Open thread October 25, 2022
Open thread, October 21, 2022, Angry Bear, Angry Bear Blog
Relevant and even prescient commentary on news, politics and the economy.
Open thread, October 21, 2022, Angry Bear, Angry Bear Blog
[Lots of good light reading can be found at the link below.]
https://www.mckinsey.com/industries/public-and-social-sector/our-insights/reinvesting-in-america
Over the next ten years, nearly $2 trillion dollars in federal funding for infrastructure upgrades, clean energy, domestic semiconductor manufacturing, and science and technology innovation will flow into the US economy. Driven by three pieces of legislation—the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law (BIL), the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA), and the Creating Helpful Incentives to Produce Semiconductors and Science Act (CHIPS)—this funding aims to lower carbon emissions substantially and boost US economic competitiveness, innovation, and productivity.
To maximize the impact of this generational investment, leaders across the public and private sectors will need to work together to reinvest in America…
[All those topics covered by several separate linked articles at the link above,]
Climate Pledges Are Falling Short, and a Chaotic Future Looks More Like Reality
NY Times – Oct 26
Climate Plans Remain Insufficient: More Ambitious Action Needed Now
World ‘nowhere near’ hitting emissions targets, UN says
Boston Globe – Oct 26
Fred,
Yep. Our grandchildren will be totally screwed by climate chaos. It is too late to prevent that now.
On that link that I posted at the top of the thread, then “funding aims to lower carbon emissions substantially” is just typical liberal climate chaos pablum, but “boost US economic competitiveness, innovation, and productivity” is stuff that will be needed when the global system where our financialized retail import economy crashes down around their shoulders. Back in the late 70’s we still had a chance to change this outcome, but we went entirely in the wrong direction. I was dismissed as a lunatic at the time and not much has change there either.
Agreed. But Mrs Fred & I won’t be having any grandchildren, so why worry?
As for dealing with Global Climate Change, we really should make a maximum effort regardless, just out of anti-cynicism. What do we have to lose?
Well, yes sir. Despite our half century too late start or rather because of it, then we have nothing to lose and everything to gain by putting forth our very best effort to avert disaster.
We have barely begun the necessary R&D curve that would allow humanity to survive our own industrial age waste and realistically continue in a manner in which most of humanity would be willing to subscribe. OTOH, if not that, then humanity’s consumption of resources can be whittled down to something that would fit into the remaining available space regardless of human preferences; i.e., succumb to the whimper rather than the bang.
It’s likely that the conventional wisdom is that ‘fixing the problem is too expensive an undertaking’, ‘we don’t really know how to fix the problem, so whatever we do will be pointless/wasteful’, ‘no one alive today is going to be around for that long anyway’, ‘this is what God intends’, or some combination of these notions.
The dinosaurs would have done the same, so that’s that. We’re done.
Unless you believe in miracles.
The Ministry for the Future – Wikipedia
by Kim Stanley Robinson, describes how some fixes can be made that end up working over the course of this century. Worth a read.
In Francis Fukuyama‘s view the novel is “ludicrously unrealistic” and “Robinson posits the most optimistic possible political developments at every turn.”
“We’re Cooked”
Beyond Catastrophe A New Climate Reality Is Coming Into View
NY Times magazine – Oct 26
You can never really see the future, only imagine it, then try to make sense of the new world when it arrives.
Just a few years ago, climate projections for this century looked quite apocalyptic, with most scientists warning that continuing “business as usual” would bring the world four or even five degrees Celsius of warming — a change disruptive enough to call forth not only predictions of food crises and heat stress, state conflict and economic strife, but, from some corners, warnings of civilizational collapse and even a sort of human endgame. (Perhaps you’ve had nightmares about each of these and seen premonitions of them in your newsfeed.)
Now, with the world already 1.2 degrees hotter, scientists believe that warming this century will most likely fall between two or three degrees. (A United Nations report released this week ahead of the COP27 climate conference in Sharm el Sheikh, Egypt, confirmed that range.) A little lower is possible, with much more concerted action; a little higher, too, with slower action and bad climate luck. Those numbers may sound abstract, but what they suggest is this: Thanks to astonishing declines in the price of renewables, a truly global political mobilization, a clearer picture of the energy future and serious policy focus from world leaders, we have cut expected warming almost in half in just five years. …
(A lengthy article, with dramatic photography.)
(OK, sometimes I like to read what Ross Douthat has to say.)
Newsom vs. DeSantis Is Our Inevitable Culture War
NY Times – Oct 26