Burning down the future

The Spray Tan Who Would Be King has declared open war on the future.

Not his future, what does he care, he will not live to see the effects of his self-glorifying ineptitude.

And not the future of his apostles and Wormtongue-whisperers, whose gaze does not extend beyond the limits of their personal greeds, hatreds, and schemes, who see the "king" as a means to their warped ends.

Nor that of the bootlickers, acolytes, and court jesters, all of who have long since abandoned any shred of independent thought or self-respect.

No, I mean The Future.

On June 11, the Environmental Protection Agency announced it was changing its name to the Environmental Destruction Agency with the announcement that the agency

is proposing to repeal all “greenhouse gas” emissions standards for the power sector under Section 111 of the Clean Air Act (CAA) and to repeal amendments to the 2024 Mercury and Air Toxics Standards (MATS) that directly result in coal-fired power plants having to shut down.

That is, it proposes to allow power plants to emit as much climate-destroying greenhouse gases as they feel like, with the argument being (if you can believe it but I bet you can, considering) that because it can't be said with assurance of just how significant an impact on global climate change is driven by US-based fossil-fuel power plants, those emissions can't be regulated at all.¹

 To show the science-based, non-political nature of the change, the announcement quotes EDA Administrator Lee Zeldin as saying the "Biden-era regulations have imposed massive costs" on the poor, beleaguered, barely-getting-by fossil fuel industry and their "primary purpose" was "to destroy industries that didn't align with their narrow-minded climate change zealotry" and to "regulate coal, oil and gas out of existence.”

The reactions from actual environmentalists were not kind.

- The plan is a "reckless betrayal," "ugly and unpatriotic," "cynical," and "dangerous." - Moms Clean Air Force director Dominique Browning

- It's "destructive," "reckless," and "fan[s] the flames of extreme heat and wildfires." - Center for Biological Diversity environmental health attorney Ryan Maher
- It's "completely reprehensible," "trad[es] American lives for campaign dollars," and is "an assault on our health and future." - Sierra Club climate policy director Patrick Drupp
- It's "astoundingly shameful," "galling," "sacrifices the public good," and would leave "no meaningful path to meet global climate goals." - Julie McNamara of the Union of Concerned Scientists' Climate and Energy Program

This announcement came on the same day that The Guardian reported that climate.gov, the highly-respected source of information and education about climate change run by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), has been effectively shut down.

Every member of the content production staff was fired as of May 31, meaning that other than (maybe) some already-prepared material to go up later this month, there will be no new content, no new reports on studies, no new refutations of denialist bullshit.

Worse, two web developers were kept on, raising the specter that the site may be maintained, but turned into an outlet for fossil-fuel industry propaganda and conspiracist trash.

Oh, and speaking of NOAA, on June 5 the agency and the Scripps Institution of Oceanography (at UCal, San Diego) stated, as reported by CommonDreams.org,

the concentration of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere peaked above 430 parts per million in 2025 - the highest it has been in millions of years.

In fact, in more than 30 million years, according to Ralph Keeling, director the Scripps CO2 Program, who responded to the study's findings with a typical scientist's understatement: “Another year, another record. It’s sad.”

Sad indeed, but it's more, though. A new study, published June 2 in the journal Communications Earth & Environment says that coastal communities in North Carolina are already experiencing a frequency of high-tide flooding "an order of magnitude greater" than the official numbers. Although the immediate cause was shortcomings in measuring rainfall runoff and the effects of local drainage infrastructure, still, as the Washington Post noted in its coverage, the study

offers insights into a reality that a growing number of coastal communities will face, or already are facing: that infrastructure built for another time and another climate is not equipped to handle the higher tides and persistent flooding fueled by rising seas.

Part of the issue with rising sea levels, of course, is that warming climate yields warming water yields expanding water yields sea level rise. Another and potentially much larger issue is melting ice caps, particularly in Greenland and Antarctica. And according to work also published in Communications Earth & Environment, this one on May 20, the current Paris Climate Agreement target of limiting warming to 1.5°C over pre-industrial levels is too damn high and

even current climate forcing (+1.2°C), if sustained, is likely to generate several meters of sea-level rise over the coming centuries, causing extensive loss and damage to coastal populations and challenging the implementation of adaptation measures

trying to deal with the result of melting of ice sheets. The study concluded that the "safe limit" of warming for ice sheets is not 1.5°C or even 1.2°C but more like 1°C "and maybe a little less," the "safe limit" being defined by study co-author Jonathan Bamber as "one which allows some level of adaptation, rather than catastrophic inland migration and forced migration." Exceed that limit and

it becomes extremely challenging for any kind of adaptation, and you're going to see massive land migration on scales that we've never witnessed in modern civilization,

he said.

And don't just think of the migration. Think of the hunger it will cause. Think of the pain, the suffering, the starvation, it will cause. Think of the wars it will cause from conflicts over land, over water, over resources, over territory, the ethnic wars over "foreign invaders."

That is the world that King Donald in his lust for vengeance and power, that corporate CEOs in their "warmed and well-lighted offices"² with their lust for more! more! more!, that the sniveling party sycophants who would rather see the world burn than have to find a different job, that the worshipful buffoons who think that wearing a red cap is a solution to their shrinking futures, that is the world they would leave to the generations to come, that is the world that we, we, that we will leave to our children, our grandchildren if we are not willing to face what is before us.

Lead author on this study Chris Stokes noted that "we only have to go back to the early 1990s to find a time when the ice sheets looked far healthier" and global warming was within that safe limit.

So let me ask you this: Think of (or do some looking into) the 1990s, the level of conveniences you had than, the standard of living, the available technology. Then ask yourself this: Was that way of life so terrible that you would sacrifice a world to avoid living that way again?

If your answer is yes, then you are a waste of air and I don't think I believe you. If your answer is no, then know that precisely because of the technological advances of those past 35 years we can leave a livable world behind us if - but only if - we are prepared to pay the price (and I mean invest the money, the tax money, because the corporations sure as hell aren't going to do it willingly) and probably do without some tech-y but unnecessary geegaws.

The choice is stark, but there is a clear right one and no it does not involve "starving in the dark" but it will likely involve some sacrifice. I can only hope we're up to it.

 

¹According to the EPA (to the extent it can still be trusted to not downplay the issue, 24% of US greenhouse gas emissions are from electricity production, of which 60% is from burning fossil fuels. That means that 15% of all US greenhouse gas emissions arise from fossil-fuel burning electric power plants. Not what I'd call "not significant."

²"The greatest evil is not now done in those sordid "dens of crime" that Dickens loved to paint. It is not done even in concentration camps and labor camps. In those we see its final result. But it is conceived and ordered (moved, seconded, carried, and minuted) in clean, carpeted, warmed and well-lighted offices, by quiet men with white collars and cut fingernails and smooth-shaven cheeks who do not need to raise their voices." - C. S. Lewis, The Screwtape Letters

Remember this - always!

I wrote about this more than a year ago. In fact, I first wrote about it more than 29 years ago. But events of late have pushed this back to the forefront of my political thoughts, pushing hard enough to get through a wall of struggles with burnout and depression to get me to write this, even if it's the only thing I manage to get out this summer.

