If it weren’t for the ability to bribe politicians and school board members, we’d have honest science textbooks in Red states; instead, their children are being criminally dumbed down & misinformed…
In other words, as long as money is speech (especially when it's unlimited and anonymous) and corporations are people, these powers of corporate personhood will be exploited by the morbidly rich and our democracy will continue its backslide into autocracy. So, we just need to elect a supermajority of competent progressives that choose to satisfy their Constitutional purpose. Seems simple enough.
Money, speech and monopoly. "The fossil fuel industry has not just bought US senators and members of congress; it’s even buying school board and state board of education members." How true. And Saudi Arabia controls our domestic fossil fuel industry.
I believe in litigation. Sue the bastards.
California has the right idea. Suing Exxon Mobil, Shell, BP, ConocoPhillips, and Chevron, as well as the domestic oil industry's biggest lobby, the American Petroleum Institute.
California hasn't addressed the fact that our entire economy is controlled by the oil industry, and our oil industry is controlled by foreign entities. .
The OPEC/Saudi/Russian threat to our economy that also represents as far as I am concerned a clear and present threat to our national security. OPEC fixes oil production and thus raises prices. Russia has an oil economy. We should sue for price fixing and price gouging. Saudis own our largest oil refineries, control energy companies like Exxon.
Money, speech, monopoly and corporate personhood are why we have a perpetual Catch-22 stuck in our democracy. In other words, this Catch-22 precludes our citizens' ability to nullify the powers of corporate personhood which is why we can't nullify the powers of corporate personhood.
So, I hope that the California's elected and appointed public-sector officials will successfully sue the oil companies, but because of the Catch-22 of corporate personhood, I'm not too confident that the suit will work after the appeal process that doesn't seem to work well when we have a menu-driven neo-theocon majority SCOTUS.
Short term it will help but in the long term (as I noted and just cut and pasted from my comment above) "we just need to elect a supermajority of competent progressives that choose to satisfy their Constitutional purpose." The assumption being that they would have the votes to end the powers of corporate personhood with an unambiguous Amendment, one that our corrupt SCOTUS cannot interpret any other way. Certainly it’s possible but the likelihood of success is low. Especially if we don’t do anything right now to get those competent and progressive officials elected.
I regret posting this comment, but I am concerned about the climate and our environment, and the extraordinary lip lock, the fossil fuel industry has on even our government and current president
143 coal plants and a punch in the face, Biden Administration has approved 80 new coal plants, and 43 more on their way, and Pete Butigeg has approved four massive, controversial proposed crude oil export projects currently planned off the Texas coast.
And as this oil is being exported, it is not being used in America. Faces with gas at $6 a gallon or more, the oil that Exxon and other oil cabal exports could be used internally to drive down the price of gas.
Evidently the fossil fuel industry is at the core of the rot of this country, and example is Venezuela, whose troubles started with Chavez had the sheer audacity to actually believe that the oil in Venezuela belong to Venezuela and not Exxon Mobil, and ever since then our corporate media has been busy turning Venezuela into a big bad communist state, using the CIA and DOD, to overthrow the government and forcing Venezuela into relying on Russia, Iran and China, just as they did to Fidel.
If you aren't a "commie" and an enemy of America, the oil companies , our bought government and CIA will turn you into one.
Thanks for the additional info. But what about those four oil terminals in the gulf, built to export gas, not to fulifill our own needs,
Gas that could and should be used, to bring down the all important price of gas, has been OK'd by the administration for export, thus further driving up the price of gas, which politically harms the party in power.
Again, the carbon cabal has a liplock on our government (bipartisan at that).
I don't know anything about the gulf policy. I do know that in 2009, under Obama, after we became energy independent, Congress felt we were so flush we could arbitrage the price of oil.
I worked with coal companies for about 20 years, at DOL. Most went bellyup, were bought by Chinese companies.
