Balloon Juice - Climate Change Archives

Help a Gal Out: Best EV Advice

by TaMara| November 23, 20252:02 pm| 78 Comments

This post is in: Climate Change Solutions, Dog Blogging, Pet Blogging

I’m seriously considering moving from my 7-year-old Niro PHEV (plug-in hybrid) to an EV soon. I’m looking at the 2026 Hyundai Ioniq 5. They’ve dropped the price almost $10k over the 2025 – it loses a few features that I can live without to accommodate that price drop (heated steering wheel, I will miss you, but I’m a CO girl, I have gloves stashed everywhere).

I am open to other vehicle suggestions – you know my requirements – it has to easily hold three Great Danes for long trips. Excellent mileage per charge is important, too. CO is not a small state. And of course, YIKES, I cannot afford a VW ID4 or KIA EV9. Somebody has to feed the menagerie.

I also would love some advice and resources for level 2 home chargers (plug-in, not hardwired), best apps for travel, and anything that will help me with the learning curve. Advice on learning regenerative braking, public charging etiquette, experiences charging on long trips*, etc, etc…I feel like I’m going to have to learn how to drive all over again.

Tell me about your experiences, the good, the bad, the ugly.

What else do I need to know before I make the leap??

I know I’m missing out on any federal rebates/tax credits, but CO still has a few that are helpful.

*I’ve had some fun planning trips out on a few apps and was surprised that the advice was to charge here or there for 10 minutes instead of a longer charge and get to the destinations with charge to spare on a 480-mile trip.

Let’s here your experiences! And thanks in advance. Here’s a bonus dogs sleeping with ducks! moment:

That’s Nora, having climbed in the dog bed next to Scout, and Scout doing her best to ignore her. I have no idea why Nora has decided Scout is her best friend, but she has. For those who don’t know, once Nick died, Nora has been getting about 30 minutes of “family time” indoors every few nights. She may or may not enjoy it, LOL.

Alright, hit the comments with your advice, I KNOW you have opinions.

Help a Gal Out: Best EV AdvicePost + Comments (78)

Trump Crony Open Thread: We Shall Not See His Like Again (If We’re Lucky)

by Anne Laurie| November 19, 20255:15 pm| 30 Comments

This post is in: How about that weather?, Open Threads, Trump Crime Cartel

Breaking news: David Richardson resigned as acting head of FEMA.
Richardson was known for frequently being inaccessible, including during the early hours of the flood disaster in Texas over the Fourth of July weekend.

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— The Washington Post (@washingtonpost.com) November 17, 2025 at 12:58 PM

Unlike most Trump subordinates, he doesn’t seem to have wanted the job in the first place, but he’s not gonna be missed now that he’s (officially) gone. Per the Washington Post, “FEMA head resigns. Richardson had been hard to reach during Texas floods” [gift link]:

David Richardson on Monday resigned as acting head of the Federal Emergency Management Agency, ending a brief tenure leading an agency that the Trump administration has publicly expressed a desire to dismantle.

Richardson, who spent about six months as the acting head of the nation’s disaster response agency, has kept a low profile and is known for often being inaccessible, including during the early hours of the flood disaster in Texas over the Fourth of July weekend.

In recent months, five current agency employees said Richardson spent little time in daily operations meetings and shrank away from the role — one that typically demands the administrator be easily reachable. The staffers, like others interviewed for this story and previous coverage, spoke on the condition of anonymity out of fear of retaliation.

After The Washington Post and other outlets reported Richardson’s resignation Monday, Department of Homeland Security assistant secretary for public affairs Tricia McLaughlin said in a statement that FEMA’s current chief of staff, Karen Evans, will “step into this important role” at the beginning of December. DHS oversees the emergency management agency…

The latest departure comes as FEMA faces an uncertain future, and could face a significant overhaul. The administration is waiting for guidance from a review council, commissioned by President Donald Trump and headed by DHS Secretary Kristi L. Noem, working on a report of how disaster response can be improved in the United States. The council could recommend ways to reform or perhaps further shrink the agency…

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Since Trump took office, FEMA has lost as much as a quarter of its workforce, according to multiple officials within the agency. Amid recent changes, dozens of employees in August signed their names to a public letter criticizing the agency’s leadership and warned that it had been operating under leaders who lack the qualifications and authority to manage FEMA’s operations.

