MAGA and MIT — Dangerously disengaged or cognitively unable?

The MIT Energy Initiative (MITEI) was set up in 2004 as a pay-2-play operation by the Koch Brothers, coal billionaires and gods on the board of the MIT Corporation for almost 40 years. From then till now, MITEI has been funded by ExxonMobil, Shell and Eni (Founding Members) and Chevron. and Petronas (Sustaining Members). [1]

In September a MITEI team produced a paper detailing the many, many reasons that DAC will never be a viable technology, and in November MIT News ran an exhaustive summary of this boondoggle.

But down, down, down at the bottom of the article, in the very last paragraph, comes this:

Nevertheless, the researchers recommend that work to develop DAC continue “because it may be needed for meeting net-zero emissions goals, especially given the current pace of emissions.” But their paper concludes with this warning: “Given the high stakes of climate change, it is foolhardy to rely on DAC to be the hero that comes to our rescue.”

In any sane world, the headline for MIT's bullshit would be, "MIT says DAC doesn't work, will never work, but keep the money coming." That's the message being handed to policy makers. Big Oil simply needs to provide them with political cover for the Big Oil donations they are already taking, and MIT's brand delivers that.

The academic community, meanwhile, cannot process the idea that MIT (or Stanford) have that kind of power. They believe they are playing on the level playing field of peer-review, and debunking bullshit is all they need to do.

And here we are.

Aaron Swartz, Virginia Giuffre, and Babak Babakinejad

For the past six years I've investigated fossil fuel corruption at MIT for the past 20 years, and even though I worked at MIT from 1991 to 2018, so theoretically experienced all this first hand, what I've learned is so much much worse than anything I had ever imagined that I feel an incredible responsibility to bring this corruption not only to light, but to accountability.

But I know in my gut that my report to the Massachusetts Attorney General may generate comment here and there, but no consequences.

Evidence

I've read a half-dozen posts amplifying this new DAC report from MIT, which have received hundreds and hundreds of likes from the LinkedIn community, from both scientists and activists. And not a single one mentioned the punchline, that MIT is saying to keep the money coming.

If the evidence of corruption is right there in the thing being reported, yet not seen, not understood, then there is nothing I can say, no evidence I can produce of far more consequential, soul-sickening crimes, that will have any impact of any kind.

MAGA Neighbors

I recently moved to Rhode Island after 32 years in the same Somerville apartment, and history has repeated itself in that my favorite neighbor is a strong MAGA supporter. I once asked my Somerville neighbor how he could possibly support Donald Trump and he said, "I used to try to watch CNN and MCNBC and it just didn't seem real to me."

Liberals, Democrats, academic and activists are incredulous that anyone could support Donald Trump, yet they don't see that their reality is manipulated and shaped by the exact same forces. That their reality is written first by PR teams, and their conclusions are carefully laid out like a fake treasure map. And though Donald Trump will likely prove to be one of the worst things to have happened in the history of the world, I'm still happy to have left the clueless certainty of Massachusetts and MIT.

To the LinkedIn 4 Environmental Justice subscribers

This was my first LinkedIn newsletter and it had 5K subscribers by the end of the first week — thank you! But as I gradually understood the crime I was investigating, and evolved my strategy to achieve accountability, I created new newsletters — Big Oil, Little Men (3,833 subscribers), Louisiana vs Massachusetts (2,427 subscribers) and most recently, Warren Commission 2024 (2.537 subscribers). Thank god LinkedIn won't let me create any more.

My plan now is to submit a report of my Findings to Massachusetts Attorney Andrea Joy Campbell , and to engage the support of Massachusetts Senators Elizabeth Warren and Edward Markey for an investigation by the Attorney General of #Citibank activities at MIT from 2010-2014, and their impact on the fraudulent Jeffrey Epstein report that the MIT Corporation published on January 10, 2020.

Basically, when former Citibank CEO John Reed became chair of the MIT Corporation in 2010, he and former CIA director John Deutch set up at least a half-dozen dark money, pay-2-play, and honey trap operations. When the Jeffrey Epstein scandal exploded in August 2019, the MIT Corporation moved to protect those operations from exposure...

Well, no need to spell it out here. Horrors happened at MIT, from the brutal prosecution of Aaron Swartz to the protection and profiteering from Jeffrey Epstein's sex trafficking operations. But if anyone thinks that MIT is sounding the alarm on DAC in good faith, then I as much as anyone must recalibrate, adjust, and try to reach my goals by other means.

Please subscribe to the Warren Commission 2024 because, alas, it isn't the argument or the evidence, it's the support.