Chugging Uphill, Unearthing Dead Presidents

Dear Readers:

If you haven’t seen the newsletter for a few weeks now, it’s because, after some 7 days of bad air,  an environmental infection caught up with me and tried to bench me permanently. I am back on the mend, but all that staring up at the ceiling got me to wondering—when I had energy to wonder—what keeps us going?  What can we look to?

We’ve got a burnt out battlefield of politicians on the take who’ve long ago forgotten to represent us; migrants in concentration camps forced by ICE to drink toilet water or die, a border patrol given to racism and misogyny; the folks left behind when farms and factories went belly up; an obscene income gap; and a government financed by war, which refuses to take any initiative either to confront the threat of climate catastrophe, or to take impeachment steps. Its answer is another dinosaur, Joe Biden.  What is left to us? 

The astonishing wealth of resistance, creative ideas, and all of us who devote our every waking moments to new ways of thinking and new ways of life. And the embracing solidarity with all of the rest of us who plug against the prevailing tides. Surely we have never seen a human effort on this scale of wakefulness. And that is the comfort that we are working every day to create and recreate—for ourselves and for each other.

Before I move to another subject, I do want to remind us all that—like all roses—the “Roses this Week Amongst the Thorns” are provisional.  That they fade and die unless we water them constantly with our thinking and with our actions.  Nothing in an ongoing struggle such as ours is ever fixed; everything is a battle which we must continue waging day by day, in new, inventive and courageous ways.

And now for something you’ll really enjoy, the re-publication this week of a pageant by David Solnit originally appearing on Lisa Savage’s blog, Went 2 the Bridge with credit to Our children’s Trust, the group of youth suing the U.S. government for climate negligence, (see Juliana vs. US for background).

#GOVKNEW PRESIDENTS PAGEANT
by David Solnit & Our Children's Trust

YOUTH : When did you know burning fossil fuels would cause climate change?

GRANDPARENT : Well, when I was 10 year old like you, way back in 1958, we were warned about climate change in movies and on TV shows, including the TV science show, “The Unchained Goddess” by the director of “It’s a Wonderful Life”. The U.S. Navy was one of the lead government agencies studying climate change.

YOUTH : Did the Fossil Fuel Industry know too?

GRANDPARENT : Yes, Exxon knew. Big Oil knew. Big Coal knew. Their own scientists warned them. And they spent millions to lie and cover up the scientists’ warnings. They created and funded climate denial and skepticism disinformation campaigns to undermine science and prevent any efforts to stop the climate crisis to protect their profits.

YOUTH : What about the Presidents? Did they know?

GRANDPARENT : The last 11 Presidents all knew. And you can ask them yourself!

(Presidents line up, one behind the other, backwards on stage right. Or They are hidden behind leg curtain formed by vertical banners. A “#GovKnew” banner will be on stage left. After each president recites lines they line up shoulder to shoulder behind the #GovKnew banner. It is held in front of puppeteers, and below the jackets of presidents, With each president we will walk through this call and response question, followed by succinct answers.)

(A prop person holds speech bubble above head of each president as he takes center stage. Then lowers it as the president exits to line up behind banner.)

YOUTH : President Kennedy, may I ask you a question? ( Enter President) When did you know about the looming climate crisis?

KENNEDY: “My fellow citizens, in 1961, I was warned by Senator Clinton Anderson that there could be 25 percent more atmospheric carbon by the year 2000.”

YOUTH : What did you do President Kennedy?

KENNEDY : “I expanded both private and public fossil fuel projects.”

YOUTH : ( All eleven times this question is asked it is directed to the audience) “Did our government know?”

CROWD/GRANDPARENT (BIG cue sign held up): “Government Knew!”

CHILD : President Johnson may I ask you a question? (Enter Pres. Johnson, Speech bubble in place) When did you know about the looming climate crisis?

JOHNSON : “In 1965, my Administration published an official report showing the steady rise of CO2 from burning Fossil Fuels and the dangerous impacts to come.”

YOUTH : And what Did The Johnson Administration Do?

JOHNSON : “Despite the dire warnings, we put our report on a shelf and didn’t take any actions that would address this crisis and build a great society.”

YOUTH : “Did our government know?”

CROWD/GRANDPARENT (BIG cue sign held up): “Government Knew!”

Nixon with map of Cambodia

YOUTH : President Nixon may I ask you a question? (Enter President; Speech Bubble in place) When did you know about the looming climate crisis?

NIXON : “My fellow Americans, in 1969, I received a memo that predicted a 10 foot sea level rise due to climate change. It read: ‘Goodbye New York. Goodbye Washington.’ I knew then that we needed to build an electric vehicle fleet.”

YOUTH : So what did The Nixon Administration do?

NIXON : “My Administration leased huge swaths of the Outer Continental Shelf for drilling and development.”

YOUTH : “Did our government know?”

CROWD/GRANDPARENT (BIG cue sign held up ): “Government Knew!”

YOUTH : President Ford. (Enter President; Speech Bubble in place) When did you know about the looming climate crisis?

FORD : “In 1975, the U.S. National Academy of Sciences put out the following warning: ‘our vulnerability to climate change is seen to be all the more serious . . .and we simply cannot afford to be unprepared for either a natural or man-made climatic catastrophe.’"

YOUTH : So what did The Ford Administration do?

FORD : At my 1975 State of the Union address, I proudly announced a program that proposed 250 major new coal mines, 150 major coal-fired power plants and 30 major new [oil] refineries within 10 years!”

YOUTH : “Did our government know?”

CROWD/GRANDPARENT (BIG cue sign held up): “Government Knew!”

YOUTH : President Carter. (Enter President; Speech Bubble in place) When did you know about the looming climate crisis?

CARTER : “By 1978, I had received multiple warnings that fossil fuel expansion would cause catastrophic climate change and global socio-political disruption by the year 2025. The scientists advised switching to renewable energy!”

YOUTH : So what did the Carter Administration do?

CARTER : “Instead of planning for renewable energy expansion, I proposed drastic increases in fossil fuel production since we had it in abundance!”

YOUTH : “Did our government know?”

CROWD/GRANDPARENT (BIG cue sign held up ): “Government Knew!”

YOUTH : President Reagan. ( Enter President; Speech Bubble in place) When did you know about the looming climate crisis?