Employees also said leadership had eroded the agency’s ability to effectively manage emergencies and other operations, including national security work, pointing specifically to stringent new rules and budget restrictions imposed by Noem, which require her approval for any expenditure over $100,000…

Richardson, a former Marine Corps artillery officer who was leading the Countering Weapons of Mass Destruction office, took over for Cameron Hamilton in May, after Noem ousted Hamilton for publicly contradicting the administration’s desired aim to eliminate FEMA as it exists today.

Hamilton, who now consults on disaster response and recovery operations, has spoken out about his concerns over FEMA’s direction and the kind of leadership the agency and the country need.

“Right now unfortunately we have a FEMA that is not as well equipped and prepared as they have been before,” Hamilton said in an interview. “Instead of the rhetoric of abolish and dismantling, we should be seeing this agency as a tremendous asset. They are some of the best public servants I have ever worked with, because they maintain a survivor centric focus.”

He said of Richardson’s resignation, “I wish Dave well, but he never should’ve been there to begin with.”…

During his first day at FEMA, Richardson held an all-hands meeting that quickly made headlines.

He told thousands of staff members listening in: “Don’t get in my way.”

He was there to “achieve the president’s intent for FEMA,” which would probably transform the agency.

“What it’s going to look like in the end, we’ll find out,” he said, and then added: “I and I alone speak for FEMA.”

I can’t find the photos of Richardson wandering around his headquarters in a vacation polo & cargo shorts a week after the Texas floods in July, but it was pretty clear at the time that he would not depart trailing clouds of glory. His acting replacement, Karen Evans, is a cybersecurity expert who doesn’t intend to stick around, either.

Permanent replacement now being touted is Nim Kidd. Per the Texas Tribune, “Trump administration considers moving FEMA to Texas and tapping state’s top emergency official, report says”:

… In February, Trump interviewed Nim Kidd, head of the Texas Division of Emergency Management, to run FEMA. Kidd later acknowledged the interview but declined the position, writing on LinkedIn that he is “committed to serving Texas first.”

Kidd sits on a 13-member FEMA review council that Trump appointed. Politico reported that the panel is expected to recommend FEMA’s move to Texas. The outlet said that would accommodate Kidd’s wish to remain in Texas.

Kidd could not be immediately reached for comment Monday. Gov. Greg Abbott also sits on the review council and could not be immediately reached. The Politico report did not say what city could be under consideration for a potential FEMA relocation.

U.S. Sen. John Cornyn of Texas called Kidd “the GOAT,” Monday on X, an acronym for “greatest of all time.”

Kidd began his career 33 years ago as a volunteer firefighter in La Vernia. He has overseen the state’s response to several large and deadly disasters, including this year’s Hill Country floods and last year’s Panhandle wildfires…

Moving the agency about 1,500 miles from Washington to Texas could create “huge challenges” by separating the headquarters from its overseeing agency, one former FEMA official told Politico.

Demanding FEMA’s remaining employees relocate to some unknown Texas location for what is being broadcast as temporary positions would certainly be one way to further reduce headcount. It’s not as though there were any indications that FEMA might need resources in the immediate future, after all…

"After Melissa, how much stronger will future hurricanes be?" by Thais Lopez Vogel for @theinvadingsea.bsky.social: www.theinvadingsea.com/2025/11/10/h…

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— Michael E. Mann (@michaelemann.bsky.social) November 18, 2025 at 3:23 PM

Trump Crony Open Thread: We Shall Not See His Like Again (If We’re Lucky)Post + Comments (30)

Sunday Morning Open Thread

by Anne Laurie| November 2, 20257:17 am| 167 Comments

This post is in: Climate Change, Open Threads, Proud to Be A Democrat, Religion, Republicans in Disarray!

