Going into the weekend we knew we were in for a bizarre news split-screen on Saturday, with major protest rallies scheduled across the country and Trump's military birthday parade he threw for himself (with $40+ million of your tax dollars) in D.C. But, it wasn't just two huge stories happening at once by Saturday. It was four. We try to get you caught up on all of them on today's BradCast before opening the line to callers. [Audio link to full show follows this summary.]
All of the stories happening all at once over the weekend, were all thanks to Donald Trump in varying ways...
- First, on Friday night, Israel unleashed a full-scale attack against Iran, killing its three top military commanders and several nuclear scientists --- among many others. The pretext for the attack was Iran's nuclear program which, had Trump not torn up the JCPOA (Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action), the hard-fought and carefully constructed nuclear deal Iran agreed to in 2015 with China, France, Germany, Russia, the UK and the U.S., there wouldn't even be a program for Israel to target. The strike came after Trump failed to strike a new nuclear deal with Iran, which had restarted its nuclear program after Trump reneged on the original deal. He had been begging them for the last month to agree to a new deal to limit its nuclear program that is almost identical to the one struck under Obama that Trump tore up during his first term. The ongoing volleys of missiles between Israel and Iran have also led the Trump Administration to call back the Voice of America Persian-bureau after foolishly (and unlawfully) shuttering VOA and its sister networks back in March.
- In the early Saturday morning hours, a long-time Trump supporter disguised as a policeman assassinated the Democratic leader of Minnesota's House of Representative, Rep. Melissa Hortmann, and her husband inside their own home. Hortmann, as House Speaker in 2023-2024, was a key player in passage of a host of popular progressive initiatives under Gov. Tim Walz that came to be known as the Minnesota Miracle. The same shooter also attempted to assassinate Democratic state Senator John Hoffman at his house just prior. Hoffman and his wife remain alive but in critical condition after Hoffman was shot nine times and his wife eight times. The alleged rightwing assailant, 57-year old Vance Luther Boelter, was found to have had a list of some 70 names on a target list in his car. The names were reportedly Democratic officials, both state and federal, and champions of abortion rights. Officials also say he had a number of "No Kings" flyers in the car, suggesting he might have been planning to target one of Saturday's many protests in the state. After a two-day manhunt, Boelter was captured late on Sunday in a cornfield south of Minneapolis/St. Paul. He was charged on Monday with both state and federal crimes including assassination and attempted assassination. It is just the latest example of increasing political violence by the right in the Trump Era, as warned about for years, even by his own FBI Director who conceded that domestic homegrown terror from those on the right --- not by migrants --- was, by far, the greatest threat currently facing Americans.
- The third major weekend story happening all at once that wouldn't have happened if not for Donald Trump, was the authoritarian-style military birthday parade he threw for himself (though we paid for it) that happened to fall on the U.S. Army's 250th birthday as well as Trump's 79th. It was, by almost all accounts, a sparsely attended snoozer of a parade which saw even Trump supporters streaming away long before it was over. Of course, the manhunt for the MN assassin and the war in Israel/Iran, thankfully, sucked up most of the cable TV news coverage.
- In likely --- or hopefully --- the most important news of the weekend, some five million Americans took to the streets to stand up against the President in "No Kings" protests decrying the rising fascism of Donald Trump, including his deployment of military troops against Americans on U.S. soil and his burgeoning military-style migrant round-ups by ICE. According to organizers, enormous and joyful rallies were held in more than 2,000 cities and town in all 50 states. They were almost all entirely peaceful but for a man who brandished a rifle at protesters in Salt Lake City, UT (a protester was killed); a counter-protesters who pulled a handgun on rally-goers in Phoenix, AZ; and an SUV driver who struck and injured a demonstrator before speeding away in Riverside, CA.
In Los Angeles, late in the day, there was a bit of violence as well. But, as all reporting seems to indicate (David Dayen's at TAP was the best) it was local law enforcement officials from both the L.A. County Sheriff's Dept. and the LAPD who sparked the violence with their unannounced use of horses, rubber bullets and teargas to suddenly clear demonstrators at 4pm, hours before the rally was to have ended in Downtown L.A.
After all of that and much more, we open the phones today to our live local listeners here in Southern California to hear their own reports and personal experiences from the weekend's many "No Kings" protests...
(Snail mail support to "Brad Friedman, 7095 Hollywood Blvd., #594 Los Angeles, CA 90028" always welcome too!)
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Sadly, it's another in our Trump 2.0 Era "Then They Came For..." series on The BradCast, which previously included "the Judges", "the Mayors" and "Members of Congress". In today's case, at least, the victim, a U.S. Senator, was roughed-up and handcuffed but not arrested and was fairly quickly released. But those elected officials are hardly the only folks they are now coming for in Donald Trump's "New Police State". [Audio link to full show follows this summary.]
Among our stories today highlighting that New Police State, Trump's continuing failures as President on several fronts, and his ongoing war with the Golden State...
