19 Comments
User's avatar
erin's avatar

"Divvy up tax dollars according to each state’s population"

How about only giving to the feds enough to run the few things the feds ought to be running? And keeping most of the money (and power) at the state level? Isn't it the feds who ought to be waiting for grants to wage their wars, not local schools? :-)

Expand full comment
Three Score and More's avatar

I’m relatively new in Substack town but we are age contemporaries and I think likeminded in many ways. Look forward to reading your views

Expand full comment
Michael Gerald-Yamasaki's avatar

So, you understand that the chart is somebody’s opinion about something that is absolutely not predictable. Just checking.

Expand full comment
Vicki Robin's avatar

no, in fact. This is data from established research institutes and verified by IPCC. We are in overshoot. There is no doubt. How the data plays out in reality is TBD

Expand full comment
Susan Meeker-Lowry's avatar

This is why I have serious issues with people paying income taxes this year. Instead that $ should go to the states so states can use it to take care of what the feds used to grant states money to do. Now none of that is happening, and even if we live in a state that wants to continue paying Medicaid, SNAP, protect the environment, support women’s health/right to choose, help seniors/disabled/poor families, education, the arts, do FEMA’s job, etc. - well where is the $ to come from when it’s all been sent to the feds for a bloated military, genocide, and billionaires’ pockets? Of course then the polluters will sue when states try to enforce reasonable regulations on them and win because the feds have done away with the regulations. As far as plastic crap in box stores? I’m fine with ditching that. Even my own kids, even the youngest who swore never to buy into the pressure of buying such crap for his kids eventually gave in. They did try, but first it came in from others - gifts and also hand-me-downs from friends whose kids were a bit older. Then, the pressure began. It was disconcerting to watch. My other son, the middle one, his girls were so overloaded with gifts, much of it crap, pretty much all of it made in China, that one Christmas, it was weeks before they even bothered to open some of the gifts beyond taking off the paper. They simply did not need or want them. This was even more disconcerting to watch. It’s not good for the kids, the house if full of so much stuff it’s work for parents to keep up with it, and for me the biggest thing is Earth. What my kids ended up allowing is “normal” and disgusting, IMO. I wish we could have serious conversations about these things, as well as the agencies that are now being defunded and destroyed. All of them were created because their services were necessary. They have been corrupted by the revolving door of CEOs being appointed to them over and over again. So . . . let’s get rid of the revolving door (and Citizen’s United, which is a pipe dream at the moment but I have to mention it). Let’s look at what these agencies do and keep what’s good and trash what isn’t. Let’s add more good to their agendas because much more work needs to be done. I’m so frustrated with people’s inability to discern, inability to vision and plan. Instead they see no shades of gray, no yes/and. It’s all good/bad, black/white, and life simply is not like that.

Expand full comment
Phoebe Barnard's avatar

PS posted you on BlueSky!

Expand full comment
barbara fess's avatar

I agree with most of this post. But... you must be aware of what NOAA does? It regulates tide gages etc BUT it also is heavily into messing with Mom (nature) and weather modification. !!

I think you might already know of a beautiful man ... Charles Eisenstein... I tried to send you his latest essay about our choices...

Also I have an opinion about our basic individual rights... If we are smart and well informed enough to choose to not take a jab that is poison, that is up to each of us (our own family) .

Thank you for ranting.

Barbara Fess

Expand full comment
Vicki Robin's avatar

bodily autonomy = women's right to choose, no unreasonable search and seizure, not deporting legal immigrants without due process. And you are free to accept or refuse any medical intervention. I do know of Charles' work. His early work was especially deep (and aligned with my own thought) but not his recent politically tinged work which seems naive and stumbles into an either/or good/bad trap while trying to point out that others fall into that trap. I think he got bamboozled, as many others did, by djt, and is unwilling to say so.

Expand full comment
Susan Meeker-Lowry's avatar

I used to read him too. But stopped, and unsubscribed to his stuff, when he came out in support of trump. That was beyond the pale to me, for anyone claiming any kind of spiritual awareness.

Expand full comment
Phoebe Barnard's avatar

So you know that I love your rants, thoroughly! But I have to disagree with you about the merits of state NOAAS and NASAs and NSFs and other agencies, at least in some cases. And it comes down to the phrase "economies of scale." Each state might be able to have its own Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, etc. But the others wouldn't work at a sub-critical mass. And also we have had, in the past at least, a national identity. Will we willingly forego 250 years of that without a lot of care?

Science agencies need critical mass to do the top class work that they often do. And a National Science Foundation or a NOAA or NASA - and a USAID or some better version of it - should be a matter of cultural identity, pride, accomplishment, and service. Beyond that, relocalization is sometimes desirable. We have to be careful in how we think of things. These guys are often doing things just to "break things" and not with any sensible strategic thought. The damage will last for years, maybe generations. Maybe we will never recover. I don't know.

Expand full comment
Vicki Robin's avatar

Well I agree of course. Subsidiarity. It's a rant not recommendations. I want institutions committed to well being at all levels of appropriate scale. My point. If I have a coherent one, is that if they want to push everything but war down to the states, they need to give us the keys to and tax dollar funding for the agencies they are decimating. I would also like to have international institutions have more teeth on issues of justice, accountability planetery health. The t-team doors not have a mandate to ignore and even bury the careful research, on every scale, on collective threats.

Expand full comment
Brodee Myers-Cooke's avatar

PS LOVE the pic!

Expand full comment
Brodee Myers-Cooke's avatar

More impolite posts please! I don’t know why “sublime” come to mind, but it does. One of the few great things about this era is seeing people’s mettle. Thanks for sharing yours. I feel like I just got a whole lot myself reading this ◡̈

Expand full comment
karen rom's avatar

How about changing the maps to reflect bioregions, instead of states?

And quick memories of all the unnecessary toys, clothes, dolls, etc etc etc that no one needs, especially the landfills, actually seems a relief to me. I just don't like that Someone made that decision for me/us. Keep it up. I like your style.

Expand full comment
Mary Earle Chase's avatar

Vicki,

Thank you for being a model of someone who is fully engaged in this moment. I admire you greatly.

Mary

Expand full comment
Pbr's avatar

If shtf I actually see the states pulling out of DC, refusing to allow federal government to collect taxes from its citizens and instead have their own laws, taxes and resource for emergency events. Have their own power grid, food systems for distribution and growing, trading with other states. The elected officials do not go to Washington but stay local and deal with local issues. What we have now is crashing and burning. We are going to have to be innovative, think differently and seriously end big government.

Expand full comment
MsRhuby's avatar

I had to look up "L’etat c’est moi" because I'm not French. Apparently it means "I am the state". I regret to inform you that you are not the state. You live in a state, governed by state regulations, that is in turn run by the Federal government. We are citizens of these UNITED states. Let's stop with the right /left, red/blue illusion. Where is your humanity? Respectfully, MsRhuby

Expand full comment
Vicki Robin's avatar

Oh no!!! I don't think I'm the state... here's some background!!! https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/L'%C3%89tat%2C_c'est_moi

Expand full comment
MsRhuby's avatar

Just Dropped In ~ Kenny Rogers

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hgAiL109P7g

Expand full comment