A beautiful and troubling essay, weaving together, finding connection in, many disparate elements. It's the way we think, the way we make sense of this sometimes troubling world, this truly alarming age, the Anthropocene. Our senses tell us something is wrong, our intuitions tell us things are out of kilter, but our lonely and disconnected imperious intellects can ignore or even veto these presentments. And so things proceed to bitter ends.
I have already voted. Straight Democrat up and down ballot. In this age of misinformation and clamorous claims, like flocks of contending gulls, it was best to steer by intuition. I urge everyone to do the same but don't discard your intellect-just think deeply and you arrive in agreement with your gut sense: Trump and his cadre are not remotely a path to anything good, they will make things worse.
I read recently that environmental scientists are less likely to vote. That seems so backwards to me and so sad - I can only imagine it is due to hopelessness. Thank you for another wonderful story. The new thing I learned today was about caul. I love the story of your grandmother. Thanks so much for sharing and please keep writing.
Thank you, Karen. Please, if you can, let me know where you read that story about environmental scientists being less likely to vote. That's intriguing. It does sound at first glance like they know too much... But I'd like to check it out. And yes, I'll keep writing.
I can't imagine that environmental scientists are less likely to vote. My long ago Berkeley professor, John Holdren, who grounded me in environmental science, has certainly voted, or will be doing so (I don't know that, but I can't imagine otherwise. He's too well grounded.) And I'm sure another environmental scientist, who told me I put her on the map, has also surely voted, or will also be doing so. (I have written a fair amount on environmental science.)
(googles)
It's not environmental scientists who don't vote. It's environmentalists, according to multiple articles. But one article, from this past January, came with this headline and subhead:
"U.S. voters’ climate change opinions swing elections
New analysis: climate concerns likely gave Democrats the White House in 2020."
My guess about all those articles claiming the opposite is the media's push for articles that say the opposite of the current wisdom, in a push for clicks and financial remuneration. For the good news, go here:
Lovely writing as always. Thanks you, but I find myself anxious and angry in ways that nature can barely soothe, and then only until the next reminder of what is at stake and the fact that half the voting population prefers Trump. And yes, of course I will vote and vote for Harris. I have almost as much intolerance for 3rd party voters in the presidential race as for Trump supporters. Oh my, that cloud of doom, that undercurrent of fear, and that caul, not of prescience but of pessimism.
I usually take the philosophical long view. Regimes come and go. The news cycle moves on like a grass fire, today's heroes are tomorrow's villains. Both fame and notoriety are fleeting. The nation recovers from bad leadership and good (for that matter) Time heals all wounds.
But Trump is different. When I think of the future libraries, there will be shelves of books (in whatever form) analyzing Trump and his impact. Only Lincoln and FDR's shelves will rival his. He is singular- not because of any greatness of character or will, but he arrived at a moment when a rare conjunction of events and forces opened up a gap for an individual like him to accrue power. He is essentially a mediocrity, but is the proxy for powerful subterranean forces that have emerged into the daylight.
He is making a tremendous impact. He is the Chicxulub asteroid of our time.
I am going to push back on this assertion you made: “Some third-party candidates are better, I know, but without ranked-choice voting a vote for them in a binary election is a vote for Trump.” I know this is a popular Democratic talking point, and given how hard they’ve been pushing it, I understand why you’re tempted to repeat it, but I find it misleading.
As you know, the president is chosen by the electoral college, not the popular vote. The majority of states are solidly blue or solidly red in terms of assigning electors, and in such states, a vote for a third party really is just a vote for a third party. For example, my vote for Nader in 1996 in Massachusetts and in Minnesota in 2000, and my vote for Stein in Oregon in 2016 and in New Mexico in 2024 were all inconsequential in terms of who won the electors for those states, given that they were all solidly blue at the the time of those elections. (I didn’t vote the other years.)