REAGAN : “In 1985, my scientists recommended specific energy policy changes like permanently ending the use of coal by the year 2000 after informing me that climate change may “overwhelm earth's life-support system. ’”

YOUTH : So what did the Reagan Administration do?

REAGAN : “During my presidency, my Administration developed fracking technology for the fossil fuel industry, moved funds away from renewable research and development, and reduced automobile fuel economy standards!

YOUTH : “Did our government know?”

CROWD/GRANDPARENT (BIG cue sign held up): “Government Knew!”

YOUTH : President Bush may I ask you a question? (Enter President; Speech Bubble in place) When did you know about the looming climate crisis?

H.W. : “In 1989, We knew so much about the dangers of the climate crisis, that I announced that I would issue an executive order for government action on climate change!”

YOUTH : So what did the Bush Senior Administration do?

H.W. : “I never issued that Executive Order, and instead, my Administration refused to join 63 countries in a pledge to curb emissions!”

YOUTH : “Did our government know?”

CROWD/GRANDPARENT (BIG cue sign held up ): “Government Knew!”

YOUTH : President Clinton. (Enter President; Speech Bubble in place) When did you know about the looming climate crisis?

CLINTON : “Acknowledging the compounding evidence of our climate crisis, I supported the 1998 Kyoto Protocol, an international climate agreement to cut emissions.”

YOUTH : So what did the Clinton Administration do?

CLINTON : “My Administration was lobbied by the American Petroleum Institute, and expanded coal leasing, despite knowledge that global warming would reverse our nation’s prosperity.

It’s the economy, stupid!”

YOUTH : “Did our government know?”

CROWD/GRANDPARENT (BIG cue sign held up): “Government Knew!”

YOUTH : President Bush. (Enter President; Speech Bubble in place) When did you know about the looming climate crisis?

GEORGE W : “During my presidency, I publicly announced my concern about global warming!”

YOUTH : So what did the Bush Administration do?

GEORGE W (Bush characterization: pronounce “s” as “ch” ): “You may have misunderestimated me, because we censored climate scientists and blocked EPA climate reports about the gravity of the climate crisis and we promoted ‘clean coal’ propaganda!”

YOUTH : “Did our government know?”

CROWD/GRANDPARENT (BIG cue sign held up): “Government Knew!”

YOUTH : President Obama. (Enter President; Speech Bubble in place) When did you know about the looming climate crisis?

(Obama characterization: pauses )

OBAMA :  “People of America, I am your Green President. My administration spoke openly of the daunting climate projections and I vowed to address our climate Crisis.”

YOUTH : So what did the Obama Administration do?

OBAMA : “I proudly expanded oil infrastructure and commissioned the highest number of coal plants in 25 years! That was me, people!”

YOUTH : “Did our government know?”

CROWD/GRANDPARENT (BIG cue sign held up): “Government Knew!”

Obstacle suddenly appears in Moselle River at Metz

YOUTH : President Trump. (Enter President; Speech Bubble in place) When did you know about the looming climate crisis?

TRUMP : “Last year, we put out the National Climate Assessment. Very, very bad. The report says we are facing a YUUUUUGE existential threat.”

YOUTH : What is the Trump Administration doing?

TRUMP : “I’ve increased coal exports and expanded oil and gas extraction everywhere I can on federal public lands and committed to making the US fossil fuel energy dominant in the world. We’ll burn it at home and promote fossil fuels throughout the world. We’re going to bring back coal!”

YOUTH : “Did our government know?”

CROWD/GRANDPARENT (BIG cue sign held up ): “Government Knew!”

YOUTH : So They did know all about the dangers of the climate crisis! And they didn’t just do nothing about it! Instead, they took sides with the fossil fuel industry for decades to cause this climate crisis and to violate my rights. Now what do we do?

(Silk flags begin to jog towards the stage area from both sides with choreographed waving, passing by the presidents and circling the crowd.)

GRANDPARENT : You’re doing it; you’re taking the government to court. And you are part of the people power and street heat necessary to help the courts force our government to address the climate crisis, just as we needed the civil rights street heat and people power to push the courts to stand up to racism. We need climate strikes and the recognition of these 21 plaintiffs’ constitutional right to safe climate system!

GRANDPARENT/YOUTH : LET THE YOUTH BE HEARD!

CROWD (Cue Sign): GOVERNMENT KNEW!

GRANDPARENT/YOUTH : LET THE YOUTH BE HEARD!

CROWD (Cue Sign): GOVERNMENT KNEW!

GRANDPARENT/YOUTH : LET THE YOUTH BE HEARD!

CROWD (Cue Sign): GOVERNMENT KNEW

-----
Photo credits:

Heat map of global surface temperature anomalies 2014 - 2018. Red indicates higher than normal temperatures, blue indicates lower than normal temperatures. By Kathryn Mersmann/NASA - Scientific Visualization Studio/AP

JFK By Cecil Stoughton, White House - This media is available in the holdings of the National Archives and Records Administration, cataloged under the National Archives Identifier (NAID) 194255., Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=1394145

LBJ By Arnold Newman, White House Press Office (WHPO) - http://photolab.lbjlib.utexas.edu/detail.asp?id=18170, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=1455862

Nixon By Jack E. Kightlinger (White House Photo Office) - This media is available in the holdings of the National Archives and Records Administration, cataloged under the National Archives Identifier (NAID) 194674., Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=3853635

Ford By David Hume Kennerly - This file was derived from: Gerald Ford - NARA - 530680.jpg:, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=77034670

Carter screenshot from C-SPAN coverage of national address on the "energy crisis" February 2, 1977

Reagan Public Domain, 

https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=2107951

H.W. Bush From Wikipedia, captioned "President Bush visits American troops in Saudi Arabia on Thanksgiving Day, 1990" By Unknown - http://bushlibrary.tamu.edu/image.php?id=957, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=485045

Clinton From Wikipedia, captioned "The Clintons in a White House Christmas Portrait, 1993" This picture was formerly found on the site of The White House. A mirror is found here: 

http://clinton4.nara.gov/WH/kids/html/children.html,

Public Domain,

https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=834851

W. Bush & Obama By White House photo by Eric Draper -https://georgewbush-whitehouse.archives.gov/news/releases/2008/11/images/20081110_5e5u4007a-515h.html (Original, broken link: 

http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2008/11/images/20081110_5e5u4007a-515h.html),

Public Domain, 

https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=5177362

Please read: http://solartopia.org/

Sign petition at: https://petitions.moveon.org/sign/gov-newsom-test-diablo?source=s.em.mt&r_hash=plIcLgbG

especially in view of major recent California earthquake.

