Editor’s Note: Dean Obeidallah, a former attorney, is the host of SiriusXM radio’s daily program “The Dean Obeidallah Show.” Follow him @DeanObeidallah@masto.ai. The opinions expressed in this commentary are his own. View more opinion on CNN.

CNN
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Last year, GOP Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia spoke at a white nationalist event organized by Holocaust denier Nick Fuentes that caused Republican leaders to denounce her.

Last week, Greene’s Twitter account was temporarily suspended by the Elon Musk-headed platform over a tweet with a graphic referring to a “Trans Day of Vengeance,” as she denounced a planned transgender rights rally.

And come Tuesday, Greene has announced plans to protest in New York City when former President Donald Trump is expected to be arraigned on an indictment of more than 30 counts, calling the proceedings against him an “unconstitutional WITCH HUNT!”

But on Sunday, Greene was featured on CBS’ “60 Minutes” in an interview the long-running show promoted on Twitter with the tease: “Republican Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, nicknamed MTG, isn’t afraid to share her opinions, no matter how intense and in-your-face they are. She sits down with Lesley Stahl this Sunday on 60 Minutes.” The images attached to this tweet by “60 Minutes” include Greene and Stahl walking through the US Capitol, taking a stroll outside and Greene showing Stahl something on her phone.

In the segment that aired Sunday night, Stahl noted the congresswoman had moved from the fringe to the GOP’s front row in two years despite a “sharp tongue” and “some pretty radical views” as well as “over the top” comments such as “the Democrats are a party of pedophiles.” Stahl also referred to video of Greene chasing a Parkland, Florida, school shooting survivor, still maintaining that the 2020 election was stolen and failing to criticize Trump over spending. (The interview was conducted before news of his indictment.)

But Stahl didn’t mention Greene spoke at a white nationalist event a year ago while a member of Congress or her extreme anti-Muslim views and her defense of January 6 rioters.

Criticism of CBS for amplifying Greene has been swift and well-deserved even before the program aired. Former GOP Rep. Adam Kinzinger of Illinois tweeted beforehand: “Wow. Insane that 60 min would do this.” (Kinzinger is a CNN senior political commentator.)

Journalist Molly Jong-Fast also slammed “60 Minutes” with the tweet: “Attention is currency and 60 minutes is spending its currency on the Jewish space lasers woman.” (Jong-Fast was apparently referring to Greene’s past claim that a massive California wildfire was started by “a laser” beamed from space controlled by a prominent Jewish banking family.)

David Hogg, who survived the 2018 horrific school shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland and has since become an activist against gun violence, responded, “I look forward to your questions about why she thinks school shootings are fake and why she’s supported QAnon.”

Greene amplified the conspiracy theory — two years before being elected to Congress — that the Parkland shooting that took 17 lives was staged. And in 2019, Greene appeared on video confronting Hogg outside the Capitol when he was championing laws to save lives from gun violence, screaming that the then-teenager was a “coward.” She also called Hogg “#littleHitler” on social media.

Greene’s own tweet promoting Sunday’s segment was not filled with her typical smears of “fake news” when she doesn’t like the coverage. Rather, Greene urged people to tune in as she praised “60 Minutes” host Stahl (and misspelled her first name): “It was an honor to spend a few days with the legendary icon Leslie Stahl and talented crew @60Minutes.” Greene added, “Leslie is a trailblazer for women in journalism. And while we may disagree on some issues, I respect her greatly.”

Now, it is true that “60 Minutes” over its 50-plus-year history has featured what the show has dubbed “controversial” guests. These include a 2000 interview with Oklahoma City bomber Timothy McVeigh, whose 1995 terrorist attack left 168 dead, including 19 children. And the show did a 1979 interview with Iran’s Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini.

Perhaps “60 Minutes” views Greene — who has repeatedly downplayed and even defended the January 6, 2021, attack plus called for the GOP to become the party of “Christian nationalism” — in the vein of its long list of controversial guests. (CBS had not responded to a request from CNN for comment at time of publishing.)

However, the choice of Greene as a guest instantly recalls the comments of then-CBS CEO Les Moonves during Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign when he admitted that Trump’s candidacy “may not be good for America, but it’s damn good for CBS.” Moonves added, “The money’s rolling in and this is fun. … (T)his is going to be a very good year for us,” concluding, “Sorry. It’s a terrible thing to say. But bring it on, Donald. Keep going.”

Moonves may be gone from CBS, but it appears his mindset continues at “60 Minutes.” And that may be good for “60 Minutes,” but it’s definitely not good for America.

CNN
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Air pollution spiked to unhealthy levels around the world in 2021, according to a new report.

The report by IQAir, a company that tracks global air quality, found that average annual air pollution in every country — and 97% of cities — exceeded the World Health Organization’s air quality guidelines, which were designed to help governments craft regulations to protect public health.

Only 222 cities of the 6,475 analyzed had average air quality that met WHO’s standard. Three territories were found to have met WHO guidelines: the French territory of New Caledonia and the United States territories of Puerto Rico and the US Virgin Islands.

