Trump’s promise to put coal miners back to work was a failure

REUTERS/LEAH MILLIS

Former US president Donald Trump at a Charleston, West Virginia rally in 2018.

• 

By Michael J. Coren

Climate reporter

3 hours ago

In 2016, Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump made a promise to coal miners at a rally in West Virginia. “For those miners, get ready because you’re going to be working your asses off,” he told them, wearing a white hard hat. “We’ll be winning, winning, winning.”

After four years of the Trump administration, coal has been losing, losing, losing. Not that Trump can take the blame (or the credit). Dismal economics have been inexorably displacing coal as the fuel of choice in the US and around the world. Trump made some attempts to stop the bleeding—easing air pollution laws and propping up ailing plants—and in 2017, falsely claimed those efforts were working. “We are putting the coal miners back to work, just as I promised,” he said.

But, the data tell a different story. The number of people employed by the coal mining industry has fallen 15% since Trump took office in January 2017. Despite job losses that temporarily stabilized during his years in office, according to US Bureau of Labor Statistics Data, the trend is continuing. Jobs did not increase, unhelped by Trump’s trade wars and unsuccessful efforts to use the Defense Production Act to prop up coal plants, before the pandemic curtailed coal demand and employment.

Production has followed suit. Despite coal prices remaining stable around $35 per ton over the last decade, production fell during Trump’s years in office to just 706 million short tons, the lowest amount since 1978, according to the US Energy Information Administration.

Coal still generates 38% of global electricity, the largest share of any fuel. But that is falling in many countries as the price of solar, wind, and natural gas dips below coal, cutting into the industry’s profits. During the first half of 2020, global coal capacity fell for the first time since at least the 1950s, reports the nonprofit Global Energy Monitor.

In the US, many coal boilers are now simply too expensive to run. In the last five years, utilities have shut down more than 48 gigawatts of coal-fired generation capacity. The pandemic accelerated that trend: As energy demand dipped, the most expensive sources were taken offline first. In 2021, another 2.7 GW, or 1% of the US coal fleet, is scheduled to be retired. Soon, it will be cheaper to build new solar or wind farms than continue operating old coal plants, accelerating retirements further.

But there remains one bright spot for US coal producers: exports. The rest of the world still has a huge (and in some cases growing) coal fleet. China and India support the industry through heavy state subsidies, and China doubled the pace of new coal permitting last year with least 250 GW of new coal power capacity planned. For now, American coal mines’ only new business is likely to come from overseas.

QZ

PASSION AND POWER

"JUST IS , IS NOT JUST ICE" 

INAGURATION POEM

NEW AMERICAN NATIONAL POET LAURETTE AMANDA GORMAN

AWESONE POEM AWESOME DELIVERY, 

WATCH THE MAGIC SHE SPINS WITH HER FINGERS

 WRITTEN THE NIGHT OF JAN 6 

AFTER THE ATTEMPTED INSURRECTION & TRUMP COUP

MY FAVOURITE PART OF THE INAUGURATION

THE OTHER WAS THE EVENING TV SPECIAL

Read the poem that riveted a nation during Joe Biden’s inauguration ceremony

REUTERS/PATRICK SEMANSKY Brilliant.


By Lila MacLellan
Quartz at Work reporter
January 20, 2021

The roughly six minutes that belonged to Amanda Gorman, a 22-year-old Black poet from Los Angeles, may become what many Americans remember most vividly about Joe Biden’s inauguration as US president on Jan. 20.

Gorman’s recitation of her work “The Hill We Climb” was a showstopper, her performance as powerful and transformative as her verses.

Gorman has explained that she finished the work late at night on Jan. 6, the day of the violent insurrection at the US Capitol. She references the darkness and trials the country has recently endured, writing of “a force that would shatter our nation rather than share it, would destroy our country if it meant delaying democracy” and “nearly succeeded.” But she also delivers an ode to America’s resilience and a call to summon it. In the final line, she writes that “the light that is always there, if only we’re brave enough to see it. If only we’re brave enough to be it.”

