Trump proposes to create up to 93 million refugees by making Iran uninhabitable, taking 4 or 5% of the world's oil supply offline for years, (while also cutting US wind & solar), & risk destruction of regional oil and gas facilities by Iran in retaliation. Another Great Depression? #Iran

Running for the House or Senate? Try offering the Green New Deal plus Trump impeachment. Once in office, use what power you have to do what you can. Don't bake compromise into your platform. Extreme income inequality and our dependence on fossil fuels require political surgery, not band-aids.

"Trump Says Iran to Allow More Oil Ships Through Strait of Hormuz... President Trump characterized the move as a “sign of respect.” NYT In other words, Iran controls the Strait and decides who will or will not transit it safely. #Iran

"Trump Administration to Pay $1 Billion to Energy Giant to Cancel Wind Farms" NYT The bloody-minded stupidity of this is amazing. But not too surprising. This is the same administration that sabotages vaccination programs. Self-mutilation is policy. #energy #climate I

People, please stop criticizing ICE agents for standing around doing nothing! Consider what they get up to when they're busy. This is the best-case scenario. #ICE #Airports #TSA

70's star Vallerie Perrine died at 82. Film-maker Stacey Souther, asked for donations to a GoFundMe account. He said,"“Her final wish is to be laid to rest at Forest Lawn Cemetery. He wrote, “but after more than 15 years of fighting Parkinson’s, her finances are exhausted." Life in the USA.

Will ICE agents - still getting paid, and generally at higher rates than TSA workers - work beside unpaid TSA staff? TSA staff who will have to teach ICE agents how to do their jobs? That will be interesting. #TSA #ICE #Airports

Brutal heat waves require A/C for survival. Destroy power plants, & you shut down desalination plants in a country with a severe water shortage. Making Iran unlivable would create a huge wave of Muslim refugees. Right-wing nationalists should be protesting their worst nightmare made real. #Iran

"Trump Is Finally Eyeing an Exit From Iran. But Will He Take It?" NYT No one is asking about Netanyahu's exit strategy. It's not as if Trump's decision to leave would necessarily end the war, or the threat to oil and gas infrastructure.

"Iran hits Gulf energy sites, escalating war," WaPo today. So much for JD Vance's pronostication that the rise in oil prices is a "temporary blip." If this gets out of hand, it's going to be a very long "temporary." As in years.

Per the NYT, "airstrikes hit the infrastructure of Iran’s vast South Pars offshore gas field, its biggest source of natural gas," followed by "an Iranian attack on the Ras Laffan [Qatar] energy hub." Per JD Vance, the oil & gas price rise is a "temporary blip." Someone please define "temporary."

If AI & robotics are going to be as disruptive as they say, the tech bros should be proactive, demanding an extensive social safety net, including pay for transition education & even life-long learning, a universal basic income, & Medicare for all. Or perhaps they lack a survival instinct.

I hope for rapid improvement in AI, not because I trust AI, but because the human race has reached its level of incompetence, and we need a nanny. #Iran #Trump #Hegseth

Khamenei has replaced Khamenei? Progress!

The Wall Street Journal has a story today about Trump's immigration program, and its targeting of US citizens. It's not given much space on the front page, but the content is well-researched and not flattering to the government. #Immigration #CE

This is a Republican war. Almost every Republicans in Congress voted to oppose the effort to rein in Trump; almost every Democrat supported it. All the damage this war will do - including to the US economy - is the result of actions taken by Trump with the support of the Republican Party. #Iran

We wouldn't be in the Middle East at all if the West weren't so dependent on fossil fuels. We wouldn't go to war to control the supply of dates. Oil & Gas = War. Solar + Wind + Geothermal = Peace. Or at least a lot fewer wars. We should be promoting them as peace fuels. Solar = Security., #Iran

Western thirst for fossil fuels fuels war in the Middle East. Want peace in the ME? The wind is blowing, the sun is shining, the earth is warm. And they can't be sunk. Take advantage. That's the first step. Solar, wind, geothermal = peace and security. #Iran

Western thirst for fossil fuels fuels war in the Middle East. Want peace in the ME? The wind is blowing, the sun is shining, the earth is warm. And they can't be sunk. Take advantage. That's the first step. Solar, wind, geothermal = peace and security. #Iran

I am sad. The Washington Post's censorship software doesn't like me.

I guess the climate crisis "hoax" is getting real - downed trees and power lines, over 100 dead. Wind + solar + geothermal + ever cheaper batteries = local resiliance. The grid must go underground. Investing in fossil fuels is like investing in a buggy whip shop in 1910.

"Exxon beats Wall Street Q4 target as Permian, Guyana fields take output to 40-year high" Reuters 2026-01-30 That's depressing. #climate

Man sprays Rep. Ilhan Omar with noxious substance. Security man saves the attacker from 5'2" Omar's counterattack. She refuses to leave to get checked out, requests a napkin to clean up, and continues her talk. youtu.be/bPlWUq1gFFk

In an effort to become more organized, I have started printing my updated todo list each morning. To reduce feelings of guilt, I have the word "ASPIRATIONAL" printed at the top.

