Arguments
Recent Comments
Prev 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 Next
Comments 451 to 500:
-
michael sweet at 08:12 AM on 31 July 20242024 now very likely to be warmest year on record
Eclectic,
Unfortunately, Tamino recently posted an analysis of the trend in global temperatures. It is not peer reviewed but Tamino is a respected, published statistician.
Tamino finds that the temperature trend has statistically significantly increased in the most recent 30 year period. He says:
" In my estimation, the current rate of global warming is greater than 0.02°C/year, probably greater than 0.025°C/year, and my opinion is up to 0.03°C/year."
Hansen published a paper last year, not widely accepted in the scientific community, projecting a strong increase in the temperature trend that should be measurable by the end of the decade.
-
One Planet Only Forever at 06:15 AM on 31 July 20242024 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #29
This BBC News item provides an update about the increasing Project 2025 team's efforts to successfully mislead. The diverse group of callously harmful self-interested people supporting Project 2025 like misleading leadership marketing and actions that are anti-intellectual and biased poor judgments.
BBC News: Project 2025 leader resigns from conservative think tank.
Don’t be misled by the headline. The article explains that the person in question is ‘stepping up into a more active misleading marketing role’.
- refer to my comment @6 regarding anti-intellectuals based on Richard Hofstadter's book “Anti-intellectualism in American Life”
- also see my comments regarding ‘judgments’ based on Daniel Kahneman’s book “Noise: A Flaw in Human Judgment” on the SkS OP “What’s next after Supreme Court curbs regulatory power: More focus on laws’ wording, less on their goals’”, particularly my comment @64.
-
Eclectic at 03:36 AM on 31 July 20242024 now very likely to be warmest year on record
Killian @1 :
For the past half-century, global surface temperature has been rising at the rate of 1 degree per (roughly) six decades. If you have evidence that the underlying physical causes of that upwards trend have altered, then please point to it. Some good news would be welcome!
-
Bob Loblaw at 00:07 AM on 31 July 20242024 now very likely to be warmest year on record
Thanks, but I'll take proper statistical analysis over the Killian Eyeball, or Killian Thinking Cap, or Killian Surprise-o-meter.
If you want to claim that your opinion is "supported by research in 2018 and 2021", then you are going to have to actually provide references to where that research is published. This is not a web site where hand-waving is considered to be proper support. And "published" does not mean "a place where I said it before". If you want it to be "support" for your opinion, then it has to use information published by an independent researcher, in a place where it had decent peer review.
Since you have not commented here in over a decade, I suggest strongly that you look over the Comments Policy. Moderation at this site is a lot more strict than you might be used to at other sites.
-
Killian at 21:14 PM on 30 July 20242024 now very likely to be warmest year on record
I find the long-term climate thinking to be outdated. Changes are coming far faster than in the past and should be expected to continue to come even more quickly. A ten-year, twenty-year or thirty-year period to call a trend is now dangerously slow, IMO. Looking at the yearly graph above, I eyeballed pullbacks from extreme highs and they have not been large except after the 2016 El Nino - about .2 degrees. Otherwise, they have been more like 0.1 to 0.12 degrees. (Again, eyeballing here so don't @ me if these are a little off.)
This was a somewhat strong EN, but not massive. I would be surprised by a large reduction in temps after the massive gains of 2023/'24. In fact, given we are at +1.6-ish, the most we could expect would be a fall to 1.47 or so. It is unlikely even two years of falling temps would go below 1.35, and I think that very unlikely. From a risk standpoint it is best to assume the pullback, if any, will be no lower than about 1.45 and we will be permanently above 1.5C by 2027 or 2028.
To add to this, the ASI is looking like tissue paper right now. An August bad for retention (GAC's, a CAA/Siberia dipole, generally strong Pacific-to-Atlantic wind regime, high August insolation) will definitely see levels below 4.0 m sq km, and with n solid pack anywhere in the basin now, we'll likely see that, anyway. As per my EN/ASI hypothesis (since supported by research in 2018 and 2021), all this extra ocean heat is going to manifest as ASI lows, imo, making these high temp scenarios all the more likely.
Cheers
-
shohag at 09:34 AM on 28 July 20242024 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #29
Hi All, BaerbelW, Doug Bostrom, John Hartz
You absoulately right about the heatwave during hajj. It was not only in middle east but also all over the world. i put the asia heatwave data in my blog during developing my https://carbonrevolve.com/ site.
-
michael sweet at 08:36 AM on 26 July 2024Why is the Texas grid in such bad shape?
David-acct:
ERCOT or another regulator is responsisble for making the rules governing how the grid is built. The electrical industry in Texas has captured the regulators and the rules for maintaining the grid are much inferior to the rest of the country. ERCOT allowing the electrical industry to maintain their machinery at lower than industry standards has cost the state of Texas consumers bilions of dollars. As documented in the OP, it would have cost much less to properly maintain the grid and generating sources than has been lost because the electricity providers in Texas only care about their profits this week and do not care that they are not prepared for even a category 1 hurricane.
Your proposing that we reduce regulations on industry would only result in even more unnessary damage to the economy. Critical industries like electrical generation and distribution have to be maintained to a high standard. As proven repeatedly by Texas, left to themselves the electircal industry does not do its job, they have to be closely watched by the regulators.
The situation in the California fires is different. Climate change has made forrest fires much worse in just the last decade. The regulators in California are reviewing their rules and making changes to prevent more fires in the future. As documented in the OP, Texas continues to have the same type of disasters year after year because the regulators do not requre routine maintenance of equipment in Texas. The ERCOT grid was specifically set up to avoid federal regulations. The customers in Texas have paid billions and billions of dollars extra because the industry is slack in maintenance.
-
One Planet Only Forever at 06:18 AM on 26 July 2024What’s next after Supreme Court curbs regulatory power: More focus on laws’ wording, less on their goals
TWFA,
A person in the habit of liking to make poor judgments, see my earlier comments referring to Daniel Kahneman's expert evaluations, would likely perceive 'agreement among others sharing common understanding of Better judgment' as Goose-stepping.
Moderator Response:[BL] The comment from TWFA that you are responding to has been largely snipped away. Expect any further comments from TWFA on this thread to be deleted entirely.
-
One Planet Only Forever at 06:10 AM on 26 July 20242024 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #29
nigelj @7,
I agree in general but offer a clarification regarding "An example of anti intellectualism is the criticism of the so called elites behind "globalisation" with its removal of tariff barriers and outsourcing of manufacturing to Asia etc,etc."
“Globalization” has many aspects, good and bad. And some of them are facts supporting the criticisms.
Less scrupulous wealthy and influential people (so called elites who don’t deserve their perceived higher status) benefit from unjust exploitation of populations and resources globally. They exploit having more global freedom to get things done more harmfully in regions that allow more harmful activity (worker compensation below a decent living wage, less safe work, more environmental harm).
A desire for “potential regional benefits from investments by those less scrupulous pursuers of benefit” produces competition between regional leadership to allow more harmful activity because of the regional benefit for the leadership and its fans. And that tragic competition spiralling down to more harmful “pursuits of benefits for some” can even happen between regions within a nation.
Tariff barriers can make those who try to benefit from “outsourcing that is cheaper and more profitable by being more harmful and less helpful” pay a penalty for doing that.
-
TWFA at 05:49 AM on 26 July 2024What’s next after Supreme Court curbs regulatory power: More focus on laws’ wording, less on their goals
You guys [Snip] should be happy, if it were not for folks like me stopping by it would get pretty boring just watching you goose-stepping together day after day.
