This and that for your Thursday reading.

– David Lurie is rightly appalled by the Trump regime’s nihilism, combining insatiable greed for whatever it can seize with a willingness to destroy anything it can’t. But Harold Meyerson discusses how Minnesota has managed to force the most violent of Trump’s minions into retreat. 

– Dharna Noor reports on Trump’s handout to billionaire polluters in the form by making climate denialism official U.S. policy. Andrea Thompson discusses how public health will suffer as a result, while Molly Taft examines the policy chaos which will be created. And each of Katharine Hayhoe and Jonathan Levy et al. review the utter lack of any evidentiary support for Trump’s idiocy. 

– Filippo Menczer examines how AI bots can pollute a political information environment to the point of threatening democracy. And Tom Chivers reports on the warnings – and in some cases resignations – of people working on artificial intelligence who see their employers choosing to endanger the public. 

– Alan Elrod writes about the reality that gambling on all manner of political and social outcomes is best set up as the next widespread form of addiction in the U.S. 

– Finally, Leigh Kimmins reports on the details of meetings between Alberta separatists and Trump officials eager to foment unrest and division. And Don Braid discusses both how many Albertans would choose to stay in Canada rather than  surrendering to the U.S., and how federalists are fighting back.