In a swing state like this year’s Michigan, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, North Carolina, Nevada and Arizona, individual votes are more meaningful. But it’s not factually true that every vote for Stein is taken from Harris, or every vote for Chase Oliver (the Libertarian) is taken from Trump. Many (and arguably most) third party voters wouldn’t vote for a Democrat or Republican no matter what. (I’m in that category personally because of my lifelong antiwar stance.) Some could be convinced, but that’s the responsibility of Harris and Trump to make their case to such voters. No vote is owed to or owned by any party. You’re making your case here why such voters should vote for Harris, and such efforts are part of the democratic process. You made a good case, and I appreciate that you’re working to educate people. The more collective knowledge we have, the more effective our collective efforts can be.
There are definitely situations where every vote really does count. Here in New Mexico, Gabe Vasquez, the incumbent Democratic Congressman, is running for reelection against Republican Yvette Herrell. This is a rematch of the 2022 election, when Vasquez squeaked by with a 1,350-vote margin out of more than 192,000 votes cast. So my vote for Vasquez this year is potentially consequential (as was the vote cast by a friend here who I convinced to vote for him too). Herrell is absolutely terrible on the environment, and is one of these people pushing to privatize public lands, which would be an absolute nightmare. There was no third party choice in this race, but given the 2022 margin, I probably would’ve voted Vasquez even if there was.
Thanks again, Kollibri, for zooming in, this time on my broad-brush statement about electoral politics. You're right of course about third party votes in safe states, and about the importance of gauging the most rational voting option in local races. In tighter swing states, yes it's up to candidates to persuade, but it's equally up to voters to look holistically at the consequences of their vote. As Rebecca Solnit says, voting is a chess move not a Valentine.
As a long time environmentalist, I see that either outcome (Trump or Harris) presents challenges. Voting is, as you say, "the least we can do" and I am not discouraging it. But the "more" and the “most” that we can do is engaging in mass movements that pressure elected officials to do the right thing. Like decrease domestic fossil fuel production, protect wildlife habitat from industrial development, and support sustainable land management practices (i.e. organic agriculture and habitat restoration). Mass movements are the forces responsible for positive change in our culture, whether that's been civil rights, labor rights or environmental protection. Politicians always need to have their feet held to the fire to do the right thing, and mass movements are the way to do that.
Hence my personal view about the outcome of this election. You've spelled out quite well why Trump and Project 2025 are potentially disastrous, and if he's in the White House again, we'll certainly have a lot of work to do to push back against their plans. Under that circumstance, there will be plenty of egregious things to motivate the growth and action of a mass movement. However, if Harris wins, the challenge will be convincing people that, no, everything's not alright, and we still have to mobilize and hold her administration’s feet to the fire.
History provides us with cautionary tales. During the Obama administration, both the antiwar movement and the environmental movement withered at the level of big mainstream organizations, though the smaller, localized or radical grassroots groups persisted with their work, bless them. Their voices don't command the same attention though, in the media or in policy circles. Obama’s energy policy was, in his words, “all of the above” and US domestic fossil fuel production rose to record levels, which is the opposite of "keeping it in the ground." Obama’s feet were not held to the fire and the damages his administration caused were real.
We also saw this during the Clinton administration. When Bill entered office, he faced a situation where efforts by environmentalists had successfully pushed a judge to declare no commercial logging on public lands. “Zero cut” is the hold grail of forest defense, but Bill didn’t want that. He convened a group with both Big Timber and Big Green, and the resulting Northwest Forest Plan clearcut more acres of old growth trees in his eight years than Reagan/Bush I had accomplished in their 12 years. It was a tragedy. By giving environmentalists “a seat at the table” he successfully neutered them, and since then the Big Green organizations have been reluctant to hold Democrats’ feet to the fire.
Under Biden, US fossil fuel production hit another historic peak, and today the US produces more annually than any other country in history. This is horrific.
My fear is that if Harris wins, the same thing will happen: that complacency will reign and that recruiting people to a mass movement will be an uphill battle.
