In line with their historical role as leaders in the battle against social justice and the right to freedom of assembly and free speech, the rednecks of the deep south states are winning their most recent attack on organizing mass political protest by holding protest organizers financially liable for any actions by any protester OR counter protester that harm any individuals or damage any property.  The SCOTUS refused to hear a case from Louisiana where a cop was hit in the face by a rock thrown by a protester, and the BLM leader who organized the protest got sued despite not having anything to do with throwing the rock.

Now, refusing to hear the case doesn't mean they approve of the decision of the lower court that held him liable, but until they specifically state that you can't do this, nobody will organize a protest down there because you can't possibly control what happens when you get a large group of people in the street with cops with billy clubs and water cannon.  Violence happens during political protests, it's almost guaranteed if the issue is polarizing enough.

Down the road to fascism we go, one case at a time.

https://www.vox.com/scotus/24080080/supreme-court-mckesson-doe-first-amendment-protest-black-lives-matter

The Supreme Court effectively abolishes the right to mass protest in three US states

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Quote from: K-Dog on Apr 16, 2024, 11:52 AM

QuoteFuel for transpotation to work and home heating consumes a much larger percentage of a min wage worker than it does a CEO.

Is irrelevant.  Percentage here is without any relevance at all.  What matters here is that the barista will always use less fuel than the CEO.  They pay less and get more back than they pay in.

$125 + $6 = $131

The barista only spent $80 on gas but got $131.  That is $51 ahead and the barista will be able to get a coffee at AM PM and a $2 chocolate twist on their way to work every day FOR FREE.

This works only if there is a CEO for every J6P, but there isn't.  10,000 J6Ps pay in the tax on the $80/wk of gas for every 1 CEO that pays in tax on $1670 in jet fuel.  Lets use round numbers now to make the calculations easier.  Say it's $100 for the gas & $2000 for the jet fuel.  Make the tax 10%.  Each J6P pays $10 X 10,000 J6Ps = $100,000.  CEO pays $200 in tax.  Total Revenue = $100,200.  When the tax is returned, each person gets $100,200/10,001 people, or >$10 but <$10.01 back.  The CEO has paid $200, each J6P received less than a penny more than they paid in.  Granted, the scheme doesn't cost J6P any more money, but nobody's getting rich on their carbon dividend here.  Nor will the CEO be too worried about spending $200 extra for his jet fuel.  You also have to pay the bureaucrats running this scheme.

If I missed something here, please lemme know without the big fonts.  I still may not understand how it's supposed to work correctly.

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The money is taken at the wellhead.  At first sale.  If a dollar worth of oil is pulled out of the ground a percentage of value is taken.  The percentage determined by a citizens assembly.  After that the cost is simply passed on as markup in the distribution chain. 

The money is equally distributed and kids get a percentage starting at 16.  Younger kids don't use gasoline or diesel, and the money needs go to people who use oil products.  Young kids are excluded.  They do not buy anything.

The users of oil products need to use their part of the payout to offset the extra cost that must be passed on after collecting the dividend.  The point of the dividend is to compensate the average user for now more expensive gasoline or whatever carbon product they are addicted to.  If everyone used the same amount of carbon, carbon dividends would do absolutely nothing.

But some people use more fossil fuel products than others do.  Those who use more wind up giving money to people who use less.  That is the whole point of carbon dividends, and why money should not be given to citizens too young to drive.  Age 16 makes sense for a lot of reasons as the starting age.  Younger kids use fossil fuel products, but adults pay for them.

It is essential that all the money collected be equally distributed.  The point is to make carbon dividends invisible to the average user.  But those who use more fossil fuel products than average will pay more because they use more.  People who use less than average essentially get a small UBI.

The barista who only rides the bus makes bank.  She only pays a slightly higher bus fare. 

Homeless people get the most money from Carbon Dividends.  Maybe enough to keep them fed and in a good tent.  A lot better than the fuck all they get now.

I've mentioned before that the problem with Affordable Housing isn't strictly an Amerikan one, similar situations exist in the UK, Oz and Canada as well, all the former Brit colonies.  It shouldn't be too surprising to hear that Germany also has the problem, despite theoretically being more "socialist" in Europe.  In fact, the same banking system is used everywhere, and there is not that much difference in how developers are financed and home buyers get mortgages.  It's all the "Persoonal Property" model throughout Western Europe.