Because I want the following quote burned into the consciousness of every single leftist, every single progressive, every single liberal, every single person on the entire left half of the American political spectrum and even those to the right of that line who are not yet beyond the reach of reality. And it is this: and yes it is deliberately in a great big bold font to emphasize its importance:

“‘Back to 1900’ is a serviceable summation of the conservatives’ goal."
- George Will, syndicated column, January 2, 1995

Yes. That's what he wrote. "Back to 1900." And every single thing conservatives say and do, every single thing they promote, every single proposal they make, every single emotional button they go to push, should be seen through that lens. They want to reproduce the social and economic relations that existed 125 years ago. They want to, in their own words, go "Back to 1900." And that is exactly what they have been trying, are trying, and will continue to try to do. Go back.

Back, that is, to a time before legal labor unions or effective anti-monopoly laws, a time of widespread child labor and twelve- or fifteen-hour work days and six- or even seven-day work weeks. Before regulations requiring safe working conditions, a time when being killed at work was a major cause of death.

Back to a time before environmental protection laws or consumer protection laws, a time when patent "medicines" were common and government "regulation" was more about promoting corporate interests than regulating them because caveat emptor was the rule of the day.

Back to before Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, unemployment or disability insurance, before any kid of public insurance, including for health, was even under discussion and decades before it was taken seriously..

“Back to 1900.” Back to when poor people were considered genetic defectives who deserved their condition and the way to deal with poverty was to shove it out of sight.

Back to a time when education was largely a perk of privilege, only half of children went to school, only 6.4 percent graduated high school, and the majority of adults had no more than eight years of schooling.

Back before civil or voting rights laws, back when women couldn’t vote, wives were chattel, blacks were either “good n*****s” who got called “boy” or “uppity n*****s” who got lynched, racism (against Irish, Italians, Chinese, and others as well as blacks) was institutionalized, sexism the norm, and gays and lesbians were sick or perverted while as far as “polite society” was concerned, bi, trans, or other flavors of the queer community simply didn’t exist.

Back to a time when valuing Protestant Christians over other religions and other people's rights was unremarkably ordinary and some, including atheists, were subject not only to social discrimination but also legal barriers to participation in society.

Back, in short, to a time when the elite and powerful were in their mansions and the rest of us were expected to know our places, live lives of servitude without complaint, and then die without making a fuss.

“Back to 1900” is indeed “a serviceable summation” of the right wing’s goal, which is to undo a century of progress toward economic and social justice in order to benefit their selfish, warped, morally warped lives.

Maya Angelou wisely said "When someone shows you who they are, believe them the first time."

We should have been paying attention when the fanatics were openly declaring what they wanted, who they were and are, and we either ignored it or dismissed it as hyperbole.

We shouldn’t have. Because they showed us, they told us directly - and we didn’t listen.

We can at least listen now. And then do more.

And we, each of us, can start by burning that quote into our minds.

Footnotes: For those who may not know, George Will is what passes for an intellectual among the right. And if anyone doubts the quote, I still have the column that I clipped out of my local paper. And it is a quote, not a paraphrase.
 

057 The Erickson Report for July 7-20

 

057 The Erickson Report for July 7-20

This episode of The Erickson Report focuses on three recent and one upcoming case before of the Supreme Court that reflect and reveal aspects of the slow-motion coup that threatens our future as a civil society and a free people. The issues are the practical ability of any federal regulation of any sort to exist, the ability to put any regulations on guns, the ability to maintain a separation of church and state, and even the ability to vote for president.

If that sounds over-dramatic, watch the episode.

The Erickson Report is news and informed commentary from a member of the radical nonviolent left (and a proud member of "the 'woke' mob"). As what's known as advocacy journalism, it uses facts and logic while never pretending it is neutral on or indifferent to the topics it addresses. Your host, Larry Erickson, is a veteran of 50 years of political activism in both "the streets and the suites" and looks with this show to both inform and inspire action.

Questions and other reactions are welcome by email at whoviating at aol dot com.

Footnote: I realize the episode is a week late. I do apologize. We do try to keep a bi-weekly schedule, but sometimes, well, we fail. Again, my apologies and I hope you'll find this show was worth the wait.

SOURCES:

Re federal regulation
https://www.cnbc.com/2022/06/30/-supreme-court-says-epa-lacks-authority-on-climate-standards-for-power-plants.html
https://www.commondreams.org/views/2022/06/21/right-wing-supreme-court-readies-help-destroy-planet
https://skeptics.stackexchange.com/questions/21907/were-firearms-prohibited-in-dodge-city-kansas-in-the-1870s

Re regulations on guns
https://www.democracynow.org/2022/6/24/supreme_court_new_york_state_concealed
https://www.wbur.org/npr/1102995474/supreme-court-opinion-guns
https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/congress/senators-aim-quick-passage-bill-providing-security-family-members-supr-rcna28000
https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2022/06/roe-overturned-supreme-court-samuel-alito-opinion/661386/

Re separation of church and state
https://www.reuters.com/legal/government/us-supreme-court-takes-aim-separation-church-state-2022-06-28/
https://www.commondreams.org/news/2022/06/27/supreme-court-takes-wrecking-ball-separation-church-and-state-prayer-ruling
https://www.vox.com/2022/6/27/23184848/supreme-court-kennedy-bremerton-school-football-coach-prayer-neil-gorsuch
https://www.rawstory.com/lied-gorsuch-blasted-after-photos-expose-his-claims-in-high-school-coach-praying-case-are-a-flat-out-knowing-lie/

Re vote for president
https://www.commondreams.org/views/2022/07/01/beware-supreme-court-laying-groundwork-pre-rig-2024-election

041 The Erickson Report, Page 5: Two Weeks of Stupid: Clowns and Outrages [the Clowns]

041 The Erickson Report, Page 5: Two Weeks of Stupid: Clowns and Outrages [the Clowns]

Now for a regular feature, Two Weeks of Stupid, Clowns and Outrages. And we start, as usual, with the Clowns.

Our first Clown this time out is President Joe Coal Baron Manchin. After his event at the Economic Club of DC on October 26, three climate hunger strikers confronted him on his demand to cut climate provisions from the reconciliation package.

Manchin replied by asserting “the United States has done more than any other country. All the emissions are coming from Asia.”

So apparently all that West Virginia coal from which he gains a million a bucks a year from investments is being used for what, doing artists' sketches?

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Next there is Texas Republican state Rep. Matt Krause, who has a 16-page list of roughly 850 books and he intends to "investigate" to see if Texas school libraries might be harboring any of them.

Krause has used his position as chair of the House Committee on General Investigating to dispatch a letter wanting school districts to report whether they have any copies of any of the named books and if so, to report how many of them and how much money the district spent to get them.

Beyond such titles as The Confessions of Nat Turner by William Styron and Between the World and Me by Ta-Nehisi Coates, the list, not at all oddly, seems obsessed with LGBTQ+ titles and ones about reproduction.

A peek under Krause's mattress might be interesting.

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Then there is the case of a reporter at the St. Louis Post-Dispatch uncovering a flaw in the website of Missouri's Department of Elementary and Secondary Education that left the Social Security numbers for 100,000 staff members vulnerable. The information was contained in the html source code for the site.

The paper notified the agency and held the story until the agency had a chance to correct the error.

But it seems true that no good deed goes unpunished, because Missouri Gov. Mike Parson, apparently jealous of all the other GOPpes who've been awarded The Order of Big Red Nose, is vowing to prosecute the staff of the paper, charging they are "hackers" who "decoded" the source code to uncover the data. He claimed such an investigation would cost taxpayers $50 million.

