Kamala Harris Has a Great Plan for Rural America by Charlotte Clymer

And you should know it. Read on Substack

This morning, the Harris-Walz campaign announced an extensive economic plan for rural communities. It’s a deeply impressive vision for working class families in these parts of the country.

Given that much—perhaps, most—of political media will not adequately report on this and inform voters of what Vice President Harris plans to do for Rural America, I’m gonna take the rare step of publishing her plan, in full, as a blog post.

I’m doing this because Lord knows we’re all more likely to see an intellectually dishonest column in The New York Times about Vice President Harris ignoring rural voters than we are to see significant reporting and analysis on her proposed policies for rural voters.

So, here it is. Just to confirm, all of the below text was written by the campaign. Please share with your friends and family in rural areas of the country:

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
October 15, 2024

Vice President Harris and Governor Walz’s Plan for Rural Communities

New Initiative Will Strengthen Rural Health Care by Adding 10,000 Health Care Professionals, Expanding Telemedicine, Cutting the Number of Ambulance Deserts in Half, and Keeping Rural Hospitals and Pharmacies Open

Supporting the Next Generation of Small- and Mid-sized Farmers and Ranchers

Strengthening the Backbone of the Rural Economy with Investments in Housing, Child Care, and Senior Care

Vice President Harris and Governor Walz believe in rural communities and understand that supporting locally led solutions is key to rural prosperity. Their administration will make it a priority to equip the nearly 50 million rural Americans with the tools and resources they need not just to get by, but get ahead.

Today, Vice President Harris and Governor Walz are announcing a plan for rural America. The key elements will:

Increase access to affordable and high-quality health care in rural communities—by adding 10,000 health care professionals, expanding telemedicine, cutting the number of ambulance deserts in half.
Support the sandwich generation to care for elders at home, lowering the cost of childcare and increasing the number of providers, and expanding the Child Tax Credit to provide tax cuts up to $6,000 for families with newborns.
Lower the costs of buying a home, starting and expanding a business, and raising a family—by sparking the construction of 3 million new housing units, providing up to $25,000 in down payment assistance for first-time homebuyers, increasing the small business tax deduction for startup expenses 10-fold to $50,000.
Invest in the future of American agriculture by boosting access to credit, land, and markets, building new markets and streams of income for small- and mid-sized farmers and producers, and supporting the rise of the next generation of American farmers and ranchers.

Donald Trump will turn back the hard-earned progress that rural communities are making. As President, he tried to repeal the Affordable Care Act and vows to terminate it if reelected, stripping protections from people with pre-existing conditions and devastating rural hospitals and care services. He will ban abortion nationwide, threaten access to contraception and IVF, and force states to monitor women’s pregnancies and report women’s miscarriages and abortions to the federal government.

He already took overtime pay away from millions of Americans while giving tax breaks to billionaires and big corporations – at the same time that he tried to cut funding that supports rural housing and creates rural jobs. If Trump returns to office, he promises to give more tax cuts to the super-rich and big corporations while hiking taxes on rural families by $4,000 a year – as estimated by the conservative leaning American Action Forum, and putting Social Security and Medicare on the chopping block.

Independent analysis from Goldman Sachs, Moody’s Analytics, and other top economists – including those surveyed by the Financial Times and Wall Street Journal – and more also agree that Vice President Harris’ plans are better for the U.S. economy than Donald Trump’s. For example, an analysis by Moody’s Analytics shows that, under a Harris presidency, more than a million new jobs would be added to the economy than under a second Trump Administration. Meanwhile, Moody’s finds that Trump’s plan would cause a recession by mid-2025, cost 3.2 million jobs, and add over 1 percent to inflation. And, a survey of nearly 40 top economists by the Financial Times and University of Chicago found that 70 percent agree that Vice President Harris would be better on the deficit than Trump, while only 11 percent believe that Trump would be better on the deficit than Harris.

Trump’s Project 2025 agenda will slash the federal crop insurance program, gut protections for clean water and air, and repeal the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law and Inflation Reduction Act, which will roll back historic investments in small businesses and rural infrastructure including broadband, and clean energy. Under a Harris-Walz administration, rural America is not going back.

EXPANDING RURAL HEALTH CARE

Vice President Harris and Governor Walz believe quality health care is a right, not a privilege. That’s why they are announcing new initiatives to improve and expand affordable health care in rural areas. Their plan will recruit 10,000 additional rural health care professionals and protect and expand access to care from telemedicine to local independent pharmacies.