Dodgers Fans In Echo Park Celebrate Another World Series Victory
@shoton35mm.bsky.social

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— L.A. TACO (@lataco.bsky.social) November 2, 2025 at 1:21 AM

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Día de los Muertos’s historical roots extend back thousands of years to ancient Aztec Indigenous traditions and are still being observed by descendants, the Nahua people.

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— The Washington Post (@washingtonpost.com) November 1, 2025 at 6:00 PM

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Lucia Ortiz trudges through endless fields of cempasuchil flowers, the luminescent orange petals of which will soon cloak everything from city streets to cemeteries across Mexico.

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— The Associated Press (@apnews.com) October 30, 2025 at 6:30 AM

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Because Sharing is caring:

If you're worried about delayed SNAP benefits or don’t know where to turn for food assistance — call Project Bread's FoodSource Hotline. 📞 Call or text: 1-800-645-8333 or learn more 🌐 projectbread.org/foodsource-hotline

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— Project Bread (@projectbread.org) October 31, 2025 at 12:22 PM

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Mayors and governors from San Francisco to Virginia will cover millions of dollars in missing federal assistance to feed their most vulnerable residents as the Trump administration battles orders from two federal judges to release backup funds.

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— The Washington Post (@washingtonpost.com) November 1, 2025 at 9:00 PM

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President Trump has done little public campaigning in marquee races where Democrats are running heavily against him, keeping a distance from some Republican candidates and signaling some pessimism about next Tuesday’s elections.

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— The Washington Post (@washingtonpost.com) November 1, 2025 at 1:00 PM

Don Chickensh*t:

President Donald Trump has done little public campaigning in marquee races where Democrats are running heavily against him, keeping a distance from some Republican candidates and signaling some pessimism about next Tuesday’s elections.

In Virginia, Trump has reserved his explicit support for just one statewide candidate — Attorney General Jason Miyares, who is viewed as the likeliest candidate on the GOP ticket to win. Trump has not officially endorsed the nominee for governor, Lt. Gov. Winsome Earle-Sears, who is trailing in the polls.

In New Jersey, Trump has limited his engagement on behalf of Jack Ciattarelli, the unusually competitive GOP nominee for governor, to an endorsement and a telerally. There is some debate in the party over how widely visible a surrogate Trump should be in a state where he made gains in 2024 but has faced a backlash over his agenda.

In California, where Democrats are increasingly hopeful they will win a vote to redraw congressional districts, Trump has mostly hung back and this past week sought to preemptively discredit the vote, without presenting evidence for his claims. Trump’s team worked with GOP allies to raise $25 million for voter turnout, but Republicans’ data suggested Proposition 50 was likely to pass, which made the Trump political team wary of more spending, according to a person familiar with their thinking who, like some others, spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss internal conversations.

Trump has long shown an eagerness to put his stamp on what he says are major accomplishments, including electoral victories, at times jumping in at the last minute to claim credit. While he has been known to rapidly step up his involvement as he sees fit and could shift his stance, Trump has no plans to rally voters in person in New Jersey or Virginia in the final days of the race, according to a senior White House official…

Tuesday’s elections, happening in mostly Democratic-leaning states, will provide one of the most concrete snapshots yet of voter attitudes about Trump’s second term. They are also expected to inform both parties’ strategies headed into next year’s midterms.

The president is keeping a light footprint as Republican campaigns are careful in how they talk about him. Polls show Trump’s approval ratings have dropped since he took office again, even as he is still popular among many loyal supporters GOP candidates need to turn out when he is not on the ballot. Some Trump allies are skeptical that the base that came out for Trump in presidential elections will be there Tuesday…

Sunday Morning Open ThreadPost + Comments (167)

Cleaning Up After Hurricane Melissa

by Anne Laurie| October 31, 202512:25 am| 12 Comments

This post is in: Climate Change, How about that weather?, How Do We Move Forward?