My spies in Pennsyltucky tell me that most gas wells are capped, and that potentially we can double or triple natural gas production. There has been consolidation in the industry, keeping gas prices artificially high. If true, DOE should be talking to the FTC about price fixing. I have friends who were the FERC ALJs involved in huge price fixing about 20 years ago. In February, Governor Newsom asked FERC to investigate price spikes affecting the west. At that time, the California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) voted to accelerate the California Climate Credit to help California families with high gas bills. The $90-$120 credit will be applied to residential utility customer bills starting in March for customers of PG&E, Southern California Edison, San Diego Gas & Electric, and Southern California Gas Company. Customers of Bear Valley, Liberty, PacifiCorp, and Southwest Gas will also receive an accelerated credit of varying amounts.
Is that credit, yearly,it looks so, as it is a credit, and $120 is small change, where utility bills are in the range of $200 to $400 a month. And not very helpful to families that makes so little that they don't pay income taxes.
I lived in Santa Cruz for seven years, and had to pay California income taxes,which were a percent of federal taxes.
The approval of oil ports in the gulf is what concerns me. Just another example of the strangle hold that the carbon cabal has on our government., that and the renewal of leases in the Arctic.
I do understand though, that now that money is speech, he who has the money has the speech, he who has the most money has the most speech, and money can and does destroy lives and careers, not to mention governments and social structure.
Yeh I bitch but will never the less hold my nose and vote Democratic, because I have no choice, voting for anyone else or not voting is a vote for Trump and the fascists who call themselves Republicans.
This comment may seem unrelated, but it is tied into and ends with the fossil fuel worldwide cabal.
I don't necessairly believe it, but as a hypthesis, it fits within the restrictions of Occam's Razor, it answeres a lot of questions, that science struggles with, if only they would repudiate Newtons lame theory of mass gravity, which is in itself circular reasoning (Gravity creates mass, mass is the source of gravity, ad infinitum)
I want to talk about the changes in earth’s atmosphere over tens of millions of years, but my questions and opinions fly against mainstream science and are scoffed at.
Yet there are question that need to be asked.
Science says that the ice age is a result of changes in the earth’s atmosphere, but hasn’t come up with a workable theory that explains the changes.
Science says that there is too much water on earth, and theorizes it comes from being bombarded with ice. A ridiculous idea.
Here is my suggestion. Atmospheric pressure is what causes beached whales to suffocate under their own weight, , among so many other things.
Armospheric pressure is caused by an invisible foce we call gravity, pulling the molecules of air towards its source. At one time the atmosphere was heavily laden with carbon dioxide, which like water in the ocean, provided some buoyancy, and thus enabled the pterodactyl to fly. The creature could not fly in our present environment, the largest raptor weighs about 30 lbs, And Juraisc park and reviving dinosaurs is a fantasy, they would not grow so large in our current gravitational field and atmosphere, because huge muscles and tendons are not required to perambulate.
Huge muscles and tendons are needed to perambulate in a heavy atmosphere, created by gravitional pull.
These muscles and tendons require bones strong enough to sustain the strain, and thus larger bones, and bigger animals. Dentists and people with false teeth, like me, know this, so does NASAm in micro gravity, the bones lose mass, and to counter that NASA has put exercise equipment aboard the ISSS.
Back to the question of ice ages. Has anyone come up with a theory about a changing earth orbit, while creatures roamed the planet, for it would need one and an extreme one to cause an ice age, much less two or three.
Here is a hypotheses. Gravity: Newton was wrong, Gravity is not a property of mass, but a current force, produced by a current process. And as that process, that goes on inside of a planet cools down, it’s electro=magnetic-gravitic field decays, the length of time it takes to decay depends on it’s size.
Although even NASA once denied that there was water on Mars and the Moon, exploration has forced them to shelve that idea, as water is found at the poles of both (and I will get to that), and I suggest, sub surface
So what happened to the water, well since Newtonian physics is sacrosanct, they had to come up with an acceptable hypothesis, and that is an asteroid.
I suggest that as the center of Mars started to cool down and shrink, it’s electro-magnetic and gravitic field diminished. And was no longer able to hold the lighter gases to the surface, the water boiled off, as it does at about 40,000 ft (that is why jet pilots were pressure suits, to keep the blood from boiling of).
The lighter gases were spun off into space b y the centrifugal force of the planet or moon, it took millions of years (for Mars) but this cloud of gases were attracted by the gravitic field of the next largest planet (Earth) and as it was drawn towards Earth, it blocked out the sun blocking out the sun, created an an ice age, and an extinction of much of life, then the ice shield over the earth, continued it’s journey and fell on earth has a flood, but not the one in the Epic of Gilgamesh/bible.. These giant creatures were buried in the flood, from which paleoentologists exhume their bones today, world wide.