Recruiting 10,000 Rural Health Care Professionals, including doctors, nurses, community health workers, and EMS professionals to provide health services to Americans in rural and tribal areas—while working to protect our health workforce from burnout. This initiative will include:
- Expanding Scholarships, Loan Forgiveness, and Other Pipeline Programs for Doctors and Nurses Who Will Provide Health Care in Rural and Tribal Areas: They will expand funding to recruit and retain doctors, nurses, pharmacists, public health professionals, and other health care providers through scholarships, loan repayment programs including the National Health Service Corps Loan Repayment Program, the Indian Health Service Loan Repayment Program, and the Public Service Loan Forgiveness Programs. Their plan to build 3 million new homes nationwide, including in rural and tribal areas, and to provide $25,000 in downpayment assistance will further lower costs of buying a home in rural America, creating incentives for health professionals to buy homes and stay in rural America. They will invest in programs that introduce rural youth to careers in medicine, and provide the necessary support for them to pursue that career path. This plan builds on Vice President Harris’s leadership in investing in programs to train more nurses and doctors who will live and work in rural and underserved communities, including funding an additional 1,000 residency slots in hospitals. When a provider trains in a rural area, they’re more likely to remain, living and working there.
- Providing a Major Grant Program To Train and Fund Rural Community Health Workers: They will launch a new permanent grant program to train and fund Rural Community Health Workers; make it easier for Medicaid to cover Community Health Workers; and expand grants to Community Health Centers and Rural Health Centers.
Expanding Rural Telehealth Services: Americans living in rural areas are around 17 times more likely to use telehealth than those in cities, but half of all people living in rural areas lack access to the broadband speeds needed to support telehealth.
- Permanently extend Medicare coverage of telemedicine benefits, currently set to expire, by working with Congress to pass the Preserving Telehealth, Hospital, and Ambulance Act.
- Double federal funding for telehealth equipment and technologies. They will double the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s (USDA) Distance Learning and Telemedicine Grant Program for Rural Communities to $120 million. This will give rural and tribal communities more resources for telehealth equipment—including at rural health clinics, hospitals, and schools–and support innovative new technologies like tele-medically equipped ambulances.
Slashing the Number of Ambulance Deserts in Half: At least 2.3 million rural Americans live in ambulance deserts—meaning they live at least 25 minutes away from an ambulance—and in 14 states more than 10% of the population lives in such an area. Volunteer squads—which provide the majority of rural EMS staff—struggle to survive due to a lack of sustainable funding sources and difficulty recruiting new volunteers. Vice President Harris and Governor Walz will take action to cut the number of rural Americans in ambulance deserts in half by the end of the decade:
- Expanding EMTs and Paramedics in Rural Areas: They will dramatically increase financial and technical support to rural and tribal communities to train, equip, and employ first responders, and provide resources for ambulances, lifesaving equipment, and the construction and maintenance of first responder stations.
- Increasing Funding and Support for Volunteer EMS Programs: They will provide grants to small volunteer ambulance and EMS programs to help them survive and thrive. These extra resources will support innovative uses of technology like telehealth and explore solutions to low reimbursement levels for both public and private insurers.
Keep Independent Pharmacies Open and Increase the Number by 3,000. Independent pharmacies make up more than three-quarters of pharmacies in rural areas, and their pharmacists are a critical and trusted health care resource. But nationally the number of independent pharmacies has decreased—by nearly 50% since 1980, leveling off at about 20,000 locations, with 1 in 10 independent retail pharmacies in rural America closing over the last decade.
- A Harris-Walz Administration will set a goal of enabling 23,000 independent pharmacies to either launch or stay open by working to enact legislation that would prevent pharmaceutical middlemen known as pharmacy benefit managers from shortchanging rural independent pharmacies and steering orders of the most profitable drugs away from independent rural pharmacies and to chains. This would be a 15% increase in the number of independent pharmacies – restoring the rural independent pharmacies that have closed over the last decade and increasing their number by 5%.
Keeping Rural Hospital Doors Open To Ensure Access to Emergency Services. Since 2010, nearly 150 rural hospitals have either shuttered or ceased providing inpatient hospital services. A Harris-Walz Administration will work to strengthen Medicare’s Rural Emergency Hospital Designation – which helps facilities offer medical services in areas that may not be able to sustain a full-service hospital, while protecting the Affordable Care Act and supporting Medicaid expansion, which has helped to reduce uncompensated care in expansion states and improves the financial health of rural hospitals. This will also help support improvement in maternal health, which Vice President Harris has long advocated for, by increasing access to options for obstetric care.
Lowering Health Care Costs. Vice President Harris and Governor Walz will also lower health care and prescription drug costs for Americans. They will work to cap the cost of insulin at $35 and out-of-pocket expenses for prescription drugs at $2,000 for everyone. They will also fight to keep helping millions of Americans save $800 a year on their health insurance and accelerate Medicare negotiations over prescription drugs to help bring drug prices down more quickly and cover more drugs.
Restoring and Protecting Reproductive Freedoms. They will also keep fighting for womens’ rights to make decisions about their own bodies. The Vice President will, if elected, never allow a national abortion ban to become law. And when Congress passes a bill to restore reproductive freedom nationwide, she will sign it.
Supporting Veterinary Care in Rural Areas and address the increasing shortage of veterinarians by encouraging providers to work in areas with too few veterinarians by strengthening USDA’s Veterinary Medicine Loan Repayment Program, which reduces debt for physicians working in high-need areas for the food supply, and increasing grants for starting and expanding veterinary practices in critical areas.

Trump meanwhile tried to end the Affordable Care Act and has promised to terminate it if reelected — over 500 rural hospitals at risk of closure could close. He sought to make significant cuts to both Medicare and Medicaid in every single one of his budgets. His Project 2025 agenda will reverse the caps on insulin and other prescription drugs, raising the prices on life-saving Medications.

A HISTORIC PLAN TO EXPAND ACCESS TO CARE AND SUPPORT THE SANDWICH GENERATION

Vice President Harris cared for her aging mother and knows that when families cannot find affordable care for their elderly parents or children, it is not just a big financial strain, but also a source of severe emotional stress that takes a big toll on families. Nearly a quarter of American adults are part of the sandwich generation providing intergenerational care to both their children and a parent or a loved one with disabilities.

Protect and Strengthen Medicare, Help Rural Seniors Live Independently, and Support Family Caregivers. Vice President Harris and Governor Walz will protect Medicare and strengthen it with a historic Medicare at Home plan, which will cover robust home care for seniors under Medicare for the first time ever. This will help both seniors and their caregivers, who often shoulder the financial and emotional burden of caring for aging loved ones. Vice President Harris and Governor Walz will also expand Medicare to cover hearing and vision benefits to support the millions of seniors who rely on glasses and hearing aids.

