Gift from a Ph.D. abvisee who just finished. It's inscribed, "Reality is what resists. - Bruno Latour" ❤️
Economic sociologist at Virginia Tech STS interested in the politics and science of markets and how these baroque contraptions mediate energy transition.
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Gift from a Ph.D. abvisee who just finished. It's inscribed, "Reality is what resists. - Bruno Latour" ❤️
I lo e that crypto bros are worried that Trump's going to give them a bad name.
ICE is a threat to public safety. Now threatening to prosecute the ICE watchers.
Papa John I
China has been trying for years to break the log jam of its high savings rate. Now, with Trump's help, they may actually do it. The Great Nation Builder strikes again.
My union.
Ending the Fed's independence would rebalance trade in the most disastrous way imaginable, via a collapse of the US dollar.
The ECB's situation is totally different from the Fed's. The US exposure to tariff shocks is much greater than the EU's, who still have lower barriers with their big non-US partners: UK, China, Russia. And who is going to lower interest rates when our bondholders are getting yippy?
If Pol Pot could do it, why can't we?
Trump's plan to bail out failing coal-fired power plants will cost ratepayers more and will worsen pollution and climate change. And it's illegal.
She had to get in to measure the drapes.
If only Columbia had capitulated to all of the Trump DOJ demands, this all could have been avoided.
I think you'll find that, although Trump's EO evokes Section 202, the DOE (which is run by an industry insider) will be looking for ways to pay coal plants, not compel them, to stay open, forcing or bypassing state regulators.
The cornerstone of Trump energy policy is to make us pay more so that we can have energy that kills more people and helps make the planet unlivable.
The plan is not to require that plants operate at a loss, but to authorize them to cover the costs of continuing to operate by billing their customers.
Yes, we always applaud when he openly admits that he requires all of us to always lie about coal.
Beware this model legislation from Heritage, now being fed to pro-fossil state legislators and introduced as a bill in many states. It is nothing but a disguised subsidy for fossil fuel generators that kneecaps renewables, at customers' expense. herit.ag/4i4nWx5
U.S. media have completely dropped the ball on explaining where trade deficits come from and all their non-tariff sources.
U.S. citizen interested in grad studies at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver (Canada)? Grad programs are re-opening applications of US programs for one week. With expedited decisions. U.S. Applicant Week: www.grad.ubc.ca/us-applicant... #AcademicChatter #Canada #GradSchool
RIP. Unfortunately, the obit does not mention Clem's greatest performances. Try X Offender.
Roanoke VA
The countries hardest hit with tariffs are also the most intensive users of thermal coal for electricity. Their manufacturing sectors will surely double down on coal fired power now that they are being squeezed by tariffs. Forget about climate progress for at least the near future.
Foolish Elon, little does he know that the whole thing, from the Constitution in 1787, the Bill of Rights, 14th-16th amendments, universal suffrage, etc. (with a few exceptions like Dred Scott and Plessy v. Ferguson) has all been one very big very long con to thwart his will.
Just a hint: It. Was. Never. About. Fraud.
“These firings cede the university’s decision-making authority to bullies and bad-faith actors committed to silencing speech with which they disagree.” - Harvard @aaup.bsky.social www.nytimes.com/2025/03/28/u...
How do we donate to your legal fund?
We asked legal experts how Columbia University would fare if they sued the Trump administration. "On the merits, there’s no doubt that Columbia would have won." chroni.cl/3FI9hdJ
New Yorker cartoon.
Here too. Cowardice and stupidity, a sickening betrayal. Without DEI efforts, our policy is affirmative action for the most privileged and powerful.
When the Trump regime's desire for control gets in the way of real efforts to make government more efficient.
In the past 20 years, annual coal mining fatalities have been reduced from about 30 per 100,000 miners to 10-12. Yet the @dol.gov Inspector General has pointed out the failure to reach mine inspection goals. Now that IG has been fired and mine safety offices are being closed. bit.ly/4kZ0XGJ
Let's be clear here. This is not about complying with the law. It is about 1. threats, fear, and money; 2. Board members who only begrudgingly supported diversity to begin with and are more than happy to have federal gov. backup for eliminating this office. bit.ly/4j5fwql
Pete Hegseth in 2016: "How damaging is it to your ability to recruit or build allies with others when they are worried that our leaders may be exposing them because of their gross negligence or their recklessness in handling information?"