 

Please submit your comment to Department of Housing and Urban Development to oppose proposal prohibiting 6 million renters in “mixed status” (where one member may be undocumented) from access to public housing at

https://www.keep-families-together.org/comment?link_id=8&can_id=655968a96e1bce05c463b2f640bf633c&source=email-news-two-huge-rent-control-wins-stand-up-for-immigrants&email_referrer=email_574477&email_subject=news-two-huge-rent-control-wins-stand-up-for-immigrants

In astonishing turn, Geo. Soros and Chas. Koch team up to prevent US forever war policy.

#NeverAgainIsNow: 36 arrested as hundred of Jewish protestors block road to detention center.

Judge Releases German Rescue Ship Captain, Saying Carola Rackete Was Fulfilling 'Her Duty to Protect Life'

'Time to Turn Up the Heat': Sunrise Movement Unveils 7-Week Organizing Plan to Force DNC Approval of 2020 Climate Debate

'Chuck Schumer Has Some Dinner Guests': Protesters Outside of Minority Leader's Home Demand Action on Detention Camps

Hugh tenant victory as tenants rights to organize pass in New York and California.

People Power sees to it that Dick Snyder who poisoned Flint’s population for years, resigns from his appointment to Harvard.

Climate Actions kicked off in France with a banner drop over the giant Cannes sign and a red carpet sit-in in front of the ‘Palace’. French rebels jumped the barrier to run up and block the stairs to the main, red-carpeted entrance.

Department of Justice blocks #45 administration’s efforts to add citizenship question to 2020 census.

Interfaith leaders block access to ICE office in Milwaukee.

Activist groups demand EPA remove Monsanto’s license to pollute.

In rare Guantanamo court victory, three judges reversed an eight-year rule that has prevented Guantánamo detainees from seeing and rebutting the evidence purportedly justifying their detentions.

Berkeley considers first ever nationally proposal banning new natural gas hookups.

Building on the leadership of the alliance and the land trust, Oakland’s the city council passes a balanced, fiscally responsible budget with $12 million allocated to create a municipal fund supporting community land trusts and limited equity housing cooperatives, with the purpose of taking land off of the speculative market by acquiring and preserving rental properties with 25 or fewer units. 

in Watertown, New York man builds pantry outside his home to feed the hungry.

200+ civil rights groups demand Congress decriminalize border crossings.

Nationwide growing public banking movement threatens Wall St.

For the third year, a US delegation joins German protests against US nuclear weapons (20 B61 hydrogen bombs) stored at Buchel Air Base.

Sorry, Ninth Circuit rejects #45 Administration request to allow use of military funds for border (mediaeval) wall.

Seattle Federal Judge Marsha Pechman blocks #45 asylum-seeker policy that would have kept 40,000 jailed for at least six months. (Joe Biden eat your heart out.)

As fury grows tens of thousands rally across US demanding immediate action to #CloseTheCamps.

Two Wrong Ways on a One-Way Street

This week, while Indivisible proposed its “consequential” plan, a three-point proposal to “beat” #45 (notice the language: beat) accompanied by a six-approach tool kit, it set me to thinking: where’s the other 42 million? The folks that give #45 a steady approval rating.  What about them? 

First of all, it occurs to me that response to #45 reflects a disconnect,  an inappropriate use of language: the language of rationality that consists in the procedural legalese of the law, congress and the courts on the one hand; and the societal response through the public and the corporate media—and those very few remaining independent voices on which we are still able to rely.

It is a language we might apply to normal affairs.  But what we have here is not normal; it is an altogether different phenomenon, a frenzied whirling about by a society obsessed around one solitary figure, and a refusal or inability to look at the broader problem.

Botticelli: Inferno

Whereas we might once have been justified in expecting a representative government, those days are long gone. The system as it exists today has variously been called corporatism in all areas of our lives from agribusiness to mass surveillance, or oligarchy, the rule of an unaccountable elite over non-elites. Occasionally, we are reminded that fascism looks a lot like this, but we still prefer not to get our skirts too muddy, because after all, we have a noble tradition of exceptionalism that’s hard to overcome.

It is hard to fully envision in what a more appropriate language might consist, but the language of rationality is NOT IT. And the language of 5150, directed solely at individuals, is too rudimentary at best, and serves its uses only in humbler emergencies, not a national one. (5150 refers to the California law code for the temporary, involuntary, psychiatric commitment of individuals who present a danger to themselves or to others.)

Another disconnect

#45 is not an individual phenomenon; it has its ramifications in layers of no-longer representative government which cushions and replicates its many violences and atrocities. It is a phenomenon that extends as well to those 42 million people who keep those  approval rates steady. Who are they exactly? And do the iterations of American election year politics—whether by Indivisible or by Nancy Pelosi—even begin to take their plight into account?

Categorizing 42 million people is altogether impossible, but in general, they are white people, many of them with high school educations at most, who have been systematically left behind educationally and economically. Many of them inhabit decaying worlds: rural America, the grandsons and daughters of once thriving agricultural communities, now bankrupt, and of factory workers of the nation’s rust belts who were left behind when factories closed, and the initiative for retooling fell haphazardly—if it fell at all—into privatized hands.  Most of them are the products of a dumbed down public school system given to blinkering its students, never much given to critical thinking, and its second ring of sycophants, the media that gave up its practice of journalism in favor of gossip, greed, and entertainment many years ago.

They hold in common their need to grasp and exploit the last straws of demagoguery which promised them what they needed to hear as a better life, where their losses might be recouped and where their communities might be lifted from abject poverty and despair. But recent tax cuts have benefitted the oligarchs, and global warming has seen to it that Midwestern farms, those not yet bankrupt, are still water logged and not ready for planting.

To compensate their losses, they have been offered the demonization of migrants, more brown, more poor, more desperate than they (but far gentler) pouring in a steady stream from central America, victims themselves of global warming and U.S. meddling in their duly elected democratic governments. 

The mind-made-up characterizes them. Almost all are closed to any form of inquiry because they have to be. Their sense of victimization—or their greed for profit—require it. A minority form part of doomsday cults eager to see the planet’s warming end in a Walpurgisnacht, which they believe will usher in a Second Coming—a last desperate pitch for the Ur-Savior to correct their woes.

