Big Meat copies Big Oil propaganda techniques

And on the public dime, no less.

This technique of using statements that are technically true but omit crucial information and therefore are misleading, is called paltering — and it’s an old favorite of the fossil fuel industry.

In fact, it’s not the only tactic the (National Cattlemen's Beef Association) has borrowed from Big Oil. Increasingly, as NCBA and other agribusiness trade associations like the National Pork Producers Council (NPPC) and U.S. Farmers and Ranchers in Action try to convince the public that animal agriculture is sustainable, they are turning to the fossil fuel industry’s tried and true playbook for greenwashing.

Like fossil fuel trade associations, these agribusiness trade associations are financing and promoting the work of third-party academics; fomenting uncertainty and doubt in cases where the evidence is already clear enough to act upon; and using slick PR and ad campaigns to present the industry as part of the solution to climate change, rather than a contributor to it.

At the bottom of each of NCBA’s “Beefing Up Sustainability” ads is a logo with “Beef Checkoff” written on it. This logo marks the biggest difference between the fossil fuel industry’s PR machine and that of animal agriculture: The animal agriculture industry’s efforts to minimize their products’ climate impact are paid for from a pot of public funds to which all beef and pork farmers and ranchers are required to contribute. - DeSmog

Shocking food waste numbers

I've actually seen estimates over the years, from various sources, ranging from 25-40%. If you click on the link below, then on "new estimates" in the first paragraph, and start looking around, you can see that this outfit has clearly done its homework.

ReFED has released new estimates on the extent, causes, and impacts of food loss and waste in the United States, as well as an updated analysis of the solutions needed to fight it. The findings represent a stark call to action for food businesses, funders, policymakers, and other food system stakeholders to dramatically ramp up the investments, operational changes, and policy shifts that are critical to cutting the amount of food going to waste in the country. The new data comes from the ReFED Insights Engine, an online hub for data and solutions that features the most comprehensive examination of food waste in the U.S., now updated to include estimates through 2021.

According to ReFED, in 2021 the U.S. generated 91 million tons of “surplus food,” defined as all food that goes unsold or uneaten. This represents 38% of U.S. food supply and contributes nearly 6% of the country’s annual greenhouse gas emissions – the equivalent of driving 83 million passenger vehicles for one full year. Close to 50% of this surplus was generated by households, with another 20% generated by consumer-facing businesses. And while 80% of total surplus food was edible parts, less than 2% was donated.

Beyond emissions, producing food that goes unsold or uneaten uses 22% of U.S. freshwater and 16% of cropland. Wasted food is also a drain on the economy, since food that goes uneaten still costs money to grow, harvest, transport, cool, prepare, and then ultimately dispose of. ReFED’s analysis places the value of food that went unsold or uneaten at $444 billion in 2021, approximately 2% of U.S. GDP. What’s more, the amount of food that goes uneaten is the equivalent of 149 billion meals’ worth of food that could have gone to the 10% of Americans who struggle with food insecurity. - ReFED

Beating the crap out of Big Oil

The link is to an interview, which covers a lot of aspects of what it will take.

Since the United States is now the biggest oil and gas producer in the world, this uncertainty about the future market matters. If U.S. producers bet on having a strong export market even as the Inflation Reduction Act and the recent EPA guidance diminish domestic gasoline consumption, then they could be disappointed if other countries move away quickly from fossil fuels. In our research we show that, indeed, big importers in Europe, Asia, and the rest of the world have every incentive to quickly jettison fossil fuels. As my co-authors and I calculate in our research, producing energy from domestic renewable sources not only creates energy security, but today and in the future, often a cost advantage. That’s so because the money paid for imported fossil fuels goes abroad and depletes foreign currency reserves...

