Let's all first be adults and admit that the Green New Deal IS a joke. The authors are politicians with neither common sense or, in case of AOC, any sense. There are real environmental issues that need addressing particularly in poorer nations. However, in order to achieve true change the world must first spend its resources on bringing energy to the poor. With power plants and energy come progress, education, and prosperity. Prosperity, then, allows the former poor countries to address environmental issues. But the arrogance of liberal politicians is reprehensible. Rather than addressing real issues they predict world wide catastrophe's that must be addressed, NOW! And, only THEY can save the planet! What an absurd and diabolical lie they sell our children every day until our brain washed youth have actual anxiety and fear over a phantom disaster. To be sure; not one climate change disaster predicted by the idiot Gore and those lined up after him have come true. There is nothing man can do to affect or effect the climate on this earth. But pay homage and trillions to the government of liberal fear mongering and ye all will be saved! The science isn't settled. The '97% of all scientist' is a lie and every day we learn that our climate is a complex, natural, phenom.
President Trump is an obnoxious, arrogant street brawler to be sure. But he spot on when it comes to man made climate change. At least he has common sense.
4
It's easy for Trump to mock climate change because he will be long dead before climate change kicks into high gear with obvious increases in devastating weather, drought due to higher temperatures, and famine drives millions into mass migration.
The dead won't mourn the living; but by then the living may envy the dead...
4
Agree totally with you and Leanhardt but I note that neither of you mention Governor Jay Inslee of Washington State who is a declared presidential candidate running on this issue. He will be on CNN tonight. Once again, are you east coast ‘elite’ pundits ignoring the rest of the country? That is dangerous.
If you don’t even mention Inslee you are missing a voice that supports our cause.
3
Every republican I know, and that’s hundreds, reject global warming as an important concern, think wasting serious money on it is foolish, and believe democrats are tree hugging Neanderthals. And they are far more practiced and competent of sending barbs than any democrat.
And all republicans hate the idea that any of their personal money gets used for such purposes.
They will laugh off the taunts and, with massive funding from the fossil fuel industry, crush democratic efforts
This is existential for the America w ants to create—a dominant commodities exporting country to rival Russia, Saudi Arabia and Brazil. Does not take much brain to dig coal out of the ground and ship,it. That’s Trump’s view of future American greatness. Money wins.
1
Gosh, seems like some evil genius is writing the D/lib/prog play book. Where can I send a contribution.
Mr. Friedman, if you think that climate change is the key to defeating Trump, you are as looney as the bullpen of Democratic challengers that make Trump look almost normal.
The Democrats lost the electoral votes of Midwestern working-class families in 2016 after Obama chased them away with eight years of ceaseless race-hustling and LGBT gender pimping.
You will not get those working-class voters back hustling something as esoteric as climate change.
3
Count me in. Trump versus the Green New Deal, I can hardly wait. Okay, we tried collusion, that was a flameout, but we have him this time.
2
"A Green Real Deal will put the president on the defensive in the next election."
No it won't.
It won't even get a tweet from him.
2
Polls shows that a large majority of people put climate change way at the bottom of their list of priority concerns.
While some people may see a catastrophic weather event, and jump to the conclusion the weather is going to destroy civilization, a far greater majority understand catastrophic weather events have been the norm since the dawn of humanity which happened to have occureed well before the industrial revolution.
If the most ardent and concerned climate alarmists are not willing to give up their fossil fueled lifestyle, and still clamor to purchase coastal property allegedly going under water, they obviously are not that concerned so why should anyone else be?
This is all to say climate change is a political issue only in so far as to ensure the far left votes which has nothing to do with Trump.
1
It doesn't help when Friedman tries to argue there are more severe weather events as a result of global warming. In fact, there is no statistically significant evidence that is the case. Meanwhile, it is a fact them earth is 17% greener due to increased plant food in the form of CO2. Deserts were expanding rapidly worldwide back in the 60s, but the situation has reversed due to CO2 emissions. The point is, there are a lot of exaggerated claims made by the global warming, alarmist side along with "educated guessing" and so forth. Meanwhile, the left opposes nuclear power which is the only currently available substitute for fossil fuels. Wind and solar simply can't get the job done. So, Trump, once again, shows he has more common sense than the media and the international left.
1
While I agree with all your well-founded alarm about climate change, I advise against making it a top-line campaign issue. Just read the comments on this article: talking about it really riles up the deniers and reinforces hatred of all things "liberal." It feeds the narrative that liberals (represented by Democrats) just want to take things from you (cars, air travel, eating meat, etc.) and generally try to run your life via "the Government." Nothing will happen to address climate change of we don't get a political change. Worry first about getting elected. This issue won't do it.
6
The people who care about coral reefs and the wildlife in Africa are already on board the Real Deal Train.
For the deniers, what about a commercial on what not acting is already costing us in dollars and cents?
38
@Southern Az
The Climate Alarmism Kool-aid drinkers still have a lot to learn about science.
There is a difference between politicization of science, and science.
There are many scientists who buy into climate alarmism.
There are many, many, more, who don't.
But they will never get any space or recognition from a media culture with an agenda.
@Southern Az African wildlife is threatened by human population growth with habitat loss - I don't see any mention of population growth issues addressed here. Also - Cobalt is an essential element in all Lithium batteries. Cobalt is a by product from copper mining - primarily from vast open pit mines in southern Democratic Republic of Congo and northern Zambia - Loss of previous pristine Miombo woodland with vast herds of large african game - never to be rehabilitated.
3
@Objectivist Who are those scientists?
10
Story well told, now getting the message out to all of America will be the true test of our citizens accepting natures might.
Speaking these words must generate awareness of this inevitable disaster. Much more likely than the southern border
"crisis".
2
I regret to inform you that most of your proposed ads will be ineffective. They also raise a lot of questions:
1) Solar energy employs more workers than coal, gas and oil? I don't suppose they are counting gas station employees, and I don't imagine I'll be the only person to notice that.
2) The wind turbine ad seems good as written.
3) The Cyclone Idai ad doesn't cut it... the link between that and extinction of big mammals is too tenuous to be meaningful, especially to people without a background in science.
4) To Trump's supporters, the Great Barrier Reef might as well be on the other side of the planet... oh wait, it is. And Trump's supporters are not going to Australia. If the Cyclone Idai ad is too tenuous, this one is worse.
The idea on which this column is based has merit, but needs a lot of work and even then is not guaranteed to get the job done.
Dan Kravitz
2
Until we identify the root cause of climate change, we will not be able to reverse the damage to the planet. That damage is due to population expansion, especially in areas that cannot sustain growth - third world and developing countries, and China (defined under the Paris Accord as a third world, developing country). It is the loss of fresh waters, the loss of forests, especially rain forests, and the utter pollution that more and more humans produce that is causing the environmental issues we face today.
Moreover, and the NYTimes and Mr. Friedman know this, the US could stop driving, flying, and pooping today and it would mean nothing as the developing world will still deposit sewage into the oceans, kill marine life for profit or sport, clear cut lands in fragile ecosystems, and seek limited resources to consume unabated. The US isn't perfect, but is far more regulated and has far more environmental legislation and laws than most countries, and all developing countries.
4
Repent: The End Is Near!
1
The yellow vests movement in France is all you need to consider if you want to know how enthused the vast majority of world citizens are about actually doing anything about climate change.
3
Pretty disingenuous opinion and attack on 'republicans' and 'Trump' when not one Dem voted for the green deal when brought to the floor.
It would seem that neither party knows what to do, or actually wants to do anything. But then, it's hard to buy into this panic of 12 years left to live when the US is but one country on a globe of many whom not only pollute with CO2, but continue to populate their countries that already struggle with access to the resources they need.
We need to stop over populating the planet!
1
Unfortunately, I don't see the corporate media being able to let go of their love for Trump. The "collusion delusion" acts like the red cape a matador uses to distract the big, powerful bull who, alas, is too stupid to see that he is being manipulated for show just before being killed on election day.
With the danger of 'collusion' fading when Mueller delivered his report to Barr, the media shifted to "tax returns" - a rich vein that no doubt will be mined til we are exhausted.
But, yeah, if the dems would ever get out of their own way and explain that green is cheap and billionaire Koch owned fossil fuel is expensive, we could all yet be winners.
Climate change is a scam.
1
Disagree. Show me an exit poll that shows climate change to be anywhere near the top of voters' concerns and I'll eat my hat.
12
@gregdn
Because politicians have not made it a top priority as it should be. My guess is that American people are sensitive to climate impacts and as such are ready to give it more importance than in the past.
5
@gregdn you are so wrong. Nothing more solidly defended by scientists than climate change. Nothing more inimical to humankind’s future than ignoring it
4
Wiping the smirk off Trump's face is not enough. Just like gradual
shifting away from dirty energy systems, we have to wipe off more than Trump's smirk.
Climate change is good for man. Man survives by adapting nature to man. Brutes survive by adapting to nature. Man must burn fossil fuels and change the climate. An unchanged climate will murder man. Man is a value to himself. Nature is a value only relative to man. There is no mystical value in nature. Sustain man. Exploit nature. Green is the color of money.
Thank you Tom! I hope the Democratic candidates are reading your columns.
3
Our world is losing to "ism", Mr Friedman. I know because Rush Limbaugh declared THE OPPOSITE long ago: "The environment cannot be destroyed. You cannot destroy the environment."
That self-congratulating voice bragged about the INDESTRUCTIBILITY of the natural world ad nauseum. That self-professed leader of Republicanism and his cousins of conservatism inject skepticism into science and pessimism into souls. Those citizens are conditioned to love the very apparatus securing their devotion. Install fear of liberalism, precursor to communism and atheism; and cement tribalism. "MAGA"
Mankind's fairly recent histories of colonialism, industrialism, militarism, and globalism is completing the selling-off and selling-out of the natural world. This administration's rush to sell drilling leases, to expand timber cutting, and to remove regulations from coal-to-energy production is the Republican Party's line in the sand.
"We own this. Investors and developers, we deliver this." On promise of prosperity and warning of empty plates, take everything.
Americans, present and future, were cheated when Donald Trump signed executive orders shrinking the Bears Ears and Grand Staircase–Escalante national monuments. Protected areas, like the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, become the politicians' bullseye for soliciting contributions because industry must market ITS INDESTRUCTIBILITY.
Markey and Ocasio-Cortez present the deal to take back everything. God speed.
2
This is further from the top of the issues most voters worry about. It’s really that simple. Focusing on it is a waste of time, except to pander to a base.
Reading the comments I see the overwhelming view is "The sky is Falling". Usually that sort of view is misplaced and says more about the character of the writer than actuality.
2
Climate change, as an election issue, barely has a heartbeat. If the Dems think global warming is the hot ticket, have at it.
2
As long as this fake science is pushed, facts must be published to refute it:
-Glaciers were Already Retreating Before 1900
-Ice ages have been coming and going for eons.
-The last 20 years have shown zero warming (hence the switch to 'climate change').
-Man produces less than 1/2 of 1 percent of C02 on the planet.
-It was warmer in the 15th century than it is now.
-The greatest warming in the 20th century was between 1935 and 1950.
-NASA confirms: Sea levels FALLING across the planet in 2016 and 2017.
-NASA Data: Earth Cooled by Half a Degree Celsius From '16-'18
-Scientists have been caught manipulating and hiding data.
-None, NONE, of their prior predictions have come true.
-In 1995 Al Gore said by 2005 Miami will be under water "due to Global warming". Miami is NOT underwater.
-The highest record temperature ever reported was 136 degrees Fahrenheit in Libya in 1922. The record high temperature for the United States was 134 degrees Fahrenheit in Death Valley, California in 1913.
-Excavations in the Antarctic have shown vegetation use to cover the continent.
2
The only climate scientists that are mentioned in the NYT are those that agree that any warming of the planet has to be man made. No one, and I mean no one, on the other side of the debate is mentioned, quoted, or even mocked as a heretic. Very poor journalism indeed.
1
“I assumed like everybody else, way back when everyone was talking about global warming and all that, I assumed that that was probably right, until I found out what it was going to cost.
- Sen. James Inhofe
(R) Oklahoma
“We love our poorly educated.”
- Donald Trump, Las Vegas, 2016
A great problem of our time is “self-serving reductionist thinking”. Politics, and many other aspects of life, have monetized this reductionism as partisan entertainment. However, to survive, we as “parts” need a much more expansive, altruistic, and thoughtful view of the “whole”. Will it be: “Science says climate change is real, how do we fix it”, or “acting on climate change would threaten my personal/donor income therefore its fake”. We’re at a critical time when only an intelligent “whole” view of social and biological systems will preserve unity and even life itself. We need to understand what “whole” means and live accordingly.
3
All the President needs to do is show the entire state of Rhode Island covered with solar panels to power NYC. Better yet, given Americans love affair with their cars, say Democrats are going to take them away in 10 years. Seems like a winning strategy to me. This is even stupider than calling for abolishing ICE.
Well trump has had one effect on the climate he didnt foresee.
All the flights being cancelled to America and all the tourists going to places that are more friendly and not so primitive.
Losing all the tourist bucks for America.
Millions being lost in tourism.
Bet you didnt see that did you trump as you munch on the burgers hunched over Twitter.
Poor Friedman, such an earnest man but completely deluded.
Man-made global warming has not been proven to exist, and even if it had been, there is no evidence that the draconian, civilization-threatening proposals being put out there to address it would even achieve their claimed effect.
On the other hand, the objective costs of these proposals, in both economic and freedom-threatening measures, are quite easy to quantify.
So, my advice to Trump is, mock away. Either there are enough sane minds left in this country to thwart this colossal scam, or we are doomed anyway. Which would be ironic, in that mankind would have actually succeeded in destroying itself.
Excellent, Thomas!
Go green, or there's no home to go to . . . .
2
If these climate change deniers were living on December 8, 1941, the day after Pearl Harbor was attacked, they would have said, "We can't go to war. How will we pay for it?"
4
Wrong Bart. Humans always seem willing and able to raise the resources to go to war.
Trying to convert Trump's base is a fools errand. The more you tell them he's a fool, the more they support him. No amount of logic is going to change their mind because that would be admitting they were duped. 2020 will be decided the same way the last three Presidential elections were decided; who gets the vote out.
3
Trump himself is a brain dead zombie. he is the perfect President for these times.
Environmental disaster already happened. Our politics is dead, hence Trump.
Democrats can win but they cannot rid us of the stench of Republicans and Trump.
2
There's no question that trump et al are on the very wrong side of history in almost all regards, but especially when it comes to the well being of life and the natural world. Trump and his pals think they will outsmart mother nature - such a fools' errand.
Yes, the Green New Deal is an excellent start and hanging trump on his lies about climate change is fine.
However, I believe that America and the world are crying out for honest, honorable, truthful, compelling and authentic vision of America's future and our role in the world. A true compelling and distinct vision, our calling for the future for my soon-to-be-born grandchild and her future is what we are called to do in our era.
Climate change, inequality of economic and live opportunities, holding those accountable for their vile misdeeds at all levels - corporate America, political leaders. We all know (OK - 90% of Americans) know they are being screwed, know the system is truly rigged for those with the gold (those who own the gold rule - remember the "golden rule") .
Another key element - vote. Get all your friends, relatives, dogs, cats to vote - and not for one single Repub. - virtually all are corrupted and bullied by trump's vile and immoral character and the criminal and inhumane policies that flow from his mouth and those wonderful sidekicks - Mulvaney, Steven Miller, W. Barr, DeVos, Ross, etc., etc.
2
I watched John Kerry attempting to give an update on the effects of climate change to a Republican congressman.
This GOP looked and sounded like old timey Southern sheriff caricatures talking to a “boy” complete with cackles.
He asked Kerry what his college degree was in. Was it in science?
Political Science.
"Well then who are you to tell US about science.” Then this idiot held up his own whacko report disputing Climate Change and gave it to the committee.
Kerry just said “Are you kidding?”
I am sick of uneducated people all trying to get cheap laughs making fun of AOC and “pointy headed scientists.”
I so want to give up... What is wrong with people! Oh yeah...it’s BROWN people who are affected. Well white people it’s coming for you and is already destroying white cities like Houston.
I wish a cyclone would take Mar-A-Lago away, then take the White House too. We no longr have a working government.
WHY? Because Bernie Bros refused to support Clinton. Hillary was “damaged goods.” Now these same people WHO NEVER VOTED clog Twitter with anti-Trump “humor.”
It’s not funny to see our planet, my wonderful Earth, destroyed folks!
3
Americans don't care about the future and they don't care about global warming. If you want to win elections, you focus on NOW. You focus on the foremost concern of every American: ME, ME, ME. Health care is the winning issue. For Trump, it's the economy. Trump is focusing on the wrong issue. Will the rest of us do so?
3
"The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed (and hence clamorous to be led to safety) by menacing it with an endless series of hobgoblins, all of them imaginary."
I remember when we experienced the extraordinary dearth of hurricanes on the gulf coast a few years ago-nearly ten years worth. Sure enough, the next hurricane to hit land was blamed on climate change.
Then last week the Guardian blamed climate change for all the inhabitants of Honduras who were leaving for the US: "an unprecedented series of frosts in the highlands."
There appears to be nothing that isn't caused by human-induced climate change.
Since we have people commenting here that coral reefs are not dying, I'm putting up this link from National Geographic
https://www.nationalgeographic.com/magazine/2018/08/explore-atlas-great-barrier-reef-coral-bleaching-map-climate-change/
"Half of the Great Barrier Reef has been bleached to death since 2016.
Bleaching in 2016 occurred so rapidly that scientists had to retool their predictions for how much heat the reef could endure.
Even in the best conditions, badly damaged reefs take at least 10 years to rebound. The Great Barrier Reef, struck two years in a row, may never fully recover.
As climate change warms Earth’s oceans, underwater heat waves last longer. Coral species can’t withstand extended hot periods."
Climate change is real.
6
No. We're talking about two separate things here: reversing climate change and defeating Trump. Let's focus on the former. Reading the data will convince any intelligent observer that moving the needle will require massive changes in living standards for the First World. Suburbs to cities, cars to transit, meat to vegetables. Cold showers. No Showers. Not only that, but the most recently quoted report states that the environmental damage is already becoming irreversible and we will be dead in 20 years.
Sometimes the first take is the truest. AOC's first-draft GND manifesto did say airplanes would be grounded and we would all take trains, this was before political good sense kicked in and the editors sharpened pencils and blamed the "misunderstanding" on underlings. Draw a line from here to what daily life must entail in order to achieve the stated required goals. As soon as comfortable Americans are forced to take their first cold shower, they will riot. The press will wail about loss of living standards and run human-interest stories about shivering old people. Sort of like today, but with real physical privation.
I mock nothing here. However, when this thing leaves the political gasbag stage and hits the economy, the effect is going to make the 19th Century urbanization changes look trivial and the social unrest will be unimaginable to us today.
1
These are great ideas. Good language, raises questions, seeks solutions with the voter. Sadly, it also means inconvenience and that is something so many people are simply unwilling to face. We are almost past the point of mitigating climate disaster, let alone heading it off.
Green real deal, green new deal... detox the implied meaning of these "deals" by raising precisely the kinds of questions Friedman advocates. Great ideas...
1
Yes. Great "ads," that any Dem candidate should run again and again and again. At the very least, this might get all those Millennials to come out to vote, in droves.
1
I switched to solar power a couple of years ago. Another commenter said it was expensive to do so. That's only if you buy the system. I have a 20-year lease. Installation cost me nothing. My electricity costs me about $2 a month (in mandatory fees, not usage). Yes, I have a monthly payment. Combine the two and I'm still paying less than half as much as I used to. My neighbor knows this, but she doesn't want to get solar power because the panels look ugly on the roof. Sigh...
6
No reasonable person could disagree with Thomas Friedman's depiction of the gravity and immediacy of the climate crisis. However, I just read the 300 page new Morning Consult poll conducted between April 5 to April 7 with 2000 respondents. That poll suggests that the most important issues for voters, whether they are young or old, conservative or liberal, male of female, are with the exception of perhaps the new generation Z (ages 18-21) climate change is not a high priority issue. Far more important to voters are the health of the American economy, national security including border security, health care and senior issues i.e. medicare and social security. Climate change and the environment for the most part comes in last and in single digits for most voter groups.