These plans are common sense. They can help family caregivers work and save both families and the federal government money by allowing seniors to stay in their homes instead of being sent to nursing homes, which are often more expensive. Medicare at Home will also reduce hospitalizations. These new benefits will be fully paid for and extend the life of the Medicare Trust Fund by expanding Medicare drug price negotiations and more.

Make Quality, Affordable Child Care Accessible and Expand the Child Tax Credit. Vice President Harris and Governor Walz know that millions of Americans are balancing both care for their children and care for aging loved ones. Too many rural families struggle to access affordable child care near them. One survey found that only 38 percent of rural parents could easily find childcare within their budget, compared to over half of urban parents. Vice President Harris and Governor Walz will bring down child care costs for American families to help save thousands of dollars on child care and expand access to good child care options by building a robust child care supply. Vice President Harris is also proposing to expand and make permanent the Child Tax Credit, including giving families with newborns a tax cut of $6,000 per child. This will help families cover expenses early on in life. After Vice President Harris cast the tie-breaking vote on the legislation that temporarily expanded the Child Tax Credit in 2021, it helped the families of over 9 million children in rural areas.

As president, Trump tried to cut Medicare and Medicaid in every single one of his budgets, has called for raising the retirement age to 70, and said privatizing Medicare will create a “stronger system.” He denied millions of families the full child tax credit and tried to cut federal child care funding by nearly $100 million. His Project 2025 agenda will actually raise costs on families by $4,000 a year.

STRENGTHENING THE BACKBONE OF THE RURAL ECONOMY

Vice President Harris and Governor Walz are committed to helping rural communities grow and thrive economically. They are fighting to lower prices for Americans including through tax cuts for 100 million working and middle-class families and policies to lower the price of housing, groceries, and health care. They are also supporting small businesses by cutting red tape and proposing a ten-fold increase in the tax deduction for new businesses starting up.

Vice President Harris has fought for landmark investments in rural communities: high-speed internet access to every corner of rural and tribal America, as well as projects to build and fix roads and bridges in rural and tribal communities across America, and to support transit vehicles and infrastructure for thousands of rural and tribal transit systems. Rural communities stand to benefit from up to 45% of the total funding—or more than $450 billion—provided by the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, the Inflation Reduction Act, and the CHIPS and Science Act is, and almost 30% of the IRA funding announced so far will flow to rural communities. Governor Walz has long championed rural communities. He spent 12 years representing a rural district in Congress, and as Governor, he spearheaded the largest single investment in broadband infrastructure in state history to help thousands of Minnesotans—including those in rural areas—connect to jobs, education, health care, and their communities.

But they know it is not enough—too many rural communities still do not have the tools they need to get ahead.

Supporting Small Businesses by Increasing Capital and Access to Resources. Vice President Harris has set an ambitious goal of 25 million new business applications by the end of her first term. She plans to encourage businesses to start and grow by increasing the small business deduction 10-fold to $50,000, providing low- to zero-interest loans to small businesses that grow and create jobs, allocating one-third of federal contract dollars to small businesses, and providing other financing for rural and tribal entrepreneurs through the Treasury Department’s State Small Business Credit Initiative—which lifts up entrepreneurs and founders in rural America, middle America, and underserved communities.
Create New Jobs and Opportunities Through:
- New America Forward Tax Credits to promote investment in the industries of the future, including greater credits for companies investing in agricultural, manufacturing, and energy communities. This includes modernizing steel and iron production, developing biotechnology, building new data centers for AI and supporting AI innovation, further developing clean energy manufacturing, revitalizing America’s semiconductor industry, and investing in aerospace, autos, and other forms of transportation. These tax credits will provide significant additional benefits to investments made in longstanding manufacturing, energy, and agricultural communities and reward companies that work with unions and communities to support workers and protect jobs.
- New Opportunities for Those Without Four-Year College Degrees including promoting meaningful pathways for those without college degrees to federal jobs and working with businesses to do the same in the private sector. Vice President Harris and Governor Walz have also set a goal of doubling the number of registered apprenticeships during their first term. This will include partnerships with community colleges on high-quality, evidence-based training programs.
- Cutting Red Tape so that America Can Build More Housing, Manufacturing, and Energy Projects Faster while also ensuring community engagement and adequate protections for the environment and public health. This will build Vice President Harris’s work through the Inflation Reduction Act to speed permitting review, and her work to finalize a rule to modernize environmental reviews.
- Keeping Rural Schools Open and Thriving. Vice President Harris knows that a great teacher can have a life-long impact on children. But teacher shortages disproportionately impact rural communities throughout the country. That’s why she will double down on programs that prepare and train teachers in rural and tribal areas in an effort to support new teachers and increase retention rates in rural communities—all of which will improve student outcomes like academic achievement and high school graduation rates, resulting in higher long-term earnings, job creation, and a boost to the economy. She will also build on federal transportation programs that help get children to school where bus routes or vehicle maintenance costs put additional strain on already limited budgets.
Protect and Strengthen Social Security while Making the Super Wealthy Pay their Fair Share. Vice President Harris and Governor Walz will protect and strengthen Social Security and Medicare by making the super-wealthy pay their fair share. Trump, by contrast, once called for raising the retirement age to 70, and he tried to cut Social Security and Medicare every year of his presidency. Now, on the campaign trail, Trump is continuing to talk up cuts to Social Security and Medicare, saying “there is a lot you can do…in terms of cutting.”
Lowering Costs:
- Lower Costs of Buying and Renting a Home Across Rural America by sparking the construction of 3 million new affordable rental and owner-occupied homes, providing up to $25,000 in down payment assistance for first-time homebuyers, and cracking down on predatory investors. Vice President Harris and Governor Walz will also work to strengthen USDA’s programs for rural and tribal communities, especially in housing, and as part of their proposal to strengthen the Low Income Housing Tax Credit program to create more homes that are affordable for renters, they will work to ensure that rural states receive a fair allocation of these credits to address the unique challenges that rural communities face when dealing with housing challenges, including higher construction costs and lower housing density.
- Providing Rural and Tribal Families with Reliable, Low-Cost Internet Access, by reenacting the Affordable Connectivity Program. The Bipartisan Infrastructure Law’s Affordable Connectivity Program provided 23 million households with up to $30 off of their monthly internet bills and a one-time discount of up to $100 to buy a laptop, desktop computer, or tablet. Over 3 million people who benefited from ACP live in rural and tribal areas. Vice President Harris will reenact this popular program, which ended in June of this year, to ensure that rural and tribal families can connect to the internet and obtain the financial, educational, and health opportunities that come from reliable internet access. She will also take common-sense steps to speed up the construction of new internet for rural and tribal communities.
Provide Funding and Support to Local Communities, Tailored to Address Local Needs.
- Vice President Harris and Governor Walz will work with Congress to pass the bipartisan Rural Partnership and Prosperity Act, led by Senators Casey and Fischer. This will provide new grants to every state that will support locally led solutions to address rural and tribal communities’ needs—including for child care, housing, job training, and economic development.
- Vice President Harris and Governor Walz will expand the Rural Partners Network nationwide by partnering with rural communities to help them navigate and access existing federal funding opportunities.

