Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

The jury literally has a bell they can ring to force Trump to show up on command. Greatest thing ever!

We’ve had enough carrots to last a lifetime. break out the sticks.

I did not have this on my fuck 2024 bingo card.

Only Democrats have agency, apparently.

Technically true, but collectively nonsense

These days, even the boring Republicans are nuts.

A democracy can’t function when people can’t distinguish facts from lies.

It may be funny to you motherfucker, but it’s not funny to me.

Never entrust democracy to any process that requires Republicans to act in good faith.

GOP baffled that ‘we don’t care if you die’ is not a winning slogan.

Fundamental belief of white supremacy: white people are presumed innocent, minorities are presumed guilty.

Not all heroes wear capes.

You can’t attract Republican voters. You can only out organize them.

The fundamental promise of conservatism all over the world is a return to an idealized past that never existed.

It’s easy to sit in safety and prescribe what other people should be doing.

Wow, I can’t imagine what it was like to comment in morse code.

If you cannot answer whether trump lost the 2020 election, you are unfit for office.

White supremacy is terrorism.

“I was told there would be no fact checking.”

You don’t get rid of your umbrella while it’s still raining.

Sadly, media malpractice has become standard practice.

When your entire life is steeped in white supremacy, equality feels like discrimination.

“When somebody takes the time to draw up a playbook, they’re gonna use it.”

Incompetence, fear, or corruption? why not all three?

You are here: Home / Politics / Biden Administration in Action / Late Night Open Thread: Environmental Stewardship

Late Night Open Thread: Environmental Stewardship

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Continuing the not-so-great American tradition where Repubs break things, and Democrats come in to fix the mess as best as can be done… literally!

A U.S. judge’s surprise decision this week to annul the Biden administration’s first Gulf of Mexico oil lease auction because of its climate change impact has raised questions about the future of the nation’s federal drilling program – and played directly into the president’s hand.

President Joe Biden, a Democrat, made a campaign pledge to end federal oil and gas drilling to fight climate change, and he quickly announced a suspension of all new lease sales pending a broad review of drilling’s impact on global warming after taking office. Some 25% of U.S. oil and gas production comes from federal lands and waters.

But this administration was later forced into the sale after several drilling states successfully sued in federal court in Louisiana. They argued that U.S. law requires the federal government to hold auctions on a regular basis to enhance energy independence and generate revenue…

This week’s ruling, from a judge in the District of Columbia who was appointed by former President Barack Obama, came after a challenge by environmental group Earthjustice. The judge vacated the auction entirely, saying the Interior Department failed to properly account for its impact on global warming.

Biden’s Interior Department must now do what it originally intended: take a fresh look at environmental and climate impacts of drilling. It has not yet said yet whether it will suspend other planned drilling auctions pending review, or how long the review will take…

Chevron CEO Michael Wirth, whose company was one of the high bidders in the Gulf of Mexico sale, said Chevron was reviewing the decision.

“We’re disappointed because these lease sales have been conducted successfully in the Gulf of Mexico for decades now and have resulted in us being one of the largest leaseholders out there with over 240 leases,” he said.

One’s heart just breaks at the thought of this man’s suffering, no? (No.)

Reader Interactions

28Comments

  1. 1.

    RaflW

    I am absolutely pro-cleanup, but the ongoing process of businesses soiling our land and water, and then going strategically bankrupt, so that the gov’t has to, say, spend $11Bn on mine cleanup (passed in the mostly-Dem ‘bipartisan’ infrastructure bill) is just too damn obvious now.

    That’s one of the reasons I’m glad the Biden Admin is pulling back on new mines in MN. The total number of jerbs! jerbs! jerbs! is never that many for the local communities. And in the case of the sulfide mine waste, it’s 100s and 100s of years of treatment after the profit is extracted. No company ever, ever makes goon on that shit. It’s just a complete farrago of fanciful fuckery to think they would.

  2. 2.

    cain

    Sorry – offtopic – but watching “conservatives” whine about Whoopi not getting fired and referencing Rosanne Barr – who has shown multiple times who she is vs Whoopi – although I have no idea what point she was trying to make about Nazis and Jews and race.

  4. 4.

    Jay

    @cain:

    “race” is seen differently in the US, and the pre-Holocaust, Nuremberg Laws and the Holocaust are not well taught or understood in the US.

    the Nazi’s targeted every group the deemed was “diluting the purity of the Ayrian race”,

    Superficial understanding focused on the the elimination of “Jews”, theoretically a religion.