So, given that polling data, I don't see how a campaign built around the Green New Deal wins.
1
Every kilowatt-hour that comes from carbon, and every gallon of fossil must include a fee that is used to make it carbon neutral and cover the future damages its emissions will cause. Anything less is perpetuating the fossil subsidies.
I agree with Friedman's basic thrust. But the ads I would suggest would show the wildfires in the west, the flooding in the Midwest, the hurricane damage to our coastal states, the droughts in various parts of the country, etc. In other words, make this personal. If farmers in the Midwest understand that the significant damage they have recently incurred will become a regular event, some of them will be persuaded.
3
The absurdity of the unthinkers supporting a fallacy that can be as easily defeated as saying, "The climate has always changed." is only eclipsed by the idea that this issue can help defeat the substantively best president since JFK...I am certainly looking forward to the election.
"The Department of Energy’s 2017 U.S. Energy and Employment Report revealed that solar energy was employing more workers than the traditional coal, gas and oil industries combined. "
This is actually bad news...the more employees the more the cost of energy. With energy being the corner stone of the economy, this just means higher costs. It is actually inevitable as solar and wind are not really renewable and certainly not as energy dense as fossil fuels--that means more mining, manufacturing, installation and grid infrastructure. Future energy sources are going to be more expensive and more difficult to distribute. It is time everyone realizes this.
No one pays their energy bill while exclaiming how happy they are because they are creating jobs.
He may well have mocked Y2K. I do not know. He certainly mocked his fellow Republican 2016 Presidential hopefuls. He mocked the idea he had colluded with the Russians. I may not like mocking, but it seems to work for Mr. Trump. How about the Dems sell something constructive that the majority of the Electoral College will buy. Even the Dems attempt on the hidden mic event re what Trump called locker room talk didn't work. Mr Friedman, did your ideas for the Dems work in 2016? If so, what were they? Remember, he was the guy who won as a first time candidate based largely on his own instincts. Are yours better?
2
yeah make a big deal out of this. nobody cares. i bought into some windmills on the altamount pass in northern california. drove by them everyday on my commute. watched my money go down the drain because there were many more days when the wind didn't move those blades, and on a lot of other days there were mechanical issues that kept many of the machines from moving at all. can only imagine the loss for solar, unless they figure a way to make the sun shine at night.
Why would you want to defeat him?
He's better than any president we've had in decades, despite his manifest faults.
1
This is why I can't take Tom Friedman seriously. Someone, and by someone I mean anyone but me, should put together a compendium of "times Thomas Friedman was wrong". There might be, in fact probably are, many reasons why Trump should not be re-elected. This is not one of them, nor is it the winning strategy to the White House. In fact, it might very well be a strategy for losing the House. Again. And over a thousand other elections at every level of government. I have no idea who said there is no greater political blessing than to be blessed with stupid enemies. But Trump surely has the market cornered in that department.
2
"...energy sources that aren’t actually renewable, but don’t emit carbon dioxide— — by 2045. So wind, solar, geothermal, biomass, large hydro, nuclear power and natural gas..."
Really Tom, natural gas has stopped emitting carbon dioxide? You need to have your stories vetted by someone with a basic knowledge of chemistry. FYI, depending on source, natural gas runs about 92$ methane (CH4) with the remainder mostly ethane (C2H6). The good news is that you get a lot more energy out per pound of carbon in methane than you do from coal, essentially pure carbon.
You might also address the issue of airplanes. Few of the energy sources you mentioned fly very well. Failure to present some realistic gives ammunition to Laura Ingram and her claim that you want to ban air travel.
2
@Matt
...with carbon capture technology. It would take a big energy output hit, but if the technology becomes workable, it can reduce the CO2 output.
@Matt -- AOC and her script-kiddies did step in their own doo-doo, multiple times ... but that doesn't relieve others from talking about reality rather than alternative nonsense.
Air travel is about 3% of mankind's total fossil carbon production, so it's hardly the first problem to attack, but in fact the aviation industry is already working on solutions and they are perfectly feasible.
* The leading one is to synthesize jet fuel from biomass, making it carbon-neutral. This has the advantage that it requires no alterations to existing aircraft and fuel handling.
* alternatives include liquid hydrogen and liquid methane. The first is carbon-free of course. The second can be synthesized easily from CO2 and water (with electricity), making it CO2-neutral.
Both of these require substantial redesign to aircraft but either is potentially advantageous for long-haul routes because the energy per unit mass is better than jet fuel.
All you have to do is read the comments on Breitbart and Fox about climate change and you soon learn that Trump's mocking resonates with his followers. They generally are the ones who flunked or barely scraped by in science courses. They despise and mock people smarter than themselves. Which is most people. They would like nothing better than to be given permission to beat up their political opponents like they did when they were able to terrorize weaker kids in school.
5
Oh, that it were easy. We don't know how bad climate change is going to get. We don't know what we can do to mitigate it without causing more harm than it would cause.
Sure, Donald Trump makes jokes out of things that other politicians don't. But he usually does it to show there's a problem with their solutions. Take windmills, for example. Does their noise cause cancer? No, and saying they did was a joke.
But it is no joke that windmills are a blot on the landscape, and turn open land into industrial sites. All to produce power that is intermittent and unreliable. We are nowhere close to being able to rely on renewable energy for our electrical power.
No one is treating climate change as an existential threat -- one that threatens the very existence of our societies and must be countered whatever the cost. The Paris climate accord shows that. That accord does nothing to stop climate change. Nothing. It's business as usual. If it required any country to actually do anything, not every country would have signed up.
Climate change is a tough issue, but there are many others. We need to prioritize them and do what we can to eliminate them. Each of us can do more. But the most important thing is not to make speeches or write articles. It's to get things done. Donald Trump excels at the latter. We should support him for that.
1
These ads are great ideas, all. But the people who are going to act and vote based on the facts about climate change have already done so. To convince those who don't see this as an urgent issue and that the time to act is now, we need messaging that gives personal narratives, both about the effects of climate change as well as the benefit of a green economy that supports jobs. For example, how about ads featuring solar and wind workers talking about their fears about losing their good jobs thanks to Republican policies (and then give the stats that more people work in green jobs than fossil fuel jobs)? And feature ads with young people who have already been impacted by climate change--such as kids from midwest flood zones or who lost homes in wildfires--about what inaction on climate change means to them. To craft an effective message, tug on the emotions and make it personal!
In his position and operating in his current frame of mind, the President ranks right up there with the largest threats to climate change. There will be no epiphany coming for this man. In this area the President of the United States has shown total disregard and malice towards the people of this country. Immigration crisis Mr. President? Wait until you see the massive numbers of people on the move due to unmitigated climate change. Oh, that's right. You won't be here.
Yes, the Democrats should run strongly on this issue. They should run for our lives and those that follow us.
5
Two of the most important green initiatives have been unmitigated public health disasters! Biofuels in America and diesel passenger cars in Europe were both promoted as programs to decrease carbon emissions and both have increased other harmful emissions. Sorry, the track record of liberals on this issue means we should be very skeptical about other proposals to curb carbon emissions.
1
@Sebastian Cremmington
Biofuels exist because of the Midwestern farm lobby, not liberals. And I haven't seen any American progressive promote diesel fueled cars. Talk about straw men!
2
Nope, the NYTimes had an in depth article about ethanol a few months ago and liberals initially supported biofuels. Liberals in Europe support diesel passenger cars.
Friedman knocks it out of the park once again. Back in 2016 he "Thanked us for being late." Yet now, time is up when it comes to addressing climate change. It seems impossible to get one's mind around how there still are climate change naysayers. Further, to think that the "leader and defender of the West and of the free world" is at the helm of disbelief and policies contrary to making positive change, is utterly flummoxing.
Seems Trump is color blind. Or is he? He's made it clear countless times how he doesn't like "brown people." He tirelessly is in opposition of all things green. Yet, he appears he does have an affinity for the color Cheeto orange.
1
I agree 100% but I’d make a suggestion on campaign ads. Unfortunately, trump supporters, along with the very wealthy in this country, aren’t going to care one bit how climate change affects Africa or the Coral Reef. It’s sad to say but the focus will have to be on how it will affect them personally right now - not their grandkids, not 10 years from now, not other countries. Their short attention span and unwillingness to consider anyone or anything not directly impacting their lives at the moment makes thoughtful, global outreach useless. It’s shameful how selfish our country has become.
3
I'm sorry, but the time for "Green Real Deal" passed 15 years ago. The Green New Deal is our only hope and it's just that hope. The luxury of time in which a "healthy debate" about such issues could have been held - left the station 15 years ago. John Sununu killed it. George W. Bush said we "couldn't afford it”. Mitch McConnell vowed to block every initiative Barack Obama proposed and did. The price of truly dealing with Climate Change now, as was foretold in 1989: is catastrophic. The Green New Deal will not stop Climate Change, but it will make it more manageable. The Republicans have sealed our fate in that regard. But we must act now. Let us Pray.
3
Agree with Jason. It's wishful thinking to suppose that the complexities of climate change, now and in the future, will have the slightest impact on voters obsessed with immigration, happy with their new-found economic security, and admiring of Trump's hard-line international economic and foreign policies. Much is happening to address climate change, but it certainly will not affect Trump's approval rating.
The doubling down on unpopular and outright wrong ideas by Trump and the GOP is a strategy based on playing the odds that the base will vote in high numbers and that the rest of the country, regardless of their views and dislike of Trump and the GOP, will not vote.
This means the key is to both sell the alternate, popular and truth based ideas, and to get people to vote. The idea of the Green New Deal does merge two disparate groups, environmentalists and science informed people and those who seek improvements in social issues. It also does eliminate the "sky is falling" narrative that reducing C02 (and more potent greenhouse gases) will result in more loss of jobs and more displacement of certain geographical areas that used their clout to elect Trump. Green renewable energy is both economically viable and does put new jobs in many of the same areas that the small minority of coal workers or even larger oil worker groups might lose.
There is a large minority of Americans who do not agree with the current direction, just need to get them out to vote .. The tax cut offering very few voters lower taxes also won't help the GOP cause, lower taxes are one of the core promises of the GOP ...
The problem with replacing hydrocarbons with "renewables" wind/solar is one of basic physics concerning energy density, and the associated economic constrains far beyond the means of any tax incentive or government subsidy scheme to overcome.
For those who care to actually understand the limitations of these technologies and properly separate reality from hype, please review the Manhattan Institute paper released last week examining these issues in excruciating detail.
https://www.manhattan-institute.org/green-energy-revolution-near-impossible
2
There is a silver lining to climate change. It shows us that we must build a sustainable economic model based on renewable energy sources. We can do this with genuine leadership and political will. It will take a lot of concerted effort, but the time to start is right now. This is our issue.
1
Trump has always lived indoors or on golf courses, he does not think that the natural environment matters. So he cannot understand why climate change is of any concern. There are a lot of very rich people just like him who are clueless about how their lives and the biosphere are inseparable, so whatever affects the environment does affect them. Ignorance has no cure save becoming informed. Trump and all the deniers of science and of the forecasts of the effects of climate change will become informed but how and when can make a great difference.
The Green New Deal is an unrealistic plan but the vision and intentions are very practical. The switch to renewables is going to take a lot longer than is anticipated and will cost a lot of new wealth to accomplish. The more objectives that are tied up with it, the longer it will take and the more money it will take to achieve. In that sense, the Green New Deal is not a viable solution. It will have to be simplified and planned in a more reasonable way to make it a good plan.
1
Can we take a chance that there is no climate change? I think this would be an error that "might/will be"" be catastrophic.
Vote 2020 for technology / science to define us and not ignorance as advocated by the present administration in Washington.
3
Exactly backwards Tom.
The wall, and the climate hoaxers and Russian hoaxers , will ensure his reelection. You really don't understand this do you?
1
It's not fair to blame the failure of American policy on climate change on Trump & GOP alone. The Great American Democracy put these people in charge. It's the System, stupid.
1
I see no political issue that is capable of consolidating an issue-free anti-Trump majority as large as the issue-free Trump base.
The achilles heel of the Democrats is its ongoing non-response to Trumpists' globalization malaise. Trump's base doesn't shrink because it is irrelevantly called racist and xenophobic. On the other hand, the Democrats' potential anti-Trumpist base isn't strengthened by more strident appeals for identity politics, conformity, and political correctness.
The climate change issue has no chance of changing this climate.
Its amazing how young people are essentially ignored on this issue. Its their future, not ours.
4
Greta Thunberg, the Swedish girl who started a global movement to fight the climate change had a most telling personal transformation. She internalized the problems facing the planet to a point that she could not eat any longer and over two months she lost a tremendous amount of weight. That made her parents believe that she had to be let free to take action as she saw fit.
By her renouncing school in favor of protesting in front of the Swedish Parliament, she, in effect, made manifest the need to take action now. The fact that millions of school kids around the world followed her call to not show in class - against schools requests - show that the young do see this as the sole existential threat to their future.
I believe that although they cannot vote, the young American school kids should storm Congress and fight for their God given rights to live on a planet that now is being destroyed with assistance from Trump and his sycophants.
3
This is a smart article and I certainly agree that ads should be rolled out using the precise wording devised by Friedman. But I do not share his optimism. There is no silver bullet that can pierce his base's admiration of Trump.
55
@Jason Galbraith The base would not change its mind even if a large astroid were approaching earth on a collision course and President Trump denied it. It must be all in the hands of all the other people who get out to vote and make their wishes known.
18
@John leslie and Jason Galbraith: Remember we don't have to convert all of them to win elections. Picking off the weakly allied can be the difference. Just listening and talking in a constructive way with Trump voters at my golf club has won some converts.
9
AOC is so toxic to a large portion of America. She plays right into Trump's hands. While her 29-year old heart may be in the right place, she is doing a disservice to the cause. Maybe - and I mean maybe - something like Mr. Friedman's proposal could be successful if it's packaged by the right people.
Every American with anything approaching average intelligence knows that climate change, global warming and the involvement of our society in causing that climate change by reliance on fossil fuels is real.
A major problem is that people with short-term vested interests in the extraction industry spend huge sums on political donations and sophisticated advertising to convince the public that the immediate, dire threat of climate change is many years away and will turn out to be far less dire than liberals claim.
An even greater problem is convincing working Americans who are directly or indirectly dependent on the coal and oil industry. They must come to believe that the jobs in that industry can be replaced with better jobs working in the growing infrastructure of solar and wind energy production.
You cannot expect a man or woman to embrace with enthusiasm the notion that to save the planet 30 years from now, your family should starve today.
Thomas Friedman recognizes this, and the TV ads which he proposes are actually very good. The persuasion of Americans, however, will not be easy when the president is an unprincipled ignoramus preaching a lie on a daily basis.
4
I have retired from the National Renewable Energy Lab after working on renewable technologies (RET) since 1978. There is no question RETS are the primary solution to our impending climate catastrophe . I say primary, because as of now we do need base- load power plants, and the new developments of small scale modular nuclear power plants (~100MW) may do the job.
One Caution. It will not be easy for any Democratic candidate for 2020, to laugh off Trump, whose style of campaigning is to utterly destroy the character of his opponent. He will use lies, half-truths, mockery, abusive language stirring-up his 45 million worshippers into a frenzy... I can see no Democratic candidate that can deal with this super-narcisisst...
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@Kenell Touryan
I wish whoever wins the nomination would get a little AOC going. She never gets defensive. Make fun of her dancing on a rooftop? She'll dance for you in Washington. Laugh at her Green New Deal? She'll tell you that your grandchildren won't be laughing.
She doesn't take the bait, and she couldn't care less what anybody thinks. She makes the idiots who attack her look like high-school level chumps. That's what we need.
I think Bernie will do just fine. He says what he means, he doesn't bother to 'package' himself, and he's a 100% obnoxious New Yorker, just like Trump. Let the games begin.
"A Green Real Deal — if framed and focused properly — could wipe that smirk right off Trump’s face."
I know I would love to erase that smirk!
Now, it is up to the Democrats to form and articulate a clear, coherent message. Make part of it a zinger of a soundbite and repeat it over and over.
The Democrats too often lose because of ineffective messaging. Please get it right for 2020!
2
The key to defeating Trump IS defeating Trump
The ad mock ups won't work - people struggling to make ends meet don't really care about wildlife in Africa. You have to make it personal or you won't get their vote. Trump is a master of making it personal.
But this line is what hits home with me: "AOC’s rejoinder: “For everyone who wants to make a joke about that, you may laugh, but your grandkids will not.”" I have already apologized to my grandkids for the mess my generation has made of the planet.
2
A plan to change the way we live, including responsible forest management, fisheries and such, I would back.
A plan to pay people for refusing to work, get rid of airplanes and the wholesale slaughter of cows … never.
Trump does not need to muck the Green Deal, he just has to quote it to get laughs across the aisle.
Here are three reasons "friends" of mine said they voted for Trump, and I quote:
1. "he's not a politician."
2. "I've always voted Republican."
3. "He stands up for the white race."
Climate change to them is fake.
But you're correct Tom. Yes, put out those ads. We must do everything to get out the vote.
2
The one thing about climate change (aka Global Warming) is that it keeps changing. And has been for millions of years, with or without man. Trying to define a normal climate over a millions years is like trying to define a normal stock market based on 1 minute of observing the ticker. Yes, we all want clean air and water, and locally can do certain things to make that happen. But setting up a world organization (aka Paris Climate Accord) and sending your money to this organization is akin to stupidity (just look how a national government wastes your money). Its nothing but a slush fund to redistribute taxpayer funds. Tell me, if we were in a sever cold age threatening humans, what could we actually do right now to heat up the earth?? Well, if we can't immediately heat up the earth, we can't change it either...and so predicating a 1.5 degree temp change in 50 years is not rational. I give more credence to sun spots and sun patterns to changing the earths climate than to man.
Unfortunately for the rest of us, too many of Trump's supporters believe that Jesus will come in back and bail us out.
Donald Trump has no background in climate, nature, or any area of science, let alone biology. The best thing for his competition is to get him campaigning and arguing in an area he knows nothing about. He liescan only carry him so far in genuine debate.
The media continues to push the false narrative of out-of-control global warming due to increasing anthropogenic CO2 in the atmosphere. I predict the climate change issue will become the media’s next great myth to be exposed, and that will happen within the next year.
The climate change myth has already caused billions of dollars to be wasted on unnecessary failed projects, on increased regulatory costs to businesses due to mountains of meaningless regulations and on efforts to obstruct the production of cheap oil and gas energy resources. Trillions more may be wasted if this myth is not exposed soon.
In the first important step to change the current climate change narrative, Caltech on December 12, 2018 announced plans to build a new climate model from the ground up. This will be a complete redo. It is happening because of the recognized uncertainties in predictions of future climate and the need for “precise and actionable predictions.” The announcement stated that the new model will be built over the next five years by researchers led by Caltech and include MIT, the Naval Postgraduate School and NASA’s Jet Propulsion Lab.
Caltech's modeling project is prima facie evidence that current climate science is not adequate to guide government policy. All we can lose by going down the wrong road is everything. There is still time to get it right.
New York is about to outlaw plastic bags -- but not all, just some. I've supported this action for years -- I have a large selection of re-usable bags and use them. But once in a while I let the checker put my stuff in the store's plastic bug but insist that they not be doubled.
I use those plastic bags to bag my used kitty litter (2 cats), twice a week. I fill one bag and then double it -- I put the resulting package on the floor of my trash room -- if you put it down the chute the bag breaks and makes an unholy mess.
When/if the ban goes into effect I'll use up whatever plastic bags I've stashed away (not much room in my NY apt. and then I'll go out and buy plastic bags for my trash and my kitty litter.
For my little family it's a no-win situation, but it's going to cost me some small amount of money. But it feels as if we've tied ourselves up in knots.
