From denial to ambiguity: A new study charts the trajectory of ExxonMobil’s climate messaging

From denial to ambiguity: A new study charts the trajectory of ExxonMobil’s climate messaging

Inside Climate News reports: Fossil fuel companies’ messaging on climate change has revolved around some common refrains: Energy demand must grow to alleviate global poverty, so fossil fuels are critical to economic growth. Technological innovation is key to limiting emissions, and consumers can do their part by using energy efficiently. New research shows that these arguments were carefully cultivated over the course of decades by ExxonMobil, which beginning in the early 2000s shifted away from outright obfuscation of climate science…

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Vaccines seem to work well against coronavirus variants. It’s also complicated

Vaccines seem to work well against coronavirus variants. It’s also complicated

STAT reports: The question about how Covid-19 vaccines stand up to coronavirus variants often gets distilled to: Do they work? The simplest answer is yes. People who’ve received one of the highly powerful vaccines don’t need to be too worried about the variants for now, experts say. But the complete answer is more complicated. The real question isn’t whether the vaccines work, but how well they do. Even the best vaccines allow some “breakthrough infections” — infections in people who’ve…

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Right-wing activists and British former spy said to have plotted to discredit Trump ‘enemies’ in government

Right-wing activists and British former spy said to have plotted to discredit Trump ‘enemies’ in government

The New York Times reports: A network of conservative activists, aided by a British former spy, mounted a campaign during the Trump administration to discredit perceived enemies of President Trump inside the government, according to documents and people involved in the operations. The campaign included a planned sting operation against Mr. Trump’s national security adviser at the time, H.R. McMaster, and secret surveillance operations against F.B.I. employees, aimed at exposing anti-Trump sentiment in the bureau’s ranks. The operations against the…

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What our use of animal-based slurs and endearments says about us

What our use of animal-based slurs and endearments says about us

David Egan writes: Human hatreds take on a depressing variety of forms: in addition to individual hatreds, the world roils with xenophobia, racism, misogyny, homophobia, transphobia, and on and on and on. Less remarked upon is an underlying zoophobia – a fear of, or antipathy towards, animals – that’s manifest in many of the slurs and insults directed at other human beings. Calling a person an animal is usually a comment on their unrestrained appetites, especially for food (‘like a…

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Palestinian refugees deserve to return home. Jews should understand

Palestinian refugees deserve to return home. Jews should understand

Peter Beinart writes: Why has the impending eviction of six Palestinian families in East Jerusalem drawn Israelis and Palestinians into a conflict that appears to be spiraling toward yet another war? Because of a word that in the American Jewish community remains largely taboo: the Nakba. The Nakba, or “catastrophe” in Arabic, need not refer only to the more than 700,000 Palestinians who were expelled or fled in terror during Israel’s founding. It can also evoke the many expulsions that…

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Netanyahu: We will bring rule of law to Israel’s cities with an iron fist

Netanyahu: We will bring rule of law to Israel’s cities with an iron fist

The Jerusalem Post reports: Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu vowed to crack down on rioters on Wednesday, after Arabs in mixed cities attacked their Jewish neighbors’ homes, synagogues and businesses. “We are in a struggle on multiple fronts,” Netanyahu said on a visit to Acre. “Last night, after the discussions and decisions at the Defense Ministry about the Gaza Strip, I went to Lod at 2 a.m., another front that opened up with anarchy.” Netanyahu pointed to the extra police and…

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A GOP civil war? Don’t bet on it

A GOP civil war? Don’t bet on it

Jeff Greenfield writes: If you’ve been reading the coverage lately, or listened to gloating Democrats, it’s easy to believe the Republican Party is eating itself alive. The former Republican president literally campaigns against incumbents of his own party. NBC calls it a “GOP power struggle”; The Hill describes “deep rifts”; and the Democratic National Committee exults over “a GOP civil war.” After losing the White House, the House and the Senate, its congressional leadership is now in open conflict; Wednesday,…