Moderator Response:[BL] Alas, your blatant trolling has forced me to recuse myself from any further discussions with you on this topic, and switch to moderator roll. Any subsequent posts from you on this topic will be deleted entirely.
Before you comment on any thread in the future, please read the Comments Policy.
-
One Planet Only Forever at 03:01 AM on 26 July 2024Why is the Texas grid in such bad shape?
Reading of the article, and the related points in the comments, from the perspective of my 1980s Engineering and MBA education and successful career, leads to the following judgment (open to adjustment if good reason is given to update it):
The recent tragic electricity supply consequences that happened in Texas that are the focus of the article were understandably avoidable. The ways to minimize the harm and risk of harm were understood and possible to achieve.
Electricity is clearly a ‘basic need’ in Texas. It is also a marketplace commodity that can be chosen to be paid for to be ‘unnecessarily consumed’. Reliable delivery of the basic need is an ‘essential service’. And it is well understood that ‘essential needs’ should not be expected to be delivered responsibly by marketplace competition. More harmful and riskier actions that others will suffer the consequences of are cheaper and more profitable.
If it was practical the total basic need would be provided by a very robust and reliable electricity system and a less reliable cost-profit driven system would exist for the unnecessary over-consumption (but unnecessary system would not have freedom to be harmful to others, only the freedom to risk the loss of access to unnecessary electricity).
That ‘dual system’ is not practical for electricity. So the total system needs to be hardened to the level of an essential service (which can even be done in a system that only uses the least harmful renewable energy generation). If the cost is prohibitive then making the unnecessary consumption more expensive could be a solution. A practical responsible government action would be to have the cost for the electricity consumed be high enough that excess revenue can be used to provide financial assistance to those who are unable to afford their ‘basic needs’.
The harms and risks were the result of the failure of the government of Texas to govern/limit the harm and risk of harm related to activity governed by the government of Texas. And the government of Texas can also be blamed for using its influence to interfere with, fight against, federal and global leadership actions that would have reduced the harm and risk of harm.
The failure of leaders to act based on learning about the potential harmful consequences of the fundamental guaranteed ‘failure of the marketplace competition for perceptions of superiority to limit harm or risk of harm’ is understandable.
The easily impressed among the population of Texas voting for that type of failing leadership is the root of the problem producing understandable consequences that others need to try to ensure do not become 'their problem'.
The citizens of Houston are victims if they are unable to isolate themselves from the harmful consequences of the failures of their Municipal or State governments to responsibly govern to limit harm done and risk of harm. And a municipal government can be the victim of being unable to isolate itself from irresponsible State leadership. Of course, a State government can also be a victim of the inability to isolate itself from irresponsible harmful federal leadership. But in this case the Texas State government has clearly fought to isolate itself from, and fought against, helpful harm limiting federal leadership actions.
-
David-acct at 21:44 PM on 25 July 2024Why is the Texas grid in such bad shape?
You mention that Oklahoma survived the Feb 2021 fiasco that felled ERCOT. What you omitted was that Oklahoma is part of the SWPP Grid which along with the MISO grid, both of which came perilously close to failure. Yes, the Texas grid failed due to the overreliance on natural gas and wind with the natural gas lines freezing and the lack of wind. Note that the lack of wind was across the entire north american continent
Both the SWPP and the MISO grid rely much more heavily on coal instead of natural gas and wind and therefore, were not subject to those risks. In spite of that fact, both grids teetered on collapse during the Feb 2021 freeze.
I strongly urge you to review the source data from the EIA website. The EIA website clearly shows how poorly wind performed across the entire United States during those 7-10 days losing 60%+ percent of electric power generation, with the SWPP grid and the ERCOT grid losing 80%-90% power for those 7-10 days. Whereas ERCOT lost 40% of electric generation from gas for 2 1/2 days.
That is a huge difference, the magnitude of losing 60-70% of power generation from wind across the entire continent 7 days is significantly greater than losing 40% electric generation from natural gas in only one state for 2 &1/2 days
There was a similar deficiency with solar during that period which was partly due to being winter months with shorter daylight time.
Again please review the link below which provides the source data
www.eia.gov/electricity/gridmonitor/expanded-view/custom/pending/GenerationByEnergySource-4/edit
-
David-acct at 21:39 PM on 25 July 2024Why is the Texas grid in such bad shape?
Michael - I appreciate your comments, though quite curious why blame is being placed on ERCOT unless its an intentional distortion by the article.
Ercot does not own the local electric distribution systems (ie the power lines that provide power to individual businesses and homes. None of the Grids operators in the US own the local distributions systems, whether it is CISO, PJM, CISO, MISO or any of the others. Thus there is no reason to place blame on ERCOT.Do you blame the CISO grit for the wild fires caused by the power lines in California - of course not since CISO grid does not own those power lines. Likewise you cant blame ERCOT for the houston powerlines since they dont own or control the owner of those power lines.
-
Doug Bostrom at 10:50 AM on 25 July 2024Skeptical Science New Research for Week #29 2024
Thanks Dawei. This was due to a bug in our compilation machinery.
-
nigelj at 08:49 AM on 25 July 20242024 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #29
I agree with OPOF.
Philosophically a lot of anti intellectualism is just envy (IMO) and a failure to carefully weigh the downsides and upsides of experts plans carefully enough. Often while there might appear to be problems with the plans, the upsides outweigh the downsides. But even when criticism of specific intellectuals and / or their findings or plans is justified, that is not a good reason to claim expertise in general is bad, or that all experts are bad. It does not provide a workable alternative to experts.
An example of anti intellectualism is the criticism of the so called elites behind "globalisation" with its removal of tariff barriers and outsourcing of manufacturing to Asia etc,etc. In the USA some lower skilled workers in manufacturing have lost their jobs, seen their wages stagnate. Financial inequality has grown although not as much as the critics claim.
But this ignores the benefits of globalistion, for example keeping inflation low for the last several decades, cheap imports especially manufactured goods, and closer relations between countries and international agreements and laws and improvements in living standards in poor and developing countries.
And its easy to help workers who are pushed into low paying jobs by government assistance programmes to retrain or relocate or financial aid like family benefits. But the critics of globalisation seem to resent those measures and instead want to take us back to a time of national "self sufficieny." There is a wise old saying the grass always seems greener in the past.
Of course China does not play nice with the global rules, and does put America in a difficult position. But as The Economist Journal points out, abandoing globalisation and imposing 100% tariffs on everything is not the answer. They argue if there must be retaliation, and some level of self sufficieny in manufacturing, it needs to be narrow and targeted.
-
nigelj at 08:08 AM on 25 July 2024Why were the 1930s so hot in North America?
Read a study somewhere saying Americas unusually strong heatwaves during the 1930s (the heatwave index was off the chart) were a statistical outlier resulting primarily from both the pacific and atlantic oceans being in a strong natural warming phase at the same time, combined with local meteorological conditions favouring heatwave formation. This combination was a very uncommon coincidence, but it seems to me that a similar combination of factors in the future is inevitable sooner or later, and when you add in anthropogenic warming since the 1930s, a new heatwave record would be set and by a wide margin, and the impacts would be huge.
Heatwave intensity and frequency has also increased in America in recent decades. Refer:
www.epa.gov/climate-indicators/climate-change-indicators-heat-waves
-
One Planet Only Forever at 07:04 AM on 25 July 20242024 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #29
I agree with the comments made by nigelj, Cleanair27, and Bob Loblaw.
I would add that part of the 2025 weapon of mass destruction is “The Seven Mountain Mandate” (link to Wikipedia here). Note that many prominent New Right (Wikipedia link here) Republicans have chosen to promote the Seven Mountain Mandate.