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@Dorothy-M: all my plastic bags have 2-5 "lives". After carrying home my groceries....they become lunch sacks for the next week. THEN they are used to pick up dog poop. Some go for kitty litter as you describe (doubled!).
If they are banned, I'll have to buy them, but the net amount of bags used will be the same.
If banned...many places will be selling off WAREHOUSES full of bags, and I plan to buy several thousands so I'll be good for years.
I did this with regular light bulbs. I have hundreds.
This will backfire on liberals.
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Yes, it's easy to say that unless everybody is willing to do something about climate change, why should I? Little ol' me can't make a difference. But you can, if eventually more and more little ol' me's do something too. Lead by example. My husband and I are solidly middle class Iowans. I drive a Prius C. Used to be you didn't see many Priuses on the road. Now you see them all over the place. Why? Because as people saw more Priuses, more people decided maybe they were not a Japanese joke after all; maybe they were ok cars. And they ditched the gas guzzler for the hybrid. When we moved to our little town of 1,500, one house had solar panels. We installed solar panels on our house a year ago. Now there are five houses with solar panels in our town. I've been vegetarian for more than 20 years but my husband is an omnivore. He eats meat only a few times a week now, and he only buys meat from local farmers, not from grocery stores that sell mass-produced meat from greenhouse gas-belching factory farms. Will our actions stop global warming. No. But it's a start.
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I visited the Great Barrier Reef area in 2004; did not scuba dive as was too old then for that but could see even then some lack of color and if I remember correctly the boat tour operators pointed that out. If only people were not so insular but instead paid attention and learned as much as possible about the world. It is great to learn new things, even in your 80's or later than that. Read, read and read more, pay attention, get involved and you might be able to help the planet or your local community.
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I’m sorry, but it’s hopeless. Americans don’t even care about flooding in Missouri, let alone Mozambique. Coral reefs near Australia? Rupert Murdoch owns Australia.
The Republicans have persuaded more than half of Americans that action on climate change is a direct threat to liberty.
Trump is poised for a landslide victory. We are in the middle of a vast right wing revolution, not just here, but in the world.
Trying to defeat Trump with climate change will be like trying catch a thief by giving him an AK 47 and a Ferrari. Presidential elections are not about ideas anyway, but about PERSONALITIES. Trump is a SUPERSTAR. He can only be defeated by a superstar of equal or greater stature. Not one of the Democratic hopefuls comes close to this. And certainly no one cares about climate change. I promise. They don’t. They want guns, money and God, in that order.
1
Yes, but. The article notes: "But my head says you can’t transform our energy system and our social/economic one at scale all at once. We have to prioritize energy/climate." This is true, but fighting climate change will not get popular support if it does not touch on social justice as well. Simply taxing carbon and letting the market run free is not going to be acceptable to the bulk of our people.
1
I think Friedman is improperly gauging the extent to which Americans actually care about climate change. While most people, when polled, will certainly express concern about it, in reality it remains mostly an abstraction and something only very distantly concerning to them.
1
Good idea. I’d start with a house with coal in the fireplace and people coughing from the smoke next to a solar house and ask which is the most beautiful. Or a coal miner after work - not so beautiful.
3
The point is well-taken, but the proposed ads won't work because they're too academic rather than hard-hitting and concise. There's no need to cite the source, leave that for a follow-up if Trumpists challenge it. For example, instead of:
"The Department of Energy’s 2017 U.S. Energy and Employment Report revealed that solar energy was employing more workers than the traditional coal, gas and oil industries combined. But Trump says he prefers big, beautiful coal. How do your kids feel about that?"
Instead, the ad should say:
Solar energy employs more workers than the coal, gas and oil industries combined. But Trump says he prefers big, beautiful coal. How do your kids feel about that?
The others can be similarly punched-up and new ones should be less academic dissertation and more challenging.
3
@JB I think what you have done is wonderful, but your concluding statement, that it's "pollution free", is incorrect; it's not even carbon free. Manufacturing of electronics: solar panels, batteries, computers, electric cars, etc. involves hazardous materials and effluents, and utilizes carbon-based fuel for energy. Those of us concerned about the health of our natural environment need to be aware of this as we advocate for our energy future.
It would, but remember you are derailing with all Americans, not just readers of the NYT. In almost any other country in the world, issues of climate change, universal health care, income inequality would be easy sells, but not in the U S. I was talking to a Canadian couple who expounded on the marvels of their healthcare system, the same one Americans love to mock. All American politicians need to do is raise the fear of job loss and we ignore a crumbling environment, going broke paying for medical services or dropping out of the middle class.
2
Well here's an idea on how this newspaper and its columnists might contribute to a reasonable and sensible discussion of the politics of climate change before the 2020 elections - scrap the garbage about "balance" and impose some reasonable criteria about who gets to express an opinion in these pages.
It's simple. The newspaper either applies professional qualification standards on commentators or it does not. This is not about "unless you have X or Y degree", this is about whether or not - based on your history of publication in peer reviewed scientific publications - you are a leader in your field.
If that kind of reasonable process was applied to ensure only qualified opinion gets published, then we will see a sensible and reasonable discussion about the reality of climate change and what we can do to address it - because nobody who wants to argue the science of climate change has anything approaching the professional qualifications and significance to meet that standard.
So we'll be watching. If one of the NYT columnists or the editors decide to give space to the paid liars who deny the reality of climate change, we will know that this newspaper has completely abandoned any pretence to excellence or objectivity. The history is very poor - "balance" was how this newspaper justified supporting the criminal invasion of Iraq.
Let's see if they have learned anything in the last 20 years.
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@Colin McKerlie
Well said.
I wish I could flag this comment so everybody sees it.
Thank you.
I’d pound Trump with these points, but they will be effective only if married to a “Green Real Deal.” For Moniz and Karsner, that would involve every state or city adopting its own version of a plan California approved last year called S.B. 100.,,,,,
1
I can be sure that the 273 comments in place at 08:36 GMT will present every single basic thought triggered by every column like this one.
Therefore I will present the forms of renewable energy never mentioned in lists such as this by TLF today:
"So wind, solar, geothermal, biomass, large hydro, nuclear power and natural gas paired with carbon capture and storage (C.C.S.) can all play, plus whatever new clean power gets invented."
What is missing:
1) Solid-waste incineration.
2) Food and human waste conversion to biogas.
3) All forms of heat pumps including ground-source geothermal (Friedman mentions geothermal but very likely has Icelandic style in mind)
Why does this matter?
1, 2, and 3 are all 24/7 365 renewable energy technologies, all of major importance in making Sweden a world leader: Paul Simon IEA vd - "Sweden is far ahead of other countries..." see: https://webstore.iea.org/energy-policies-of-iea-countries-sweden-2019-review
1, 2, and 3 can be put in place far more quickly than most.
There is a hitch. American Environmental Groups such as Sierra Club are fiercely opposed to 1 and seem reluctant to even name the others. The same is true for the Times.
Read IEA reports on the Nordic countries and then tell me why you, perhaps a Sierra Club or other member, do not want to make America Sweden.
Only-NeverInSweden.blogspot.com
Citizen US SE
2
The only possible means of reducing America’s carbon emissions as far and as fast as climate activists say is necessary is for the federal government to intervene quickly and decisively in the energy marketplace to: (1) sharply raise the price of all carbon fuels; (2) enforce mandatory across-the-board energy conservation measures; and eventually, (3) to directly limit and control the quantities of carbon fuels which can be produced, distributed, and consumed in the United States.
The EPA has full authority under the Clean Air Act to regulate all of America’s carbon emissions, not just those from coal. The EPA could also impose a system of carbon pollution fines which is the functional equivalent of a legislated tax on carbon. Using the authorities granted by Congress under existing national security legislation, the president could declare a carbon pollution emergency and impose a program of fuel rationing similar to what was done in World War II.
For better or worse, the legal authorities needed to move as far and as fast as climate activists want America to go in quickly reducing our carbon emissions already exist and rest solely in the hands of the president. More to the point, if the president doesn’t do it, then it won’t get done.
Barack Obama refused to do it while he was president. Donald Trump certainly won’t do it while he remains in office. Whether or not the president elect who replaces Donald Trump in 2021 or 2025 will do it remains to be seen.
Not a bit compelling.
Problem 1:
The case for man-made global warming is still unproven.
There are no randomized double blinded prospective studies or even close to a full planetary life cycle useful for observational science.
So it is educated guesswork. Who wants to reduce their standards of living for that?
Problem 2:
The US govt cannot bind the actions of India and China (or Russia, Pakistan, Brazil, etc).
Some say that any reduction in carbon output is good, even if some places don't participate. If that is true, then if CA or NY want to reduce carbon output, fine by me, as long as my state can choose otherwise.
Opportunity 1:
Lots of people believe that this is an existential threat, and lots of other people are willing to lower their standards of living on guesswork.
But we could agree on a few things.
Let us start with expanding nuclear power.
Also, when wind and solar become cheaper per kWh, and are either reliable when it is calm and cloudy or there is better energy storage, the market will move that way without govt interference.
Basically, some want green energy and others want cheap energy. Nobody objects to cheap green energy.
@Brian said "So it is educated guesswork. Who wants to reduce their standards of living for that?" All of science is educated guesswork. When you conduct a randomized double-blind study, you assume the results apply to the world around you. That's an assumption: its educated guesswork. Also, your saying there is no reason to worry about nuclear annihilation because its never happened before. Educated guesswork suggests that a world filled with nuclear missiles is at risk of having one get fired. Compared to that guesswork, a climate model is solid gold, since its just applied 18th century gas physics. Also, wind and solar are already the lowest cost energy sources out there. The cost/kWhr of lithium batteries has declined by 85% in the last 8 years. Care to speculate what that cost will be 8 years from now? You could do a randomized double-blind study!
The climate change ad that I would promote is one that made the point that there is no downside to energy efficiency and alternative sources. None. There's only positive results. What's not to like?
3
Many are willing to bypass Trump and work for the Green New Deal's goals of drastically cutting greenhouse emissions and to elect a Democratic candidate running for president that will bring us back to the Paris Accord. Climate change is a defining issue and the Republican's denial of climate change for short term profits will cost them politically in the end.
2
The Green New Deal is a real deal if implemented properly. Nobody claims its goals can be accomplished overnight. However, it is a great start. Especially if the pundits would quit moaning about it.
3
No matter whether it is the Paris Climate Accord, the Green Real Deal or any other Agreement, the objective and purpose is the same. They all say the seriousness of rapid changes facing the climate, and what we all need to do to address the concerns.
What we ignore or forget is the fact that we humans, live on this god given earth. We all have a responsibility as to how we live, and importantly, how we all treat the earth we all live on. Are we not being selfish? Are we not thinking of just now, and caring less for the future generations? This is not a sermon. Just thinking like a layman, and trying to be as simplistic as one can get.
If we ignore the impact on actions such as carbon emissions, the impact on deforestation, we are being beyond reckless. WE, human beings are destroying this earth we live on, depriving a place for the plants and trees, the animals and the birds. The future of planet earth is at stake.
2
Trump is about the quick $. Nothing else matter as much. Before regs the mountains in TN were been destroyed. I witness part of the destruction myself.
http://www.appalachianhistory.net/2017/08/acid-rain-devastates-tennessees-copper.html
1
Dems must quickly formulate a reasonable platform on climate change, immigration, medical care, taxation and gun control. Most voters are on the Democratic side as long as the policies are not extreme (open borders, no guns, etc.). Stop letting R's frame and define the Democratic platform, and do it quickly.
5
With all the talk about carbon free power, why don't we hear more about nuclear plants? Sure, they are not risk free but global warming is a guaranteed disaster that will affect hundreds of millions. France and Sweden use nuclear for 75% and 100%, respectively, of their power plants. And Sweden is the home of the Volvo, the safe car!
6
The Green New Deal is mostly addle-brained nonsense. It harms the working class with massive job loss and it will have no effect on the rest of the carbon-spewing world.
Please, Democrats, make it the centerpiece of your electoral strategy !
3
excellent!
3
It's unscientific articles like this that will keep Trump in office. Note to author: Never attempt to correlate a single weather event to climate. That's a task for fools.
4
Tommy, parking your article in the same, “this has the potential to take #45 down”, heap as your other articles on Russian Collusion, obstruction of justice, conspiracy to defraud the US gov’t, immigration policy, the pending ‘recession’. I promise not to burn it as to increase global warming. Y’all continue to avoid the facts that the US contribution to global warming has been declining for the past +20 yrs, w/the exception of some farting cows. We would be much better served to learn and understand the impact on global warming if China & India stay their present course. Of course that would be too much effort on your part. Intellectually easier to simply a Never Trump.
1
“Sensible republicans” is an oxymoron. Americans don’t care about Africa, heck Americans don’t care about Puerto Rico and it’s America.
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Yet another NYT editorial on climate change that doesn't mention the automobile industry.
4
The quagmire of climate change. In our 6 billion year history, climate change is part of our DNA. That’s a scientific fact! It’s also a fact that in this past century, humankind has been responsible for it’s acceleration.
Climate deniers live mostly in Republican black holes. If Black is the only color you can see, Green is an oxymoron.
Back in 1960, I wrote a song called “Forgive us Son”. It was a song about how we destroyed our planet with the ravages of war. Little did I know then how close I came to describing the fate of our planet just 60 years later.
When is too late TOO LATE to act? I’m guessing 2020 could give us a better answer! Vote like your life depends on it, because it really does!
4
I like wind and solar as a way to reach those goals. The great thing about utilizing them is that should a more appropriate alternative be realized, we can always dismantle them.
And for those that love to stay with oil, coal and nukes - don't worry, no one is going to steal them out from under us. They'll be there if we some how screw up an take too much carbon from the atmosphere.
1
The dummy ads are OK-- except for the one about flooding in Africa. Lions and elephants (and rhinos, pangolins and just about anything else that East Asian males idiotically think will enhance their sexual prowess) are in far more danger-- of a terrible and worsening nature-- from human actions (i.e. poaching) than they ever will be from changing weather patterns (barring some kind of final atmospheric apocalypse).
1
This is the third piece I have read in the NYTs this AM re climate change but no mention of Jay Inslee. He's the Dem who is running on a climate change/green jobs platform and has a record of success with same in the state of Washington. Maybe the paper of record could cut just a few hundred words about the Pessimist/Denier Trump, (granted this huckster does sell papers), and use a paragraph or two to point out the progress that has been made by a Optimist/realist like Inslee.
4
At this point I’ve come to understand that there is literally no one more out of touch with the political reality of the average American than Friedman. The breaking point was probably when he wrote that article about Saudi Arabia’s reformist government, when the whole world saw the opposite as true. Now he’s writing political ads with coral bleaching as their central theme and thinking they will take down Trump. That’s the exact kind of relevant-adjacent milquetoast thinking that got Trump elected.
The messed up part is the future I dream of is the same as the one Friedman dreams of; our politics align almost perfectly. But where does this guy operate on a daily basis? Is he attending parties where his friends are trying to reenact ‘salons’ in some attic in the Tenderloin? Does he think people in America haven’t grown up on Fox News four nights a week for the past thirty years, where climate change is literally being pilloried into oblivion?
Have you ever watched this guy on Charlie Rose? He mansplains-into-the-ground a guy whose career has been deleted for not understanding white male head-in-the-sand privilege. When will we stop reading him, and understand he’s a fantasy land pundit? He was a great reporter in his day. It’s time for the times to catch on that he is politically senile.
- A single issue climate voter. (Go through a goals strategies tactics refresher Friedman. Your goals are admirable. Your strategies are worth debating. Your tactics are asinine).
2
You could also run a new take on memorable Archie Bunker. Run a few lines from Trump. Contrast them with short video shots of climate mayhem, in TX, FL, Midwest and southeastern coastal states. Close the sequence with, “which will you believe, him, or your lying eyes?”
“Vote Democrat.” Maybe add, “vote for the candidates that respond to disasters, not the ones that just call for more moments of silence.”
2
As a Once Beloved comedian said as God “How long can you tread water?
1
Friedman is so out of touch with what voters are concerned with. Price of living in the bubble
2
Just the fact that this article needed to be written is damning. It is also daunting to the degree we are forced to fight for the recognition of the obvious.
Trump in all his appalling ignorance is throwing our world to the wolves. The Democrats must consolidate their offerings and get on with the business of moving America ahead and not backwards as our esteemed leader is doing.
Vote 2020!
144
@Steve
"Updated data from NASA satellite instruments reveal the Earth’s polar ice caps have not receded at all since the satellite instruments began measuring the ice caps in 1979. Since the end of 2012, moreover, total polar ice extent has largely remained above the post-1979 average. The updated data contradict one of the most frequently asserted global warming claims – that global warming is causing the polar ice caps to recede." Forbes.
I believe we certainly need to reduce carbon emissions. I believe that the climate changes. Indeed, in the history of the Earth, it never has not changed (forgive the double negative). BUT nothing about the climate is "obvious," except that the climate is exceedingly complex. Skepticism in science is the foundation of science. Dems need to stop castigating anyone who simply has a question.
2
@Steve Tom Friedman is a genius, I sincerely hope all Democrats listen to him and follow his advice.
8
@BK
Have you been to Alaska??? I spent three summers there in the early 90s, and visited last year. Great rock cliffs stand where there used to be beautiful blue ice. The glaciers have lost so much ice that they experience heat waves in Glacier Bay. Hubbard Glacier has lost a lot of area (the size of RI back then) and associated wildlife. Greenland is losing ice, as well.
It may not be the polar caps, but it certainly is happening in other parts of the world that connect to the sea.
6
Mr. Friedman: If only...you and others would focus on facts about CC and not politically-motivated exaggerations, our society and world could probably make real progress on making reasonable reductions in CO2 emissions in some parts of the economy, i.e. transportation, without destroying our economy and the hopes of hundreds of millions throughout the developing world.
Those facts would include:
-there may be prima facie concern, e.g. Mauna Loa PPM data, that human-caused CO2 emissions contribute to global warming but those indications are far from conclusive in the face of the clear and overwhelming influence of the Sun on our climate and global temperature;
-you, among other climate activists, continue to focus on the political summary of the IPCC 5 report and ignore and cover-up the detailed scientific findings in the report itself, which clarify that there has been NO increase in hurricanes, NO increase in the rate of ocean rise since 1900;
-the oft-cited data that recent years are the hottest on record is derived ONLY BY AND BECAUSE OF recent manipulation of buoy-recorded temperatures earlier in this century, and ONLY BY ignoring the satellite temperature data, which points to a different conclusion; and
-ONLY nuclear energy can supply the critical energy needed to sustain our global economy.
We will know that you are serious about global warming, rather than politics, when you write a column encouraging the rapid development of nuclear energy.
2
@SonomaEastSide
"in the face of the clear and overwhelming influence of the Sun on our climate and global temperature" ... you provide no evidence for this, and there is excellent evidence against it.
"ONLY BY AND BECAUSE OF recent manipulation of buoy-recorded temperatures earlier in this century, and ONLY BY ignoring the satellite temperature data, which points to a different conclusion"
WRONG. The buoy corrections change the data only a very little bit in modern times -- look here:
https://www.carbonbrief.org/explainer-how-data-adjustments-affect-global-temperature-records
and then as to "ONLY BY ignoring the satellite temperature data, which points to a different conclusion" ... WRONG, the satellite data are now substantially in agreement with the terrestrial measurements after a series of errors in their data processing were corrected.
Ad to your claims about nuclear energy -- these are immaterial to the questions about the realities of AGW.
3
@SonomaEastSide
"...in the face of the clear and overwhelming influence of the Sun on our climate and global temperature;.."
The sun has been cooling for decades....so, the planet warming must be due to other causes and the only change of significance has been WMGHGs.
IPCC has never concluded that hurricanes will increase in frequency. They will get more intense due to warming oceans...basic physics.
Ocean levels rose at about 1.5 mm/yr during most of the 20th century and increased to about 3 mm/yr since mid 90s. That is the definition of increase and the increase is direct evidence of the planet warming.
