world leaders making promises they can't keep

President Biden made a pledge to cut US CO2 emissions by 50% at the end of this decade, as compared to 2005.  It's a strange pledge in many ways.  First, it is currently 2021, why does this pledge go back 16 years to 2005 for its reference point?  The pledge isn't to cut 50% from today's levels, but from the year when US CO2 emissions peaked.  As of 2019 the US has already cut energy-related CO2 emissions by about 15% since 2005, mainly by switching from coal to natural gas, so this pledge is a way of double counting the emissions we've already cut.

So the pledge is really to cut current (latest official figures from 2019) emissions by about 42%.  Doesn't sound quite as fancy as 50%, but politicians do like to exaggerate.

More to the point -- Biden doesn't have the power to unilaterally cut US emissions by 42% by 2030.  He's not a dictator.  His pledge does not have the force of law, he'll need Congress to do something.  So how the fuck is he going to accomplish this goal?

According to his speech:

(1) Laying thousands of miles of new electric transmission cables

(2) Building electric cars and electric charging stations

(3) Carbon capture

(4) New hydrogen power plants (?!?)

(5) Farmers doing something vague that is cutting edge somehow with respect to soil

OK, good luck with this plan.

Really, I did expect something more logical and specific when I started reading his speech.

Oh, the White House also released a FACT SHEET elaborating ... I mean, I hoped it would elaborate, but it doesn't actually contain any facts or additional details.  There's no numbers in it, usually facts are related to numbers?  It's entirely free of math.  Sigh.

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Why do we need thousands of miles of new electricity transmission cables, and if we need them, why aren't our regional public utilities already building them?  We currently have 7,000,000 miles of electricity transmission cables between power plants and customers.  Supposedly these cables and their systems can be upgraded to be more "smart" so that less electricity is wasted between power plant and customer.  OK, go for it.  Be smarter.  But can anybody give me some numbers?  And if this is truly a matter of efficiency, it should already be paying for itself, utilities should already be doing it without Biden kicking them in the pants or providing federal funding.  I'm sure they already are doing it.

Electric cars are an expensive, slow, and selfish way to cut CO2 emissions.  Manufacturing a new electric car and its battery creates a lot of CO2 emissions up front, more than building a gasoline car, and then you only save on CO2 emissions over time if you drive the fuck out of that electric car, as compared to driving the fuck out of a gasoline car.  The best way to cut CO2 emissions with respect to personal transportation is to (1) not buy a new car at all, and (2) take mass transit or carpool instead.  A massive program to build new electric cars will actually increase CO2 emissions over the next nine years, though it may reduce them later on as compared to a massive program to build new gasoline cars, assuming we were all going to drive the fuck out of those gasoline cars anyway.  Sigh.

Carbon capture?  This involves storing burnt CO2 gases underground.  This doesn't scale up.  And it would be horribly inefficient, which would require burning even more fossil fuels than before (which is why the fossil fuel industry likes this idea).  If you hear a Republican talking about "clean coal" this is what she meant, burying the exhaust fumes underground somehow.  And then hoping those buried fumes stay buried FOREVER.

Hydrogen power plants!?!  Where is this hydrogen coming from?  There's no such thing as a hydrogen mine, you have to create the hydrogen, which requires enormous energy inputs, more energy inputs than you'll get back from burning the hydrogen later in your power plant.  This is a net energy waste.  WTF.  Please don't do this!  I'm genuinely shocked that this is part of the plan.

Farmers doing vaguely cutting edge things with their soil -- seriously didn't think soil was a major emitter of CO2.  Does anybody have details on this?

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I can also promise to cut my own CO2 emissions by 50% compared to the year of my peak emissions while pointing to stuff that may or may not help while avoiding doing any math.  Please adore me.

Also, BTW, I've conveniently picked an end date for my goal that is beyond the last day of my second term in office, assuming I even get a second term in office, which means I am 100% unaccountable for my goal.  I cannot possibly meet it, or not meet it, because I will have retired by then.  Please adore me anyway.

Bug's simple and foolproof plan for cutting CO2 emissions by 50%

Tally up how much fossil fuel the US burned in 2019.  Create a quota or permit system, such as "cap and trade", that reduces the total amount of fossil fuels burned each year by 5% each year, for 10 years.

Done.

Add onto this plan anything else you want, have fun adding additional stuff, but you HAVE TO LIMIT THE AMOUNT OF FOSSIL FUELS WE BURN.

And then don't import anything from China, or any other country, until they agree in a binding way to do the same thing, otherwise you're merely exporting your CO2 emissions to other countries.

Sure, the US and EU have actually reduced CO2 emissions over the past 10-15 years, but the world as a whole has increased CO2 emissions because instead of emitting CO2 at home we buy products that emitted CO2 somewhere else.

I'd also ban the export of fossil fuels, because it does no good for the US to burn less of the crap if we're merely exporting it to somebody else.  This is a huge problem with Canada, which is basically a petrostate like Saudi Arabia that pretends to be a liberal democracy that cares about the environment blah blah.  And it is a growing problem for the US, and for Australia -- pretending to care while exporting our fossil fuels to other countries.

You have to leave that crap in the ground.

OK, nobody's gonna vote for this plan, you'd rather vote for Biden's false promises, I know.  That's because you don't really want to fix the problem.  You just want to pretend you are.

Dax is gone :-(

Just since the vet last saw him on Monday, Dax had developed a new and alarming -- to the vet -- symptom: pale gums.