- Breaking shortly before airtime... Just two days after the Trump Administration's corrupted and actually weaponized Dept. of Justice indicted a sitting Democratic U.S. Congresswoman from New Jersey on absurd assault charges related to allegedly impeding the arrest of Newark's Democratic Mayor (for whom all charges were soon dropped), California's Democratic U.S. Senator Alex Padilla, the state's first Hispanic Senator, was roughed up on Thursday, forcibly pushed out of a room where Homeland Security chief Kristi Noem was holding a press conference in L.A., was thrown onto the floor by FBI agents and handcuffed after he'd peacefully dared attempt to ask a question of Noem.
- A new Quinnipiac poll finds that Donald Trump is being rejected by voters on virtually every front. His approval rating in the survey of more than a thousand registered voters has now fallen to 38%; his budget bill is opposed by almost twice as many as those who support it (while a huge majority of Americans want to see Medicaid expanded or left as is, as opposed to cut, as the Trump/GOP "Big Beautiful Bill Act" would do); and he is deeply underwater on every single issue they polled on, including immigration, deportation and the economy. New polling out today from AP/NORC finds similarly poor numbers for the President, which is largely unprecedented in modern times this early in a new term.
- Those 4,000 California National Guard soldiers federalized by Trump and deployed against Americans on U.S. soil over the weekend against the wishes and needs of the state's Governor and the Los Angeles Mayor? They aren't getting paid yet, according to Military.com, which cites military sources describing a chaotic, still-incomplete activation, leaving soldiers without pay, a place to sleep, food, amid a local community uncharacteristically unsupportive of the deployed troops.
- But Trump's New Police State is not only rolling out in large cities. WaPo's Catherine Rampell has a chilling story of heavily armed masked men, claiming to be federal agents (while refusing to show ID), showing up with out-of-state plates to sweep up migrant gardeners in a tiny New England town. Yes, Trump's New Police State is coming to a town near you as well, no matter where you live.
- On Thursday at the White House, Donald Trump signed three bills that were recently --- and perhaps unlawfully --- rammed through the Senate by Republicans in violation of its rules, nuking the filibuster in the bargain to do so. They are meant to strip California of its legal right to establish its own clean air and car pollution standards. Specifically, the new laws, if they are allowed to stand --- CA has already said they are filing suit --- would, among other things, ban the state's 2036 deadline for phasing out the sale of new, gasoline-only cars and trucks. A dozen or so other states have previously adopted CA's now "banned" standards. Despite the fact that used all-gasoline cars and trucks could still be sold and that those who really wanted a new one could still buy them from another state in 2036, this is apparently what Trump has been falsely describing as "Joe Biden's EV mandate" for years now. Today, once again, he did another solid for his owners in the fossil fuel industry. Desi Doyen has the full scoop and context.
- Then, Desi is here with our 1,500th Green News Report! Sadly, with the above news and much more, it's a rather grim milestone today, largely from top to bottom.
- BUT, we close with something a bit brighter that we hope might cheer you up after all of that, and help you leave the theater whistling. It's the latest Randy Rainbow tune on Trump Derangement!...
(Snail mail support to "Brad Friedman, 7095 Hollywood Blvd., #594 Los Angeles, CA 90028" always welcome too!)
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IN TODAY'S RADIO REPORT: Trump plan to dismantle FEMA means states must kowtow to Trump; Hurricane season off to a fast start --- at least in the Pacific; EPA to revoke fossil fuel power plant pollution rules; PLUS: Republican majority in Congress succeeds in killing off California's clean car standards... All that and more in today's Green News Report!
PLEASE CLICK HERE TO HELP US CELEBRATE WITH A DONATION!
Got comments, tips, love letters, hate mail? Drop us a line at [email protected] or right here at the comments link below. All GNRs are always archived at GreenNews.BradBlog.com.
IN 'GREEN NEWS EXTRA' (see links below): How ocean acidification, the 'evil twin' of the climate crisis is threatening our oceans; Canada has already surpassed a year’s worth of charred land from wildfires; DOJ finds Trump can abolish areas protected as national monuments; Why rooftop solar could crash under the GOP tax bill; Developers propose more than 1-- new gas power plants in Texas... PLUS: The War on Science in overdrive... and much, MUCH more! ...
STORIES DISCUSSED ON TODAY'S 'GREEN NEWS REPORT'...