New images show the swaths of destruction across Jamaica left by Hurricane Melissa, from roofs completely ripped off homes to entire towns flooded. The storm also slammed Cuba, which suffered flash flooding, and Haiti where the government is reporting more than 20 deaths.
youtu.be/XPuveykbnBg?…

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— Jonathan-FL #HumanRightsForEVERYONE (@amerliberal.bsky.social) October 30, 2025 at 8:19 PM

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For those of us with Caribbean roots, seeing the damage from Hurricane Melissa hits especially hard. Privileged to talk to organizers in Jamaica who are already looking ahead. @adamlmahoney.bsky.social @capitalb.bsky.social
capitalbnews.org/hurricane-me…

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— Victoria St. Martin (@victoriastmartin.bsky.social) October 30, 2025 at 8:07 PM

From Capital B News, “Jamaican Americans Mobilize After the Island’s Worst Hurricane in a Century”:

… After Hurricane Melissa hammered Jamaica as a Category 5 storm, bringing 185 mph winds on Tuesday afternoon, it brought life-threatening storm surge and floods to Cuba and Haiti. It later turned towards the Bahamas and headed to Bermuda.

The storm, one of the most powerful ever recorded in the Atlantic, left Jamaica reeling before weakening slightly as it crossed warm Caribbean waters toward its next target.

In its wake, dozens have died amid widespread destruction across Cuba, Haiti, and Jamaica. More than two dozen people died in Jamaica and Haiti as of Thursday. The exact death toll will become clearer in coming days once aid workers are able to reach more remote and damaged areas.

Simpson is the founder and CEO of Ignite Jamaica Fund, a nonprofit based in Philadelphia that does educational advocacy work on the island. Ever since the hurricane touched down there, she’s been reaching out to friends and family in Manchester, a parish in the western region. She said she wanted to “get updates beyond the media and hearing from them what they were experiencing.”

As the storm pummeled Jamaica, it brought the strongest hurricane wind speed to make landfall in 90 years. With it came catastrophic floods, landslides, and a sea surge up to 13 feet along the island’s southern coast. The storm knocked out power and telecommunications for much of the country, with internet connectivity dropping to about 30% of normal levels by Tuesday night, according to NetBlocks, which monitors global outages.

Power lines, roads, and bridges were damaged across the island, and more than half a million people were left without electricity…

The island is home to about 2.8 million people, about 90% of whom are Black. The diaspora of Jamaica — or the Jamaicans who have left and their descendants who live in the U.S. and all over the world — is estimated to be over 2 million people.

Daryl Vaz, Jamaica’s science, energy, telecommunications and transport minister, told Sky News that initial reports from the hardest-hit western parishes were “catastrophic.” In Saint Elizabeth Parish, where Melissa made landfall, floodwaters and flying debris destroyed homes and farms in what officials described as a “complete disaster.”…

Melissa made landfall early Wednesday in eastern Cuba as a Category 3 storm with sustained winds near 120 mph, according to the National Hurricane Center. Cuban President Miguel Díaz-Canel warned residents late Tuesday of a “very difficult night,” urging them to stay sheltered. Officials said roughly 750,000 people were evacuated.

Melissa likely caused $7.7 billion of damage in Jamaica alone, according to catastrophe modeler Enki Research. But across the entire Northern Caribbean, recovery will be difficult…

Aid experts fear that Jamaica and Cuba could face severe public health challenges in the days ahead — contaminated water, collapsed medical facilities, disease outbreaks, and growing mental health crises. The United Nations has warned that budget cuts and reduced global aid donations are expected to limit the amount of food and emergency support agencies like the World Food Program can provide this year.

Much of Jamaica’s southern coast, its agricultural “breadbasket,” remains underwater after more than 2 feet of rain…

The government of Jamaica has set up an official website for updates on the storm as well as donations for emergency relief, housing reconstruction, and health care…

Links for other programs on the ground — including, of course, World Central Kitchen — at the link.

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World Central Kitchen (WCK) staff arrived in Jamaica this morning (October 30) with relief supplies to support communities affected by Hurricane Melissa.
#WorldCentralKitchen #HurricaneMelissa #ReliefEfforts #Jamaica #Hurricane #Melissa #Relief

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— Michael Barthel (@mibawi.bsky.social) October 30, 2025 at 1:30 PM

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I wrote for @msnbc.com about Hurricane Melissa, Jamaica, rapid intensification, emissions imbalances, and what a storm that strong might do to the US:

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— Dave Levitan (@davelevitan.bsky.social) October 30, 2025 at 6:28 PM

… Jamaica felt the full wrath of Melissa, a storm that needed only 24 hours to intensify from a tropical storm to a Category 4 behemoth. By the time it made landfall only 10 or 12 miles from Black River in New Hope, it had grown even stronger: Category 5, 185 mph winds — or maybe even stronger — and a slow, meandering pace that let it lash its targets with that wind and rain for too long.