The poet is herself a personification of that light. One section of her work reads:

And yet the dawn is ours before we knew it, somehow we do it, somehow we’ve weathered and witnessed a nation that isn’t broken but simply unfinished.

We, the successors of a country and a time where a skinny black girl descended from slaves and raised by a single mother can dream of becoming president only to find herself reciting for one.

According to NPR, the young poet, like Biden, suffered from a speech impediment as a child. Biden struggled with stuttering, something that he still manages, and Gorman couldn’t pronounce certain sounds. She nevertheless became LA’s first Youth Poet Laureate at age 16 and, while studying three years later at Harvard University, was named the first National Youth Poet Laureate.

She isn’t the first poet invited to read at an inauguration who had to overcome an obstacle to communicating. “Maya Angelou was mute growing up as a child and she grew up to deliver the inaugural poem for president Bill Clinton,” Gorman told NPR. “So I think there is a real history of orators who have had to struggle with a type of imposed voicelessness, you know, having that stage in the inauguration.”

The connection between Gorman and Angelou wasn’t lost on others watching the event:

You can watch a video of Gorman reading “The Hill We Climb” and read the text of the poem, as transcribed by Los Angeles Magazine, 

“The Hill We Climb” by Amanda Gorman


When day comes we ask ourselves, where can we find light in this never-ending shade? The loss we carry, a sea we must wade. We’ve braved the belly of the beast, we’ve learned that quiet isn’t always peace and the norms and notions of what just is, isn’t always justice. And yet the dawn is ours before we knew it, somehow we do it, somehow we’ve weathered and witnessed a nation that isn’t broken but simply unfinished.

We, the successors of a country and a time where a skinny black girl descended from slaves and raised by a single mother can dream of becoming president only to find herself reciting for one. And, yes, we are far from polished, far from pristine, but that doesn’t mean we are striving to form a union that is perfect, we are striving to forge a union with purpose, to compose a country committed to all cultures, colors, characters and conditions of man.

So we lift our gazes not to what stands between us, but what stands before us. We close the divide because we know to put our future first, we must first put our differences aside. We lay down our arms so we can reach out our arms to one another, we seek harm to none and harmony for all.

Let the globe, if nothing else, say this is true: that even as we grieved, we grew, even as we hurt, we hoped, that even as we tired, we tried, that we’ll forever be tied together victorious, not because we will never again know defeat but because we will never again sow division.

Scripture tells us to envision that everyone shall sit under their own vine and fig tree and no one should make them afraid. If we’re to live up to our own time, then victory won’t lie in the blade, but in in all of the bridges we’ve made.

That is the promise to glade, the hill we climb if only we dare it because being American is more than a pride we inherit, it’s the past we step into and how we repair it. We’ve seen a force that would shatter our nation rather than share it. That would destroy our country if it meant delaying democracy, and this effort very nearly succeeded. But while democracy can periodically be delayed, but it can never be permanently defeated.

In this truth, in this faith, we trust, for while we have our eyes on the future, history has its eyes on us, this is the era of just redemption we feared in its inception we did not feel prepared to be the heirs of such a terrifying hour but within it we found the power to author a new chapter, to offer hope and laughter to ourselves, so while once we asked how can we possibly prevail over catastrophe, now we assert how could catastrophe possibly prevail over us.

We will not march back to what was but move to what shall be, a country that is bruised but whole, benevolent but bold, fierce and free, we will not be turned around or interrupted by intimidation because we know our inaction and inertia will be the inheritance of the next generation, our blunders become their burden. But one thing is certain: if we merge mercy with might and might with right, then love becomes our legacy and change our children’s birthright.

So let us leave behind a country better than the one we were left, with every breath from my bronze, pounded chest, we will raise this wounded world into a wondrous one, we will rise from the golden hills of the West, we will rise from the windswept Northeast where our forefathers first realized revolution, we will rise from the lake-rimmed cities of the Midwestern states, we will rise from the sunbaked South, we will rebuild, reconcile, and recover in every known nook of our nation in every corner called our country our people diverse and beautiful will emerge battered and beautiful, when the day comes we step out of the shade aflame and unafraid, the new dawn blooms as we free it, for there is always light if only we’re brave enough to see it, if only we’re brave enough to be it.

