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Instead of running for President, billionaire Michael Bloomberg commits to shutting down coal plants and moving U.S. to clean energy ASAP.

Michael Bloomberg has been all over the news lately due to his potential presidential candidacy, however that’s far from his primary focus. Instead, he’s decided to put his attentions toward improving clean energy over the next 11 years.

He intends to accomplish this through a project he refers to as ‘the ‘Beyond Carbon’ initiative - a grassroots effort to move as fast as possible away from oil and gas and towards total clean energy. The initiative admirably aims to close all coal-fired power plants by 2030.

"While there would be no higher honor than serving as president, my highest obligation as a citizen is to help the country the best way I can, right now. That's what I'll do, including the launch of a new effort called Beyond Carbon," the entrepreneur, philanthropist, and three term mayor tweeted.

The statement he published (which can be viewed on bloomberg.com) addresses the suggestions he run for president, the realism he sees in the struggle to get the Democratic nomination, and most importantly the understated, bipartisan importance of upping the anti in America’s fight to curtail climate change.

And he’s already taken several steps to combat that long before the 2020 presidential candidacy was a twinkle in anyone’s eye.

Since 2011, the billionaire turned climate Advocate has worked with Sierra Club to close many of the coal-fired plants and replace them with cleaner energy. His results speak for themselves.

“By organizing and mobilizing communities affected by the harmful pollution of coal-fired power plants, we have helped close more than half the nation’s plants — 285 out of 530 — and replaced them with cleaner and cheaper energy. That was the single biggest reason the U.S. has been able to reduce its carbon footprint by 11 percent — and cut deaths from coal power plants from 13,000 to 3,000,” wrote Bloomberg.

The progress Bloomberg’s seen so far plays an undeniable role in his decision to distance himself from talking and focus on action.

“Should I devote the next two years to talking about my ideas and record, knowing that I might never win the Democratic nomination? Or should I spend the next two years doubling down on the work that I am already leading and funding, and that I know can produce real and beneficial results for the country, right now?”

Scientists, and the Environmental Protection Agency say that we likely have only 50 to 75 years before the effects of climate change get much more intolerable. Bloomberg is one of many who believes we have to make big moves to change that projection NOW.

“Mother Nature does not wait on our political calendar, and neither can we,” he warned.

Is Bloomberg still considering a 2020, presidential run? Possibly. But what he's expressed thus far makes it clear that everything comes second to climate and environmental concerns.

We need more people in positions of power like him to prioritize saving our planet. Without bipartisan efforts, it will be difficult to make major movement happen. Hopefully many more, regardless of how they lean, will realize this issue far outweighs any political power play and follow suit.

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On grief and gratitude: saying goodbye to President Obama.

The movers unloaded the furniture and personal items at the Obamas' new D.C. residence, and I find myself ill-prepared to say goodbye.

I've been shuffling through the past few weeks in a haze, clinging to the first family's final moments in the White House, lost in what can only be described as a kind of grief.

President Barack Obama cries as he speaks during his farewell address in Chicago. Photo by Joshua Lott/AFP/Getty Images.

I don’t have to agree with my president. I don’t have to want to share a beer with him or want to be his friend. But win or lose, I want my president to be just that: my president.

I want him to think of me or, more accurately, people like me. People who don’t look like him, act like him, or necessarily agree with him. I want him to consider people who live a world away from him in class, geography, age, and upbringing. I want my president to listen to demonstrators and respond not with threats or aggression but with compassion and be open to criticism and feedback. I want my president to have some respect for this country and its citizens, whether they voted for him or not.

I grieve not for the man who’s leaving, but for the people who stand to lose when he departs.

His successor campaigned on and is setting into motion a wave of policy changes that threaten the health, safety, and well-being of millions of Americans.

I grieve for the people who may lose their access to their medical insurance and affordable health care, including from clinics like Planned Parenthood. I grieve for the people of color, Muslims, and Jews who fear for their safety in the wake of brutal hate crimes and the sexual assault survivors who may be reminded of their own attacks every single time this man takes the podium. I grieve for the refugees and immigrants who face uncertain futures, no matter how long they've called this country home. And I grieve for the LGBTQ individuals, couples, and families who fear their marriages and civil rights are on the chopping block.  

