Free Republic

How odd it is that America is wasting billions of dollars hiring DEI czars and electing woke politicians, who so often accuse others of a multitude of sins, largely as a way of enriching themselves. When ideology replaces meritocracy or provides immunity from the consequences of illegal behavior, systemic mediocrity follows. Under toxic National Socialism, Stalinism, and Maoism, millions of cronies and grifters mouthed party lines in hopes that their approved ideology would allow them to advance their careers and excuse their lawbreaking. The same thing has happened with the woke movement and the now-huge Diversity/Equity/Inclusion conglomerate. Grifters and opportunists...

OXFORD, England (AP) — Humanity has only two years left “to save the world” by making dramatic changes in the way it spews heat-trapping emissions and it has even less time to act to get the finances behind such a massive shift, the head of the United Nations climate agency said. With governments of the world facing a 2025 deadline for new and stronger plans to curb carbon pollution, nearly half of the world's populations voting in elections this year, and crucial global finance meetings later this month in Washington, United Nations executive climate secretary Simon Stiell said Wednesday he...

After decades of waging war against impoverished nations with destitute armies, or no standing armies at all, the US has suddenly found itself in a rapidly changing world where peer and near-peer competitors are outpacing it in military capabilities. Many of these capabilities are showing up on the battlefield in places the US has until recently enjoyed relative military superiority. One area the US has found itself particularly weak in is artillery. The conflict in Ukraine has revealed a variety of shortcomings regarding not only US artillery capabilities, but those of the collective West.

President Joe Biden keeps lecturing corporate America to “pay your fair share” of taxes. It turns out he’s right that some companies really are getting away scot-free from paying taxes.But it isn’t Big Tech companies in Silicon Valley or the Wall Street financial company “fat cats” or big banks or Walmart. They pay billions in taxes.The culprits here are the very companies that President Biden is in bed with: green energy firms.It turns out that despite all the promises over the past decade about how renewable energy is the future of power production in America, by far the biggest tax...

The Senate on Wednesday afternoon voted in favor of passing a bill reversing the Biden administration's actions mandating states to track and set reduction goals for greenhouse gas emissions from vehicles on highways. The chamber approved the resolution in a 53-47 vote in which Sens. Kyrsten Sinema, I-Ariz.; Sherrod Brown, D-Ohio; Jon Tester, D-Mont.; and Joe Manchin, D-W.Va., joined every Republican voting in the affirmative. The bill was introduced in February by Sens. Kevin Cramer, R-N.D.; Shelley Moore Capito, R-W.Va.; and Manchin. "Few things are more frustrating in government than un-elected bureaucrats asserting authority they don’t have and foisting federal...

State insurance regulators are taking the first steps on what will be long and difficult effort to mitigate climate impacts. Foremost it will require cooperation and buy in. To that end, the National Association of Insurance Commissioners took the rare step of holding a media briefing Friday to again spotlight its landmark National Climate Resilience Strategy. Adopted March 18, the strategy is a desperately needed first step, said Andrew Mais, Connecticut insurance commissioner and 2024 president of the NAIC. “The goal of a strategy is to drive faster and more effective risk reduction by state insurance regulators to ensure that...

One of nature’s most important keystone species is working itself to death. Colonies of honey bees — crucial pollinators for a wide variety of plants and cash crops — are at risk of collapse because of climate change, a recent study by scientists at Washington State University and the U.S. Department of Agriculture found. Long and warmer fall months across the Pacific Northwest encourage bees to emerge from their colonies when they should be resting, said Gloria DeGrandi-Hoffman, a research leader at the USDA’s Carl Hayden Bee Research Center in Arizona. “When it’s warm out, they fly and when they...

President Biden has done more to address climate change than any of his predecessors. So far, voters don’t seem to care. The Biden campaign and a collection of progressive groups are trying to change that. They believe the president’s record on climate change can boost his popularity with young voters. The strategy is risky because climate has never been a priority with voters. A Journal poll, which surveyed voters in seven swing states in March, found that just 3% of 18-to-34-year-old voters named climate change as their top issue, with most citing the economy, inflation or immigration. That is roughly...

CAMBRIDGE, Massachusetts — Lawyers advancing an effort to charge oil companies with homicide over climate-related deaths are ramping up their campaign to hold fossil fuel producers criminally accountable for contributing to climate change. The authors of “Climate Homicide: Prosecuting Big Oil for Climate Death” embarked on a road trip of college campuses this spring, making the case for bringingcriminal charges against oil and gas companies. The push by David Arkush, director of Public Citizen’s climate program, and Donald Braman, an associate professor at George Washington University Law School, aims to bolster support for the theory through presentations at law schools....

April 9 (UPI) -- The European Union's Copernicus Climate Change Service said Tuesday that at 1.68 degrees Celsius hotter than the "pre-industrial" era, March was the warmest March on record and the tenth straight temperature record-breaking month. The new March high was calculated from an estimate of the average March temperature during the "pre-industrial" reference period, designated as 1850-1900 which also shows a year-round global average temperature from April 2023 to March 2024 period that is 1.58 degrees Celsius higher than the pre-industrial average. The climate group's top scientist called for urgent cuts in the volume of greenhouse gasses being...