This has become a grim hallmark of a warming world. Rapid intensification of hurricanes relies on conditions that in decades past were much more rare than they are today. A 2023 study found that the average maximum rate of intensification was almost 30% higher from 2001 to 2020 than it was between 1971 and 1990; the number of storms that leap from Category 1 to Category 3 or higher within 36 hours has “more than doubled” in that modern era compared to in the past. Since that study came out, we have witnessed, among other examples, Hurricane Milton’s wind speed jump 95 mph in a day.

The main culprit is heat. Abnormally warm waters — both at the surface and down below — helped Melissa gain strength, even as it took a leisurely path that in a normal world would likely lead its power to wane. That warmth is being added, year by year, via the greenhouse gases the world continues to emit. Saying so has become cliche at this point, but once again, it’s necessary to point out that the countries barely responsible for the emission of greenhouse gases are bearing the brunt of the consequences…

The other anomaly facing Jamaica and the rest of the region isn’t climatological, but governmental. The Trump administration has made some promising noises this week about providing aid as the damage becomes more clear, but it is doing so after nine months of attempts to kneecap a wide swath of government function and while, notably, the federal government remains shut down. Already, the difference in response to disasters rich countries’ emissions have helped fuel is plain: Only a year ago, the United States Agency for International Development, or USAID, sent staff and supplies to the Caribbean before Hurricane Beryl arrived on its tear through the region, along with coordinating the response once it had passed. This time, USAID is … gone…

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Haiti, Jamaica and Cuba pick up the pieces after Melissa’s destruction
apnews.com/article/hurr…

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— Denise Oliver-Velez (@deniseoliver-velez.bsky.social) October 30, 2025 at 10:07 AM

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It's bad. They really took a hit. And folks are now on the ground in Jamaica moving to help. They need our support:
www.today.com/news/how-to-…

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— David Simon (@audacityofdespair.bsky.social) October 30, 2025 at 12:38 PM

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As Jamaica worked on Thursday to assess the damage from Hurricane Melissa, it faced a long and daunting road to recovery, particularly in the western part of the country. That region was hardest hit by the hurricane, among the strongest ever recorded in the Atlantic. www.nytimes.com/2025/10/30/u…

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— The New York Times (@nytimes.com) October 30, 2025 at 6:13 PM

[Gift link]

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Hurricane Melissa made landfall in the Caribbean as one of the strongest hurricanes on record, causing death and massive devastation. Haiti, Jamaica, Cuba, Bahamas, and everyone in its wake is going to need support. Here are a few ways you can help:
apnews.com/article/hurr…

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— Misha Collins (@mishacollins.bsky.social) October 29, 2025 at 1:09 PM

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#HappeningNow: The first shipment of emergency relief supplies is officially sailing to Jamaica to support communities hardest hit by #HurricaneMelissa.
Thank you, France, for your partnership! 🇫🇷 🇺🇳

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— KarenM (Sussex Squad) (@karensussex.bsky.social) October 30, 2025 at 6:01 PM

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US prepared to offer humanitarian aid to Cuba after hurricane, Rubio says reut.rs/47ydlHy

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— Reuters (@reuters.com) October 30, 2025 at 10:10 AM

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How Jamaica took out an insurance policy for itself, and why it’s about to pay off after Hurricane Melissa
$150M US ‘catastrophe bond’ issued last year headed to full payout, will provide Jamaica immediate help

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— Ravi 🇨🇦 (@medical91.bsky.social) October 30, 2025 at 9:49 AM

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#HurricaneMelissa has struck #Jamaica, #Cuba, #Haiti and other countries.
MSF is preparing to send emergency teams and medical, water and sanitation supplies.
Read more from Brice de le Vingne, Head of Emergency Unit: ow.ly/ZY2c50XkCyo

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— Doctors Without Borders / Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) (@msf.ca) October 30, 2025 at 4:26 PM

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Hurricane Melissa has devastated communities across the Caribbean, including Jamaica, Cuba, Haiti, the Dominican Republic and beyond bringing flooding, storm surge and winds.
We've distributed relief items to families in the Dominican Republic and stand ready to assist further.

