Some good news on energy
The New York Times – October 25 – Ivan Penn
https://www.nytimes.com/2022/10/25/climate/energy-transition-solar-wind.html
Renewable sources made up the vast majority of new generating capacity last year, a new report found. But the world’s energy transition still needs to speed up.
In Yet Another Ominous Climate Change Warning, Greenhouse Gases Reach Highest Levels Ever
NBC News – October 24, 2022 – Denise Chow
https://www.nbcnews.com/science/environment/greenhouses-gases-earths-atmosphere-hit-record-high-2021-rcna53900
The U.N. weather agency published the alarming report less than two weeks before world leaders gather for the U.N. Climate Change Conference.
Recycling Plastic Is Practically Impossible – and the Problem Is Getting Worse
NPR – October 24, 2022 – Laura Sullivan
https://www.npr.org/2022/10/24/1131131088/recycling-plastic-is-practically-impossible-and-the-problem-is-getting-worse
Greenpeace found that no plastic — not even soda bottles, one of the most prolific items thrown into recycling bins — meets the threshold to be called “recyclable” according to standards set by the Ellen MacArthur Foundation New Plastic Economy Initiative. Plastic must have a recycling rate of 30% to reach that standard; no plastic has ever been recycled and reused close to that rate. “More plastic is being produced, and an even smaller percentage of it is being recycled,” says Lisa Ramsden, senior plastic campaigner for Greenpeace USA. “The crisis just gets worse and worse, and without drastic change will continue to worsen as the industry plans to triple plastic production by 2050.”
The shrinking ozone hole shows that the world can actually solve an environmental crisis
Vox – October 27, 2022 – Kelsey Piper
https://www.vox.com/future-perfect/22686105/future-of-life-ozone-hole-environmental-crisis
If you haven’t heard about the ozone hole in years, that’s because scientists did a pretty good job saving us from ourselves… The damage we wrought last century has been reversed. Even with the complications and caveats, the world’s response to the ozone crisis should be seen as an instructive, even inspiring, success story — one that can perhaps inform our response to the climate crisis.
Republicans Are Coming for Your Social Security and Medicare
The American Prospec – October 20, 2022 – Ryan Cooper
https://prospect.org/economy/republicans-coming-for-your-social-security-medicare/
We now have an answer to this question, and it is firmly negative. If they win in 2022, Republicans are promising the same old massive cuts to social programs, above all Social Security and Medicare, which they’ve been trying to get at for decades. And they’re going to try to force President Biden to agree by threatening a global financial apocalypse. In the words of Roger Daltrey, meet the new boss, same as the old boss.
Democrats need to address economic fears now – or risk losing their majorities
The Guardian – October 23, 2022 – Robert Reich
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2022/oct/23/inflation-democrats-economy-corporate-power
Republicans are focusing on inflation because voters see it as their biggest immediate problem, and it’s easy to pin blame on the Democrats because they’re in charge. But the Biden administration and the Democrats aren’t responsible. Inflation is worldwide. It’s being propelled by continuing global supply shocks – including Putin’s war in Ukraine and China’s Covid lockdowns – which are contributing to shortages of energy, food and hi-tech components. The shortages are coming just at a time when consumer demand is soaring in the wake of what is hopefully the end of the worst of Covid. Inflation in the United States is also being caused by corporations raising their prices faster than their costs to fatten their profit margins. The evidence of this is now all around us. Corporate profit margins are at record highs.
Democrats have helped working-class Americans. They need to say so loudly.
The Washington Post – October 25, 2022 – Katrina vanden Heuvel
https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2022/10/25/democrats-working-class-victories-katrina-vanden-heuvel/
Democrats have bolstered people’s bank accounts. It’s just that it won’t do them any good unless they remind people where that windfall came from — and unless they keep those benefits coming. A recent Data for Progress report indicated that the child tax credit led to a surge in support for Democrats among parents who received it — but that bump evaporated as soon as the program expired. Research has also found that even though wages are up and unemployment is down, voters perceive that the economy is poor. A majority of Americans believe we’re in a recession, though we are not. And when people don’t realize that the government is helping them, anti-government conservatives benefit.
It’s Time for Progressives to Unite Against the Fascistic Republican Party
Reader Supported News – October 25, 2022 – Norman Solomon
https://www.rsn.org/001/its-time-for-progressives-to-unite-against-the-fascistic-republican-party.html
Progressives have overarching responsibilities to oppose the corporate power that ushers in oligarchy and also to oppose the far-right forces that lead to tyranny. Focusing on just one of those responsibilities while dodging the other just won’t do. It’s accurate to say that the neoliberalism of the Democratic Party has been creating and exacerbating conditions that fuel right-wing engines. But at certain times — which definitely include the next two weeks, through Election Day on Nov. 8 — electoral battles come to a decisive fork in the road. We will be living with the consequences of this crossroads for the rest of our lives.
