This is still achievable from an engineering point of view, and even on an apocalyptic landscape with 50-90% of the currently inhabitable earth no longer liveable, humans can likely survive on the poles. There are pathways to full extinction but these seem unlikely edge cases in terms of environmental collapse (such as oxygen depletion or turning the atmosphere toxic). — boethius

Oh I have no doubt that humans will survive this in some form. They will start taking climate change seriously when it becomes an immediate concern (one can argue that it really is in some cases). Unfortunately it'd be too late in large part to stop the damage. In addition the failure to act will open up a whole host of other issues on which society will divide itself such as fights over natural resources, migration, and more pandemics (and judging by the way COVID was handled, it's not looking very good).

It's safe to say that this year has pretty much made me lose faith in humanity altogether. With all the recent events going on now, it's hard to be optimistic. Human nature is just inherently flawed and we probably deserve whatever is gonna come our way.

Wow, I was just about to make a joke about how the right was gonna blame wind energy again for failing in the heat instead of the cold. Now I just feel unoriginal.

We will need now to be relying now on the US, China and India, Russia Brazil et. al. to lead the way in environmental policies. — boethius

Well Russia isn't exactly keen on stopping climate change (in large part due to it's reliance on it's gas), Brazil is currently run by a man who seems fine with letting the Amazon burn (at least hopefully until October), China is the world's biggest emitter currently, India isn't really that far off from China, and the US... well enough has already been said about that.

Pretty dark times indeed. Do you see any possible solution to this mess or has humanity royally screwed itself over for the foreseeable future?

The US just overwhelmingly endorsed $40 billion in spending for Ukraine (I suppose inflation didn't matter there) and the budget for that war in the end of it all will probably dwarf the costs of this bill, so you're not wrong on that one.

Well on the bright side Europe is probably gonna be forced to taking the transition more seriously this time now that they are effectively at war with Russia.

In hindsight, about ten years from now, this will be recognised as one of those watershed moments when the battle was lost. — Wayfarer

It sucks but it really wasn't that much money last I checked. $300 billion over 10 years is like 15% the cost of Afghanistan. The US spends twice that much a year annually on the military.

Sure but there is only so much that can be done the local level. In spite of being the world's biggest emitter the Chinese have invested more in renewables than any other country by far, and that will likely continue as they wish to dominate the world economy. As an authoritarian government they can pretty much allocate as many resources as they want towards this end.

Meanwhile the US is barely capable of operating either because of corruption or tribalism. Simply put, they're incapable of meeting the moment.

And there goes the next 10+ more years of inaction. Combined with the 30-40 years of courts acting against any action whatsoever. — Xtrix

And China along with Europe will most definitely overtake the US in the green tech revolution since the US is incapable of getting it's act together on just about anything.

Leaves little option but to unionize workplaces and start striking, and shift to the state and local level. — Xtrix

Well, might as well leave this here, since I don't want to end this on a down note:

Just another reason why the US shouldn't be the leader of the free world. And hopefully they won't be, as other countries start to realize how broken of a nation it's become.

Poor(er) countries have larger populations, oui monsieur/mademoiselle? — Agent Smith

That's too vague to really tell us anything. Given the specific points mentioned, I think it would all net out in the end (though thinking about it more, climate change would probably increase migration from poorer nations resulting in a net increase of people in places like the US and be a new issue for the country to divide itself on in the future I'm sure).

With Roe vs. Wade squashed, we should expect a population explosion in the US in the coming few decades. — Agent Smith

Between the defunding of social security, healthcare, daily mass shootings, and uncontrolled climate change (all Republican priorities), I kind of doubt that.

I was referring more to the legislative process, which especially holds true for the current makeup of congress.

If anything happens it’ll be because real people are organizing on the ground and building structures there. This may be yet another catalyst, but I wouldn’t put money on it. — Xtrix

We'll see, but there does seem to be an growing appetite for it among the Democrat base. Of course, all it takes is for a few bad actors to ruin the whole thing and it apparently doesn't cost alot for someone to sell out like Sinema did, but one could always hope.