One more history lesson: What president put into place the most environmental legislation? That would be the president responsible for the National Environmental Protection Act (NEPA, one of our most powerful tools for protecting places), the Environmental Protection Agency, the Clean Air Act, the Endangered Species Act, the Marine Mammal Protection Act and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, which engages in important climate and environmental research. Who was that president?
Nixon. A staunch Republican (and a war monger of astounding proportions). But Nixon felt forced to do these things because of the power of the environmental movement at the time. Now I know that the Republican party of now is an entirely different thing, but the example is still instructive. People power is powerful.
We can’t elect people to office assuming they will do the right thing. We need to elect people who will be more susceptible to our pressure when we hold their feet to the fire. It is widely believed that Democrats are more susceptible to that pressure than Republicans and I won’t argue against that. But if Harris wins, we we must take advantage of that susceptibility and hold her administration’s feet to the fire from Day 1, which means the day after the election. After all, that’s the day her team will be at work crafting policy and assigning people to fill important posts. We can’t allow a Harris administration to raise fossil fuel production to yet another record high, for example. Nor can we allow it to destroy wildlife habitat for “green energy” industrial development or to continue subsidizing Big Ag over small-scale organic farming or to keep supporting an “invasive plant” ideology that utilizes widespread application of herbicides. We will have our work cut out for us!
So sure, we can vote because it’s “the least we can do.” But we must—must!—do the “more” and the “most” as hard as we can. Given the state of the world, we must mobilize with an intensity as yet unseen, no matter who ends up occupying the White House.
Agreed on all accounts, Kollibri. Thanks for spelling it out so thoroughly. The Nixon note is an important one. That first Earth Day is still the largest single day of protest in US history, with about 10% of the population hitting the streets. But I think in the same scenario Trump will call in the dogs. There will be no compliance with popular opinion in another Trump presidency. I think people don't really know the scale of change that's in the offing nor how fast it will be.
What a beautiful, lyrical essay about the problems we face and the election that could keep us pointed in the direction of problems that have been growing for well over a century, and exploding since 1980, when we traded a decent, thoughtful man in the White House who has continued to do good ever since he left Sodom on the Potomac, and persists after a century on this mortal coil, for one who helped the rich become richer, and more destructive, and enabled the rise of Mary's bad uncle, and all the evil that spreads in his wake. Good grief.
I think I'm going to go read the comics, and then, perhaps, I should phone bank. I have voted--for Kamala Harris, of course, and if she gains the White House, which my rational side thinks she will, she will continue all the good that President Biden has begun (see the Nov. 4 New Yorker), and there will be more hope for our species, and the myriad species with which we share this planet.
Thanks, David. Wouldn't it be lovely if politics revolved a little closer to the honorable orbit of Jimmy Carter than in the colder reaches of space that Reagan created? And yes, I wish people actually understood how much Biden has accomplished and how unlikely those accomplishments would have been under anyone else.
Biden has been amazing! During his first year of office, I noticed I was feeling the way I did when, while riding a bicycle from Seattle to Boston, I'd get a strong tailwind. He's the best president of my lifetime, which began the first summer of the Eisenhower Administration (see the aforementioned NYer article for some details), although I think it's possible that Harris might be even better.
And, yes, as you say, except that I'd call it the frigid reaches of space that Reagan created. Reagan should never have gained the White House. I remember how Reagan fired the air traffic controllers early in his presidency. It was only years later, well after my father had died, that I found out that during WWII, my father had been an air traffic controller on a base in what was then the Soviet Union, and is now Ukraine--which somehow gave me a more distinct sense of solidarity with the air traffic controllers that Reagan fired. But I wish they'd had a union.
A beautiful and troubling essay, weaving together, finding connection in, many disparate elements. It's the way we think, the way we make sense of this sometimes troubling world, this truly alarming age, the Anthropocene. Our senses tell us something is wrong, our intuitions tell us things are out of kilter, but our lonely and disconnected imperious intellects can ignore or even veto these presentments. And so things proceed to bitter ends.
