We have some bad news I don’t think this is even hitting the front pages but it should: Scientists have delivered a “final warning” on the climate crisis, as rising greenhouse gas emissions push the world to the brink of irrevocable damage that only swift and drastic action can avert. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), made up of the world’s leading climate scientists, set out the final part of its mammoth sixth assessment report on Monday. The comprehensive review of human knowledge of the climate crisis took hundreds of scientists eight years to compile and runs to thousands of pages, but boiled down to one message: act now, or it will be too late. The UN secretary general, António Guterres, said: “This report is a clarion call to massively fast-track climate efforts by every country and every sector and on every timeframe. Our world needs climate action on all fronts: everything, everywhere, all at once.” In sober language, the IPCC set out the devastation that has already been inflicted on swathes of the world.
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People in the comments are all protesting that the shirt isn’t really about that. But she’s right: These people, including Rand Paul are “grooming” kids to be violent sexual psychos.
A Black in power man trying to get a white man No surprise: it’s working. He pulled that chain and they came running: Bump writes: One of Donald Trump’s less-appreciated political skills is getting his supporters to view attacks on him as attacks on them. His supporters have often seen him that way, viewing criticism of Trump’s presidency or of him personally as an attack on the political movement he leads and, therefore, on them. The tactic works. Or: It generally does. When Trump’s primary frustration was the investigation into Russia’s interference in the 2016 election and possible overlap between that effort and his campaign, turning the probe into a perceived attack on his supporters was tricky. Sure, there was a lot of “the Deep State is out of control and could do this to you,” but it’s not clear that this really landed. Instead of building his base’s reserves of empathy, the Russia probe drew from them. Instead of Trump making everyone the victim, he mostly fell back on complaining about being a victim himself. Since he lost the 2020 election, though, he’s had better luck.
Coming soon to a red state near you Further evidence this morning that opposition to democracy has become a feature of the Republican Party. And not of the Trumpublican Party, mind you. This trend predates the Menace from Mar-a-Lago. Will Bunch comments on doings in Republican Gov. Greg Abbott’s Texas that merit attention yet again. Texas officials last week announced the state’s takeover of the eighth-largest public school system in the country: Houston’s. Take note, Bunch cautions: First of all, the move is outrageous. Despite facing the same struggles as most large urban school districts around poverty and disinvestment, topped by the double whammy of COVID-19 and the natural disaster of Hurricane Harvey, Houston schools have been improving under metrics set by the state.
Luckovich again Gov. Wokety-woke DeWoke has even lost Bret Stephens (like I care): “He’s showing he’s just another George Costanza Republican, whose idea of taking a foreign-policy stand is to “do the opposite” of whatever the Democrats do.” Gail Collins and Stephens got distracted by DeSantis before making a passing reference to the prospect of a Donald Trump indictment this week. Joe Scarborough (like I care) believes any indictment will fire up Trump’s base briefly before fading, and any indictment will erode Trump’s support in Wisconsin, in Michigan, in Pennsylvania and elsewhere. Sounds about right. But before that fade happens:
“Fall in line” seems to be the order of the day Donald Trump announced over the weekend that he was going to be arrested on Tuesday by publishing a series of hysterical posts on his Truth Social media platform exhorting his followers to take to the streets in protest. As it turns out he doesn’t actually know that he’s being arrested on Tuesday but surmised it from the media reports and decided to signal his loyal followers to get organized. As I write this it seems that an indictment is imminent but there is at least one more witness scheduled to testify to the grand jury today (Michael Cohen’s former lawyer), so it’s unclear exactly when it’s coming. Trump isn’t taking it well: Social media set itself on fire over Trump’s announcement and some of Trump’s minions appeared on TV to echo his rage suggesting that the case is being brought to hide the crimes of the “Biden Crime Family” which includes the widow of the late Beau Biden.
The press got so excited Those who were following politics 20 years ago surely remember how the media reacted to the invasion of Iraq. I’ve never seen them so stimulated. Here’s what I wrote on this day in 2003: Resistance Is Futile The United States knows all and sees all. Schwartzkopf said he’s never seen anything like this “awesome” technology. The BBC said “it’s as if the US has a 3 dimensional picture of every single thing that is happening in Baghdad.” No need to tell the Brits about the strike, though. Gotta move fast. They may represent 70% of the coalition ‘o the willin’, but Blair is still a limey twit, always making Bush sound stupid. Killing Saddam’s like swatting a fly. We have X-Ray vision and he’s probably dead. We think. Like Osama. Oh wait. We got to watch Bush putting on his make-up on the BBC feed for about 5 minutes before the speech. He looked psyched.
DeSantis gave a back-handed statement this morning in which he repeatedly used the words hush money payments to a porn star” repeatedly. (The video is in a post below.) Trump isn’t happy about it Did he just hint that Ron DeSantis molested young men when he was a high school teacher? Lol. It’s going to be a long campaign. His meltdown is impressive. This is just from the last 48 hours. And it’s not all of them: Let it sink in once again that this man is the leader of the Republican Party, was president of the United States and has a decent chance of becoming president again. And he is certifiably nuts. But then, so are his fans:
I’ve lived through quite a few financial crises, some local to Australia, and others global. Invariably, the first failures are those of obvious shonks (Australianism?) who would probably have failed anyway. Then there are seemingly reputable institutions that turn out to have been shonky. Then there are institutions that played by the rules, but it […]
That seems to be on the agenda in Florida This is the nonsense Ron DeSantis and the GOP brain trust believe will win them a general election: As Florida Republicans are introducing and advancing a wave of bills on gender and diversity that are likely to be signed into law by Gov. Ron DeSantis (R), one GOP lawmaker acknowledged this week that his proposed sexual health bill would ban girls from talking about their menstrual cycles in school. During a Florida House Education Quality Subcommittee hearing Wednesday, state Rep. Ashley Gantt (D) questioned her Republican colleague, state Rep. Stan McClain, on his proposed legislation that would restrict certain educational materials used in state schools, which Democrats and critics have likened to banning books. House Bill 1069 would also require that instruction on sexual health, such as health education, sexually transmitted diseases and human sexuality, “only occur in grades 6 through 12,” which prompted Gantt to ask whether the proposed legislation would prohibit young girls from talking about their periods in school when they first start having them.