Tag Archives: Michael Hoexter

Michael Hoexter, Ph.D. [embedded content] The hopes of many progressives in the United States are being hitched to a new generation of left-wing Democratic politicians emerging to challenge both corporate Democrats and the Trump-loving radical-right Republican Party.  This movement has grown out of a group of organizations and institutions originating in, or energized by, the Bernie Sanders campaign of 2015-2016.  Among the most prominent of this new generation and perhaps its first...

By Michael Hoexter, Ph.D. [The Young Turks (TYTNetwork) is an online news network that has a wide reach among mostly progressives and independents in the United States with viewership in the hundreds of thousands of unique visitors per day and over 2 million views per day.  Cenk Uygur is its founder, CEO, and leading on-camera commentator.] Dear Cenk, John Iadarola, Ana Kasparian, and the Young Turks Team, I’m a Young Turks subscriber, member, and a longtime fan of your coverage of...

Michael Hoexter, Ph.D. In the past week, Donald Trump has with his cabinet choices on energy, environment, and now foreign affairs openly declared war on a stable climate and the future of humanity.  The manner in which he did these now, and soon-to-be more, heinous acts has been revealing about who Donald Trump is and how he can be expected to act in the future on a whole host of issues related and unrelated to climate. While Trump in his campaign gave almost no signs that he had any...

Michael Hoexter, Ph.D. Listen Donald, Becoming President-elect was a grand coup for you, yet, with the path of climate denial and destruction you are headed on as President, you will be personally responsible for some extremely bad, real impacts on all Americans, even on all human beings, making you and them big “losers”.  It is no longer a matter of you playing a game for yourself in which you might be a “winner” but it means protecting and taking care of the destinies of all Americans,...

Michael Hoexter, Ph.D. The US press has generally played a dismal role in warning people of the imminent dangers of climate breakdown and upcoming thresholds beyond which humanity may not survive as an organized species or a species at all.   The media should be every day reporting on both the record breaking temperatures of 2016 as well as alarming changes in the surface of the earth that have resulted and will likely result from the enormous heat. Questions for the recent 2016 US...

Michael Hoexter, Ph.D. The Presidential election campaign of 2016 has been nauseating in the ugliness of its tone and content as well as how discussion of important issues about government policy has been sidelined in the public debates and the public sphere more generally.  The media seem to be encouraging the personalized ugliness in ways that are perhaps predictable as they have for years now reported politics as a horserace and soap opera and not as the conflict of ideas.  If we were to...

Michael Hoexter, Ph.D. In a recent piece, I introduced the concept of “soft climate denial”.  In soft climate denial, people acknowledge that climate change is real and threatening and may even be panicked about it.  However, in this cultural-political constellation with attendant states of mind, the solutions for climate change that are embraced are in no way commensurate to the acknowledged threats to human existence posed by anthropogenic global warming.   Consequently, soft climate...

Michael Hoexter, Ph.D. Contents Conventional “Hard” Climate Denial A Web of Soft Climate Denial The Foundations of Soft Climate Denial in Economics Settling on Neoliberal, “Market-Based” Carbon Gradualism Soft Climate Denial, Fossil Fuels, and the Hedonic Self 1. Conventional “Hard” Climate Denial The Rio Olympics opening ceremony highlighted global warming as a major theme of international concern even on an occasion of diversion from the cares of the world.  That most Brazilians...

By Michael Hoexter On July 10, the National Day of Climate Mobilization declared by The Climate Mobilization, I gave a talk about the role of money and morality in effective climate action.  The setting was the gymnasium of the St. Robert Catholic School in Sacramento, California.  A parishioner at the adjoining St. Robert Church, Vince Valdez, has been spearheading the development of a Climate Mobilization group in Sacramento, in part inspired by Pope Francis’s “Laudatio Si” encyclical....

Michael Hoexter, Ph.D. The Brexit vote is being taken by some commentators as a sign that the basic competence of leadership groups throughout Western countries is in question.  Unfortunately not enough media attention has been paid, public concern raised, and action taken about the most massive and long-standing failure of the political leadership classes, a failure to protect by governments that threatens humanity itself.  Governments and government leaders have failed to lead on climate...