According to Chris Hedges, it is this susceptibility to America’s long tradition of cultism that has drawn them to a figure like #45, who represents for them many of the qualities cult leaders usually embody:

Immunity to the norms of established society, a quality their followers (and  the media) find endlessly fascinating and appealing.

Refusal to acknowledge impending disaster, such as global warming.

Insistence on fawning and total loyalty over competence.

Inability to tolerate criticism.

Grandiosity and bellicosity as covers for insecurity,

Use of those around them as objects to be manipulated for their own aggrandizement.

Unfortunately, any attempt to oppose rationality to what can only be identified as absurdity plays into the hands of the cult master.  Quoting Joost Meerloo in Rape of the Mind, “They never knew what [Hitler] was going to do next. [He] was never logical because he knew that that was what he was expected to be…” and illogic is impervious to the structures of logic. 

To these two linguistic disconnects, the first in the political sphere, the second in the public sphere there are answers, but they are far from easy ones. For starters, we might look to the sage advice of the Sansksrit puranas which counsel: Do not cultivate madness. In an age where all is madness, one needs to tread lightly, to question all, to examine how much of this culture we wish to embrace. And to come in contact daily with one’s imagination for living.

That requires the courage to live at the edge, to avoid what everyone else is doing; and to do what everyone else avoids.

And in our present existential dilemma, Chris Hedges offers us a choice:

“… organize the overthrow of the corporate state that vomited up Trump….We must, like liberation movements of the past, engage in acts of sustained mass civil disobedience and non-cooperation. By turning our ire on the corporate state, we name the true sources of power and abuse…. We give people an alternative to a Democratic Party that refuses to confront the corporate forces of oppression and cannot be rehabilitated. We make possible the restoration of an open society. If we fail to embrace this militancy, which alone has the ability to destroy cult leaders, we will continue the march toward tyranny.”

Sign international appeal to stop 5G on earth and in space at https://www.5gspaceappeal.org/the-appeal

Judge sets long timetable for Assange, facing draconian charges to prepare defense ag. extradition.

Millions of Brazils strike against Bolsonaro’s pension  “reforms.”

Contradicting US claim of Iranian mine attack, japan  ship owner says flying object caused explosions.

Hung Arizona  jury refuses to convict Scott Warren, a young humanitarian volunteer facing 20 years who kept bringing water and aid to desert drop-off to help migrants.

Changing the Holocene Mind from the Air

While the human race still remains at loggerheads debating whether “climate change is real” or not, we might consider designing a chart which would actually show how high the floodwaters of climate change have already reached our species, and where to position the marker: at the knees?  at the thighs? Because sooner or later we may be faced with the dilemma of where to go to breathe, a threat which is already impacting many of the Earth’s millions.

Squint to see last 23 seconds

This chart, a cosmic calendar of the birth of Earth and evolution of earthlings in the last 23 seconds of the cosmic year might suggest to the canny reader that maybe it’s time we got down from the trees. And how ironic is it that, not even quite down yet, we are faced with a challenge like none we have ever had to face—or will face. The challenge of climate collapse—the threat of famine now looming as Midwestern farmers are still unable to plant after massive flood waters inundated their fields; or the threat now driving multitudes of desperate people feeing drought into leaking rubber dinghies as they attempt a Mediterranean crossing, or crossing the Rio Grande into the receiving arms of the United States.

As an urbanite (one of the first dinosaurs to become irrelevant in the face of the new reality) I tend to overlook the whole picture addressing the source the Earth’s polluting gases—not just CO2. Three charts developed by Dr. Jonathan Foley, executive director of Project Drawdown, illustrate the point. Absent the charts themselves (which i couldn’t manage to download)  here’s the world-wide story (each country varies somewhat from these world averages): CO2 comes from 62% fossil fuels, 11% land use, that is agriculture and forestry practices, and 3% chemicals. Other greenhouse warming gases: 24%.

Source of world-wide warming emissions can be attributed as follows: Electricity, 25%, Food and land use, 24%, transportation, 14%, industry, 21%, buildings, 6%, other energy, 10%. So far, although I have certainly urged not driving and not flying, my attention has not focused readers on the imperative of looking at manufacturing, cement mixing, and where our food is sourced, and the farming practices which cause a full one quarter of warming.

On Dec. 17, 2018, after a long process of activism by land justice groups, the UN General Assembly finally adopted the Declaration on the Rights of Peasants and others working in rural areas.  These are the mostly landless peasants, many of them women, and fisherfolk, albeit often being food insecure themselves,  who have been feeding the world’s people for hundreds of years.

Why is this movement to recognize them important? Because peasant agriculture traditionally increases bio-diversity, and encourages a sense of community, and their growing methods sequester carbon in a way commercial agriculture, with its tilling practices, and its heavy reliance on fossil fuels, fails to do.

Here is an abbreviated statement of groups representing family and women farmers, dalits, landless poor, and fisherfolk as set down in the Kathmandu Declaration, a related document: “We…take our struggle forward for food sovereignty…as peasants of South Asia, [reiterating] our rights on land, water, and territories… against… discrimination, rights on seeds and livestock…and fisheries, right to fight agribusiness, transnational organizations, free trade agreements and WTO…. We consider Food Sovereignty and Agroecology as the only way to cool down the planet…and the only way of changing the current model imposed by agribusiness and transnational companies.” 

In 2011, I gave up driving or owning a car. So far, I know of only on activist who has done likewise, preferring to ride a bike. Only one musician that I know of has given up a brilliant career; she happens to be Malena Emman, opera singer, and mother of Greta Thunberg. But every morning as I wait for the bus, I see traffic streaming by me along one of my city’s major arteries, intent on global suicide and getting to it as fast as possible. And that’s only one city, and one thoroughfare. Now imagine the same phenomenon in all the world’s nearly 2000 major cities worldwide. And you see suicide on a massive scale.

What is being asked of creatures barely making their way down from the trees is to consider de-growth. What would that look like? How might we turn a fossil-fuel culture completely upside down. We have work to do, learning how to use a hoe, thinking to consider, and most of us are not even close to a mind like Einstein’s.

Here is Dr. Foley’s last chart: He titles it Fate of Carbon Dioxide Emissions. Long-term increase in atmospheric CO2, 45%, is the amount of green house gas remaining in the atmosphere, and contributing to global warming, versus that percentage that is absorbed by the oceans of 23%, and land-based ecosystems of 32%.