The Virginia Tech community is in the street. Stop the attacks on higher ed, on DEI. To our Board of Visitors: get a spine and stand up for us@
New article by my student, Pratyusha Kiran gets inside fast fashion supply chains to look at constraints faced by Indian manufacturers.
"We will not take lectures on antisemitism from segregationists & neo-nazis. We will not allow [the]..pres..to claim the mantle of Jewish safety as they shred the Constitution & spin outlandish..theories to justify the suppression of dissent.." lithub.com/a-columbia-u...
First they came for the consulting firms ...
@nytimes.com : "an ethical situation that has few precedents in modern American history." Translation: corruption on a massive and unprecedented scale. www.nytimes.com/2025/03/23/u...
If you throw a social security recipient in the river and they float - you know they're a fraudster.
@haaretzcom.bsky.social Reporting that Israel is preparing to conquer and occupy the entire Gaza Strip., and to impose full military rule over the entire population.
Here's the powerful open letter from @alt-epa-workers.bsky.social EPA staff. www.ehn.org/epa-environm...
More chaotic trade policy. The port fees are a reverse tariff, making US exports more expensive. This "improve the trade balance by handicapping U.S. exports" plan would also require shippers to use 20% U.S. vessels. They didn't know that there are zero U.S. ships for liquid natural gas (LNG).
Straight-up human trafficking.
I can't stop fuming at the silence of my Columbia U. class of '83 classmate, a certain ex-POTUS, regarding the Trump attacks on our alma mater.
I'm a little uneasy with the term "coal renaissance," just like I would not refer to a "measles renaissance."
I'm with you on this ... but transmission...
Illegal firings of Biden-appointed @ferc.gov commissioners in 10, 9, 8 ...
This is as though Trump discovered that China has more malnutrition than the U.S. and launched a costly policy to catch up. oilprice.com/Latest-Energ...
This is a plan to subsidize coal because we need to catch up to China in pollution. It will increase, not decrease the cost of energy. What country pays more in order to pollute more? finance.yahoo.com/news/trump-s...
But seriously, since he knows no one is getting to Mars in his lifetime, this is not about the future, but about commandeering resources in the present.
I'm thinking a lot about how the Trump negative personality cult is a trap. Don't fall for it.
I don't think this works unless Trump finds a way to nationalize a significant part of US oil reserves. Family-based petrokleptocracy, like the Saudis, the Nazarbayevs in Kazakhstan, the Do Santos's in Angola, don't get off the ground without the secret revenue streams to the state energy companies.
The workers want to strike. The stakes are so high that the sacrifice is worth it, and they go into it open-eyed not even knowing if the strike fund will hold up. But the collaborationist union boss won't authorize it, claiming he knows better what's good for the workers. Schumer is that guy.
What a huge betrayal of everyone who has been out in the streets, showing up at town halls, calling in every day, the residents of DC who soon will not have functioning city services.
This is a disgraceful abdication.
US to world: F*** you, f*** off, and f*** you again. In a speech before the UN’s General Assembly last week, a Trump administration representative said the U.S. “rejects and denounces” the UN’s 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and its 17 Sustainable Development Goals. bit.ly/3XPY2Wy
This is about Musk's fantasy of going to Mars, right?
Now that one of our two parties is openly pursuing collective abdication, thought I had better reread this. Book club anyone? www.alibris.com/Ruling-Onese...
What distinguishes patronage-style corruption, which we are seeing plenty of, from genuine kleptocracy is access of the corrupt official to secret, unaccountable, revenue streams of state-owned enterprises. You may be wondering how Trump could do that, but so is he.
If you are reading this, it probably means you are doomscrolling the authoritarian apocalypse, instead of actually doing something about it. I can't recommend action enough. Switch off social media, limit it to a small bit of time per day, and work on your organising instead.
This seems just a bit credulous, not even entertaining the possibility that the US-Ukraine ceasefire proposal was pre-coordinated with Moscow. www.nytimes.com/2025/03/12/w...
Yet another climate-driving feedback loop: climate change -> more international conferences -> more deforestation and emissions associated with getting people to conferences -> more climate change!