And, building on nigelj’s @1 suggestion that “we need to come back to some of the core problems we face as a society, and why this lead to the administrative state”, I would add the need to collectively effectively address anti-intellectualism (wikipedia link here), particularly the dislike for ‘learning to be less harmful and more helpful’ that applies to denial and attacks on climate science.
The core problem of the popularity of anti-intellectualism is an understandable threat to social democracy. Anti-intellectualism claims that emotional instinctive beliefs are superior to the results of rigorous skeptical investigation and thoughtful consideration.
A clear recent example of the harmful popularity of anti-intellectualism is Michael Gove’s, a misleading promoter of Leave in the Brexit referendum, declaration that “Oh we’ve had enough of experts”. His “we” was only himself and easily impressed anti-learning types.
The Wikipedia item regarding anti-intellectualism is quite informative. But the Nature Human Behaviour article “Anti-intellectualism and the mass public’s response to the COVID-19 pandemic” includes the following helpful description with my addition in [ ]:
“People tend to be persuaded by speakers they see as knowledgeable (that is, experts), but only when they perceive the existence of common interests [when the expert’s statement supports their preferred belief and interests]. Some groups of citizens, such as ideological conservatives, populists, religious fundamentalists and the like, may see experts as threatening to their social identities. Consequently, they will be less amenable to expert messages, even in times of crisis.”
Origins or causes of anti-intellectualism can be complex. Protestants opposed to being dictated to by The Vatican educated experts are an example. But evangelists also used it against established Protestant groups. However, it is clear that there have always been, and always will be, some anti-intellectualism.
It is important to understand that everyone can choose to learn to not be anti-intellectual. Nobody is ‘born to be, and destined to be, intractably anti-intellectual’. Being anti-intellectual is a ‘learned behaviour’.
In Alberta, I encounter many non-religious people who are selectively anti-intellectual and resist learning about climate science. They really dislike the related importance of rapidly ending the harmful impacts of fossil fuel use and making amends for the damage done. I also encounter many religious people who are more open-minded regarding climate science and the required corrections of what has developed and making amends for damage done.
There are many examples that highlight anti-intellectualism attacks on ‘climate science and the need to rapidly end the harmful impacts of fossil fuel use’. Al Gore presented this ‘problem in America’ in his 2007 book “The Assault on Reason”. In that book Gore presents many ways that the New Right Republicans make-up misleading attacks on evidence-based and reasoned understanding that ‘is not in common with their interests’.
A detailed explanation of the source/cause of anti-intellectualism in America was presented by the originator of the term ‘anti-intellectualism’, Richard Hofstadter, in his 1963 book “Anti-Intellectualism in American Life” (Wikipedia link here). In the 1700s anti-intellectual evangelism grew quicker in the US than organized established religions. That anti-intellectual revolution of religion extended into secular aspects of society, with business interests becoming engaged with evangelical interests in the 1800s.
The need for the welfare state to address the unjust inequities (marketplace failures) of freer misleading marketplace capitalism in America, free to fail to investigate the potential for harmful results and free to misleadingly excuse or deny that harm has been done, fuelled growth of anti-intellectualism beyond the Protestant-Evangelical anti-intellectual religious movements.
I will end my comment with an edited quote from the Hofstadter’s Introduction, Chapter 2, Section 4, with my inserts in [ ]. Note the ending lists targets (supporters) of anti-intellectual misleading politics that will look very similar to today’s New Right-wing targets of unjustified attack. Being anti-climate science is a major part of the New Right-wing anti-intellectual agenda because it connects to other anti-intellectual targets of attack.
“Compared with the intellectual as expert, who must be accepted even when feared, the intellectual as ideologist is an object of unqualified suspicion, resentment, and distrust [Now even the expert can be dismissed, disrespected, and attacked by the misleading New Right]. The expert appears as a threat to dominate or destroy the ordinary individual, but the ideologist is widely believed to have already destroyed a cherished American society. To understand the background of this belief, it is necessary to recall how consistently the intellectual has found himself ranged in politics against the right-wing mind. This is, of course, no peculiarity of American politics. ...
“... if there is anything that could be called an intellectual establishment in America, this establishment has been, though not profoundly radical (which would be unbecoming of an establishment), on the left side of center. And it has drawn the continuing and implacable resentment of the right, which has always liked to blur the distinction between the moderate progressive and the revolutionary. ...
“... The truth is that the right-winger needs his Communists [unjustified made-up threats] badly, and is pathetically reluctant to give them up. ...
“... Had the [McCarthy] Great Inquisition been directed only against Communists, it would have tried to be more precise and discriminating in its search for them: in fact, its leading practitioners seemed to care little for the difference between a Communist and a unicorn. ...
“... The inquisitors were trying to give satisfaction [create misleading anti-learning attacks] against liberals, New Dealers, reformers, internationalists, intellectuals, and finally even against the Republican administration that failed to reverse liberal policies [like the Tea Party and Freedom Caucus radical factions in the Republican Party. What was involved, above all, was a set of political hostilities in which the New Deal was linked to the welfare state, the welfare state to socialism, and socialism to Communism. In this crusade Communism was not the target but the weapon, ...
“... The deeper historical sources of the Great Inquisition are best revealed by the other enthusiasms of its devotees: hatred of Franklin D. Roosevelt, implacable opposition to New Deal reforms, desire to banish or destroy the United Nations, anti-semitism, Negrophobia, isolationism, a passion for repeal of the income tax, fear of poisoning by fluoridation of the water system, opposition to modernism in the churches.”
-
Bob Loblaw at 01:50 AM on 25 July 2024Why is the Texas grid in such bad shape?
The story David-acct linked to seems to be largely based on a story at E&E News, linked to in the first paragraph of the story David-acct linked to. The E&E story states:
It’s unclear why the department rejected CenterPoint’s request. DOE did not respond to questions. Federal departments and agencies routinely reject grant proposals because their programs have limited funds.
...and got some feedback from CenterPoint. The E&E article says:
CenterPoint said in email Thursday, “These are highly competitive processes with applicants from around the country.” The company said it “incorporated the feedback from DOE” into a revised proposal that it resubmitted in January when the department launched a second round of funding under the $10.5 billion program.
It looks to me like CenterPoint is in a bit of a bind. They don't want to pay for the costs of adding resiliency to their grid. They don't want to charge their customers for it, either. ERCOT won't force them to do it. And they're having a hard time convincing others that it should be paid for from taxes collected outside of Texas.
This sounds like what my dad called "freeload enterprise". Privatized profits, and socialized costs.
-
Bob Loblaw at 23:27 PM on 24 July 20242024 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #29
nigelj:
Yes "free market" is difficult to pin down.
Of course, corporations only exist as legal entities because governments created the legal structures that allow them to exist. Prior to that, individuals carried on business as individuals - so that any business liabilities fall on the individual. Your store owes money to a supplier? The supplier takes the individual to court, and the individual can lose their house (which has nothing to do with the business) because it's all part of the individual's assets.
The "Ltd" in "Acme Ltd." stands for "limited liability". Created by government.
-
Bob Loblaw at 23:19 PM on 24 July 2024What’s next after Supreme Court curbs regulatory power: More focus on laws’ wording, less on their goals
Ah, yes. The classic TWFA posting style. Lots of use of emotional triggers such as "regulation mastermind defenders", "perpetual motion machine", "end of the world", "worship at the alter [sic]".
...but completely devoid of substance.
