Death by Endangerment

The demented Don and stooge Zeldin gleefully gas the planet

Lee Zeldin demonstrates how to kiss a fat farty ass. The gas won’t be limited to those in the vicinity of Trump.

In April 2007, our formerly Supreme Court ruled that greenhouse gases are air pollutants in Massachusetts v. EPA covered by the Clean Air Act of 1970. This key ruling led to Lisa P. Jackson the head administrator of the EPA in 2009 issuing the “Endangerment Finding” which identified six greenhouse gases that “threaten the public health and welfare of current and future generations.” The finding became foundational to all EPA regulation of greenhouse gases since, ensuring the agency could not legally ignore climate change or eliminate greenhouse gas regulations. You know, protect us as the name implies.

Ms. Jackson attended Tulane University on scholarship (ironically sponsored by Shell Oil, I guess that investment backfired on the shareholders, tears) and was named a National Merit Scholar. At Tulane she was inspired to pursue engineering graduating summa cum laude with a Bachelor of Science in chemical engineering in 1983. She earned a Master’s degree in the same from Princeton in 1986.

To her discredit and no doubt profound disappointment, Lisa did not attend Trump University. Well, we do the best with the opportunities we’re given. More tears.

The Trump University administration building. This picture is totally not fake.

Her mother was living in New Orleans in 2005 when Hurricane Katrina submerged 80 percent of the city changing its culture forever, so Ms. Jackson knew personally of the permanent individual and collective price extreme storms exact. Nearly 1400 people perished and caskets floated into the Gulf of America. I mean the Gulf of Trump. The storm wrought $125 billion in damage. Adjusted for inflation that figure today would be $320 billion.

Below is a graph of US climate catastrophes exceeding a billion dollars through 2023. Climate change carnage has only increased since. Each of the last three years broke records. We’re crossing permanent thresholds unless GHG emissions are reduced as Trump removes safeguards that were already inadequate.

1980-2023 billion dollar climate disasters exploding

This graph makes the results of our overheated Earth abundantly clear.

The disappearing Louisiana coastline

Southern Louisiana Coast, 1932.

Southern Louisiana Coast, 2011.

In 2005 far fewer had drawn the connection between fossil fuels and climate change even though Big Oil knew as early as 1953. Twenty years later the link is undeniable. The science is proven and the number and scale of tragedies growing yearly. 2023 was announced to be the hottest ever. Then 2024 was given that credit. Not to be outdone, 2025 was hotter still.

2024 was only briefly the hottest global temperature ever recorded.

Yet, the dumbest Americans our society produces elected a serial liar. Again. The greatest flimflam man ever claims climate change is a hoax. Never mind the hundreds, if not thousands of studies and repeated warnings from the science community. Never mind Hurricane Helene destroying Asheville, NC, formerly considered safely inland, killing hundreds. Never mind fires currently torching 300,000 acres in Oklahoma weeks ahead of fire season or the 35 consecutive days of rain currently submerging southern France. Nope, we elected the poster boy of ignorance and inspiration of racists — forever part of the American fabric — that used to scurry into dark crevices when the lights were turned on.

I once stated the only difference between a sociopath and psychopath is opportunity. With the Epstein files we see the world is not run by mere sociopaths.

And let me just say, fuck the Democrats, too. They are equally complicit in bringing the world to the brink. Liberal, conservative, it doesn’t matter. Both parties march in lockstep when it comes to neoliberal capitalism and an obscene military budget used to enforce and grow that capitalism with violence and denial of reality of the limits of the planet.

Keeping us fighting each other is always the plan of oligarchy and there’s no doubt of the ruthlessness of billionaires, high-end millionaires and their political lackeys who don’t think twice about sacrificing the average American, starving African child or obviously, Palestinian baby buried in the rubble. If you’re not in the pedophile club, consider yourself fair game. And when it comes to providing the tools to kill each other, America is number one.

The US has provided tens of billions of dollars to Israel for the Palestinian genocide regardless of administration. Our tax dollars are awash in blood.

