Republicans used to be more gung-ho about saving endangered species and other environmental causes, e.g., a Republican president established the Environmental Protection Agency and the late, great John McCain fought many battles to protect natural habitats. But then the ardor cooled. Why was that?
“President Trump made 16,241 false or misleading claims in his first three years” - Headline/ Washington Post January 20, 2020
What are we to make of the above headline? That Trump says a lot of things that just ain’t so. Then again, politicians exaggerate, lie and mislead all the time. …Is Trump that much worse than, say, Bernie Sanders in the untruth-telling department? Time to get the ol’ calculator out.
Depending on the scenario, average global temperatures may rise anywhere from less than 2°F to over 9°F by 2100 (.9°C – 5.4°C). The question is how to plan for such a range of possible climate futures? I offer some thoughts from people who make a living pondering this very question:
“Uncertain changes in climate, technological, socio-economic and political situations, and the dynamic interaction among these changes, and between these changes and interventions, pose a challenge to planners and decision-makers. Due to these uncertainties, there is a risk of making an inappropriate decision (too little, too much, too soon, or too late).” Kwakkel, J. H., M. Haasnoot, et al., 2016.
These measures include: increasing ocean carbon uptake (thereby reducing atmospheric CO2); utilizing solar energy to convert greenhouse gases into renewable fuels; adding biochar to soils; restoration of wetlands…
Note that I’m not endorsing some measures over others. None of the above measures are mature technologies and none should be excluded from consideration. As energy systems engineer and Princeton professor Jesse Jenkins put it:
“If we’re really in a ‘climate crisis,’ then you go to war with your full arsenal, you don’t hold anything back. And you don’t purposefully make this crisis harder by limiting our already limited options.”
Per the IPCC glossary, decarbonisation (British spelling) aims to achieve “zero fossil carbon existence” and typically refers to a reduction of the carbon emissions associated with electricity, industry and transport. Examples include methanisation, biomass co-firing, carbon capture and storage, and many more. Here’s a list of 18 decarbonisation measures…
Climate change mitigation pathways are a series of measures taken to reduce or prevent greenhouse gas emissions or to remove greenhouse gases from the atmosphere. Demand-side measures are policies and programs for influencing the demand for goods and/or services. Without further ado, here are 17 demand-side measures found in the 2018 IPCC report, “Mitigation pathways compatible with 1.5°C in the context of sustainable development”…
“Profit is the money a business pulls in after accounting for all expenses. Whether it's a lemonade stand or a publicly-traded multinational company, the primary goal of any business is to earn money, therefore a business performance is based on profitability, in its various forms.” — What Is Profit? by Will Kenton/Investopedia Updated Nov 13, 2019
News Flash! According to a recent Pew Research Survey, most Republicans and Democrats can’t stand each other and large numbers consider the other side to be closed-minded, immoral, and dumb. This got me to thinking: if you want to better understand what people care about, ask them what they hate. And if you want to know what people hate, read the posted comments on political opinion pieces. So that’s what I did.
A bunch of studies have concluded that effective psychotherapy is almost entirely associated with factors common to all therapies but specific to none (Laska & Gurman (2014), Wampold (2015), Cuijpers, Reijnders, et al. (2019). These common factors include….
Relative to GDP, the federal debt may be nearly twice what it was 30 years ago, but it is costing the feds half as much to service - thanks to low interest rates.
…A much better of indicator of household well-being is the labor market participation rate for individuals between 25-54, which excludes early retirees, most students, and a good portion of the disabled (who skew older). And here the picture looks better…
Per the IPCC, here are a few of the “key uncertainties” (reflecting low or very low confidence) regarding the effects of climate change…Global-scale trends in drought…Changes in tropical cyclone activity…Global-scale trends in cloud cover (as well as cloud-climate feedback effects)…Global-scale ocean sub-surface temperature trends and variability…Global-scale and regional changes in precipitation levels….
Cross-cultural studies have found that people generally agree the needy deserve some sort of help (van Oorschot and Roosma, (2017). Such generosity comes with qualifications, though. For example, individuals “seen as being personally responsible for their neediness are seen as less deserving (if at all)” (van Oorschot and Roosma, (2017). How much control the needy have over their circumstances, and whether these circumstances are so bad that charitable assistance is warranted are additional considerations. In lab studies, young children would not help a distressed child if her distress appears unjustified, such as crying over something trivial. They would only help when the distress seems justified by a clear cause (Tomasello 2019).
Per “Analysis: Global coal power set for record fall in 2019” (Carbon Brief), global electricity production from coal is set to fall by around 3% in 2019, the largest drop on record. The projected drop is due to record falls in developed countries, including Germany, the EU overall, South Korea and the United States.
Who would be tempted to stop working, reduce their work hours, take longer breaks between jobs, plan gap years from work, or simply retire early if they could count on a UBI check of, say, $1000 a month? Some candidates….
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As if Trump were so bad, it’s okay to downplay the shortcoming of “anyone but Trump”. I don’t share that sentiment. So thank you FactCheck.org for combing through the Democrat debates and calling out candidates who spoke less than the truth.
Per FactCheck.org (and in their own words), here are questionable statements made by Pete Buttigieg during the Democrat debates…
Per FactCheck.org (and in their own words), here are questionable statements made by Elizabeth Warren during the Democrat debates:….
The news media tend to focus on President Trump’s exaggerations, misstatements and false claims - not a hard task, given the president’s tendency for loose talk. No such due diligence with the current crop of Democrat candidates. No ongoing catalogue of lies, ala CNN, of anyone other than Donald J. Trump. As if Trump were so bad, it’s okay to downplay the shortcoming of “anyone but Trump”. I don’t share that sentiment. So thank you FactCheck.org for combing through the Democrat debates and calling out candidates who spoke less than the truth.
FactCheck.org is a project of the Annenberg Public Policy Center of the University of Pennsylvania. According to its website, FactCheck.org is a nonpartisan, nonprofit “consumer advocate” for voters that aims to reduce the level of deception and confusion in U.S. politics. It monitors the factual accuracy of what is said by major U.S. political players in the form of TV ads, debates, speeches, interviews and news releases.