If you had a chance to talk to some smart experts about CDR (carbon dioxide removal), what would you ask? What are you curious/worried/excited about in that space? Political dynamics? Tech developments? Hit me.
Hm, it appears I'm going to need a 47-hour interview.
One strong message from this call: trees, *as a means of carbon sequestration*, are bullshit. Plenty of great reasons to plant trees, to love trees, to hug trees, but carbon sequestration isn't one of them.
Oh, the other strong message from the CDR call, which ought to go without saying but rarely does: whether CDR is ultimately necessary to mop up the last 10 or 20% of emissions we can't eliminate ... the overwhelming priority right now is to reduce the emissions we can.
There's a weird phenomenon where people want to avoid the (very real) political difficulties & tradeoffs involved in reducing emissions ... so they retreat to stuff like CDR & geoengineering, as though the politics of those will be any easier!
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1. This is a good excuse to finally try to articulate what I think about the politics of fracking. (I got tired of people saying nice things about my geothermal article and want to resume getting yelled at.)
2. The obvious implication of the poll results described in the article, IMO, is that public opinion on fracking, as on most issues, is quite *shallow*. Most people are happy to take cues from elites. "Oh, we hate fracking? Fine. Oh, but we don't wanna ban it? Fine."
3. On the other hand, there are a few constituencies, in PA & other fracking states, that DO care passionately about fracking. Enviros are passionately against, but they're voting D regardless. Then there are frack workers & communities that have jobs/money on the line.
This thread shows that it's historically been extremely difficult to pass anything big (federally) w/out bipartisan support. But of course Rs know this & have exploited this feature of the system & plan to continue exploiting it. So what are Dems supposed to do?
The "pull together in unity and simply steamroll the other party" strategy is incredibly difficult & prone to failure, but the GOP has made clear that the bipartisan route is absolutely, 100% closed off. So what else are Ds supposed to do? They can't just do nothing.
Holding onto unity will be difficult, for all the usual Dem-infighting reasons, & also because Rs & VSP pundits will be relentlessly scolding them for being partisan, for not reaching out enough, for not being "open to compromise." Dems either ignore that scolding or they are Fd.
So, last night I watched Fargo (the original movie, not the show) with the kids. It's been over 20 years since I last saw it and DAMN did it hit me different/harder this time. It is profound about humanity, about good & evil, in ways I didn't really appreciate before.
I think when I first saw it, I took the "bad guy" to be the anomaly in need of explanation -- a red streak of pure evil against the bland white background of upper midwest Normal. I thought that contrast was the center of the movie. This time around, though ...
... a different contrast struck me, namely the simple kindness & decency of Marge & Norm against the backdrop of a Normal mostly populated by people like Jerry Lundegaard -- not evil, really, just petty & shortsighted, an unwitting enabler of evil.
I honestly think most Republicans don't have any problem with Russia helping Trump get elected. Not sure if any of them have come out & said so plainly, but there's no other way to explain the party's reaction to confirmation that Russia is spreading disinformation through them.
After all, "telling lies to help Trump get elected" is what everyone in the party has devoted themselves to for going on five years now. Why would they turn down help? Why would it bother them?
I know I keep saying this, but: the whole point of spending decades painting Democrats not as political opponents but as killers & monsters determined to destroy the country ... is to soften the audience up so they will accept crimes & atrocities on behalf of "their side."
In the name of copping to mistakes, I will say, I assumed at the beginning of this race that the right would be able to do to ANY candidate what it did to Hillary. But it has really failed to touch Biden. I don't fully get it. washingtonpost.com/politics/trump…
So is the explanation:
A) Hillary had unique vulnerabilities.
B) It was misogyny -- they woulda slimed Warren too.
C) Biden has unique strengths.
D) The RW slime machine is losing its touch.
Or some mix?
Obviously one can't run such experiments, but it would sure be interesting to re-run the campaign w/ Warren (to see whether they could Hillary her or whether the 20yr headstart on Hillary was crucial) or a different old white man (to see how much teflon is unique to Biden).
"Donald Trump’s re-election campaign poses the greatest threat to American democracy since World War II." nytimes.com/interactive/20…
Trump is a classic leader of a reactionary movement. He was elected to stomp in & piss all over the elites, their institutions, their norms, their precious procedures & habits. Yes, GOP elites want the judges & the tax cuts, but the base wants the cruelty & crudeness.
The problem is that reactionary movements are purely destructive. Once they piss all over everything, they have nothing to do but ... find other things to piss on, other enemies. There's nothing TO them but organized resentment. There's no generative project.