Whether they voted for him, against him, or not at all, millions of people — many of them already vulnerable — will be left to deal with the consequences of this president-elect's decisions. I think of all this, and I grieve.

Obama greets kids at the U.S. embassy in Nairobi, Kenya. Official White House Photo by Pete Souza/Flickr.

I still remember listening to Kanye West’s “Touch the Sky” no less than a dozen times the day after Obama was elected.

I held my head high on Wednesday, Nov. 5, 2008, my old, crappy earbuds falling out and lovingly replaced with each confident step.

Two months later, I cheered, hollered, and shed a small frozen tear at his chilly inauguration. Nothing could dim my shine. My president was black.

Obama tours Kenai Fjords National Park by boat. Official White House Photo by Pete Souza/Flickr.

But it was more than that.

My president believed in education. He read books. Lots of them. He trusted good science. He encouraged children (and grown-ups) to invent, create, code, and think their way to a better world.

Obama sits with a Lego statue during preparations for the South by South Lawn event at the White House.  Official White House Photo by Pete Souza/Medium.

My president was put together. He was mature and cool under pressure. He carried himself with the gravitas, passion, and self-deprecating sense of humor his position demanded, even when it would've been easier to resort to vicious attacks.

Obama in the Rose Garden. Official White House Photo by Pete Souza/Flickr.

My president was accessible. Maybe not, "here's my cell phone number" accessible, but he opened the doors of the White House to welcome diverse performers, experts, civilians, nonprofit leaders, children, and more from across the nation and around the world, even starting his own Big Block of Cheese Day. He made the White House "our" house again.

Obama  talks with Girl Scouts, from Tulsa, Oklahoma, at the White House Science Fair in 2015. Official White House Photo by Chuck Kennedy/Flickr.

My president was kind. He smiled around kids. He paid attention to people from all walks of life. He doted on his wife. His daughters seemed to adore him. He was well respected, affable, and compassionate.

My president made me proud. And for that, I am eternally grateful.

President Obama and first lady Michelle Obama join hands with Rep. John Lewis (D-Georgia) as they lead the walk across the Edmund Pettus Bridge to commemorate the 50th anniversary of Bloody Sunday and the Selma to Montgomery civil rights marches, in Selma, Alabama. Official White House Photo by Lawrence Jackson/Flickr.

President Obama wasn’t perfect. Far from it.

He approached issues at home and abroad in ways I didn’t always agree with, and without the sense of urgency some situations required. From his use of drone strikes to the delays and silence at Standing Rock and multiple moments and missteps in between. I often wonder how much more he could have accomplished, how much further we’d be today if he’d acted with the progressive courage we saw on the campaign trail in 2008.

Obama takes a call in the Oval Office. Official White House Photo by Pete Souza/Flickr.

Still, I will remember his presidency fondly. On Inauguration Day, I will grieve. Then, I will get back to work.

That former grad student blasting old Kanye still remembers how good it felt to have hope. How strong and powerful I felt when I spoke up and knew my voice was heard. We all deserve to feel that, and feel respected by our elected leaders, no matter who is in the White House.

A lot of things change with a new administration, but doing what's right and treating people with respect should not.

The president's wave aligns with a rainbow as he boards Air Force One. Official White House Photo by Pete Souza/Flickr.

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21 powerful photos show what life inside a Japanese internment camp was like.

Dorothea Lange's work was hidden away for more than 60 years.

When the U.S. government hired photographer Dorothea Lange in 1942, she thought she'd be documenting history for the world to see.

After spending much of the 1930s snapping candid shots of Americans during the Great Depression, Lange was offered the chance to document Japanese-American internment camps during World War II.

While she was personally opposed to internment, Lange accepted the government's offer in hopes that her work would provide a valuable record of events for future generations.

Tenant farmer of Japanese ancestry who has just completed settlement of their affairs and everything is packed ready for evacuation in Woodland, California. All photos by Dorothea Lange/National Archives.

Flag of allegiance pledge at Raphael Weill Public School in San Francisco, California.

Grandfather of Japanese ancestry teaching his little grandson to walk at this War Relocation Authority center for evacuees at Manzanar Relocation Center, Manzanar, California.