The earth recovered and the lesser creatures inhabitated the earth, and free of dinosaurs they flourished.
The moon was once covered with water, some of which remains at the poles, same as Mars.
There was a time when man looked up and actually saw a Blue Moon, and we carry and epigenetic memory of a blue moon, only now they classify a different phenomenon as a blue moon.
Same thing happened, water and light gases were spun off into space, only this time, there was only 240.000 miles of space to traverse to earth, so instead of taking millions of years, it only took a couple of hundred thousands of years, and created the last ice age., then it happened again, it reached earth and attracted by its gravitational field, it fell to earth as a great flood,and again wiped out large fauna, like the Mastadon, or ground sloth, those that didn’t die in the flood, starved to death, and predators lacking food also starved to death. Bye by Saber tooth tiger, smaller versions of these animals were able to survive
Larger versions, found that they couldn’t’ perambulate in the now reduced (cooled by water) gravitational field. And like a beached whale suffocated under their own weight.
Now that the Earth is warming again, there is nothing to cool it down, and we are faced with an inward turning spiral, because we are denuding the planet, extracting carbon,burning it and continuously pumping toxic gases into the air, which makes the atmosphere heavier and warmer, disrupting the circulation of the planets blood and lungs, the jet stream and the ocean currents.
We are in an inward turning death spiral. And thee is no escape, maybe that's why Musk is so deadset on getting to the moon, no problem, human life cannot long exist there without a perpetual pressure suit, even when you sleep, bath and eat. For the same reason that humans can't live, unaided, at 100,000 ft.
Just yesterday, walking past my corner gas station, I noticed a large round sign on the side of the semi-length fuel truck delivering gasoline to the pumps. The sign stated they were "carbon neutral."
Carbon neutral gasoline. Of course.
Why didn't I think of it?
From now on I'm declaring everything I do as "Carbon Neutral."
It is not very intelligent to foul your own nest. You can count on right wing leaders to lead America and the world to hell. Instead of teaching that the truth is sacred, the churches have been teaching that the truth is whatever you believe it to be, that along with unlimited greed is good, has pretty much destroyed any chance of a decent standard of living for anyone on earth except the ultra rich. The only way this makes any sense, is if the ultra rich have underground or underwater bunkers and they are using global warming to depopulate the Earth? I'm sure they will figure out how to blame it on the hippies and expect the hippies to fix their mess, again.
If anyone had the heart to do this, it would be interesting to see just how much biased misinformation is shoved at school children. I realize that instilling pride in one's country is understandable, even laudable when done right. And maybe we've come a little ways from what I was taught in the '50s that "all Commies are bad and all democracies are good and free". But then maybe not. On 9/11 I was substitute teaching in a junior high where the students were given reading lessons on that event. They all said that the U.S. was attacked because, "They hated us for our freedoms." When I pointed out that this was nonsensical babbling from a Bush speech the answer was, "This is what we were given and nobody has time to get into details." So much for serious and critical thinking.
Big round of applause for Clarence Thomas and the fossil fuel cartel for demonstrating that things can get done - so long as we reach across the public/ private aisle and exchange lavish favors.
Anyways... In 1973 Kurt Vonnegut wrote "Breakfast of Champions" and foreshadowed with great accuracy the dumbing down of our population in an absolutely quotable quote:
“So, in the interests of survival, they trained themselves to be agreeing machines instead of thinking machines. All their minds had to do was to discover what other people were thinking, and then they thought that, too.”
Many thanks to the GOP, not only for mainlining poison into the arteries of life itself, but for the deep rooted cynicism a lot of folks now have towards society as a result of naked bribery flourishing unchecked at he highest levels.
Citizen’s United was predetermined. It was just the formal declaration of the choice that had been decided by the reactionary mucky-mucks who were stringing up the strings and pulling them for many decades. The strategy had been well-thought out and carefully implemented. The plan was to cut the legs out from under those who were old-fashioned enough to still believe in liberal democratic principles and those who had been so naïve that they espoused liberal ideas and believed that they were winning somehow.