According to Dr. Foley, the Earth is already helping us to an overwhelming degree.  It is that 45% left to us that we must worry about. But are Holocene-intelligenced humans equipped to confront that challenge in time? Or will Earth turn into another Venus?

Add your name please to 314 Action’s Emergency Petition demanding we act on climate change now at

https://www.dailykos.com/campaigns/forms/live-petition-sign-now-to-demand-immediate-action-on-climate-change?detail=emailaction&link_id=0&can_id=447ac5b0d7a5124338b20f2bb702d0f8&source=email-fwd-bill-nye-has-a-stunning-message-to-republicans-about-climate-change-2&email_referrer=email_559054&email_subject=fwd-bill-nye-has-a-stunning-message-to-republicans-about-climate-change

Please tell fossil fuel companies to end anti-climate lobbying at

https://secure.ucsusa.org/onlineactions/goPqyH9k30evhtjO4ftSUg2?emci=2d5b1147-f086-e911-abc4-281878391efb&emdi=70717d5a-9c88-e911-abc4-281878391efb&ceid=875408&contactdata=a6Hlju%2bwWwHKURJy%2fPAXWK7ES9GFSGMLlVhkkXqcdR5rzNFyfOwXnHkSCywJnQFjJzmNdYPhvHZnZ6mtFiM4yw3Z4A5GmjMokF37MStSKMWPVgP%2fP5kOmjtIERFAx%2bzxjovu4X5GK%2fd5bf8Yu5gU5gOTsnWIUifedHIuqGr3lfNcekrasEQondQ20KlG7XfQ

Please sign petition demanding immediate release of activists jailed for protecting their forest at

https://www.thepetitionsite.com/562/724/087/?z00m=31710776&redirectID=2890841208

Foreign

European Parliament dodges far-right bullet in recent elections, although threat of autocracy remains real and growing.

Irish Senate stands up for Palestine.

German activists disrupt  Arye Shalicar, Israeli intelligence officer promoting his new book.

Activist Benjamin Ladraa walks from Sweden to Palestine to protest occupation.

Statement by Mecca summit slams US embassy move to Jerusalem.

Iran, Turkey develop pact ditching greenback in bilateral trade.

Injured yellow vests protest police brutality in Paris.

Assange won’t face charges over role in devastating CIA leak.

Protests in London and Edinburgh demand freedom for Assange and Manning.

UN warns against extraditing Assange to US.

UN recognizes Venezuela among top nations for right to housing.

China and Russia will support Venezuela against US aggression.

Brazil “uninvites” Gaidó’s envoi  amid reports of possible talks with Maduro.

Argentina warns Bolsonaro “Your hatred is not welcome here.”

Protesters set fire to US embassy in Honduras.

Cuban doctors raised for work in post-cyclone Mozambique.

“Dump Trump trade deal” banner dropped from Tower Bridge at start of state visit.

Following ongoing protests and pressure from activist organization, Extinction Rebellion, Welsh government declares climate emergency, along with Ireland, whose leader, Eamon Ryan states there must be action to back it up.

Mass demonstration against Saudi summit and US “deal” mark Quds in Yemen.

US up in arms  as Brussels continues to insist on cutting US weapons makers out of the bargain.

Tens of thousand flood UK streets protesting #45 and “everything he stands for.” (Please see Sunday Funnies.)

Warning of “surveillance capitalism nightmare, big tech investor-turned-critic Roger McNamee pushes Toronto to abandon ‘smart city’ waterfront development.

As more die at sea, EU is sued at ICC over Mediterranean migration policy.

In a crisis displacing 68.5 million people worldwide, Sea Watch flying the German flag, one of Europe’s last migrant  rescue ships defies political pressure to save a total of 37,000 lives.

Haem Zaghloul, sentenced to death as a child by Egypt, pardoned and freed.

Domestic

Proving she knows lots more about the Grand Jury than the jurors do, Manning resistance aims at abolishing it altogether.

Pushback against 5G deadly wireless spreads to at least 7 Pacific Northwest cities: Eugene, Portland, Olympia, Lacey, Tumwater, Gig Harbor, Seattle.

Oregon lawmakers vote to elect president by popular vote by 2024.

US cuts funds for propaganda Iran group, funded by the State Department, that was discovered trolling journalists and activists.

Former US ethics chief warms not to “underestimate the threat to our republic from within.”

Beyond Nuclear appeals against proposed national high-level radioactive waste dump targeted at New Mexico.

New Mexico governor says no to high-level nuclear waste.

California San Bernardino community helps hundreds of migrants border patrol drops off without orientation or assistance at Greyhound station.

Asylum-seeker falsely accused of gang ties by border officials reunited with kids—after 184 days.

Asylum-seeker separated from son for 378 days by  administration wins immigration case.

Florida launches probe into group behind private border wall.

Comcast ditches ties with ALEC

Responding to threats by management, American Airlines mechanics promise “bloodiest, ugliest battle’ in labor history.

Warren unveils plan to reverse policy, allowing DOJ to indict and prosecute a sitting “president.”

Ten Dem presidential candidates promise(?) to ban fracking.

Sanders hands over his social media accounts to Walmart Workers ahead of attending annual meeting to advocate for them.

Sanders blasts Walmart execs to their faces at annual shareholder meeting demanding “Pay your workers a living wage.”

Anti-democracy riders removed from House Financial Services and General Government Appropriations bill.

California Dems back #NoMiddleGround with Medicare for all.

Doctors and nurses to march on AMA annual meeting demanding end to “rotten” opposition to Medicare for all.

In California’s East Bay local activists plan to erase over $1 million in medical debt using debt collectors’ tools.

Study claims ribociclib/Kisqali drug, funded by its producer, Big Pharm Novartrs, extends life of younger women with advanced beast cancer. Duh.

San Francisco joins national push to abolish youth prisons.

San Francisco to pay $400K settlement to mother of Mario Woods over fatal police shooting.

Oakland California votes to decriminalize magic mushrooms, the psychedelic fungus.

Fifty years later, NYPD “apologizes” for 1969 raid of Stonewall Inn.

Hollywood producer, Peter Chernin, plans to raise millions to fight anti-abortion laws.