- Hurricane season off to a fast start, in the Pacific:
- Hurricane season is off to a fast start — at least in the Pacific Ocean (Washington Post)
- Trump Administration plan to dismantle FEMA means states must kowtow to Trump:
- "We're going to give it out directly": Trump plans to scrap FEMA, have White House distribute aid (Salon/MSN):
President Donald Trump said on Tuesday he planned to start "phasing out" the Federal Emergency Management Agency after the hurricane season and that states would receive less federal aid to respond to natural disasters. Trump also said he planned to distribute disaster relief funds directly from the president's office...Distributing funds directly from the White House would also mark a departure from current protocols. - Trump’s plan to begin ‘phasing out’ FEMA after hurricane season burdens states, experts warn (AP):
Declaring fewer major disasters or giving less federal support could put an untenable financial burden on states, said Sara McTarnaghan, principal research associate at the Urban Institute. "Very few of them would have had enough funds set aside to anticipate the federal government stepping back from its historic role in disaster recovery for major events," McTarnaghan said. - Trump says his administration wants to "wean" states off FEMA aid after hurricane season (CBS News)
- Trump wants to end FEMA, says governors can handle disasters (Washington Post):
In remarks to reporters, the president said the administration plans to “wean” states off FEMA assistance after hurricane season ends. - VIDEO: President Trump and Cabinet Secretaries Speak in Oval Office (@10:00, C-SPAN)
- VIDEO: Karoline Leavitt, White House Daily Briefing (@11:00, C-SPAN)
- Head of FEMA's storm response center leaving agency amid leadership exodus (CBS News)
- Congressional Republican majority succeeds in killing off California's clean car rules:
- Trump targets California with bill blocking ban on sales of new gas cars by 2036 (Washington Post)
- Trump to sign resolutions nixing California's EV rules, sources (MSN)
- Trump is expected to sign a measure blocking California’s nation-leading vehicle emissions rules (AP):
"If it’s a day ending in Y, it’s another day of Trump’s war on California," Newsom spokesperson Daniel Villaseñor said in an email. "We’re fighting back." - Trump Signs Illegal Attack on California’s Clean Car Authority (Center for Biological Diversity)
- The Senate just voted to block California’s gas car ban (Grist, 5/22/2025):
Legal experts say Congress misused a federal law to do so, potentially "opening up a Pandora’s box it cannot close." - Trump EPA moves to revoke fossil fuel power plant pollution and emissions rules:
- EPA Says Power Plant Carbon Emissions Aren’t Dangerous. Scientists Disagree. (AP)
- Trump EPA rollbacks would weaken rules projected to save billions of dollars and thousands of lives (AP):
What Lee Zeldin didn’t mention: how ending the rules could have devastating consequences to human health. The EPA-targeted rules could prevent an estimated 30,000 deaths and save $275 billion each year they are in effect, according to an Associated Press examination that included the agency’s own prior assessments as well as a wide range of other research./div>- EPA proposes rollback on rules limiting carbon and air pollution from fossil fuel power plants (CBS News)
- EPA proposes rolling back clean air rules for power plants: What to know (ABC News):
In a statement to ABC News, Gina McCarthy, a former EPA administrator and White House national climate advisor during the Biden administration, wrote "The key rationale Zeldin is using to justify the dismantling of our nation's protections from power plant pollution is absolutely illogical and indefensible." She added,...The Sierra Club estimates that these changes would allow some power plants to release nearly seven times as much CO2 as they currently put into the atmosphere.- EPA seeks to roll back regulations that limit greenhouse gas emissions from power plants (LA Times):
The EPA’s own 2024 analysis found that the rules currently on the chopping block would deliver $390 billion in total climate and health benefits. By the agency’s accounting, that is more than 20 times the amount that those same rules would cost the industry to comply with the laws.'GREEN NEWS EXTRA' (Stuff we didn't have time for in today's audio report)...
For a comprehensive roundup of daily environmental news you can trust, see the Society of Environmental Journalists' Daily Headlines page
- How the 'evil twin' of the climate crisis is threatening our oceans (Guardian)
- Canada has already surpassed a year’s worth of charred land from wildfires (Washington Post)
- DOJ finds Trump can abolish areas protected as national monuments (Washington Post)
- War on Science in Overdrive (This Is Not Cool)
- Why rooftop solar could crash under the GOP tax bill (NY Times)
- Developers propose more than 100 new gas power plants in Texas (Inside Climate News)
- Greenland and Iceland saw record heat in May. Here's what it means for the world (AP)
- ‘Forever chemicals’ industry aims to capitalize on AI boom (E&E News)
- Toxic truth? The cookware craze redefining ‘ceramic’ and ‘nontoxic' (Guardian)
- Scientists fear pesticides are raising resistance to antifungal drugs (The Hill)
- EPA drops complaint vs. major Trump donor over disinfectant in ICE facility (Pro Publica)
- Summer staffing crunch hits national parks after Trump cuts (Reuters)
- Trump’s Second Term Is Creating ‘A Limbo Moment’ For US Battery Recyclers (Grist)