Trump neglected rural communities. He failed to address the housing supply crisis during this presidency, and now his Project 2025 agenda will increase mortgage premiums on federally backed loans, and drive up mortgage rates by around $1,200 by privatizing Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. He also tried to eliminate the Economic Development Administration, and wants to repeal investments in infrastructure, clean energy, and more that have been strengthening the economies of rural communities. He will also raise costs by nearly $4,000 per family with a “Trump Sales Tax” on imported items that families rely on.

He also has no plan to support families and seniors. He has called for raising the retirement age to 70 years old. His Project 2025 agenda would slash funding for child care, abolish Head Start, and cut more than $20 billion in federal support for the nation’s most vulnerable students.

HARVESTING THE FUTURE OF AMERICAN AGRICULTURE

Vice President Harris and Governor Walz know that America’s farmers, farmworkers, and ranchers feed our nation, drive our economic growth, and enhance our security and resilience. That’s why Vice President Harris helped secure nearly $20 billion in investments to help hundreds of thousands of farmers and ranchers adopt voluntary innovative conservation practices, promote sustainable agriculture, and increase resilience against extreme weather. She also directed $1 billion to increase meat and poultry processing capacity, up to $900 million to boost domestic fertilizer production, and funding to strengthen food supply chains and give farmers more choices. Governor Walz—who grew up spending time on the family farm—has stood by farmers and ranchers throughout his time in public service. In Congress, Governor Walz worked across the aisle to pass three Farm Bills to expand veterans’ access to crop insurance, farm education, and job training and enacted legislation to improve veterans’ health care. And as Governor, he championed efforts to support new farmers and to build new markets and revenue streams.

But Vice President Harris and Governor Walz know that today too many small farmers and ranchers still face barriers to success or are getting ripped off by big corporations. Vice President Harris and Governor Walz have a plan to invest in the future of America’s agricultural industry. They will combat consolidation and other barriers that make it more difficult for small farmers to get ahead, and support the next generation of American farming by:

Making it Easier for Beginning Farmers and Ranchers to Get Started by improving access to credit for beginning farmers—including by reducing barriers to receive USDA’s farm ownership and operating loans—and supporting training and technical assistance including for military veterans and young farmers. This builds on Vice President Harris and Governor Walz’s proposals to provide one million forgivable loans to entrepreneurs who have historically faced barriers to accessing credit as well as low- to zero-interest loans to small businesses that create jobs.
Expanding Farmland Protection Programs including supporting working farm easements that ensure farmland remains farmland and isn’t lost to non-agricultural buyers.
Doubling Down on Partnerships with Farmers and Producers to Build New Markets and Streams of Incomes. That’s why Vice President Harris fought tirelessly for the Inflation Reduction Act, which included a $20 billion investment to help the agricultural community voluntarily adopt and expand conservation and climate smart agricultural strategies—all while saving money, creating new income streams, ensuring the wealthy pay their fair share in taxes, and increasing productivity. If elected, Vice President Harris and Governor Walz will double down on this work.
Ensuring America’s Farmers Have the Right to Repair Their Equipment. Currently, equipment manufacturers put in place restrictions, such as software blocks on tractors and other farm equipment, that make it difficult if not impossible for farmers to repair their own equipment. Vice President Harris and Governor Walz will require manufacturers of electronics-enabled agricultural equipment to share documents, parts, software, and tools with owners and independent repair shops by working with Congress to enact the Agricultural Right to Repair Act.
Boost Competition to Create Opportunities for Small Farmers and Ranchers. Vice President Harris and Governor Walz will support small businesses in the agricultural industry, including continuing successful efforts to block excessive consolidation by working with Congress to pass bipartisan legislation to increase antitrust enforcement in agriculture and help ensure poultry growers and ranchers get a fair price. They will also focus on expanding production among new suppliers and small farms, growers, and processors to create broad-based, resilient local and regional food supply chains and spur competition with large conglomerates.
Ensuring Crop Insurance Works for All Farmers and Ranchers. Vice President Harris and Governor Walz will strengthen the Federal Crop Insurance Program by directing the USDA to study whether the program should cover additional crops and working with Congress to ensure the program protects against more threats like natural disasters and extreme climate events – risks that raise costs and disrupt supply chains.
Growing Opportunities and Small and Mid-Size Farms and Small Businesses in Rural and Tribal Communities to Sell to Customers Around the Globe. Research shows that agricultural export losses due to retaliatory tariffs from Trump’s trade wars totaled more than $27 billion in 2018 and 2019. The impact on small farmers and rural communities was devastating: agricultural jobs fell, U.S. farm bankruptcies surged, and net farm income plummeted. Vice President Harris and Governor Walz will provide technical assistance to small and mid-sized farmers and businesses so that they have more opportunity to sell their products.