Goes to show how important the 2014 and 2016 elections really were. We’ll be living with the consequences for the next 30 years. — Xtrix

Hopefully less than that if the Dems can finally get their act together and gut the filibuster. Obviously they won't be able to do it this cycle, but given the growing support for it in the party perhaps that may change the next time they come into power. Honestly it's hard for me to see American politics being salvaged any other way at this point.

Honestly I'm more concerned about the SCOTUS's upcoming ruling on the West Virginia v. EPA case which could seriously hinder the US's attempts to regulate greenhouse gases.

And speaking of West Virginia, the senator from that state is still holding up climate legislation in the senate until he feels like passing it.

Indeed, Manchin is pretty much a Republican. That’s well known. Its West Virginia. Not sure what Sinemas deal is either but Arizona is not known as a bastion for liberal politics either. Mainly libertarian republicans. — schopenhauer1

To be fair, Manchin at the very least supported reversing the Trump tax cuts (or at least that was his public statement). Sinema opposed those same tax cuts back in 2017 but then reversed course suddenly without explaining why. I mean, I think we can probably all guess as to why, but it is quite baffling.

Filibuster. You need 60% not 51% to do anything at all. — schopenhauer1

The Dems can get rid of the filibuster on a party line basis, but the senators from Arizona and West Virginia thought it more important that congress remain an impotent body.

And before anyone says that this will give Republicans free rein to pass whatever aspects of their agenda they want when they get into power, then I very much welcome them to try and do so and face the political consequences. Better for them to try to gut abortion access in the public eye than to try and play backroom games with the SCOTUS.

It's been 6 years since Trump was elected. If you still can't "make sense" of why the GOP backs him after 6 years - when 74 million people can - then you, specifically you, are stupider than every Trump voter in existence. — Streetlight

It's not that the Democrats in power can't make sense of the reason why Trump came into power, it's that they don't like the implications of the answer. Better to think that they're not the problem and that they don't need to change then to go through the trouble of stirring up the status quo.

Laws have been passed and presidents elected in the US with less popular support. — Benkei

Cause that's the way that things are designed in the US. It's the policies with broad support that are usually the most difficult to pass.

Honestly I don't disagree. The firearm obsession in the US has gotten to the point where I personally avoid engaging the issue for the most part, knowing the sorts of kneejerk defensive reactions it will provoke from some people. Of course that doesn't mean I'll just sit by while others like Agent Smith attempt to mischaracterize what the "real problem" is, which was why I felt like responding.

Or maybe the US should ask the other countries to the left which seem to have it all figured out.

It is unfortunate that cancer did not kill justice Ginsburg earlier than it did. — Streetlight

Or alternatively she could've just vacated her position, being in her 80s and having survived cancer multiple times. It was arrogant of her to not consider the greater good which is ironic for a justice.

I suppose she isn't the only person in power who feels like staying well beyond their prime. The average age of US congress is around 60 and the past two presidents have been over 75. Though in that case I don't blame them entirely since the voters still decided to keep them in anyways, but for Ginsburg that was all her.

Notice that now Russia is de facto quite attached to China. If Russia can't sell the gas and oil to Western Europe, where can Putin sell it? Yet China isn't a pariah state, it hasn't invaded Taiwan, so it has room to move. All this is an advantage to China. — ssu

Yep, Russia is gonna become completely reliant on China now if it doesn't want to collapse, just like North Korea. That's really the best possible outcome for them in all of this and it's not even that great since China would have all the leverage in such a relationship. I mean sure oil and gas prices are at an all time high right now, but if you can only sell it to one customer then China can probably dictate whatever price they want.

In an odd twist of fate, this could end up pushing China away from coal just as much as it could push Europe away from natural gas and into renewables, which would be a welcome development.