I have already voted. Straight Democrat up and down ballot. In this age of misinformation and clamorous claims, like flocks of contending gulls, it was best to steer by intuition. I urge everyone to do the same but don't discard your intellect-just think deeply and you arrive in agreement with your gut sense: Trump and his cadre are not remotely a path to anything good, they will make things worse.
.
Well said as always, Michael. Love that "flocks of contending gulls, it's best to steer by intuition."
I read recently that environmental scientists are less likely to vote. That seems so backwards to me and so sad - I can only imagine it is due to hopelessness. Thank you for another wonderful story. The new thing I learned today was about caul. I love the story of your grandmother. Thanks so much for sharing and please keep writing.
Thank you, Karen. Please, if you can, let me know where you read that story about environmental scientists being less likely to vote. That's intriguing. It does sound at first glance like they know too much... But I'd like to check it out. And yes, I'll keep writing.
I can't imagine that environmental scientists are less likely to vote. My long ago Berkeley professor, John Holdren, who grounded me in environmental science, has certainly voted, or will be doing so (I don't know that, but I can't imagine otherwise. He's too well grounded.) And I'm sure another environmental scientist, who told me I put her on the map, has also surely voted, or will also be doing so. (I have written a fair amount on environmental science.)
(googles)
It's not environmental scientists who don't vote. It's environmentalists, according to multiple articles. But one article, from this past January, came with this headline and subhead:
"U.S. voters’ climate change opinions swing elections
New analysis: climate concerns likely gave Democrats the White House in 2020."
My guess about all those articles claiming the opposite is the media's push for articles that say the opposite of the current wisdom, in a push for clicks and financial remuneration. For the good news, go here:
https://cires.colorado.edu/news/us-voters-climate-change-opinions-swing-elections
Lovely writing as always. Thanks you, but I find myself anxious and angry in ways that nature can barely soothe, and then only until the next reminder of what is at stake and the fact that half the voting population prefers Trump. And yes, of course I will vote and vote for Harris. I have almost as much intolerance for 3rd party voters in the presidential race as for Trump supporters. Oh my, that cloud of doom, that undercurrent of fear, and that caul, not of prescience but of pessimism.
Thank you, Terry. I feel what you're saying. Trying to contain my concern for what I can't control, but the scale of what may come is overwhelming.
I usually take the philosophical long view. Regimes come and go. The news cycle moves on like a grass fire, today's heroes are tomorrow's villains. Both fame and notoriety are fleeting. The nation recovers from bad leadership and good (for that matter) Time heals all wounds.
But Trump is different. When I think of the future libraries, there will be shelves of books (in whatever form) analyzing Trump and his impact. Only Lincoln and FDR's shelves will rival his. He is singular- not because of any greatness of character or will, but he arrived at a moment when a rare conjunction of events and forces opened up a gap for an individual like him to accrue power. He is essentially a mediocrity, but is the proxy for powerful subterranean forces that have emerged into the daylight.
He is making a tremendous impact. He is the Chicxulub asteroid of our time.
And he won't be re-elected.
Sharing your fabulous post
Another incredible piece. Your writing is my favorite thing on Substack.
Wow, thank you, Stef. Kind of you to say.
Thank you. I feel this one.
Thank you, Melina.
I am going to push back on this assertion you made: “Some third-party candidates are better, I know, but without ranked-choice voting a vote for them in a binary election is a vote for Trump.” I know this is a popular Democratic talking point, and given how hard they’ve been pushing it, I understand why you’re tempted to repeat it, but I find it misleading.
As you know, the president is chosen by the electoral college, not the popular vote. The majority of states are solidly blue or solidly red in terms of assigning electors, and in such states, a vote for a third party really is just a vote for a third party. For example, my vote for Nader in 1996 in Massachusetts and in Minnesota in 2000, and my vote for Stein in Oregon in 2016 and in New Mexico in 2024 were all inconsequential in terms of who won the electors for those states, given that they were all solidly blue at the the time of those elections. (I didn’t vote the other years.)