Let’s circle back to the elimination of the endangerment finding, another facet in The Administration of Death.

Ramifications of undermining the endangerment finding

Trump and former Congressman now EPA head Lee Zeldin gleefully announced overturning the endangerment finding at a press conference on February 12. They claim $1.3 trillion dollars in savings for the consumer by effectively freeing polluters to do what they please. This decision will lead to billions of extra tons of greenhouse gas emissions in the coming decades and cause conservatively tens to hundreds of thousands of otherwise preventable deaths. For the first time in 17 years, the EPA will no longer consider greenhouse gases a threat to public health and welfare. It’s not a smoking gun, but Lee Zeldin’s has received $269,608 from the oil and gas industry in his career. Just saying.

If you want a hotter smoking gun, Deviant Donald openly solicited pay-to-play as he campaigned, promising windfall profits to the fossil fuel industry by undermining environmental regulations if they raised a billion dollars for his war chest. Apparently, $760 billion of US taxpayer subsidies annually and $7 trillion world-wide including “externalities” (i.e. costs of floods, fires and oil spills) is insufficient for companies earning tens of billions in profits every year. Now he and Lee are delivering.

Just a little over a month ago, Zeldin announced that he was canceling more than 400 “DEI and Environmental Justice grants” totaling $1.7 billion under the guise of “saving taxpayers money.” Considering the climate disaster numbers from 2023 to 2025 and the inevitable increase in disasters from removing all guardrails, the math doesn’t add up. Perhaps Lee attended Trump University.

The EPA has also stopped collecting emissions data from polluters. Zeldin described the reporting program as “burdensome.”

According to Zeldin:

“Working hand-in-hand with DOGE to rein [sic] in wasteful federal spending, EPA has saved more than $2 billion in taxpayer money. It is our commitment at EPA to be exceptional stewards of tax dollars.”

Uh huh. Let’s all enjoy our cancer if we’re not flooded or burned out of our homes and jobs. It’s all good. After all, rebuilding from such tragedies count as GDP.

A personal experience of idiots and late stage capitalism

Back in 2020, coming off a brain tumor in which insurance and medical incompetence nearly killed me, I grabbed a part-time job in a liquor store. My profession of graphic design had long been driven down to “why bother” by the internet, crowdsourcing and computerization. I did better for longer than most designers through some fortuitous connections, but eventually threw in the towel. Who can compete with a designer in Bangladesh selling corporate identity packages for 25 bucks?

The store was nice, in a well-to-do area, but what was most appealing were the solo shifts. I got to be boss, and it was a low-key job in which I could read a book or carry on text conversations with friends. The job was in a suburb of Albany, NY, and Andrew “the groper” Cuomo was governor. He had just announced Covid masking requirements when three laughing, unmasked, oblivious people walked in at about 9:10 in the morning.

This was irksome because before Trump and Covid, I definitely didn't recommend drinking before at least 10AM!

The three of them were having a merry old time, but I was irritated. So six steps in I asked, “Where are your masks?”

I asked this in sincere concern for their health of course, idiots are people, too.

They eruditely pointed out masking requirements started on Saturday, and it was only Thursday! This was true, but really not caring about selling them a bottle of Bacardi or whatever, I retorted, “Yeah, well I don’t feel like dying on a Thursday.” Duh. I sent them out requiring masks if they cared to return. They didn’t. Was this poor customer service? Naturally, I feel guilty to this day.

The owner was a guy who was rarely around, spending as much time as possible in Key West. Covid made the store very popular. He told me sales were up 25 percent while he paid me jack. Good capitalism, that!

An unpleasant weight lifter who forgot to work his skinny little legs, I wonder if he had any clue his favorite place in the world is fated to go underwater? Nah. BTW, I’m not insulting weight lifters, just this particular one.

On those rare days he was around his demeanor was like a little Hitler. Little Hitlers are everywhere, enjoying huge signing bonuses with ICE. The recruitment ads are on YouTube as is a lot of AI generated garbage.

It’s bite the bullet now. Or take the bullet later. We must fight in every way possible.

Thank you for being here.