1
I saw a news clip of a GOP Congressman harassing John Kerry about climate issues (actually, he started out complaining that John Kerry's political science major, the word science, was incompatible with Kerry's BA degree, the word Arts - I guess that tells you how silly the interrogation was). But one point the Congressman tried to make was that efforts to reduce climate change were a cost disproportionately foisted on lower income people. I couldn't help thinking about the cost disproportionately borne by lower income people who live near oil refineries, live in communities with land and water polluted by the coal industry, breath air laden with particulates from the major highways, ports and distribution centers surrounded by lower income communities.
So how about we focus on the human and financial costs associated with our fossil fuels energy system and the benefits of clean energy to the health and safety of people who live and work in the communities most affected by fossil fuels extraction, refining and combustion. How about we use the words clean and green together to communicate with people who might not appreciate climate change but certainly do understand shorter and less healthy lifetimes and the diseases consequential of fossil fuels pollution.
2
Unlike our authoritarian President a Democratic President will follow the law and attempt to legislate for a Green Deal, health care for all and protection for those with pre-existing conditions, a return to appropriate taxing of corporations and the rich, and a humanitarian immigration policy. Unless there is an overwhelming landslide for Democrats in the senate and the house, which is extremely unlikely, the road to these important goals will be difficult and tortuous. The Democratic President we elect must have the unflagging will to continue the fight for these important goals and the political savvy to gain support from Republican opponents to legislate theses life saving programs. Every democratic candidate wants these programs but it’s not necessarily the most liberal who will get us there. The candidate who can clearly and lucidly educate the American public on climate change and then garner the bilateral support of both parties to make significant change is what we need.
1
The problem is now the messenger. This news source has been busy for the last 2 plus years crying “wolf” in bold, unsubstantiated stories about Russia and now has no credibility in “fly over” country. In my deep red state we have a saying, “Fool me once, shame on you; full me twice, shame on me.”.
1
In Goethe's "Faust," Mephistopheles (Satan) is said to will the bad but work the good.
So it is that Trump, by both denying and trivializing climate change (willing the bad), has provoked others to create the Green New Deal and the Green New Deal and inspired Mr. Friedman to write one of his finest columns (working the good).
Trump has been called everything under the sun, but he is just a very small man.
2
Yes the climate has been different for a few years....trending warmer.
But man has only been accurately measuring the climate for around 100 years...right?
And that amount of time in the earth's history is what a zillionth second?
And where I sit , sip coffee, and type was at one time under water, and another time under ice.
That is what makes me wonder, guys and gals, really..do you believe it???
1
@Joe Paper we don't even have 100 years of data. Alarmists claim we have an accurate record since 1880. But they have a vivid imagination. Most of the global land masses only had a few temp collection stations on the coasts --- in 1880, 1900, 1950. Data collection has been sporadic and the various stations didn't all use the same collection protocols. The list of problems is endless. So, I wouldn't count on us, the world, having an accurate measure for the last 100 years.
Science has methods of tracking climate past the last one hundred years. There is much evidence of prior climates in the fossil records, in sedimentary layers in the ocean, and much geological evidence. The actual recorded observations of climate, even thought only a hundred years old is a part of the whole body of science, but not the entirety.
3
"A Green Real Deal — if framed and focused properly — could wipe that smirk right off Trump’s face." I beg to disagree.
i think to fight Trump you need silly sound bites and images.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
Endless rambling arguments are what cost Democrats elections.
Take for example, Trump's famous OK sign.
Why not try mocking him by showing OK signs in both hands?
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Or, how about showing inverted (distress) American flags?
To fight the endless stream of fake ideas, try silly humor?
"Be a clown, be a clown
All the world loves a clown
Act the fool, play the calf
And you'll always have the last laugh" (Cole Porter)
2
"A Green Real Deal — if framed and focused properly — could wipe that smirk right off Trump’s face."
"if framed and focused properly"-- well that is unlikely, but I'll grant you the point.
Mr. Friedman, nobody gets elected or loses elections on ecology or climate change (or lack thereof). This may excite you, but there is a world outside of NYT readers and their response would be "boring".
You want Trump for 4 more years. Make it about climate.
3
Sorry Tom, but the bulk of Trump voters are “reality impaired”. Factual and logical arguements have no impact.
2
I agree to disagree. Yes, you can state your "best case" for the green revolution and you can refer to the many peer reviewed papers published in Nature and Science. Will you win the argument? Nay. Will scientific reasoning and published references change anyone's opinion? Nay. Face the facts. Mr Donald Trump is on the road to victory, like it or not. The economic indexes are up and jobs are plentiful. Trump is in the White House and God is in heaven. Talking tough and walking tall. Who needs Green Gobbledygook? No one, that is who. Trump today. Trump tomorrow. Trump for all. Amen.
There was a time not too long ago when if the President of the United States of America said when we woke up the next day we would have to begin living life anew and our civilization depended on it , we would wake up and live our lives anew.
I knew America and her people and they were as good and kind as any people on this planet. Then a theology they call "Conservatism" put an end to the evolution of a more perfect union and the idea of a kinder gentler nation was put to the sword.
A country that promised truth, justice and a better future for our planet is now a nation of cynics.
America's founding document was not the Declaration of Independence or the Constitution it was Milton's Paradise Lost. Only one hundred years ago if you studied history, literature and philosophy you knew and understood that America was the response to the central query of Milton's most Epic poem of the English language "is it better to rule in Hell or serve in Heaven?".
Today America is roiled by the two very different answers to Milton's query even as the founders thought their new nation was founded on the idea that it is better to serve in Heaven.
Living twixt Gog and Magog we know there will be no Apocalypse only slow decay. There will be no trumpets blaring only the angry voices of old men cursing their God for allowing this to happen.
It was Milton who informed the founders that it is men not gods that will determine destiny.
2
Pres trump,
I wish to express my gratitude for releasing your snapshots of the M-87 black hole.
A government run by billionaires, for billionaires is stealing our childrens' future. Republicans think that's OK. Do you?
3
I just have to say it but one of the most obvious reasons is that you have a whole lot of really stupid people in this country. People who do not believe science and facts, and people who did not read. These are the people that believe in Trump and they believe he's right. So hats off to the American people and the dumbing-down of our society
1
Even Nancy Pelosi makes fun of the name, Green New Deal. I wonder why?
1
Sorry, but a member of his base told me that climate change was not real because if it were Al Gore would live in a shack and not fly in a plane. . .
Well, what do you expect from a man who stared directly at the sun the last time there was an eclipse? His brain is a byproduct of global warming as much as anything on this Earth. At least, we have a chance to save the Earth. Trump, not so much.
1
I'm sure the incredibly ignorant Trump could not find Mozambique on a map. He will only be aware of the climate disaster when it gets his lawn chair wet at Mar-A-Lago.
We are wasting precious time with this arch fool.
2
Trump can run this counter commercial:
My opponent supports an insane proposal called the Green New Deal. In ten years under this proposal, the government will prohibit the fuels which put food on our plates, manufacture the things we use every day, warm and cool our homes, and fuel the cars and trucks we drive and the planes we fly. My opponent even proposes killing off cattle and other farm animals which fart.
Are you OK with this?
1
Good piece. Question.....what would a “sensible republican” look like?
1
Rome had Nero, We have Trunp.
1
People vote for Trump because they feel like he gets them at a gut level and understands what they care about: jobs and a way out of the misery they see or fear in their non-coastal town due to globalization and economic decline in those places. I’m sorry, but a climate change campaign just isn’t going to break that bond. It’s going to reinforce it because, let’s face it: if you are struggling with those fears, a climate change campaign is just going to reinforce your alientation from the global elites who just don’t get your concerns. Add in the fact that the Green New Deal includes a guarantee of pay for all, whether or not they are employed, and it is dead in the water. People want a future, not a handout.
You are living in a bubble Mr. Friedman. Democrats need a campaign that convinces people in Trump country that they have a future in a globalized world. I hope they find one.
4
I too am a climate change believer. But what I believe is that the Earth’s climate has been changing for eons. From periods of rain forests to periods of ice age in the same exact spot on Earth. And exactly zero influence by man.
The solutions proposed are largely economic and political with no guarantees of any change in climate. What is guaranteed is that masses of people cede power and transfer huge amounts of wealth from here to there to soothe their climate induced guilt. With money changers skimming millions as their share for brokering the planet’s salvation.
Climate change. Religion for those too cool for God.
1
For what it's worth to Trump and his cult followers, the migrants from the south that he would have us fear are not only pushed out by gang violence and abject poverty but also by climate change. According to the Texas Observer, 12/3/18. El Salvador, Honduras and Guatemala have had worsening floods, droughts and storms for several years. When farmers can't grow crops, starvation follows.
Remember our own history; in the 1930's the prolonged drought in the southern Plain states became Dust Bowls and an estimated 2.5 million people out (UC Davis publication 2008). Many came to California and although there was resistance to these "Okies," they came nonetheless. Many settled in California's central valley. Recall further back how the potato famine in Ireland led to ship loads of Irish migrants to the US. When the land no longer supports crops, those who can, move out. But with global climate change, it will not be just a few disasters per century; it will be multiple disasters continuously, without relief.
2
In this article, the feel-good, but ineffective power technologies are essentially those other than wind and solar.
The actual feel-good craze is wind and solar.
The green solution is nuclear power. It's on Friedman's list of useful technologies, but grudgingly so, just ahead of natural gas, which is scorned by environmentalists as Coal Lite.
Choosing the technology should be a matter of weighing the costs against the advantages. That is, it should be a discussion about spreadsheets.
And that means ALL costs against ALL advantages, or at least those which can be identified. Thus, eg, the footprint of wind power needs to be quantified and accounted a cost.
It's an immense cost. Come here to West Virginia to see the 150 miles to 300 miles of pristine mountain ridgelines defaced by 400-foot high turbines, rather than one small nuclear plant. One looks at visual pollution of at least 50 (wind) to 1 (nuclear).
And the safety cost of nuclear should go on the spreadsheets. It's small. There are extremely reliable technologies now available. E.g. The French reactors are virtually trouble free, accounting for at most a handful of deaths.
Nuclear will win on the spreadsheets. Easily.
But hysteria replaces spreadsheets: Reuters reported "...rising concern over nuclear safety in the wake of Japan’s Fukushima disaster."
Fukushima was a tsunami disaster. But a nuclear plant was struck (with few if any deaths), so "Fukushima" has joined "TMI" and "Chernobyl".
1
Sorry, Tom, but your proposed political ads are too wonky and reasoned. The primary way to win votes is to appeal to voters' fears, including our fear of losing something we want. Hence the effectiveness of scaring people into believing they won't be able to afford fuel for their unnecessarily and oftentimes garishly oversized vehicles and homes.
Those appeals don't have to be as brutish and heavy-handed as those of Trump but they do have to be framed in terms of immediate risk to something we consider important. So highlighting threats to coral reefs and African wildlife (or even African humanlife) ain't going to cut it for most, at least not when compared to cheap gas.
The appeals, though, will have to be as simplistic as Trump's. And to my mind, that adds up to scaring people to death about how every catastrophic weather event can be closely tied to climate change. The press is doing a pretty good job of that already as I understand that, precisely because of these weather events, more people believe in climate change and that we should be doing more about it.
Keep at it.
Recall the “dastardly” attack on our nation that precipitated our entry into WWII. Our response was immediate: TOTAL national mobilization. Everything was to be devoted to defeating the enemy. We currently face an attack that (unfortunately) does not have the immediacy of bombs but is far, far more devastating - global warming. It’s consequences are nothing short of a sixth extinction on the planet. We MUST take IMMEDIATE and TOTAL action to rebuff this global terror. And, if the US takes the lead in this response, yes, China, Russia, and India can be persuaded to join this grand endeavor (or face global condemnation with its own consequences to their economies).
There are benefits to such massive retrenchment just as there were to mobilization (even though we “accepted” the deaths of so many young and brave Americans): we transformed our industry; because additional labor was needed, the existing social inequalities were (temporarily) reduced. Regrettably massive, global war seems to have such benefits that we do not seem to accomplish in peace.
Mr. Friedman and all Americans must realize that nothing short of total mobilization will “avert the evil decree”.
4
The problem is that a vast majority of Americans, including those who pay lip service to the urgency of climate change, are constitutionally unwilling to make a minimal “sacrifice” toward “green” goals. They won’t forgo their carbon fueled personal transportation behemoths, can’t bother to read a paragraph to learn how to effectively recycle in their communities, etc. I wish I were wrong, but the world will become progressively more bleak and sterile. I cannot understand why the religious of the world don’t take an activist stand against this assault on Creation.
2
Tom, both you and the GNDrs surprisingly seem to ignore a factor you know a lot about: the economy itself. As long as fossil fuels continue to be artificially "cheap," their true social costs externalized, they'll be consumed. The best way to internalize those costs and raise their price -- while avoiding riots -- is to return the revenues to people so they can continue to afford their lives, while stimulating the economy and incentivizing industry to shift to lower carbon processes and products. The Energy Innovation and Carbon Dividend Act, now in the House has widespread support from many credible people. You should be among them. https://energyinnovationact.org/supporters/
2
Anyone who wishes to formulate a Green New Deal must demonstrate that he/she/they are fully informed about all of the green-energy technologies and policies already in effect in world-leader countries, even small ones.
A visit to the International Energy Agency home page would be an excellent place to start. If you enter https://www.iea.org and view the lower right hand corner of the home page, you will see this:
"Sweden is a leader in the energy transition, according to latest IEA country review - 9 April 2019"
If you read the complete report on Sweden you will learn that Sweden makes extensive use of renewable-energy technologies that are not named by Green New Dealers, OpEd writers, and even comment writers.
Some of these technologies have been in use since the 1950s, but with many additions and improvements since then. Some of them are readily available not only to units of county size on up but even to you, the reader, or small company head. Others have to come from your county.
Because of this I often ask comment writers to tell me how their living or working space is heated and cooled. The small number who answer do so because they use renewable. Nobody who uses fossil answers.
Why don't more of you who write here in support of green energy tell us how you heat and cool. Maybe you are in the majority, still on fossil, but you could tell us when you will be able to make the switch.
Looking forward to your reports.
Only-NeverInSweden.blogspot.com
2
The Green New Deal and its focus on dramatically reducing greenhouse gases emissions has offered an opportunity to look at climate change and channel energy into something meaningful, constructive, and positive for our future.
Trump and his administration's mocking and denial of climate change, in their pursuit of short term profits, is one of the key issues for the Democrats in the 2020 election. The cost of climate change to our environment, health, and our economic future is well known and established.
For the Republicans to turn a blind eye to climate science and the Paris Accord means that this fundamental issue is being ignored and not addressed. Trump and the Republicans are ignoring reality all over the world, climate change and climate science have been solidly proven.
The 2020 election can generate a crucial opportunity for ideas, conversations and policy actions driven by the Green New Deal. The Democrats concentrating on ways to solve the climate change crisis which is fundamental to our well being and our future will put the president on the defensive in the 2020 election.
1
Corporate media and most politicians have long ignored the threat of climate change due to their reliance on fossil fuel reliant corporate advertising dollars and campaign contributions. Thankfully, those days appear to be ending.
As we begin the 2020 race for the White House, nothing less than the future of humanity is at stake. The Green New Deal offers a simple choice: do something quickly, and at a scale that matches the threat, or, consign our children and grandchildren to the Four Horsemen— war, famine, pestilence, and death.
I'd have an ad pointing out what climate change is going to do to illegal immigration. Deserts are already expanding, inflaming tribal violence into civil war, like Syria's. Central Americans and North Africans are already fleeing, in part, drought conditions that will only grow with the decades. The consensus is 3 feet of sea level rise by 2100. Bangladesh is 160 million people. Ask the President pointedly: where does he think those people are going to go when the oceans rise? Then point out the many things this President has done to make the situation worse (reducing auto mileage standards, ordering gas pipelines to be greenlighted against state objections, opening up the East Coast and the Arctic for drilling, etc). He's vulnerable on this issue because he chose to look tough by belittling it. But as his base in the MidWest bail out from yet another drenching, it ain't so funny once Nature clears her voice.
2
Blaming cyclone Idai on global warming is scientifically incorrect. That cyclone formed in an area of the Indian Ocean where, at the time it formed, the surface sea temperature was almost 4 degrees Fahrenheit below normal for that time of the year.
What a simple solution to the complex psychological problem of attempting to understand and appeal to the average Trump supporter and Fox's Nation of Americans. A phenomenon that can't be understood and defies logic. With a little more than half the voters and the help of the Electoral College...there will be no defeating Trump or his Nation in 2020. The fact that the man made it through the Primaries and had enough support to even attempt a Presidential run, let alone his subsequent election, says a lot about us as Americans. It's not good. Too many of us like it his way !! Last election we needed to realize we had to vote for Clinton...like it or not.. to avoid a Trump Presidency and the pickle we now find ourselves. Things have derailed and been worse than anyone could imagine...the Trump Train has gone ...Nowhere ..Fast! The next election the same will hold true...just vote Blue No Matter Who...no matter what the platform! Let's not take any more chances. Let's not wait for a perfect candidate...just vote Blue! The GOP has been..useless! Years of chaos and dysfunction..and yet...there is a Fox NATION ...and the supporters at Trump rallies seem rested and energetic. Vote Blue No Matter Who..and No Matter What....or we're all going to turn Blue in 2020!
I would suggest that climate change is but a subset of the larger issue of healthcare, albeit healthcare embodying our future; that is, the world our children and grandchildren inherit from us.
I believe we need to do a better job of knitting together the major issues of our geologic time, as well as tieing them to our future on this planet. If people cannot manage that thought integration, then perhaps the future of democratic government is moribund.
We are particularly ignorant and lazy citizenry for a country with our heavy responsibilities in the world. Perhaps it may be time to consider more radical methods of governing if we are not more prepared to be full Citizens. That really what “make America great again” should be about!
People should be taking Jay Inslee's run for the Democratic nomination a lot more seriously.
4
I agree, we must frame and focus the climate issue properly. So why on earth do some folks usurp the Green New Deal terminology with Green Real Deal? Intentionally or not, they come across as distancing their GRD from the GND, regardless of the contents of each. Do they really want competing slogans in the Dems’ 2020 campaign?
Recently, the Dems’ sloganeering has been far from brilliant, and Green New Deal is a welcome exception. It comes of the tongue much, much more easily than Green Real Deal.
This is the circular firing squad that President Obama warned against the other day, and it's not the visionaries that are taking aim.
Then there’s this from Friedman:
“But my head says you can’t transform our energy system and our social/economic one at scale all at once. We have to prioritize energy/climate.”
A straw man if ever I saw one. Nobody to my knowledge has claimed you can do everything all at once. There must be an ideal to aim for; if memory serves, the conventional punditry in 2016 was strictly for pragmatism, and the Dems went with it. How did that work out?
We must obviously keep different ideas in mind, but not at the cost of ideals; if the ideals are lost, we might as well kiss goodbye to Mother Earth as our hospitable home. And let’s remember that when FDR first took office, nobody, not even the President himself, had much idea what the original New Deal would look like. And stick to the catchy name, not some clumsy knockoff.
22:00 EDT, 4/09
I'd like to think this would would work. But I despair over the venality and corruption of the GOP members of Congress and of the emotional super-glue bond Trump has with 40% of the American voters. Their short term hatreds and grievances seem to know no limits.
1
Now we can see the back-lighted silhouette of a black hole. With trump, his new black abyss is so deep that not even future life can escape his grasp.
Trump is pro-life-of-misery like the rest of the trumplicans, and is seeking to abort future generations of life with his sadistic treatment of the environment. He's the depraved little kid who never grew up, relishing the torture of insects and animals with a smirk and a giggle - as always, without personal consequence.
Trump and his ilk believe in socialized misery, where poverty, bad health, contaminated food, water and air for all - to enrich themselves.
We do need to prioritize, now! And THE most consequential step we can take to save the earth and future generations of life is to rid us of the trump. Until that happens, we're wasting our energy, powerless to overcome his destructive dirty new deal that will kill off and abort generations of life.
It is not trump's planet to do as he wishes, or the 1%'s planet to exploit as they wish.