A new cold war. Will it turn hot? According to Murphy's law everything that can go wrong will go wrong, no matter how cool played. It can always turn hot. Oh what save nuclear weapons keep the world! — EugeneW

Looks more like Russia is going the way of North Korea so this isn't gonna be the US vs. the USSR part 2. Hell at this point a lot of former Soviet states probably want nothing to do with Russia (Ukraine obviously included).

Not that I don't think a new Cold War is happening since it is with China, but that's already been going on for a while now.

I hope starting this war will be the start of the downfall of Putin. — ssu

This is probably gonna be the start of the downfall of Russia overall if I'm being frank. No matter how you look at it, the long-term outlook of this adventure for the country does not look good. Makes it all the more surprising that Putin went and did it anyways, but I guess his dreams about reviving the Soviet Union outweighed all of that.

Again, it is not I who seeks to restrict the use of the word "change" to temporal events. It is not I who disregards ordinary use. — Banno

It seems like objecting to change as being temporal is precisely disregarding ordinary use, but hey what do I know.

So much for national politics. Time to get back to the grassroots level anyway. We're probably long out of time, in terms of the climate disaster that's already happening and will inevitably become worse, if not destroy the human species altogether, but there's little else we can do at this point. — Xtrix

Honestly I have more faith that Elon Musk will come in and save the day and I wish I were joking.

I think the human race will adapt. But it won't be pretty. — jgill

And I'm sure that politicians like Joe Manchin will be there to block any such efforts when that happens.

Yep. Turns out Manchin never wanted anything in the first place if he's gonna close the door on even talks about a bill which meets his remaining demands. He slow walked this for 6 months, while making increasingly more ridiculous demands that were all met, just to come out and kill the bill anyways.

Really makes me question the point of the Dems winning the Georgia runoffs if what we're gonna get from all this was a bipartisan bill that could've passed anyways.

Meanwhile: Senate passes $768 billion annual defense bill, sending measure to Biden

I'd say 50/50 depending on whether Manchin is acting in good faith or not. Progressives are gonna cave to whatever he wants like they always have and after today's news, the bill is gonna be watered down even more to fit his demands of narrowing the scope of the bill. Though to be fair, I kind of blame the progressives in part for insisting on doing more for less when leadership wanted to focus on fewer programs, though Manchin and Sinema insisting on an arbitrary lower number forced that as well.

Can't imagine the outcome would have been the same with a young black male carrying a weapon, either on the streets or in court. — Xtrix

Don't even think he'd make it to court to be honest since he'd likely be killed by the police before then. Fact is there are racial disparities in how people are treated by law enforcement which is borne out through the statistics which do need to be addressed, but for a lot of people either it doesn't exist at all or it's because cops are Nazis or something so I don't see it being addressed anytime soon.

I'm not sure if anyone can really make any absolute statement about Rittenhouse's state of mind at the time, but just suppositions based on his behavior. But here is the sense I got: from videos of him earlier of the night of the killings, one can see that he had a swaggery, self-important personality that is common in boys his age who are anxious to prove themselves and want to be a hero. He wanted to become a cop and he probably just couldn't wait to get out there with a gun and intimidate people, so he went LARPing across town, where there was a riot and he could be a badass. Things got ugly, reality shattered his stupid fantasy, then he killed people and almost got himself killed. He's a stupid kid with delusions of grandeur who got himself into a bad situation, and is now celebrated as a national hero by the right because it technically was self-defense, and the left just can't deal with it. — _db

My guess based on his profile is that he just wanted to pull a political stunt more than anything, and fortunately for him he got just what he wanted out of all of this. If this were an anti-vax riot or a men's right riot then I don't see him going out of his way to "help" in the same way as he did here.

This is all part of the bigger picture of mob rioting, looting, and smash and grab incidents and the failure of law enforcement to control. Should a responsible citizen simply stand by and observe their car being torched or their store being decimated? Is there any justification of vigilantism? Is there justification of smash and grab? Should one stand by and applaud? Or hide in the basement until all is done?