Now, not only is that figure manifestly absurd, the thing is, the source code for a website is easily available to anyone with at most a couple of clicks because your own computer must have access to that information in order to display the web page correctly. Try it. Look for the Tools menu in your web browser, where you should find something listed like "View source code." In fact, if your browser is Firefox, just do control-u.

In other words, all this proves is that Mike Parson has absolutely no idea what hacking is.

I love this one because it gets back to the true meaning of Clown.

=

But finally, sometimes it's hard to say if something is a Clown or an Outrage, it straddles the line between. Here's an example.

It's an unnamed teacher at Ridgefield Memorial High School in Ridgefield, New Jersey.

On October 18, Mohammed Zubi, A Muslim Arab-American senior at the school, asked for an extension on completing a math assignment. The teacher responded with 'We don't negotiate with terrorists."

Shortly after making the comment, the teacher supposedly told Zubi he did not “mean it like that.”

Excuse me, teacher person, but just how the hell did you mean it?

A supporting Clown award goes to the school administration which initially dismissed it as a “personal matter.” Only after the incident became known through social media did school board members take it seriously. In a statement a couple of days later, the district said it is conducting a full investigation and that the teacher in question has been suspended until further notice.

041 The Erickson Report, Page 1: Good News

041 The Erickson Report, Page 1: Good News

On October 22, the United States District Court for the Northern District of California rejected an attempt by the Blahden administration to keep in place a Tweetie-pie-era Clean Water Act rule which environmental and Indigenous advocates argued would have "devastated" states' ability to manage their rivers.

The June 2020 rule changed the Clean Water Act certification process to allow federal agencies to approve large projects such as fossil fuel pipelines, hydroelectric dams, industrial plants, and wetland developments over the objections of states and Native American tribes along with establishing with a one-year deadline for permitting decisions and limiting the factors that state and tribal officials could consider.

Washington Attorney General and co-plaintiff Bob Ferguson welcomed the ruling, saying the Trump administration "did everything it could to yield to the interests of polluting industries." And now - my words, not his - over the objections of the Blahden administration, that rule is no more.

=

On October 29, the Supreme Court refused to block a vaccine requirement imposed on Maine health care workers, the latest defeat for opponents of vaccine mandates.

The Court had previously rejected challenges of vaccine requirements for New York City teachers and Indiana University staff and students, but this was the first time it had ruled on a statewide mandate.

The mandate went into effect on October 1 but the state gave until October 29 before it would be enforced to give time for people to get the shot.

As of November 2, Maine's four largest hospital systems reported that between 96 and 100 percent of employees were either vaccinated or had a valid medical exemption.

030 The Erickson Report for January 21 to February 3, Page 2: Good News

030 The Erickson Report for January 21 to February 3, Page 2: Good News

We start, as I always like to do when I can, with some Good News.

First, some truly rare Good News on cars and the 4th amendment. On December 22, the Pennsylvania Supreme Court ruled that Pennsylvania police can no longer search cars without a warrant unless there is both probable cause to believe a crime occurred and emergency circumstances that require immediate action. That reverses a decision from just five years ago that cleared the way for warrantless searches based on nothing more than a claimed belief that contraband is present.

A little over a year before the new decision, an analysis by the Philadelphia Inquirer found that Philly cops, using the old standard, were performing an average of more than 2,000 warrantless car searches a month. You won't be surprised to learn that about 80% of them involved Black drivers.

Before, the excuse often was a claim by a cop that they smelled marijuana. I wonder what will be the go-to excuse now.

My entirely justified cynicism aside, this is still good news in light of the fact that courts, both state and federal, have often treated cars as a place where the 4th-amendment does not apply.

=

Even in the midst of a resurgence of violent overt white supremacy, we can still see signs that yes, over time, things have gotten better. Just consider that the state of Georgia has just sent a black man and a Jew to the US Senate.

Okay, this example isn't about racism, it's about homophobia. But still embrace it for what encouragement it offers.

On December 23, New York’s Second Department Supreme Court - New York's state-level equivalent to a federal Circuit Court of Appeals - ruled that being accused of being a homosexual can no longer be considered defamation per se. Per se, as I expect you know, means "in and of itself," so what the ruling is saying is that acceptance of LGBTQ folks has come to the point where falsely saying "so-and-so is gay" is not itself defamatory.

And this is by no means the only case or the only court to say so.

At one time and not so long ago, the very idea of being LGBTQ was thought to be so shameful and such a disgrace that falsely accusing someone of it legally could be likened to falsely accusing them of a heinous crime or having a "loathsome disease," something so bad that you didn't have to prove you suffered any damages as a result in order to win a suit; the accusation itself was enough.

Now, the general trend courts have followed is to rule that such an accusation is no longer defamation per se. You can still sue, but you have to show actual damage, such as losing a job as a result.

As it's said, the moral arc of the universe may be long but it does bend toward justice. So don't ever give up the struggle, because subjected to the pressure of persistence and time, things can get better.

=

Two years ago, Tweetie-pie was frustrated after federal courts blocked his attempt to illegally force a question about citizenship into the census forms. So he demanded that the Census Bureau prepare a separate report on the number of undocumented immigrants in the US, intending to use it as a basis for an executive order removing those people from the count for reapportionment of Congressional seats - to the benefit of GOPpers and non-Hispanic whites.

That order would be illegal, too, as the Constitution clearly gives the role of overseeing those matters to Congress. There have been several suits over the prospect of the order, but the Supreme Court has said they are premature.

Now, however, that won't matter because te project won't even be finished. On January 13, Census Bureau Director Steven Dillingham ordered Bureau staff to "stand down and discontinue their data reviews," putting an end to the attempts by the Tweetie-pie thugs to change the rules to their own benefit.

Dillingham was facing demands he resign for buckling to Tweetie-pie's demands and agreeing to the data review in the first place. So maybe he just said "the hell with it, he's out in a week and my term ends in just over two weeks; I have better things to do with my life than deal with this crap."

Or maybe he decided to do the right thing. Whyever, the effort to turn undocumented immigrants into constitutional non-persons has failed. Again.

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On January 15, the NRA announced that it is leaving New York, where it has been incorporated since its founding in 1871, and heading for Texas, where it intends to file for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in an attempt to evade the civil suit filed by New York Attorney General Letitia James charging large-scale financial corruption and looking to dissolve the group.

James' response to the announcement was to say that "The NRA's claimed financial status has finally met its moral status: bankrupt," adding that "we will not allow the NRA to evade accountability and my office’s oversight."

You go, girl.

=

A quick one just for fun: On January 17, Betty White turned 99. The day before, she said she was going to celebrate by having a hot dog and french fries for dinner and then staying up late.

=

Finally for now, an Obama-era rule, the Clean Power Plan, was about limiting greenhouse gas emissions from power plants. The Tweetie-pie gangsters wanted to replace it with what they called the Affordable Clean Energy rule, based on an interpretation of the Clean Air Act under which emission controls would have to be imposed plant by plant - every one of which could be challenged, producing years and potentially decades of litigation and delay.

On January 19, Tweetie-pie's last full day in office, the US Circuit Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia unanimously threw out the new rule and remanded the matter back to the EPA - which is of course now in an administration which says it will prioritize climate change.

I'd call that a nice going-away present.

The Erickson Report for November 11 to 24, Page 3: Two Weeks of Stupid: Clowns and Outrages [the Outrages]

The Erickson Report for November 11 to 24, Page 3: Two Weeks of Stupid: Clowns and Outrages [the Outrages]

For the Outrages, we need to be looking to the future and expecting that, as dangerous as a second term for Tweetie-pie would have been, he still has something around 10 weeks to do as much damage as he can.