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— UNHCR, the UN Refugee Agency (@unhcr.org) October 30, 2025 at 4:29 PM

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At least 25 killed in Haiti after river bursts its banks, local official says, as Hurricane Melissa sweeps across the Caribbean. Follow live updates. https://cnn.it/4oIW31x

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— CNN (@cnn.com) October 29, 2025 at 11:52 AM

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Please. #Jamaica needs help. People are lost, homeless and pretty desperate. Most of the island has no power and very little telecoms. Some places, especially where #HurricaneMelissa made landfall (as the strongest Atlantic storm ever to do so) look like war zones.

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— Emma Lewis (@petchary.bsky.social) October 30, 2025 at 3:41 PM

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Before and after satellite imagery reveals the extent of the destruction from Hurricane Melissa in primary locations throughout Jamaica.
Watch more video: www.theweathernetwork.com/en/video/

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— The Weather Network (@weathernetwork.bsky.social) October 30, 2025 at 3:39 PM

Cleaning Up After Hurricane MelissaPost + Comments (12)

Thursday Morning Open Thread: Chaos Everywhere

by Anne Laurie| October 30, 20256:35 am| 343 Comments

This post is in: How about that weather?, Military, Open Threads, Trump Crime Cartel, World's Best Healthcare (If You Can Afford It)

#Hurricane #Melissa leaves trail of destruction across #Cuba, #Haiti and #Jamaica. www.npr.org/2025/10/29/n…

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— ZenArchie (@zenarchie.bsky.social) October 30, 2025 at 2:47 AM

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Higher prices, less help and a government shutdown hang over health insurance markets as shoppers start looking for coverage this week.

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— The Associated Press (@apnews.com) October 29, 2025 at 1:00 PM

I am not sure what they hope t achieve by lying about this. People are already learning what their new premiums and out of pocket expenses are going to be and it is not 13 dollars.

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— Stephen Nuñez (@socio-steve.bsky.social) October 29, 2025 at 4:14 PM

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These people have civilian jobs. It's one thing to mobilize them for an emergency or a legitimate war, another thing to send them to American cities to stand around and mill about. You're messing with people's careers to further a hostile and idiotic agenda.

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— Brandon Friedman (@brandonfriedman.bsky.social) October 29, 2025 at 9:11 PM

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interesting to see that the supermarket publications have had significantly more courage to speak plainly than the prestige press this time around

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— GHOULLIKEHELLMACHINE (@golikehellmachine.com) October 29, 2025 at 1:03 PM

(Rex Huppke, author of that op-ed, has been consistently good at dinging the Trump maladministration.)

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And there are still people working to make the world better!

Alabama State University President Dr. Quinton T. Ross Jr. said the donation is "the largest single donation in its 158-year history."

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— USA TODAY (@usatoday.com) October 29, 2025 at 11:11 AM

Philanthropist MacKenzie Scott has made a monumental donation to another historically Black college or university (HBCU), which the school is touting as a “defining moment.”

In a social media post on Monday, Oct. 27, Alabama State University President Dr. Quinton T. Ross Jr. confirmed that Scott, the former wife of billionaire businessman Jeff Bezos, gifted the school $38 million.

Scott’s donation is the latest in her philanthropic efforts to Black institutions and programs. This month, she donated $63 million to Morgan State University in Baltimore and $38 million to the University of Maryland Eastern Shore in Princess Anne.

Another one of Scott’s recent donations includes $40 million to the African American Cultural Heritage Action Fund, part of the Washington-based National Trust for Historic Preservation.

The Action Fund said in a press release on Oct. 15 that Scott’s $40 million donation comes after another $20 million investment made just four years ago.