- The river that came back to life: a journey down the reborn Klamath (Guardian)
- What's missing from the U.S. debate on electric vehicles (CSIS)
- A guide to the 4 minerals shaping the world's energy future (Grist)
- Wall Street Journal: Clean energy transition is unstoppable (This Is Not Cool blog)
- Can we avoid the enshittification of clean-energy tech? (David Roberts, Volts)
- Stop emissions, stop warming: A climate reality check (Dr. Andrew Dessler, Climate Brink)
- The Climate Fight Will Continue (This Is Not Cool blog)
- Who Will Care for Americans Left Behind by Climate Migration? (Pro Publica)
- Is the Atlantic Overturning Circulation Approaching a Tipping Point? (The Oceanography Society)
- How Oil Companies Manipulate Journalists (Drilled)
- Abrupt reduction in shipping emission as an inadvertent geoengineering termination shock produces substantial radiative warming (Nature)
- How To Spot 5 Of The Fossil Fuel Industry's Biggest Disinformation Tactics (Guardian)
- The Oceans We Knew Are Already Gone (The Atlantic)
- Plug-in hybrids vs. electric cars: We did the math on which is better for you (Washington Post)
- How to electrify your life when you rent (The Verge)
- Complete Series: Farmers Under Attack for Supporting Clean Energy (This Is Not Cool blog)
- Feeling Overwhelmed About Going All-Electric at Home? Here's How to Get Started (Inside Climate News)
- Feeling Hopeless About the Climate? Try Our 30-Day Action Plan (The Revelator)
- Climate Change Will Force a New American Migration (Pro Publica)
- Exxon's Snake Oil: 100 years of deception (Columbia Journalism Review)
- Project Drawdown: 100 Solutions to Reverse Global Warming (Drawdown.org)
]]>
With 'No Reason to Obey the Law Anymore', Trump Warms Up for the Insurrection Act: 'BradCast' 6/11/2025 https://bradblog.com/?p=15413https://bradblog.com/?p=15413#comments Thu, 12 Jun 2025 01:37:12 +0000 New Jersey BRAD BLOG Media Appearance Stephanie Miller Accountability Immigration Democrats Republicans Los Angeles KPFK Donald Trump Oklahoma BradCast Gavin Newsom Fascism/Autocracy ICE National Guard Mikie Sherrill Elon Musk Election 2025 Jack Ciattarelli https://bradblog.com/?p=15413 
It's all so stupid and ridiculous. But, as discussed on today's BradCast, the stupidity and ridiculousness knows no bound now that he's won a criminal immunity ticket from the Supreme Court. So we will all pay the price until voters change the score. [Audio link to full show follows this summary.]
To that end, Gubernatorial primary elections were held in New Jersey on Tuesday for this November's general election. Democratic U.S. Rep. Mikey Sherrill, a Navy pilot and former prosecutor, will face off with Trump-endorsed Republican Jack Ciatterelli, who came within just about three points of unseating the state's now termed-out Democratic Gov. Phil Murphy four years ago.
Perhaps more interesting on Tuesday were six state legislative special elections held in three different states. Democrats outpaced expectations in five of them, including one in Tulsa, Oklahoma, where a native American candidate trounced her Republican challenger by a landslide 69 points! The results amounted to a 50-point over-performance by the Dem as compared to their results in the Presidential election in the same district last November. In all, Dems are now running an average of about 16.4 points ahead of their 2024 results in special elections in 2025.
Then, it's back once again to the mess here in Los Angeles, which isn't really a mess at all. Or, at least, it wasn't until tough guy Donald Trump decided to pretend that largely peaceful protests against his immigration policies required him to violate the law to federalize California National Guard troops and deploy them with the U.S. Marines to support the ICE round-ups of hard-working, non-criminal migrants in the city including, apparently, children.
In a televised address on Tuesday night, CA's Governor Gavin Newsom, who, along with L.A. Mayor Karen Bass, opposed Trump's federalization and deployment of troops in the city, described the President's "authoritarian", wannabe "dictatorial" tactics. He warned that Trump is now waging war on democracy and the Constitution itself, and that Americans outside of California can expect to see much the same thing soon in their own hometowns. Will Americans heed his warning?
We're joined today by fellow L.A. resident HEATHER DIGBY PARTON, award-winning Salon columnist and longtime Digby's Hullabaloo proprietor, and another OG blogger friend known simply as 'DRIFTGLASS', co-host of his weekly Professional Left Podcast. As usual, they are here for a roundtable discussion to help us make sense of it all...as senseless and stupid as it all is.
Both share thoughts on what they see as the real point of Trump's dumb but dangerous incitement of violence here in L.A., what it is meant to distract from, and where all of this is headed. Is there any chance this doesn't lead to an invocation of the Insurrection Act by Trump, so he can really violate the law, American values, rights, and the Constitution itself?
"Donald Trump simply has no reason to obey the law anymore, of any kind, for any reason," argues Driftglass. "They feel no compunction about breaking the law because there's no one to stop them" Because he was elected, after receiving criminal immunity from SCOTUS, he believes "he can do whatever he wants. It's an ugly, terrifying fact that we warned people about for years. We begged people not to do this. We still came up short, because 77 million or so people voted for exactly this."