I'm glad that TWFA is concerned about the health of others, though - since he wants the "well-healed" to lead the cause. I was more concerned that the US legal system is controlled by people with money (well-heeled). You know - one dollar, one vote.
In the previously-linked LegalEagles video, they point out that the two recent SCOTUS decisions had been lost at the trial level, and lost at the DC Circuits level, and by the time they reached SCOTUS, the only legal question at hand was overturning the Chevron deference or clarifying the issue of Congressional silence on matters. The issue of fish was always a red herring. An excuse.
TWFA seems to think that rich industrialists are making these challenges for the benefit of the poor, downtrodden everyday American. Yes, I'm sure the tobacco companies fought restrictions on tobacco use because they wanted all Americans to have the chance to be "well-healed".
-
michael sweet at 12:14 PM on 24 July 2024Why is the Texas grid in such bad shape?
David-acct:
As the OP points out, ERCOT does not require power companies to harden their electrical sydtems. This hardening is required by federal regulations in the test of the country. After the often repeated disasters in Texas, consumers AR required to pay for he immense damages while the electrical generators who failed to take reasonable action to prevent disasters made extra profits. The problem lies entirely with ERCOT, the federal government is not responsible for Texas regulators allowing electrical companies to neglect normal maintenance.
I note that in 2021 Oaklahoma, which endured the same cold as Texas, had no problem during the cold event that crippled Texas. Oklahoma's grid complied with federal regulations while the ERCOT grid did not.
-
Philippe Chantreau at 10:14 AM on 24 July 2024What’s next after Supreme Court curbs regulatory power: More focus on laws’ wording, less on their goals
Lots of sarcasm but not that much substance. The real enemies of artisanal fisheries are industrial fishing corporations exploiting factory ships, not regulations desperately attempting to protect a resource. Back 150 years ago, cod mountains seemed as inexhaustible as the plains bisons.
-
TWFA at 09:52 AM on 24 July 2024What’s next after Supreme Court curbs regulatory power: More focus on laws’ wording, less on their goals
It's amazing, the regulation mastermind defenders are like a perpetual motion machine... I give the wheel a nudge and it never stops.
Anyway, all this hand wringing over the end of Chevron meaning the end of the world will prove as silly as Dobbs leading to the end of abortions, those who worship at the alter of abortion can take heart that abortions are up substantially since then, [Here] and no doubt the relentless march for more regulation will continue with the only difference being that people of less means, like those fishermen, will have a better chance of fighting unreasonableness than before, where as has been correctly pointed out, it was only the well-healed who could take up a cause.
-
nigelj at 08:02 AM on 24 July 2024A major milestone: Global climate pollution may have just peaked
Regarding "A major milestone: Global climate pollution may have just peaked." Something related and important:
From the Sydney Morning Herald: “It’s good news’: Scientists suspect history about to be made in China” July 13th 2024.
“But it is data from the past few months that is intriguing analysts today. The world’s economy is growing. China’s economy is growing. Yet greenhouse gas emissions appear to have peaked.”
“Some time last year, or perhaps earlier this year, it appears China’s emissions, in particular, reached a high point. If China has peaked, there is good reason to believe global emissions peaked, too. It would mean that some time over the past few months, the stubborn nexus between economic growth and greenhouse gas pollution was snapped, and the 250-year surge in emissions ended…….”
“In November last year, he wrote that despite the post-COVID surge in emissions, China’s massive deployment of wind and solar energy, growth in EVs and an end to a drought that had cut hydroelectricity generation had caused emissions to tumble.”
“A 2023 peak in China’s CO2 emissions is possible if the build-out of clean energy sources is kept at the record levels seen last year,” he wrote in an analysis for Carbon Brief based on official figures and commercial data.”
“Largely as a result of the China green surge, global investment in renewable technology in 2023 outstripped that in fossil fuels for the first time, the International Energy Agency reported.”
Lots of caveats of course. But I found the article interesting. Especially Chinas self interested motivation to dominate certain technology markets, and reduce its dependence on foreign oil for geo political reasons. But at least the environmental consequences are positive:
-
nigelj at 07:33 AM on 24 July 20242024 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #29
Just adding to Bob Loblows comments. In my view the term free market is a bit problematic, because what is meant by the term free? Taken literally it would mean people are free to do what they like including theft and murder, so you have the rule of the jungle. Of course no modern markets work like that, there is basic criminal and property law. The free market is thus really a managed market in practice.
The question is how many other restraints / constraints are acceptable? Many economists say markets should not have tariff protections or price controls but its acceptable to have governmnet regulations relating to health and safety and the environment and anti monopoly laws. This is common in practice in many countries, and seems sensible to me. Some even call this a free market.
Free markets really is a terrible term and when we use the term we need to define what we mean by it. I should have done that. I did in fact mean the free market in its unconstrained form and without governmnet interventions, and this is not inherently good at providing adequate health and safety outcomes. Thus the need for adequate regulations. Whether we have this in practice is of course up for debate.
-
David-acct at 07:26 AM on 24 July 2024Why is the Texas grid in such bad shape?
Centerpoint which is the houston area electric provider requested funds from the US DOE to upgrade the houston area electric distribution system using funds avaiable due to the inflation reduction act. The DOE said no. The local distribution systems are not part of ERCOT, thus no blame can be placed on ERCOT
www.chron.com/weather/article/houston-beryl-centerpoint-doe-grid-19571835.php
-
Bob Loblaw at 06:00 AM on 24 July 2024What’s next after Supreme Court curbs regulatory power: More focus on laws’ wording, less on their goals
In comment 7, Eclectic mention a Youtube video from the LegalEagle channel that discusses this topic. This is the direct link to that video. I finally got around to viewing it a few days ago.
Although the ads are annoying, the video does provide some interesting details on a number of the historical precedents that are related to the most recent Supreme Court decision. The producers of that video obviously have a viewpoint about the SCOTUS decision that TWFA and David-acct probably will not agree with, but it is definitely worth watching if you don't know what the fuss is all about.
Two of the predictions they make are interesting:
- This decision will lead to huge numbers more lawsuits against regulatory agencies, which will choke the legal system.
- This decision will stifle regulatory actions and result in regulations (if the agencies don't simply give up) that will be increasingly complex as they try to avoid future legal challenges. Not efficient - but that is a feature, not a bug, if the goal is to choke the $#!^ out the regulatory agencies so that industry can do whatever they darn well please and can externalize the damage they cause (i.e., get someone else to pay for it).
At the end of the video, one of the points they make is that it is worthwhile in such (legal) cases to look at the end of the brief, to determine who it is that decided to spend money on challenging a law in court. For the two cases that led to this SCOTUS decision, the plaintiffs are well-funded think tanks that include the Koch brothers as sources of funding.
This case is not "the little guy looking for justice". This is rich industrialists with a primary goal of getting richer. Why worry about trying to achieve "regulatory capture" when you can accomplish "legal system capture"?
-
Bob Loblaw at 05:39 AM on 24 July 20242024 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #29
I think I'd go further than "deconstruct" or "dismantle". If we are looking for antonyms to "construction", then I think "demolition" is the one that comes to mind. There are certain elements in the US (and other countries) that simply want to blow up any sort of regulation or governance that gets in their way.
ClearnAir27 is correct that there is really no completely "free market" economy anywhere. There might have been back in the days 100,000 (+ ?) years ago when everyone lived in little tiny family groups. Even then, when Grog discovered how to make a club and decided that he could just bash the head in of anyone that got in his way, others would have decided that they, too, could make clubs and bash heads in. "Society" would have started to put constraints on how people could behave towards others, subject to the wrath of the group as a whole.