India, Pakistan and Bangladesh were among the countries with the worst air pollution, exceeding the guidelines by at least 10 times.

The Scandinavian countries, Australia, Canada, Japan and United Kingdom ranked among the best countries for air quality, with average levels that exceeded the guidelines by 1 to 2 times.

In the United States, IQAir found air pollution exceeded WHO guidelines by 2 to 3 times in 2021.

“This report underscores the need for governments around the world to help reduce global air pollution,” Glory Dolphin Hammes, CEO of IQAir North America, told CNN. “(Fine particulate matter) kills far too many people every year and governments need to set more stringent air quality national standards and explore better foreign policies that promote better air quality.”

Above: IQAir analyzed average annual air quality for more than 6,000 cities and categorized them from best air quality, in blue (Meets WHO PM2.5 guildline) to worst, in purple (Exceeds WHO PM2.5 guideline by over 10 times). An interactive map is available from IQAir.

It’s the first major global air quality report based on WHO’s new annual air pollution guidelines, which were updated in September 2021. The new guidelines halved the acceptable concentration of fine particulate matter — or PM 2.5 — from 10 down to 5 micrograms per cubic meter.

PM 2.5 is the tiniest pollutant yet also among the most dangerous. When inhaled, it travels deep into lung tissue where it can enter the bloodstream. It comes from sources like the burning of fossil fuels, dust storms and wildfires, and has been linked to a number of health threats including asthma, heart disease and other respiratory illnesses.

Millions of people die each year from air quality issues. In 2016, around 4.2 million premature deaths were associated with fine particulate matter, according to WHO. If the 2021 guidelines had been applied that year, WHO found there could have been nearly 3.3 million fewer pollution-related deaths.

IQAir analyzed pollution-monitoring stations in 6,475 cities across 117 countries, regions and territories.

In the US, air pollution spiked in 2021 compared to 2020. Out of the more than 2,400 US cities analyzed, Los Angeles air remained the most polluted, despite seeing a 6% decrease compared to 2020. Atlanta and Minneapolis saw significant increases in pollution, the report showed.

“The (United States’) reliance on fossil fuels, increasing severity of wildfires as well as varying enforcement of the Clean Air Act from administration to administration have all added to U.S. air pollution,” the authors wrote.

Researchers say the main sources of pollution in the US were fossil fuel-powered transportation, energy production and wildfires, which wreak havoc on the country’s most vulnerable and marginalized communities.

“We are heavily dependent on fossil fuels, especially in terms of transportation,” said Hammes, who lives a few miles from Los Angeles. “We can act smartly on this with zero emissions, but we’re still not doing it. And this is having a devastating impact on the air pollution that we’re seeing in major cities.”

Climate change-fueled wildfires played a significant role in reducing air quality in the US in 2021. The authors pointed to a number of fires that led to hazardous air pollution — including the Caldor and Dixie fires in California, as well as the Bootleg Fire in Oregon, which wafted smoke all the way to the East Coast in July.

China — which is among the countries with the worst air pollution — showed improved air quality in 2021. More than half of the Chinese cities analyzed in the report saw lower levels of air pollution compared to the previous year. The capital city of Beijing continued a five-year trend of improved air quality, according to the report, due to a policy-driven drawdown of polluting industries in the city.

The report also found that the Amazon Rainforest, which had acted as the world’s major defender against the climate crisis, emitted more carbon dioxide than it absorbed last year. Deforestation and wildfires have threatened the critical ecosystem, polluted the air and contributed to climate change.

“This is all a part of the formula that will lead to or is leading to global warming.” Hammes said.

The report also unveiled some inequalities: Monitoring stations remain scant in some developing countries in Africa, South America and the Middle East, resulting in a dearth of air quality data in those regions.

“When you don’t have that data, you’re really in the dark,” Hammes said.

Hammes noted the African country of Chad was included in the report for the first time, due to an improvement in its monitoring network. IQAir found the country’s air pollution was the second-highest in the world last year, behind Bangladesh.

Tarik Benmarhnia, a climate change epidemiologist at Scripps Institution of Oceanography who has studied the health impact of wildfire smoke, also noted that relying only on monitoring stations can lead to blind spots in these reports.

“I think it is great that they relied on different networks and not only governmental sources,” Benmarhnia, who was not involved in this report, told CNN. “However, many regions do not have enough stations and alternative techniques exist.”

The UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change concluded in its 2021 report that, in addition to slowing the speed of global warming, curbing the use of fossil fuels would have the added benefit of improving air quality and public health.

Hammes said the IQAir report is even more reason for the world to wean off fossil fuel.

“We’ve got the report, we can read it, we can internalize it and really devote ourselves to taking action,” she said. “There needs to be a major move towards renewable energy. We need to take drastic action in order to reverse the tide of global warming; otherwise, the impact and the train that we’re on (would be) irreversible.”