Frank Brunai and Bret Stephens of the NYT had a conversation about Trump, etc. No mention of the climate crisis. Multiple reports have recently been published about the truly catastrophic risks posed by accelerating climate change. But it's not even worth mentioning in discussing US politics. .

High Food Prices - Mass Migration - Nuclear War All "low probability, but plausible" per 2025 UK study "Global Biodiversity Loss, Ecosystem Collapse and National Security". Suppressed as too pessimistic. Focus is effects on Britain, but importance is broader. Source: The Times (London).

Midwest US weather is interesting. By 7AM we'll have -15°F, wind ~24mph here in Coralville, IA. Frostbite in 5-10 minutes. Minneapolis (-22°F overnight ) is having an anti-ICE march downtown at 2PM tomorrow. It may warm up to -11°F. Will ICE stay indoors?

Explore this gift article from The New York Times. You can read it for free without a subscription. www.nytimes.com/2026/01/17/h...

The latest report from the Institute of Actuaries has just been published. The report highlights climate sensitivity and geoengineering following a warning that “catastrophic warming levels of above 2°C by 2050 are likely.” #climatechange #risk #actuaries #finance #economy #planetaryboundaries

A NYT headline comments that Trump doesn't seem interested in an "off-ramp" from the Greenland fiasco. Why should he want to find a way out of destroying NATO under the pretext of promoting US security? He's entirely unpredictable, but a reformulated NATO without the US seems likely.

To compensate Trump for the failure to give him the Nobel Peace Prize, I nominate him for the SPECTREE Award for the best James Bond villian. Special Exective for Counter-Intelligence, Terrorism, Revenge, and Extortion plus an extra E for Ecocide.

I suspect Xi Jinping is in his happy place this AM. If I were XI, I'd be lining up phone calls with every national leader who has or might anticipate having a beef with Trump, offering friendship and the opportunity to buy Chinese weapons. Also, electric cars and solar panels. #Venezuela

The lead author of a research paper from Case Western Reserve that demonstrates the reversal of Alzheimer's-like conditions in animal models is an Indian-educated woman. Couldn't a US-born white male have made this discovery? Are US schools discriminating in favor of genius? /s

If AI deployment causes a rapid & massive increase in unemployment, its billionaire backers had better have their running shoes on and their bunkers well-stocked. If they were as smart as they think they are, they'd be demanding a robust social safety net, not working to destroy what we've got.

I was just looking at a photo gallery of the cardiology fellows at the University of Iowa. If we stop taking in foreign doctors, our hospitals are screwed. Of course, so are we patients. #immigration

In Trump world, cocaine is cocaine. And mackerel is cocaine. And sardines are cocaine. As soon as the boat is sunk, it's all cocaine. We'll never know for sure. It makes me nostalgic for trial by jury.

Today, the editorial board of The Washington Post blamed the lack of free-market policies for causing Iran's worsening water crisis. They didn't even mention the decades-long drop in rainfall or rise in temperatures. #climate

I was passing through the kitchen this am and my wife had NPR on. I heard my first NPR Amazon commercial. Then I sat down at my computer with my coffee and clicked on a promo email that led to a Robert Reich YouTube video in which he referenced Amazon union busting. Interesting times. #NPR

Testing AI image generation. The White House press pool has a very bad day as Karoline Leavitt reveals her true identity as Black Canary.

Nature says incrementalism is dead. Nature speaks through tornadoes, hurricanes, floods, droughts, melting glaciers, forest fires, & other voices. Nature doesn't grant extensions. But I can't think of a single US election that was decided by the candidates' positions on the climate crisis. #climate

To get big money out of politics, we need to reverse Supreme Court decisions, from Santa Clara County v. Southern Pacific Railroad (1886) through Citizens United v. FEC (2010), that established corporations as persons with 14th Amendment rights. Corporations are not people. People are people.

🆕 Climate change and rural livelihoods: How extreme heat drives international migration from El Salvador Today on VoxDev w/ Ana María Ibáñez (IDB), Juliana Quigua (UCL), Jimena Romero (Stockholm University) & Andrea Velasquez (CU Denver): https://ow.ly/zc5S50XqokT

"Republican strategy: If we can make lives hell for enough Americans, Democrats will fold because they are empathetic and human suffering bothers them. And as Elon has told us, empathy is a weakness." The WaPo rejected this comment as violating guidelines.| #media #WaPo #censorship

Based on recent election campaigns, and panel discussions about US politics, I conclude that the climate crisis is existential, but not important. Maybe we can get nature to grant us an extension? #climate #elections

If Trump succeeds in keeping control of the House and Senate by means of voter intimidation, he will find himself with a country where over half the population considers the federal government illegitimate. He'll have a very angry tiger by the tail.

Hunter Biden's laptop, lost in the vastness of a gold-plated ballroom.

Michigan U.S. Sen. Elissa Slotkin gave a speech at the Brookings institution saying the obvious that few others have been willing to say. Trump's killing without trial at sea is a step toward killing his enemies at home.

Taxes—not just because it’s the moral thing to do, but because if we don’t we will lose democracy.