    Nazi’s didn’t care, you could be Catholic but if your grandmother was Jewish, you were a “Jew”.

    They started with the disabled from the Spanish Flu, worked their way through political opponents, “Jewish” peoples, LBGTQ, despite how many senior Nazi’s were LBGTQ but “semi-closeted”, Roma, Ruethiethans, Slavs, etc.

    Anything that potentially “polluted” the mythical Ayrian  race was a target.

  7. 7.

    mrmoshpotato

    Tomorrow 02/02 98% / 2.5 in

    Snow during the morning will transition to snow showers during the afternoon.

    Snow to snow showers.  Thank goodness.  I thought it was going to snow all day.

  9. 9.

    Tony Jay

    @Jay:

    Once you start your winding road to power with the gleeful justification of extra-judicial violence used against a grab-bag of ‘traitors’, it’s really not much of a stretch to death-camps and gas-chambers for everyone who isn’t one of ‘you’.

    And when you combine that with a cultist system where every action of your revolutionary state is carried out in the name of an infallible Leader, who is going to stand up and say no?

    But I digress, let’s get back to talking about the Nazis.

  10. 10.

    David ? ☘The Establishment☘? Koch

    I’m sick and tired of Biden doing good stuff.

    How am I supposed to wallow in despair when he keeps spreading cheer.

  14. 14.

    evodevo

    Good…I’ve said this for years…why should the taxpayers subsidize the extractive industries? Let them at least be forced to pay the market rate for those mining, logging, grazing, oil/gas rights/leases….federal rates are normally far below what the free markit/private owners charge…and maybe include a requirement for a cleanup bond to be posted…

  15. 15.

    Baud

    @satby:

    Do you use the website or the app? Content aside, I have difficulty with the format.  The wall of tweets overwhelms me.

  16. 16.

    mrmoshpotato

    @satby:

    South and east are going to get hammered. 1-2 feet of snow predicted for me. 

    East is that lake thing.  It can get buried in snow for all I care!

  17. 17.

    satby

    @Baud: I use the website, not the app. I’ve had an account for years, so I mainly see the accounts I follow (news, friends, other jackals, etc) instead of a flood of random stuff. And I block promoted tweets.

  19. 19.

    satby

    On topic, I’m delighted that environmental standards are being reapplied.

    And it’s 6:20 on a Wednesday morning, with no one and no cars stirring outside at all. Snow’s coming down fast in fine powdery flakes. A peaceful moment to savor.

  20. 20.

    NotMax

    @satby

    Jean Shepherd, “The Great Indiana Blizzard.”

    Wind comes off the lake “…and you can smell the polar bears.”

    ;)

  22. 22.

    Percysowner

    @mrmoshpotato: ​
     We’re predicted to get 3-6 inches, but that will be over .1 to .25 inches of ice. I’m not looking forward to the next few days.

    Fortunately, I can walk to my kids’ house, take care of the kiddo there and not drive. I’m doing a final milk run this morning, before the Apocalypse hits.

  24. 24.

    MagdaInBlack

    @Percysowner: I have ice under the snow here in beautiful Arlington Heights, IL and I am about to call a snow day. Not doing 25 miles one way in an Elantra in snow over ice tyvm.

  27. 27.

    JML

    I have some conflicted thoughts about things like copper mining, because our society is awfully thirsty for it. The environmental movement in the US is essentially at a “no new mines, period” in this country, and while I get it: the mining companies are some of the worst corporate actors you can possibly find. They’ll dodge every regulation they can get away with, they’re notorious for screwing their workers, and they’re very good at finding ways to extract money for a number of years and then somehow manage to restructure and go bankrupt to get out from the tail of pensions and environmental cleanup after they’ve essentially run it dry.

    On the other side of it, if we never open any new mines in the US, they’re going to be made elsewhere, primarily in 3rd world countries where environmental regulations are hardly even a thing, worker safety is a joke, child labor is used and every move that we hate by mining companies in the US is ten times worse overseas. And the minerals being extracted are being used to fund the US’s insatiable need for technology: the newest cell phone, bigger and better tvs, electric cars, etc. At what point do we decide that environmental justice also includes us having to take some responsibility for our own consumption and try to find a model for mining inside our borders that actually works? When do we take a risk in trying to enforce regulations here, rather than let others be ruined for our needs?

    I don’t know the answer. Mining companies cannot be trusted. But is it never going to be possible to do this right? Expecting us to simply stop our consumption of the technology that needs these minerals is unrealistic and we end up being an environmental NIMBY…

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