And we should expect him to try to punish the nation - or at least the states that voted for Biden.

He said it himself. Writing at Raw Story, journalist David Cay Johnston notes that in Tweetie-pie's book Think Big he summed up his life philosophy in a single word: revenge.

"Then," quoting Johnston now, "he went on for 16 pages about how what gives him pleasure is ruining the lives of anyone who does not do as he asks. His long diatribe was intermingled with observations about his desires to do violence, especially against women."

In Tweetie-pie's own words, "If you don't get even you are just a schmuck!"

So for our Outrages we have four examples of Tweetie-pie trying to deny the truth that he is a thoroughgoing schmuck and a loser.

In chronological order:

On October 27, before the election but with the ultimate outcome clearly in sight, the EPA relinquished its oversight of a number of environmental issues across 38 federally recognized tribes’ lands in Oklahoma. Federal authorities mandated under the Clean Air Act, Clean Water Act, and Safe Drinking Water Act, among others, will now be overseen by the state of Oklahoma.

The move means that fossil fuel and agriculture corporations will no longer have to consult with tribal governments about environmental issues related to, among others, fracking, the dumping of hazardous waste, and factory farm pollution runoff.

Those living on tribal lands are now subject to the by no means tender mercies of the state government of Oklahoma, whose fawning over the dirty fuelers and polluters leaves little doubt about the effect on native communities, which will become dumping grounds for toxic waste and a long list of other poisons and pollutants.

Next, for nearly 20 years, the "roadless rule" has protected wilderness by prohibiting timber harvesting and road construction in designated areas.

On October 28, the Tweetie-pie gang announced an intention to strip the protection of the roadless rule from Alaska’s Tongass National Forest.

Tongass is our largest national forest, covering 26,000 square miles (68,000 square kilometers) of southeast Alaska, and is called the nation’s "crown jewel” by the US Forest Service. It is a pristine and rare temperate zone rainforest whose ecosystems provide critical habitat for grizzly bears, wolves, bald eagles all five species of Pacific salmon, and numerous other species.

I picked one picture to show the Tongass, but one picture can't do it justice, not when its ecosystems include ice fields, glaciers, old-growth forests, and islands facing the Pacific Ocean.

As a result of that rule change - done in the face of the fact that 96% of public comment on the change was against it - more than half of the Tongass can be opened to logging and mineral exploration.

Getting in one more kick to the national groin before the election, on November 1, the beginning of the 2021 open enrollment period for the Affordable Care Act, the Whitest House announced a waiver for the state of Georgia, allowing it to avoid using Healthcare.gov website, the marketplace for plans under the ACA, in the state.

Over a dozen states have gotten such waivers because they had developed either their own state-based exchanges or some other mechanism that provides coverage at least equal to that mandated under the ACS. Georgia - which didn't expand Medicaid - doesn't have its own online marketplace or any similar mechanism, so for practical purposes no one in Georgia will be able to sign up for Obamacare. Instead, people will have to go through brokers or do their own research on private websites. In other words, any Georgian in need of health insurance has just been dumped into the individual market. And good luck to them.

But don't worry, according to Seema Verma, director of the Center for Medicaid and Medicare Services, the waiver will "usher in a groundswell of healthcare innovation that will deliver lower costs, better care, and more choice to Georgians" - just like the individual market always did in the past.

That could have been a good for a Clown Award - but considering that it's estimated that tens of thousands of people in Georgia will lose coverage because of this and so it can be reasonably said that people will die as a result, it's too serious for that.

Finally, one from after the election. It came out on November 9 that Tweetie-pie has removed the director of the National Climate Assessment, the federal government’s definitive report on climate change, which is updated every four years. The fifth one is due in 2022.

Michael Kuperberg, a climatologist who has held the post since 2015, was abruptly replaced by David Legates, who was first appointed by Tweetie-pie to a post as a deputy assistant secretary at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and is - you won't be surprised - someone who has claimed, among other things, that increased levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere in fact are good for the planet and has dismissed his critics in the scientific community as “a bunch of thugs.”

Last month, it was reported that the Trump administration was delaying work on the Fifth National Climate Assessment. It looks now that delaying it has been upgraded to wrecking it.

Remember: Three of these examples are from before the election, when Tweetie-pie was only scared of losing. The tantrums he will throw now that he has lost - and make no mistake, he doesn't believe a word of the crap he's throwing around, he's just trying to avoid admitting that his presidency is as bankrupt as most of his businesses - can be expected to be much worse.

Revenge. It's what the next weeks will all be about. And that is an Outrage.

Some Good News amid all this

Some Good News amid all this

I wrote a number of time in the past about the struggle over the Dakota Access Pipeline, or DAPL, as Native American groups staged large-scale civil disobedience and protest in the attempt to block the pipeline from putting water supplies at risk.

Now comes some long overdue Good News on that front.

On March 25, the Washington, DC, federal district court ruled that the Army Corps of Engineers violated federal law when it affirmed federal permits for the pipeline originally issued in 2016.

The ruling, which came in response to a suit filed by the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe, found that in approving the project the Corps had violated the National Environmental Protection Act by, among other things, failing to take into account the criticisms by the Tribe's experts and paying insufficient attention to the safety record of the parent company, one which the court said "does not inspire confidence."

The original parent company, Energy Transfer Partners, has merged with Sunoco over the course of the legal battle over the pipeline.

The pipeline, designed to carry oil 1200 miles (1930 km) from North Dakota to Illinois, crosses the Missouri River near Standing Rock Sioux lands, threatening their water supply. After a lot of dithering, in December 2016 outgoing President The Amazing Mr. O denied the required permits - only to have Tweetie-pie reverse the decision his first week on the throne. The pipeline was completed in June 2017.

However, a suit challenging parts of the approved permits continued. Now, the court has ordered the Corps to undertake a full review and prepare a full Environmental Impact Statement, which the Corps has thus far avoided doing. Such a review could take years, during which the pipeline may - this has not yet been decided - have to be shut down.

Hopefully, in light of the finding that the project went ahead in violation of federal law, the court will do the obvious and shut it down until the review can be completed (since the result could be to find that the pipeline never should have been built, at least in its present configuration or on its present route). But we can't count on it: In 2017 the same court allowed construction of the pipeline to continue and in October 2017 said the pipeline could continue to function while the suit continued.

Still, the order for a full Environmental Impact Statement is different from a remand order to address details, so maybe the court will feel differently this time. In any event, the new decision is still Good News.

The Erickson Report, Page 4: Two Weeks of Stupid: Clowns and Outrages [the Outrages]

The Erickson Report, Page 4: Two Weeks of Stupid: Clowns and Outrages [the Outrages]

Now for the Outrages and we certainly had enough to choose from.

We had Tucks Carlson capping Faux News months-long attacks on the homeless with his own week-long diatribe against San Francisco and the homeless problem there under the claim that it's all because of "liberalism" - because, as is well known, the way you make people homeless is by caring about them.

We had examples of the Tweetie-pie gang just openly ignoring a court order not to deport someone who was challenging their deportation order - and worse, getting away with it because the court was too cowardly use its contempt powers.

We had that same gang finalizing a rule to roll back clean water protections for streams and wetlands, affecting not only areas protected by a 2015 rule but even some covered by the original Clean Water Act of 1972, overturning pollution controls that have stood for nearly 50 years.