I suspect the housing situation is not that much better in Eastern Europe in the countries that were part of the old Soviet Union, but for different reasons.  In Moscow for instance, the population has been undergoing die off since the fall of the Soviet Union, which should leave apartments emptied by dead people.  However, I also doubt much new construction has taken place over the last 40 years either, as the State used to build housing and issue it out, but I doubt they do it that way now.  Nor do I think there are many private contractors. So they probably are living in buildings dating back to WWII and earlier.

https://www.dw.com/en/german-housing-crisis-finding-a-home-like-winning-the-lottery/a-68840785

German housing crisis: 'Like winning the lottery!'

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What could possibly go wrong? lol

Famously, one EGS plant in South Korea was abruptly shuttered in 2017 after having probably caused a 5.5-magnitude earthquake

OK, I don't want to be a complete Negative Nellie on this one, geothermal power does have potential and if you can drill enough big enough deep enough wells, then do the requisite fracking to connect the downspout and upspout, AND these miles deep holes and cracks remain clear and open for 50 years or more generating power to pay off the cost of drilling and building the power plant, it could be a contributor to the total mix of carbon free energy extraction.  That's a lot of ifs though.

One thing is pretty clear though, TPTB are becoming increasingly frantic about finding/developing alternative sources of energy to keep their dreams of a high energy techno-futuristic utopia of AI, robotics, flying cars, Mars colonies and interstellar travel alive.  It seems like every day now we hear about a new source of energy to be tapped and/or a new way to store it.

Maybe if they had got rolling on some of this shit 50 years ago in the 1970s enough of it might be online today to make a somewhat smooth transition off FFs.  As it is, they are decades late and gigawatts short of getting it all up and running before the blackouts and shortages start making their way in from the periphery of 3rd world countries into the belly of the beast in Europe and the FSoA, where the road to ruin began back in ~1750 with the coal fired steam engine and 1859 with the first oil well in Pennsylvania.

It will be interesting to see how far they get though before the dream finally meets reality.

https://arstechnica.com/science/2024/04/how-new-tech-is-making-geothermal-energy-a-more-versatile-power-source/

How new tech is making geothermal energy a more versatile power source

RE

Quote from: K-Dog on Apr 16, 2024, 11:52 AMThe man on the right (Robin Hood) had a similar idea centuries ago.  He too started collecting 'tax'.

Blunt is fine, and no I haven't done any research on it which was WHY I asked you to elaborate.  Really, take a chill pill.  The BOLD and Big Fonts are wholly unnecessary.

Still not clear on how it works. When does Robin Hood steal the money?  From who does he steal it?  How did the person RH steals the money get it? All the money collected over the year by RH from this person/entity is thrown into a pile divided equally among all citizens?  Does that include all the kids also?

RE

QuoteAlthough I agree a Carbon tax is an essential component of reducing consumption of FFs, like all end-user sales taxes it's highly regressive and hits low income people much harder than it does the rich.  Fuel for transpotation to work and home heating consumes a much larger percentage of a min wage worker than it does a CEO.  While the Starbucks barrista may not be able to afford gas for the beater he drives to work to serve lattes to the CEO, the CEO will still easily have plenty of money to buy fuel for his Private Jet to fly down to Brazil for afternoon coffee break and have his coffee brewed from beans recently picked and roasted on his plantation just outside of Rio.

I am going to be blunt.  I thought you had a brain.  You totally do not understand how CARBON DIVIDENDS work and how they are fundamentally different than a CARBON TAX. 

You have not bothered to do any research on the subject.  If you had you would know they are fundamentally different.

If you don't like me being so blunt, too bad.  If I am not blunt about this then you (concerning this idea) are no better than a troll who comes in and throws a hand grenade into this discussion.

Get clear on this.  What you call a 'tax' is collected at the point of origin AND NOWHERE ELSE. This is an iron clad rule of carbon dividends.  This way all proceeds are passed on to all people equally.  As it can only be collected at the point of carbon extraction carbon dividends cannot be an actual tax.  It is impossible to itemize carbon dividends on a receipt.  Taxes can always be visible.

Iron clad rule number one, essential for equal distribution of dividends.

Second rule, you can't call carbon dividends a tax.  GOVERNMENT DOES NOT GET THE MONEY.  Tax money always goes to the government. 

Carbon dividends never do.  The money is EQUALLY DISTRIBUTED TO ALL CITIZENS. 

Iron clad rule number two, essential for equal distribution of dividends.

