Alabama Dispatch
I've been down on a small peninsula on the Alabama shore across the bay from Mobile for the last week. It's been a great time despite an initial torrential downpour that put a foot of water over the roads in some places. It doesn't seem like a place that is likely to be inhabited in 50 years or so.
However, on that note I'd like to recommend The Ministry of the Future, a book by Kim Stanley Robinson that has a ton of fascinating ideas about climate policy. It might just be possible to save the world's beaches by pumping the water out from under glaciers in Antarctica and Greenland!l
Just a couple articles this week. First, states like Alabama (almost nobody is wearing masks down here, by the way) have left themselves wide open to the Delta Variant:
As a result, a recent poll found that 47 percent of Republicans say they likely will not get the vaccine, as compared to just six percent of Democrats. Fully 38 percent of Republicans say they definitely will not get vaccinated, along with 22 percent of independents. This means the situation is even worse than those pathetic vaccination rates mentioned above, since liberals in those states are likely to make up a disproportionate share of the already-vaccinated, and they tend to cluster in cities. Sure enough, a great many rural, conservative counties have not even cracked 20 percent vaccination.
Second, Trump is likely going to make the 2022 midterms about the January 6 insurrection:
It's an instructive example of the bind Trump has forced the GOP into. A tiny handful of party members tried to push Trump out after the putsch, but they have mostly been purged. The large minority of dedicated Trump-loving cranks, like Reps. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) and Paul Gosar (R-Ariz.), are eager to follow Dear Leader's every whim. The rest of the party would no doubt like Trump to disappear so they aren't stuck with his insane ravings, but will do absolutely nothing to make that happen.
Hope everyone is staying cool out there.