Trump has been the laughingstock for decades, yet he bamboozled enough Americans to give him totalitarian power. Trumplicans are experts sabotaging all sane Democratic and environmental ideas, even misrepresenting them into caricatures they can laugh at.
Pro-life? No they're pro-life-of-misery as they support the cruel treatment of the recently born at the border. Socialism? They're the corrupt socialists, a la Venezuela, on behalf of the rich.
The 1% will always own the higher ground.
Good ideas all. By the way, carbon capture and sequestration is an expensive, possibly hazardous pipe dream and a waste of time.
And there was no collusion. The Muller investigation was a hoax and a witch hunt. Just ask Barr....because you are never going to see the report. There are ways to control the outcome of any controversy.
1
David Attenborough's narration of a climate change movie now playing on Netflix is not to be missed.
Well I confess that this film had such an emotional impact on me, that I
couldn't take, so I dumped it halfway through.
If you encounter anybody who thinks that global warming isn't the finish of
our planet, then tell the fool to just see the movie
It will break his heart if not brainwashed, and I mix my anatomical metaphors, because there is no comedy in our ongoing tragedy,. except when a wannabe
persuader is flublonged, Yiddish for what reality feels like or close enough.
2
"A Green Real Deal" will never happens unless the US and China cooperate, you know it Mr. Friedman and you also knows that China will never sign "a real deal" unless it achieves its economics and military goals. the USA though, under different president, will probably sign. In the last 30 years Mr. Friedman you lost touch with reality, you leave in a dream better wake up
Thats right. Forget the border crisis, run on climate change.
Thatll get those folks who voted for Trump to vote for the Democrat nominee.
Its time for moderate Democrats to come to the realization that their party left them.
Our Planet with the magnificent David Attenborough should be shown to every Kid on the planet starting with the one in the White House. Maybe he could convince his dad when no one else can!
2
Green New Reality in 2020? Don’t forget who you are trying to reason with. Let me make a few suggestions:
A Tesla will beat a ‘vette in the 1/4 mile.
Over 30,000 Hillary Clinton emails were kept on a private server, powered by fossil fuel. Where’s the investigation?
Wind turbines on the southern border will give Mexicans cancer.
Robert Mueller’s carbon paper emissions must be capped!
Solar power is the name of a giant nuclear plant, located on the sun, and we need to get control of it before the Russians do.
Coal and Santa Claus. Think about it.
We can accomplish no meaningful change with even a 55-45 electoral win.
There has to be general agreement based on consensus-reality. We have social media hardening a sizable minority of the country into reality-denying Trump lovers. We have for-profit hate-pundits and conspiracy lunatics, fake Russian-bot Twitter accounts.
We have Facebook and Google trafficking in the hugely profitable exploitation of human emotion revealed by user self-identification. The hotter the emotion, the more profitable are their businesses.
In 2020, a rational (by definition, a Democrat, since Trump will lie, fantasize and run a completely dishonest and irrational campaign)will win the Presidency, probably by a 55-45 majority. That’s best case scenario.
The climate deniers among the Red State Republican Senators, along with their House counterparts aren’t going away nor will they be able to say, “oh, we were wrong on global warming, and our arguments were stupid”.
Yes, I can see how Earth's Average Global temp being 72F for the last 570 Million years barring the 4 major Cool Periods, but it's still only 61F as we recently came out of a Cool Period, mocks Trump for the "crazy" (sarcasm) belief that it's going to get warmer whether Man is here or not. That graph of Temp going up for the last 1.5 million years obviously returning to the straight line average is definitely the way to convince people of insanity.
Just not the way you think.
I love the way Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez gets under the skin of Republicans. They are apoplectic over her Green New Deal. A conversation with a member of the Republican base might go something like this...
"AOC wants to take away our hamburgers!"
"So what? You can make great burgers from ground lamb, ground bison and ground pork."
"I can't believe she wants to take away all our cows!"
"The Earth is a closed system, but the United States is not a closed system. You will still be able to purchase beef from Argentina."
"Yeah, but it will cost more!"
Don't mention veggie burgers right away. Invite him over for dinner and secretly serve him a delicious plant-based cheeseburger, through the garden, all the fixings. Someday his children will thank you.
Not sure. I've come to wonder whether the progressive themes that are rising within the Democratic party are being intentionally stoked by Trump: the green new deal, reparations, allowing more immigration, raising the minimum wage, gun control, late term abortions, ...
It's hard to play the sober, responsible, taking-the-long-view adult when competing with an irresponsible, gratification-now narcissist like Trump for votes from a population that consists of a Frankenstein-like collection of angry failed or failing racist whites and wealthy tax-avoiding whites.
I worry about a trap.
Sorry but this is a profoundly wrong analysis.
Trump hasn't lost one vote in coal country despite the fact that all the tax breaks have gone into the pockets of big coal CEO Robert Murry, and that with all the deregulations the rate of black lung in West Virginia has skyrocketed, or the fact that Federal aid for black lung care have been cut.
Every Republican Bible Belt state knows the effects of climate change, yet they keep voting in the same politicians. So long as our tax dollars keep subsidizing their annual disaster relief there won't be any change. Go talk to people in hurricane alley, it's the norm for them now. They don't even bother rebuilding, they just collect disaster relief, patch up the holes and wait for the next storm.
The media still under estimates how powerful hate "Trumps" a racists self interests. It's never been about economics or climate or healthcare. That is what will carry Trump in 2020.
"Carbon Dioxide Floods Farmlands"
"God sent the scientists to warn us"
"Stabilize our weather NOW"
"The life you save may be your grandchild's"
"Fossil Fuel = Floods & Famines"
"Coal Causes Cyclones"
Mocking anybody may be effective in short term politics, but it’s otherwise not smart. Let Trump show himself for what he is by our simple truth-telling. Stooping to his level is equally disrespectful of the American public.
Above all, Trump projects his own stupidity on us—he thinks we believe his lies and, even if not, that we don’t care about them, they’re just “harmless hyperbole” he has called them—in a book he didn’t write. He has no respect for the American people, nor for our institutions, nor for our democratic aspirations. He’s quite simply—wrong.
adding a note and a recommendation...currently reading "The Uninhabitable Earth, life after warming" by David Wallace-Wells.
Democrats and ‘progressives’ are masters at stoking societal anxiety.
This nation does not need any Green New Deal or Great Next Depression.
The planet is not dying, and we will not be dead in 12 years either.
Just stop with the hyperbolic nonsense.
I would strongly encourage Nancy Pelosi to read this and to stop trashing what she herself does not apparently understand about the Green New Deal’s value, when appropriately messaged, as a tool to defeat Trump and address climate change. Just like the Democrats continue to alllow Trump to tar them as advocates for “open borders” because they fail to address immigration challenges in a coherent and consistent fashion, this entire climate narrative could slip through their grasp as well if they don’t get their act together soon. One thing most Americans understand is that the greatest threat to our liberty, democracy and sanity would be four more years of the most intellectually and morally deficient man child to ever occupy the Oval Office.
Sadly, Dr. Tom, the key to the Democratic Party defeating Trump isn't in shoring up arguments for climate change and a green real deal. Trump's people are as antidiluvian as dinosaurs submerged in oil and plastic-filled oceans. Until climate warming floods some of our coastal cities, Trump's base won't see the light and be woke. The planet's dying and Trump laughs.
Face the changes in America. And in Israel, where Netanyahu -- thanks to Trump and Bibi's ultra-right Conservative base --will be the longest ruling Prime Minister in Israeli history. Arrant white nationalism, anti-immigrant bias, ignoring basic human rights, are the order of the day, globally.
It's bogus. Worse, it's a religion, no science. Goes nowhere. Trump returns.
1
There's the saying "follow the money". The Democrats should follow the weather and the environment.
With every weather and environmental disaster show up and ask:
1. How's FEMA doing for you
2. How are your levies holding up?
3. How fast are your electrical grids being restored?
4. How safe is your drinking water after the flood?
5.How safe are your roads and bridges?
6. How clean is your air?
Keep it local and something that the voter is affected by and can see.
1
Mr. Friedman may be an expert on climate change. Tragically perhaps, he is not an expert on presidential politics.
Every real American male, and many women now, owns a Ford F350 or a Chevy Tahoe.
Otherwise, your are not a real American "guy".
And, you say: Highlighting climate change to Americans driving vehicles that pump 300 pounds of CO2 per minute into the air,
just to drive to the car wash,
is the key to the election.
Uh, huh. Ok, Got it. Thanks. I will take that to the bank.
2
Good article, thoughtful comments. HOWEVER, and let's be real about this: the next elections will be about as clean as a pool of diarrhea, and as disgusting as this may sound, it's not as disgusting as the state of US politics today. Yesterday I watched a GOP so-called lawmaker have a mocking session with John Kerry, which tells you all you need to know about the cesspool everyone is swimming in with this government. Until Americans get a REAL EDUCATION, the majority of votes will go to the party that entertains the most - catchy slogans and all.
Trump knows climate change is real unless he really is mentally ill.
I really, really, really hope that the Democratic party reads and uses this column.
1
I have driven across the country many times and saw this very windfarm (I have a picture of it that I took and it's NOT in my rearview mirror!)
Climate change is real. One way or another. And it must be dealt with or the richsters will go back in their gated communities and they won't care about you and me. That's a fact. Greed triumphs over morals. Hey, where's my kid's seat at Harvard or Stanford? I paid for this so let me have it!
When I was young and lived in DC for 41 years it was normal to go to Wilmington, NC (Kitty Hawk) and see stair stringers on the beach after a storm. Of course "flood insurance" (read: you and I) paid for this. How stupid could people be in realizing that living right next to the ocean is pretty and all that but it's really not all that safe, regardless?
What? The GND is what will help Trump get re-elected. What universe does this author live in? People generally want a cleaner planet but for swing states, a cleaner planet is like #10 on their list. Economy and jobs is #1, in which Trump dominates over Dems.
Thanks for this article. I am in my seventies and I have said this before and will say it again: I suspect that there are many, many grandparents like myself who are deeply concerned about the future for our children and grandchildren. Thus, the climate change issue is of utmost importance to us as well as to younger voters. I do believe it will be an important issue in the 2020 election. One more thing: from a military defense posture—- rising seas are creating unacceptable problems for Navy ports and recent flooding in the middle of the country as well as severe storms in the south are causing military air bases to face
disruptions in the mission of defending the nation.
CO is now one of the states moving rapidly to reverse the harmful effects of climate change. I just sent a message to my state legislator to vote yes on HB-19-1261. It is innovative, aggressive, and protective of public health. Other states are moving fast too. As a trained Climate Reality presenter, I am so encouraged by these bold actions to help save our planet!!
It is time to again have a serious comparative look at nuclear power. It has a few advantages. For example:
No carbon dioxide. No soot. No arsenic, mercury, and radioactivity inherent in burning coal. No black lung. No acid rain. No ocean acidifcation.
Enough reliable electricity so that all vehicles and trains could be electric, some probably by way of overhead wires.
No solar panels which take up huge amounts of land and still need fossil plants to take over during calms. Ditto for wind turbines.
Existing nuclear plants are just scaled-up submarine power plants from the 50s. Advanced reactor designs are much safer, can be located inland away from the ocean and hurricanes/tsunamis, and far from the expensive coastal real estate.
Some spent fuel can be reused, the rest safely buried. The best burial places are certain locations far at sea where the waste is sunk and buries itself deep into the seabed, which forms natural shielding.
I’ve have more reasons. Need any?
I agreed with everything Thomas Friedman said here until I got down to "carbon capture and storage", which is usually presented as 'carbon capture and permanent sequestration'. This is to be in disused oil wells and bore holes where the carbon dioxide will (in the hopes of the sequestrationists) combine permanently and forever with iron compounds in the rocks; and problem solved.
That is, until the next glaciation brings 1 km thick ice down to cover New York and most of Northern Europe. That process has arguably already begun, but has been postponed until the supply of fossil carbon runs out in about 300 years time (ie about as far into the future as George Washington is into the past.)
At that stage, our descendants may need all the carbon they can get to do a controlled warming of the planet.
A different take:
I am an ardent climate change believer. I consider it the defining problem of my daughter's generation.
And yet... Last night, I had an excellent rib-eye steak. Seriously, it was great; marinated in beer, we grilled for the first time this season. I got in my car this morning and drove to work; I could bike, but it takes over an hour. I'll probably head home tonight and hop on some electronic device. I mean, I am commenting on an energy sucking computer. My carbon footprint is smaller than some - I'm broke as a joke due to college debt so I don't travel - but I can't kid myself about my personal failings.
And when you multiple those failings times 400 million, you begin to realize how even in our daily lives our society continues to ignore the looming threat.
The government needs to take point on climate change, for certain; it's nigh impossible for one person to due things like alter economic trends and bolster renewable energy. But the individual members of our society - myself included - need to figure out some way to get our collective hiney in gear and start practicing what we preach. It's difficult to change; personal trainers and Catholic confession exist for the same foundational reason.
But We the People need to show our government that we are truly committed to fighting climate change by altering our daily lifestyles. Maybe then our government will pay a little more attention.
105
@htg. Individual effort will not work. Only collective effort will work. For every individual who will change there will be one or more who will actually increase their carbon footprint. Only collective effort will require all to change.
18
@David S
What is a collective but a mesh of individuals moving in the same direction as one group? And sometimes, the best way to get that collective moving is to lead by example, not by legislated direction.
15
@htg I've cut down on driving, collect gray water from the sinks to feed the plants around our home, all local to the desert we live in. We flush only when necessary, use rags instead of paper towels and reusable coffee cups. We compost, not because we have a garden, but to keep that black gold from the dump. I could go on.
But all that daily attention to lessening my household carbon impact doesn't come close to mitigating my flights to see family a couple of times a year.
I'm with you -- we need individuals to act in their daily lives in ways that recognize the impact of consumption, but there are areas, like transportation that are out of our control where we really need to pressure our government to step up.
19
I often reach the end of Mr. Friedman's columns with a sense of frustration as he seems to correctly describe the symptoms but can only view solutions through a neo-liberal lens. His proposals must always be presented as practical only within this context.
The Green New Deal is already quite 'Real' and doesn't need re-branding or watering down. It addresses the climate crisis and the impacts of neo-liberal polices, many of which are at the root of the crisis.
The science on climate change is overwhelmingly clear and the message urgent. Rapid and systemic changes across societies are required, and fast. The GNR is a solid, broad, socially inclusive path to a better future.
Everything he says about the climate should work against him, but but his base hears him quote the 2% of "scientists" who dispute the notion of man-made climate change, and 40% of America is suddenly convinced. We would need a bunch of hurricanes, earthquakes, oil spills, floods, and tornadoes right before the election to get anybody in the red states to think about the climate. Even then, I'm not sure they would connect the dots.
Health care hits everybody, all the time. In my opinion, this clip (his lies about health care) can't be replayed too often:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XQFItVBKlAU
Anyway, the key to defeating him is not arguing with him, but offering something better.
@Peter Maybe you should simply hope for the trends in these things to be positive. They are currently not, which may be why thinking about about them fails to inspire terror.
Hurricane strikes, including both absolute number of strikes and major strikes, have trended downward for more than a century - inversely proportional to CO2 increase in the atmosphere. See here and here:
https://www.nhc.noaa.gov/pastdec.shtml
https://journals.ametsoc.org/doi/pdf/10.1175/BAMS-D-17-0184.1
Major tornado strikes have also declined significantly as CO2 has increased:
https://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/climate-information/extreme-events/us-tornado-climatology/trends
As for CO2 causing earthquakes- that's a new one! But I guess when the invisible, all-powerful molecule increases from 3/10,000th of the atmosphere to 4/10,000th of the atmosphere over a century and a half, anything can happen!
@Bob
This is what I mean about connecting the dots:
Since fracking began, the number of earthquakes in Oklahoma has gone from 1 or 2 a year to 800 a year. CO2 comes from fossil fuel, which we get by fracking. See any connection?
The other data you provided links to is indeed very interesting. Other sites, using the same data, post different conclusions:
https://www.thoughtspot.com/thoughtspot-blog/are-hurricanes-getting-worse-story-told-7-charts
1
@Peter The site you linked to is nonsense, and it does not use the same data. The supposed increasing "trend" reported in high intensity storms uses data from only 2 decades. The data actually go back far further than 2 decades. I gave you data going back to 1850. If you are forced to disregard 80%+ of the available data in order to make your point, then you have no point. There is an inverse relationship between storm frequency and concentration of atmospheric CO2. This is completely obvious from the empirical data.
Similarly, storm damage is not a function simply of storm frequency or intensity. It is rather a function of storms x how many people live in storm prone areas (e.g coasts and flood plains), how their houses are constructed, and how much stuff they own that can be damaged. Since the coastal population keeps increasing over time, and since people increasingly build in flood plains, and since people get wealthier over time and have more things to damage, storms therefore cause more damage. This has no obvious relation to "climate change."
As for fracking, if minor tremors bother you, then switch to coal. Coal mining doesn't cause tremors. Fracking tremors do not appear to cause significant problems either, of course. Certainly not enough of a problem to entertain spending $100 trillion to reconfigure the U.S. economy, eliminate flying and farting cows, and hope that someone in a lab coat will solve the problem of the wind intermittency.
Trump's base will never desert him for add on TV regardless of how they're framed. For them Trump is "hurting people", as one Trump supporter put it he needs to "hurt the right people" - which means people who are not like her. Trump's supporters have one goal - to hurt the people they don't like: Black, brown, women, LBGT, etc. and the "deep state" or the "establishment" Trump's base is only interested in destruction.
Trump supporters want destruction because feel they have been left behind and therefore want to take everyone else down too. They don't seem to realize that most people have been "left behind", unless you're the 0.1% you've been left behind.
That anger is not going to be assuaged by bright adds about new jobs or how green energy will help their kids or polar bears will become extinct if we don't act.
I wish people made rational decisions based on facts and had the ability to grasp the big picture and see how interconnected the economies and people of the world are but they don't. And Trump is making sure to keep their attention on their anger, not on possible solutions.
2
Tom - did your head tell you that we needed to "play it safe" in 2016 and nominate HRC? Does it tell you now that we need to "move to the center" in order to appeal to non-college educated white males in the rust belt? Sorry, but you are one election behind and still taking all the wrong lessons from the past. Dukakis. Gore, HRC - all "safe" choices designed not to offend. Bill Clinton and Barak Obama were disruptors who weren't "electable" at the time. If you didn't see Trump coming, then you should not get to tell the rest of us who or what platform is "electable". The Green New Deal is the answer, and I'm looking for a candidate with the skills to sell it and the conviction to get it done. The "Green Real Deal" is patronizing and yet another example of Dems giving up half the farm before even getting to the negotiating table. That's how we lose - by campaigning from a place of fear. We win when we stand for something. If you don't think we can sell better jobs and opportunities and a strong social safety net for all Americans as part of our platform, then you are lacking the vision and courage that are required not only to defeat Trump, but also to govern in his wake. " I don't care who it is or what their platform is or anything other than that we beat Trump because he is so awful" is exactly the line of thinking that will give us another four years of Trump.
1
Good column this morning, David, but could you please mention some time a bill with broad, grassroots support, the Energy Innovation and Carbon Dividend Act, now before Congress (HR763). One of its main features is a carbon fee or tax, based on the GHG (greenhouse gas) potential of the source of energy mined, pumped, or imported. The other main feature is to return the funds collected to the American people in the form of a monthly dividend, so much per individual. The bill thus incorporates the measure economists regard as most effective, and a measure to offset the costs to poor and middle class Americans. The Green New Deal describes admirable aspirations; The EICD bill actually does something about climate change. It worries me that columnists like yourself so rarely mention it.
1
I forwarded this article to my representative in Congress.
I hope others will do the same.
Today Mr. Friedman nails it!
1
Oh that climate change stuff again. The climate has always been changing and the failure of these of these green purveyors of "truth" to admit this and the fact that given the chance adaptation and innovation are completely ignored. If anybody involved in this issue was honest, lol, just follow the money. Power and control are the ends; hysteria, bold unfulfilled predictions are the means.