California Act to Save Lives, designed to hold police accountable for needless  violence passes state Assembly with huge support.

California Assembly passes two bills helping people with old criminal records to access opportunities.

Rhode Island Sen. Elaine Morgan supports a study commission to review possible health impacts of 5 G wireless networks.

Texas Dems force resignation of voter-suppressing Texas Secy. of State.

Some prosecutors say they’ll refuse to enforce state abortion bans.

Overriding Gov. Sununu’s veto, N. Hampshire Senate votes to abolish death penalty.

Announcing the largest independent survey of black people in the US ever, Alicia Garza of Black Live Matter introduces latest project to survey more than 31,000 black people to determine “What Black People Want.”

Lonnie Bunch first black man ever to head the entire Smithsonian.

Across US and Canada, residents unite to fight displacement in Chinatowns.

Judge orders Feds to disclose climate impacts of fracking on public lands in Colorado and Utah.

Shareholders strongly support climate resolutions at Chevron and Exxon annual meetings.

Overruling GOP, House passes $19.1 billion disaster relief, for US and Puerto Rico.

House sets contempt votes for Barr and McGahn by changing rules to enforce subpoenas.

House passes latest DREAM Act, hoping to place millions of immigrants on citizenship path.

To honor her immigrant, farmworker parent, high school valedictorian carries basket of strawberries on state.

Protesters at Creech drone base and Nevada security site cross line for peace.

Clean school buses come to Maryland, Arizona, and Nevada.

Saying we have “national crisis in public safety,” Julián Castro’s proposes people first policing plan.

Threatening revolt, Republicans threaten to block #45 Mexico tariffs, while Americans for Prosperity also call on Congress to block them.

U.S.S. Abraham Lincoln hangs back outside Persian Gulf.

US lawmakers push back against #45 on Saudi weapons sales.

PA County sues Monsanto over chemical contamination.

Opioid maker Insys “Therapeutics” admits bribing doctors to push fentanyl.

South Carolina Public Service Commission slaps down outrageous Duke Energy fee hike.

EPA cancels registration of 12 toxic, bee-killing pesticides.

SEIU first national union to endorse Green New Deal.

Courts give endangered vaquitas glimmer of hope.

Court of International Trade issues preliminary injunction banning shrimp and other seafood caught in Gulf of California with gillnets.

DOJ exploring antitrust investigation of Google.

Judge denies Facebook’s motion to dismiss Cambridge Analytica lawsuit in DC.

Rhode Island farmer protests to shut down ICE, jailed.

Eastern Illinois conservative county stands yup to big coal.

 

 

  

 

And last but not least: 

House Dems propose $4,500 pay raise a year for Congress

ARMS AGAINST A SEA OF TROUBLES

I want to devote this issue of the newsletter to a matter having a wider reach than our current political discourse (and lack of it).

In a recent conversation with a friend, she speculated that I might not want to get quite so “dark” as she put it, compared to where I “have been going” lately. Indeed, she is not the first. One friendship has been lost around this very issue. The issue of “going there.”

For some uncanny reason (maybe it’s genes) I seem to have somewhat less trouble than some folks “going there.” That seems always to have been the case, from the time when, as a very young person, I accepted the mentorship of three people who in various ways, had experienced being Jewish, living in Europe through the years of the Third Reich, each of them having paid variously and dearly for their experiences. That said, I experienced one period of high stress when this gift deserted me for some time. 

I told my friend I was not without secrets, that I had some defenses up my sleeve. I think it may be helpful to some of the over 800 readers of this newsletter for me to try to share some of them.

The west is not the only fruit

While the western hemisphere basks in full sunlight, the eastern half of our planet lies in darkness. Without realizing it, most people of the west are completely in the dark about what the east has to teach us. Increasingly, our planet seems to have allowed itself to succumb to the lures of western culture, a culture based on individualism, competition, and the collapse of time itself, whereas for the most part, the east embodies in its cultures a slower pace of living, a more collaborative, collective view of work and life, and a sense of history rooted in the very distant past, a sense which lends opinion formation both perspective and humility.

 

And that seasoned sense of time allows the viewing of technology, certainly as the manifestation of the western, one-sided state of mind, with a certain skepticism, and to recognize in its single-minded pursuit, an obsessiveness which characterizes any other religion. That untempered pursuit has gotten us earthlings in a mighty fix, one we lack language and vision to encounter. At best we have the glimmerings of new birth, an awakening piloted by children. In our growing dilemma, we forget that Earth is custodian of the music of Johann Sebastian Bach, Shivkumar Sharma, Nikhil Banerjee, Jimi Hendrix, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, and Sophie Watillon, and the painting of Michelangelo, da Vinci, Matisse, Courbet, and the writing of Shakespeare, Kazantzakis, and Sam Beckett, and the theater of Peter Schumann, and such thinkers as Buber, and Levinas, and the mathematics of Ramanujan, and the mysticism of St. Francis, and that we earthlings are the guardians of such treasures, which perish when we perish.  

 

 Living Things 

What other folks sometimes refer to as Creation, namely all things that live (including the human) is cause for study, and celebration, and some of them are things I have learned to hold dear. Trees, especially, occupy that part of my landscape—which is why I continue living where I do. Whenever I find myself in their presence, I notice that the air feels different, which I experience as a freshness, a coolness I find no where else.  I am breathing the air the trees have breathed. We are sharing this air, and I am conscious of their gift, and their great beauty and majesty.

 

 Some time ago, when the East Bay Regional Park District announced their plan to clearcut thousands of trees along the East Bay Hills, I attended a hearing (a sham hearing as it turned out: the apparent jury declared at one point: “Oh, we’re not the commissioners! We are just the secretaries!”) I spoke. I testified, if you will, about what those trees meant to me after living under them for so many years. “I have put a lot of love on those trees,” I tried explaining.

The point here, is not whether or not I might have been heard by the secretaries, or their masters, but how I chose to encapsulate a feeling that is infinitely broader than words can ever express:  I hold trees—and all of creation—sacred.  In other words, awe is part of my life. I am not ashamed of it. I need it to lend dimension to the way I perceive human existence, and my own small place in the world.

