Wooden stakes bearing pictures of young men were driven into the yellow sands of Copacabana beach this week, opposite Rio de Janeiro's swanky hotels on Avenida Atlantica where 300 mayors and their entourages were staying during the C40 World Mayors Summit. Smiling up at the mayors in their hotel suites were photographs of four officers killed in what was the deadliest police raid in Brazilian history, just a few days before the summit.
In 1988, the United States entered into its worst drought since the Dust Bowl. Crops withered in fields nationwide, part of an estimated $60bn in damage ($160bn in 2025). Dust storms swept the midwest and northern Great Plains. Cities instituted water restrictions. That summer, unrelentingly hot temperatures killed between 5,000 and 10,000 people, and Yellowstone national park suffered the worst wildfire in its history.