There are no easy answers. — jgill

Rittenhouse was 17, lived in another state, and came to Kenosha with a gun knowing that things were gonna get ugly. I've felt since last year that he acted in self-defense, but he certainly wasn't wise in getting involved in the first place.

Like actual war? None. Every country has too much to lose in today's globalized society so something along the lines of a WW3 is simply not gonna happen (assuming that our world leaders are rational actors). Not that there isn't gonna be tensions between both countries, but it's gonna be more economic than militaristic and on that front the US is losing. The Chinese has the Belt and Road Initiative, but what is the US doing in response to that?

Can't really say nothing, but it's more half-measures that are woefully insufficient to solve the problem at hand. At the very least it's more than I expected but that isn't saying much.

Looks like the progressives will cave. No surprise. — Xtrix

That was gonna be the story regardless of how this day went. The progressives have already signaled that they were gonna give up the hostage a few days ago, meaning that Manchin will get to craft the final bill. That dynamic ultimately hasn't changed.

The thing that annoys me though is how even passing the BBB in the House was a mess. A handful of moderates moved the goalposts last minute (as in literally 3 days ago) and demanded a CBO score which is an impossible ask completely stalling any momentum the Dems had coming out of the Tuesday elections. Somehow Pelosi was able to rein in the SALT people, and the immigration crew, but not the CBO gang, which just tells me that even if the CBO score comes out and the bill was made deficit neutral, the holdouts would find some other excuse not to support the bill.

I mean I could be wrong, but that's just the impression I get coming out of this. I trust the moderates even less now and having the progressives give up their leverage to these people when they're pulling off dumb stunts like this hurts more than it already does.

I think this is misreading what Jayapal is saying. She's willing to vote on both, and is leaving the convincing of Manchin to Biden. She says she's not in direct contact with Manchin. — Xtrix

Well, we'll see what happens this week since their plan for a vote on both bills (in the House) apparently hasn't changed.

If they cave and vote on the “bipartisan” bill, that’ll be disappointing. I don’t see indications of that happening yet. — Xtrix

Jayapal has already signalled she's gonna continue with the plan to get a vote on the BIF and they'll take a "leap of faith" on Biden's word that he will get his vote in the end.

https://twitter.com/mkraju/status/1455246896847589376

Personally I think it's probably more to it than that since they did not seem shaken at all in their resolve from this morning when it looked like the BBB was on a path to a vote this week. I mean Manchin isn't Sinema. At least they can talk to him.

In recent news, Manchin has once again called for a pause right before the BBB bill can be agreed upon citing his concerns on the debt and inflation. At best this means he's waiting for a CBO score before supporting it but who knows how long that will take. At worst it means he's looking to kill the bill as many have feared by holding out... again.

Strangely enough, the response from the Dems have been pretty calm. Jayapal has just stated that she and the progressives plan to vote for the BIF anyways and they feel optimistic that the BBB will pass with assurances from Biden. The White House response has been similarly hopeful.

So what should we make of all this? Is Manchin just putting up a show to make himself look like some fiscally conservative politician? Perhaps he's given the progressives private assurances that he will support the bill. Otherwise I can't imagine them caving so easily and so quickly but that is what it looks like from the outside.

Just for context: Manchin originally wanted $4 trillion for infrastructure. If we were generous and put the price tag of both bills together (including the $0.7 trillion of non-new spending in the bipartisan bill), the current package barely adds up to $3 trillion. The fact that the media hasn't brought this up with him over the past several weeks is infuriating to say the least.

The poll results are not very encouraging. — TheMadFool

Not that they mean anything but alot of people are, for good reason, pessimistic about climate change. I try to be hopeful about it all because I feel like I have to be, but I also have a "believe it when I see it approach" as well. In particular with respect to COP26 I'll be watching what the US is doing with regards to their infrastructure plans and how that will be received by other countries next month. At the very least it can't be any worse than the Trump years, where he was an easy scapegoat for other countries' inaction so there's that at least.