Compiled by Dick Bennett https://jamesrichardbennett.blogspot.com/2025/02/omni-climate-memo-mondays-218-february.html
Green New Deal. Kate Aronoff. Overheated.
Greenpeace.
Inside Climate News.
GREEN NEW DEAL
Kate Aronoff. Overheated: How Capitalism Broke the Planet—and How We Fight Back. Bold Type Books, 2021.
[Aronoff reflects the long tradition of Utopian thought and practice. For utopianism means the ability to imagine a better world, without which we can’t get started,–such as with the New Deal of the 1930s. –D]
“Decarbonizing the global economy and adapting to the climate changed century ahead will be the single hardest and most important thing our species has ever done.* It’s impossible without a big, democratic government and massive state investment, as well as the dismantling of the most powerful industry that has ever existed. That, in turn, seems dangerously far off unless some critical mass of people see the Green New Deal as their path to a better life and manage to overcome the rank [class] and racist divide-and-conquer politics that have been so successful at stopping efforts to turn these United States into a more perfect union, and this planet into a fairer place. . . .
A Green New Deal isn’t just about subbing out one form or energy for another as all else states equal. It means rooting out the deep power imbalances that have made the fossil fuel economy possible and will keep toxic and deadly extraction humming along if they remain in place. It means writing a new social contract in its place that ensures people are as free as money to move around the places where they were born and be welcomed with open arms where they weren’t. It’s about building a genuinely sustainable United States….Should all that succeed, the resulting society will also be a happier one,” where “people can dream about abundant, joyful futures and have the tools to turn those dreams into reality” (358-59). [Aronoff discusses the UN World Happiness Report 2019 on p. 350.] [*As you know, I add nuclear weapons and war for the two hardest and most important things for our species to do. –D]
| Dick, after more than 7 years of fighting Big Oil company Energy Transfer’s $300 million lawsuit against us, we are now just days away from going to trial in North Dakota. This is the biggest case ever filed in North Dakota, and a negative outcome for Greenpeace USA could threaten every American’s fundamental rights to free speech and peaceful protest. Next week, we’re inviting every Greenpeace USA supporter to join us for a virtual event where we’ll be sharing important updates about this case and what it means for our entire movement. RSVP |
Inside Climate News (ICN) is increasingly an excellent source of current climate information, as it increasingly foregrounds the climate origin of the increasingly extreme weather. I count 17 directly or indirectly climate stories reported in the ICN Weekly of 12-15-24. <newsletters@insideclimatenews.org> The ICN Weekly of 1-11-25 is similar. The intro. focuses on the present LA fires: Trump blaming governor Newsom, Trump’s failure to mention the impact of climate change, and “the information ecosystem… expected to be further tested during climate-fueled disasters as social media platforms like Facebook roll back fact-checking programs.” Then it gives 11 abstracts with five reports of events traceable directly to climate change, ending with “Climate Trauma Is a Thing. Here’s What the Research Reveals.” Climate is “its own beast that we now want to study on its own and deserves its own recognition, awareness and characterization.”