As a message on Veterans’ Day, Yusuf / Cat Stevens, apparently standing by his Peace Train, writes: I always stood for the elimination of conflict and wars, and any of those causes that ignite them.
This is perhaps the most compelling reason to address climate change, i.e., because the growing scarcities of resources, including food, potable water, and inhabitable land, will make conflicts fiercer and more numerous.
Jair Bolsonaro’s loss in Brazil and various aspects of the 2022 midterms here in the U.S. stand out as bright spots in terms of dealing with the trend to fascism/nationalism around the world.
On a related matter, it’s gratifying that the people involved in overturning the dreadful U.S. Supreme Court decision Citizens United, which empowers corporations to commandeer our elections, have not given up.
It’s no secret that the American business community and the government entities that support it distrusts the Chinese when it comes to things like IP theft.
I’m not saying that this is unwarranted, but it’s certainly regrettable. That’s because it stands in the way of cooperation, and lack of cooperation means lack of synergy, thus impeding progress in various technological disciplines. Now, if by “technological disciplines” we were referring exclusive to 5G or Big Data, I’m not sure most people would care.
The problem is that this impasse includes the decarbonization of energy and transportation. The COP 27 meeting in Egypt shines a spotlight on precisely why this is so catastrophic. Midway through the conference we find ourselves facing a reprise of so many earlier events, in which everyone paying attention despairs that the 200+ sovereign countries on this planet continue to a) point fingers at one another or b) make promises they have no intention of keeping.
The gentleman I interviewed for a chapter on climate change in my first book, Renewable Energy–Facts and Fantasies, Veerabhadran Ramanathan said, “We had to stay at COP 15 an extra day, because not one of us was able to write down a single declarative statement in the English language that stated what we had accomplished in the previous two weeks.
“Love is wise – Hatred is foolish. In this world, which is getting more and more closely interconnected, we have to learn to tolerate each other. We have to learn to put up with the fact that some people say things we don’t like. We can only live together in that way. But if we are to live together, and not die together, we must learn a kind of charity and a kind of tolerance which is absolutely vital, to the continuation of human life on this planet.”
The cartoon here would be a lot funnier if it didn’t so accurately depict the behavior of our global corporations.
Whether it’s plastics, fossil fuels, fast food nearly devoid of nutrition, exorbitantly expensive drugs, products with planned obsolescence, weapons of war, or tobacco, the people at the top are (at best) indifferent to our well-being.
I’m still struggling to understand how half the nation voted for terrorism, gutting Social Security and Medicare, and banning abortion.
We’re a very coarse bunch of people at this point. We’re closer to Iran or Syria than we are to the America of a decade ago.
A reader notes: This is how the global appetite for ‘cheap meat’ is affecting the earth.
So true. Fortunately for us, the Asian countries use meat more as a decoration that a meal in and of itself.
Also on our side is plant-based and laboratory-grown meat, both of which are improving with each passing month.
Sure would be good to see this in action.
The sketchy performance of Trump’s endorsements in the midterms combined with his legal woes seem to indicate that he’s going down hard. But is he taking the whole GOP with him? I doubt it.
My prediction: Two years from now the Republicans will nominate someone who will pretend he’s never heard of the Big Lie, and that Trump was just an unfortunate phase.
This from a reader.
I don’t think anyone is kidding himself about the candidate’s astonishing lack of intelligence, or his capacity to do anything for the people of Georgia. If he’s elected, God help us, he’s there to do what he’s told.
At a certain level, the 2022 midterms were a referendum on honesty, at least as far as the voter fraud myth was concerned; most of the purveyors of the Big Lie got clobbered.
Yet that doesn’t mean we’ve moved into an era of candor and transparency. I was amused at the Republicans’ political posturing in Texas, where they have been in power for the last 27 years. Their slogan? “Help us fix what’s broken in Texas.”
I kid you not.
