances have been and continue to be. Now that we know more about Trump’s sexual practices, fascist fantasizing seems altogether rote and boring, but certainly redolent of a banality...
Rye Development is proposing a massive pumped storage power plant uphill from the site of the closed Goldendale smelter, next to the Columbia River. This facility will take over a closed pumped storage plant. Native American tribes, including tribes from Asia, originally migrated to this vicinity as a group with common languages and...
He’s not the only one, of course. For instance, I’m convinced Matt Gaetz has the largest head-to-brain-size ratio in the animal kingdom and that Louie Gohmert is the lamentable result of a failed attempt to breed a white supremacist lemur with a bowl of beets. Then there’s Lauren Boebert and Marjorie...
Twitter is dragging Jonathan Turley because of attributing a Rousseau quote to the Reign of Terror, but more likely because they mistook him for Jeffrey Toobin. That’s the nature of conservative culture war, making class warfare a struggle more transcendent and less applicable in times of right-wing insurrection. x Since philosopher Jean...
About 15 years ago, my son and I dug out two back yard fish ponds with a back hoe, to my wife’s surprise. A backhoe. (not in my backyard.) This pond was about 12 X eight feet. We stocked it with dime-a-dance aquarium goldfish. The goldfish grew rapidly. I operate...
There’s really only one Ted that’s applicable to an unconfirmed source trying to connect Greta Thunberg with the Unabomber and that’s Ted “Zodiac Killer” Cruz. Swedish climate activist Greta Thunberg has mocked Senator Ted Cruz (R-TX) after he criticized President Joe Biden‘s decision to rejoin the Paris climate agreement. “So happy that USA has finally...
In the choice between wolf predation and human predation wolf culling seems more about sport than the economic threat to herds. Subsidizing trapping and killing with wolf bounties doesn’t begin to address the real ecological harms from other populations like feral pigs. “Should Montana Allow New Methods of Killing Wolves to...
From the Church of the Perpetual Face Palm (aka the modern-day Republican Party) comes another wee dollop of “what the fuck?” So how do you even begin to respond to this? The Republican-controlled Arizona House voted along party lines last week to allow state businesses to ignore any and all city,...
Hi, Hoomans! The last couple of months have been a whirl! All I remember is waking up really horny and cold in the middle of January. “Hey,” I thought to my self, I remember these ponds from before.” At dusk, I heard a dozen male chorus frogs making their crude and...
The sparse number of actual carbon capture and sequestration projects plus weak carbon markets amplify the problems of the climate crisis yet to be revisited, post-Trump. Two heartland examples in North Dakota and Texas show how there are several interlocking problems addressing the climate crisis that must be included in future environmental policy. More specifically...
The rift on Antarctica’s Brunt ice shelf has torn itself away from the glacier resulting in a massive iceberg that is known as A74. British Antarctic Survey has been monitoring the glacier for years. The shelf was at its largest extent for over 100 years. The Brits have relocated their research station twice...
Received this e-mail today from actor and activist, Bradley Whitford, in support of Governor Tony Evers’ (D. WI) re-election campaign: Gov. Tony Evers (D. WI) & Lt. Gov. Mandela Barnes (D. WI) Hey there, While some might know me from shows like The West Wing (a fantasy series about American politics that...
Are we not distracted enough by bombing targets in Syria to know that the White House will do better than the “best path forward”. Pelosi indicates bill expected to pass House Friday will include wage hike. Then that means the Senate will strip it out next week. And assuming Senate...