Citizen’s United was god’s will and god’s way of imposing his will. Fighting Republicans without opposing this almighty god is kind of a losing battle. Dealing with irrationality by using rationality is swimming upstream with an anchor tied to your tail. Talking about the mandates coming from Texas school textbook producers without asking how they got to be so omnipotent is like talking to all four walls in a very large empty auditorium. Good luck with that.
Yesterday, Slate had a title that said, “The Decadeslong Travesty that made Millions of Americans Mistrust their Kids’ Schools”, by Kendra Hurley. That article is about a technique for teaching reading that was hyped and promoted and became the reading-method de jour in schools all over the US for decades. Now, it turns out, it is being called a “travesty” because it has been decided by the latest mucky-mucks in “education” (schools) that it didn’t work worth a tinker’s damn.
The problems are fundamental. Superficial solutions go nowhere. When something as essential, as individual, and as ineffable as teaching, learning, training, indoctrination, and education are placed under a central authority what you get, post haste, is a lot of watered-down Pablum and worthless crap. When are we going to stop committing the “error of the third kind”, which simply is solving the wrong problems and ignoring the actual cause of 90% of these problems? I thought we were serious about science and truth here.
From the “Daily Take”:
If it weren’t for the ability to bribe politicians and school board members with impunity, we’d have honest science textbooks in Red states; instead, their children are being criminally dumbed down and misinformed.
If that were true, why was I taught in the 1950’s that Columbus “discovered” America and about 80,000 other myths and lies? Give me a break, Thom! The situation is absolutely massively exacerbated by the bribery. However, the origins of the problems are the control placed directly in the hands of politicians, demagogues, religious fanatics, pretend experts, and complete fools and jocks with degrees who do not have a clue or who have an agenda which has nothing whatsoever to do with democracy or education.
Btw, I spent some time with my four year-old great granddaughter the other day. I picked up a novel with the title, “Chain Reaction” which my grandson’s fiancé had brought from school where she teaches. This four year-old girl asked me about it and I thought she probably didn’t know what a chain is. When I asked her, she defined what a chain reaction is as if she had been studying for years. Her dad brags that she comes up with such information every day routinely. And, you think this girl should go sit in a classroom for 12 years? You must be out of your gourd!
Wonderful take and metaphors. Thank you for highlighting the Catch-22 of our democracy, the powers of corporate personhood which exist to preclude our citizens from nullifying the powers of corporate personhood (which we need to get rid of if we are to ever have our general welfare promoted properly).
As you know, Texas's malevolent power over textbook publishing long predates Citizens United. In high school history in the late 1960s, I learned how the John Birch Society (and probably others) taught its good little do-bees how to vet textbooks for communist influence: Check the index. If more pages are devoted to FDR than Calvin Coolidge, the Reds have clearly been there. Now whole state governments are blatantly acting on the famous axiom from Orwell's 1984: "Who controls the past controls the future. Who controls the present controls the past." The whitewashing of Martin Luther King Jr.'s legacy, along with the complete erasure of so many others, may not be quite as blatant, but it's on the same continuum.
In other words, as long as money is speech (especially when it's unlimited and anonymous) and corporations are people, these powers of corporate personhood will be exploited by the morbidly rich and our democracy will continue its backslide into autocracy. So, we just need to elect a supermajority of competent progressives that choose to satisfy their Constitutional purpose. Seems simple enough.
Money, speech and monopoly. "The fossil fuel industry has not just bought US senators and members of congress; it’s even buying school board and state board of education members." How true. And Saudi Arabia controls our domestic fossil fuel industry.
I believe in litigation. Sue the bastards.
California has the right idea. Suing Exxon Mobil, Shell, BP, ConocoPhillips, and Chevron, as well as the domestic oil industry's biggest lobby, the American Petroleum Institute.
California hasn't addressed the fact that our entire economy is controlled by the oil industry, and our oil industry is controlled by foreign entities. .