Read more about Gorman and her forthcoming children’s book, Change Sings (Penguin Random House) on her official site.

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Maya Angelou moved us with “Pulse of the Morning” in ‘93 so Amanda Gorman could inspire us with “The Hill We Climb” in ‘21 #fullcircle #Inauguration

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China’s gift for the Biden inauguration is a conspiracy theory about Covid-19’s US origins

REUTERS/KEVIN LAMARQUEA blame game.
FROM OUR OBSESSION
Because China
China is striving for global leadership, and has the economic clout to realize its vision.


By Jane Li
China tech reporter
January 20, 2021

A conspiracy theory that links the origins of Covid-19 to a US military lab is trending on Chinese social media on Wednesday (Jan. 20), after a spokesperson from the country’s foreign ministry redirected the public’s focus to the lab this week.

The fresh attention being drawn by a Chinese official to the theory just ahead of the inauguration of Joe Biden today (Jan. 20) as president, could indicate that the new administration will face an uphill battle when it comes to US-China relationship, and a continuation of the blame game between the two countries over the pandemic.

Hua Chunying, a spokesperson for China’s foreign ministry, said on Monday (Jan. 18) at a press conference that the US should open Fort Detrick, a military medical research base in Maryland, for further investigation as a possible origin of Covid-19. “I’d like to stress that if the United States truly respects facts, it should open the biological lab at Fort Detrick, give more transparency to issues like its 200-plus overseas bio-labs, invite WHO [the World Health Organization] experts to conduct origin-tracing in the United States, and respond to the concerns from the international community with real actions,” she said.

Hua made the remark in response to a question on China’s reaction to a statement last week from the outgoing US state secretary Mike Pompeo, who said the US government has “reasons to believe” some staffers at China’s state-owned Wuhan Institute of Virology developed symptoms that were consistent with “both Covid-19 and common seasonal illnesses” in autumn 2019, before the pandemic turned Wuhan into its epicenter early last year. Early into the pandemic, the Wuhan lab has been at the center of the conspiracy theories about the virus, to an extent that Shi Zhengli, a lead researcher of the lab, said she “guaranteed with her life” that the virus was totally unrelated to the institution.

In general, theories suggesting the virus was purpose-built or the work of scientists have been emphatically rejected by scientists globally, and many of them believe it originated in wildlife, such as bats. Although some studies indicate that the virus could have been present in countries like Italy in 2019, most researchers point to China as the most likely origin of Covid-19 given the virus was first identified in Wuhan. Despite the apparent danger of promoting unfounded conspiracy theories, prominent figures from both China and the US, such as Chinese foreign ministry spokesperson Zhao Lijian and Republican senators Tom Cotton and Ted Cruz, have promoted some of these claims amid ongoing US-China tensions.

Hua’s Monday comment gave a fresh push to the ongoing suspicion in China that the virus could come from outside the country, partly a result of Beijing’s effort to sow confusion over the origins of Covid-19. Last year Zhao promoted the idea that US athletes from the military who attended a sports event in Wuhan in 2019 could have spread the virus.

The hashtag #foreign ministry, which accompanied reports of Hua’s Fort Detrick remarks published by media outlets, shot to the top among all trending topics on Weibo late on Tuesday, while early today the hashtag #the US Fort Detrick biology lab, which has been viewed over 1 billion times, also occupied the top place on the platform briefly.

A post that contained a video clip of Hua’s remark on the US lab received around 4.5 million upvotes, with commentators saying they now firmly believe the virus is from the US. “Even the foreign ministry said so, it seems [the conspiracy theory] is true,” the top comment under the post read. Multiple state-owned Chinese outlets published reports on the US military lab shortly after Hua’s comment became viral, with the articles carrying headlines such as “the secret you don’t know about: the Fort Detrick biology lab.”

Hua’s remark came shortly after a team of independent experts led by WHO arrived in China last week to investigate the origins of the coronavirus, including how it leaped to humans. They are currently going through a two-week quarantine before they can look at samples and evidence provided by the Chinese authorities.