However, our runner-up is an outrage I'm not going to talk about. It's one I was going to talk it about even though it technically hasn't happened yet: It's Tweetie-pie's so-called "Deal of the Century" for Israel and supposedly for Palestinians although from what's known of it certainly doesn't look that way. I was going to go over it based on what it was expected to include but as it develops it is being released almost literally the same moment I am recording this so I will hold off until next time when we can look at it more closely if only because with Tweetie-pie, the actuality is almost always worse than the prediction.

What we can say now is that based on what's known and expected, it is indeed the "Deal of the Century" for Israel - if the century is the 16th or 17th, full of colonialism, expansionism, oppression, and might makes right.

But if you really want an outrage, you have to go to the source, the real source of too many outrages. You have to go to Washington, DC. No, not the White House: Many of those outrages can be undone by a new administration. No, you have to leave the White House and go past the other end of the National Mall - to the Supreme Court.

You may recall that back in October I noted a proposal to greatly expand the definition of a "public charge" under immigration law and so also greatly restrict the number of people who could get green cards, cutting legal immigration by an estimated two-thirds.

There long had been an understanding that the term "public charge," which had no specific definition in law, referred to people who as immigrants would be primarily dependent on cash benefits from the government - more simply, they would be mostly on welfare.

Supreme Clown

The Whitest House wants to dramatically expand that definition to include noncash benefits such as Medicaid, supplemental nutrition aid - that is, SNAP, still often called Food Stamps - and federal housing assistance. Even using subsidies under the Affordable Care Act to purchase health insurance on an exchange could be affected. Anyone predicted to use any such benefits for more than 12 months out of any three year period would be denied a green card and note that is a standard that millions, even tens of millions, of our fellow citizens could not meet.

The proposal has been under legal challenge in multiple jurisdictions with mixed results. The Second Circuit Court of Appeals had issued a nationwide injunction, barring the change from being enforced while those suits worked their way through the courts.

But on January 27, the Supreme Court overturned that injunction, freeing Tweetie-pie's thugs to start turning away anyone they think is not rich enough - or white enough - to merit their imperial favor.

It's hard to grasp the moral depravity of this decision. Injunctions are supposed to consider the idea of "irreparable harm." Where is the irreparable harm to the administration, to anyone at all, in letting "public charge" continue to be understood the same way it has been all along while the suits work their way through the courts? None that I can find. On the other hand, the irreparable harm to the hundreds of thousands of immigrants who will be denied entry across that same time is manifest and undeniable.

There is just as clearly no denying that people, people denied the chance to flee the crime, the violence, the oppression, the hunger, that drives them to seek refuge in a foreign country, that people will die because of this decision. That a majority of the Supreme Court just doesn't care is an affront to basic human decency. It is indeed an Outrage.

The Erickson Report, Page 5: Two Weeks of Stupid: Clowns and Outrages [the Outrages]

The Erickson Report, Page 5: Two Weeks of Stupid: Clowns and Outrages [the Outrages]

And now we go to the Outrages and we're a bit short of time so there will only be two of them.

First, some outfit called stopantisemitism.org has announced its Anti-Semite of the Year. And with the evidence of an upsurge in antisemitism to be found in any day's news - and the group offers plenty of examples - it should be easy to find someone truly deserving of the title of biggest anti-Semite of 2019.

But who did they come up with? Congresswomen Ilhan Omar, the "evidence" for this, if I can stretch the word that far, consisting mostly of a list of dredged-up and long-settled bull about statements she made last spring, statements which did reveal an embarrassing lack of knowledge about the history of anti-Semitism on her part but revealed no actual anti-Semitism, especially considering she apologized for that lack of knowledge and in fact thanked people for pointing it out to her.

One claim reprised here which I always thought was nonsensical was that it was anti-Semitic of her to suggest that Jewish groups try to buy political influence with money. Of course they do! Just like any other interest group! Do you think that when the health insurance industry gives big bucks to Pete Buttigieg they are not trying to buy influence with his campaign? Do you think that when the big telecoms spread cash around to various candidates they are not trying to buy influence with those campaigns and subsequently with what bills those candidates do and do not support? If I point that obvious truth out, does that mean I am anti-health care or anti-telecommunications? Don't be stupid.

Instead, let's be truthful: Ultimately, this is not about a handful of unrevealing tweets. This is all about her support of the BDS movement and Palestinian rights. That's the point of this smear, that's the purpose of this smear, that's why she is being labeled a huge anti-Semite. It's about equating the BDS movement and Palestinian rights with anti-Semitism.

Ilhan Omar

That isn't attacking anti-Semitism, that's weaponizing anti-Semitism for political purposes and that is a  outrage. What's revealed here is nothing about Ilhan Omar but rather that antisemitism.org, which says it is part of a non-profit foundation but doesn't say what one and which itself engages in the anti-Semitic trope of "the self-hating Jew," is part of that reactionary right-wing core that wants to establish the idea that any criticism of Israel or Israeli government policy is by definition antisemitism.

Which doubtless makes me an anti-Semite in their minds, because I do support Palestinian rights and I do support the BDS movement (without feeling, I note, obliged to support all of its leaders). And when 2019 saw a 45-percent increase in demolitions and confiscations of Palestinian homes in the West Bank over 2018, I find a lot about Israel and Israeli policy to criticize.

Footnote: On January 6, citing the group's report, Israel's ambassador to the United Nations, Danny Danon, directly meddled in US domestic politics, encouraging "action" against Omar. Oddly enough, one of the things Omar was accused of was making an accusation of "dual loyalty" because she objected to the notion that intense support of Israel is effectively a political requirement for gaining and holding office in the US. Apparently that kind of support is exactly what Ambassador Danon expects.

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https://www.alternet.org/2020/01/trump-accused-of-disgraceful-abdication-of-duty-for-proposal-to-neuter-landmark-environmental-law/
One more for the road: On January 3, the New York Times reported that the Tweetie-pie White House is about to expand its open war on environmental protection by going after its bedrock law, the law that has been called the Magna Carta of environmental legislation.

It is the National Environmental Policy Act and it is 50 years old, having been signed into law on January 1, 1970. This landmark law charges the federal government and its agencies with a responsibility to promote environmental protection, preservation, and restoration, and notes the responsibility each generation has to act as trustee of the environment for the generations to follow.

For fifty years it has provided the legal basis for environmental review of, and public input on, projects that impact the environment.

And now Tweetie-pie is planning to wreck it by redefining what the law does and does not do by:
- narrowing the definition of what type of project requires an environmental review,
- expanding the number of project categories that can be excluded from review,
- allowing companies or developers to conduct their own environmental assessments, and
- dropping entirely any requirement to consider cumulative, rather than just immediate, impacts - meaning not only that you could, for example, build a road without considering the effect of traffic or a pipeline without addressing the risk of a spill, but that any effect on climate change would be clearly beyond the law's reach.

Outrageous and nauseating.

And by the way, Australia is still on fire.

The Erickson Report for January 15-28

The Erickson Report for January 15-28

Back to the grind after our Thanksgiving and Christmas-New Year's episodes, The Erickson Report for January 15-28 looks at media coverage of the Iran crisis and the White House lies before running though some interesting items Noted in Passing and, of course, Two Weeks of Stupid: Clowns and Outrages.