In a swing state like this year’s Michigan, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, North Carolina, Nevada and Arizona, individual votes are more meaningful. But it’s not factually true that every vote for Stein is taken from Harris, or every vote for Chase Oliver (the Libertarian) is taken from Trump. Many (and arguably most) third party voters wouldn’t vote for a Democrat or Republican no matter what. (I’m in that category personally because of my lifelong antiwar stance.) Some could be convinced, but that’s the responsibility of Harris and Trump to make their case to such voters. No vote is owed to or owned by any party. You’re making your case here why such voters should vote for Harris, and such efforts are part of the democratic process. You made a good case, and I appreciate that you’re working to educate people. The more collective knowledge we have, the more effective our collective efforts can be.
There are definitely situations where every vote really does count. Here in New Mexico, Gabe Vasquez, the incumbent Democratic Congressman, is running for reelection against Republican Yvette Herrell. This is a rematch of the 2022 election, when Vasquez squeaked by with a 1,350-vote margin out of more than 192,000 votes cast. So my vote for Vasquez this year is potentially consequential (as was the vote cast by a friend here who I convinced to vote for him too). Herrell is absolutely terrible on the environment, and is one of these people pushing to privatize public lands, which would be an absolute nightmare. There was no third party choice in this race, but given the 2022 margin, I probably would’ve voted Vasquez even if there was.
Thanks again, Kollibri, for zooming in, this time on my broad-brush statement about electoral politics. You're right of course about third party votes in safe states, and about the importance of gauging the most rational voting option in local races. In tighter swing states, yes it's up to candidates to persuade, but it's equally up to voters to look holistically at the consequences of their vote. As Rebecca Solnit says, voting is a chess move not a Valentine.
Side note: you might be interested in this post about Stein's candidacy: https://revkin.substack.com/p/for-those-voting-for-jill-stein-a
As a long time environmentalist, I see that either outcome (Trump or Harris) presents challenges. Voting is, as you say, "the least we can do" and I am not discouraging it. But the "more" and the “most” that we can do is engaging in mass movements that pressure elected officials to do the right thing. Like decrease domestic fossil fuel production, protect wildlife habitat from industrial development, and support sustainable land management practices (i.e. organic agriculture and habitat restoration). Mass movements are the forces responsible for positive change in our culture, whether that's been civil rights, labor rights or environmental protection. Politicians always need to have their feet held to the fire to do the right thing, and mass movements are the way to do that.
Hence my personal view about the outcome of this election. You've spelled out quite well why Trump and Project 2025 are potentially disastrous, and if he's in the White House again, we'll certainly have a lot of work to do to push back against their plans. Under that circumstance, there will be plenty of egregious things to motivate the growth and action of a mass movement. However, if Harris wins, the challenge will be convincing people that, no, everything's not alright, and we still have to mobilize and hold her administration’s feet to the fire.
History provides us with cautionary tales. During the Obama administration, both the antiwar movement and the environmental movement withered at the level of big mainstream organizations, though the smaller, localized or radical grassroots groups persisted with their work, bless them. Their voices don't command the same attention though, in the media or in policy circles. Obama’s energy policy was, in his words, “all of the above” and US domestic fossil fuel production rose to record levels, which is the opposite of "keeping it in the ground." Obama’s feet were not held to the fire and the damages his administration caused were real.
We also saw this during the Clinton administration. When Bill entered office, he faced a situation where efforts by environmentalists had successfully pushed a judge to declare no commercial logging on public lands. “Zero cut” is the hold grail of forest defense, but Bill didn’t want that. He convened a group with both Big Timber and Big Green, and the resulting Northwest Forest Plan clearcut more acres of old growth trees in his eight years than Reagan/Bush I had accomplished in their 12 years. It was a tragedy. By giving environmentalists “a seat at the table” he successfully neutered them, and since then the Big Green organizations have been reluctant to hold Democrats’ feet to the fire.