[On the other hand, maybe we have not advanced that much from Grog's way of thinking.]
Taking a look at that page for The Fourth Branch, I kind of like the phrase "the accumulating derangements in the American constitutional system". Not enough to buy the book, though. I'm sure the Libertarians would view it as yet another One World Government to Rule Us All.
-
Bob Loblaw at 05:18 AM on 24 July 2024CO2 is coming from the ocean
ThePooleMan:
Also take a look at this post, which explains a simple mass balance approach to the cause of atmospheric CO2 increases.
-
Bob Loblaw at 05:12 AM on 24 July 2024CO2 is coming from the ocean
ThePooleMan:
I think it may be easier to just think in terms of mass, not volume. Total atmospheric mass, per square meter, is easily calculated from standard surface pressure. As a mass calculation, density, temperature, etc. become moot.
You can see more numbers on this page about the human contribution to atmospheric CO2. That the rise is due to anthropogenic releases can been seen on this web page.
-
Bob Loblaw at 04:54 AM on 24 July 2024A major milestone: Global climate pollution may have just peaked
Joel:
The figure mentions OurWorldInData.org. They have a large collection of charts of CO2 and greenhouse gas information on this web page.
One of the charts (second row, right side, in the view I have) is for "Annual greenhouse gas emissions by world region". It looks like the total for that chart matches the values in the figure in this post, so I expect the figure here is using the same data (just not by region).
If you dig down into the information for that chart at OurWorldInData, it gives the following reference:
Jones, Matthew W., Glen P. Peters, Thomas Gasser, Robbie M. Andrew, Clemens Schwingshackl, Johannes Gütschow, Richard A. Houghton, Pierre Friedlingstein, Julia Pongratz, and Corinne Le Quéré. “National Contributions to Climate Change Due to Historical Emissions of Carbon Dioxide, Methane and Nitrous Oxide”. Scientific Data. Zenodo, March 19, 2024. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.10839859.
That paper describes the data as "emissions CO2, CH4 and N2O from fossil and land use sources during 1851-2021."
If you follow the link to that paper, it then points to yet another paper that gives a more complete description: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41597-023-02041-1. The abstract of that paper starts with:
Anthropogenic emissions of carbon dioxide (CO2), methane (CH4) and nitrous oxide (N2O) have made significant contributions to global warming since the pre-industrial period and are therefore targeted in international climate policy.
From that information, it seems pretty clear that forest fires, peat, etc. are not included.
The figure here provides enough information that your question can be answered with a little effort tracking down sources.
-
Joel_Huberman at 03:59 AM on 24 July 2024A major milestone: Global climate pollution may have just peaked
Does the graph (and other data reported here) apply only to anthropogenic emissions or to total emissions? Total emissions would include all "natural" emissions, including CO2 due to forest fires and methane/CO2 from peat melting. Emissions like those I've mentioned seem likely to increase in the near future.
-
ThePooleMan at 23:05 PM on 23 July 2024CO2 is coming from the ocean
The "all CO2 comes from the ocean" myth is being commonly used this month and therefore that man cannot change the climate.
It seems obvious that burning fossil fuels adds CO2 to the atmosphere and so I set about calculating the volume of CO2 produced and comparing calculated ppm yearly increase to actual CO2 concentration change (around 2.5 ppm/year in 2024). Here is the approach:
35 billion metric tonnes of CO2 per year.
1 Kg of CO2 occupies 190L at standard pressure & temperature.
Earth radius is 6400 Km.
Volume of a sphere is 4/3 Pi r^3.
Assumed that CO2 is fully mixed.
Assume that effective atmosphere is no more than 10 Km. Obviously the atmosphere is higher but at 10Km the atmospheric pressure is 0.26 (see https://www.engineeringtoolbox.com/international-standard-atmosphere-d_985.html)
I then calculate the volume of CO2 and divided by effective atmospehric volume* to work out CO2 ppm.
Using 10 Km then the calculated increase is 1.3 ppm.
Using 5 Km then the calculate increase is 2.6 ppm.
* By effective atmosperic volume I mean the height of the atmosphere if all the atmosphere was evenly compressed to 1 bar. I need to 'compress' atmosphere to 1 bar as I calculated CO2 volume at one bar.
Is there a better/published approach?
Pressure drops with altitude is not linear and I have not included temperature. So whilst perhaps Ok for a fag packet the approach is lacking some.
-
Cleanair27 at 04:25 AM on 23 July 20242024 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #29
As nigelj points out, the proper term is 'dismantle', not Heritage's humorously incompetent and unintentionally ironic use of 'deconstruct'. This calls to mind Jacques Derrida's post-modernist deconstruction project, hardly what Heritage would want to be associated with.
I don't entirely agree with nigelj's critique, rooted in standard welfare economics. There is no free market, and market failures are common and widespread, so different concepts are better for justifying regulation. For a different perspective on the history, troubles, and potential of the American administrative state, and why the Heritage wrecking ball is seriously foolish, consider this: The Fourth Branch
-
nigelj at 07:16 AM on 22 July 20242024 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #29
Regarding Project 2025 and its unfortunate attempts to dismantle the administrative state. Firstly I suggest we need to come back to some of the core problems we face as a society, and why this lead to the administrative state. And virtually all successful civilsations have an administrative state:
1) The capitalist free market is great at producing goods and services, but is not inherently good at providing adequate health and safety. This is known as a market failure in economics and well acknowledged by virtually all economists.
2) The failures of some leadership in all facets of society to act responsibly and helpfully towards people.
3) "The tragedy of the commons" is the concept which states that if many people enjoy unfettered access to a finite, valuable resource such as a pasture, they will tend to overuse it and may end up destroying its value altogether. Even if some users exercised voluntary restraint, the other users would merely supplant them, the predictable result a tragedy for all." (Wikipedia definition)
Modern society has responded to these problems with various attempts at corrective mechanisms including , self regulation, and civil court action (lawsuits), government laws, regulations, and market orientated mechanisms like carbon taxes or cap and trade, and incentivising people not to pollute. These mechanisms and the related government agencies are the administrative state (excepting self regulation obviously).
Self regulation has a history of mostly not working, and the only real winners with lawsuits are lawyers. Government paying people not to pollute gets expensive but might ocassionally have its place (IMO). Because of this most civilisations have developed a set of government organisations, agencies, laws, regulations, cap and trade schemes and so on and these have been very effective when they have been strong enough.
Examples are the ozone hole was reduced using a cap and trade scheme to push alternative refrigerants. Air pollution has plumetted in various countries due to government laws and regulations witrh penalties. The growth in renewable energy has been due to the use of regulations, carbon taxes, cap and trade schemes and incentives (subsidies) depending on the country and which solution it has preferred. Some countries use a combination of solutions.
The proponents of project 2025 by dismanting the administrative state are putting all these gains at risk. They are apparently trying to return to hiding environmental problems, (for example by dismanting NOAA) and to bring back failed self regulation, or failed, very weak regulations, and costly reliance on lawsuits, and will no doubt try to weaken even that as well. As Einstein said "dont keep doing the same experiment and expecting different results".
Of course sometimes you can have too many regulations or bad regulations and governmnet agencies can get too powerful. There are simple ways to minimise this and America already does a decent job of this by its democratic government and its divisions of government power. What is unfortunate is a clumsy wrecking ball like project 2025, that destroys agencies, is slanted to benefit the big corporates and rich people, puts profit above all other considerations, and that clearly does not serve the wider public interest.
