We both assumed, as parents of young children, that kindness is just something our kids would pick up by osmosis, because we love them. It’s a common assumption.
“We often just expect people to be kind without talking about it,” says Jennifer Kotler, vice president of research and evaluation at Sesame Workshop. “We think, ‘Oh, you’re a good kid. You’re gonna be kind.’ ”
Now, that’s not entirely wrong. Humans are certainly born with a capacity to be kind — even leaning toward kindness in many situations.
“We do need a world-war type mobilization and that means putting in place incentives to move our economy as quickly as we can away from fossil fuels to renewable energy,” Mann, a scientist at Pennsylvania State University who is known for taking on climate skeptics, told Hill.TV in an interview that aired Wednesday.
“Now how we do that, there’s a legitimate policy debate to be had about how we do that but there isn’t a legitimate debate to be had anymore about the need to do that,” he added.
Mann warned that lawmakers should take immediate action, arguing that the Trump administration is actively seeking to dismantle 50 years of environmental protections put in place by both Democratic and Republican administrations.
He pointed to Trump’s rollback of the Clean Power Plan, a 2015 Obama-era policy aimed at combatting greenhouse gas emissions from power plants, as an example.
Mann also argued that Trump is “committed to denying” climate change and has pushed to prevent the government from taking the issue into account when making policy decisions.
The Department of Agriculture (USDA) reportedly opted against publicizing dozens of peer-reviewed studies on climate change while Trump has been in office. Politico reported last week that the studies all point to the potential effects of climate change on everything from allergies to crops.
A USDA spokesperson told The Hill that there were no directives to limit the spread of climate-related research.
During his interview, Mann voiced support for a number of Democrats seeking to take on Trump in 2020, arguing that any of the Democratic hopefuls would prove to be a better alternative on the issue of climate action than the current administration.
“There’s a world of difference of where the Trump administration is and all of the Democrats and I would hate to see too much infighting at this point,” Mann told Hill.TV. “Let’s make sure that we elect a president who’s not going to continue to lead us backward and defy the rest of the world as we try to work on this existential threat.”
Mann’s comments come amid calls for a standalone climate debate for Democratic primary candidates.
The Democratic National Committee (DNC) is considering two measures related to holding such a debate and the two proposals could be voted on as early as August.
The Donald’s mode of operation has always been spend, spend, spend. Then file bankruptcy. Not a good business man. He runs our country the same way he has run his failed businesses, in the ground. But, somehow, he comes out not holding the bag. Not this time I say.
Q: Where is the “Tea Party” when we actually have a president that is blowing up the deficit? A: Worshipping Trump, you know, the same people that were demanding strong moral character from our previous presidents.
rethuglicunts always make our debt explode, while they scream about democrats’ spending! Clinton balanced our fucking budget!
The incident, known as the Ludlow Massacre, occurred in April of 1914, and it sparked a 10-day battle in the coalfields of the American West. It was one of the bloodiest episodes in the history of American class conflict, and one of the closest things to war between compatriots since the Confederacy was defeated a half-century earlier.