Donald Trump will make the challenges that American farmers face worse. As President, he bailed out the largest 10% of farmers, while sacrificing smaller family farms in his trade wars. Between September 2018 and September 2019, farm bankruptcy filings rose 24% nationally. He also enabled big meatpackers and agribusinesses to run family farms out of business. As his own Secretary of Agriculture said, “In America, the big get bigger and the small go out.” Now, if Trump is elected again, his Project 2025 agenda will hurt rural America, including making crop insurance for family farmers even more expensive and risking another slew of retaliatory tariffs.

Vice President Harris and Governor Walz believe in rural America and pledge to support rural Americans to create a New Way Forward.

Peace & Justice History for 10/16:

It is World Food Day. (Among other things; this is a busy date!)

https://www.peacebuttons.info/E-News/peacehistoryoctober.htm#october16

Bye-Bye, Russian Gas!

A funny bit; I pasted in the link to see if it would embed the story, and it did! Sort of. It put the title as a hyperlink, as you can see below. I was sorely tempted to just leave it there like that, because what a witty title on its own! Then everyone could either be curious enough to click (it’s not too long to read,) or go ahead and post it all.

Bye-Bye, Russian Gas!

Here’s a snippet, because the photo should be seen on the page, and JSTOR is generous and deserves a click now and then:

By: Aissa Dearing and Michaela Rychetska October 10, 2024 4 minutes

Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has fundamentally altered Europe’s geopolitical landscape, with profound implications for its energy security. The invasion exposed Europe’s vulnerabilities, particularly its heavy reliance on Russian oil and natural gas. This has repositioned energy security as a central concern, with Russia seen as a significant threat to the stability and reliability of Europe’s energy supply chains. In response, Europe has taken decisive action to reduce its energy imports from Russia. In May 2022, the European Council agreed to ban almost 90 percent of Russian oil imports—with the notable exception of pipeline crude oil—complemented by stringent sanctions aimed at weakening Russia’s economic leverage. Does this shift suggest that the European Union’s transition to renewable energy is accelerating, not solely for climate reasons, but to achieve energy sovereignty amidst a geopolitical crisis?

The ongoing conflict in Ukraine has indeed catalyzed a unified European reassessment of energy dependence on Russia, prompting collective efforts to diversify energy sources and bolster energy security. As security studies scholar Marc Ozawa notes, Western European countries historically framed their reliance on Russian energy within the context of market transactions and economic interests, a legacy of the oil shocks during the 1970s OPEC crisis. In this light, reliance on Russian energy was, in some respects, a strategic response to earlier crises. (snip)

The transition to an energy sovereign economy cannot solely focus on implementing renewable energy—it requires more than technological advancements—it necessitates profound socioeconomic shifts and a reevaluation of the traditional monopolistic energy business model. A just transition, as scholars Elianor Gerrard and Peter Westoby emphasize, is “the idea that the burdens of decarbonization—such as job losses from the closing of the fossil fuel industry or the high costs of clean technologies—should not unfairly impact any one group.” Achieving this transition involves developing policies that are both pragmatic and ethically sound, ensuring that the shift to a low-carbon economy goes beyond labor market adjustments. At its core, a just transition seeks to reconcile environmental protection with the need to protect vulnerable communities long reliant on fossil fuels. The decarbonization process cannot succeed without prioritizing these communities, providing workforce development for fossil fuel workers, and supporting decentralized, community-owned renewable technologies with adequate storage capacities. Existing electric technologies and grid infrastructure shouldn’t become stranded in this process but be retrofitted to ensure efficiency and multilateral grid cooperation.

Peace & Justice History for 10/15:

https://www.peacebuttons.info/E-News/peacehistoryoctober.htm#october15

Reblog Michael Seidel, writer

I look forward to these every day, even though I don’t get to them until the night! 🤷‍♀️🌞🖖

Sunday’s Theme Music

Work to focus on engaging communities during the energy transition

(It can’t hurt to put bits like this out into the universe. Somebody’s working on this, and more people ought to. So a nice little discussion of what’s working is appropriate. -A)

October 11, 2024 ARC Laureate Fellows

This Cosmos series on Australian Research Council Laureate Fellows 2024 reflects excellence from world class researchers in Australia.

Chris Gibson is a Senior Professor in the School of Geography and Sustainable Communities at the University of Wollongong. For his ARC Fellowship, he is investigating how decarbonisation impacts Australian regions.

Professor Chris Gibson: finding a truce in the climate wars.

Decarbonisation and energy transition are at the sharp edge of a hot political battle. There is a lot of dispute over new technologies like offshore wind, and exactly what mix of energy we need. It’s like a second iteration of the climate wars. But after a decade of stalled policy on climate, we have to embrace the decarbonised future, whether we like it or not. It’s an issue that needs to transcend the political divide.

But we’re faced with a dilemma: we need urgent change, but urgent change rarely occurs, if ever, in a way that is fair. The burdens and benefits of change are not distributed equally across society. And the quicker the change, the more risks there are. Regions can be all too easily left behind.

Geographers think about how substantial change, like this energy transition, affects communities. We think of ourselves as an integrative discipline. We bring together expertise from across environmental science, economics, social geography, legal geography, and from experts who are good on governing transitions. By stitching together insights from all directions, we try to see the bigger picture.