Democrats Need to Remember What It Means to Be a Workers’ Party
Esquire – October 27, 2022 – Charles Pierce
https://www.esquire.com/news-politics/politics/a41793226/shell-stock-buyback/
Between price gouging and stock buybacks, it’s time to talk about what’s really driving inflation…. Somewhere between Reagan’s election and now, Democratic candidates have lost whatever it was that allowed Franklin Roosevelt to welcome the hatred of the “malefactors of great wealth.” It ought to be easy to argue as ferociously against price gouging as the Republicans are arguing against inflation—easier, actually, because there’s substance behind an anti-gouging campaign and actual legislation aimed at correcting it; whereas the Republican railing about “inflation” uses the term as a mere conjuring word, and the people invoking it have no substantive plan to deal with it. But sometime over the last 40 years, as a national party the Democrats lost the ability to discuss class with the appropriate vigor and fire.
Shell and Total, Oil Giants, Report Huge Profits on High Energy Prices
The New York Times – October 27, 2022 – Stanley Reed
https://www.nytimes.com/2022/10/27/business/shell-earnings-profit-oil-gas.html
The two European companies reported earnings totaling nearly $20 billion, partly on higher energy prices as Russia’s war in Ukraine continues… Shell and Total, like other energy companies this year, are benefiting from high oil and natural gas prices partly stoked by the war in Ukraine, as Russia squeezes gas flows to Europe.
The Next Big Battle in America’s Abortion Fight Will Be Over Fetal Personhood
NBC News – October 23, 2022 – Wendy Davis
https://www.nbcnews.com/think/opinion/americas-abortion-law-fight-will-fetal-personhood-rcna53477
If there is anything I have learned as a policymaker and advocate for abortion rights, it’s that the abortion debate has always been as much if not more about controlling women as it has been about an interest in protecting life. And the misogyny that drives this quest has an insatiable appetite. The next countrywide chapter in this debate is almost certainly going to be around personhood. And if we don’t fight back this November by defeating the anti-abortion lawmakers who successfully fought to overturn Roe, we’ll have only ourselves to blame.
The United States’ Unamendable Constitution
The New Yorker – October 26, 2022 – Jill Lepore
https://www.newyorker.com/culture/annals-of-inquiry/the-united-states-unamendable-constitution
Laws govern people; constitutions govern governments. Lately, American democracy has begun to wobble, leaning on a constitution that’s grown brittle. How far can a constitution bend before it breaks? The study of written constitutions has become a lot more sophisticated since Madison’s day. A project called Constitute has collected and analyzed every national constitution ever enacted. “Constitutions are designed to stabilize and facilitate politics,” the project’s founders write. “But, there is certainly the possibility that constitutions can outlive their utility and create pathologies in the political process that distort democracy.” Could that be happening in the United States?… In this piece, The New Yorker will be asking you some of the same questions. More than two centuries on, does the U.S. Constitution need mending?
Steadiness in Turmoil
Steady – October 19, 2022 – Dan Rather and Elliot Kirschner
https://steady.substack.com/p/steadiness-in-turmoil
We are living in a time of great turmoil. Our democracy is being undermined at its core, from within. Our constitutional order is being threatened by politicians who betray their oath to support and defend it. Meanwhile, our planet’s livability for our species is being jeopardized by our actions. We have long understood what needs to be done, and we’re not doing it nearly fast enough. … We should remember that the search for a It is an accumulation of all the choices we make and the roles we seek. Steadiness is recognizing that the struggle will always continue, but it should also always be accompanied by hope.
We May Have Only a Few Months to Prevent the Next Pandemic
Thed New York Times – October 24, 2022 – Craig Spencer
https://www.nytimes.com/2022/10/24/opinion/covid-ebola-pandemic-prevention.html
We probably can’t prevent the emergence of future pandemic threats, and that’s what makes rapidly detecting them critically important. But you can’t see what you’re not looking for. A massive scaling up of disease surveillance is needed not just in wealthy nations but also in low- and middle-income countries and areas of humanitarian crisis. The World Health Organization coordinates an international network of influenza laboratories that conduct year-round surveillance of the flu. A consortium of scientists tracking coronavirus evolution has been built in Africa, and now more than two-thirds of countries on the continent are capable of sequencing genomes. These could serve as models.
Indigenous women in Guatamala are defending weavings from cultural appropriation
Waging Non-Violence – October 20, 2022 – Jeff Abbott
https://wagingnonviolence.org/2022/10/indigenous-women-guatemala-defend-weavings-from-cultural-appropriation/
By pushing for intellectual property legislation and documenting the disappearing meaning of their designs, Indigenous weavers are challenging the tourism industry… AFEDES has now worked in at least seven Indigenous communities, including Tecpán, to collect the meanings of the various designs. The weavings hold generations of knowledge that the Spanish invaders attempted to erase by burning the Mayan books when they invaded the region in 1524. But 500 years later, the knowledge continues to be passed on in the weavings. “The books are those of the weavings,” Aspuac said. “They are the books that the colony could not burn.”