The Action Fund’s efforts include the preservation of historically Black sites such as churches and hotels, as well as raising money for HBCUs…

Scott, who has an estimated net worth of $33.9 billion, also made Forbes’ 2025 list of the 400 richest people in the United States, ranking No. 28.

In 2020 alone, she donated millions to several other HBCUs, including Hampton University, Howard University, Morehouse College, Spelman College, Tuskegee University, and Xavier University of Louisiana.

Thursday Morning Open Thread: Chaos EverywherePost + Comments (343)

Wednesday Morning Open Thread

by Anne Laurie| October 29, 20257:42 am| 246 Comments

This post is in: Climate Change, How about that weather?, Proud to Be A Democrat, Republican Stupidity, Show Us on the Doll Where the Invisible Hand Touched You

Some of the most remarkable hurricane imagery of all time is currently being recorded.
The eye of Melissa is an almost perfect circle. At over 15 miles wide, pilots have reported seeing birds trapped in the center unable to escape.
The footage from the flight inside the eye looks like CGI.

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— News Eye (@newseye.bsky.social) October 28, 2025 at 8:04 AM

Sharing for awareness: For those able and willing to help, the Embassy of Jamaica in DC is coordinating disaster relief in the U.S.
They have asked folks to reach out to them at [email protected] to coordinate support.
The government has info on donations supportjamaica.gov.jm

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— Phil Lewis (@phillewis.bsky.social) October 28, 2025 at 1:17 PM

Hurricane Melissa made landfall in eastern Cuba early Wednesday as a Category 3 storm after pummeling Jamaica as one of the strongest Atlantic hurricanes on record, the U.S. National Hurricane Center said.
Hundreds of thousands of people had been evacuated to shelters in Cuba.

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— The Associated Press (@apnews.com) October 29, 2025 at 3:31 AM

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BREAKING: A federal judge in San Francisco has indefinitely blocked the Trump administration from firing federal workers during the government shutdown.

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— The Associated Press (@apnews.com) October 28, 2025 at 2:58 PM

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It is a choice to say this while you personally are keeping the House out of session to protect the Epstein Files from release

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— Vituperative Erb (@vituperativeerb.bsky.social) October 28, 2025 at 2:18 PM

dems attacks are getting sharper the longer this goes on and republican defenses are getting weaker

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— GHOULLIKEHELLMACHINE (@golikehellmachine.com) October 28, 2025 at 7:38 PM

this btw is the framing that's getting a lot of traction with my normie friends. The house GOP is trying to repeal Obamacare, dems are saying no and so the GOP shut the government down to try and get the dems to cave; trump is too busy caring about the ballroom.

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— Sky Marchini (@sky.skymarchini.net) October 28, 2025 at 11:16 PM

“Trump is illegally impounding SNAP funds to make people hungry so he can force the Democrats to capitulate to help the hungry people” is just a wild state of affairs.

I do not believe Dems should fold. I believe if this works, he will keep doing it. If I believed folding would feed hungry people, I would at the very least strongly consider it. But he explicitly said he felt no obligation to honor any deal struck.

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— Starfish Who Can’t Think Something Witty (@irhottakes.bsky.social) October 28, 2025 at 3:46 PM

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Trump is under water in Texas, which he won by 14. And he’s on the verge of going under water in Ohio, Iowa, Kansas, & South Carolina, which he won by 11, 13, 16, & 18 points.

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— Dana Houle (@danahoule.bsky.social) October 28, 2025 at 2:28 PM

Wednesday Morning Open ThreadPost + Comments (246)

Extremely Open Thread: World On Fire

by Anne Laurie| October 10, 20256:01 pm| 54 Comments

This post is in: Climate Change, Open Threads

We’re in the process of moving from the residential hotel where I’ve been posting for the last four months to a one-bedroom apartment on a six-month lease, so things right now are *fraught.* Especially since this post is being done on a phone hotspot wi-fi, and even when our apartment internet is turned on next week, it’ll be… Xfinity.

******
Unrelated story, for a change of topic:

Los Angeles firefighters lacked enough resources and struggled to communicate clearly in the first 36 hours of January’s devastating Palisades Fire, according to a report released Wednesday by the fire department.