But, will even MAGA support the deployment of U.S. troops on American streets? Something that Republicans, including MAGA, have pretended for years to oppose? "As long as Trump is doing it, they'll be for it," asserts Digby. "The minute it's not him, they'll be against it. They retired the concept of hypocrisy a long time ago."
It is going to worse before it gets better, she warns, citing Trump's top henchman Stephen Miller who, she says, "has given interviews saying that they have plotted this out. Plan B, Plan C. They've been thinking this stuff through. This is actually part of their plan. They're testing the electrified fence here to see what they can get away with."
There is, of course, much much more from both of them today, including on a couple of stories you may have forgotten about for some reason, from just days ago. For example, last Friday, less than a week ago, Elon Musk publicly accused Trump of being named in the unreleased Epstein Files. Also, if you remember, Congressional Republicans passed a bill to slash $1.4 trillion worth of health care and food assistance from low-income Americans to help defray the cost of some $4 trillion in tax cuts mostly for the wealthy, at the cost of a $3 trillion spike to the national debt.
Remember when Republicans used to care about such things? As Digby sez: "They retired the concept of hypocrisy a long time ago"...
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Team Trump Inciting Violence, State of Fear in City of Angels, Elsewhere: 'BradCast' 6/10/2025 https://bradblog.com/?p=15412https://bradblog.com/?p=15412#comments Wed, 11 Jun 2025 01:39:57 +0000 California Pennsylvania Oregon BRAD BLOG Media Appearance Election Fraud Accountability Dept. of Defense U.S. Supreme Court Los Angeles Vote-by-Mail Washington D.C. Dominion Voting KPFK Donald Trump Natural gas Canada Oil Climate change BradCast Gavin Newsom Pam Bondi Fascism/Autocracy Election 2020 Pollution Karen Bass National Guard Insurrection Mike Lindell wildfires Kristi Noem Pete Hegseth https://bradblog.com/?p=15412 
We've got a bit more on today's BradCast regarding Team Trump's attempt to distract from the many failures of his Administration by hoping to frighten Americans with the deployment of military assets against those of us here in Los Angeles. Plus, we've got a number of other stories that I suspect they would be happy for us not to tell you about today. [Audio link to full show follows this summary.]
The City of Angels continues to hang tough against the Trump Administration, even as horrible human and DHS Secretary Kristi Noem, last night, described the city of nearly four million people as "a city of criminals". The pathetic insult against the nation's second largest city came after Trump federalized 4,000 California National Guard troops against the wishes of the state's Governor, Gavin Newsom, and deployed 700 U.S. Marines to L.A., purportedly to help ICE round up migrants as part of the Administration's by the San Francisco Chronicle from Noem to Fox "News" host turned SecDef Pete Hegseth, the DHS chief requests Hegseth order military troops to actively participate in arrests and detentions on U.S. soil, an apparent violation of the law, unless the President invokes the Insurrection Act first under certain circumstances. Her letter suggests the Administration is preparing to do exactly that. Or she doesn't understand how the law works. Or both.
In 2020, after George Floyd was murdered, spurring far larger protests than the relatively minor ones we've seen here in L.A. in recent days, Donald Trump insisted it would be against the law for him to federalize and deploy troops against the wishes of a Governor. "We have laws. We have to go by the laws," he insisted at the time. "We can't move in the National Guard. I can call 'insurrection' but there's no reason to ever do that. We can't call in the National Guard unless we're requested by a Governor."
Things change. Presidencies fail. The protests against the Administration in cities large and small are expanding by the day from coast to coast.
IN OTHER NEWS THIS WEEK covered on today's program...
- U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi's brother Brad Bondi bombed --- and I mean bombed --- in his run to become President of the D.C. Bar Association. We discuss what that means and why it's important.
- SCOTUS did something right by voters, for a change --- this time in Pennsylvania --- against the wishes of the Republican Party which hoped to disenfranchise voters (as usual).
- MyPillow CEO and 2020 election conspiracy doofus Mike Lindell took the stand this week to double-down in his own defense during trial in a defamation lawsuit filed against him by former Dominion Voting Systems executive Eric Coomer. Since 2020, the bedding impresario and former crack addict has spent tens of millions to repeatedly echo evidence-free claims of a stolen election, including the false charge that Coomer was part of an "antifa" scheme to rig voting machines and steal the election from Trump. We've got much more for you today on all of this to remind you of many of Lindell's ridiculous lies, schemes, antics and evidence-free allegations. Though they are completely nuts, his own attorneys now seem to be hoping to use them in order to buttress his defense. Tune in for details.
- Finally, Desi Doyen joins us for our latest Green News Report, on toxic smoke from record, climate-change driven wildfires in Canada, threatening the health of residents in both their country and ours; more bad news about indoor air pollution; a new lawsuit against Big Oil for its role in a heat wave that killed an elderly Oregon woman; and the Trump Administration's curious attempt to bury a federal report on last year's decrease in climate warming carbon emissions...