My ARC project is aiming to put together a systematic understanding of what’s happening in decarbonisation, both from the top down, with a nationwide view, and from the ground up, about how people in different regions are responding to change.

We’re putting together a team to look at how decarbonisation hits the ground in different regions, and how it affects different workers, different industries, what kinds of opportunities come out of that, what kinds of changes are needed, how communities and households are responding to the decarbonisation challenge, and how a First Nations’ perspective can lead the way.

Community responses have to be taken seriously. It’s too easy and too convenient to cast aside sceptics as “nimbies” (Not In My Backyard) or selfish or ignorant. If you take the time to hear the diversity of opinions that come from communities, you’ll often find that people are worried about real issues, with valid concerns. Local communities are very knowledgeable about their patch, and have a capacity to understand what kinds of changes are needed. If we can forge a more inclusive process that brings regional perspectives, skills and experience to the forefront, we reduce the risk that regions are left behind. And governments might actually see regional communities as an opportunity rather than a hindrance to change.

A good example is here in the Illawarra, (Coastal New South Wales) where offshore wind has been very controversial in the last year. One of the lessons to be had is to not underestimate the community’s ability to understand what an energy transition means, and not to underestimate the degree of attachment people have to their local places.

The community here is highly knowledgeable about energy. The Illawarra has a workforce with a long history in heavy industry – the number of electricians per capita in the Illawarra must be as high as anywhere in Australia. And people have opinions – it’s not a passive region that knows nothing about the change that’s coming. The task is not purely to convince local people that this is a good thing, but to have a mature conversation with them about the pros and cons.

Who benefits in the energy transition?

There are all kinds of philosophical questions about who benefits, how those benefits are shared, what it means to turn our oceans into a space for energy generation. Some members of the community are asking for a proper conversation, because they don’t feel like they’ve been part of the story so far.

People react unpredictably to change that they see is imposed upon them. Let’s say it’s closing down a coal-fired power station in the Hunter Valley in New South Wales, or proposing a green hydrogen hub in South Australia – people don’t necessarily assess these as singular proposals that exist outside of everything else in their region or in their lives. People make sense of change in relation to their place, their community, their household, their family.

My work is about putting those people and their households first, and looking at it from their point of view. How does structural change look when we take into account the pressures of cost of living, on housing, on employment? People are grappling with these issues in their everyday lives.

There’s also a real risk in introducing changes that are presented to communities as if they have arrived from elsewhere, as a fait accompli. The direction of the flow of ideas and proposals, how they hit the ground, are a very important part of the process. If a proposal seems to arrive in their backyard from the top down – from a government or a corporation provider – you can get a community offside from the outset.

My work is about setting up different kinds of approaches that recognise that these communities have their own capacities and their own perspectives to offer. What we hope to do in the five years of the ARC Laureate program is develop an evidence base so that we can craft better models of how to manage this change. We’re looking at some of the implementations that have already occurred, tracing where those decarbonisation initiatives are hitting the ground, and looking at different kinds of community reactions – what sorts of processes work better than others in terms of building that relationship with community, as well as what happens when things end up in a more antagonistic situation.

Geography is the study of the relationship between humans and our environment. It has always occupied a slightly slippery position in universities and in public life, because we’re both a science and a social science, because we do this work of integrating perspectives from different areas of knowledge. In fact, we call ourselves all sorts of different things: we’re also environmental managers and coastal managers, policy officers and sustainability experts. It’s a discipline that connects, that fills the gaps. We often find solutions to problems by putting knowledge together from those different perspectives. It’s making these connections that can make a big difference.

As told to Graem Sims

https://cosmosmagazine.com/energise/engaging-communities-during-energy-transition/

Scientists Are Turning Mosquitoes “Trans” So They Can Fight Malaria

New LGBTQ+ insect just dropped. (From A: But is this really trans?)

By Abby Monteil October 8, 2024

From gay polyamorous flamingos to a “half-male, half-female bird” sighting, Mother Nature has proven that she’s pretty damn queer. But sometimes, scientists like to get in on the fun, too. It turns out that some are even using their talents to engineer “trans” mosquitoes (yes, really).

On October 5, the X account @Rainmaker1973 shared a video of a female mosquito attempting to bite a human hand. However, its blood-sucking attempts are thwarted because its proboscis — aka its needle-like mouth — could not break through the skin.

“Using the CRISPR technique, it’s possible to genetically modify mosquitoes by disabling a gene in females, so that their proboscis turns male, making them unable to pierce human skin,” @Rainmaker1973 explained.

https://twitter.com/Rainmaker1973/status/1842601255220465690

Before we go further, a quick science lesson: According to the National Human Genome Research Institute, Clustered Regularly Interspaced Short Palindromic Repeats, or CRISPR, is a technology that allows scientists to selectively modify DNA.

So why use this technology on mosquitoes? Well, malaria, which kills more than 600,000 people per year, is transmitted to humans by female mosquitoes belonging to the genus Anopheles, which, per the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, encompasses between 30 and 40 mosquito species. According to a 2018 study in the journal Nature Biotechnology, using CRISPR technology on female mosquitoes resulted in egg production reaching the point of “total population collapse” within 7 to 11 generations. In other words, this technique allows scientists to not only ensure that female mosquitoes carrying malaria can’t spread the disease to humans, but that they can’t reproduce in general. This CRISPR-enabled gene editing is just one of several techniques that researchers have used to fight the spread of malaria in humans.

So, sure, in a manner of speaking, scientists are doing their best to curb the spread of malaria by making some mosquitoes “trans.” In addition to being a genetic achievement, @Rainmaker1973’s viral video sharing the news also unsurprisingly inspired some excellent tweets. (see on the page)

She strokin tryna wake it up OMG… hrt no joke,” one X user tweeted.