Addressing the Affordable Housing Crisis Requires Expanding Rental Assistance and Adding Housing Units
Center on Budget and Policy Priorities – Oxtober 27, 2022 – Peggy Bailey
https://www.cbpp.org/research/housing/addressing-the-affordable-housing-crisis-requires-expanding-rental-assistance-and
Closing the housing affordability gap will require a comprehensive housing strategy, including developing new units, preserving existing affordable housing, and expanding rental assistance.
The Wreckage of Neoliberalism
The Atlantic – Octobedr 25, 2022 – Sen. Chris Murphy
https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2022/10/democrats-should-reject-neoliberalism/671850/
Economic neoliberalism underpins the past 70 years of Western economic and cultural order. Broadly speaking, neoliberalism argues that barrier-free international markets, rapidly advancing communications technology and automation, decreased regulation, and empowered citizen-consumers are the keys to prosperity, happiness, and strong democracy. Though it contains the word liberal, neoliberalism was devised by libertarian-conservative economists and political scientists as an alternative to the state-controlled command economy favored by Communists and other authoritarians… About 30 years ago, the project started to fray at the edges. The newly global economy moved America’s well-paying jobs—the ones that had created the U.S.’s early- and mid-20th-century blue-collar aristocracy—overseas, but the jobs that replaced them offered lower pay, fewer benefits, and less opportunity for advancement. Technology, which had promised to make our lives easier and more connected, started to get so complicated, and advance at a pace so dizzying, that it no longer felt within our control… This does not have to be our nation’s fate. It is possible to reverse the damaging impacts of the neoliberal world order while saving democracy.
Reparations as a Construction Project
Portside – October 29, 2022 – Alexandra Tempus
https://portside.org/2022-10-29/reparations-construction-project
An interview with philosopher Olúf´mi Táíwò on his climate justice-centered framework for ‘remaking the world.’ — “What I hope is becoming clearer as the climate crisis accelerates is that you actually can’t buy a new ecology.” … what I hope is becoming clearer as the climate crisis accelerates is that you actually can’t buy a new ecology, and people at the individual or household level can’t buy levees. We can’t individually buy public transportation and infrastructure. These are all collective projects that we have to invest in. But if we tell the political story about why we aren’t investing in them, we’ll end up at a level of practical inequality that exists between the haves and have-nots, right? It’s not that individually we could go to the store and buy a subway system, but the people that own car companies have such a large [concentration] of political power, which has to do with this large disparity of economic power, which we really could upset by redistributing money.
Elon’s Twitter
Robert Reich’s blog – October 29, 2022
https://robertreich.substack.com/p/elons-twitter
Make no mistake: this is not about freedom. It’s about power. In Musk’s vision of Twitter and the internet, he’s the wizard behind the curtain – projecting on the world’s screen a fake image of a brave new world empowering everyone. In reality, that world is coming to be dominated by the richest and most powerful people on the globe, who aren’t accountable to anyone for anything — for facts, truth, science or the common good. That’s Elon’s dream. And Trump’s. And Putin’s. And the dream of every dictator, strongman, demagogue and modern-day robber baron on Earth. For the rest of us, it’s a brave new nightmare.
Will There be a Nuclear War?
Counterpunch – October 28, 2022 – Jim Kavanagh
https://www.counterpunch.org/2022/10/28/261878/
In the current context in Ukraine, given that Russia considers the battle of existential importance, and the terrain of actual combat its “homeland” territory, Russia’s use of a nuclear weapon is possible even within its more restrictive explicit policy. This is a very dangerous situation, and no “doctrine” here guarantees against the use of nuclear weapons. Nor, I regret to inform you, does any explicit “doctrine” anywhere. The actual policy for nuclear weapons use of any state that has them, and the danger to the entire world as long as any nation does, is: We will use them when we judge that it’s absolutely necessary to do so. And we will determine what “absolutely necessary” means. The question in this dangerous situation is: Which party is more likely to find it absolutely necessary to use nuclear weapons to stave off what it considers an existential defeat?
Reclaiming Abundance Under Capitalism
Yes! Magazine – October 26, 2022 – Gabes Torres
https://www.yesmagazine.org/opinion/2022/10/26/capitalism-consumption-holidays-abundance
Reclaiming abundance is to understand and remember that, naturally, we already have all that we need. All that we are and all that surrounds us have always been enough. The problem is the political and economic structures of the powerful have privatized and polluted natural resources, which has resulted in the inequitable distribution and allocation of said resources. This then exacerbates our anxiety around scarcity and poverty. In a way, our anxiety is informed, because the world’s major pollutants—hyper-industrialization, militarization, and global capitalism—aggravate unnatural scarcity and our fear of it. It makes sense that we want to consume more and more, and we are anxious and fearful if we don’t… Abundance begins with the conscious choice to reciprocate the nourishment and protection that the Earth gives us. It is with sustained mutual exchange where abundance unfurls and flourishes.