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Inside Liz Cheney’s plan to take on former president Donald Trump

Inside Liz Cheney’s plan to take on former president Donald Trump

The Washington Post reports: Rep. Liz Cheney lost her House leadership position Wednesday, but she aims to become an even more influential political figure capable of weakening former president Trump’s hold on their party — and continuing to push for his purge. Rather than focusing on whipping votes to save her job as conference chair, the Wyoming Republican has drafted plans for increased travel and media appearances, such as an interview Wednesday on NBC’s “Today Show,” meant to drive home…

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How a small city in Brazil may reveal how fast vaccines can curb Covid

How a small city in Brazil may reveal how fast vaccines can curb Covid

Science News reports: The city of Serrana in Brazil is a living experiment. The picturesque place, surrounded by sugarcane fields, is nestled in the southeast of one of the countries hit hardest by COVID-19. By the end of March, daily deaths in Brazil surged to 3,000 on average a day, a high in a pandemic that has claimed more than 405,000 lives there — the second worst death toll of any country in the world behind only the United States….

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Climate emissions shrinking the stratosphere, scientists reveal

Climate emissions shrinking the stratosphere, scientists reveal

The Guardian reports: Humanity’s enormous emissions of greenhouse gases are shrinking the stratosphere, a new study has revealed. The thickness of the atmospheric layer has contracted by 400 metres since the 1980s, the researchers found, and will thin by about another kilometre by 2080 without major cuts in emissions. The changes have the potential to affect satellite operations, the GPS navigation system and radio communications. The discovery is the latest to show the profound impact of humans on the planet….

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It’s time to kick gas

It’s time to kick gas

Bill McKibben writes: We’re used to the idea that CO2—one carbon atom, two oxygen atoms—is a dangerous molecule. Indeed, driving down carbon-dioxide emissions has become the way that many leaders and journalists describe our task. But CH4—one carbon atom combined with four hydrogen atoms, otherwise known as methane—is carbon dioxide’s evil twin. It traps heat roughly eighty times more efficiently than carbon dioxide does, which explains why the fact that it’s spiking in the atmosphere scares scientists so much. Despite…

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The latest Israel-Palestine crisis isn’t a ‘real estate dispute.’ It’s ethnic cleansing

The latest Israel-Palestine crisis isn’t a ‘real estate dispute.’ It’s ethnic cleansing

Hayes Brown writes: As we’re watching what might well turn into a third intifada play out in Jerusalem, images of fires burning among the trees outside the Al-Aqsa mosque and reports of children being injured in a new volley of airstrikes in Gaza, I can’t get a line from the Israeli Foreign Affairs Ministry out of my head. “Regrettably, the PA” — the Palestinian Authority — “and Palestinian terror groups are presenting a real-estate dispute between private parties, as a…

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‘Civil war’ breaks out in central Israeli city as mayor calls for military

‘Civil war’ breaks out in central Israeli city as mayor calls for military

Agencies report: The mayor of Israel’s Lod city pointed to a “civil war out of control,” Israeli media reported late Tuesday, calling upon Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to send military forces to handle the situation. The central Israeli city witnessed fierce clashes with police after a funeral procession of an Arab Israeli killed by an Israeli settler. Israeli daily Yediot Ahronoth reported two Israeli police officers in the city of Lod were injured in the clashes, which also saw a…

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U.S. judge tosses NRA bankruptcy bid, letting New York seek dissolution

U.S. judge tosses NRA bankruptcy bid, letting New York seek dissolution

Reuters reports: A federal judge in Dallas ruled on Tuesday that the National Rifle Association cannot use bankruptcy to reorganize in gun-friendly Texas, dealing a serious blow to the influential gun rights group’s effort to avoid a lawsuit in New York seeking its dissolution. U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Harlin Hale said the NRA did not file for Chapter 11 protection in good faith, but rather did so to avoid oversight by New York Attorney General Letitia James and gain an “unfair…

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