“Mosquitoes pissing me off so I took out my crispr and gave them gender dysphoria,” another joked.

The past few years have introduced no shortage of queer bugs, from fruit flies who were potentially turned gay by air pollution to cicadas who became hypersexual zombies after being infected with a sexually transmitted fungus. What’s a few more trans mosquitoes?

https://www.them.us/story/mosquitoes-trans-crispr-gene-editing

Such Beauty!!

The Powers That Be Blessed Us Tonight…

I’ve seen Bee comment and like here on Playtime, so I follow The Bee Writes, and am rewarded every time I read there!

In Case Readers Are Checking In Here re FL Weather

NWS’s 10 PM Update:

Hurricane Milton Tropical Cyclone Update
NWS National Hurricane Center Miami FL       AL142024
1000 PM EDT Wed Oct 09 2024

...FLASH FLOOD EMERGENCY IN EFFECT FOR THE TAMPA BAY AREA AS 
MILTON CONTINUES MOVING INLAND...
...1000 PM EDT POSITION UPDATE...

A sustained wind of 69 mph (111 km/h) and a gust of 102 mph (165 
km/h) was recently reported at the Sarasota-Bradenton International 
Airport. A sustained wind of 86 mph (139 km/h) and a gust of 105 mph 
(169 km/h) was recently reported at a WeatherFlow station at Egmont 
Channel. A sustained wind of 74 mph (119 km/h) and a gust of 98 mph 
(157 km/h) was recently reported at a NOS station at Middle Tampa 
Bay. A gust of 91 mph (146 km/h) was recently reported at a Citizen 
Weather Observer Program station in Bartow.

A Flash Flood Emergency is in effect for the Tampa Bay area, 
including the cities of Tampa, St. Petersburg, and Clearwater. 
Albert Whitted Airport in St. Petersburg has received 16.61 inches 
of rain so far today.

The next update will be the full advisory at 1100 PM EDT (0300 
UTC).

SUMMARY OF 1000 PM EDT...0200 UTC...INFORMATION
-----------------------------------------------
LOCATION...27.5N 82.3W
ABOUT 20 MI...30 KM NE OF SARASOTA FLORIDA
ABOUT 90 MI...145 KM SW OF ORLANDO FLORIDA
MAXIMUM SUSTAINED WINDS...110 MPH...175 KM/H
PRESENT MOVEMENT...ENE OR 60 DEGREES AT 16 MPH...26 KM/H
MINIMUM CENTRAL PRESSURE...958 MB...28.29 INCHES

Here’s the Weather Service’s most recent full advisory re Southern FL:


BULLETIN
Hurricane Milton Intermediate Advisory Number 19A
NWS National Hurricane Center Miami FL       AL142024
800 PM EDT Wed Oct 09 2024

...MILTON CLOSE TO MAKING LANDFALL ALONG THE COAST OF WEST-CENTRAL 
FLORIDA...
...LIFE-THREATENING STORM SURGE, DAMAGING WINDS, AND FLOODING RAINS
OCCURRING ACROSS PORTIONS OF CENTRAL AND SOUTHWESTERN FLORIDA...


SUMMARY OF 800 PM EDT...0000 UTC...INFORMATION
----------------------------------------------
LOCATION...27.2N 82.8W
ABOUT 20 MI...30 KM WSW OF SARASOTA FLORIDA
ABOUT 130 MI...205 KM SW OF ORLANDO FLORIDA
MAXIMUM SUSTAINED WINDS...120 MPH...195 KM/H
PRESENT MOVEMENT...ENE OR 60 DEGREES AT 15 MPH...24 KM/H
MINIMUM CENTRAL PRESSURE...954 MB...28.17 INCHES


WATCHES AND WARNINGS
--------------------
CHANGES WITH THIS ADVISORY:

None.

SUMMARY OF WATCHES AND WARNINGS IN EFFECT:

A Storm Surge Warning is in effect for...
* Florida west coast from Flamingo northward to Yankeetown,
including Charlotte Harbor and Tampa Bay
* Sebastian Inlet Florida to Altamaha Sound Georgia, including the
St. Johns River

A Hurricane Warning is in effect for...
* Florida west coast from Bonita Beach northward to Suwannee River,
including Tampa Bay
* Florida east coast from the St. Lucie/Martin County Line northward
to Ponte Vedra Beach

A Hurricane Watch is in effect for...
* Lake Okeechobee
* Florida east coast from the St. Lucie/Martin County Line to the
Palm Beach/Martin County Line

A Tropical Storm Warning is in effect for...
* Florida Keys, including Dry Tortugas and Florida Bay
* Lake Okeechobee
* Florida west coast from Flamingo to south of Bonita Beach
* Florida west coast from north of Suwanee River to Indian Pass
* Florida east coast south of the St. Lucie/Martin County Line to
Flamingo
* North of Ponte Vedra Beach Florida to Edisto Beach South Carolina
* Extreme northwestern Bahamas, including Grand Bahama Island, the
Abacos, and Bimini

A Storm Surge Warning means there is a danger of life-threatening 
inundation, from rising water moving inland from the coastline in 
the indicated locations. For a depiction of areas at risk, please 
see the National Weather Service Storm Surge Watch/Warning Graphic, 
available at hurricanes.gov.  This is a life-threatening situation.  
Persons located within these areas should take all necessary actions 
to protect life and property from rising water and the potential for 
other dangerous conditions.  Promptly follow evacuation and other 
instructions from local officials.

A Hurricane Warning means that hurricane conditions are expected
somewhere within the warning area.

A Tropical Storm Warning means that tropical storm conditions are
expected somewhere within the warning area within 36 hours.

A Hurricane Watch means that hurricane conditions are possible
within the watch area.

