The solution isn’t ozempic. The solution is getting food conglomerates to stop using addictive salts and oils. Rebuild cities to prioritize bikes and walkability. Get people off their phones and video games. Restructure the economy, to have fewer sedentary jobs.

"people are less likely to be obese or have diabetes if they live in cities where walking and cycling is safe and convenient" The work of land use planners and transportation engineers is directly connected to public health.

This is literal treason

How did we get stuck with both planned obsolescence and forever chemicals. Like pick one

No it doesn't (Acemoglu and Robinson, 2019).

Elon has long hated public transit, which he thinks carries a bunch of “serial killers.” He instead wants everyone to drive a car (preferably a Tesla). Now he has government power & is trying to kill off CA’s high speed rail project. It’s called killing off the competition. 🧵

Every car crash death is—by definition—sudden, violent and traumatic. Those killed are disproportionately young and healthy. Car crashes are not accidents but the predictable, preventable, inevitable result of a transportation system that mandates driving everywhere all the time.

It's just so tricky to figure out if vaccines work or not Let's look at polio. The data isn't clear We may never know

Andrew Carnegie believed a free public library was the key to mass enlightenment. Lenin famously lost his mind visiting the New York Public Library, amazed at this equalizing resource Modern people are like "Free books? At the public-Starbucks-without-coffee? No thanks."

After leaving the Navy in 1953, Jimmy Carter made so little money that he and his family had to live in public housing in Plains, GA. We’re so used to impossibly wealthy politicians that it’s important to remember it wasn’t always that way. RIP

the fact that someone would drive from 61st st to 79th st (less than 1 mile) when it’s served by multiple subway lines is *exactly* why congestion pricing is sorely needed

Make no mistake: this is the result of decades of terrible land-use policy in California that has allowed and encouraged housing growth in the wildland urban interface and inhibits it in existing cities and suburbs

Left: $50 billion cost of *one* set of LA wildfires Right: $18 billion cost of Bernie Sanders's Green New Deal proposal to increase firefighter funding to deal with wildfires

my favorite New York City stat is that two thirds of all train trips in the entire country take place in the NYC area

If you want to build a social democracy like Denmark, you can't be an anarchist. That kind of society *requires* high levels of social trust, which you can only get if people think the rules apply to everyone and if there are strong norms against rule breaking. Pay the fare!

Hey, Dems. Stop saying Trump cut funding for the “Bipartisan Infrastructure Act,” & start saying “Trump defunded our roads & bridges.” Focus on the concrete actions that impact everyday Americans. Messaging & language matter.

one of the most frustrating things about DOGE is that there is so much genuine waste in the federal government—bloated defense contracts, infrastructure that costs 10x to build in the US vs peer nations, etc—but we’re arguing about fucking Politico subscriptions

Ronald Dahl wrote this about his daughter’s measles illness

Join your local planning and zoning boards.

If you want to know where we're headed if we continue to allow NIMBYs to dominate our urban politics in the United States -- just look across the pond at the UK. This is end-stage NIMBYism, which looks a lot like end-stage climate denial. Because ... they're the same thing.