Notes, references (including the video referenced), & transcript: https://chloehumbert.substack.com/p/some-narratives-are-just-blunt-honesty
References:
People are not even talking about the same things and this is dangerous. I don't think most people realize that many times we think we're talking about the same thing, but in fact, we're not actually on the same page with the underlying premise or even basic facts. Chloe Humbert Feb 14, 2025 Whatever the cause I think the only answer is to start speaking in specifics rather than shorthand or buzzwords or sound bites. We need to name specific things happening, and spell out what we mean, not just make off-hand comments and assume everyone's on the same page, because I can guarantee you, not everyone is on the same page.
Don't fail to communicate. Don't Wait For Everybody - Episode 017 Chloe Humbert Feb 10, 2025 Say exactly what it's doing. Delivering money into the pockets of working people. That means nothing. It means nothing. That doesn't help. It doesn't help people want to protect this. They're just like, well, Trump's going to deliver money into the pockets of working people. I mean, you might as well just say, well, no, I'm going to do it. No, I'm going to do it. That doesn't make any sense. You have to be specific. So this problem is – I just see this everywhere. Nobody is doing this like where – it's just a pervasive problem.
"Behind the scenes" hopium peddling needs to stop. Savior syndrome, normalcy bias, and apocalyptic hopium, it's all a bamboozle. Chloe Humbert Dec 02, 2024 This presenter at this town hall also said they want progressive policies. But then this person also said they’re going to keep using the word “progressive” because: “We are not crazy lefty people.” So wait, so you’re against progressive policies like universal healthcare and paid leave and stuff like that? Because that’s what that means! When people say “crazy lefty people” they mean PROGRESSIVES! Do these people think they’re going to somehow outwit the openly stated plans for right-wing atrocities against “lefty people” with semantics like this to save themselves and sell out the most vulnerable among us? What happened to “First they came for the socialists”? If they meant tankies or some specific issue they were denouncing they could've specified. But insulting 80% of the people most aligned with your own policy preferences seems bonkers.
PA Democratic Party politicians celebrate corporate giveaway. Less than 10 days after having to deny being elitists who’ve abandoned the working class, to defend the party’s historic defeats they announce millions of taxpayer money being given to a literal bank. Chloe Humbert Nov 18, 2024 If we had participatory budgeting here, this would never happen. I guarantee you nobody regardless of their political leaning would vote for giving taxpayer money to a bank. Only people with privilege and power make these decisions for mysterious reasons we can only speculate make sense for them. This is “trickle down economics” being pushed by Democrats.
Indiana Gazette - AG targets scammers exploiting elderly - RON MUSSELMAN May 9, 2018 Updated Oct 19, 2022 Agent Jim Embree from the AG’s office talked about six kinds of scams he has investigated statewide, including door-to-door scams. He also cited other scams involving drugs, phones, those committed by family members, and those involving hospital and care facilities, as well as the post office, dark web, social media and the internet.
PublicSource - As prosecutor, Josh Shapiro was for fracking reform. Can he pull it off as governor? The attorney general’s tough talk on fracking suggests potential new regulations, but the governor-elect’s support for a hydrogen hub and the realities of a divided general assembly could fuel more drilling. Quinn Glabicki November 30, 2022 Yesterday, Shapiro announced that Coterra Energy Inc., formerly known as Cabot Oil and Gas, pleaded no contest to 15 environmental charges brought by the 2020 grand jury, which found that the company polluted well water in the Susquehanna town of Dimock with metals and high levels of methane. As part of the plea, Coterra will pay $16.29 million to construct a new public water line and cover 75 years worth of water bills for homeowners that were impacted. Shapiro called it an “historic settlement.” “Companies will take notice that we won’t allow communities like this to be taken advantage of or forgotten,” he said in a press release.
Gift Bans: Everyone knows "there's no such thing as a free lunch." PA Governor missteps to the right at lunchtime Chloe Humbert Feb 18, 2023 If free lunches were so nominal and irrelevant, why do shrewd pharmaceutical companies spend so much money on buying meals for doctors who are hardly likely to be scraping for lunch money? It’s because this tactic is not irrelevant. Free lunches are incredibly effective marketing tools in persuading people. It’s harder to turn down a gift lunch. We’ve all heard the old adage that states “There’s no such thing as a free lunch!”