Corrections
https://www.indy100.com/article/trump-us-election-2020-president-five-terms-rally-speech-8923291
https://www.indy100.com/article/trump-twitter-us-president-executive-power-mueller-investigation-9003321
https://www.newsweek.com/trump-insists-constitution-allows-do-whatever-want-1444235


Iran and the media
https://us20.campaign-archive.com/?e=20cc5fa835&u=e6457f9552de19bc603e65b9c&id=748e115148
https://www.commondreams.org/news/2020/01/03/corporate-media-turns-warhawks-including-former-bush-officials-beat-drums-war-iran
https://presswatchers.org/2020/01/what-the-press-needs-to-do-to-stop-the-march-to-war-in-iran/
https://www.mediamatters.org/washington-post/after-afghanistan-papers-we-need-skeptical-media-cover-iran
https://www.vox.com/2020/1/3/21048079/trump-pompeo-iran-lies
https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2020/1/12/21062399/trump-iran-esper-o-brien-four-embassies-why-soleimani-killed
https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2020/1/11/1910826/-Evolution-of-a-lie-from-imminent-attack-to-four-embassies-with-no-facts-in-between
https://www.aol.com/article/news/2020/01/13/trump-doesnt-really-matter-if-there-was-an-imminent-threat-from-soleimani/23899962/
https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/national-security/trump-authorized-soleimani-s-killing-7-months-ago-conditions-n1113271
https://www.cnn.com/2020/01/06/middleeast/soleimani-strike-legality-doubts-us-iran-intl/index.html
https://www.vox.com/2020/1/8/21057344/trump-congress-iran-intelligence-briefing-soleimani
https://www.nbcnews.com/news/military/u-s-sending-thousands-more-troops-mideast-after-baghdad-attack-n1110081
https://www.latimes.com/politics/story/2020-01-10/with-hundreds-of-sanctions-on-iran-trump-adds-a-few-more?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+latimes%2Fnews%2Fpolitics+%28L.A.+Times+-+Politics%29
https://www.thedailybeast.com/netanyahu-distances-from-soleimani-slaying-says-israel-shouldnt-be-dragged-into-it-report
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/iran-plane-crash-ukraine-airliner-crashes-iran-kills-all-onboard-today-2020-01-08/
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-01-11/iran-says-it-accidentally-shot-down-ukraine-plane-isna
https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/navy-1988-iranian-jet/
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/war-powers-resolution-house-votes-to-limit-trumps-ability-act-against-iran/
https://www.history.com/topics/vietnam-war/war-powers-act


Noted in Passing
https://www.aol.com/article/news/2020/01/01/2020s-new-laws-gender-neutral-x-licenses-stronger-id-wear-your-hair-the-way-you-want/23890932/
https://www.washingtonpost.com/religion/2020/01/03/united-methodist-church-is-expected-split-over-gay-marriage-disagreement-fracturing-nations-third-largest-denomination/
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https://theconversation.com/for-linguists-it-was-the-decade-of-the-pronoun-128606
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https://www.newscientist.com/article/2229238-a-lazy-fix-20-years-ago-means-the-y2k-bug-is-taking-down-computers-now/
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https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2020/01/07/puerto-rico-earthquake/2830673001/
https://www.aol.com/article/news/2020/01/11/magnitude-59-shock-rocks-quake-stunned-puerto-rico/23899082/
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https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2020/1/8/1910216/-Red-alert-from-World-Health-Organization-6-000-dead-in-Congo-measles-outbreak
https://www.afro.who.int/news/deaths-democratic-republic-congo-measles-outbreak-top-6000
https://news.un.org/en/story/2019/11/1052321
https://apnews.com/0cd4deb8141742b5903fbef3cb0e8afa
https://www.who.int/csr/don/26-november-2019-measles-global_situation/en/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Measles_resurgence_in_the_United_States
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https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2020/1/12/1910962/-Taal-Volcano-erupts-in-the-Philippines-Now-at-Alert-Level-4
https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/matthewchampion/taal-volcano-lava-philippines
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https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/bushfires
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https://theconversation.com/wtf-slurs-offend-young-adults-more-than-swearing-125193
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kyBH5oNQOS0


Two Weeks of Stupid: Clowns and Outrages - the Clowns
https://morningconsult.com/2020/01/08/can-you-locate-iran-few-voters-can/?fbclid=IwAR0e40DoAUi3WgTLmyPLAXAklAw8XcVy3fk4Uae1D6Njgtau0YcSQE_zqWk
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https://www.instagram.com/p/B67J4TTlnDn/
https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2020/1/6/1909727/-Don-Jr-shows-off-custom-assault-rifle-with-white-supremacist-imagery-and-image-of-Hillary-Clinton#read-more
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https://www.nytimes.com/2019/12/31/us/navy-seals-edward-gallagher-trump.html
https://www.salon.com/2020/01/02/eddie-gallagher-isnt-a-lifestyle-brand-story-its-a-story-about-the-rights-violent-nihilism/
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https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2020/1/4/1909453/-eponymous-ground-meat-dish-calls-Nobel-Prize-recipient-brainwashed
https://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/music/news/meat-loaf-greta-thunberg-climate-change-australia-bushfire-sharon-a9270246.html


Two Weeks of Stupid: Clowns and Outrages - the Outrages
https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2019/12/after-monsey-will-jews-go-underground/604219/
https://www.vox.com/2020/1/3/21039446/anti-semitism-anti-orthodox-farrakhan-conspiracy-theories-bipartisan
https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/anti-semitic-attacks-more-violent-hate-crimes-new-york-n1110036
https://www.jpost.com/Diaspora/Antisemitism/Ilhan-Omar-voted-2019s-antisemite-of-the-year-613308
https://www.haaretz.com/middle-east-news/palestinians/.premium-un-confiscations-demolitions-of-palestinian-homes-rose-by-45-percent-in-2019-1.8347116
https://www.haaretz.com/us-news/.premium-israel-s-un-envoy-calls-ilhan-omar-anti-semite-of-the-year-1.8369471
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Danny_Danon
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https://www.alternet.org/2020/01/trump-accused-of-disgraceful-abdication-of-duty-for-proposal-to-neuter-landmark-environmental-law/
https://blog.ucsusa.org/kathleen-rest/kathleen-hartnett-white-nomination-spells-trouble-for-the-magna-carta-of-environmental-law-nepa

The Erickson Report, Page 9: India

The Erickson Report, Page 9: India

I'll end with this, because I swear if I were doing a Clown Award this week I would have a runaway winner.

New Delhi, the capital city of India, has been experiencing record levels of air pollution.

How bad? Consider that on the Air Quality Index, an international metric used by public health officials, any reading above 100 is considered unhealthy. In some areas of Delhi, that being the province in which the city of New Delhi is located, during the first week of November that index was well over 900.

Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal said the city had been "turned into a gas chamber."

Not just there, either: In the industrial hub of Kanpur, home to 3 million people, air quality readings have been consistently above 500 for several days.

a street in New Delhi

There have been steps taken to deal with this: Construction activities that could add to the dust in the air were halted temporarily. Schools were shut, government advisories were issued, asking people to stay indoors. Factories that hadn't shifted to piped natural gas were temporarily shut down. Odd-even driving days were instituted.

But even in the middle of this  mess, some people just had to prove what clowns they are. India's Minister for Health and Family Welfare tweeted that eating carrots would help and the Minister of Environment, Forest & Climate Change tweeted an encouragement for affected citizens to "start your day with music."

Not to be outdone by mere bureaucrats, Vineet Agarwal Sharda, a leader of India’s ruling Bharatiya Janata Party, said that the pollution should not be blamed on stubble burning or industrial emissions, the most commonly cited caused, but on Pakistan and China, either of which, he said could have released poisonous gases into India because, he said, "they are afraid of us."