Between people, the biggest worry is that policies penalizing emission-intensive activities disproportionately hurt the poor. The “yellow vest” movement in France is pointed to as an example that interpersonal inequality even in rich countries would be exacerbated and made unbearable by carbon taxes. For instance, if you can’t afford to rent in a city and you move to the lower-rent countryside, you are more reliant on a greenhouse gas emitting car, and so would be harder hit by a tax. That was the case in France for many people. However, it is entirely feasible to design policies that make them less unequal or even progressive. For instance, if affordable electric transport was provided alongside taxes that increase fossil fuel prices, then it would be easier to switch by swapping your old car for a new electric one at a subsidized price + availability of charging infrastructure. And my colleague Jim Boyce has shown that when combined with progressive (i.e., income inequality-reducing) rebates financed by at least part of the money accruing to the government, carbon taxes or auctioned-off emissions permits can contribute to progressive redistribution. Key is that richer people will pay much more for consuming carbon in absolute terms, which is money that can be redistributed, it just amounts to a lower share of their income. Examples, such as the carbon tax in British Columbia, show that it can be done, and that people come to accept the carbon tax. - Truthout

Where are new ozone-destroying emissions coming from?

Scientists don't know, yet.

Thirty years after countries agreed to ease up on the use of chemicals damaging the ozone layer, there are promising signs that the ozone will be fully recovered by the 2060s. But we’re not out of the woods yet. A study published this month in Nature Geoscience shows that emissions from dangerous gases banned in the 1980s are actually on the rise today—with implications not only for the ozone layer but for climate change as well. Even more worryingly, we’re not sure what, exactly, is causing some of these emissions to creep up...

The research done by Western and his team isn’t able to concretely pin emissions to a specific region or factory—but we can make some guesses. China has, historically, been the world’s largest producer of HFCs. As InsideClimate News reported, outside of China, the largest producer of the HFCs whose byproducts were tracked by the study is a Honeywell factory located in Louisiana. - Earther

Many states can amend to protect reproductive rights

Minnesota is one of them. Obviously you have to click for the referenced map and spreadsheet.

Voters in California, Michigan, and Vermont resoundingly approved amendments to their state constitutions last year that now guarantee the right to an abortion in the wake of the Supreme Court’s decision overturning Roe v. Wade. Many more states can—and should—follow suit.

Two states, New York and Maryland, in fact, have already placed similar amendments on the ballot, but another 21 could do the same thing, as illustrated in the map at the top of this post and in this companion spreadsheet. Together, these 26 states would cover 58% of the nation’s population—a critical step in the battle to restore abortion rights for the entire nation. - Daily Kos

Republicans are pro-child labor

The crazed stupidity does not end. I get that the right wing is scared and flailing, but that doesn't justify anything.

The New York Times’s recent exposé on child labor in the United States wasn’t about what might be called “child labor lite”: examples, say, of kids working in candy stores, logging long hours as babysitters, or getting up early to do paper-delivery rounds. Instead, it was about truly Dickensian conditions: children, many of whom were unaccompanied migrants, getting mangled while working overnight shifts in meat-packing plants; children working long hours on construction sites; children working into the wee hours in food-processing facilities; children getting chemically burned after working overnight shifts as janitors. These kids were, plain and simple, being labor-trafficked...

I was right that politicians would indeed be goaded into action; I was wrong, however, as to what action they would take. Far from shoring up protections against the exploitation of children by multinational corporations, by temporary employment agencies and by the “guardians” who, like Dickensian villains of yesteryear, send their wards out to work, GOP politicians took it as an opportunity to weaken child labor laws. - Truthout

Economic models are often proved wrong

This isn't generally emphasized in financial media, 90+ percent of which is just the plutocrats' whimpering, simpering, groveling propagandist curs. And of course motivated reasoning, as opposed to rational objectivity, is what drives the development of a lot of models in the first place.

Most of the models that economists currently use ignore the role of market power in today’s economy. And in the gizzards of the models are a variety of other assumptions that affect how the consequences of any policy are calculated, including the macroeconomic consequences that determine the size of the pie and the nature of the trade-offs. The estimated responses to any policy change are claimed to be the most reliable estimates of what will happen, based on past data, using the “best” models and best statistical techniques. Typically, these estimates are not robust—with large variations in the estimates depending on how they are done and the sample period over which they are done. The sample period is in fact critical: The current situation may be markedly different from the one in which the studies were conducted. Applying those results to today leads to faulty conclusions...

Often, simple reasoning can beat out seemingly complex and sophisticated econometric modeling. In 2017, then-President Donald Trump proposed, and Congress adopted, a massive cut in the corporate income tax. The claim was made, supposedly based on models, that it would massively stimulate investment. It did not. It simply stimulated increases in share buybacks and dividends, funneling money to investors. It was, in effect, a big gift to rich corporations and their shareholders. - The American Prospect