For storm information specific to your area in the United
States, including possible inland watches and warnings, please
monitor products issued by your local National Weather Service
forecast office. For storm information specific to your area
outside of the United States, please monitor products issued by
your national meteorological service.


DISCUSSION AND OUTLOOK
----------------------
At 800 PM EDT (0000 UTC), the center of Hurricane Milton was located
near latitude 27.2 North, longitude 82.8 West.  Milton is moving
toward the east-northeast near 15 mph (24 km/h), and this general 
motion is expected to continue through Thursday, followed by a turn 
toward the east on Friday.  On the forecast track, the center of 
Milton will make landfall just south of the Tampa Bay region 
within the next hour or two, and then move across the central part 
of the Florida peninsula overnight, and emerge off the east coast of 
Florida on Thursday.

Maximum sustained winds are near 120 mph (195 km/h) with higher
gusts.  Milton is a category 3 hurricane on the Saffir-Simpson
Hurricane Wind Scale.  Little change in strength is likely 
until landfall, and Milton is expected to remain a hurricane 
while it moves across central Florida through Thursday.  The system 
is forecast to weaken over the western Atlantic and become 
extratropical by Thursday night.

Hurricane-force winds extend outward up to 35 miles (55 km) from
the center and tropical-storm-force winds extend outward up to 255
miles (405 km). A sustained wind of 54 mph (87 km/h) and a gust of 
96 mph (154 km/h) was recently reported at the Sarasota-Bradenton 
International Airport. A C-MAN Station in Venice, Florida recently 
reported a sustained wind of 71 mph (115 km/h) with a gust to 90 
mph (145 km/h).

The minimum central pressure estimated from Hurricane Hunter 
aircraft observations is 954 mb (28.17 inches).


HAZARDS AFFECTING LAND
----------------------
Key Messages for Milton can be found in the Tropical Cyclone
Discussion under AWIPS header MIATCDAT4 and WMO header WTNT44 KNHC
and on the web at hurricanes.gov/text/MIATCDAT4.shtml

STORM SURGE: The combination of a dangerous storm surge and the
tide will cause normally dry areas near the coast to be flooded by
rising waters moving inland from the shoreline.  The water could
reach the following heights above ground somewhere in the indicated
areas if the peak surge occurs at the time of high tide...

Anna Maria Island, FL to Boca Grande, FL...9-13 ft
Anclote River, FL to Anna Maria Island, FL...6-9 ft
Tampa Bay...6-9 ft
Boca Grande, FL to Bonita Beach, FL...8-12 ft
Charlotte Harbor...8-12 ft
Bonita Beach, FL to Chokoloskee, FL...5-8 ft
Chokoloskee, FL to Flamingo, FL...3-5 ft
Sebastian Inlet, FL to Altamaha Sound, GA...3-5 ft
Yankeetown, FL to Anclote River, FL...2-4 ft
Dry Tortugas...2-4 ft
St. Johns River...2-4 ft

The deepest water will occur along the immediate coast near and to
the south of the landfall location, where the surge will be
accompanied by large and dangerous waves.  Surge-related flooding
depends on the relative timing of the surge and the tidal cycle,
and can vary greatly over short distances.  For information
specific to your area, please see products issued by your local
National Weather Service forecast office.

For a complete depiction of areas at risk of storm surge
inundation, please see the National Weather Service Peak Storm
Surge Graphic, available at
hurricanes.gov/graphics_at4.shtml?peakSurge.

RAINFALL: Rainfall amounts of 6 to 12 inches, with localized totals
up to 18 inches, are expected across central to northern portions of
the Florida Peninsula through Thursday.  This rainfall brings the
risk of catastrophic and life-threatening flash and urban flooding,
along with moderate to major river flooding.

For a complete depiction of forecast rainfall associated with
Hurricane Milton, please see the National Weather Service Storm
Total Rainfall Graphic, available at
hurricanes.gov/graphics_at4.shtml?rainqpf and the Flash Flood Risk
graphic at hurricanes.gov/graphics_at4.shtml?ero.

WIND: Hurricane conditions are occurring within the hurricane 
warning area and will spread east-northeastward across the Florida 
peninsula overnight.  Hurricane conditions are possible in the 
hurricane watch area tonight and on Thursday.  Tropical storm 
conditions are occurring along the west coast of Florida and are 
forecast to spread across the peninsula and reach the east coast 
tonight.  Tropical storm conditions are expected to begin in the 
warning area along the Georgia and South Carolina coast on Thursday.

Tropical storm conditions are expected in portions of the
northwestern Bahamas on Thursday.

TORNADOES: Several tornadoes, possibly including a few strong
tornadoes, are likely this evening and tonight across parts of
central Florida.

SURF:  Swells generated by Milton are expected to continue to affect
much of the Gulf Coast and will increase along the southeastern U.S.
coast during the next day or two.  These swells are likely to cause
life-threatening surf and rip current conditions.  Please consult
products from your local weather office.


NEXT ADVISORY
-------------
Next complete advisory at 1100 PM EDT.

$$
Forecaster Pasch

A Resource for Up-to-the-Hour News about Hurricane Milton

Sometimes knowledge helps us cope with less stress. Plus, this is available on any device, as long as there is wifi or mobile data available. Which, tomorrow, may not be a thing for Scottie, Ron, and the kitties tomorrow and after, as well as any other readers in the vast path of Milton. But up till then, there is current info. It’s better on the page; I put a bit here so we can see what’s available. The time zone will be that of the person accessing the info; I’m in Central, so this shows Central. I learned Zulu time researching tornado formation! NWS uses Zulu, as well, but this page does show regular time.

https://www.nhc.noaa.gov/

Tropical Weather Discussion
1205 UTC Tue Oct 8 2024