Yeah, well, you are pretty scary.

The Erickson Report, Page 6: New Zealand

The Erickson Report, Page 6: New Zealand

On November 7, New Zealand lawmakers approved a bill that commits the country to being carbon neutral by the year 2050. The measure, which passed 119 votes to 1, demonstrates the cross-party support that climate protection has in the Pacific island nation.

Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern said she was grateful that in the past 10 years, Parliament had progressed from debating whether global warming is real to discussing what to do about it.

The Zero Carbon bill aims to provide a framework to implement climate change policies. It's in line with an international effort under the Paris Agreement to limit the global average temperature increase to 1.5° Celsius above preindustrial levels.

New Zealand's bill sets an ambitious target: to reduce all greenhouse gases to net zero by 2050.

The country is well-positioned to do it. It already generates 80% of its electricity from renewables, and that portion will be higher by 2035 as offshore oil and gas are phased out. The government is shifting its fleet to electric vehicles and is working to transition other vehicles to electric, too. The government also has restarted a program to subsidize home insulation and is putting $14.5 billion over the next 10 years into transit, biking and walking infrastructure. In addition, New Zealand has already committed to planting 1 billion trees by 2028.

All of which is to the good - but when officials say "all greenhouse gases," they don't actually mean "all." The bill creates an exemption for biogenic methane, which is emitted by plant and animal sources. That loophole is actually a big deal.

Methane does not persist in the atmosphere as long as CO2 - decades as opposed to centuries - but it's far more potent, trapping about 30 times as much heat as CO2 does.

Ruminant animals such as sheep and cattle release methane as they digest grass and other leaves. Such animals made up 34% of New Zealand's total emissions of greenhouse gases. Overall, agriculture is the largest single source of greenhouse emissions in New Zealand, accounting for a whopping 48% of the total.

So in the case of biogenic methane, New Zealand isn't aiming for net zero but just to reduce emissions by 24-47% over the next 30 years. Which means that if those targets are met, in 2050 New Zealand overall still will be emitting about a quarter to over a third of what it does today. Which would be a dramatic achievement - but it ain't net zero. And it's legitimate to ask how far short of net zero we can go before it's simply not good enough.

Dozens of countries have declared a goal of net zero. Costa Rica, Denmark, Fiji, France, Germany and the UK have all said they intend to achieve net zero emissions by 2050; Sweden has gone them one better by aiming to do it by 2045.

Meanwhile, the world's largest greenhouse gas emitters - China, the United States and India - have not made any zero-carbon national commitments, although a number of US states, including California, Washington, and New Mexico, along with a large number of US cities, have pledged net zero on their own.

The New Zealand nature advocacy organization Forest and Bird called the bill's passage an important first step but says the work is far from over, which is particularly true since the main conservative opposition party, despite supporting the bill, nevertheless promised changes if it wins the next election.

The left giveth and the right taketh away.

The Erickson Report, Page 5: Two Weeks of Stupid: Clowns and Outrages [the Clowns]

The Erickson Report, Page 5: Two Weeks of Stupid: Clowns and Outrages [the Clowns]

Now for our regular feature, Two Weeks of Stupid: Clowns and Outrages.

Turning first to the Clowns as we usually do, we start with a repeat winner: Sen. Lindsey Grahamcracker, who so frightened himself by coming perilously close to breaking with Tweetie-pie over the latter's abandonment of the Kurds in Syria, that within a couple of days he was in awe at The Great Orange One's leadership and wisdom.

Grahamcracker said Tweetie-pie plans to use US air power over a demilitarized zone occupied by international forces - after, that is, Turkey had completed its ethnic cleansing in northern Syria, creating a Turkish "safe zone," because we must "protect Turkey from elements of the Kurds that they consider to be terrorists," said the man who a couple of days earlier was calling for sanctions against Turkey.

What's more - oh yes, there's more -

You've heard how we are "protecting" the Syrian oil fields in the eastern part of the country, because of course we get to decide what happens to and with them. Grahamcracker says "we are on the verge of a joint venture between us and the Syrian democratic forces" - the very people we just betrayed - "to modernize the oil fields" and give the revenue from them to the Kurds.

"I'm increasingly optimistic," he said to laughter from the circus crowd. "This can turn out very well."

Meanwhile journalist and author Chris Hedges notes that "The withdrawal of Iraq from the northern Kurdish areas following the 1991 Gulf War created a de facto Kurdish state, the third this century. But Turkey remains determined to destroy it. If history is any guide, the autonomous Kurdish region in northern Iraq will be as short-lived as the other autonomous enclaves briefly carved out by the Kurds over the last century."

Oh and as a footnote: The Pentagon is planning to send tanks and armored vehicles into eastern Syria as part of "protecting" those oil fields, which will require troops to operate and maintain the vehicles, as well as more troops to protect the bases from which they operate. At least we have our priorities straight.

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Next up and standing as a symbol of many others, we have James Bagnell of Edmonton, Alberta.

A painted portrait of Swedish climate activist Greta Thunberg appeared on a section of a downtown "free wall" in the city, an area where people are encouraged to do art or make comments.

Bagnell's "comment" was to deface the portrait by spray painting the message "Stop the Lies. This is Oil Country!!!" over the teen's face.

He was seen by a CBC reporter, who asked him why. "We don't need foreigners coming in and telling us" what to do, was the answer.

Showing that he's up to date with his rightwing memes, Bagnell said climate activists are "intolerant" because they are calling for change and Thunberg is a child who is just "doing what she's told," and doesn't know better but who at the same time "should go back to her country and try to make her country better," where apparently she is a fully mature, informed, and independent agent.

Bagnell, who insisted that of course he's concerned about the environment - I bet some of his best friends are environmentalists - said Thunberg should "Just shut up until you have solutions."

Of course, we do have solutions, primary among which is stopping the use of fossil fuels. It's just that clowns like Bagnell don't want to hear about them.

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Speaking of clowns, here's a collection of them: the Christian Right. That's an oxymoron if ever there was one and with the death of Elijah Cummings, some of them proved that the emphasis clearly should be on moron.

"Christian" fundamentalist Stacey Shiftlett insisted that Trump was sent by God himself to govern the US and that Cummings helped lead a “demonic attempt” to remove Trump from office. "I believe that God had had enough," Shiftlett said, "and God moved.”

Yeah, just like with Ananias and Sapphira.

Meanwhile, "Christian" fundamentalist Dave Daubenmire denounced Cummings as an “enemy of the cross” and went on to say, “I’m glad he’s gone. I bet he’s not pro-choice now. I bet he’s not pro-homo now.”

Radio host Jesse Lee Peterson declared “if you notice, John McCain, he dead. Charles Krauthammer, he dead. And Elijah Cummings, now he dead. They all didn’t like The Great White Hope" - which is how he refers to Tweetie-pie, no joke - "they went against him, they talked about him. Now, they all dead. That’s amazing.”

“Don’t mess with The Great White Hope," Peterson intoned. "You see what happens. Don’t mess with God’s children.”

I swear these people are genuinely sick. Clowns, but sick.

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Mike Pence

I should be outraged by this but the image of it is just too comical.

On October 21, Vice President Mike Not-Worth-a-Farthing addressed the opening ceremony of the 70th International Astronautical Congress in Washington, DC.