Climate change is at the bottom of the list of concerns of voters. Healthcare, immigration, and the economy will determine the next election. In reading Mr. Friedmans opinion piece I conclude he has no clue what is on voters minds outside the beltway and California. Trump in 2020 is the result.
1
There was an older green new deal which at the time was in many ways far more progressive than that proposed by OAC.
"Solar Energy: The sun offers an almost unlimited supply of energy if we can learn to use it economically"
"...shall we surrender to our surroundings, or shall we make our peace with nature and begin to make reparations for the damage we have done to our air, to our land, and to our water?"
"We still think of air as free. But clean air is not free, and neither is clean water."
"The program I shall propose to Congress will be the most comprehensive and costly program in this field in America's history."
"It is not a program for just one year. A year's plan in this field is no plan at all. This is a time to look ahead not a year, but 5 years or 10 years--whatever time is required to do the job."
"I am not a crook" Nobody's perfect.
1
The problem is that climate change advocates and their sky-is-falling rhetoric when combined with a pie-in-the-sky Green New Deal are eminently mockable. In any case, isn't citing the cyclone, at the every start of this column, a classic case of confusing climate and weather?
3
@J. And when, with increasingly common “500-year” meteorological catastrophes, world-wide disruptions in climatic cycles, disappearance of glacial ice, rising sea levels, desertification, species extinction, ad nauseum, do you decide that the weather aberrations may just possibly be a new normal signaling a major change in climate? When change in climate is generational instead of millennial, it’s time to take notice.
1
No one has to refer to disasters around the world to illustrate the effects of climate change. Images of the damage from recent hurricanes, tornados, floods, etc. in this country would take up most of a 30 second ad. Couple that with Trumps ridiculous denials and making things all better by throwing paper towels at hurricane victims might help illustrate the fact that natural disasters are happening more often and are often more serious than before, and we need serious leadership, not clownish buffoonery in the Oval Office. Sadly, we have almost a year and a half of future damage to add to the list--might have to expand to a 60 second spot.
1
I beg to disagree with Tom Friedman on the Green Deal, alone.
Trumpsters believe that Trump is the boss, and thus he is right.
Rule#1: The boss (Trump) is always right.
Rule#2: If the boss (Trump) is wrong, see Rule#1
Trumpsters tend to live this lie, this safety bubble of security.
The way to defeat Trump with a Green Deal may be with humor.
Maybe Democrats could tease Trumpsters with Trump's OK sign.
They might show the OK sign with both hands at the same time.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Boss Trump is not OK, as he seeks to defeat climate change.
OK, OK?
OK, OK?
1
If only the green new deal had some relation to reality. Until then, the concept will be mocked by the Trump loyalists who can rely on the deal's absurd and extremely costly goals as justification for dismissing climate change. Whats even more apolitical of the deal is that the costs are likely to impact the middle and lower class far more than the privileged class - see the yellow jacket movement when Macron hiked gasoline taxes. Like AOC el al, Friedman has a tendency to latch on simplistic solutions like "100% renewable grid" ignoring that there are plenty of industrial and commercial potential where the simultaneous generation of electricity and heat would result in far greater reduction of CO2 emissions - economically.
People who care about coral reefs in Australia and animals in Africa are not the target audience for this message. Stick with the local economic issues and provide concrete non refutable examples. A great time to stick to the All Politics is Local mentality.
2
For Democrats they are hurt by broad labels like progressive, far left, etc. They need to move from the general to the granular (specific programs). Those who defeat Trump have the opposite challenge. They need to go from the myriad disasters associated with his positions and actions and link these into one broad message. I think that this message should be stewardship. He is irresponsible when it comes to climate change, but he is also irresponsible when it comes to issues such as the long term implications of immigration, trade (especially his instability and unpredictability) , intrusions in the markets, etc, etc. Of course these are all due to a combination of narcissism and gross incompetence (the perfect storm)
2
Nothing wrong with taking better care of the environment and finding ways to replace fossil fuels as they will run out. However;
- the data that climate scientists rely on is very weak, the unprecedented warming across the globe since 1880 is based on bad data.
- whatever we do here in the US will have little impact unless China and India stop emitting
- nothing wrong with decorating your roof with solar panels, but wind and solar are not good solutions at this point
- nukes are the only alternative energy source we know of that can replace fossil fuels
- single weather events means nothing. We've always had huge storms. There is no evidence that there is an increase in violent storms. Hurricane activity in the atlantic hasn't increased, tornadoes, no. cherry picking single events is at best not scientific, at worst it's simply propaganda.
- environments always change. When stressed, weaker members of a species die out and stronger ones, resistant to the stress, prevail and the species overall becomes stronger. If a species is wiped out, new ones replace them. The earth never sits still.
If the dems want to win on the GND, you need to martial facts and science and present facts and science (should be interesting since there's lot's of copmuter projections but little evidence). Not weeping college freshmen wearing signs and t-shirts who probably have never taken a science course in their lives. If you want to win on this issue -- head, not heart.
1
@Ralphie -- you are reduced to a Gish-gallop of claims that you make with no substantiation, and for them to be right you need all those scientists out there to be a conspiracy and only you and a handful of "others who know the truth" are right.
And among the many things you say one that is clearly missing the point is your view of evolutionary gradual change in the face of mass extinctions. In mass extinctions very large numbers of species die off -- almost all the dinosaurs are gone, we have only birds today; they came from what was "a twig on the branches of dinosaur evolution" ... look here:
https://evolution.berkeley.edu/evolibrary/article/0_0_0/evograms_06
After mass extinctions it takes tens of millions of years for species diversity to be reestablished, and of course it is quite different from what was before.
If your view is that humans could extinguish themselves and a very large fraction of the animals and plants on earth and you don't care: "new ones will replace US" ... then say so.
2
@Lee Harrison Come on.
1) Check out the raw temp station data at Berkeley earth. I have. Everything station's raw data has been adjusted, almost always up. And for long term stations (ove 1000 months) the raw data shows little if any warming. Not the magnitude claimed by alarmists.
2) You know as well as I do that emerging economies are the primary culprits in emissions now, the US is on the decline.
3) You don't think nukes are a better long term solution than wind and solar? You should.
4) There is no evidence that hurricanes, tornadoes, etc., are increasing in frequency or intensity.
5) Weather isn't climate.
6) Don't conflate mass extinction events with the mechanisms of evolution.
@Ralphie -- you Gish-gallop off to another set of claims. None of those have anything to do with your claims that I demolished, other than
"Don't conflate mass extinction events with the mechanisms of evolution" ... I am not, you are.
None of your other claims are relevant to the issue of whether mankind's production of CO2 is changing the climate unacceptably (or acidifying the oceans, another major problem).
It doesn't matter who is the biggest cause. It doesn't matter to what degree nuclear power might (or might not) be "a solution." Arguments over hurricanes are not the issue here, though that is my speciality not yours, and the evidence we have does suggest that hurricane intensities will be greater. Indeed weather is not climate ... "Mare's eat oats and does eat oats..." is equally relevant here.
You are just spouting slogans.
3
Yet another thought-provoking, fact-rich near philippic by one of the Times' best columnists. I would only suggest that his political ads need editing down to a pithier 2-3 lines. And, since it is difficult to love coral reefs (despite the urgency here) but easy to love polar bears (think Coke ads) point out that the loss of their sea ice hunting grounds is driving them to extinction. Bleached coral may be as tragic but not nearly as cuddly as those fluffy, family-oriented Ursidea.
2
I suspect that a lot of Americans don't care NOW about the collapse of the great barrier reefs or the polar ice caps. But they will if the message gets to them that this destruction is threatening the worlds seafood supply. This destruction is not as threatening locally as massive storms and flooding in the USA but this climate-change-induced effect does show that CO2 emissions are having a profound global impact on human life.
3
Candidates rarely win or lose based on a single issue, and climate change is not likely going to be the exception.
Yes, Bibi Netanyahu just won re-election based mostly on his being seen as tough on security, but in Israel, security is always the number 1 and often the *only* issue.
And while Trump may be very callous and wrong about climate change, his likely opponent is going to be tarred with all kinds of negatives on lots of other issues.
Reparations is not going to be a winning issue.
Getting rid of all medical insurance isn't either.
If the economy holds up for another year and a half, Trump will rightly claim that anyone who wants a job can have one.
And he will claim, whether right or wrong, that his opponent wants to pay a living wage to anyone who refuses to work.
These others issues will be seen as more important to more Americans than will climate change.
1
It's time for aware people to emphasize the possibility that large scale agriculture will be heavily impacted by unpredictable storms (as are happening now in the mid West). One season of industrial crop failure would be a disaster for Americans.
It doesn't matter now if the changing climate is caused by humans or not; everybody depends on food and water, and it's obvious to most people that stable and predictable weather is not our present reality. We know that CO2 is a contributing factor, and we know some ways to address that. AOC & Inslee and others are naming the obvious. The children of our great, great grandchildren will thank them.
Instead of pointing repeatedly to climate science—which continues to be undermined by the right and petro-business interests, I think it's possible to make the simple case that the earth is the human habitat: The bio-sphere is a thin little band around the surface of the earth where life abounds, and it is precious. As it stands, it's not possible for people to live underwater or in outer space. The surface of the earth is all we have, and we need to preserve this habitat where humans evolved and adapted to over the past ten thousand years.
I am 100% on board with enacting programs or legislation to address climate change, but I also did not think that the Green New Deal proposal was the right approach. The Democratic Party should have gotten to some consensus on a realistic plan—maybe something like the California plan suggested in Friedman’s column. The proposal from Ocasio-Cortez and Markey is not realistic, and it was too open to criticism. So much, in fact, that McConnell could use it as a tool to get Senate Democrats to abstain from voting for it.
Let’s do something that is supportable by a wide range of the electorate. The deniers, either through ignorance or politics, are in the minority now. The Green New Deal was not thought out economically or politically, in my opinion. It could have been much better.
1
Proposing socialism (which universally fails) to combat climate change paints Democrats as more power hungry than environmentally concerned. Market competition and private investment in the energy sector have delivered on the clean air and water act dating back to 1963. REASONABLE regulations have a positive effect; radical global 'initiatives' do not.
Anyone with any sense "mocks climate change."
At best, "climate change"--of the anthropogenic sort--is egregiously bad "science," what's called in the business a "pathological science" that turns scientific method upside down. At worst, it's a complete and deliberate fraud.
Real science takes observations, looks for a theory that explains the observations, tests the theory, and uses the results of the tests as observations to revise the theory. This cycle iterates until the theory and the observations agree. (I'm a scientist--I've been doing this for a third of a century.)
Climate "science" has tried to reverse this process. The "scientists" started out with the theory--that it's all the fault of humans--and have been searching for observations that confirm their theory, ignoring anything that doesn't confirm the theory.
Yes, the climate is likely changing. It's been doing that for millions of years. We've had two noticeable warm-cold-warm-cold cycles just over the last two thousand years, and neither extreme of either cycle did us any significant harm. In fact, a good case can be made that the warm phases were actually beneficial.
1
@Henry Miller, Libertarian
Wow, are you wrong. I don't know what kind of scientist you are, but there is this thing called 'consensus.' Scientists have reached a consensus that humans are causing climate change, and the change is not beneficial. Personally, what's going on with ocean warming is rather concerning to me.
Next week, maybe we'll identify some asteroid that's going to terminate us. Or, one of our mega-volcanoes will erupt and put us out of business. And, yes, we do have naturally occurring cycles of glaciation which occur over thousands of years--not the decades we're talking about now. Those are things over which we have no control--but limiting the change humans make to our climate is within our control. This idea that "climate always changes, this too shall pass" doesn't make any sense whatsoever. Why not make a concerted effort to avert problems that we see in front of us, problems we've been studying for half a century? There are still jobs in it--green energy production, green buildings, the whole bit. We're not asking humanity to go back to living in caves, we're just asking to switch to different energy sources. And, if somebody actually does come up with 'clean coal,' then, sure, let's burn it. Right now, clean coal is an oxymoron.
What's the harm in trying? Even if climate change isn't so bad, at least the air will be cleaner.
I am a scientist also, and rather more open minded and socially conscious than you, apparently.
4
@Henry Miller, Libertarian
Consider this, then. What are some of the social points that anthropological climate change believers are supporting?
- Increased renewable energy and less reliance on fossil fuels. Yes, non-windy days and nights are a problem, but so is burning natural gas so we can charge our iPhones and run AC all day in every house and commercial building. On top of that, relying more on renewable energy allows us to stockpile our oil and gas, promoting national security.
- Increased and more accessible mass transportation. Yes, cars are great for remote areas, but anyone who commutes an interstate has considered just how insane it is that a million cars drive to work every day in their metro.
- Decreased deforestation and increased reforestation, along with protection of wilderness areas. Yes, we need land to develop, but surely we can appreciate the value of a resource that takes 100 or more years to mature.
- Proper disposal of refrigerants. This was a key point of Presidents Clinton's and Bush 2's environmental platforms and remains vital given our reliance on refrigeration and the harms that CFCs cause.
Believe what you will, but I fail to see how anyone's position on climate change makes these ideas bad or improper. Maybe the time has come to stop debating climate change and simply get on board with sound policies.
2
Well, I would classify ...as one example....The Great Barrier Reef dying a "significant harm".....not you?...benefical perhaps..? Wow.
2
At 50 I went snorkeling for the first time over a reef in the Virgin Islands. It was a wondrous eye opening experience. Such a colorful beautiful otherworldly place and it captured my imagination so much that I then learned how to scuba dive so I could get closer as I admired the coral and the creatures that inhabit the reef. The thought that future generation will not be able to share this experience is truly heartbreaking. My advice to my fellow citizens is to get off the couch and go check this out before it is gone forever. Afterwards think about how you want to vote going forward.
The fact that the U.N. believes the storm is “one of the worst ever” is by its own terms not evidence of climate change. Put aside the simple fact that the historical records of such weather events in that part of the world are lacking and so unreliable. The U.N. language itself leaves open the possibility that worse storms may have occurred there in say the 30s and 50s when extreme weather, including extreme heat and hurricanes/cyclones, was impacting the earth. So it is not evidence of CO2 caused climate change in the 21st century, but evidence that extreme whether has always impacted the earth and that even well educated people forget that.
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@ehillesum
So extreme weather has always impacted the Earth. This assertion--aside from being obvious in the extreme--in no way negates the now firm scientific evidence that human caused CO2 is causing and will continue to cause severe negative impacts on the planet.
2
A picture is worth a 100 words. I live in the Mojave desert where vast areas are being covered by solar fields. Driving by one of these new solar fields the other day I couldn't help but notice that there were hundreds of cars of workers parked adjacent to the site. Each car represents a good paying job, a long term job based on the future not the past. Pictures of these kind of employment successes need to be a part of the incentive for a New Green Deal; solving an environmental problem at same time as solving an economic program.
Getting Trump out of office will certainly help with the battle against global warming but individuals must be willing to take action as well. Electing someone different will not be the magic bullet and when personal sacrifice is involved, how many will be up to the task? As individuals have to stop eating meat, drive less or buy an electric car, use renewable energy by converting to solar and wind, build smaller homes, take less flights, create less waste. Certainly global cooperation, government policy and incentives will steer the way but how many among us will be happy about it and be willing commit to it? In this scenario actions definitely speak louder than words.
1
Changing the name to the "Green Real Deal" will be unnoticed by our attention deficit voters. A brand new name is needed.
1
Contrast what the outlook might be by 2030, starting with the swing Congressional Districts and the electoral map. Contrast expectations with what a decentralized green strategy could do in that CD: wind power, water, flood control, etc.
Bring the Green New Deal down to earth, one CD at a time, eventually one city and one county at a time. The impacts must be anticipated, preparations begun (such as infrastructure), and opportunities seized. Be prepared.
Largely agree with this well written column.
We need a Green Deal, but it also has to be realistic & primarily focused on lowering CO2 emissions (not equally focused on eliminating every injustice on earth, though a start in that direction might be achievable).
But we should focus on new clean energy through a variety of approaches, as outlined by Moniz & Karsner in the linked article:
"a rigorous, science-based approach, an appreciation for the powerful role of globally interdependent markets, and an understanding of how leadership in clean energy innovation helps advance U.S. interests at home and around the globe."
In a nutshell, a rational approach that is so foreign to tump he is clearly incapable of understanding it at all.
Most of us know tump's core voters will never change. There is no factual science based message that they'll accept. They believe their ignorance or what "feels" good to them equals expertise.
The planet & people of the earth face massive threats as all degreed experts have been saying for decades.
The earth will experience great hardship from climate impacts if nothing changes, we're seeing the beginning of it now--and tump says its all fake news.
It's incomprehensible but most of his supporters are ignorant beyond belief, & seem to have hearts made of coal.
Yes, the dems need to construct a rational message focused on changing energy paradigms, new jobs, educ, infrastructure & health care. But eliminating all injustice will take longer.
The green real Deal is an implementation plan for the Green New Deal and is this a subset of it. In fact it’s a pretty good approach to implementing the GND. Good call.
If the old party DINOs or 'Democrats in Name Only' run a wimpy, joyless and loveless candidate with no *passion* or fire let alone any "real programs", the "Donald" and his entire crime family will easily be re-elected as is pretty obvious.
However, the game is still in spin, and he can easily be criminally indicted along with his crime family members and friends. All of this because the Democrats are and have been fully detached and removed from the struggles, heartbreak, anguish and realities of living in a country that does not want, seek nor desire them, aside from crucial votes at election time. Think the former middle and working class here and the young!
As far a climate change: It's the single most important crises that our globe faces today and maybe other countries in the EU and elsewhere can pick up the torch for us as we regress and slide further into a third world country. It's the new nuclear war issue, except it's already started. God, help us.
2
For a powerful ad I recommend contrasting the Trumpster and his enablers mocking the threat of climate change, with insurance companies rising rates for low lying areas and the work and planning of the US Military in response the threat of climate change.
2
Dream on, Mr. Friedman. While Climate Change is the new religion of the Left, most people vote on other issues, such as their economic well being.
2
Intelligent voters understand the connection.
2
Trump voters:
- trees are dirty, clear cut them
- wild animals should be killed, in the way, dangerous
- gas should be cheap
- cars are good, big trucks even better
- guns and hunting, particularly game, even if rare is good
- spray poisons on insects
- science and books are an attack on me
- protecting the job I have or returning to the one I had, good
- pave more surfaces, easier to clean
- AstroTurf lawns, big improvement
- travel to another country, never
- a winning sports team matters, on TV, a party and food
So you think those ads would work? And I see these attitudes in Massachusetts.
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@poslug
Agreed but in the USA of 2020 that group of people should be getting smaller....
Oh but wait college now is for the uber rich and b level Hollywood stars who pay their kids way into the school
Excellent ads. And they should be accompanied with stunning visuals. More importantly, massive amounts of money should be raised to run PSAs of these and similar ads NON STOP on the FOX News channel. And on every right-wing, anti-human media outlet in this country. In fact, all sensible people who believe in science should band together and raise massive amounts of money in order to offer financial renumeration to people who attend "climate-reality classes". This may be the only way to help Trump's base break through the anti-science information currently streaming like untreated sewage from the mouths of the potty-mouthed President and his minions.
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@Allegra
correction: Financial compensation not renumeration. Noting like proofreading before hitting send!
A great editorial with a winning perspective. We also need to communicate that other countries will bypass the US as leaders in renewable energy industries and jobs, while we will be left behind with the modern day equivalent of horses and buggy whips: dirty coal that no one will want.
The lack of media attention to Cyclone Idai was despicable. But the media makes its decisions based on what stories engage the viewing audience. It's clear that most - or at least, many - Americans still don't care.
Your arrogance assumes that President Trump is the only one that feels this way. As a world we should've done something as the Industrial Revolution was gearing up. Way past the time now. And yes, there will be destruction as we've been seeing. Even if the President agreed with you, the world, and even this country is not united to do anything remotely productive now.
