Michael K. Dorsey on Climate Summit, Nekessa Opoti on Haitian Refugees

  (cc photo: Doug Peters/British government) This week on CounterSpin: The impacts of climate disruption are not theoretical; they are happening. Those already worst off are facing the worst of it, and those who profit from it continue to profit. There are finer points, but that’s reality. And it’s fair to measure journalism not by its cleverness, or by demonstrated balance between the voices of various power players—because when it comes to climate change, power players are the problem—but by the justice it does to that reality. As national leaders meet at COP26 in Glasgow to discuss ways to confront this already unfolding disaster, the Washington Post is suggesting US readers celebrate —what’s this?—the Transportation Department’s Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration’s decision to finalize a “rule extending federal pipeline safety standards to more than 400,000 miles of currently unregulated onshore gathering lines.” You can acknowledge that certain steps are good, without thereby suggesting that they are within shouting distance of “enough” when it comes to climate change. We talk about comparing what’s happening to what needs to happen with environmental scientist and advocate, and longtime climate conference participant and observer, Michael K. Dorsey. https://media.blubrry.com/counterspin/content.blubrry.com/counterspin/CounterSpin211105Dorsey.mp3 Transcript: ‘We’re Several Days Late and Many Dollars Short in Getting Ahead of Climate Catastrophe’ New York Times (9/21/21) Also on the show: In the wake of the horrifying front-page photos from September, the Biden administration says that the US Border Patrol will no longer use horses to round up Haitian asylum seekers they are flushing out of a makeshift shelters to send back over the border into Mexico, without the opportunity to present their case about the dangers they have spent, in many cases, years trying to escape. That may cut down on horrifying front-page photos, which is why it’s all the more important to ask what’s actually changing with regard to US policy toward Haitian refugees. We talk about that with Nekessa Opoti, communications director at the Black Alliance for Just Immigration. https://media.blubrry.com/counterspin/content.blubrry.com/counterspin/CounterSpin211105Opoti.mp3 Transcript: ‘The Anti-Blackness of the US Is Extending to Black Asylum Seekers’ Plus Janine Jackson takes a quick look at media coverage of the new climate denialism. https://media.blubrry.com/counterspin/content.blubrry.com/counterspin/CounterSpin211105Banter.mp3