For more than 60 years, Lange's work sat in the National Archives, hidden from public view.

U.S. military officials were unhappy with Lange's honest and sympathetic look at what life was like for the more than 110,000 people living in internment camps and, as a result, seized her work and locked it away.

It wasn't until the 2006 release of "Impounded: Dorothea Lange and the Censored Images of Japanese American Internment" that many of Lange's suppressed images resurfaced in a meaningful way.

Saturday afternoon shoppers reading an order directing evacuation of persons of Japanese ancestry. This store on Grant Avenue in Chinatown was vacated by an art dealer of Japanese descent.

Kimiko Kitagaki, a young evacuee guarding the family baggage prior to departure by bus in one half hour to Tanforan Assembly Center in Oakland, California.

Making artificial flowers in the art school at this War Relocation Authority center for evacuees of Japanese ancestry at Manzanar Relocation Center, Manzanar, California.

Though the government has never offered an explanation for why Lange's photos were held, the reasoning is pretty clear: They showed us a glimpse of the internees' humanity.

The decision to house Japanese-Americans in internment camps is largely looked back on as a scar on American history. In issuing Executive Order 9066 and authorizing the internment camps on Feb. 19, 1942, President Franklin D. Roosevelt embraced the fear of the "other," a sentiment that directly opposed the famous line from his first inaugural address, "The only thing we have to fear is fear itself."

Japanese mother, wife of interned Shinto priest with youngest of her nine children who are American born in San Francisco, California.

A young evacuee looks out the window of bus before it starts for Tanforan Assembly Center in San Francisco, California.

The first contingent of evacuees of Japanese ancestry board the buses for assembly centers in San Francisco, California.

Two years later, in 1944, Roosevelt suspended the executive order, beginning the process of closing the internment camps, but the damage was done.

Internees were released, though for many, they no longer had a home. Even worse, the government did nothing to help them financially. Japanese-Americans were forced to rebuild their lives from scratch. The entire ordeal was one injustice after another as none of the internees had done anything to deserve being forcibly uprooted and detained.

Residents of Japanese ancestry file forms containing personal data two days before evacuation in San Francisco, California.

An early comer arrives with personal effects in San Francisco, California.

Street scene of barrack homes at this War Relocation Authority Center at Manzanar Relocation Center, Manzanar, California.

It wasn't until 1988 that the U.S. offered any sort of formal apology or reparations to surviving detainees.

President Ronald Reagan signed the Civil Liberties Act of 1988, which called internment "a grave injustice" and acknowledged that "these actions were carried out without adequate security reasons and without any acts of espionage or sabotage ... motivated largely by racial prejudice, wartime hysteria, and a failure of political leadership."

Each surviving internee received $20,000.

In 1991, President George H.W. Bush issued another formal apology to those affected by internment:

"In remembering, it is important to come to grips with the past. No nation can fully understand itself or find its place in the world if it does not look with clear eyes at all the glories and disgraces of its past. We in the United States acknowledge such an injustice in our history. The internment of Americans of Japanese ancestry was a great injustice, and it will never be repeated."

It's with that in mind that Lange's photos remain essential today.

Making camouflage nets for the War Department at the Manzanar Relocation Center, Manzanar, California.

Guayule beds in the lath house at the Manzanar Relocation Center, Manzanar, California.

High school boys on balcony of Japanese American Citizens League in San Francisco, California.

Today, as the country grapples with threats of war and terrorism, some are suggesting that we once again implement this sort of wide-range racial stereotyping.

On Nov. 16, 2016, one of Donald Trump's supporters appeared on Fox News' "The Kelly File" to advocate for a Muslim registry. Asked about the legality of such a program, proposed by the president-elect, Trump supporter Carl Higbie cited Japanese internment to support his position that the U.S. could and should create a database of Muslims in the U.S.

This is the exact wrong lesson to be taken away from what happened during World War II. If we are to once again cave to a fear of the "other," we'll only be setting ourselves up for future shame over human rights abuses.

Field laborers of Japanese ancestry in front of Wartime Civil Control Administration station in Byron, California.

A child evacuee of Japanese ancestry gets a haircut at Manzanar Relocation Center, Manzanar, California.

