Rome Burns While Nero Pours on Gas

I wanted to write something about all of this, but wasn't sure where to start -- or whether to do a series of pieces on each outrage.  Fortunately, Sen. Tammy Duckworth (D-IL) came along and did it for me in a single tweet, responding to a news story.

What I'll only add to it briefly afterwards are three things. 

Glaciers are melting, islands are sinking and forests are burning. We can't afford to go backward.

The same week that Trump skips meetings with G7 leaders on #ClimateChange, his Admin announces plans that allow oil & gas companies to leak harmful methane gas into our atmosphere. https://t.co/n6gLjGiALv

— Tammy Duckworth (@SenDuckworth) August 29, 2019

​The first of my additional commets is that left out of this is that it's all being done while the Amazon rain forest is catastrophically burning.  

The second is that also left out is that on top of all this -- and as the Amazon rain forest is catastrophically burning, the Trump administration has announced their plans to allow mining, drilling and cutting down trees in the Alaskan rain forest.

And the third is that I think there is more importance to these Trump actions than just environmental disaster.  As has long been known, the part of the public that is hardest to motivate to vote is young people.  This year, polls show that the three most important issues for young people are gun safety, student loans and...Climate Change.  I suspect that Trump and the enabling GOP have given little thought to how they are driving young people to the polls in greater numbers than historically usual.  It is not just the environment they're hurting -- it's their own political survival.