An overlong thread of personal info, with one or two twists at the end.
First piece of 'news': I'm starting a free substack newsletter of my very own. It's going to be called The Crucial Years, because--well...here we are, between a rock and a hot place
That means today's installment of my New Yorker "Climate Crisis" will be the last, though I'll still write regularly for the magazine. So many thanks to everyone--esp. Virginia Cannon--who made it a pleasure, and to all those I got to pass the mic to! newyorker.com/news/annals-of…
So why am I joining @emorwee, @EricHolthaus , @drvolts, and so many others who pioneered this new form? In part because I'm also swinging back to more organizing. In fact, consider this the announcement of a *very* soft launch for ThirdAct.org thirdact.org
We're going to try and organize 'experienced Americans'--i.e., people over 60 like me--around issues of climate justice, racial justice, economic justice. Our generations have done their share of damage; we're on the verge of leaving the world a worse place than we found it.
But we also have the skills and resources to help make change. If you go to ThirdAct.org you'll see leaders like @SenSanders@GretaThunberg@Janefonda@RevYearwood and Robin Wall Kimmerer making the case for why we need older people fully engaged in this fight.
There are already some great organizations, by the way: @eldersclimate, @OldBroads4Wild. But we need far more. The first act for many in these generations was pretty great: they inspired or witnessed profound change. Now we need the Third Act to be as sweet.
Anyway, though my substack newsletter will be free, there will be a way to pay money, and my share of those subscriptions will go to help fund ThirdAct.org. In return you'll get to read my new book, which I'm going to release in serial form, a new chunk every Friday.
It's not my normal doom and gloom. Instead, it's the prequel/sequel to my only novel, the oddly popular Radio Free Vermont. nytimes.com/2017/12/08/boo…
This time, however, none of the action's in Vermont--it takes place all over the world, and I've borrowed everyone from the Pope to the Dalai Lama as characters. Basically, it's an attempt to make nonviolent movements as interesting as violent ones.
Anyway, all of these announcements are of a piece. We need more organizing--I've been writing, and will keep doing so, about everyone's great plans for change. But it is going to require more people coming together to make those ideas real. So we shall organize!
Finally, enormous thanks to Vanessa Arcara, and for the long roster of people who have been advising ThirdAct.org It's going to take us a while to really get going--but if you're good at the essential tasks of building an org., please get involved now!
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HARVARD JUST DIVESTED FROM FOSSIL FUELS.
Because great activists never let up.
They don't use the word 'divestment,' but they said they have no direct investments left, will make no new ones, and that their indirect investments are in 'runoff mode' and will be allowed to expire
Yes, it's messy, and somewhat incomplete--the wonderful campaigners @DivestHarvard have a good response showing the places the university still must move. But the richest school on earth, which in 2013 pledged never to divest, has been forced to capitulate
I'm not even going to try and list the endless wonderful people who worked on this remarkable campaign--they are legion. And they have dealt a stunning blow to the fossil fuel industry. The smart money--even the conservative smart money--is fleeing Big Oil
Guys, we've crossed the marsh and the Enbridge crossing point of the Mississipi is now occupied. I think this camp will last until Line 3 is stopped.#StopLine3
The scene here is solemn and joyful. Treaty rights need respecting and so do the laws of physics. Instead of 800,000 barrels of oil crossing this wetland there are thousands of people.
Indigenous leaders welcoming visitors now, and reminding them to go back to their communities and spread the word. #StopLine3@IENearth
Walloping Wolverines!! Huge divestment news out of Ann Arbor, where the University of Michigan--as heartland a school as you can imagine--announces plans to stop investing in fossil fuels! record.umich.edu/articles/u-m-s…
This is crucial because a) it's a big big endowment b) it's arguably, along with the already divested UC system, America's foremost public university and c) most of all, it's a huge reversal, won by courageous students. Here's what I mean:
When UMich refused to divest in 2015, the oil industry celebrated--indeed, they blazoned the words of its president, Mark Schlissel, across the front of their anti-divestment website, and they've been there ever since.
So Biden's climate/energy/environment team is mostly complete, and on balance there's never been anything like it in U.S. history. With people like @RepDebHaaland and @GinaNRDC and @JohnKerry and @JenGranholm, there's high profile and seriousness of purpose
There are weaknesses (Vilsack at Ag strikes me as the only downright dud, a wasted pick that shows no understanding farming must change), and questions (Regan at EPA was a fan of burning wood pellets when he was in NC.) And they have to overcome Joe Manchin and Mitch McConnell.
But there now seems the real possibility of concerted action across the federal government to make sweeping change--if, of course, there are movements prodding, and opening up space, and cheering accomplishments to build momentum. That's the work of the rest of us.
So, every once in a while by pure chance, one knows something about something in the news. Today that's me--it's about a guy named Brian Deese who is up for an econ job in the Biden administration. But it's a longish story.
I've spent most of my life living in rural America, much of it in a remote, poor, red, and exceptionally beautiful corner of upstate New York. Among other things, I taught Sunday School in the basement of the Methodist church in our town of 300
Four sisters were in that class, beginning when they were very small; my wife and I got to know them all well, and their parents. All four managed to make it out to college in Middlebury VT, which was exceptional for our community. (I followed them there some years later).
This feels like the most serious announcement from a =n oil major: after years of pressure from activists, BP to cut oil and gas production 40% by 2030. Far from perfect, but far from normal cnn.com/2020/08/04/bus…