STRASBOURG, France, April 9 (Reuters) - Europe's top human rights court ruled on Tuesday that the Swiss government had violated the human rights of its citizens by failing to do enough to combat climate change. The European Court of Human Rights's (ECtHR) decision on the case brought by more than 2,000 elderly Swiss women set a precedent that will resonate across Europe and beyond for how courts deal with a growing trend of climate litigation. The Swiss women, known as KlimaSeniorinnen, argued their government's climate inaction put them at risk of dying during heatwaves. In her ruling, Court President Siofra...

North Carolina’s first Black-owned children’s bookstore, Liberation Station is being forced to move out of downtown Raleigh after only being open for less than a year. Liberation Station reportedly opened on Juneteenth last year. The book store is known for hosting events for the community and selling children’s books written and illustrated by Black and underrepresented authors and illustrators. “Unfortunately, we live in a country that has given permission to the nameless and faceless people to make threats and cause harm, emotional harm,” owner Victoria Scott-Miller said. On Monday, Scott-Miller took to her Instagram to tell her followers that the...

A new study led by Jarmo Kikstra, a research scholar in the IIASA Energy, Climate, and Environment Program, explores whether reducing production and consumption growth could make a significant contribution to resolving the climate crisis. As the effects of climate change become more severe and the scale of environmental damage gains magnitude, some researchers disagree about the desirability and feasibility of further economic growth in high-income countries. More recently, the case has been made for exploring a "degrowth" (or post-growth) strategy. Such a strategy would entail reducing less necessary forms of production and consumption (rather than growing them) with the...

For decades, scientists and inventors have flirted with the concept of a water engine, but their attempts often hit insurmountable roadblocks. However, Elon Musk, known for pushing the boundaries of technology, has provided a fascinating insight. His revelation might just revolutionize the transportation industry at all levels. But people are asking exciting questions. Is water a viable source of fuel? What other innovative solutions are available for transportation problems? Join us as we unravel how Elon Musk went public with the new engine that changes everything. Transcript Follow along using the transcript. Show transcript

Earthquakes on the East Coast are rare but sea level rise and frequent flooding may lead to a higher frequency of quakes. But here's why you shouldn't be alarmed. "An earthquake is based on tectonic plates, and New York is sitting on a 'lazy' plate, which is good, meaning we do not have so many earthquakes, but there are other things that happen -- too much rain or drought," Dr. Marsellos told NBC New York. Long periods of flooding can cause water levels to rise leading to possible landslides. Those slides can "lubricate" faults and may account for a higher...

The Biden administration announced recipients of the climate law’s biggest grant program Thursday, kicking off a $20 billion effort to transform community lending and green the U.S. economy. EPA will award eight initial grants under the Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund, ranging in size from $400 million to almost $7 billion. The largest award will go to Climate United, a partnership that includes a nonprofit impact investment firm and two affordable housing lenders. EPA chose three nonprofits — Climate United, Coalition for Green Capital and Power Forward Communities — to distribute a total of $14 billion in capital to finance projects...

Changing weather patterns induced by climate change are contributing to shifts in the location of terrorist activity, according to new research. An exploratory study led by extremism expert Dr Jared Dmello, from the University of Adelaide's School of Social Sciences, found some climatological variables affected terrorist activity in India. "Suitability analyses indicate that all the climatological variables tested -- temperature, precipitation, and elevation -- relate to shifting patterns of terrorist activity," says Dr Dmello. "Urban centres have increasingly grown in population density, particularly in spaces with favourable climates, and some of the more remote areas once used by extremists have...

A recent study from the Journal of Climate Change and Health indicates climate change may widen preexisting health disparities in the lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer populations. "Can’t Stop Change: Queer Climate Stories from the Florida Frontlines” is a Queers 4 Climate Justice documentary that premiered last weekend at the Tampa Bay Transgender Film Festival. It illustrates those disparities and more — and the work being done to counteract them. The documentary follows the production team on a road trip across Florida to meet with 14 LGBTQ+ artists, organizers and activists. “A lot of queer and trans people are...

The Vermont Legislature is advancing legislation requiring big fossil fuel companies pay a share of the damage caused by climate change after the state suffered catastrophic summer flooding and damage from other extreme weather. “In order to remedy the problems created by washed out roads, downed electrical wires, damaged crops and repeated flooding, the largest fossil fuel entities that have contributed to climate change should also contribute to fixing the problem that they caused,” Sen. Nader Hashim, a Democrat from Windham County, said to Senate colleagues on Friday. It’s a polluter-pays model affecting companies engaged in the trade or business...

The jobs board for the American Climate Corps is set to officially launch in April, and it’s likely to be flooded with eager applicants. Since President Biden announced the New Deal-inspired program in September, more than 50,000 people have expressed interest in joining. “I think the idea is to make it as broad as possible so all young people can find something, whether they’re at a 7th-grade reading level and they’re coming out of the foster care or juvenile justice system, or whether they’re a PhD candidate at a university,” said Mary Ellen Sprenkel, president and CEO of The Corps...