Wednesday Afternoon Links

Miscellaneous material to start your new year.

- Michael Mann and Peter Hotez write about the combined threat posed by climate change, pandemics and an anti-science message which makes it far more difficult to deal with real problems. Katharine Hayhoe offers a year-end summary of the state of the climate - featuring the juxtaposition of a climate breaking down faster than previously assumed with growing recognition that we have (but are failing to implement) means to stop the harm. And Holly Elser et al. study how the effects of wildfire smoke include increased risks of dementia and other brain damage. 

- Andrew Egger highlights how Republicans have become trained to reward chaos agents while seeing actual governance as a problem. Stephen Hanson and Jeffrey Kopstein discuss how the plan for Donald Trump's second term is to replace any trace of public service with patrimonialism based solely on Trump's connections and interests. 

- Jared Yates Sexton offers his take on how Americans need to prepare for Trump's ascension to power. And Ian Dunt notes that the most important individual action will be to act with decency even in the face of a government bent on cruelty. 

- Finally, Paul Krugman discusses how social media fits into the culture of generating profits from addictions. And Thor Benson interviews Ryan Cooper about the options available to build a new information ecosystem beyond the poisoned social media giants. 

Tuesday Afternoon Links

This and that for your Tuesday reading.

- The Guardian's This is Climate Breakdown series offers first-hand accounts of the current catastrophes arising out of the climate crisis. And Michael Mann writes that it's possible to avoid the worst anticipated effects of climate change - but only if we stop spewing carbon pollution in a hurry. 

- But Sehoon Kim discusses how the corporate sector is buying cheap and meaningless credits rather than taking steps to reduce its own environmental harm. Fatima Syed reports on Enbridge's laughable attempt to avoid any regulation of emissions by claiming that greenwashing is more than enough. And Angela Amato and Carly Penrose examine Alberta's plans for fossil fuel propaganda in schools - even as Breene Murphy notes that oil and gas aren't viable long-term investments.  

- John Clarke writes about the importance of cultivating truth and understanding against the entrenched interests seeking to drown out anything that might threaten their accumulation of wealth and power. But Charlie Warzel points out the immense resources being used to try to push people away from reality-based media, while Carole Cadwalladr discusses the especially dangerous combination of media and government power currently coalescing under the impending Trump regime. And Zak Vescera reports on Stockwell Day's role in building an alt-right echo chamber to try to install the BC Cons in government. 

- Finally, David Climenhaga reports on Danielle Smith's summary termination of the pension board it wants to put in charge of all Albertans' retirement income - while Paula Sambo, Layan Odeh and Dawn Lim confirm the UCP's plans for AIMCo are so political that they're planning to hand it over to Stephen Harper.

Wednesday Afternoon Links

Miscellaneous material for your mid-week reading.

- Sueellen Campbell highlights how record-breaking temperatures are being covered around the globe, while Sarah Collins discusses new research showing that the northern hemisphere's summer of 2023 was the hottest in millenia. And Qi Zhao et al. examine the growing death toll from heatwaves around the world even before the unprecedented warming of the last few years. 

- Michael Mann and Katharine Hayhoe make the case that the antidote to doom is doing. But Natalie Alcoba reports on the torrent of threats and abuse directed at Charlie Angus for proposing even the most modest limits on climate-destroying propaganda. And Drew Anderson reports that the UCP's reality denialism extends to an outright refusal to accept direct evidence that their ban on renewables was entirely the result of a political order, while Neel Dhanesha takes a look at the "news mirages" being set up by dirty energy operators to substitute fossil fuel PR for any actual reporting which might expose their pollution or corruption. 

- Hazel Sheffield reports on new research showing that UK corporations hiked their prices far beyond the rate of any cost increases to goose their profits at public expense. 

- Finally, Kate Dubinski discusses a study confirming that the costs of homelessness impose an even greater burden on an already-overwhelmed health care sector. 

Tuesday Afternoon Links

This and that for your Tuesday reading.