The OPEC/Saudi/Russian threat to our economy that also represents as far as I am concerned a clear and present threat to our national security. OPEC fixes oil production and thus raises prices. Russia has an oil economy. We should sue for price fixing and price gouging. Saudis own our largest oil refineries, control energy companies like Exxon.
https://www.npr.org/2023/09/16/1199974919/california-oil-lawsuit-climate-change?fbclid=IwAR1-91XUtfriv1HOfMWMaCfG4eWo9TRMkUCnX56ZlsNkb8loWHvzXlxTUDY
Money, speech, monopoly and corporate personhood are why we have a perpetual Catch-22 stuck in our democracy. In other words, this Catch-22 precludes our citizens' ability to nullify the powers of corporate personhood which is why we can't nullify the powers of corporate personhood.
So, I hope that the California's elected and appointed public-sector officials will successfully sue the oil companies, but because of the Catch-22 of corporate personhood, I'm not too confident that the suit will work after the appeal process that doesn't seem to work well when we have a menu-driven neo-theocon majority SCOTUS.
Short term it will help but in the long term (as I noted and just cut and pasted from my comment above) "we just need to elect a supermajority of competent progressives that choose to satisfy their Constitutional purpose." The assumption being that they would have the votes to end the powers of corporate personhood with an unambiguous Amendment, one that our corrupt SCOTUS cannot interpret any other way. Certainly it’s possible but the likelihood of success is low. Especially if we don’t do anything right now to get those competent and progressive officials elected.
I regret posting this comment, but I am concerned about the climate and our environment, and the extraordinary lip lock, the fossil fuel industry has on even our government and current president
This from Heated: https://heated.world/p/143-coal-plants-and-a-punch-in-the
143 coal plants and a punch in the face, Biden Administration has approved 80 new coal plants, and 43 more on their way, and Pete Butigeg has approved four massive, controversial proposed crude oil export projects currently planned off the Texas coast.
And as this oil is being exported, it is not being used in America. Faces with gas at $6 a gallon or more, the oil that Exxon and other oil cabal exports could be used internally to drive down the price of gas.
Evidently the fossil fuel industry is at the core of the rot of this country, and example is Venezuela, whose troubles started with Chavez had the sheer audacity to actually believe that the oil in Venezuela belong to Venezuela and not Exxon Mobil, and ever since then our corporate media has been busy turning Venezuela into a big bad communist state, using the CIA and DOD, to overthrow the government and forcing Venezuela into relying on Russia, Iran and China, just as they did to Fidel.
If you aren't a "commie" and an enemy of America, the oil companies , our bought government and CIA will turn you into one.
The Biden administration proposed new limits on greenhouse gas emissions from coal- and gas-fired power plants, which are the most ambitious effort ever to roll back planet-warming pollution from the nation’s second-largest contributor to climate change. https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/watch-live-biden-gives-remarks-after-epa-passes-greenhouse-gas-emission-rules-for-power-plants
https://www.politico.com/news/2023/04/26/bidens-risky-effort-to-take-on-coal-00093817
I don't think that article is accurate. Attached is a list of decommissioned coal plants. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_decommissioned_coal-fired_power_stations_in_the_United_States#:~:text=Coal%20plants%20have%20been%20closing,so%20many%20coal%20plants%20that
Most domestic coal plants have been converted to gas. According to data from the U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA), 121 U.S. coal-fired power plants were repurposed to burn other types of fuels between 2011 and 2019, 103 of which were converted to or replaced by natural gas-fired plants. https://www.eia.gov/todayinenergy/detail.php?id=44636#:~:text=According%20to%20data%20from%20the,by%20natural%20gas%2Dfired%20plants.
The article fails to mention that the state of California has filed a sweeping climate lawsuit against Exxon Mobil, Shell, BP, ConocoPhillips, and Chevron, as well as the domestic oil industry's biggest lobby, the American Petroleum Institute. https://www.npr.org/2023/09/16/1199974919/california-oil-lawsuit-climate-change?fbclid=IwAR1-91XUtfriv1HOfMWMaCfG4eWo9TRMkUCnX56ZlsNkb8loWHvzXlxTUDY
Thanks for the additional info. But what about those four oil terminals in the gulf, built to export gas, not to fulifill our own needs,
Gas that could and should be used, to bring down the all important price of gas, has been OK'd by the administration for export, thus further driving up the price of gas, which politically harms the party in power.
