Cows lined up for feeding (Robin Lubbock/WBUR)
There are plenty of reports that extol the virtue of replacing beef farming with meat products that are derived from the various proteins found in plants, e.g., the Impossible Burger and Beyond Meat.
Meat and dairy rely on huge quantities of feed crops and occupy nearly 80 percent of global farmland—accounting for between 14 percent and 30 percent of global greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. (more…)
Perhaps the ultimate conspiracy theory, and it’s one that’s been around for at least the last 300 years ago, is that all the major decisions that are made on this planet come from a mysterious and invisible group of the ultra-elite, say, the Illuminati.
Let me ask you this: Given what you know about world politics, does it seem likely that the Xi, Putin, and Trump answer to some more powerful group of people? Someone even crazier than Trump himself ordered the former president to attempt to overthrow the United States government?
Noam Chomsky is arguably the most intelligent and best-informed person on the planet, but I think he has this one wrong. I believe that what we’re seeing is a natural consequence of the greed and amorality that is inseparable from unregulated capitalism.
The winners have won and the losers have lost, so now most Americans live paycheck to paycheck. Yes, most of them are uninvolved politically, but it’s hard to believe that’s by design.
Have you ever had the unpleasant experience of learning that someone you admired was actually a terrible person?
Here’s former U.S. Rep Tulsi Gabbard (D-HI) writing to Elon Musk: (more…)
Our species has evolved to live most effectively in groups, and to put up walls of resentment, suspicion, and even hate against member of different groups.
Up until recently, this aspect of human civilization has been regrettable, though not potentially lethal. Now we live with a world with social media and fake news, declining educational standards, the proliferation of guns, nuclear weapons, overpopulation, impending environmental collapse, pandemics, heightened religious fanaticism, the aggregation of wealth into the hands of a few, and the decay of of morals and personal integrity.
There is no doubt that people who disconnect from the news cycle have happier and less stressful lives.
And today’s bad news isn’t about car accidents and house fires; it’s about global pandemics, environmental collapse, and our trajectory towards world fascism, as Trump works to join Putin as the world’s next authoritarian.
The problem, of course, is that these things really are happening, whether we’re paying attention to them or not.
From this:
Conservative Christians are quickly piling on Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga., who this week accused churches that help resettle undocumented immigrants of being controlled by Satan. (more…)
My eldest nephew and his wife are buying a house in Rolesville, North Carolina. I had never heard of it, but I was gratified to know that it’s very close to Raleigh, and even closer to Wake Forest. It’s a region robust in high tech, and, of course, higher education.
As suggested in the meme here, if you get more than about 50 miles from Raleigh/Durham or Charlotte, you’re going to find yourself living among Trump supporters from hell.
Some progressives claim they don’t mind, but speaking for myself, I can’t walk past a house with a “Trump Won” sign and not shudder.
As Elizabeth Warren points out in this brief video, over the six years since the Paris Climate Accord was signed, the world’s 60 largest banks have poured $4.6 trillion into fossil fuel extraction.
Of course, through accounting tricks and vague promises about the future, their public relations teams tell a completely different story.
This fellow claims that his plane’s propulsion mechanism consists of two wires that are charged to have a potential difference of 40K volts, the first of which ionizes nitrogen atoms, causing them to be strongly attracted to the second, via the intensity of the electric field.
I think what he’s going to find is that, due to the First and Second Laws of thermodynamics, more energy needs to go into keeping the wires charged than the kinetic energy of the plane.
I like you, Ms. Warren, but are you trying to tell me there aren’t existing laws prohibiting Clarence Thomas from doing what he did (failing to recuse himself in a case in which he has a personal interest), or what his wife did (attempting to overthrow the U.S. federal government)?
We have laws. What we don’t have is the personal integrity to enforce them when powerful people stand in violation.
