1/The greatest challenge of our time is constructing a decarbonized economy. Passage of the IRA will spur a building boom not seen since the New Deal. But, @billmckibben writes in our cover story, success requires a paradigm shift on the left. #EarthWeekmotherjones.com/environment/20…
2/ The environmental movement, and the left more broadly, has been all about "no" to development, be it pipelines or power plants. motherjones.com/environment/20…
4/ It's a familiar thing to those of us who live in California to see people who purport to be environmentalists fighting the very things we must do, right now, to ward off climate change.
(Cough, like denser housing, more in a minute.)
5/ We wanted to give readers a full picture of what must be done. So all week we'll be rolling out stories from this package: motherjones.com/environment/20…
6/ But back to @billmckibben's piece. It's a mental roadmap for everybody. But *especially* as Bill puts it, for people like him. Folks who are older, whiter, used to using the mechanisms of government to stop things they don't like.
7/ But your local fight—to protect your view, or "local character"—has global consequences. Saying "yes" to denser housing, or transmission lines, or yes, mines—that's not a betrayal of old environmental goals, it's a necessary update.
8/ Opposing denser housing is climate denialism. Full stop. And it has a direct human toll on the ability of other people to have homes:
9/ This package comes from watching how California's housing wars have been playing out, where people and politicians who call themselves progressive have been fighting housing using the tools and language of segregation. Which is this subject of my piece motherjones.com/politics/2023/…
10/ If you live here, you know, just how mind bending it is for people who fight housing density to call themselves progressives. Like, say, most of the @sfbos:
11/ Progressive NIMBYs like to tell themselves that by fighting new development, they're fighting displacement. But scads of research has shown, that's not how it works. motherjones.com/politics/2023/…
13/ If you ignore a huge body of research for vibes, you don't make good policy. And yet that's what SF, and the leaders and activists throughout the state are doing. And who wins? Rich homeowners. I run down some of the excuses:
14/ Letting perfect be the enemy of the good—a San Francisco treat—is a phrase we use more than once in this package. We can't mire every needed project in endless reviews and hearings and have a liveable planet: motherjones.com/politics/2023/…
15/ Which brings me to a piece on CEQA by @CSElmendorf. This '70s-era green law is being abused to block development, or shake down developers—for even projects manifestly for good of environment: motherjones.com/politics/2023/…
16/ And yes, @CSElmendorf discusses the infamous 469 Stevenson Street debacle:
17/ But it's not just one downtown housing project. In SF and around the state, CEQA is being used to block so much good housing, so many green energy projects. @GavinNewsom has said he wants to reform. We urgently need to. motherjones.com/politics/2023/…
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1/ Whether or not Biden explicitly endorses Harris, it's hard to imagine who would a) decide to go up against her and b) wind up on top with the amount of time left.
Maybe a year ago or even six months ago. But now?
2/ Biden cannot make his delegates vote for Harris. Sure, if he was like "imho, she's the only one for the job" they'd be *even more* likely to go for her. But they're not legally bound to follow his lead.
To many, this signals chaos ahead. But another way to think about it...
3/ Is that a process that wasn't kicked off by Biden being super explicit about his wishes would still likely wind up with Harris, but with less worry that voters would feel they were forced to supporters.
1/ Today we began to roll out an incredible 2.5 year project with @reveal and @publicintegrity. We found 1250 formerly enslaved people who WERE given the 40 Acres Gen Sherman promised them, only to have it seized back after Lincoln was killed motherjones.com/politics/2024/…
2/ It began when @AlexiaCampbell found some documents deep in the US Archives…
@AlexiaCampbell 3/ Years of document dives, many reporting trips, and a giant database build later, @publicintegrity reporters not only found land titles given to 1,250 emancipated people (there are likely thousands more) but traced the geneology of many: motherjones.com/politics/2024/…
1/For years, the mother of mass shooter Elliot Rogers has been quietly helping experts prevent future massacres. For the past two years, she's been talking to @markfollman. This is an important story, unlike any other: motherjones.com/criminal-justi…
2/ Family, friends, the many therapists he saw—they all knew he struggled. But nobody thought he was suicidal, much less murderous. How can we all learn from missed signals, and ensure that our communities have threat assessment teams to flag and help divert potential killers?
3/ Elliot Roger is especially infamous b/c left behind misogynistic rants. But the media label of “intel ringleader,” say the experts who’ve studied him for 10 years, is skewed, and it’s help fuel copycat cases. And this is important, generally, because...
1/ Jesus, Blue Wave twitter has, yet again, completely lost its mind re @maggieNYT. Guys, texting with sources is how you get the inside dope and "start writing" isn't an order from Trump HQ, it's like, start your process and I'll maybe feed you something.
2/ Does a reporter coax info out of someone by...coaxing, yes, yes they do. It's a game of cat and mouse where each side hopes to get something from the other. The journalist: info. The source: sympathy/spin/down payment on future leakage, etc.
3/ In a case like this the source and the journo have known each other for years, maybe decades. They are each doing a dance to get what they want. Nobody in this case is a media naif.
1/ Today, we launched a giant project on American Oligarchy.
From the rise of Trump, to crippling housing prices, to reality TV, there's nothing that explains America's crises like seemingly limitless power (and oft farcical vanity) of the super rich: motherjones.com/politics/2024/…
2/ First, a quick video preview of what a full issue of @MotherJones magazine, plus a lot more online, holds: tiktok.com/@motherjonesma…
1/ Sure seems like big news orgs should update their "what we know and don't know" stories about the bombing at the hospital to mention in the first graph that the hospital itself was not hit or even sustained much damage! npr.org/2023/10/18/120…
2/ NPR doesn't have a transcript up yet but listen to this 3-min piece that's a good rundown of the whole situation npr.org/2023/10/19/120…
3/ The cynic in me thinks news orgs that were too hasty in their assessments are now hiding behind language like the bombing "at" the hospital. (Rather than "of.")