Again, the carbon cabal has a liplock on our government (bipartisan at that).
I don't know anything about the gulf policy. I do know that in 2009, under Obama, after we became energy independent, Congress felt we were so flush we could arbitrage the price of oil.
I worked with coal companies for about 20 years, at DOL. Most went bellyup, were bought by Chinese companies.
My spies in Pennsyltucky tell me that most gas wells are capped, and that potentially we can double or triple natural gas production. There has been consolidation in the industry, keeping gas prices artificially high. If true, DOE should be talking to the FTC about price fixing. I have friends who were the FERC ALJs involved in huge price fixing about 20 years ago. In February, Governor Newsom asked FERC to investigate price spikes affecting the west. At that time, the California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) voted to accelerate the California Climate Credit to help California families with high gas bills. The $90-$120 credit will be applied to residential utility customer bills starting in March for customers of PG&E, Southern California Edison, San Diego Gas & Electric, and Southern California Gas Company. Customers of Bear Valley, Liberty, PacifiCorp, and Southwest Gas will also receive an accelerated credit of varying amounts.
Is that credit, yearly,it looks so, as it is a credit, and $120 is small change, where utility bills are in the range of $200 to $400 a month. And not very helpful to families that makes so little that they don't pay income taxes.
I lived in Santa Cruz for seven years, and had to pay California income taxes,which were a percent of federal taxes.
The approval of oil ports in the gulf is what concerns me. Just another example of the strangle hold that the carbon cabal has on our government., that and the renewal of leases in the Arctic.
I do understand though, that now that money is speech, he who has the money has the speech, he who has the most money has the most speech, and money can and does destroy lives and careers, not to mention governments and social structure.
Yeh I bitch but will never the less hold my nose and vote Democratic, because I have no choice, voting for anyone else or not voting is a vote for Trump and the fascists who call themselves Republicans.
This comment may seem unrelated, but it is tied into and ends with the fossil fuel worldwide cabal.
I don't necessairly believe it, but as a hypthesis, it fits within the restrictions of Occam's Razor, it answeres a lot of questions, that science struggles with, if only they would repudiate Newtons lame theory of mass gravity, which is in itself circular reasoning (Gravity creates mass, mass is the source of gravity, ad infinitum)
I want to talk about the changes in earth’s atmosphere over tens of millions of years, but my questions and opinions fly against mainstream science and are scoffed at.
Yet there are question that need to be asked.
Science says that the ice age is a result of changes in the earth’s atmosphere, but hasn’t come up with a workable theory that explains the changes.
Science says that there is too much water on earth, and theorizes it comes from being bombarded with ice. A ridiculous idea.
Here is my suggestion. Atmospheric pressure is what causes beached whales to suffocate under their own weight, , among so many other things.
Armospheric pressure is caused by an invisible foce we call gravity, pulling the molecules of air towards its source. At one time the atmosphere was heavily laden with carbon dioxide, which like water in the ocean, provided some buoyancy, and thus enabled the pterodactyl to fly. The creature could not fly in our present environment, the largest raptor weighs about 30 lbs, And Juraisc park and reviving dinosaurs is a fantasy, they would not grow so large in our current gravitational field and atmosphere, because huge muscles and tendons are not required to perambulate.
Huge muscles and tendons are needed to perambulate in a heavy atmosphere, created by gravitional pull.
These muscles and tendons require bones strong enough to sustain the strain, and thus larger bones, and bigger animals. Dentists and people with false teeth, like me, know this, so does NASAm in micro gravity, the bones lose mass, and to counter that NASA has put exercise equipment aboard the ISSS.
Back to the question of ice ages. Has anyone come up with a theory about a changing earth orbit, while creatures roamed the planet, for it would need one and an extreme one to cause an ice age, much less two or three.
Here is a hypotheses. Gravity: Newton was wrong, Gravity is not a property of mass, but a current force, produced by a current process. And as that process, that goes on inside of a planet cools down, it’s electro=magnetic-gravitic field decays, the length of time it takes to decay depends on it’s size.
Although even NASA once denied that there was water on Mars and the Moon, exploration has forced them to shelve that idea, as water is found at the poles of both (and I will get to that), and I suggest, sub surface
So what happened to the water, well since Newtonian physics is sacrosanct, they had to come up with an acceptable hypothesis, and that is an asteroid.