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— The Associated Press (@apnews.com) October 8, 2025 at 8:28 PM

From the Atlantic, “A Surreal New Revelation About the L.A. Fires” [gift link]:

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The origin story of L.A.’s Palisades Fire, according to a criminal complaint announced yesterday, reads like a scene from an art-house film. Shortly before midnight on New Year’s Eve, a son of missionaries visits a scenic overlook near the Los Angeles coast. The clearing is known for the Buddha statues hikers leave behind in the hollowed-out stump of a power pole. The man listens to a French rap song about the malaise of modern life. Then, according to investigators, he starts a fire with an open flame, a combustible material, and malicious intent.

He dials 911 to report the fire, but his first few calls do not connect (presumably because this is coastal Los Angeles, and our cell service is terrible). He then begins screen-recording on his cellphone while he continues to dial 911. He asks ChatGPT if he might be criminally liable for starting a fire with cigarettes, possibly to cover up what he’s done. Then, the man films the flames on his iPhone as firefighters arrive.

By January 2, they determine that the fire is out. But it has in fact gone underground, smoldering in the root system of the hillside’s brush. Days later, strong winds travel from the desert to that same hillside and revive the blaze, which becomes the Palisades Fire. It levels more than 6,800 structures and kills 12 people. (Those structures included my childhood home, and those deaths included Arthur, a man who’d lived next door to that old house and whom I’d known and loved since I was born.)

The suspect is a 29-year-old Florida man named Jonathan Rinderknecht, and the case against him is one that could be made only in an era of AI. To help establish intent, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives turned to Rinderknecht’s conversations with ChatGPT—not just his cigarette question, but also an exchange from months earlier in which he asked ChatGPT to generate an image of a “burning forest” next to a crowd of people “running away from the fire.” OpenAI declined to specify whether the company had handed Rinderknecht’s chat logs over to the investigators; a spokesperson for OpenAI told The Atlantic only that “following the Palisades fire tragedy, we responded to standard law enforcement requests related to this individual.” It was standard in the sense that tech companies comply with requests relating to criminal investigations all the time. But for an investigation to rely to this degree on a conversation with a large language model is new. The allure of a chatbot is that it’s a machine that will process your most private thoughts without judgment. Now it seems that those conversations can appear before a judge and jury. (A public defender for Florida’s Middle District told the Associated Press that the evidence against Rinderknecht is circumstantial; the public defender’s office did not immediately return my request for comment.)…

Extremely Open Thread: World On FirePost + Comments (54)

hueyplong on Ramblings on Friday Morning (Dec 5, 2025 @ 1:21pm)

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CaseyL on Ramblings on Friday Morning (Dec 5, 2025 @ 1:19pm)

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Ruckus on Ramblings on Friday Morning (Dec 5, 2025 @ 1:18pm)

if you can’t see it, then you are useless in the fight to stop it.

Give the craziest people you know everything they want and hope they don’t ask for more? Great plan.

Not so fun when the rabbit gets the gun, is it?

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

Boeing: repeatedly making the case for high speed rail.

If senate republicans had any shame, they’d die of it.

Their freedom requires your slavery.

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

Not all heroes wear capes.

Stand up, dammit!

This isn’t Democrats spending madly. This is government catching up.

A norm that restrains only one side really is not a norm – it is a trap.

Keep the Immigrants and deport the fascists!

Jesus, Mary, & Joseph how is that election even close?

Polls are now a reliable indicator of what corporate Republicans want us to think.

“The difference between stupidity and genius is that genius has its limits.”

Is trump is trying to break black America over his knee? signs point to ‘yes’.

I’d hate to be the candidate who lost to this guy.

Stamping your little feets and demanding that they see how important you are? Not working anymore.

Baby steps, because the Republican Party is full of angry babies.

Mediocre white men think RFK Jr’s pathetic midlife crisis is inspirational. The bar is set so low for them, it’s subterranean.

Is it irresponsible to speculate? It is irresponsible not to.

They traffic in fear. it is their only currency. if we are fearful, they are winning.

Democracy is not a spectator sport.

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Extremely Open Thread: World On Fire