Happy Earth Day!

When I interviewed him years ago, Steve Jobs told me that one of his favorite Bob Dylan songs was "Only a Pawn in their Game."

Fact check: true

in case you were wondering how all those lawsuits against Big Oil for climate damages are going to go.

The same people who argue with climate scientists about who knows more about climate are naturally going to argue with the Pope about who knows more about Jesus.

Big Oil has built a new pipeline from your wallet to theirs.

"Every month, Rebecca Michalski takes a deep breath before opening her electric bill. She lives on a fixed income, and heating her small house this winter has been staggering: Her February charge was $940.08 — more than her check."

"it’s sad to watch this country sabotage itself and cede the most important industry of the future to China.... In the end, we aren’t just burning fossil fuels; we’re also burning our future." open.substack.com/pub/paulkrug...

My daughter had a better grasp of Earth science in Third Grade.

What if July, but in April

How many people does climate change kill every summer? Great post by @andrewdessler.com on why the answer you get depends on how you ask the question.

The bizarre pretzel logic of MAGA world is brought to you by the fossil fuels industry. bsky.app/profile/atru...

👉 "...if there was a theme, it was that everything was so complicated and uncertain that no-one can know anything. This is a notable contrast to previous outings where everything was definitely due to the sun or ‘natural’ variability (anything but carbon remains the organizing principle)."

"In the end, the defeat of Viktor Orbán ... required not just an ordinary election campaign or new messaging but rather the construction of a broad, diverse, and patriotic grassroots social movement. And by building exactly that, Hungary’s opposition changed politics around the world."

Big Oil is terrified they will be held accountable for decades of lying about what they knew about climate change and for the harms their Big Tobacco-like advocacy for fossil fuels has done to us all. www.nytimes.com/2026/04/13/o...

Could we do a Truman Show situation where we build a fake Oval Office where he watches AI created fake news about himself and let him believe he's still president and tweet the hours away and meanwhile we can impeach him and move on...I'm not sure he'd know the difference

The result is huge. Vast in its consequences. Orban was the inspiration to all those who came after him. He served as Putin's puppet, undermining Europe from within and Ukraine from without. He funded a vast network of fascists around the world. It's all vulnerable now, or falling apart entirely.

Make America read again (or at least California, anyway) @katieporterca.bsky.social

This seems suboptimal

We need to talk a bit about how utterly absurd the March heatwave was in the USA. This heatwave would have been impossible without a boost from climate change, but even with climate change it remains a deeply unlikely event. A thread looking at some of the numbers. 🧵

Just to crib Jan's great chart here a little bit - here are just a few of the headlines that came out when growth somewhat slowed in 2024 Many, many media outlets do not really know how to handle technological change like this

Albertine, George Orwell’s favorite rose, in full bloom in Austin.

All the grey hair in this audience, a hospice-leaning crowd of old white men who just don't give a fuck.

the thing about a publicly funded space program is that you get to be represented by these people as opposed to, say, Jeff Bezos's second wife

@emorwee.bsky.social: “What really makes this story remarkable is not simply that oil executives got rich from a war. It’s how perfectly legal and normal it all is, and what that legality reveals about who wins and who loses when America goes to war.” open.substack.com/pub/heated/p...

One of the top headlines of the day.

A propos of nothing, "So it is to be war between us. If these demands are not met, a disaster beyond all imagination will occur!" . . . . is from Phantom of the Opera, and I find myself recalling that Andrew Lloyd Webber used to live in Trump Tower, and also this: www.rawstory.com/trump-white-...

Thinking about when Anthony Bourdain visited Iran, and he said, "It wasn’t supposed to be like this—of all the places, of all the countries, all the years of traveling, it’s here, in Iran, that I am greeted most warmly by total strangers."

Trump is not just a creation of Big Oil, he is the most vivid expression of its values and moral character.

I’ve been there. This is true

I asked Google about life in Tehran

“I don’t see why [fossil fuel companies] would be pushing for immunity if they thought they could win on the merits of their case ... The evidence shows they knew about climate risks for decades and lied about it, so they’re trying to change the rules of the game entirely.”

Publicly-funded science is a source of knowledge that is not under the sway of the executive. It is therefore a threat to their ability to shape/control narratives and declare 'truth' via executive order. It produces meaning in shades of gray instead of the desired black/white absolutes.

It's beautiful. Let's try not to fuck the whole thing up.

Constitutional lawyer here. I don't think it would violate the Constitution for the VP/Cabinet to invoke the 25th Amendment, but the intended constitutional remedy for this behavior is impeachment & removal. The fact that that remedy is politically impossible is a scandal and a crisis.

2022: "The Pentagon slammed Russia’s barrage of missile strikes across Ukrainian cities & said Moscow’s deliberate targeting of energy infrastructure is a war crime." 2025: "Tuesday will be Power Plant Day, & Bridge Day, all wrapped up in one, in Iran...Open the Fuckin' Strait you crazy bastards...

Nice commentary on climate change planning. “The climate does not negotiate with infrastructure timelines. In Corpus Christi, the forecast arrived before the infrastructure did. Other Texas cities are likely to encounter the same alignment problem as their reservoirs decline.”

Another example of refusing to collect data whose results you don’t like: Forest Service Will Close Research Stations That Study Wildfire Risk www.nytimes.com/2026/04/03/c...

The Trump budget once again proposes to eliminate NOAA OAR, which brings you the CO₂ Keeling Curve. In this piece, I argued that the Keeling Curve is a treasure that belongs to humanity as the most poignant indication of our impact on the environment and as a testament to our ability to document it.

incredible that there's any doubt about what Trump is doing across the world in the name of climate denial and fossil-energy dominance

Great use of a great song.

Glacial ice is melting like a popsicle dropped on a hot summer sidewalk.

The crazy heat wave that gripped the southwest half of the U.S. in late March 2026 joins our semi-subjective top-six list of the meteorologically stunning extreme events this century that have most astonished myself and @bhensonweather.bsky.social : yaleclimateconnections.org/2026/04/the-...

No matter how high the price of oil climbs, the actual price is far, far higher

Solar saved Europe €3bn in fossil fuel imports in March: A new analysis found that Europe’s solar capabilities could save the continent €67.5 billion by the end of the year if gas prices remain high. www.euronews.com/2026/04/01/s...

Staggering to contemplate the appetite for abject corruption and humiliation that it will require to be nominated as one of Trump’s replacement secretaries

“I felt a lot of pressure as I got better known that if you wanna get rich, keep your mouth closed.”

Consider the opportunity costs of the war in Iran. The missiles might have been sent to Ukraine, to end that war. The money might have bought healthcare for Americans. The attention of Europe and Asia might have been focused on countering Russia and China, not re-opening the Strait of Hormuz

The walls have been breached. Just went for walk in my Austin neighborhood and spotted this Chinese BYD EV. Second BYD I’ve seen in a week.

This is what a 150 year-long fossil fuel binge will get you. And this year's sauna party is just getting started.