“They have certainly set up the idea domestically at least that the WHO investigation is a farce unless they investigate the US too,” wrote Bill Bishop, a veteran China analyst in his newsletter.

For Biden, who is expected to unite western democracies to challenge Beijing’s authoritarian rule, the timing of Hua’s remark and the discussion that ensued signal he should expect to deal with a Beijing that will continue its aggressive diplomatic style, whose practitioners have been dubbed “wolf warriors.”

“This whole ‘wolf-warrior’ approach is not an anomaly, it is a fundamental principle of Xi Jinping Thought on Diplomacy, and the struggle is only going to intensify, now [no] matter who is in the White House,” wrote Bishop, referring to the thinking of China’s leader.

Correction: This article was updated to clarify Zhao Lijian was the foreign ministry official who promoted a Covid-19 conspiracy theory about US athletes last year.

New Mexico zoo sends endangered 

wolf pack to Mexico







Endangered Wolves MexicoThis Jan. 15, 2021 image provided by the ABQ BioPark shows a male endangered Mexican gray wolf named Ryder at the zoo in Albuquerque, N.M. It is part of a pack that has been transported to Mexico for eventual release into the wild as part of conservation efforts in that country. (ABQ BioPark via AP)

SUSAN MONTOYA BRYAN
Wed, January 20, 2021,

ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. (AP) — A pair of endangered Mexican gray wolves and their seven pups have been sent from a zoo in New Mexico's largest city to Mexico as part of conservation efforts in that country.

Officials at the ABQ BioPark in Albuquerque confirmed Tuesday that the wolves were loaded up in separate crates and trucked south last week. The pack of predators will eventually be released into the wild after they learn to hunt and survive on their own.

The zoo is among others in the United States that have partnered with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service for decades on Mexican gray wolf breeding and recovery efforts. Several wolves born at the zoo have been released into the wild over the years, but this marks its first international pack release.


“We’re excited and sad at the same time,” Erin Flynn, ABQ BioPark mammal curator, said in a statement. “It’s a zoo’s dream to directly help a wild population like this. It’s even more powerful and touching for us that it's our beloved lobo that we’re helping.”

The pack was selected for release in part because it has shown to be a strong family, Flynn said.

The male wolf arrived at the zoo in late 2018 and warmed up to his mate quickly. The two had their first litter of three pups in 2019, marking the first pups born at the zoo in 15 years. Their second litter of seven pups arrived in May 2020.

The female wolf came to the BioPark in 2016 after being born at the Zoológico de San Juan de Aragón in Mexico.

Once across the border, the pack was taken to a “wilding school” near Mexico City by a team from Universidad Autónoma de Querétaro.

Teaching the wolves to hunt will be hands-off, Flynn said. Biologists and environmentalists who have advocated for releasing more wolves into their historic range in northern Mexico and parts of the American Southwest have said less human contact can help ensure better outcomes in the wild.

More Mexican wolves are in the wild now than at any time since they were nearly exterminated decades ago. At least 163 wolves were counted during last year's survey in southeastern Arizona and southwestern New Mexico, marking a nearly 25% jump in the population from the previous year. There are an estimated 30 wolves in the wild in Mexico's Sierra Madre Occidental.

Work is underway on this year's survey, with results expected in the coming weeks.

A subspecies of the Western gray wolf, Mexican wolves have faced a difficult road to recovery that has been complicated by politics and conflicts with livestock. The challenges have been mounting: Ranchers and rural residents say the situation has become untenable as 2019 marked a record year for livestock kills. In the first nine months of 2020, 140 kills were confirmed.

Federal and state wildlife managers have established several food caches in Arizona and New Mexico as a way to keep the wolves from preying on cattle. They also have logged several dozen efforts to scare away wolves to try to prevent more conflicts.

The Fish and Wildlife Service also is in the process of rewriting rules that govern management of the wolves due to a legal challenge by environmentalists. A federal judge has ordered the new rules to be finalized by May 21.