 Commitment to Buddhism

At most, I am an accidental Buddhist. The story begins some 40 years or so, after experiencing two uncanny episodes, 15 years apart, of absolutely undeserved, and unearned serendipity. What I  appreciate about Buddhism is it allows you to think for yourself and progress at your own (sometimes pathetic) pace. It does not tell you what to think (although its amusing mythology attributes the Buddha’s birth to his mother’s encounter—not with a bird—but with an elephant)! For someone areligious, it appeals because it is not a religion; it is a path without absolutes, one adaptable even to slow learners. It offers few declarative sentences, and it poses its questions in the form of unfathomable koans. (All dharmas are inherently empty; form is no other than emptiness, emptiness no other than form - from the Heart Sutra.)

Ajanta Cave - India

Over a great deal of time, in its mysterious way, little by little, its practice seasons the untamed soul. The small increments are barely noticeable at first, but over many years, they add up to a stronger sense of perspective, and balance, and strengthen one’s ability to count to ten, and above all to listen. It gives one the insight and courage to begin facing oneself. And to observe the distinction between saying “that’s good, that’s bad” vs. “I think that’s good. I think that’s bad.” In other words you give up any impulse to lay trips on other people, some of them ex-friends, and begin learning to take responsibility. And that growing sense of responsibility allows even willfully junglee people to grow up. A little.

What I especially like about Buddhism is one of its so-called noble truths: See things as they are. And that ability is essential if we are ever honestly to face the challenges coming at us thick and fast, and to become effective at doing something about them, not just smiling (that is the danger of over-Buddhism) and continuing on one’s placid way, but allowing the divine fire of anger to move us off our duffs.

Tile detail - Blue Mosque, Isfahan

INTENTIONAL PLANET, APPROPRIATE POLITICS

This week, we have been bombarded with a Persied shower of  bad news coming at us thick , fast, and unsustainably. Julian Assange, one 

of a handful of journalists to have penetrated the gold curtain to expose those elites who wield the power oppressing the planet’s peoples, showing signs of psychological torture, unable to hold a conversation; intensifying anti-abortion warfare against women. (In fact, I even considered a headline “Growing babies for Fun and Profit.”) But that is what is happening to women. Why? because the birthrate is falling and the captains of capital need new consumers and new cannon fodder to wage their perpetual wars, and operate their increasingly lethal technology.

 

And just this morning, I read 75% of congress, both houses demand #45 boost intervention in Syria, and pressure Iran and Russia. We know the military is responsible for 93% of the U.S. use of fossil fuel. Dahr Jamail writes we are now at 415 ppm, the hottest this planet has ever been in millions of years. Tornado warnings (two of them) were posted in New York City. The market has tanked over the tariff war being waged first against China, now Mexico. And the war makers are busy at their drawing boards preparing the next full scale military aggression, this one against Iran.

 

As a coping strategy, I sometimes resort to reading astronomy to gain a more distanced perspective. And it allows me to see that building walls, even privatized walls on private property on a small stretch of real estate bordering Mexico, indicates we have not yet come down from the trees in our ability to think.

What we still refer to as migration, caravans of desperate people, either crossing the Mediterranean, or the southern U.S. border is really a manifestation of the planetary response to global warming—as is a falling birthrate. I am reminded of a remarkable phenomenon I first read about maybe 20 years ago: a migration of tiny, finger-sized frogs stretching over one thousand miles marching across much of China.  At the time, what I found most remarkable is that that any humans had bothered to notice at all, let alone written about it.

 

Immigration is our migration of frogs, living beings fleeing one habitat, in search of a friendlier one. But we still imagine in our pre-historic mind set we can counter vast planetary movements by building walls, and forcing women to give birth.

How can we as the planet’s people begin to untangle our Gordian knot? We can learn to ask questions. For example when do such signs as a falling birthrate, and an uninterrupted migration stream become not just political phenomena, but transcended the political domain to take on planetary dimensions? Then we need to learn to address current political realities, not with baby carriages, rock concerts, balloons and pussy hats. The time of Mr. Nice Guy is over, especially when an  overwhelming 75% of congress proves itself to be warmongering. We need to engage in serious disruption of the status quo. We need a full blown peace movement asap. Sticking with old-style tactics in the face of rampant fascism is tantamount to political neurosis, and leads to planetary suicide.

Next, we need to imagine clear ways to think about our planetary dilemma. We can learn something from the predatory/prey cycles first described by Italian physicist Vito Volterra in the 1940s, who described the differential declines between sharks (the predator) and mackerel (the prey). Predators continue to thrive well beyond the point where prey experience a population crash. This concept is a useful one if we imagine human agency as predatory and the planet as prey. It is equally useful if we imagine the entrenchment of the elite as predator; and of the world’s oppressed people as prey.

And having  learned to think about the two domains, the political, and planetary, we need to learn to think more clearly about planets and their civilizations as users of energy.

Astrophysicist Adam Frank, writing in Light of the Stars: alien worlds and the fate of the Earth, proposes five planetary stages, all defined by the way in which a planet organizes its use of energy. He sees our present planetary dilemma as we pass now through our narrow energy use bottleneck into a Class 5 planet, as one in which we must learn to wring work and change out of sunlight. To that end he proposes what he calls an intentional, agency-motivated civilization.

 

That means that humans who speak nearly 8,000 separate and distinct languages, with their corresponding nearly 8,000 different cultures, must somehow find common cause which allows them to overcome their differences long enough to engage in a concerted, and coordinated effort to respond appropriately to our present global challenge. How might we accomplish that? As of now, we have embarked on a children-led crusade, but at present Earth is still without any coordinated plan to accomplish what it must. Technology alone cannot do it. It’s time to come down from the trees.

For starters, we must think locally, act globally. The planet you live on just might be your own.