Under Biden, US fossil fuel production hit another historic peak, and today the US produces more annually than any other country in history. This is horrific.
My fear is that if Harris wins, the same thing will happen: that complacency will reign and that recruiting people to a mass movement will be an uphill battle.
One more history lesson: What president put into place the most environmental legislation? That would be the president responsible for the National Environmental Protection Act (NEPA, one of our most powerful tools for protecting places), the Environmental Protection Agency, the Clean Air Act, the Endangered Species Act, the Marine Mammal Protection Act and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, which engages in important climate and environmental research. Who was that president?
Nixon. A staunch Republican (and a war monger of astounding proportions). But Nixon felt forced to do these things because of the power of the environmental movement at the time. Now I know that the Republican party of now is an entirely different thing, but the example is still instructive. People power is powerful.
We can’t elect people to office assuming they will do the right thing. We need to elect people who will be more susceptible to our pressure when we hold their feet to the fire. It is widely believed that Democrats are more susceptible to that pressure than Republicans and I won’t argue against that. But if Harris wins, we we must take advantage of that susceptibility and hold her administration’s feet to the fire from Day 1, which means the day after the election. After all, that’s the day her team will be at work crafting policy and assigning people to fill important posts. We can’t allow a Harris administration to raise fossil fuel production to yet another record high, for example. Nor can we allow it to destroy wildlife habitat for “green energy” industrial development or to continue subsidizing Big Ag over small-scale organic farming or to keep supporting an “invasive plant” ideology that utilizes widespread application of herbicides. We will have our work cut out for us!
So sure, we can vote because it’s “the least we can do.” But we must—must!—do the “more” and the “most” as hard as we can. Given the state of the world, we must mobilize with an intensity as yet unseen, no matter who ends up occupying the White House.
I discussed all this in more detail in a Substack post about a month ago: https://kollibri.substack.com/p/the-environment-and-the-election
Agreed on all accounts, Kollibri. Thanks for spelling it out so thoroughly. The Nixon note is an important one. That first Earth Day is still the largest single day of protest in US history, with about 10% of the population hitting the streets. But I think in the same scenario Trump will call in the dogs. There will be no compliance with popular opinion in another Trump presidency. I think people don't really know the scale of change that's in the offing nor how fast it will be.
What a beautiful, lyrical essay about the problems we face and the election that could keep us pointed in the direction of problems that have been growing for well over a century, and exploding since 1980, when we traded a decent, thoughtful man in the White House who has continued to do good ever since he left Sodom on the Potomac, and persists after a century on this mortal coil, for one who helped the rich become richer, and more destructive, and enabled the rise of Mary's bad uncle, and all the evil that spreads in his wake. Good grief.
I think I'm going to go read the comics, and then, perhaps, I should phone bank. I have voted--for Kamala Harris, of course, and if she gains the White House, which my rational side thinks she will, she will continue all the good that President Biden has begun (see the Nov. 4 New Yorker), and there will be more hope for our species, and the myriad species with which we share this planet.
Thanks, David. Wouldn't it be lovely if politics revolved a little closer to the honorable orbit of Jimmy Carter than in the colder reaches of space that Reagan created? And yes, I wish people actually understood how much Biden has accomplished and how unlikely those accomplishments would have been under anyone else.
Biden has been amazing! During his first year of office, I noticed I was feeling the way I did when, while riding a bicycle from Seattle to Boston, I'd get a strong tailwind. He's the best president of my lifetime, which began the first summer of the Eisenhower Administration (see the aforementioned NYer article for some details), although I think it's possible that Harris might be even better.
And, yes, as you say, except that I'd call it the frigid reaches of space that Reagan created. Reagan should never have gained the White House. I remember how Reagan fired the air traffic controllers early in his presidency. It was only years later, well after my father had died, that I found out that during WWII, my father had been an air traffic controller on a base in what was then the Soviet Union, and is now Ukraine--which somehow gave me a more distinct sense of solidarity with the air traffic controllers that Reagan fired. But I wish they'd had a union.