1
I like the idea of an EARTH RACE. That could capture the zeal of those who like races, and we need their zeal. Mr Trump is the loser in that race. That should make him a loser in the election too.
1
Is there something that Trump doesn't mock? If there is, I missed it.
Mockery is his super power.
Sad commentary for those who fall for it, as well as the rest, who must fight against it.
This is what happens when you have a president acting like The Apprentice.
It's bad enough that he is full of hot air, among other things. It's worse that he doesn't give a whit about the air that the rest of us breathe, and the temperature of the world we live in.
If enough people get it, the 2020 sequel to the Trump presidency could be The Biggest Loser.
3
Yes, we have to get leadership that will do the smart thing for the earth, not the 1%. That includes Trump AND McConnell. Putting it all on Trump is a mistake.
The worst part of the Green New Deal is that it takes the most difficult, most costly route to protecting Americans from natural disasters when there are practical measures that can be taken to reduce the loss of life in the event of natural disasters. How about building better levies around New Orleans? How about thinning out the forests so a fire won’t be so difficult to contain? How about implementing improved building codes? How about engineering better fire fighting equipment and developing better fire fighting techniques? These are practical measures that will protect lives and create jobs. The Green New Deal is a ridiculous proposal, because even if we stopped burning fossil fuels completely, natural disasters would still happen. If we had knob we could turn to set the CO2 level of the atmosphere to whatever we want, climate scientists wouldn't know what to set it at. This is why climate science is junk science and resembles a religion.
1
Real humans, take heed and pay attention.
There is nothing - nothing - more devastating that climate change due to global warming and human overexploitation, hubris, and inequality.
The few, the proud, think their billions are worth destroying civilization and the rest of humanity for profit.
This isn't new; the exploitative have always been ready to take advantage of tolerance and ignorance. But the scale is new.
Those refugees people love to hate and blame? They're victims too.
But in the end, we will all suffer. Try a two week power outage if you want to grok what's in store for us all.
Nothing will persuade Trump voters. Fortunately they are the minority. The rest of us just have to get to vote. That's the real deal.
Trump's behavior is something new in the political world. The man who promised to drain the swamp. filled two new swamps. The man who knew better how to provide the best health care, make peace in the Mideast, build a border wall and have the Mexicans pay for it. The list goes on and on. Yet the democrats seem to believe he's not responsible for his past behavior. The US Government prosecutes those companies and individuals involved in money laundering. Yet, I haven't seen the Democrats mention Trump's past history of money laundering. The US Dept of Treasury found that the Taj Mahal broke the bank secrecy act 106 times. The Casino was fined several times, the last time, before the casino's bankruptcy was for $10 million. Is this under the Democrats radar. Trump University/Institute received a $25 million fine for fraudulent business practices. The NY Attorney General's office warned Trump U numerous times that it couldn't operate as a University. 5,000 + citizens lost $40 million in fees due to Trump's fraudulent business practices. I could go on and on. Yet, the Democratic leadership has material on hand that could hang any politician. Are they fearful of using this material? Trump's businesses have a record of hiring illegal immigrants, his family foundation has used tax exempt contributions to pay for his personal expenses, yet the dems skp over his past behavior. Why isn't democratic leadership using this material to hang Trump?
OMG...please, please, Democrats, run on the Green New Deal.
Trump will win 48 states and the popular vote (so the Electoral College ‘debate’ will stop).
I love how people who allegedly support the GND never mention the best and cleanest alternative to fossil fuels: Nuclear energy. Interesting, right?
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Fossil fuels pump noxious carbon gasses into the atmosphere but are relatively cheap and highly effective energy sources. Greedy, clueless people like Trump will continue to use them until they take their last gasp.
1
Climate activism is Democrat Party politics masquerading as secular religion. "Trump Mocks Climate Change". What's the key word there? 'Mocks', as in, 'God is not mocked'. The urgent appeal-method is taken from televangelists: the time is now, salvation can't wait, get on the bandwagon before it's too late, you don't want to be left behind, do you? Come on, the world is not coming to an end. We don't have the power to regulate the climate and in any case the world political structure needed to do it doesn't exist. The media driver of climate hysteria is the internet: spring showers are now of unsurpassed fury, heavy rains are re-christened 'Bomb Cyclones', every big storm is now "one of the worst disasters ever". Nature is surely showing God's anger, and God is not mocked. "His yoke is easy, His burthen is light", He only needs your vote to save the world, that's easy enough, isn't it? If you want to win merit in heaven you know which party to support. Stop! Laissez faire, leave it alone, the market will sort it all out in its own good time. We don't need hyper-ventilating leftist political-religious extremists leading us to the promised land.
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"While this historic weather disaster was unfolding, President Trump was urging Republicans not to kill the Democrats’ Green New Deal proposal — not because Trump wants to work with it, but because he wants to run against it in 2020." What kind of reason is this? In the face of disaster, instead of showing a bit of compassion Trump can only mock! It beggars belief that any president can be so unfeeling and so uncaring. Trump is a disaster for America, he is pulling the country into the mire and I am afraid it is going to take a very long time after he is gone to repair the damge that he has done.
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I always cringe whenever I hear Democrats talk on TV. I have absolutely no idea whom they are addressing. The language they use never seems directed at the people they claim to be trying to reach. Tom Friedman can reach far more people in terms they can understand and appreciate in one article than all the 20+ candidates can do in a whole season of campaigning. Because they don't talk to the people, they talk at them, the opposition has an easy time of making the message look radical and crazy. The people don't need charts and experts and position papers to know it's getting too hot, the storms too severe, the seas too high, and the fires too wild for their taste. They KNOW why all that is happening. Trump has no problem helping them put blinders on...You are afraid... I will build a wall and someone else will pay for it. Now. Don't you feel better? If you don't see the problem it does not exist. The Dems need to talk in simple, easy to understand terms and point out the solution is not so radical after all. If you had a choice between clean forms of energy and dirty ones, which would you choose? You will still get the energy. Just because it is different, doesn't mean it is so radical.
Donald Trump could put a coal burning furnace in the White House, and it wouldn't make any difference. He's found the key to remaining in power, and he can't be beat.
While praising the intelligence of the American electorate, he secretly knows that they can be led around like a bulls with nose rings - only instead of bull rings, he uses their beliefs and prejudices to lead them wherever he wants. He loves and needs bigots.
If DJT doesn't destroy our fragile democracy, he has published the blueprint and playbook for some other demagogue to do it later. If a democracy like America's is going to exist, there will have to be a paradigm shift in human thought throughout the world.
In the near future, we will program the human mind in the computer based on a "survival" algorithm, which will provide irrefutable proof as to how we trick the mind with our ridiculous beliefs about what is supposed to survive - producing minds programmed de facto for destruction. These minds see the survival of a particular belief as more important than the survival of us all. When we understand all this, we will begin the long trek back to reason and sanity.
See RevolutionOfReason.com
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If I was running for President in 2020, I would run ads of trump making his ignorant promises and statements - both video and tweets. And I would hire Stephen Colbert to produce them.
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never tell a python what it can't eat. ever see a python eat a dog, a goat, a human being? they can do it. so if trump says "serve me up some climate change, i'm hungrah!" i'd not poke the maw.
denial.
doctors will know what i'm talking about. tell the smoker to stop smoking, the obese person to diet, the hypertensive to cut out the salt -- what happens? cancers, strokes and heart attacks as far as the gurneys can roll.
ask a dental hygienist: tell people to floss, and what happens? steady work for the hygienist.
what trump is selling isn't ignorance, it's denial. the average trump voter just asks one question: is solving climate change harder than flossing my teeth? doing without a big mac, a cigaret, a bag of salty chips? then forget about it -- not interested. ain't gonna floss, nor save the planet neither.
do you really think people care about what happens in south africa? they don't even care what happens in the next town over.
"a majority want the government to do something." a majority want the government to take away the pain. trump does that: denial takes away the pain. denial, and a good burger.
sure, some people laugh at green. ever met a drunk who laughed at abstinence? they laugh, they drive around, and then "later is too late." until then, though, they'll vote for trump.
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Very persuasive except that (like Trump himself) his popular minority of support believe that ‘making America great again’ means going backwards not forwards. The future, for them, holds unimaginable fears of social & economic uncertainty while memories of the past are comforting & reassuring.
Hoax? Absolutely. Only the 'hoax part' is what the deny-ers are saying.
Run those ads and more. Pound it until those messages are in front of the faces of our entire citizenry, like the omnipresence of our president's tweets and antics.
Tragically, climate change means little to many voters. To them it’s about the weather and weather changes. Thoughts?
It’s fascinating that those animals in Mozambique didn’t just sense the approach of a storm; they realized that a storm would cause flooding and moved to higher ground.
Smelling rain or feeling a change in atmospheric pressure is one thing, and inferring a consequence is quite another. Those four-legged beasts understand cause and effect better than the primate in the White House.
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The green new deal is DOA, just ask Nancy, even she knows we will still be around in 12 years. It's laughable to be taking this seriously, when the biggest polluters will never agree to pull back from their national interests. Wiki the list of scientists who DON'T agree with this settled science nonsense, I will put them up against the bartender and the columnist. Climate is ALWAYS changing, the fear used to be global warming, when that fell flat, it became global cooling and now it's just climate change, well that should cover every possibility, why didn't they think of that first?
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Of course Mr. Friedman has been right about climate change and so have been all the Cassandras who have tried to wake up the American people regarding this all important issue for the past forty years. But Jimmy Carter was mocked for wearing sweaters and putting up solar panels on the White House, then Reagan became a hero to blind supporters by undoing it all. Have the American people gained any wisdom during those past forty years or are we still stuck in the rut of ignorance that seems to swamp all good intentions and possible action? I am praying and will work once again with people of wisdom for national policies that can at least moderate our irresponsible use of our home. But at the same time after the election of Trump do not under estimate the stupidity of a vast swath of the American people.
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The problem is Trump supports only have enough bandwidth for stupid, vapid nuggets: Make America Great, Witch Hunt, Build the Wall, and yes, Lock Her Up.
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Ahh, but you Americans *did* elect Trump, and he has quite decent odds of being re-elected. The problem isn't just Trump, it's America
@Mark Nuckols
I was thinking earlier this morning that we're turning into Turkey and Saudi Arabia over here with thugs, grifters, yutzes, and bozos running our government. For a split second, Russia started to look good. Then, I drank some coffee.
We elected Trump, but I predict he will lose the next election by a landslide even if the Democratic candidate is a gecko. Of course, the gecko had better be able to produce a long form birth certificate because that's the only sort of thing Trump actually cares about.
Well, the best and the brightest have failed America, again! Time to try someone closer to the people, a fellow deplorable. Someone who actually loves the country, what a concept. No apology tour, no bald face lying, and no looking the other way on illegals.
Trump is a non-thinker and a non-carer to the point that I can't listen to him. He has made truth questionable and there are those that would swear the sky was purple if he said it was. Our nation has gone into a stupor with him as our leader, but I have hope that one disaster after another will win over those non-thinkers that support him. Climate disruptions will be involving more and more people including the deniers. This is the only way some ever learn the all too painful truth that climate does rule our lives and yes we need to use our brains to do take care of it.
There are many more ways than climate change to defeat Trump. Voters need to be reminded of all his lies, his family separation policy on our southern border, his really stupid statements like "wind farms cause cancer," his greed, his corruption, his attacks on all our democratic institutions, his strange infatuation with Putin and, above all, his desire to take away our health care. His MAGA-hatted faithful will continue to vote for him but the rest of us won't, and there are many more of us than them.
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This is really a oversimplified and extremely optimistic opinion of what it will take to defeat Trump. The Democrats (how many now 18 of them at last count?) running for office think that climate change, prison reform and all the rest will somehow appeal to the Electorate--especially Trump's immoral and thoughtless base of supporters at his religious revival rallies.
None of this appeals to any of them. What's more convincing to them is Trump's lies, name calling, making fun of people, and offering enemy conspiracy nonsense like the Deep State and Fake News claims. And, of course, their Life Coach comes out of Fox News and blowhards like Rush Limbaugh.
Did you know, e.g., that the Clintons got away with murdering people? This must be true, just ask Trump's base.
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No, no, no! Keep it simple and aim at what average Americans want: Health Care, Drug prices,living wages for all, access to decent housing, free post secondary education at public schools and protection from the ravenous, greedy 1%.
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If Dems can continue to look forward into the future as Trump's party continues to idolize the worst parts of our past and we lose in 2020 anyway, this country deserves its horrors.
Let me be clear, no individual citizen (not even the Trumpettes) and no other living individual or animal deserves the coming horrors of dynamic climate change--it is our country (and the industrialized world with its institutionalized greed and shortsightedness and its policies that deserve the horrors.
If we lose in 2020, there will be no justice for the planet.
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As long as the voting lines are not low due to an unseasonably early freezing blizzard in several northern blue states.
Simple equation I would like share. A dying planet = a dying economy.
If the Trump campaign explains the facts of so-called climate change, that issue will help not hurt his chances for reelection. The two most important facts are these: first, there is no green energy or combination of green energies that will be in a position in the next 30 years to provide the heat, let alone cooling, Americans will need. Secondly, if MSM journalists would do their homework and stop genuflecting before the small number of global warming elites, they could ask them some hard questions about their data—like why their own graphs and charts reflecting temperature readings for the last 120 years have been adjusted to decrease the extreme heat in the 20s to 50s and increase the heat in the last 30 years. Go through the NYT’s archives and read stories from 1930 to 1990 about a cooling or warming climate, number and intensity of hurricanes, flooding events, etc. what is clear is that the 30s (before today’s higher CO2 levels) were a period of extreme heat, hurricanes and floods) that exceeded today’s weather events (read Steinbeck’s novels for a reminder). It is ironic that MSM journalists who are skeptical about religious authority are true believers in a faith that goes under the guise of science. Do your homework. Review the data. Consider the details of how and where and when that data was recorded. If you do, you will see that many of today’s so called climate scientists are the same chicken littles that have always been around.
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'Cyclone Idai devastated some of the greatest wilderness areas in Africa. Trump couldn’t care less. Do you? Because another decade of storms like that, and the only lions, elephants and zebras your grandkids will ever see will be in a Disney movie', is exactly the sort of line that will be beaten to a pulp as pure overkill, id even go as far as to suggest that this type of fear mongering would lose the election. There is no doubt that the planet we need to sustain us, the human race is at risk, but using doomsday scenarios' however real, will likely only strengthen Trumps hand, not weaken it. Every single time this baffoon open his mouth to spout lies they need to be turned around and shoved forcefully back in with short sharp evidence to prove his lies are just that, lies, each and every time.
Re:
A Green Real Deal — if framed and focused properly — could wipe that smirk right off Trump’s face.
The trumpican attack angle will be to pair "green" with "new
deal" to insinuate that the pie in the sky features of what AOC
and Markey proposed in their "green new deal" are everything
that a free market lovin', socialist hatin', red blooded American
couldn't possibly vote for. They will tar and feather all
of it and they will have very big bucks to saturate media
with their slime. They will aim to put fear into the naive
and insecure that such changes will not be in their interests
because they are not pro-American growth blah blah blah.
The opening for this line of attack was, of course,
freely given, almost as in a dare, by the two proposers.
This line of attack will find targets of opportunity and succeed in weaning the economic oriented swing voter who wants
focused attention on jobs/job creations and who cringes
with fear that greening of the economy will target
them either by job creation slow down or tax increases
to pay for pie in the sky policies that could slow job creation.
It is critical for there to be a pivot to
a Real Green Deal being promoted along the lines
proposed in the column. Focus on what is understandable
and which connects with job creation. Don't get
bogged down defending ambitious goals that cannot
be achieved in this fractured society with
a large carbon based energy industry that loves its SUVS and pick up trucks.
I acknowledge Mr Friedman is a true an classic American educated citizen. The class of society that made America great and famous.
But this is an endangered species and just not Trump’s electorate. You will never beat Trump by addressing Green topics: this man is separating children from their parents for months! Democrats seem to still not understand they need to address this “basket of deplorables” in a different way than (in their eyes) leftist, unproven, unimportant issues. It is a pain to say but I claim this is a reality.
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Average Americans ALSO joke at the cherry-picking political advocates constantly do to try to sell their the-sky-is-falling-theory.
When you have to ignore the known history of the planet regarding temperature trends to sell a political change handing power and control over people to ideologues with NO record of being trustworthy, you chase everyday voters to the GOP.
Oh, yeah, Trump is definitely a goner in 2020.
Better yet, BET YOUR HOUSE on this political forecast. Oh, yeah, a definite win for the Left.
Read the comments on this page. The people that have bought into the conservative lie about climate will double down. A hoax or gov conspiracy to take away their rights, guns, freedom, whatever. I get it because who could accept being so catastrophically wrong about something that will kill the world... their children? No it probably won't be a political turning point but I'm a cynical old geezer about a lot of things I hoped for my country. I pray that I am wrong here.
Americans will buy the Green New Deal eventually, but it will cost many times what it would have if they’d bought into it before the global changes are baked in. The cost will be paid but not primarily by Americans, as usual. Millions, perhaps billions, will suffer from insect born disease and famines and violence in our children’s time. . . . On the upside, it may reduce the human population to something more “manageable” for the planet. In any case, most of those who don’t believe in it may very well be dead before the worst of global warming makes itself felt. It’s only another twenty years or so.
"one of the worst weather disasters to ever strike the Southern Hemisphere"
If it was unequivocally caused by the current climate change crisis then it would have been described as " 'THE' worst weather disaster to ever strike the Souther Hemisphere" wouldn't it?
Mr. Friedman neglects to acknowledge that Trump is not a fool. Let's not forget he managed to defeat career politicians, entrenched on their own follies, but no paying attention to what low and middle class Americans need and want. The key to defeat Trump is not one single issue, particularly one as controversial as climate change. The 18 Democrat contenders for their party nomination should move away from demagoguery and promising things they know can't deliver, and listen to the real needs of the people who live in this country, not the Hollywood crowd. If democrats fail again to unite behind real issues, not personality worship, we will have another four years with Trump.
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Do Americans realise that the last time there was this much CO2 in the earths atmosphere there were trees in Antartica? Think about that for a moment, that might make for a good ad also.
Weather happens. Always has. Cooler temperatures this year, the year will "go down as the 3rd warmest or record', or whatever because you can no longer believe the meteorologists because climate change has become a holy war.
1
Sadly, we need a big climate catastrophe, or even a series of catastrophes between now and October 2020 to convince hard core Trumpian climate deniers that it's way past time to believe their lyin' eyes. Even then, some of them will never bend to the truth.
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Neither logic nor reality will defeat DJT or dissuade his base. Next suggestion. please.
1
If and when ads are created there should be two more. One showing the devastation by the wild fires in California, and one showing the recent flooding in the mid west. Both tag lined with is this the hoax the president refers to?
BTW, the climate changes we are witnessing were all predicted by climate researchers and scientists. And written about by Al Gore.
If we cannot defeat Trump, then we deserve whatever happens.
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Congratulations. That’s the best article I’ve read since the 2016 election.
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Yea, but your own company is promoting someone traveling to 52 places in one year as a travel feature. How irresponsible is that? Sets a bad role model I'm afraid.
1
If Trump fears the invasion of the brown people at the southern border now, what does he think will happen when despoilation of arable land, increased drought, and crazy weather patterns due to climate change that creates economic migrants on a global scale? Starving people will migrant to where there is food and water. This is exactly what drove our hunter-gatherer ancestors to sites around the globe in prehistoric times. Hungry people with starving children will wander in search of food. There won't be enough heavily armed ICE agents to prevent it.
The Democratic candidate who heeds Mr. Friedman's advice will lose in a Trump landslide in 2020. Thanks, Tom.
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Uniting behind the green new deal is probably onecbrilliant idea.
Letting go of some of the purist cultural rants might be another.
1
Please Democrats follow this plan. Obviously Americans are concerned with cyclones in other countries. I would love to see exactly what the max number of states that President Trump could win and this would let us find out.
1
In 2050, will cars, trucks, buses, transport ships, airplanes, house heating, etc. be all-electric? What an increase in electricity production and consumption, all sustainable?