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'Green News Report' - June 10, 2025 https://bradblog.com/?p=15411https://bradblog.com/?p=15411#comments Tue, 10 Jun 2025 17:47:42 +0000 Oregon Environment Green News EPA Natural gas Canada Oil Climate change Extreme weather Pollution wildfires https://bradblog.com/?p=15411 
Follow @GreenNewsReport...
(Or use "Click here to listen..." link below.)IN TODAY'S RADIO REPORT: Wildfire smoke from Canada's mining country may be more toxic than usual, including in the U.S.; Natural gas stoves increase risk of cancers, new study finds; PLUS: Oregon woman sues Big Oil for its role in deadly 2021 extreme heat wave in Pacific Northwest... All that and more in today's Green News Report!
GNR's now celebrating 16 YEARS of independent green news, politics, analysis, snarky comment and connecting climate change dots over your public airwaves!
PLEASE CLICK HERE TO HELP US CELEBRATE WITH A DONATION!Got comments, tips, love letters, hate mail? Drop us a line at [email protected] or right here at the comments link below. All GNRs are always archived at GreenNews.BradBlog.com.
IN 'GREEN NEWS EXTRA' (see links below): UN Ocean Summit opens in France as U.S. government scientists stay away; 'Ticking timebomb': sea acidity has reached critical levels, threatening entire ecosystems - study; Trump cuts would scrap USGS biological research arm; Homeless are the group most vulnerable to heat-related illnesses by far; In highly polluted AL black community, Trump axes funds for air monitoring... PLUS: See how marine heat waves are spreading across the globe... and much, MUCH more! ...
STORIES DISCUSSED ON TODAY'S 'GREEN NEWS REPORT'...
- Canada's wildfires rage out of control, smoke spreads to Europe:
- Military aids evacuations as Canada wildfires expand eastward (Phys.org)
- Canadian wildfire smoke causes 'very unhealthy' conditions in American Midwest and reaches Europe (AP)
- Why are so many of Canada's wildfires burning out of control? (Washington Post):
"Of the more than 200 wildfires incinerating Canadian forests - and sending smoke into the United States - more than half are burning "out of control," and some are being monitored but allowed to burn, Canadian authorities said. As fires intensify, so do concerns over air quality. But conditions on the ground mean that suppressing many of the fires swiftly is not realistic, authorities and researchers say. - Canada's wildfire smoke may be more toxic than usual:
- The smoke from Canada's wildfires may be even more toxic than usual (Grist):
A legacy of mining means that toxic metals could be carried along plumes of smoke. - Wildfire smoke is always toxic (Grist)
- Wildfire Smoke Brings More Hazardous Air Quality to Great Lakes and Beyond (NY Times)
- VIDEO: Canadian Fires Bring Air Quality Alerts to Midwest (This Is Not Cool blog)
- Wildfire smoke causes more indoor air pollution than known:
- Toxic wildfire pollution infiltrates homes of 1bn people a year, study finds (Guardian):
Dangerous indoor pollution could be tackled with air purifiers but costs are too high for many, researchers say. - VIDEO: Raging Canadian wildfires trigger air quality warnings across upper Midwest (PBS NewsHour)
- Wildfires curtail Alberta tar sands production:
- Alberta's wildfires disrupt some 7% of Canada's oil production (Reuters)
- Wildfires force Alberta oil sands producers to evacuate workers, stop some oil flows (Globe and Mail)
- Gas-fired stoves increase risk of cancers, study finds:
- Gas stoves increase cancer risk, especially for kids, new study finds (Canary Media):
The appliances emit benzene, a potent carcinogen. Exposure varies depending on ventilation and other factors, but there's no safe level. - Gas and Propane Combustion from Stoves Emits Benzene and Increases Indoor Air Pollution (Environmental Science & Technology)
- Oregon woman sues Big Oil over wrongful death in 2021 PNW heat wave:
- Oil companies are facing the first-ever climate change wrongful death lawsuit (Quartz)
- Oil Companies Are Sued Over Death of Woman in 2021 Heat Wave (NY Times)/li>
- Trump EPA buried analysis showing US greenhouse gas emissions fell in 2023:
- The Trump EPA tried to bury some good news showing that U.S. climate pollution declined in 2023 (Yale Climate Connections)
- Freedom of Information Act documents for the EPA's greenhouse gas inventory (Environmental Defense Fund)
'GREEN NEWS EXTRA' (Stuff we didn't have time for in today's audio report)...
