By now all but the hopelessly stupid or deliberately ignorant understand the basics of climate change. Increasing the amounts of a few gases in the atmosphere traps heat and make the planet’s equilibrium temperature higher. The big three are methane (CH4), nitrous oxide (N2O), and mainly carbon dioxide (CO2): humans are pumping these gases out […]
Michael O'Hare
Michael O'Hare is a Professor of Public Policy at the University of California, Berkeley.
Posted inEducation, Higher Education
UC Berkeley’s Disaster Sports Program
Time to update the amazing failing-upward saga of the UC Berkeley Intercollegiate Athletics program, because we have hit the front page of our local paper with another humiliating roundup. Just to review, we are talking about a $70m-per-year business that loses $10m sending athletes to compete against other schools in a couple of dozen sports […]
Posted inPolitics
Oklahoma Tornado
Oklahoma is an oil state. Oklahomans vote for people like senators Inhofe and Coburn, who rail at the ‘myth’ of climate change. After all, there are millions and millions of dollars still to earn selling oil to burn: what more evidence does a reasonable Sooner need? People who think science is more than a political […]
Posted inPolitics
Why I’m Fascinated by Beer Even Though It Usually Tastes Terrible
Keith’s post reminds me that I love almost everything about beer except drinking it (on the latter, I like it with spicy food or on hot summer afternoons, but as often as not I’d be equally happy with a nice cold glass of milk or lemonade). As a beer is any fermented grain [fermented fruit […]
Posted inPolitics
Francis
The god of irony is everywhere and never sleeps. Who would have guessed that the first pope from the global South would be an ethnic European, from the most European southern country? …that this third non-Italian pope in several centuries would be from the most Italian country outside Italy and have Italian parents? Who would […]
Posted inPolitics
Really Hard Jobs
Some jobs are challenging, and some are so hard it’s a wonder anyone can be found to take them on. Ambassador from Pakistan to anywhere, for example. At the moment, the US slot is held by Sherry Rehman, and representing her country in a positive way to anyone not clinically insane has just become even […]
Posted inPolitics
Hair of the Dog
Let’s reflect on the two real lessons of the Battle of Newtown. First, the Second Amendment is not about hunting animals and punching paper, it’s about winning a war against the government, and here we have a man who didn’t whine about tyranny, or run and hide: he took up arms like a Real American, […]
Posted inPolitics
Convergence of Forces
John Boehner has committed the house majority to accept new revenues under the “right conditions”. The California legislature has a 2/3 D majority in both houses, which means it can actually raise taxes, and the CA electorate that pulled the legs out from under its government a third of a century ago voted to increase […]
Posted inPolitics
Voting as Though Reality Matters
Matt Stoller thinks this would be a good time to vote for a third-party candidate. His case, approximately, comes in two parts. The first is a sheet of charges against Obama for bad things he did and good things he didn’t do in his first term (some of which are a little naïve about what […]
Posted inPolitics
Continued Collapse of the Information System: Two More Dead Canaries
Two significant pieces of news: Google’s earnings (and stock price) are down, and Newsweek has given up on a paper edition.The Newsweek story is only the latest step down a path to oblivion, as the digital edition cannot survive financially either and will close down in turn. This is happening because the business models for […]