This second rule makes sure the final math is not fucked up so pay attention. 

If your CEO fuels his private jet and carbon dividends have added $250 dollars on the cost of an hours flight the CEO is going to get $125 dollars BACK into his personal account.  On which he will pay income tax.  Unearned riches transferred from the corporation to the rich, the horror you think?  Like that never happens?  Relax there is more.

THE BARISTA GETS THE OTHER $125. On which they too will pay income tax if they manage to make more than the standard deduction, which AS A BARISTA they will not!

This is not a new idea.  The man on the right (Robin Hood) had a similar idea centuries ago.  He too started collecting 'tax'.  For the government of the people.

Calling carbon dividends a 'tax' makes sense insofar as it is money collected by the government.  But there any similarity ENDS.

Carbon dividend is not a 'tax", as the money  DOES NOT GOT TO GOVERNMENT.  None of it.  No sixty-forty split, nothing to fuck up the math of the final distribution checks. 

Back to the weekly distribution.  The barista only spent $80 for the week on gas.  The Barista only paid $12 extra because of what was taken by collecting the carbon dividend when the oil came out of the ground.

The fucker who flew in the private jet is going to get $6 from the barista, and the barista is going to get $6 back.

Now add it up.  Both the CEO and the barista get a weekly distribution.  Your troll comment:

QuoteFuel for transpotation to work and home heating consumes a much larger percentage of a min wage worker than it does a CEO.

Is irrelevant.  Percentage here is without any relevance at all.  What matters here is that the barista will always use less fuel than the CEO.  They pay less and get more back than they pay in.

$125 + $6 = $131

The barista only spent $80 on gas but got $131.  That is $51 ahead and the barista will be able to get a coffee at AM PM and a $2 chocolate twist on their way to work every day FOR FREE.

And so will I.



* Some say citizen assemblies would determine the tax rate.  Iron clad rule three.

** The cost of the fuel in the private jet was about $1670.00 A 15% carbon dividend was collected in that total.

*** To all Putin haters.  Hope Putin does not find out about Carbon Dividends and order that all Russians get one.

**** The CEO spent his $125 on cheap sex, got a disease from it.  Then he wound up getting a divorce.

Ad I am sure Diners are aware although typical J6P is not, projections of this sort made by UN statisticians and demographers are loaded with assumptions that BAU will continue over the next 25 & 75 years.  They assume current rates of decline will continue along in a smooth curve that can be modeled as a mathematical function.  they don't account for "black swan" events like Global Thermonuclear War, global famine or a global pandemic that actually kills a significant number of the people it infects, unlike COVID or flu pandemics with relatively low mortality rates.

They also assume that we'll continue to supply enough energy to the population to maintain these rates through the entire timespan, which is unlikely.  All of which makes any projection that goes more than 10 years ahead is practically worthless.  Maybe the 2050 projections will be in the ballpark without a black swan landing in the next 25 years, but the likelihood we make it to 2100 under 2024 BAU conditions is vanishingly small.

Still, the charts are nice to look at as a "best case" scenario.

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-13309391/Mesmerising-charts-worlds-populated-countries-time-Britain-slipped-rankings-20.html

Mesmerising charts show world's most and least populated countries over time - and how Britain has slipped down the rankings and out of the top 20

RE

Interesting take on the history of homo saps use of fire since we learned how to start it back in the mist of prehistoric times.  It's a little pedantic and I'm not sure how practical any of this academic insight is toward building a more sustainable civilization, but nevertheless makes interesting reading.

https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/we-are-living-in-the-pyrocene-at-our-peril/

We Are Living in the Pyrocene—At Our Peril

RE

Quote from: K-Dog on Apr 16, 2024, 12:34 AMA tax on carbon paid to all citizens (with which they can buy anything they want) What would happen?

Although I agree a Carbon tax is an essential component of reducing consumption of FFs, like all end-user sales taxes it's highly regressive and hits low income people much harder than it does the rich.  Fuel for transpotation to work and home heating consumes a much larger percentage of a min wage worker than it does a CEO.  While the Starbucks barrista may not be able to afford gas for the beater he drives to work to serve lattes to the CEO, the CEO will still easily have plenty of money to buy fuel for his Private Jet to fly down to Brazil for afternoon coffee break and have his coffee brewed from beans recently picked and roasted on his plantation just outside of Rio.

How would you structure the carbon tax scheme to in a progressive manner so that it hits the rich harder than the poor?



RE