-
Dawei at 08:44 AM on 21 July 2024Skeptical Science New Research for Week #29 2024
This paper has been in the 'New Research' postings every single week for at least 17 weeks, why does it appear every week?
Long-term straw return to a wheat-maize system results in topsoil organic C saturation and increased yields while no stimulating or reducing yield-scaled N2O and NO emissions -
Bob Loblaw at 01:10 AM on 19 July 2024What’s next after Supreme Court curbs regulatory power: More focus on laws’ wording, less on their goals
Now, to address David-acct's comments (66 and 67) about the Chevron deference and expertise.
You start in comment 66 with "There is a gross misunderstanding..." and basically call it all politics. I dont' see the quotes you provide as supporting that argument. In the OP, you quoted the section I have also previously quoted, which says "...the agency’s interpretation if it is reasonable...", and claim that this is different from the actual wording of the decisions which states (your quote) "... unless they are arbitrary, capricious, or manifestly contrary to the statute." In my mind, "arbitrary, capricious, or manifestly contrary to the statute" would be, well, let me search for a word, unreasonable.
The OP gives this link to Cornell Law School's description of the Chevron deference. This is their description of the issue (emphasis added in bold):
The scope of the Chevron deference doctrine was when a legislative delegation to an administrative agency on a particular issue or question was not explicit but rather implicit, a court may not substitute its own interpretation of the statute for a reasonable interpretation made by the administrative agency. Rather, as Justice Stevens wrote in Chevron, when the statute was silent or ambiguous with respect to the specific issue, the question for the court was whether the agency’s action was based on a permissible construction of the statute.
First, the Chevron deference required that the administrative interpretation in question was issued by the agency charged with administering that statute. Accordingly, interpretations by agencies not in charge of the statute in question were not owed any judicial deference. Also, the implicit delegation of authority to an administrative agency to interpret a statute did not extend to the agency’s interpretation of its own jurisdiction under that statute.
Generally, to be accorded Chevron deference, the agency’s interpretation of an ambiguous statute had to be permissible, which the Court has defined to mean “rational” or “reasonable.” In determining the reasonableness for the particular construction of a statute by the agency, the age of that administrative interpretation as well as the congressional action or inaction in response to that interpretation at issue would be a useful guide; if Congress were aware of the interpretation when it acted or refrained from action, and when the agency’s interpretation was not inconsistent with the clear statutory language.
In subsequent cases, the Supreme Court narrowed the scope of Chevron deference, holding that only the agency interpretations reached through formal proceedings with the force of law, such as adjudications, or notice-and-comment rulemaking, qualify for Chevron deference, while those contained in opinion letters, policy statements, agency manuals, or other formats that do not carry the force of law are not warranted a Chevron deference. In such cases, the Court may have given a slightly less deferential treatment to the agency’s interpretation, giving a persuasive value under the Court’s “Skidmore deference” analysis.
You (David-acct) call the Chevron deference "political", and unrelated to expertise. Yet the quotes you provide in comment 60 include the following (emphasis added):
- "..the decision involves reconciling conflicting policies..."
- "...thinking that those with great expertise and charged with responsibility for administering the provision would be in a better position to do so..."
- "...properly rely upon the incumbent administration's views of wise policy..."
- "...it is entirely appropriate for this political branch of the Government to make such policy choices..."
- "...the competing interests which Congress itself either inadvertently did not resolve, or intentionally left to be resolved by the agency charged with the administration of the statute in light of everyday realities..."
I see "policy decisions". Although policies are established by the acts legislated by politicians, I do not see every policy decision as a political act. Your mileage may vary.
I will close with a comment on the last bit in the opinion footnotes you quoted: "the administration of the statute in light of everyday realities."
- If Congress is expected to provide definitive, unambiguous legislation that covers every possible case - anticipated or not - then you are asking Congress to micro-manage every single aspect of the actions of the executive branch.
- In such a work environment, no decision would be made unless someone can find a rule to guide them. No managers would ever be able to apply judgment or ethics in order to make a decision and take action in a timely fashion.
- This will choke the $#^ out of government - but then, for some people that is probably the desired outcome.
- In the real world, decent management requires an appropriate delegation of authority. Small decisions made at a distributed level, larger (more consequential) decisions made at higher levels of management, etc. We can argue about how well government (or private industry) does this, but the idea that it will all be resolved by getting the legislative branch to tell everyone exactly what to do is -pie-in-the-sky thinking.
The ultimate outcome of the latest ruling will require that we wait to see what effect it has on future court decisions.
-
Bob Loblaw at 00:23 AM on 19 July 2024What’s next after Supreme Court curbs regulatory power: More focus on laws’ wording, less on their goals
David-acct @ 65:
You are completely missing my point. Of course, my point was made implicitly, not explicitly - and in sarcasm (part of my Brritish heritage when it comes to humour, in all probability).
My point is that your point of "You will almost always find much greater levels of expertise in industry than you find in government positions." paints a very incomplete picture. Good behaviour is not guaranteed by "greater levels of expertise". It also requires ethics.
I am quite sure that Bernie Madoff and Charles Ponzi had much greater expertise in the investment business than your average retail investment advisor. That does not mean that they would have been good people to get advice from when trying to develop, establish, or apply regulations for the investment industry. Because they lacked ethics.
Eclectic @ 68 has pointed out that your examples of industry expertise are narrow in scope. I also pointed that out in comment 60, but you have ignored that. You continue to make broad, sweeping claims of "almost always". Please try to broaden your view.
You seem fixated on "IRS agents". What is your definition of an "IRS agent"? What does their job description entail, and what training/academic background are they required to have? I could probably just as easily say "your average lawyer rarely has any true expertise in tax law". Are "IRS agents" the ones that advise government on developing tax law? Are they the ones that will testify in court to support an agency interpretation of a regulation?
If an "IRS agent" is a person that deals with public questions, in order to try to help them through difficult, hard-to-interpret tax regulations, then I can easily imagine that they are only trained to deal with the simpler situations. And that specialized tax lawyers know more. To generalize that to "employees in industry ... almost always have greater expertise than the government experts" is a huge stretch. You're making a comparison between the top end of "industry experts" and the bottom end of "IRS agents" and making a specious comparison.
-
Eclectic at 18:15 PM on 18 July 2024What’s next after Supreme Court curbs regulatory power: More focus on laws’ wording, less on their goals
David-acct :
Your examples of industry expertise have been rather narrow in scope. I am fairly certain you could also adduce some contrary examples ~ particularly in the areas of the EPA and also worker safety areas (and public safety).
Horses for courses . . . but as a default position, the Chevron Deference is a commonsense starting position. Unfortunately, common sense gets short shrift when doctrinaire political animals insist on being guided by their ideology rather than by their intellect. (And "reasonable" goes out the window.
-
David-acct at 08:59 AM on 18 July 2024What’s next after Supreme Court curbs regulatory power: More focus on laws’ wording, less on their goals
The except below is an example of my point regarding industry experts having significantly more real world expertise than so called government experts who often have limited practical experience.
"The final rule pushed by the biden administration would be upheld by the courts if following the Chevron doctrine. Yet actual industry experts point out the massive increase in the risk of grid failure.
"PJM manages the transmission of wholesale electricity across 13 states and the District of Columbia – including major data center hotspots such as Virginia and Ohio.
Meanwhile, a neighboring RTO, the Mid-Continent Independent System Operator (MISO) painted an even gloomier picture in its recent “Reliability Imperative Report.” MISO manages electric transmission across 15 states throughout most of the Midwest, Mississippi Valley, and Great Plains regions as well as the Province of Manitoba in Canada.
