This is the 663rd edition of the Spotlight on Green News & Views (previously known as the Green Diary Rescue). Here is the Jan. 16 edition. Inclusion of a story in the Spotlight does not necessarily indicate my agreement with or endorsement of it.
OUTSTANDING GREEN STORIES
Mark Lippman writes—Ted Cruz tweets nonsense about the Paris Climate Agreement.
Scott Fairlamb, a former ultimate fighter, got pulled into the “conspiracy theory vortex,” one associate said.
Garret Miller of Dallas, Texas, has been arrested and faces federal charges for allegedly participating in the Capitol attack, the Justice Department said.
Paul Spella / HBO / Netflix / Getty / The AtlanticLate last year, at the end of my parental leave, I finally caught up with The Comey Rule, Showtime’s stolid adaptation of former FBI Director James Comey’s memoir about—among other things—being fired by Donald Trump.
I still feel guilty, four years later.
Amazon’s bid comes as Biden officials say they’re trying to repair the vaccine distribution system they inherited.
One nation has already provided more than a quarter of its people with at least one dose of COVID-19 vaccine, outpacing every other country in the world and more than sextupling the percentage in the United States. During one recent three-day period, in fact, it administered a dose of the vaccine to a higher percentage of its population than the U.S. has altogether. Nearly three-fourths of those over age 60 have gotten their first shot.
Both the Trump and Obama administrations relied heavily on highly trained Special Forces units to keep Afghanistan from collapse. The strategy has kept recent episodes of the 21-year Afghan War out of the public eye, but it is failing to stabilize the country and is straining the United States military’s elite troops, who serve back-to-back combat tours without an end in sight and disproportionately give their lives in service of a war the public knows almost nothing about.
Until the day that a violent mob stormed the Capitol building, it seemed possible that Donald Trump would be able to shuffle into postpresidential life without facing any real consequences. President-elect Joe Biden had indicated his anxiety over a potential prosecution of the former president. Commentators muttered about the political divisiveness of pursuing Trump after he left office.
He can’t possibly expect the GOP to go along with this—but that might be a good thing.
States are warning they’re running out of the vaccine, with little sense of when more will arrive.
Speaking at a White House news briefing, the government’s top infectious disease expert warned that strains first identified in South Africa and Brazil could reduce the potency of the two vaccines now in use.
Should I send my son back to school?
The government said that 5.1 million Americans are continuing to receive state jobless benefits, down from 5.2 million in the previous week.
Trump’s presidency may be best remembered for its cataclysmic end. But his four years as president also changed real American policy in lasting ways, just more quietly. We asked POLITICO’s best-in-class policy reporters to recap some of the ways Trump changed the country while in office, for better or worse.
At the same time, the unemployment rate stayed at 6.7%, the first time it hasn’t fallen since April.
The share of wealth controlled by the top 1 percent sits at levels not seen since the 1920s. Biden’s hopes for changing it rests on Senate control.
A government shutdown was averted after the president approved the Covid relief package and annual spending bill.
One of the most remarkable moments from Wednesday’s inauguration ceremony came from poet Amanda Gorman, the youngest poet in U.S. history to speak at a presidential inauguration. The 22 year-old read “The Hill We Climb,” a poem she finished right after the riot at the Capitol earlier this month. We feature her full recitation and get reaction from scholar Cornel West and award-winning journalist Maria Hinojosa.
Donald Trump driving a crowd into a violent attack on the Capitol may be the defining image that will remain in the minds of most Americans. But that assault on Jan. 6 wasn’t the only coup Trump planned. After his ridiculous legal ploys had all floundered; after his attempts to strong arm governors and secretaries of state had failed; after he had wined and dined state legislators in an attempt to prevent the certification of votes … Trump had another scheme.
Night Owls is a themed open thread appearing at Daily Kos seven days a week.
Sarah Lazare at In These Times writes—The “Essential Worker” Swindle. How this label is used to justify a social order in which workers are abused, discarded and left to die:
Politicians, pundits, CEOs and think tank staffers have spent the past 10 months effusively praising the heroism and sacrifice of essential workers.
Donald Trump is responsible for the Jan. 6 riot, but so are you, according to the House Republican leader.
In her second press briefing as White House press secretary, Jen Psaki was forced to explain a few basics about the new posture of the man now sitting in the Oval Office. Those basics included the fact that Joe Biden is a president who is demonstrating actual leadership in the White House, and he’s delivering on the campaign promises he made as a Democratic candidate.
Another Trump supporter who violently invaded the Capitol on Jan. 6 was arrested this week only to be released shortly after. But in this case not only is Riley June Williams facing charges for storming the Capitol building, but also for helping to steal Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s laptop, NBC News reported.
The change means fewer vials of vaccine as some states complain they’ve run out of shots.
Over the last four years, Donald Trump did everything possible to help the world unravel. Sometimes that meant withdrawing from organizations like the World Health Organization, or dropping out of the Paris agreement. It also meant flat-out breaking trade agreements or even the six-party nuclear agreement on Iran. Trump has also moved to simply allow existing treaties to expire, including major arms agreements that have (had) existed for decades.
“I mean, why would you want to put yourself through that every day?” she asked herself.