An art school wall has been established in this assembly center in San Bruno, California.

Lange's photos are essential artifacts of American history, and it's no wonder that they've been getting increased attention in late 2016.

On Dec. 6, 2016, Tim Chambers of Anchor Editions devoted a blog post to Lange's "lost" photos, publishing in honor of the 75th anniversary of the Pearl Harbor attack. In addition to his blog post, he's selling prints of Lange's work, donating half of the proceeds to the ACLU, a group that fought for the rights of those detained during Japanese internment and has vowed to push back on efforts to create religious or ethnicity-based profiling.

Greenhouse on nursery operated, before evacuation, by horticultural experts of Japanese ancestry in San Leandro, California.

A young evacuee arrives at 2020 Van Ness Avenue, meeting place of first contingent to be removed from San Francisco to Santa Anita Park Assembly center at Arcadia, California.

Residents of Japanese ancestry appear for registration prior to evacuation in San Francisco, California.

As Bush said, "No nation can fully understand itself or find its place in the world if it does not look with clear eyes at all the glories and disgraces of its past." Lange's work, in its pain and its beauty, reminds us of the disgraceful past we must never return to.

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What a Muslim mom said to her daughter about the election — and what you can say, too.

Muna Hussaini walked into her polling station near Austin, Texas, with her daughter on Election Day. Her excitement was weighed down by fear.

Now a mother of two, Hussaini was born and raised in the United States to immigrant parents from India. But as a Muslim woman who wears hijab, she's seen firsthand the angry and xenophobic rhetoric that still plagues this country. Sometimes, she still feels unsafe in her rightful home.

"This election has wreaked havoc on our family as Muslims, who have continued to look on in horror as women, Latinos, Blacks, gays ... so many have been denigrated," she confessed in a private post to tens of thousands of strangers in Pantsuit Nation, a secret Facebook group. (Her post is shared here with permission.)

"These people and their views will still be here after the election. And who will now be walking around with a target on their back?"

Photo by Muna Hussaini, used with permission.

Hussaini watched her 8-year-old daughter press the buttons in the voting booth. She cried.

"Is it true, Mom, do Obama and Hillary think it's OK for two men to marry each other?" her daughter asked. "That's what one kid said at school today and why I should vote for Trump."

Hussaini replied: "Baby, what if tomorrow someone said we can't eat meat because it's against their religious beliefs?"

Her daughter paused to process the thought before agreeing that it wouldn't be fair.

"That's right, sweet love," Hussaini said. "That's the beauty of democracy in the USA. No one's religion gets to be more important than other people's beliefs. That's called separation of church and state. And you can't pick and choose, otherwise tomorrow, someone will get to tell Mommy to take her scarf off. If two dads want to marry, we have to fight for their right to do so. We have to show up and vote."

Photo by Sean Gallup/Getty Images.

Tuesday morning was full of hope and inspiration for the Hussaini family. But the next day, they woke up to an opposite feeling.

Like many parents, Hussaini tries not to push too many worldviews on her daughter. But on Wednesday morning after Election Day, that was simply unavoidable.

Her daughter was terrified of being kicked out of the country she was born in, with an impenetrable wall between her and her friends. She asked, in detail, questions about passports, contingencies, and travel plans and whether it was even safe for her to go school.

Hussaini did her best to explain how the government works — that there's a Constitution and three separate branches with a system of checks and balances built in to make sure no one has too much power.

She told her daughter, "We want to be positive, because as Americans, we believe in our laws and [that] people are generally good" — even though, she noted, she wasn't even sure if she believed those words herself.

But sometimes, she said, you need to believe in something, even if it's just to hearing yourself say it. Sometimes that's what it takes to get by.

Photo by Andrew Biraj/AFP/Getty Images.

"What would be helpful [now] is knowing I'm not alone," Hussaini told me. "That if hate comes out in full force that I can keep my family safe."

"I'm an American citizen, born and raised, and I don't feel safe or comfortable. I don't know when my rights are going to be infringed upon and if they will, what I am supposed to do.

I want to know that my freedom of religion is covered.

I want to know that my freedom of speech is still safe.





I want to know that America is still for me."

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