I suggest that as the center of Mars started to cool down and shrink, it’s electro-magnetic and gravitic field diminished. And was no longer able to hold the lighter gases to the surface, the water boiled off, as it does at about 40,000 ft (that is why jet pilots were pressure suits, to keep the blood from boiling of).
The lighter gases were spun off into space b y the centrifugal force of the planet or moon, it took millions of years (for Mars) but this cloud of gases were attracted by the gravitic field of the next largest planet (Earth) and as it was drawn towards Earth, it blocked out the sun blocking out the sun, created an an ice age, and an extinction of much of life, then the ice shield over the earth, continued it’s journey and fell on earth has a flood, but not the one in the Epic of Gilgamesh/bible.. These giant creatures were buried in the flood, from which paleoentologists exhume their bones today, world wide.
The earth recovered and the lesser creatures inhabitated the earth, and free of dinosaurs they flourished.
The moon was once covered with water, some of which remains at the poles, same as Mars.
There was a time when man looked up and actually saw a Blue Moon, and we carry and epigenetic memory of a blue moon, only now they classify a different phenomenon as a blue moon.
Same thing happened, water and light gases were spun off into space, only this time, there was only 240.000 miles of space to traverse to earth, so instead of taking millions of years, it only took a couple of hundred thousands of years, and created the last ice age., then it happened again, it reached earth and attracted by its gravitational field, it fell to earth as a great flood,and again wiped out large fauna, like the Mastadon, or ground sloth, those that didn’t die in the flood, starved to death, and predators lacking food also starved to death. Bye by Saber tooth tiger, smaller versions of these animals were able to survive
Larger versions, found that they couldn’t’ perambulate in the now reduced (cooled by water) gravitational field. And like a beached whale suffocated under their own weight.
Now that the Earth is warming again, there is nothing to cool it down, and we are faced with an inward turning spiral, because we are denuding the planet, extracting carbon,burning it and continuously pumping toxic gases into the air, which makes the atmosphere heavier and warmer, disrupting the circulation of the planets blood and lungs, the jet stream and the ocean currents.
We are in an inward turning death spiral. And thee is no escape, maybe that's why Musk is so deadset on getting to the moon, no problem, human life cannot long exist there without a perpetual pressure suit, even when you sleep, bath and eat. For the same reason that humans can't live, unaided, at 100,000 ft.
Just yesterday, walking past my corner gas station, I noticed a large round sign on the side of the semi-length fuel truck delivering gasoline to the pumps. The sign stated they were "carbon neutral."
Carbon neutral gasoline. Of course.
Why didn't I think of it?
From now on I'm declaring everything I do as "Carbon Neutral."
If anyone can declare that they are "Carbon Neutral" it would be the oligarchs of carbon, because when have they ever lied to us?
It is not very intelligent to foul your own nest. You can count on right wing leaders to lead America and the world to hell. Instead of teaching that the truth is sacred, the churches have been teaching that the truth is whatever you believe it to be, that along with unlimited greed is good, has pretty much destroyed any chance of a decent standard of living for anyone on earth except the ultra rich. The only way this makes any sense, is if the ultra rich have underground or underwater bunkers and they are using global warming to depopulate the Earth? I'm sure they will figure out how to blame it on the hippies and expect the hippies to fix their mess, again.
If anyone had the heart to do this, it would be interesting to see just how much biased misinformation is shoved at school children. I realize that instilling pride in one's country is understandable, even laudable when done right. And maybe we've come a little ways from what I was taught in the '50s that "all Commies are bad and all democracies are good and free". But then maybe not. On 9/11 I was substitute teaching in a junior high where the students were given reading lessons on that event. They all said that the U.S. was attacked because, "They hated us for our freedoms." When I pointed out that this was nonsensical babbling from a Bush speech the answer was, "This is what we were given and nobody has time to get into details." So much for serious and critical thinking.
Big round of applause for Clarence Thomas and the fossil fuel cartel for demonstrating that things can get done - so long as we reach across the public/ private aisle and exchange lavish favors.
