If you’re reading CleanTechnica (which you are), there’s a good chance you already “get” the key points of this story, but it seems that much of the population doesn’t benefit from your understanding. Hence the following article.
There are a set number of ways that a deck of cards can be dealt out. As you see the cards being dealt, you’re in fact watching possibilities being destroyed and inevitabilities arising. What exactly those inevitabilities are, depends upon the cards that you have just witnessed being dealt.
Is democracy the best societal avenue for humans to go down? That’s a question many of us in democratic countries don’t typically ask. The assumed answer is: “duh.” But democracy does indeed have its drawbacks. Tyranny of the masses is no small concern.
If you are watching the attacks on US democracy closely, it’s a bit shocking. Basic elements of the US Constitution and a functional democracy are attacked on a daily basis. There are attacks on an independent judicial systems, attacks on independent media (which is essential to provide societal checks on political power — Thomas Jefferson said it was more critical than government itself), attacks on individuals who express different viewpoints, and attacks on free speech and the idea of discussion at all.
Electronic voting machines and vote counting systems are wide open to outside interference. Tortured voting district maps distort the democratic process. Both threaten the ability of the United States to respond to the challenge of climate change.
Tesla is prohibited by law from selling its cars directly to customers in Texas. Those who want one of the US manufacturer’s high-tech electric cars can buy one online, but then have to pick it up in some other state and drive it home to the Lone Star state.
Tesla has been trying to get the Texas legislature to change the law for years without success. Now, lawmakers in Texas have once again told Tesla to go pound sand.
The Trump & Russian chaos — no matter how extensive it is and where it goes — is a tiny preview of the massive disruption we have coming as the global carbon bubble pops.
The people of the United States didn’t elect Donald Trump. Approximately 3 million more people voted for Hillary Clinton than Donald Trump, while approximately half of the population stayed home. In typical Donald fashion, he is trying to take revenge by pulling the country further into the gutter.
Despite the challenges due to its position between European democracies and Putin’s autocracy in Russia, Estonia is looking to increase its clean energy capacity. It has already overshot its clean energy generation targets for 2020.
As someone who covered climate science during the Russian-fabricated “climategate” scandal and who has moderated thousands of comment threads (tens of thousands or hundreds of thousands of comments) on clean energy, electric vehicle, and climate matters for approximately 7 years, I have come to learn a few things about the “democratic web.”