- Cory Doctorow discusses how the concentration of wealth and power in corporate hands represents a threat to individual freedoms and the pursuit of social justice. And Pete Evans reports on new Statistics Canada showing that the gap between the wealthy few and the rest of us continues to grow - due to both escalating incomes at the top of the spectrum, and outright losses at the bottom.  

- Michael Mann discusses how there's still an opportunity to avoid the worst-case climate scenarios - but only by actually reducing the carbon pollution we spew into the atmosphere. Will Greaves and Yvonne Su write that we can't afford to keep treating regular and predictable climate calamities as unanticipated events. And Scott McGrane and Christopher White examine the causes and consequences of the hottest autumn in recorded history. 

- Joseph Winters examines how the costs of excessive plastic consumption are being dumped onto the developing world. 

- Finally, Andre Picard rightly notes that Danielle Smith's plans for Alberta's health system appear to be aimed more at exacting vengeance than at ensuring the provision of care. And Mike Crawley reports on the Ford PCs' choice to shower politically-connected for-profit clinics with far more money than public-sector providers for the performance of the same services. 

Friday Morning Links

Assorted content to end your week.

- Alex Himelfarb reviews Quinn Slobodian's Crack-Up Capitalism as a valuable account of the myths and rationalizations underlying the propagation of inequality to serve the uber-rich. Cory Doctorow highlights how the attack on Social Security by Republicans and their donors represents a form of class war. And Justin Chandler reports on the immense benefits resulting from an Ontario basic income pilot project which was promptly shredded by Doug Ford so he could focus solely on funneling public money to his cronies. 

- Michael Mann examines where we now stand in the fight to rein in catastrophic climate change - while noting that while we likely have the technical means to prevent dangerous levels of climate breakdown, we're showing few signs of the political will to get there. And Jenni Reid reports on yet another quarter of obscene profits and climate delay for Shell. 

- Casey Feindt reports on the FDA's action to ban the use of brominated vegetable oil as a drink additive after its widespread use has been found to cause thyroid damage and memory loss. And University College London highlights new research showing that up to one in seven Americans has suffered from long COVID already - with the number only figuring to escalate as new waves are allowed to spread unchecked. 

- Finally, Amanda Marcotte explores the compelling evidence that toxic masculinity doesn't keep anybody safe - though such inconvenient reality doesn't figure to stop the right from demanding that it be applied as the answer to everything. 

Friday Afternoon Links

Assorted content to end your week.

- Andrew Freedman examines how the climate breakdown is generating consequences far beyond those foreseen by previous projections. Seth Borenstein reports on the immense loss of Antarctic ice - and the danger it poses to coastal areas in particular. And Michael Mann points to the rise and fall of the Akkadian Empire as a precedent as to what can happen when heat and drought force people to migrate en masse. 

- The IEA offers a roadmap to limit global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius, with an emphasis on a rapid conversion to clean energy. And David Vetter notes that the arguments used by petropoliticians looking for excuses to block renewable power sources lack any basis in reality.

- But Sarah Munoz discusses how the oil industry is bent on spinning the climate crisis as a matter of individual responsibility rather than social organization in order to keep on spewing carbon pollution for decades to come. And Chris Tomlinson reports on the increased demands on energy systems (and resulting cost to consumers) from power-hogging crypto miners, while Victor Tangerman points out that the use of AI technology may produce a similar effect. 

- Devi Sridhar discusses how the UK Cons (like so many other right-wing parties) used the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic as an excuse to enrich cronies who lacked any ability to deliver what they were paid for. 

- Finally, Cory Doctorow writes that we have every reason to be skeptical of corporate shows of progressivity - but that the appropriate response is for workers to organize and stand up to bosses on teir own terms, not to accept the reactionary position that nothing is worth improving. 

Friday Afternoon Links

Assorted content to end your week.

- Chris Hedges discusses how the end of empire-based colonialism has only given way to an even more exploitative corporate version. And Cory Doctorow points out how surveillance capitalism inevitably turns its resources toward defrauding the people being monitored and manipulated. 