He made no announcements about national space policy or international cooperation in his remarks, but he did say this:

Under President Donald Trump’s leadership, America is leading in space once again. He believes, as I do, that’s it’s America’s destiny to be the leader amongst nations in our adventure into the great unknown.

Graciously, as befits someone speaking from such a high perch, Not-worth-a-farthing added that our Glorious Leader of Great and Unmatched Wisdom would condescend to allow other "freedom-loving" nations to assist us - "freedom-loving" being defined as sufficiently pro-corporate.

He was reported to have gotten "a lukewarm reaction" from the diverse international audience.

The Erickson Report, Page 2: Two Weeks of Stupid: Clowns and Outrages [the Clowns]

The Erickson Report, Page 2: Two Weeks of Stupid: Clowns and Outrages [the Clowns]

Okay, we turn now to a popular feature, Two Weeks of Stupid: Clowns and Outrages. We start, as usual, with the Clowns and oh do we have a carful this time.

Our first Clown is conservative radio host and poster boy for privilege Ben Shapiro, who said on his show a couple of weeks ago that people who have to work two jobs are actually just, well, stupid:

If you had to work more than one job to have a roof over your head or food on the table, you probably shouldn’t have taken the job that’s not paying you enough. That’d be a you problem.

Put another way, if you have to take a second - or a third, or a fourth, or whatever - job in order to provide for your family, it's your own damn fault because you should have refused to take any job at all until one that paid enough came along.

He got scorched on Twitter, provoking him to shift into damage control mode, claiming - I shouldn't even have to tell you this - claiming he was taken out of context, the context being, it seems, that the government should take no steps at all toward establishing a living wage because The Market (pbui) "knows more than you do."

Ben Shapiro

How that affects his blaming struggling people for their problems goes unexplained. Which is pretty typical for a Clown.

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Next up, and we're sort of taking these chronologically, is the Hasbro company, which has come out with a variation on the board game Monopoly, this one called "Monopoly Socialism." You immediately can get a flavor of the game by noting the tagline is "Winning is for capitalists."

Historian Nick Kapur described the game in a lengthy Twitter thread, including noting the lame jokes about vegetarianism - how that got to be about socialism is beyond me - and the "We Are All Winners" school as well as pointing out the mockery aimed at environmentalism and, get this, voting.

the game

The whole idea seems to be that no one in the game gets anywhere, the "community fund" that finances projects which individual players can't afford is designed to be constantly going broke, and from time to time any wealth that the community has actually accumulated is simply destroyed.

I could have done without Kapur's suggesting the target audience is "hate-filled baby boomers who grew up during the cold war and are triggered by anything done by anyone under 40," but the fact remains that the whole thing is so thoroughly lame it is hard to imagine just who it is for and it is clearly the product of the minds of Clowns.

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We move on to the fact that last week, in response to a report that bedbugs had been found in the New York Times newsroom, a George Washington University professor named named David Karpf tweeted that "The bedbugs are a metaphor. The bedbugs are Bret Stephens," Stephens being a right-wing Times op-Ed columnist.

Bret Stephens

His tweet got, Karpf later said, nine likes and zero retweets and was not sent to Stephens.

Now personally, I think the joke is not funny and in fact a bit creepy but Stephens, who somehow heard about it, went out of his little mind. He wrote to Karpf complaining about his tweet and essentially daring Karpf to come to his house and say it to his face - a letter which he copied to the the university provost, that is, Karpf's boss. Oh, not to threaten his job of course, not to get him in trouble at work, oh no perish the thought, rather it was merely that he thought the provost should be aware of his underling's behavior. He then wrote a whole column about about attacks on Jews in World War II referencing insect comparisons and saying "the rhetoric of infestation is back."

To top is off, he then took advantage of his place as a contributor on MSNBC to get face time to bloviate about his side of his by-then-viral tiff with Karpf, who of course was afforded no such opportunity.

And if all that doesn't add up to Clown status (with the Times and MSNBC as enablers), then how about this:

James Inhofe

Despite cc'ing Karpf's boss, when it came to the case of Tucks Carlson saying Iraqis are "semi-literate primitive monkeys," Stephens defended him, saying threatening someone's career is an assault on free speech - in addition to which, insect and "infestation" references are not new to him, as he once compared Palestinians to a giant mosquito.

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Okay, an old favorite Clown is Sen. James Inhofe. He has introduced an amendment to the National Defense Authorization Act to limit the authority of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission to regulate lake levels and flood control related to a dam on Grand Lake in northeastern Oklahoma.

Folks upstream of the damn, including local Native American tribes and officials in the high-poverty town of Miami, say that maintaining high water levels on the lake has contributed to repeated floods as water backs up from the dam. Two dozen floods in less than 30 years, in fact, with 150 homes torn down and more abandoned as a result. This spring’s floods forced the Eastern Shawnee tribe to evacuate, its ceremonial grounds covered in three feet of water.

LeBron James

Inhofe wants higher water levels at Grand Lake on the grounds that it "makes the lake a better place for recreation and commerce." We're all sure here that the facts that he has a vacation home there and a company in his wife’s name holds $1 million in property around the lake has nothing to do with his enthusiasm for deregulation.

Inhofe's middle name, no joke, is Mountain. Which seems entirely appropriate for a Clown who has rocks in his head.

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And the Clowns keep on coming. LeBron James has reportedly filed for a trademark for the phrase "Taco Tuesday," apparently based on his popular series of social media posts on the theme.

According to the application, James wants to trademark the phrase for "advertising and marketing services" through "indirect methods" that include social media and blogging.

So be careful: If you ever want to have tacos on a Tuesday, you may have to pay a fee to LeBron James, professional Clown.

the shirt

As a footnote to that, of course the phrase "Taco Tuesday" has been around a long time, long before LeBron James became a fabulously rich man who wants to be a fabulously richer one. You're not supposed to be able to trademark a common phrase or expression, but in a world where money speaks louder than law and the patent office is hopelessly overburdened, that principle did not keep Paris Hilton from trademarking "That's hot!" or Rachel Zoe from getting a trademark on the word "bananas" referring to something crazy, even though that's an expression that dates back to at least 1935.

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Then there are the Clowns of the administration of the Highland Hills Middle School in Highland Hills, Indiana, where a 13-year-old girl got in trouble over a t-shirt.

What was wrong with it? Well, it had a slogan that read "Why be racist, sexist, homophobic, or transphobic when you can just be quiet?" which the principal declared inappropriate and disrespectful, along with claiming the words “Sex” and “Homo” were too eye-catching. As you can see in the picture, yeah, they really do just pop out at you, don't they.

The school's dress code bans shirts that are "suggestive, obscene or promote alcohol or drug products or use" or are sheer. It seems that "oppose bigotry" needs to be added to that list - unless doing so is already considered obscene by the Clowns at Highland Hills Middle School.

Dan Rehill

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Finally for this time, we have the Rev. Dan Reehil, a Clown pastor at the St. Edward School, a Roman Catholic grammar school in Nashville, Tennessee. He just sent an email to parents of students telling them that the Harry Potter books have been removed from the school library because they "risk conjuring evil spirits." Seriously.

Quoting the email:

These books present magic as both good and evil, which is not true, but in fact a clever deception. The curses and spells used in the books are actual curses and spells; which when read by a human being risk conjuring evil spirits into the presence of the person reading the text.

Personally, I think that's just Riddikulus.

Clowns to the right of me, Clowns to the left of me, Clowns in front of me, volleyed and thundered....