Pa. Gov. Josh Shapiro loosens his predecessor’s notoriously strict gift ban for top officials by Stephen Caruso of Spotlight PA and Kate Huangpu of Spotlight PA | Jan. 20, 2023 Top officials for Pennsylvania’s governor are now allowed to accept an occasional free lunch while on duty. In one of the first notable changes of his new administration, Democratic Gov. Josh Shapiro announced Friday that he has loosened a gift ban that was put in place since the start of his predecessor, Democratic Gov. Tom Wolf’s, eight-year tenure.
Gift Ban — MarchOnHarrisburg In Pennsylvania, lobbyists can legally bribe legislators. There are no limits on how much lobbyists can “gift” public officials in Pennsylvania. Millions of dollars are unreported every year. Gifts valued at over $250 or travel, lodging, and hospitality greater than $650 must be reported by legislators… but even that isn’t enforced.
Daily Mail - Residents of small Pennsylvania town are being driven mad by huge BITCOIN MINE whose two large cooling towers vibrate and hum more loudly than a waterfall By Dominic Yeatman For Dailymail.Com Published: 14:40 EDT, 13 December 2023 'I have a little pond in front of my house where I used to sit and have my coffee at,' he added. 'I can't even enjoy that because I can't even hear the water over the Bitcoin. It is louder than the waterfall.' Talen Energy won over locals with promises of hundreds of news jobs and an economic boom in the township of 6,000 when they announced plans for the operation last year. 'Amazon, Google, all those cloud computing applications, those are the potential clients, customers that we will have in the data center buildings,' said Dustin Wertheimer, VP and Division CFO Talen Cumulus and Susquehanna Data Center. 'On the coin mining side, there will be computers again located in those buildings and those computers will run computations that will trigger and generate the issuance of coins.' The controversial cryptocurrency has been in the news again after a wild ride since the start of December. A rally last week saw it rise above $44,000 to reach its highest level in almost two years - then on Sunday it lost 6.5 percent of its value in just 20 minutes and dipped below $41,000. Global bank Standard Chartered thinks bitcoin could surpass $100,000 before the end of 2024 - yet well-known JP Morgan boss Jamie Dimon said last week that US lawmakers should 'close it down'. The first 1,500 Bitcoins out of Salem Township were sold for $37.6 million after the 180 megawatt mine was plugged in this summer, but that was little consolation to residents at an angry town hall meeting on Tuesday.
Indonesia’s TOXIC TOFU Timebomb: Poisoning Millions Daily - Andrew Fraser Apr 26, 2025
I Live 400 Yards From Mark Zuckerberg’s Massive Data Center More Perfect Union Mar 27, 2025
Issues You May Know, 30 May 2025. A list of things you might want to know about - or write your reps about. Chloe Humbert May 30, 2025 Pennsylvania American Water seems a little nervous. I’m seeing PA American Water commercials on youtube making claims about how safe and reliable they are. You know it’s bad and they’re probably feeling some heat. There must be a lot of people writing letters like I have about the fees, the slow processing of payments, the dirty water without notice, and the pollution of our local river. This privatized water company polluted the stream and river and got away with it by saying they will "invest" in the cleanup. Meanwhile the price hikes are allowed to proceed, and representatives in the PA state house testify about constituents peeing in their backyard because they can't afford their water bill.
Sediment solution reached for polluted Lackawanna County waterways By Kat Bolus | WVIA News Published June 25, 2024 at 6:00 AM EDT Pennsylvania American Water will not pay a state penalty for polluting Roaring Brook and the Lackawanna River. Instead, the utility company will put money back in the community. "It's a very good scenario from an unfortunate situation. We certainly didn't want this to happen in the first place and there are safeguards in the agreement that will hopefully prevent something like this from ever happening again," said Tara Jones, executive director of the Lackawanna River Conservation Association (LRCA). The organization protects and advocates for the river’s watershed. The water company will spend around $300,000 to create fish habitats along Roaring Brook and stabilize the stream bank, according to a consent order and agreement between the utility and the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection (DEP). PA American Water will add educational features along the waterway and create a fishing deck with handicap access and handicap accessible parking.