These pale gums signified possible anemia, from possible internal bleeding, of which -- as the vet investigated this morning -- there was plenty, because of a new and quickly growing malignant tumor of the spleen that had probably spread to other major organs already.

We had internal imaging of Dax from just a month ago, when they were going to do that elective surgery, and this fist-sized tumor had not been present at that time.  A fast-growing malignant metastasizing tumor.  Life expectancy from this point would not be long, and it would be increasingly painful.  Although they could do surgery to try to remove the tumor, the vet said, "Once I opened up, I'd likely find it had spread, and I'd advise you not to let Dax wake up."

This didn't have anything to do with the liver problem that postponed his elective surgery, or the several benign growths that would have been removed.  I'm so fucking glad Dax didn't spend the last month of his life recovering from that surgery -- surgery that I opposed, but not strongly enough, but ... it never happened anyway.

So instead we let Dax go today.  I really didn't think this would be how the day went.  I thought even if we found the cause of the tummy problems today, and it was bad like cancer, that we'd have some time left.  When we learned Edwina had cancer, we took care of her at home until she passed peacefully in her sleep.  But there was no time left for Dax.  He was bleeding internally, and in pain, and it would very quickly get worse.

I did not intend our Thursday night PIZZA meal to be Dax's last supper, but at least it was his favorite, pizza crust, and he definitely enjoyed it.  And then I joined T and Dax in bed for a while to sing Dax to sleep with his favorite songs that I'd "written", like, "There's a Pup for Us" and "We Will, We Will, Dax You".  When we saw him this afternoon to say goodbye, he was no longer interested in pizza crust, or his favorite songs.  I'd brought some crust along -- and the toy he'd played "Keep Away From Bug" with this morning.  This morning he and I were running around the house, chasing each other for that toy!  I thought he was getting better with the antibiotics!  Yeah, the UTI, also not related to the cancer.

Early this morning I said to T, "I think we're pulling the trigger too early on taking him back to the vet, he seems to be improving, maybe a few more days of the antibiotic."  But together we decided there was no harm in taking him in for some more tests and supportive care -- at least it would give us a day off from taking care of him and the emotional roller coaster of watching his various symptoms come and go.

He seemed fine this morning!  Shit.

We comforted Dax for a few minutes outside under a tree, while the vet and the nursing staff put out some blankets and brought out the injections that would send him away.  We took a few last pictures of him.  And then we held him as he passed away.

We sang his favorite songs to him as he got sleepy from the first shot, and then he went under from the second shot, and then he stopped breathing from the third shot.

"I would never have left you"

The last thing I said to Dax as his soul went away was, "I would never have left you."

After we got home, T said to me, "That first night when we brought Dax home, I slept next to him in the basement and told him, 'I will never leave you.'"

We were there for Dax from beginning to end.

petechiae

I now have petechiae on my eyelids from all the crying.  I put on sunglasses even though it was momentarily cloudy, as I drove to get us some wine.  We'll probably watch TV together tonight.  B can't get here until Sunday, he's driving to York for his P2 tomorrow morning.

I have to remember to eat something.

There will be time for an oration about how wonderful Dax was later, right now we're both doing a lot of crying.

I let K know what was happening ASAP, actually during the call with the vet this morning I started texting him, then I called him and we both bawled on the phone.  K was a Dax Dad also, we acquired Dax while K was living here at the house.  I'm very sorry K didn't get to see Dax again before we had to let him go :-(

This sucks!

unfixable

I've never cried so much in one day in my adult life.

I will not allow this to destroy me, none of those who have passed before me would want that.  But today it hurts.  Sometimes you lose a loved one with little warning, for reasons you did not expect.

I remember back during college, when the AIDS pandemic was raging hard among the gay community, I was so worried about losing my gay friends from AIDS (because eventually I did), and then a woman friend of mine died suddenly in a car accident.  We'd all been at her house just the other day ...

Her death reminded me -- it isn't the problems I'm worried about that will snatch away those I love.  Reality doesn't care what I think.  Focused on this health threat or that health threat, Dax was snatched away by something else entirely that blew up almost overnight.  At least he was active and loved until the end, and then we helped him to his end quickly and humanely.  Pizza feasts, trips to the playground, hikes, snuggles, songs.

T asked me whether I thought we made the right decision today, and yes, I think we made the right decision, I made the vet show me the evidence and explain things step by step.  But it happened so goddess damned fast.  This morning I genuinely thought Dax was getting better.  I remember last night, right before we went to bed, Dax snatched an extra bagel bite from his bowl, and then seemed miffed that I was tossing the rest of his uneaten food away, because the vet requested he eat nothing after 9pm, so they could do the blood test in the morning.  It seemed like his appetite was coming back.  And then this other problem took him within hours.  So unfair.

I'm hitting three of the five stages of grief today -- denial (this is impossible!), anger, and sadness.  I've spent all day, since the vet called, with T, except for a moment while I was calling K, and now I'm going to spend the night in my separate bed, although with Astrid next to me.

Oh, good, Sam is sharing T's bed now, I'm worried about him not having Dax beside him at night anymore, although recently this was more of a burden, because Dax needed to pee often during the night, and he was shivering and whimpering from time to time.  Ugh.  We did our best to fix him over the past few weeks, but he was unfixable.

It's probably the biggest lesson of life, that we are unfixable.  That nobody is in control, nothing is in control of the outcome.