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by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Renewables - Politics

I’m sure I’m not the only one who finds the antics of Republican congressman George Santos to be amusing.  On one hand, one can say that there’s nothing amusing about having a pathological liar and serial felon in a position to make laws that affect every single American.  On the other, however, we have to admit that every word that comes out of his mouth has a certain comedic value.

The latest is his letter to House Speaker Keven McCarthy explaining that he wishes to recuse himself from committee assignments “until matters are cleared up.”  As if these hundreds of lies and crimes are going to miraculously vanish when these subjects receive more scrutiny.

What is happening is that Santos is going to prison.

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by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Renewables - Politics

Two things:

I’m a whore for the National Rifle Association, and

I’m completely indifferent to the misery of the American people.

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by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Renewables - Politics

…is show in the graphic here.

Of course, Trump supporters don’t care.  In their view, Trump is “making America great again,” and if our country is reviled by the rest of the world, that’s tough.

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by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Sustainability

Here’s a reminder of another intractable problem facing American society: our fondness for weapons designed to kill as many people as possible, in the shortest possible amount of time.

The gun lobby sends enormous fortunes to lawmakers who, in turn, thwart our efforts to prevent ourselves and our children from being shot to bits.

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by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Fossil Fuels

From: The Story of Stuff Project 

While Americans were reckoning with sky-high gas prices at the pump last year, ExxonMobil reported on Tuesday that it made $56 billion in profits in 2022. That’s the most a Western oil company has ever earned and averages out to around $6.3 million an hour over the course of the year.

It’s not just Exxon. Other major oil companies such as Chevron and Shell are expected to report similar results in the coming weeks, pushing their combined profits to around $200 billion, according to the financial markets data firm Refinitiv.

The challenge facing human civilization when it comes to mitigating climate change is that baking this planet is insanely profitable.  Just as we’re finding how difficult it is to remove the drug cartels from Mexico, $56 billion carries a level of political power that is hard to describe.

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by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Renewables - Science

It’s one thing to be anti-abortion and another to be just plain stupid.

When we learn that a woman is pregnant, do we congratulate her on her baby?  If this is to be her first child, do we think of her as a parent?

I sure don’t, because I understand the concept of a miscarriage, and, more generally, the difference between something that has already happened vs. some future event.

If we ask a young person what she wants to do when she enters the work force and she says “a veterinarian,” we might say “Oh, that’s great,” but it would be inappropriate to congratulate her for something that may or may not happen in the future.

 

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by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Renewables - Politics

If you think there is no chance of another insurrection, one that may be orders of magnitude larger than January 6th, ask yourself what certain congresspeople are trying to communicate by wearing AR-15 pins on their lapels.

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by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Renewables - Politics

It comes as no surprise that the cable news channel Newsmax, far to the right of Fox News in terms of its spreading pure disinformation, is apoplectic about AT&T’s and its subsidiary’s Direct TV’s dropping them when they continued to support Trump after he took on the role as one the world’s most notorious criminals.

AT&T had long supported far-right causes, but here they figured, we were OK with Richard Nixon, Ronald Reagan and Bushes # 41 and #43.  But traitors?

We can almost hear the discussion in the boardroom: “We can continue to be America’s phone company, or we can support this sociopath.  We can either draw the line or slowly fade into becoming part of a criminal enterprise.  I believe that the American people have a limited appetite for treason. Who’s with me?”

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by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Renewables - Politics

In terms of political ideology, it could be that DeSantis is worse than Trump himself.

If he represents an improvement over the former president, it’s possible that he’s not a criminal sociopath.  I use the word “possible” because, at this point, we don’t know if he’s capable of committing any of the wide array of felonies that Trump did, including attempting to overthrow the United States federal government.

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by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Renewables - Business

Here’s a story about Jigar Shah, long-term friend and colleague, and how he finds himself in a position within the U.S. Department of Energy to make loans totaling hundreds of billions of dollars to companies in cleantech.

As the director of the DOE’s Loan Programs Office, Jigar will be shaping the future in terms of America’s transition from fossil fuels, in favor of renewables, efficiency, energy storage, and electric transportation.  IMO, no one is better qualified for this position, if only because of his keen understanding of energy markets, and the imperative to make all this profitable to investors.

This subject is always top-of-mind for Jigar, as demonstrated in the title of his book: Creating Climate Wealth: Unlocking the Impact Economy.

Good news for everyone with lungs.

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