Bitfarms wants Pennsylvania's power, so it's buying two waste coal plants - Anya Litvak - Pittsburgh Post-Gazette - Mar 3, 2025 6:22 PM To its investors, Bitfarms said its locations in Pennsylvania are strategic. “Pennsylvania is a conservative business friendly jurisdiction with a notably pro-Bitcoin & pro-energy Democratic Governor (Joshua Shapiro),” an investor presentation highlighted. The Scrubgrass and Panther Creek power plants are also near major metropolitan areas and “major fiber lines.” The company envisions building data centers on the campuses of the power plants, which it could isolate from the grid to ferry all their power to the computers onsite.
Big Tech's AI Blackmail State and local data center extortion is going national. Pat Garofalo Dec 18, 2024 In response to the rapid growth of data centers in recent years — those large facilities that hold the plumbing necessary for businesses to store and manage their data — residents of many communities have stepped up to voice their concerns about the inevitable downsides of data center construction, which include noise, high energy and water use, and environmental degradation. These protests have occurred across the country, from Virginia to Arizona to Massachusetts. In rare instances, those local residents have been joined by state legislators or other local leaders. More often, though, elected officials roll out the red carpet for Big Tech data centers, lavishing them with public subsidies and other regulatory favors.
Business Insider - Investors love layoffs - Employees are getting crushed by layoffs. But they're fueling big gains for Wall Street. Emily Stewart Feb 22, 2024, 10:27 AM UTC Companies just can’t stop talking about their plans to cut jobs. A recent Bloomberg analysis found that the rate of mentions of layoffs in quarterly earnings calls was at its highest since the start of the pandemic. And while all the layoff chatter is deeply unnerving for workers, executives keep talking about plans to slash payrolls for a pretty clear reason: Investors are eating it up.
Better Offline The Invisible War December 31, 2024
Medicaid info town hall by Pennsylvania state Rep Kosierowski. I listened to the whole thing in case you can't or don't want to. (Voila, you can thank me later!) Chloe Humbert Mar 10, 2025 Linda Thomas-Hemak was perhaps not believing that it could happen at the level of cuts they're proposing, or perhaps she seemed concerned with people being overwrought, so some of this may have been elite panic where people in positions of leadership start worrying more about quelling consternation over allowing people to react appropriately to a crisis. Because I don't see any evidence that anyone in DC cares that it can't happen, they're doing lots of things that really can't happen.
Health Organizations Drop Ad Agencies Working with Fossil Fuel Industry 02/06/2025 • Sophia Samantaroy For decades, oil and gas companies have employed PR and lobbying tactics strikingly similar to those of the tobacco industry: seeding doubt about established science, creating front groups, and pushing misleading narratives to stall regulation despite overwhelming evidence that fossil fuel pollution harms human and planetary health. Yet many of the same PR and advertising agencies employed by health groups to promote healthy habits, vaccinations, and cancer prevention have continued partnering with fossil fuel companies, spreading misleading messages that downplay or deny these health harms and delay action needed to curb emissions. “The same PR firms spreading fossil fuel disinformation are also working with health organizations—a clear conflict of interest for health,” said Shweta Narayan, Campaign Lead at the Global Climate and Health Alliance (GCHA).
The Wrong Impact Research Chloe Humbert · Jun 25, 2023 If this is representative of the kind of advice and guidance from Democratic Party consultants, I think it’s evidence the current consultant base has been infiltrated by a lot of fossil fuel industry advocates and libertarians aligned with corporate forces against public health. And that would explain a lot about the abandonment of public health I guess.
Issues You May Know, 14 March 2025. A list of things you might want to know about - or write your reps about. Chloe Humbert Mar 14, 2025 Accelerationist James Carville at a retreat this week advising House Dems and Dem governors.
Don't blame the messenger. Don't Wait For Everybody - Episode 015 Chloe Humbert Dec 27, 2024
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