   

Tell dinosaurs Pelosi and Schumer: Stop war with Iran talk at:

https://act.winwithoutwar.org/act/pelosi_schumer_stop_war_with_iran?source=aa_MO20190521

Tell congress to halt Saudi and Emirati arms sales now at

https://act.winwithoutwar.org/act/tell-congress-ban-saudi-and-emirati-arms-sales-now?source=em20190530&t=4&akid=3656%2E328736%2EeKz56f

Urge congress to co sponsor H. Rec. 152 calling for formal ending to Korean War at:

https://actionnetwork.org/letters/peace-in-korea-email-your-representative-and-senators?source=UFPJ190527&referrer=group-united-for-peace-justice&link_id=4&can_id=655968a96e1bce05c463b2f640bf633c&email_referrer=email_555984&email_subject=a-path-to-peace-in-korea

Sign the petition to free the Kings Bay Plowshares peace-maker’s petition at:

https://actionnetwork.org/petitions/sign-global-petition-to-dismiss-charges-against-anti-nuclear-plowshares-activists-facing-25-years?source=direct_link&

End wasteful military spending (it’s a start) at:

https://actionnetwork.org/petitions/sign-the-petition-end-wasteful-military-spending?source=direct_link&referrer=group-peace-action-2

Protect Undocumented Californians from ICE data brokers at:

https://takeaction.salsalabs.org/databrokers/index.html?eType=EmailBlastContent&eId=5148755b-175e-483d-a05a-64f24a3d1cf1

Tell congress to support the Women’s Health Protection act at

https://act.nwlc.org/onlineactions/9t7rQw-UHUSaLbhG7g0M6A2?emci=5c05175e-e582-e911-abc4-281878391efb&emdi=3e2b25aa-f282-e911-abc4-281878391efb&ceid=792364&contactdata=MDIeCEfumrjf7WLpZufgKsdiNhWyRB4T405RgDZ7HRds1xwunMWt%2bI2lebaBEIVSAboLOJBOCrcyoUR1YomhN%2bIRzbiNZwwP8fS9PA7lpmxst0wOVoxLI%2ftlGty4W65tgiXy4RVKm3hDl35LI5wukEigRGSCsOC0H8D3OB7U2rw%3d

Protect abortion rights at:
https://petitions.moveon.org/sign/dont-overturn-roe-v-wade-1?source=share_chain

Tell Supreme Court “Don’t overturn Roe vs. Wade! Don’t criminalize abortion at:

 https://act.weareultraviolet.org/sign/stop_abortion_bans/?t=6&referring_akid=45357.347764.ejqiIe

Best news of the week: Pilgrim Mark I nuclear reactor, same G. E. model that exploded at Fukushima, on Cape Cod (where there was never any way to evacuate) shuts down for good.

Foreign

Taliban claims progress made at Afghan talks in Moscow.

Glasgow City Council drops defense industry in new ethical events policy.

BirthStrike a UK online community declare decision not to bear children in the face of global warming and government inaction.

Israel’s settler railway runs into a snag when French trade unions and human rights organizations band together to celebrate Alstom’s withdrawal from Jerusalem Light Rail linking Jerusalem and West Bank settlements.

UN chief: Fossil fuel subsidies mean using public money to “Destroy the World.”

UN special rapporteur on torture calls for freeing Julian Assange, claiming that Assange would likely face a political show trial were he extradited to the U.S.

New Filipino law requires all students to plant ten trees if they want to graduate.

In Colombia, Jesús Santrich, a representative of Colombia’s new legal political party, Revolutionary Alternative Common Force (FARC) is freed, and no longer faces extradition to—yes, of all things—the United States.

German activists disrupt Israeli intelligence officer accused of painting all anti-Zionists as anti-Semitic.

Glyphosate now banned or restricted in 17 countries worldwide.

Domestic

Tide of U.S. public opinion turns in favor of Assange.

Chelsea Manning’s legal team files motion to reconsider sanctions.

Renewable energy costs decline further, making fossils and their backers more obsolete than ever.

76 retired U.S. generals and diplomats warn #45 against war with Iran.

As global climate  crisis continues unabated, Alameda, California will be among first Bay Area cities to confront major sea level rise.

Judge Carlton Reeves temporarily blocks Mississippi fetal heartbeat law.

Sanders leads top 2020 contenders on Greenpeace climate scorecard (while Biden wimps out dead last).

“Enough is enough” at Town Halls nation-wide, Democrats get earfuls from constituents who demand impeachment hearing.

In Louisiana’s Death Alley, activists march for a Green New Deal Revolution, demanding end to petrochemical pollution in Black communities.

Just one day after airline sued them for an “illegal work shutdown,” mechanics at American Airlines, U.S. largest airline after merger with U.S. Airways, threaten “bloodiest, ugliest battle” in U.S. labor history

New York State Appeals Court recognizes farmworkers right to organize.

Colorado becomes first state to cap cost of insulin.

#45 sued to save eight species on the  brink of extinction.

Comcast dumps ALEC (but continues attack on labor).

Judge Timothy Hillman, in a federal Massachusetts federal court, finds that 14-year-old FCC guidelines do not bar claims by those having EHS sensitivity to cell phones or Wi-Fi can go forward.

Activists have yet more work to do as California State Assembly votes to pass AB 857, the local public banking bill with 41 yes votes, the bare minimum to keep the bill alive.

AOC calls for ban on revolving door as study demonstrates 2/3 recently departed lawmakers become K street lobbyists.

Johnson $ Johnson, the big pharma company that brings you tendon destruction, is on trial in Oklahoma for its role in the opioid crisis with production of fentanyl.

SCOTUS declines to hear challenge to inclusive Pennsylvania school district bathroom policy in victory for transgender students.

Maine becomes 17^th state to ban conversion therapy.

More than 200 economists send letter to congress endorsing medicare for all.

As Pence warns U.S. “can more than double” tariffs on China, treasury note yield tumbles.

Unless Democrats develop spine to impeach, professor who correctly predicted last  9 presidential elections says #45 will win in 2020. 

Thanks to advocates and legislature support, Oklahoma passes bill expediting commutation process for misdemeanor offenses, and stops revocations back to prison for people still under probate for felonies no longer existing.

Border congressional members, among them Xochitl Torres-Small, and Henry Cuellar and Veronica Escobar send letter to House Appropriation requesting grants be made to FEMA to reimburse governmental and NGO groups along border providing humanitarian assistance to refugees released by ICE and CBP.

Pioneer Valley Workers Center announces formation by seven members of a new farm coop.

Following mass protests in St. Louis, Missouri’s last abortion clinic safe for now under federal judge’s order.

Consumer Financial Protection Bureau proposes rule limiting what debt collectors can do to pursue overdue bills.

Baltimore teachers manage to unseat sore loser incumbents.

Pentagon fails audit: Asks for a raise.

Man suspected of rhino poaching killed by elephant, and devoured by lions.

Climate-denying administration rebrands fossil fuels as "Freedom Gas" (like Freedom Fries but greasier).

Big tobacco funds McConnell, who pledges he won't get cancer.

Geographically challenged: Florida Gov. de Santis sued over state meeting in Jerusalem.