#49: Step away from me fortune, yeh crook!

Welcome back to "who knows what the hell is going on anymore" land where 100 mostly old white men who generally don't give a flying fuck about trees or ducks or breathable air managed to get a slim majority of votes to hold onto an Obama-era methane regulation. I mean I'm celebrating like you are but did I see it coming? No, no I did not.

However -- ONE way to read into this lovely little decision is that your activism is working. So keep it up. We're a proud support of 5calls.org, where you can make 5 calls in 5 minutes to help push your Congresshuman towards the light.

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On to the news!


1. Don't sleep on India #1: Power boss unveils plan to go totally electric by 2030. - International Business Times

"As per the International Organisation of Motor Vehicle Manufacturers, there were 28.6 million — or 2.86 crore — cars, jeeps and taxis in India. While replacing them — and more, because public demand will grow — by 2030 is one challenge, an equal if not bigger challenge will be how to keep the electric cars fuelled and running.

Goyal had an answer to that as well. He said the government was investing in charging infrastructure, "beginning with the larger consumer centres, where pollution is at all-time highs." His reference was to Delhi, where pollution has reached such heights that the city is often ranked among the most polluted in the world."

+ MY NOTES: Progress.



2. Don't sleep on India #2: how India, after building a voluntary (though heavily incentivized) universal ID database of 750 million citizens, can tackle poverty and inequality with a universal basic income. - Times of India

"In India, apart from its anti-poverty potential, it can also be a substantial measure to improve autonomy (say, of adult women, three-quarters of whom do not earn income) and dignity by giving workers an escape ladder from socially despised occupations (scavenging, waste-carrying, prostitution, etc)."

+ MY NOTES: A reminder why news re: UBI is "news most relevant to our survival as a species": local, regional, national and global economies are changing quickly, and will be, by most predictions, incredibly different in a decade. AKA a lot of 20th century jobs are going to go away, completely. New jobs will be created in manifestations we've never considered before, but there's going to be a transition period where a whole hell of a lot of people are going to be out of work and out of money, and moments such as those are typically pretty ugly from a civil unrest standpoint, and can, though not necessarily will, include the toppling of otherwise steadfast regimes, or the election of unusual candidates with little or no experience managing, say, a nuclear arsenal. 



3. Oh, hey, scientists just straight up cut HIV right out of a LIVE ANIMAL - Science Daily

"In new research published in print May 3 in the journal Molecular Therapy, scientists at the Lewis Katz School of Medicine at Temple University (LKSOM) and the University of Pittsburgh show that they can excise HIV DNA from the genomes of living animals to eliminate further infection. They are the first to perform the feat in three different animal models, including a "humanized" model in which mice were transplanted with human immune cells and infected with the virus."

+ MY NOTES: Don't come at me with your "where's my flying car" shit, this is the future



4. Investors representing a veritable shit-ton of money tell Trump to stick with Paris accord - Reuters

"Investors with more than $15 trillion of assets under management urged governments led by the United States to implement the Paris climate accord to fight climate change despite U.S. President Donald Trump's threats to pull out."

+ MY NOTES: $15 trillion. Tell your friends that. When they tell you green is bad for business, tell them that there's $15 trillion riding on Trump sticking to the goddamn plan.



5. California set an ambitious goal for fighting global warming. Time to walk the walk. - LA Times

"The state wants to slash greenhouse gas emissions so deeply in the coming years that oil refineries and other industries could face skyrocketing costs to comply with regulations, driving up gasoline prices until the system loses political support. If that happens, an effort touted as an international model for fighting global warming could collapse.

Not everyone agrees with Cullenward’s assessment, but it reflects how experts, officials and lawmakers are starting to reckon with the state’s steep ambitions and the understanding that its current policies may no longer be adequate. Although California has been gliding toward its initial goal of reducing emissions to 1990 levels by 2020, it must cut an additional 40% by 2030 under a law signed by Gov. Jerry Brown last year.
“It’s going to take bold proposals to get us to where we need to be,” said Cullenward, who has helped shape legislation in the Capitol."

+ MY NOTES: This is not going to be easy. But most things that are worth it, aren't.




SHIT I DIDN'T HAVE TIME TO GET INTO BUT YOU SHOULD STILL READ

A NYT newsletter re: climate change, interview with Climate Editor (subscribers-only)

Bikes > electric cars? 

Conscious consumerism is a lie (Thanks, Anna!)

The myth of the superhuman AI

Alaska is leaking and that is very, very bad

More on UBI: Silicon Valley's next move, and new in Europe

Why farming on Mars could help save agriculture on Earth, the only place we can still technically survive

The new World Health Organization director's got a tough ass job coming down the pipes

US life expectancy varies by *20 years* from county to county