For a comprehensive roundup of daily environmental news you can trust, see the Society of Environmental Journalists' Daily Headlines page
- UN Ocean Summit opens in France as U.S. government scientists stay away (NPR)
- 'Ticking timebomb': sea acidity has reached critical levels, threatening entire ecosystems - study (Guardian)
- Trump cuts would scrap USGS biological research arm (E&E News)
- Homeless are the group most vulnerable to heat-related illnesses by far (Washington Post)
- In highly polluted AL black community, Trump axes funds for air monitoring (Inside Climate News)
- Rockaway NY was fighting coastal erosion - then EPA cancelled funding (Inside Climate News)
- A proposal for a Massachusetts wood-burning plant is back from the dead (Canary Media)
- Trump’s cuts to National Park Service rankle Republicans (The Hill)
- See how marine heat waves are spreading across the globe (NY Times)
- Dying before their day in court --- Syngenta paraquat litigation drags on (The New Lede)
- Big bill hands public land near Minnesota wilderness to foreign mining company (Public Domain)
- What's missing from the U.S. debate on electric vehicles (CSIS)
- A guide to the 4 minerals shaping the world's energy future (Grist)
- Wall Street Journal: Clean energy transition is unstoppable (This Is Not Cool blog)
- Can we avoid the enshittification of clean-energy tech? (David Roberts, Volts)
- Stop emissions, stop warming: A climate reality check (Dr. Andrew Dessler, Climate Brink)
- The Climate Fight Will Continue (This Is Not Cool blog)
- Who Will Care for Americans Left Behind by Climate Migration? (Pro Publica)
- Is the Atlantic Overturning Circulation Approaching a Tipping Point? (The Oceanography Society)
- How Oil Companies Manipulate Journalists (Drilled)
- Abrupt reduction in shipping emission as an inadvertent geoengineering termination shock produces substantial radiative warming (Nature)
- How To Spot 5 Of The Fossil Fuel Industry's Biggest Disinformation Tactics (Guardian)
- The Oceans We Knew Are Already Gone (The Atlantic)
- Plug-in hybrids vs. electric cars: We did the math on which is better for you (Washington Post)
- How to electrify your life when you rent (The Verge)
- Complete Series: Farmers Under Attack for Supporting Clean Energy (This Is Not Cool blog)
- Feeling Overwhelmed About Going All-Electric at Home? Here's How to Get Started (Inside Climate News)
- Feeling Hopeless About the Climate? Try Our 30-Day Action Plan (The Revelator)
- Climate Change Will Force a New American Migration (Pro Publica)
- Exxon's Snake Oil: 100 years of deception (Columbia Journalism Review)
- Project Drawdown: 100 Solutions to Reverse Global Warming (Drawdown.org)
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Never Mind Elon and the Epstein Files, Trump Says There Are 'Riots' in L.A.!: 'BradCast' 6/9/2025 https://bradblog.com/?p=15410https://bradblog.com/?p=15410#comments Tue, 10 Jun 2025 01:28:33 +0000 California BRAD BLOG Media Appearance U.S. Constitution Stephanie Miller Immigration Dept. of Defense Los Angeles KPFK Donald Trump BradCast Gavin Newsom Fascism/Autocracy ICE Jeffrey Epstein Karen Bass National Guard Insurrection Elon Musk https://bradblog.com/?p=15410 
Never mind all that stuff about Donald Trump's breakup with his best buddy on Friday, including Elon Musk's claim that Trump is blocking the release of the Jeffrey Epstein Files because he's featured in them. There's RIOTING AND LOOTING IN LOS ANGELES! ... according to Trump's social media feed.
As discussed on today's BradCast, however, from here in L.A., relatively minor weekend demonstrations against Trump's daily ICE quotas for arresting migrants --- now including day laborers outside of Home Depot, children and U.S. Marshals --- don't amount to much of a "riot" by L.A. standards, no matter what they may be showing you on cable TV or social media. [Audio link to full story follows below this summary.]
It was another lovely, mild, sunny day here in Southern California today, just as it was over the weekend. At least until Trump's federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) brownshirts opened fire with tear gas and flash-bang grenades against largely peaceful demonstrators in a couple of small blocks downtown and a small city about 30 minutes south of downtown.
But I'm sure wall-to-wall media coverage and social media algorithms are telling folks out there a very different (and completely unhelpful) story about what is going on here.
In case they aren't, Trump is hoping to grab your attention by abusing his authority again, this time by federalizing the California National Guard against the wishes of both the state's Governor and the Mayor of Los Angeles. Moreover, late today, Trump is said to be deploying the U.S. Marines here, for some reason, in defiance of the U.S. Constitution. But the rule of law and Constitution are for suckers and Democrats, right?
We're happy to report on today's program what is actually going on today here in Los Angeles. Though it is fun to see that Trump --- after recently pardoning thousands of actually violent insurrectionists who actually launched a deadly riot against federal law enforcement officials at the U.S. Capitol a few years ago --- now thinks all of that, at least when it happens in California, is a bad thing.
Not that anything like what Trump incited among his followers on January 6, 2021 is happening here. Not even close. We have far larger demonstrations in this town about every other week just because it's a Thursday. Anyway, tough guy Trump would like you to discuss all of this, rather than his break-up with Elon and all of his other non-stop criming. So, I guess we make his dreams come true on today's program.
Among just some of our source material today...