In their report, MISO forecasts a demand increase of 60 GW, or 32%, by 2042. At the same time, MISO expects much of their current baseload capacity to retire. And despite new renewable generation planned for construction, MISO expects to see a net capacity decline of 32 GW (@18%).
“Because new wind and solar resources have significantly lower accreditation values than the conventional resources that utilities and states plan to retire in the same 20-year period, the region’s level of accredited capacity is forecast to decline by 32 GW by 2042” MISO stated.
PJM expects 58 GW of current capacity to retire by 2032, which is approximately 30% of the total current capacity of 196 GW). This amount of capacity loss is despite peak forecasted demand increasing by 43 GW above current capacity."As noted above, Even though a shif to greater relience on renewable energy is good, policy, industry experts with real world experience have vastly greater expertise than most of the government experts.
-
David-acct at 08:55 AM on 18 July 2024What’s next after Supreme Court curbs regulatory power: More focus on laws’ wording, less on their goals
Bob at 60 -
there is a gross misunderstanding of Chevron deference and experts/expertise. Chevron deference has always been about the political preference, it was never about actual scientific expertise.
I realize the author of the OP is an administrative law expert, but his characterization of the chevron doctrine is incorrect and/or misleading.
His quote:
· Congress directs.
· In Step 2, however, if Congress is silent or unclear, then the court should defer to the agency’s interpretation if it is reasonable because agency staff is presumed to be experts on the issue."The Actual language from Stevens Opinion in Chevron. "Such legislative regulations are given controlling weight unless they are arbitrary, capricious, or manifestly contrary to the statute."
Stevens never actually used the term "experts" or "expertise" in the body of the Chevron opinion, though he made vague reference in the footnotes.
The Following are the two footnotes of the opinion
"In these cases, the Administrator's interpretation represents a reasonable accommodation of manifestly competing interests and is entitled to deference: the regulatory scheme is technical and complex,39 the agency considered the matter in a detailed and reasoned fashion,40 and the decision involves reconciling conflicting policies.41 Congress intended to accommodate both interests, but did not do so itself on the level of specificity presented by these cases. Perhaps that body consciously desired the Administrator to strike the balance at this level, thinking that those with great expertise and charged with responsibility for administering the provision would be in a better position to do so; perhaps it simply did not consider the question at this level; and perhaps Congress was unable to forge a coalition on either side of the question, and those on each side decided to take their chances with the scheme devised by the agency. For judicial purposes, it matters not which of these things occurred."
65
"Judges are not experts in the field, and are not part of either political branch of the Government. Courts must, in some cases, reconcile competing political interests, but not on the basis of the judges' personal policy preferences. In contrast, an agency to which Congress has delegated policy-making responsibilities may, within the limits of that delegation, properly rely upon the incumbent administration's views of wise policy to inform its judgments. While agencies are not directly accountable to the people, the Chief Executive is, and it is entirely appropriate for this political branch of the Government to make such policy choices—resolving the competing interests which Congress itself either inadvertently did not resolve, or intentionally left to be resolved by the agency charged with the administration of the statute in light of everyday realities."As noted by the above citations, Chevron deference was always a political deference, not a deference to experts.
-
David-acct at 08:50 AM on 18 July 2024What’s next after Supreme Court curbs regulatory power: More focus on laws’ wording, less on their goals
Bob At 61 - You misinterpreted my point - The enron scandal was fraud, Its totally non relevant to my point which was the employees in industry who perform actual work in the field almost always have more expertise than the government experts. My experience with IRS agents bears that out. Very few IRS agents have any true expertise in tax law.
Secondly, reliance on experts was never the real issue in chevron. The issue in Chevron is who gets to decide what a statute is supposed to mean when the meaning of the words is unclear. The scientific expertise of the expert was never the real issue.
-
One Planet Only Forever at 08:00 AM on 18 July 2024What’s next after Supreme Court curbs regulatory power: More focus on laws’ wording, less on their goals
My comments about the harmful learning/change resistant hard-liners (religious, racist, sexist, greedy rich, and more types) taking over the US right-wing, including the SC control evident in the Chevron deference judgement, is well summarized in this new NPR article:
RNC represents culmination of a decades-old movement in the Republican Party
The article also aligns with the understanding that ruining democracy and ending the related freedoms, particularly the freedom from unjust persecution, for caring thoughtful responsible people is often a slow process (I mentioned this was presented in the book “How Democracies Die” in my comment @62 and earlier comments). It also supports the understanding that the institution of the Republican Party failed to protect US democracy by allowing the hard-line social conservatives to taking over the party. And it presents the case that the take-over of the Republican Party was a significant source of the divisiveness in current day USA.
The following are a few quotes from the article:
They feared changing values around sex, civil rights, women’s rights and gay rights.
They believed the establishment was too moderate, too accommodating.
They dismissed the machinery of government and the media as controlled by a liberal elite.
They were known as “the New Right,” and 50 years ago they won a victory in the Republican Party.
It is the heirs of that political movement who have gathered at this year’s Republican National Convention in Milwaukee. As the party pushes to dramatically reshape government and roll back changing cultural mores, nominating a candidate who has disregarded fundamental elements of American democracy, it may feel like a sudden and extreme pivot in American politics. But this surge to the far-right stems from seeds planted a half-century ago.
...
1974: Kanawha County, West Virginia
... They were appalled by mentions of sex, inclusions of profanity, exploration of non-Christian creation myths, and readings from Malcolm X.
The protests grew violent. Bombs exploded at elementary schools (Horan later went to prison for his involvement). Snipers fired at school buses. The Ku Klux Klan joined a rally at the state capitol in Charleston.
Meanwhile, outside activists arrived to aid the protesters, as well. They came from a variety of mostly new organizations: the Conservative Caucus, Citizens for Decency Through Law, the Populist Forum, and one called the Heritage Foundation.The Heritage Foundation is undeniably the harmful buddying up of the fossil fuel interests with the social conservative interests (almost all in conflict with learning to b e less harmful and more helpful to others)
It is important to understand that the powerful fossil fuel interests had been significantly influencing US leadership judgment before the social conservatives pursued the capture (hostile take-over stuff) of the Republican Party in the 1970s. The harmful wealthy fossil fuellers willingly buddy up with harmful social conservatives because:
- It costs callous wealthy fossil fuellers very little to support the unreasonable misunderstanding-based leadership judgments and actions desired by the social conservatives.
- And the social conservatives are obviously happy to support any interest group that will support their interests no matter how unreasonable they are and how much misunderstanding is required to support them.
The union of unreasonable misunderstanding fuelled people have captured control of the SC for the foreseeable future (no mechanism to change the SC other than a SC justice ‘retiring’ when Democrats control the Senate and Presidency, or a SC justice being successfully impeached and convicted by the House and Senate).
Some final quotes from the NPR article:
1974: Boston, Massachusetts
A bottle shattered. Eggs splattered and rocks hammered against the window of a school bus filled with children. Parents had violently risen up against a plan to desegregate schools, which involved sending children sometimes across town by bus.
As riots engulfed the city, once again outside activists from a variety of new groups arrived to help the protesters.
The next year, 1975, featured a remarkable convergence. Hundreds of anti-busing protesters from Boston and anti-textbook protesters from West Virginia joined together in a march on Washington, D.C.
Two separate, regional uprisings against social change became one.
...
The outside groups who aided the protests, along with a host of others like them, would earn the moniker “the New Right.”
...
1976: North Carolina
It was embarrassing how badly Ronald Reagan was losing.
... Reagan pledged to transform the GOP, shift it rightward, into a “party of bold colors, no pale pastels.”