Of all the own goals and self-owns of the Musk/Trump regime, all the ways they are making America less great, dismantling the publicly funded R&D system will make us the least great of all.
It seems a little weak, very weak, to defend them simply on the basis of abstract civil liberties (though it's true our civil liberties are endangered when anyone is denied them). I defend them because our world needs them.
Our pro-Palestine student leaders are some of the most well-informed, ethical, caring people you could ever meet - a credit to our institution. It has been a pleasure to work with them, support them, and to get to know some of them.
She... who is obeyed. open.substack.com/pub/mexfiles... My friend Richard Grabman writes, from Mexico City:
"The rule of law is for suckers." - Schmitt
Oil and petrochemical companies pay the congressman. The congressman strikes down EPA rules regulating toxic pollution from the tire industry. The tire industry buys the petrochemicals. That's the short and long of it. www.washingtonexaminer.com/policy/energ...
Another step in the consolidation of the Fascist International.
The U.S. is already providing material support to Putin's war: www.nbcnews.com/politics/sta...
All those American avocado farmers are going to cash in!
The way they baited him, and as soon as they found something to fake indignation about, pounced - it was planned! This televised episode was orchestrated to signal to those under Trump's control that Zelensky is persona non grata. Statements by Graham, Rubio, and others, show that it worked.
I can't bear to support this tool.
The American Sociological Association joins the American Federation of Teachers in filing suit over the Dear Colleague letter. democracyforward.org/wp-content/u...
He's lost about $50 Billion in the last 30 days, as Tesla stock plummeted by 30%.
I found some fraud, waste, and abuse! Didn't even have to rummage through your data. floodlightnews.org/lng-operator...
Nice guide to Canadian whiskeys: www.liquor.com/best-canadia...
I'm pretty sure I still have my copy in my office, if you want to borrow it.
Hey @nytimes.com your headline here just repeats a DOJ lie. The dismissal of charges is a bribe.
Joan Wallach Scott, Gender and the Politics of History
The hypocrisy of lecturing European leaders on "democratic values"! This was nothing but a message of support to the European far right.
The biggest threat to Europe in 90 years was not Feb. 2022. It's today.
A lot of people are worried that the US has conceded too much to Putin. The correct take: the US has switched sides in the Ukraine conflict.
"On at least two notable occasions, federal court decisions have been rendered unenforceable as a result of a president’s refusal to accept them." Here's what you need to know: www.fjc.gov/history/admi...
It's meant to be the Trump mirror-world counterpart of ESG investing. Many states, supported by Trump Republicans, have passed anti-ESG laws prohibiting them from taking into account anything but projected returns in investing. Those laws should also prohibit "patriotic" investment.
The Treasury knows exactly how much it owes. What Trump is suggesting here is sovereign debt repudiation. That will shrink the size of the government very fast when there's no one who will lend to us. This kind of talk could already have lenders recalculating our risk.
Thanks, I feel much better after listening to that. "There is no way to exaggerate how enormously dangerous this is."
creating a list of highlighted text. your comments, page numbers! 4. Export the new note as html 5. Open it in your word processor 6. Edit it, add more comments, that paragraph where you say how great the paper is, but... You're done!
Manuscript reviewing pro tip: I do this in Zotero but there are other apps that do the same thing. 1. Load the pdf into Zotero 2. Use the internal reader to highlight and comment on the text 3. Use the option to Add note from annotations, 1/2
The administration is threatening to fire 25-50% of NSF staff. Could be a bluff, but if it's not, what a national self-own.
Someone please mash up Trump's comments on the US taking over the occupation of Gaza and overseeing the mass relocation of Palestinians with the visuals of Dr. Birx's reaction to his proposal of Lysol enemas for Covid.
Omg this is horrible. He was a big reason I got into sociology, though I thought they were all like him!
If this stands, anyone who gives fealty and/or money to Trump will be at liberty to poison us. www.nytimes.com/2025/02/03/c...
Musk bought X to extricate it from state censorship. Now he's made it an organ of the state!
Nancy Goodman, founder and CEO of Kids v Cancer, told Newsweek the funding would go to critical research for pediatric cancer.
Grad school commencement 🎓! Congrats to the new masters and doctors.