- ICE is so desperate to meet Stephen Miller's 3,000-arrests-per-day quota, that they mistakenly arrested and detained a member of the U.S. Marshal Service recently. Instead of being shipped off to a super max prison in El Salvador, the arrestee who matched the "general description of a subject being sought by ICE", was eventually released once other law enforcement officials vouched for him.
- CA Governor Gavin Newsom charges that Trump's seemingly unlawful federalization of the California National Guard "is purposely inflammatory and will only escalate tensions". The state is now suing him to stop it. Newsom notes, correctly, that L.A. authorities have access to plenty of law enforcement officials to handle a handful of violent protesters amid the weekend's largely peaceful demonstrations. By Sunday night, in an excellent interview by NBC News' Jake Soboroff, an "unfazed" Newsom dared the Trump Administration to arrest him --- as Trump's "Border Czar" Tom Homan threatened against both him and Mayor Karen Bass --- and underscored again that Trump is little more than a bully whose tough guy act is being carried out because he is "trying to incite violence."
- Trump's unnecessary deployment of federal troops was so poorly planned, by the way, that Guard Members are being forced to sleep on the floor in an L.A. federal building basement or on the street. Photos here.
- His federalizing of the National Guard against the wishes of the Governor (and his mobilization of U.S. Marines) for this purpose is both unprecedented and likely unlawful under the Title 10 authority he has invoked. But if you think he will only do this in L.A. or California, think again. Trump's weekend declaration claims the authority to deploy federal troops --- in violation of the Posse Comitatus Act --- anywhere in the country that he feels like.
We also take a few calls today from listeners in L.A., some email from a listener in the U.K., and finish with this important message for folks both here and elsewhere: DON'T TAKE THE BAIT.
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Sunday 'Breaking Up is Hard Hilarious to Do' Toons https://bradblog.com/?p=15409https://bradblog.com/?p=15409#comments Sun, 08 Jun 2025 13:35:50 +0000 Toons https://bradblog.com/?p=15409 
...IN MEMORIAM......NEXT WEEK!...
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As The BRAD BLOG's former longtime toon sherpa PDiddie always reminded us: "With editorial cartooning increasingly an endangered species, please consider supporting them if you possibly can."* * *
The BRAD BLOG is looking for someone --- other than me --- who may be able and available to post our weekly toons here! Interested? Let me know!]]>
There's probably not enough popcorn in the world for the hilarious madness that's blown up over the several hours or so, since we wrapped today's BradCast. Oh, well. I guess that's what next week is for. In the meantime... [Audio link to full show follows this summary.]
Somewhat less amusing, if still very interesting and actually of much more importance (I think)...from today's program.....
- Lincoln Project unleashes a killer 60-second ad against Donald Trump and the Congressional Republicans' "MAGA Murder Budget".
- Democratic "landslide" in South Carolina in Tuesday's special election for the statehouse, and what the "eye-popping win" may foretell for the forces opposed to authoritarianism in the year ahead.
- SCOTUS begins its month of long-awaited decision releases before Summer recess. They start with an easy one: a unanimous decision regarding a Catholic charity in Wisconsin.
- But, as long as Republican officials are continuing to pretend they care about religion, particularly Catholicism, will the Congressional Republicans pay attention to what the editorial staff at the 60-year old, independent National Catholic Reporter outlet has to say about their so-called "One Big, Beautiful Bill"? In its unsparing and historical accurate piece, the authors describe the measure as "one big shameful bill" and "one of the most immoral pieces of legislation in recent memory," before going on to explain why. And it's brutal. That's before they close this way: "Jesus weeps over this cruelty. So do we. We must reject this heartless bargain and instead pursue policies that honor the dignity of every citizen and the collective well-being of our nation."
- Newark, New Jersey's Democratic Mayor Ras Baraka is pushing back this week against the Trump Administration with a lawsuit against Trump's former defense attorney turned Interim U.S. Attorney for NJ Alina Habba for “false arrest and malicious prosecution". That, after Baraka was handcuffed and detained last month outside of a private facility contracted by DHS to house migrants. The charges were dropped just days later due to a complete lack of merit. Or, as Habba ridiculously described it, "for the sake of moving forward."
- And, catching up with a story that broke late last week while we were off...138 bipartisan, retired, state and federal judges submitted an amicus brief last Friday calling for a federal court to drop charges against Milwaukee County Circuit Court Judge Hannah Dugan. She was arrested by federal officials in late April after, they claim, she helped a migrant avoid arrest in her courthouse. Her own subsequent arrest and the charges against her, according to the former judges, undermine "centuries of precedent on judicial immunity."
- Finally, Desi Doyen is here for our latest Green News Report, with disturbing news on understaffed National Weather Service offices along the Gulf Coast as hurricane season begins; officials sounding the alarm about Trump's gutting of FEMA; and dirty deeds, done dirt cheap for the fossil fuel industry recently by our corrupted SCOTUS...
(Snail mail support to "Brad Friedman, 7095 Hollywood Blvd., #594 Los Angeles, CA 90028" always welcome too!)
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