Anyways... In 1973 Kurt Vonnegut wrote "Breakfast of Champions" and foreshadowed with great accuracy the dumbing down of our population in an absolutely quotable quote:
“So, in the interests of survival, they trained themselves to be agreeing machines instead of thinking machines. All their minds had to do was to discover what other people were thinking, and then they thought that, too.”
Many thanks to the GOP, not only for mainlining poison into the arteries of life itself, but for the deep rooted cynicism a lot of folks now have towards society as a result of naked bribery flourishing unchecked at he highest levels.
Congratulations! You did it!
Citizen’s United was predetermined. It was just the formal declaration of the choice that had been decided by the reactionary mucky-mucks who were stringing up the strings and pulling them for many decades. The strategy had been well-thought out and carefully implemented. The plan was to cut the legs out from under those who were old-fashioned enough to still believe in liberal democratic principles and those who had been so naïve that they espoused liberal ideas and believed that they were winning somehow.
Citizen’s United was god’s will and god’s way of imposing his will. Fighting Republicans without opposing this almighty god is kind of a losing battle. Dealing with irrationality by using rationality is swimming upstream with an anchor tied to your tail. Talking about the mandates coming from Texas school textbook producers without asking how they got to be so omnipotent is like talking to all four walls in a very large empty auditorium. Good luck with that.
Yesterday, Slate had a title that said, “The Decadeslong Travesty that made Millions of Americans Mistrust their Kids’ Schools”, by Kendra Hurley. That article is about a technique for teaching reading that was hyped and promoted and became the reading-method de jour in schools all over the US for decades. Now, it turns out, it is being called a “travesty” because it has been decided by the latest mucky-mucks in “education” (schools) that it didn’t work worth a tinker’s damn.
The problems are fundamental. Superficial solutions go nowhere. When something as essential, as individual, and as ineffable as teaching, learning, training, indoctrination, and education are placed under a central authority what you get, post haste, is a lot of watered-down Pablum and worthless crap. When are we going to stop committing the “error of the third kind”, which simply is solving the wrong problems and ignoring the actual cause of 90% of these problems? I thought we were serious about science and truth here.
From the “Daily Take”:
If it weren’t for the ability to bribe politicians and school board members with impunity, we’d have honest science textbooks in Red states; instead, their children are being criminally dumbed down and misinformed.
If that were true, why was I taught in the 1950’s that Columbus “discovered” America and about 80,000 other myths and lies? Give me a break, Thom! The situation is absolutely massively exacerbated by the bribery. However, the origins of the problems are the control placed directly in the hands of politicians, demagogues, religious fanatics, pretend experts, and complete fools and jocks with degrees who do not have a clue or who have an agenda which has nothing whatsoever to do with democracy or education.
Btw, I spent some time with my four year-old great granddaughter the other day. I picked up a novel with the title, “Chain Reaction” which my grandson’s fiancé had brought from school where she teaches. This four year-old girl asked me about it and I thought she probably didn’t know what a chain is. When I asked her, she defined what a chain reaction is as if she had been studying for years. Her dad brags that she comes up with such information every day routinely. And, you think this girl should go sit in a classroom for 12 years? You must be out of your gourd!
Wonderful take and metaphors. Thank you for highlighting the Catch-22 of our democracy, the powers of corporate personhood which exist to preclude our citizens from nullifying the powers of corporate personhood (which we need to get rid of if we are to ever have our general welfare promoted properly).
As you know, Texas's malevolent power over textbook publishing long predates Citizens United. In high school history in the late 1960s, I learned how the John Birch Society (and probably others) taught its good little do-bees how to vet textbooks for communist influence: Check the index. If more pages are devoted to FDR than Calvin Coolidge, the Reds have clearly been there. Now whole state governments are blatantly acting on the famous axiom from Orwell's 1984: "Who controls the past controls the future. Who controls the present controls the past." The whitewashing of Martin Luther King Jr.'s legacy, along with the complete erasure of so many others, may not be quite as blatant, but it's on the same continuum.
Right. See the California lawsuit I attached above.
The Rockefeller family knew this years ago and tried to change Exxon policy, but the Saudis, who control our energy policy through OPEC, prevailed. https://www.cbsnews.com/news/rockefeller-family-is-exiting-the-oil-business/