Environmental News (Supreme Court just signed our death warrant)

This topic has 5 replies, 3 voices, and was last updated 2 years, 5 months ago by Billy_T.

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July 1, 2022 at 10:20 am #139481

Billy_T
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https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2022/jun/30/us-supreme-court-ruling-restricts-federal-power-greenhouse-gas-emissions

US supreme court hobbles government power to limit harmful emissions

Court sides with Republican states as ruling represents landmark moment in rightwing effort to dismantle ‘regulatory state’

Excerpt:

The US supreme court has sided with Republican-led states to in effect hobble the federal government’s ability to tackle the climate crisis, in a ruling that will have profound implications for the government’s overall regulatory power.

In a 6-3 decision that will seriously hinder America’s ability to stave off disastrous global heating, the supreme court, which became dominated by rightwing justices under the Trump administration, has opted to support a case brought by West Virginia that demands the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) be limited in how it regulates planet-heating gases from the energy sector.

The case, which was backed by a host of other Republican-led states including Texas and Kentucky, was highly unusual in that it was based upon the Clean Power Plan, an Obama-era strategy to cut emissions from coal-fired power plants that never came into effect. The Biden administration sought to have the case dismissed as baseless given the plan was dropped and has not been resurrected.

Not only was this case about a regulation that does not exist, that never took effect, and which would have imposed obligations on the energy sector that it would have met regardless. It also involves two legal doctrines that are not mentioned in the constitution, and that most scholars agree have no basis in any federal statute.

July 4, 2022 at 11:57 am #139528

Zooey
Moderator

Yep. We iz dead.

July 5, 2022 at 10:15 am #139541

wv
Participant

Would seem that american-capitalism is

ecocide

Perhaps, possibly, there is some ‘kinder-gentler’ form of capitalism. Maybe.

(though, i would argue that sooner or later even those systems drift farther and farther right over the decades…)

But the American version, given the level of propaganda in this country — it was always gonna be Ecocide.    I mean, the Left was just obliterated before each world war. Obliterated.   What would we expect a country to look like without an actual Left?     Prettymuch what we got.

Rightwing-Duopoly.   Public with astonishingly low Political-IQ.   Astonishingly Low.

Plant some seeds.   Watch some Kupp highlights.   Play with the dog 🙂

w

v

July 5, 2022 at 10:57 am #139543

Billy_T
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Was wondering when this would post. Tried a coupla days ago and it went into moderation.

Maybe all the smog choked up the software.

____

WV, I think capitalism in any form is going to necessarily lead to ecocide. Its internal mechanics of Grow or Die, its laws of competitive motion, basically guarantee that. It has to continuously expand, geographically, geologically, and into the future, or it collapses.

Not saying anything new here, obviously, but there is just no money to be made in conserving resources this or that industry requires. Fossil fuel companies, for instance, can’t make money by leaving gas and oil in the ground, and if they don’t leave roughly 80% of known reserves alone . . . . we’re screwed — along with most living things on this planet. Some estimates point to an even higher percentage.

Jason Hickel’s books, The Divide, and Less is More, are great at spelling all of this out. You’ve quoted him in the past, if memory serves. He’s excellent at presenting the facts in a logical, coherent manner that makes it easy for the reader to connect the dots. He doesn’t need to editorialize, etc.

July 5, 2022 at 11:19 am #139544

wv
Participant

Billy_T wrote:

. . . . we’re screwed — along with most living things on this planet. Some estimates point to an even higher percentage. Jason Hickel’s books, The Divide, and Less is More, are great at spelling all of this out. You’ve quoted him in the past, if memory serves. He’s excellent at presenting the facts in a logical, coherent manner that makes it easy for the reader to connect the dots. He doesn’t need to editorialize, etc.

==

Yes.

…I’m 65 now, BT.   Spent many-a-year learning about capitalism, as you have.

I’m done reading about it now, though. Just Nuthin left I wanna know about it.   The ‘big picture’ is pretty clear.

At any rate, I’m done reading political books.   Capitalism is ecocide. What else is there to know, to say…

Gonna read some nature stuff. Some sci-fi, some fantasy, some literature, whatever seems fun, from week to week.

I finished a book on Punk music the other day. Enjoyed it.   Couldnt find a single solitary decent person in the whole book 🙂

w

v

July 5, 2022 at 11:39 am #139545

Billy_T
Participant

wv wrote:

What else is there to know, to say… Gonna read some nature stuff. Some sci-fi, some fantasy, some literature, whatever seems fun, from week to week. I finished a book on Punk music the other day. Enjoyed it. Couldnt find a single solitary decent person in the whole book 🙂 w v

;>)

Sounds like a good plan.

I mostly do that too. Recently finished a good short read, Three Rings, by Daniel Mendelsohn. It’s a pretty cool mashup of different styles, memoir, essay, literary criticism, a dash of history, etc. Focusing primarily on Homer’s Odyssey, Francois Fenelon’s 17th century novelistic update, Proust’s writings, and W.G. Sebald’s. A wandering, meandering book about meandering wanderers. Digressions about digressions. Structured with rings and loops and some autobiography, pointing to earlier narratives using rings and loops, etc.

I think I’ll start a literature thread later this week. Hope you’ll add to it.
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