In other words, Reagan was the candidate of the New Right.
... He lost the first five primaries to Ford, in increasingly emphatic fashion. His top aides prepared to withdraw.
... Sen. Jesse Helms and his political strategist Tom Ellis, took charge of Reagan’s campaign in their state. They reshaped his message, emphasizing a nationalist appeal featuring the Panama Canal.
Reagan adopted a new slogan: “Make America Number One Again.”
...
This week, amid bipartisan calls to ratchet down political rhetoric after the assassination attempt against Trump, Republican delegates in Milwaukee approved the party’s latest platform. While it removes explicit opposition to abortion, the social backlash and apocalyptic rhetoric that decades ago typified the New Right infuses the document, from its call to “deport millions of illegal Migrants who Joe Biden has deliberately encouraged to invade our Country” to its focus on banning textbooks “pushing critical race theory.”
The New Right did not fully succeed 50 years ago when it sought to “organize discontent,” with “its eye on the presidency,” and the goal of taking “control of the culture.” But its values and heirs to its movement drive today’s Republican Party.And the New Right Republican Party also supports environmental and fossil fuel interests that conflict with learning to be less harmful and more helpful.
I recommend reading the full NPR article and the many other presentations of the long slow deliberate attack on democracy and its 'freedoms for all reasonable responsible people' by the collective of unreasonable hard-liners who win by promoting harmful misunderstanding to excuse unjust beliefs and related unjust judgments. They harmfully mislead because they can get away with it.
-
One Planet Only Forever at 07:18 AM on 17 July 2024What’s next after Supreme Court curbs regulatory power: More focus on laws’ wording, less on their goals
Another thought regarding the Chevron deference judgment.
Prior to this judgment by the SC, if any legislature-of-the-moment disliked the court's 'Chevron deference acceptance of actions of regulators as reasonable' then the legislature-of-the-moment could still try to update the legislation.
But the opportunity to get the SC-of-the-moment to unreasonably declare that the reasonable Chevron deference approach was 'null and void' is another significant harm done to the ability of governing institutions to reasonably limit harm done.
The SC, and all other institutions, need to be More Progressive = more interested in learning to limit harm done, help others, and make amends for harms done.
-
One Planet Only Forever at 06:36 AM on 17 July 2024What’s next after Supreme Court curbs regulatory power: More focus on laws’ wording, less on their goals
Bob Loblaw @61 provided great examples of ‘harmful industry accountant experts’ in response to David-acct.
I would add that Exxon leadership and its industry leadership fans, like the Kochs and Chevron, provided an example of harmfully compromised judgment in their response to the understanding of climate science that Exxon’s in-house experts had developed.
The hard-line groups vehemently opposed to learning to be less harmful (angrily opposed to learning and progress) have captured and control right-wing groups in the US and so many other places. They are loudly and proudly incorrect about many ‘understandable matters of judgment’ these days. And they resist learning that their beliefs are fuelled by harmful misunderstandings.
Even if the current ‘harmfully biased against learning to be less harmful’ SC had not had the opportunity to ‘unreasonably cancel/nullify the reasonable understanding of Chevron deference’ it appears that their judgments on similar matters would be aligned with ignoring the helpful reasonableness of Chevron deference.
Powerful people with interests that conflict with learning to be less harmful and more helpful have always been a problem. In order for humanity to collectively improve life for all humans now and into the future civil society needs to succeed in their helpful efforts to govern/limit the freedoms of harmful trouble-makers, especially limiting their freedom to benefit from the promotion of misunderstanding.
The Welsh government (the Senedd) may make a big progressive step by 2026. They promise to enact a law that penalizes elected representatives who knowingly promote misunderstandings. The following BBC article is one of many reports of this ‘global first – legally penalizing politicians for being misleading’:
Ban on Welsh politicians lying promised by 2026
It be great if SC justices could be reasonably banned from the SC if they are found to have passed judgments that conflict with learning to be less harmful and more helpful to others, including being misleading to try to mask the harmfulness of an unreasonable judgment by claiming that the unreasonableness is justified by ‘their’ selected interpretation of the wording of a law or the Constitution?
But the majority in the current SC would not even accept 'ethical limits to their freedoms'. So the limits on their freedom to be harmfully unreasonable would be almost impossible under the current Constitution. That is a clear massive-error in the Constitution that is almost impossible to correct. And there are likely many more 'almost impossible to correct' massive-errors and omissions in the Constitution.
As the authors of the book "How Democracies Die" explain, democracy often does not die in a rapid event. It often dies slowly from repeated successful attacks on its institutions. Those attacks compromise the ability of institutions to keep people who have interests that conflict with learning to be less harmful and more helpful from influencing leadership judgments.
-
Bob Loblaw at 04:03 AM on 17 July 2024Can we air condition our way out of extreme heat?
With regard to the increased capacity issue, humidity is probably a larger factor as temperatures continue to rise. In addition to cooling the air, AC also removes water vapour. The dehumidification factor requires additional energy.
The humidity increase is not a linear function of temperature - it is an exponential increase. At the same relative humidity (the common measure in weather reports), each degree rise in temperature results in a great and greater increase in absolute humidity (the actual amount of water vapour in the air).
I remember about 15 years ago when a hospital in Regina (western Canada) had to shut down its operating rooms during a heat wave. Not because the AC couldn't handle the heat, but because the AC couldn't handle the extra humidity. The hot, humid interior meant that sterilizing the surgical tools was too difficult. Upgrading the AC systems cost them millions of dollars.
-
michael sweet at 02:42 AM on 17 July 2024Fact brief - Were scientists caught falsifying data in the hacked emails incident dubbed 'climategate'?
David-acct:
In any case, current data that is much, much more extensive than that used in Mann & MBH98 & MBH99 have validated the conclusions by Mann et al. Arguing that there is a problem about the Hocky-stick graphs is like arguing that the world is flat.
-
walschuler at 02:16 AM on 17 July 2024Can we air condition our way out of extreme heat?
I would add to this post two unfortunate feedback effects involved with air conditioning: first, in cities the heat rejected from air conditioned spaces raises the outdoor temperature, as the heat can't be rejected unless it flows out at a temperature higher than the air it is rejected to. Raising the outdoor temperature increases the energy required to achieve the next degree of cooling. In principle,this means that as time goes on air conditioning systems will have to be increased in capacity or indoor temperatures in air conditioned spaces will rise. Secondly, if the electricity driving the air conditioners is fossil fueled, and most still is, the supply of chilling adds CO2 to the atmosphere, adding to overall heat trapping and making that worse on a larger scale. Converting to renewably sourced electricity is essential and will help deal with the second feedback but not the first. Energy conservation and other measures are needed to fix this.
-
michael sweet at 01:36 AM on 17 July 2024Fact brief - Were scientists caught falsifying data in the hacked emails incident dubbed 'climategate'?
David Acct:
The OP points out that "climate-gate" was invegestated by 9 separate imvestigations. All of them found that there was no misconduct. Your factoid that one of the investigations did not relate to Mann & MBH98 & MBH99 is simply off-topic since the OP is about climate-gate emails and not the Mann papers. Please try to stay on topic with your posts.
-
Bob Loblaw at 23:23 PM on 16 July 2024What’s next after Supreme Court curbs regulatory power: More focus on laws’ wording, less on their goals
As far as David-acct's claim that industry accountants are better than government accountants, I can imagine that this is quite possibly true. I think the accountants at Enron and Arthur Andersen were probably a lot brighter that the IRA accountants. At least, they were a lot more creative. Glad that worked out so well for everyone.
