Welcome to Axis ProRata, a podcast that takes just 10 minutes to get you smarter on the collision of tech, business, and politics.

I'm Dan Premack. On today's show, President Trump's mostly empty threat against General Motors and the new startup that wants to take on Amazon.

But first, the big climate report. So last week, the Trump administration released this massive report on climate change,

written by scientists at 13 federal agencies and then peer reviewed, which estimated that

certain sectors of the U.S. economy could eventually face annual losses of hundreds of billions

of dollars unless we quickly accelerate efforts to slash carbon emissions.

And to be honest, that was really only the beginning of the list of possible economic and human horribles.

Now, if you miss the news, that's understandable, because the White House chose to release the report on the Friday after Thanksgiving

when most people are focused on rampaging through shopping malls.

And then once reporters did begin asking about it, this was the reply from President Trump.

I don't believe it.

You don't believe it?

No, no, I don't believe it.

And then yesterday, another reporter question and this reply from White House Press Secretary Sarah Sanders.

We think that this is the most extreme version, and it's not based on facts. It's based on, it's

not data driven. We'd like to see something that is more data driven. It's based on modeling,

which is extremely hard to do when you're talking about the climate. So first, remember,

it was President Trump's own administration that released the report he thinks is bogus. And as for

Sanders, someone needs to remind her that the models

were based on data. Kind of like the models that provide us with this Friday's forecast are based

on data. It's not a guarantee, but it is our best estimate of what's coming next. Anyway, the bottom

line here is that the White House just cannot be convinced to care about climate change. We might

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