- Matthew Rosza interviews Michael Mann about the need to pair accurate information about the threat posed by climate change with discussion of how it's possible to take positive action. 

- Kevin Drum graphs the connection between lead contamination and murder rates in Washington DC. And Mira Rojanasakul reports on the rise of saltwater levels in New Orleans, with the foreseeable results including the salination of drinking water sources and the release of lead and other matter from pipes.  

- Bob Weber reports on new polling showing a strong majority of Albertans opposed to the UCP's attacks on renewable energy. And Gary Mason calls out Danielle Smith's plan to use Albertans' retirement savings as a slush for for the oil industry as a Brexit-style calamity in the making. 

- Finally, Emily Leedham reports on the Manitoba PCs' choice to offer only meaningless guesswork in place of any plan to ensure people have access to health care. 

Wednesday Afternoon Links

Miscellaneous material for your mid-week reading.

- Leonie Thorne reports on new data showing that COVID-19 was Australia's third-leading cause of death in 2022 even as conventional wisdom decreed that the pandemic in progress be ignored. And Christopher Waddell examines (PDF) the lessons Canada should have recognized for future health emergencies from COVID, while Andre Picard asks whether we've learned anything to prepare for another pandemic even while in the midst of a continuing one. 

- Blair Fix takes a look at the mountain of evidence showing that inequality has been worsening over the past few decades as public policy has catered more and more to corporate interests. Cory Doctorow examines how Amazon has enshittified its services to extract more and more from buyers and sellers alike. And Debbie Cenziper et al. expose how Philips Respironics covered up known dangers of tainted breathing machines, putting hundreds of thousands of vulnerable children at avoidable risk in order to avoid answering for defects in their products. 

- Gordon Laxer discusses how any serious conversation about foreign meddling in Canadian governance needs to start by recognizing the grossly outsized influence of the foreign-owned oil sector. Claire O'Manique writes that we can't afford to keep giving carbon polluters a free pass for the damage they're doing to our living environment. And Michael Mann writes that while we've already failed to keep global warming below 1.5 degrees, we can't give up on the work that can still be done to rein in catastrophic climate change. 

- Finally, John Woodside reports on the warning from numerous nuclear safety experts as to the costs and risks of the small modular reactors being pushed by the Trudeau government (along with several right-wing provincial governments).  

Saturday Afternoon Links

Assorted content for your weekend reading.

- Esther Choo and Scott Duke Kominers are the latest to point out the need for a focused effort (comparable to the Operation Warp Speed project to develop the original COVID-19 vaccines) to respond to the public health emergency that is widespread long COVID. Phil Tank highlights how the Moe government's elimination of masking protection in Saskatchewan health care facilities is a purely political decision to cater to anti-science cranks (which figures to produce disastrous health consequences). And Josiah Mortimer reports on the UK's apparent coverup of workplace COVID infections and fatalities in health facilities.

- Max Fawcett writes about the clear connection between strong social safety nets and people's happiness and well-being. Claire Cain Miller and Alicia Parlapiano chart how the U.S. built a functioning welfare state at the outset of the COVID pandemic - and has since dismantled it based on the perceived imperative to stop helping people. Andre La Rosa-Rodriguez reports on the rightful concerns by food banks that governments are entrenching the need for private charity rather than doing anything to ameliorate systemic deprivation. And Moira Welsh reports on the high rates of poverty and precarious housing among older women - and some of the options available to ensure a reasonable standard of living.

- Monica Potts discusses how rural America's combination of moral puritanism and limited economic development traps women based on their family backgrounds and sexual choices.

- Finally, Ann Pettifor writes about the importance of applying the principle that "we can afford what we can do" to the task of transitioning to a clean energy society. And Michael Mann discusses how climate change deniers seem to have finally been left behind in Australia's policy discussions - though many of us know from experience how other delay and obfuscation tactics can temporarily take the place of outright denial with a substantially similar effect.