And for humanity's survival on earth, we must also solve the super-bug/antibiotics over consumption problem. Bacteria rule the world. But we don't see them.
Meanwhile the traditional entrenched Democratic establishment is running away from the very idea of a Green New Deal.
Jay Inslee, governor of Washington and a 2020 candidate, isn't getting much attention.
His #1 reason for entering the race is climate change!
I hope he at least gets to the debates.
For all its admirable, aspirational goals regarding the urgent need to combat climate change, the Green New Deal also calls for “unprecedented economic prosperity,” “millions of new high paying jobs,” “economic security for all peoples of the United States.” Without a single word on how to accomplish any of this, this new litmus test for progressives is in danger of being little more than a feel-good bumper sticker slogan and a missed opportunity for real action. Perhaps the visionaries who sounded this important rallying cry could also create some specific programs and legislation that produces demonstrable results.
1
Didn't Trump just say the other day that he wants to be the environmental president? He can read the tea leaves. Or at least they are being read to him. And after his people read this Friedman column to him Trump will order them to give him cover on the environmental issue. Trump will demand conservative solutions to climate change. And that will involve the fossil fuel industry making money from them as they come up with their "fixes."
2
The argument that policy pronouncements, however wise, will defeat Trump in 2020 is as laughable as Trump's views on climate change. Trump's voters know, and they don't care.
Only mass voter registration, especially in particular states, and mass voter turnout, will defeat Trump in 2020.
7
@R.S. - In general I agree. But I think some realistic, relevant policy discussions in key swing states like PA could make a difference with enough voters, discussions that focus on issues meaningful to the people in those places.
Big, national visions like the Green New Deal, will help motivate and turn out the vote of the party faithful and should perhaps be used for that reason. But that strategy won't persuade key swing voter groups. They need a different message, one that has to do with understanding and focusing on their specific needs.
Friedman calls for a "real Deal" that gets "industry" buy-in. But nowhere in this article does he talk about the impact of the energy changes on workers.
The concerns of industry are acknowledged, but the very real, upfront impact on workers is ignored, to be put off to some later date.
Won't happen. Workers won't stand for it. If the DEMs continue to ignore their needs they will vote Trump again and again, any demagogue that claims, however speciously, to have their interests at heart.
The social justice issues connected to the economic changes MUST be addressed up front or none of it will happen.
1
@J Jencks You assume that workers don't care about their children or grandchildren having a habitable environment. Workers can move to clean energy or environmental protection jobs. Or at least the could if the lobbyists from industries that are killing us would allow reasonable measures for work shifting.
3
@Yodastrategy - I don't assume they don't care. I assume their FIRST concern is with immediate "check book" issues, paying their utility bills, their mortgage, gas for their car... This is what they experience every day and what will be on their minds the day they go to the polls.
And by all means, yes!, they can get those new clean energy jobs. And how much more likely we would be to succeed, if we were proposing a whole program of policies, such as the Green New Deal does, in which they are encouraged and enabled to make the transition into the new economy as smoothly as possible.
Typical warmist hysteria:
"Cyclone Idai devastated some of the greatest wilderness areas in Africa. Trump couldn’t care less. Do you? Because another decade of storms like that, and the only lions, elephants and zebras your grandkids will ever see will be in a Disney movie."
Which makes no sense literally.
Nothing we could do would remotely make a difference in the next decade, and the elephants and zebras will survive just fine, thank you very much. (Unless poachers take them).
The Democrats should just go whole hog and run on the GND, a thinly disguised attempt at a socialist takeover this nation -- so the voters have a crystal clear vision of the difference before us.
Pointillistic citation of bad weather events to fear-monger (weather isn't climate, I always heard, Mr. Friedman?) is in bad taste.
Hopefully a decade from now AGW's computer models will prove just as inaccurate as the previous several decades, and by then the left will have joined the greater public in sensibly moving on and focusing on real issues, like rising income inequality.
Thankfully at least the AFL-CIO and big labor is starting to awaken that they've been sold a bill of goods and that, sans infinite budgets governed by MMT, the green aspirations are diametrically opposed to stronger bargaining clout for the line workers who keep this nation humming.
2
@John LintonFlorida is a prime example of a state not responding to the needs of its people. FPL cannot keep pace- sheriff and police cannot keep up- and litter lines the medians and ditches of interstate 75 in south Florida. We had two friends severely injured by cars running red lights from 300 feet back and then being broadsided. Cars and pickups drive 80-90 mph with a 70 mph speed limit.
Of course we need jobs for people but we also need a planet that will sustain us. But who cares about the future as long as we get what we want right now right? When I returned to Florida this year for the 32nd time...I felt like it was everyone for themselves and We can set our own rules. I was ashamed of the lack of concern for others.
Wonderful piece. I hope everyone reads it and takes it to heart. We need to do something to save the planet - and ourselves - and we can't count on our current government to do anything except help themselves.
4
Mr Friedman,
How does America (and the world) find solutions to global warming when so many Americans are simply not interested in the facts and in scientific forecasts about our future?
Our president does not stand alone on this issue. He has hundreds of politicians and millions of citizens with him.
Clearly, nature does not care about our dysfunctional politics, but humanity has repeatedly made disastrous choices.
I fear we are on path to make the largest (and potentially last) mistake in our long journey here on earth.
Earth will survive, but what about us?
3
Voters in Iowa, Alabama, and Wisconsin could care less about climate devastation in Mozambique.
Flood the Mississippi and Missouri River valleys repeatedly and make growing conditions so challenging that America’s agricultural Heartland becomes a muddy wasteland, and you MAY begin to get the attention of Trump voters who finally see the fallacy of following this destructive president.
Only when devastation hits home will people be prompted to act in a manner consistent with the danger that confronts us all.
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I applaud the Democratic freshmen for bringing in lots of great ideas, and I think much of what they say is correct. However, playing politics effectively at the national level requires a slower & more moderate approach. It is vital that a Democrat wins the White House in 2020, and I do believe it can be accomplished, IF the message & candidate we offer to the general public is not seen as frighteningly extreme to the vast middle ground of voters. Once the WH is achieved (and maybe the Senate??), much can be accomplished over time that the more progressive DFL members would want. Divisive DFL party politics will only increase Trump's chances of a 2nd term, and that would be disastrous for our nation & the globe.
3
I appreciate your efforts at political ads, but some of the best political ads will include clips of Trump making statements that disparage climate change. With so much emphasis on "fake news"... video clips are the best way to prove what is not fake. I'll never forget one of the most powerful ads Hillary Clinton's campaign put out: Young children sitting around a television set watching Trump on-screen say the most awful things. When he said that Mexicans "are rapists"... the camera pans to a young Mexican girl listening to that. That's powerful. More ads like that are needed. Trump has made more than enough deplorable statements to dig his own grave.
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@Tom
That was a good ad, powerful. For me, with the obvious fact that the amazing students from Marjory Stoneman Douglas H.S. must have wonderful parents and school system, those student were raised during the 8 years of Barack Obama’s presidency. I happen think that is a factor in their development. Their activism, their honesty after the horrendous school shooting were awe inspiring.
What will developing minds absorb while Donald Trump is president, insulting, lying, cheating and influencing the culture? Hate crimes are in the rise, nothing good can come from such a role model. This is person who will rant at a Boy Scout Jamboree, he will inevitably effect young minds.
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@Kathryn Thomas
Complacent Americans bear responsibility as well. Note that Trump ranted at the Boy Scout Jamboree, and not one individual boldly spoke up to renounce what Trump said. There was an adult scout leader on that stage (in uniform) and he stood silent. At the very least, you would think that after Trump left the stage, someone in the audience would have stood up and spoken up?
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Some nice potential ads here from Mr. Friedman for a Democratic candidate, although I definitely think the first two would hit more people where they live than the last two; Americans don't overall care that much about coral reefs and megafauna.
The problem remains, though, that we have a country with a large number of people--not a majority, I suspect, but certainly a significant minority--who can't see beyond their own immediate situation and are not usually reachable through logical argument; they're going to vote for Trump because 1) he has an "R" next to his name, 2) they think he'll hold the line against a black/brown/female/gay planet, and 3) they know he won't try to regulate their rapid fire firearms for the coming apocalypse and rapture (Jesus God will take care of the climate, anyway).
Far better to aim these messages at the people who haven't gone to the polls consistently, and especially those who stayed home in 2016. They are the ones that need to be convinced that if action isn't taken soon, there won't be action left to take.
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@Glenn Ribotsky The thing about the green new deal is that there is something for anyone... I'm no one special, but I know a good number of very diverse people from different political backgrounds and walks of life and ethnic heritage who go to the reefs on vacation.
It's a niche thing,and it crosses political lines
9
@Glenn Ribotsky Friedman works for the Democratic Party
@Terry Hinson
And that's a good thing.
4
The changes will no doubt require courage and a great sense of community and legacy.
3
I talk to people in the small town I live in. I guarantee they do not care if the Great Barrier Reef is dying. They couldn't care less. The ads will have to hit them where they live, pound away at jobs produced in Oklahoma by the wind and solar industry, remind them that they are getting hit with super tornadoes, record heat, and droughts.
I hate to say it, but a lot of Americans do not know or care what goes on in the rest of the world.
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Yes, you are correct. But, when tornadoes become more and more intense and frequent people will listen up. Also, jobs in sustainable and renewable energy.
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@Linda I agree. Here in the small town where I live it is the absolute same. There are some people that get it, but most are in denial. We have a new wind farm going in south of town, but I don't think most people understand the importance of it.
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@Linda Knowledge of the world is limited as is local insight. Many people do not spend the gas to go beyond 30 miles, then rarely. Not to mention the airline baggage employee who asked me what country Tulsa was in.
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This can be a winning issue IF Dems can finally learn to sell the right message. They need to keep it simple and to keep it real.
I live in NJ and I have a solar system that produces enough electricity to power 90% of my home -- a home that includes 2 electric cars. While my solar system was expensive, between energy savings and incentives, it will pay for itself in 4 years. Yes, 4 years. After it pays for itself, I'm effectively powering my home and my cars for free for the next 20 or so years. Oh, and when the sun isn't shining, my Powerwall battery backup system keeps my home running, so Trump's idiotic statement that there's no power when the sun doesn't shine or when the wind doesn't blow is literally blown out of the water.
This needs to be the Democratic message. Renewable energy works. It's cheaper than fossil-fuel generated electricity. It's reliable due to effective battery-backup systems. Oh, and it's totally pollution-free.
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@JB you're really right. For much of this country, that's how bottom line you have to make this message. I completely agree with Friedman's proposed ads in his piece, and sure, run them if possible, but ads and messages that articulate your points here are KEY, especially in middle america.
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@JB
Keeping the message on climate change simple and clear is key. Which is why it is so important to focus on "articulate" candidates. If the majority of Americans don't want to listen to the message, then the message gets lost. Bernie Sanders is a good man, but he is NOT articulate. One can barely listen to him for more than two minutes. Democrats fortunately have several articulate candidates, who can clearly discuss climate change: Pete Buttigieg, Beto O'Rourke and Kamala Harris.
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@JB
And… you're going to have to make the argument appealing to businesses as well. Like it or not, the business of America is business. If corporations don't see the benefit to renewables, they will fight it. On the other hand, if they feel it's a win for them too, they will embrace it.
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Friedman did not attempt to tie the storm to anthropogenic climate change with data but by implication, and proceeds to urge running ads exhorting children's fears to be our policy guide.
I want policies informed by solid, proven science and sensible economics, not emotional manipulation.
Can we hear from Tom on that basis?
1
@OldEngineer, I agree that science and data should run our decion-making, but given the current state of politics in the US, I think we have to use whatever is effective (within ethical bounds) to win back the White House. Trump's base has already shown they care little for facts & science; why would they change now? Focusing on everyone's hopes and fears for their children and grandchildren is emotional, but it's also realistic. We ALL want a good future for our kids, don't we?
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Democrats will have to offer a clear, tangible platform in 2020 and the 'Green New Deal' can be an important part of it.
Never mind its awkward early rollout, or Trump's mockery; Democratic candidates will have to unite around the agenda and dignify the plan. Democrats have to own it fully, now.
They should also resist the understandable urge to use Trump as a foil because, let's face it, the rest of the GOP is just as reckless with the environment, and has been for years.
We all need responsible leaders, and our one planet needs protectors.
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@NM -
"Trump's mockery"
I agree. It makes absolutely NO difference what DEMs say or do. Trump will mock them. That's what he does.
We need to turn it to our advantage by revealing for its stupidity and ill-will.
Let him mock. And let him suffer the consequences.
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Living in flyover country, Trump evidently missed what is happening here. Iowa now gets 38% of its electricity from wind and has huge support from his own supporters (even though they continue to deny climate change while cleaning up from the floods). Minnesota set a goal of 25% renewable by 2025 and reached it last year, 7 years ahead of schedule and electricity prices rose at the same rate as the surrounding coal reliant states. That part of the green new deal can be done and can be done without economic disruption. Cognitive dissonance of conservative climate change deniers is breathtaking.
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Thank you, Mr. Friedman, for a purposeful and persuasive piece. Much of the progress made in the last two decades has been reversed by Mr. Trump. He, and his Republican senators, are beholden to the fossil industry and will continue to stay the course. The Democrats, as usual, cannot stand behind this issue in a united "come what may" manner. The way Feinstein and Schumer spoke disparagingly of the Green New Deal is a case in point. The senior senators are afraid for their own future. In this scenario, there is little hope for drastic change. The only solution is to flush out the hardened senior senators and inject fresh blood into Congress. We need a turnover. Yes, the youth and the general public feel the urgency for decisive action. However, as with many other movements of the recent past, they stall in the Senate.
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"...my head says you can’t transform our energy system and our social/economic one at scale all at once. We have to prioritize energy/climate. Because for the environment, later will be too late. Later is officially over.'
We are under the Green Thumb of the rich and unless and until we attack the foundations of their resistance, we will see ZERO success. Hoping, wishing imploring and begging get us NOTHING.
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Mr. Friedman - All in all a good article but I think you're missing something essential.
"But my head says you can’t transform our energy system and our social/economic one at scale all at once. We have to prioritize energy/climate."
What you are not recognizing is that you can't separate the social/economic impacts from the changes necessary to accomplish the energy/climate goals. They are inseparable.
The impacts WILL happen. Industries will be forced to change. Some will shrink, others grow. And along with that A LOT of people will lose jobs.
If we do not address up front the immediate, short term and VERY REAL impacts on workers there will be massive resistance to change.
I believe AOC has it right on this one and you need to look more closely at the details of what it means to implement the changes. In your piece you refer many times to getting "industry" buy-in to policy changes. But nowhere do you talk about the people who will most experience the consequences, the workers. And workers vote. And last time a lot of them voted for Trump.
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@J Jencks Agree. Sometime "change" is harder than "certain destruction".
"The Department of Energy’s 2017 U.S. Energy and Employment Report revealed that solar energy was employing more workers than the traditional coal, gas and oil industries combined."
Not in Ohio, West Virginia, Kentucky, and Pennsylvania. Get it?
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@HurryHarry - Absolutely! This is why the social/economic impacts, "social justice" needs to be part of the plan from the start. Otherwise, we'll simply be abandoning the people of OH, KY, WV and PA, the result of which is another Trump victory.
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I remember growing up on a farm and watching my staunch Republican father rub his hands together each time he open up a dividend check from one of the utilities companies he invested in and arguing with him about renewable energy when we were all paying over 5.00 a gallon for gas. He is in his 90’s now no longer receiving utilities checks and only now will admit that maybe it’s time for the government to get involve with addressing climate change. It’s now time to use all of our mental power to revamp and push forward a livable agenda for our children and grandchildren when it comes to renewables, climate change, and oh yes capitalism.
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@CathyK Where & when were you paying over $5 for gas? Your faceless response will have the same response today as it had on your Dad back in those $5 gas days
The head-in-the-sand Republicans want us to believe the GND is the end of "hamberders" and air travel among other things. They forget it is more of an aspirational proposal than a fully fleshed-out plan.
Above all, we need such a yardstick against which to measure the things we do both to and for the planet and all its inhabitants whether human or animal.
Even the small things add up. Cities can help with zoning to make stores proximate to housing to reduce the need for cars for every activity. Bike lanes and parks can be added to encourage carbon-free activities and exercise for better health. Workers can be trained to retrofit insulation into buildings which now eat prodigious amounts of energy to give both jobs and direct reduction in energy requirements.
Everyone who claims a place at the table to enjoy earth's bounty has a job to do to ensure the same benefits for those yet to be born.
(Do you remember The Little Red Hen from primary school? For those who do not, it was the story of the hen who asked for help in tending crops, harvesting them and cooking them and, finding none, did not share in her work product with those who did not help her.)
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I hate to say this, but, we need really bad weather to help whatever deal along. Trump can beat back this renewable trend with an emotional appeal to jobs in coal and oil industry and our cultures love of big cars and cheap gas. Rational arguments citing declining jobs in coal and oil industry and what exhaust emissions do to our climate won't work. But last year in particular, where the entire country looked like a scene from a Mad Max movie--that did get people's attention. Even this winter with flooding and polar blasts has become a conversation changer at my local DD coffee shop in the midwest. What we have now is two policy race between extreme weather conditions that does have our country's attention---most sense something is up about the climate; and an emotional attachment to those good old days in the 50's where you could climb into your Electra 225 and let those eight cylinders raw.
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I agree, Mr. Friedman! It is a great thing that talk of the Green New Deal has people talking about climate change. However, your idea of a Green Real Deal is more likely to win support from a broader group of voters. A large investment in green energy infrastructure will create jobs for many people, so it has the potential to help alleviate poverty but Time is of the essence, so our most important consideration for now has to be reducing carbon pollution.
Reminding the public of how ridiculous it is for Trump to support the continued fouling of our earth for short term profit could be the key to changing voters' minds - especially young Republicans. Their generation is going to bear the brunt of the devastation global warming will cause.
4
It all sounds so reasonable. Personally, though, I'm not convinced Tom Friedman recognizes the scale of the problem. The entire economic system upon which we've built our remarkable modern world may be reaching a limit where its impact on our environment and our social stability makes it unsustainable. I'm not sure there is a possible solution, but if there is one, I'm afraid it's going to have to be much more ambitious than what Friedman suggests here. It will require a complete restructuring of the entire global economy.
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@617to416
Too true. but let's not make the perfect, the enemy of the good. Someone has to set the ball rolling, right? in whatever small way. "One small step", remember Neil Armstrong? "ONE GIANT LEAP FOR MANKIND". The U.S. prides itself on being the world's leader. Once this country seriously commits at the federal level, others follow. Countries like India with its giant population and still developing economy, may not be able to follow right away. But there are right thinking folk / visionaries, here too, who are working towards a cleaner environment. Our problems are gargantuan; but one problem we do not have, is a national political party which chooses to willfully disclaim SCIENCE. STEM is still the people's first educational priority.
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@angela koreth
Yes, and certainly small steps are better than no steps at all. But I wouldn't ridicule bold proposals like the Green New Deal. We may actually be at a point where we need to rethink the whole system from the ground up and our future could depend on us being able to transcend pragmatism and embrace ambitious and truly transformative solutions.
I doubt the most American care about what is happening outside of their localities, much less what is happening outside of the country. They need to be able to see how climate change is effecting them personally. Talking to people I know who are grandparents, I am struck with the lack of concern for their children and grandchildren. They seem more concerned in what the stock market is doing and these are not big investors.
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@K D It’s b/c they’ve seen a lot more weather than a 29 yr old bartender from Brooklyn. Learn from our elders be mocking them
@MTM
I’m 75 how old are you. Some of the people I know who are my age are concerned about what they leave to their children, others have said that that’s their problem. I’ll be dead so not my problem.
I agree with all this stuff...but my question, will it matter if much of the rest of the world goes merrily on with its polluting ways?
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@john fisher
The rest of the world, excepting China is far more committed to stopping global warming. Along with China we are by far the biggest problem polluters out there. So the short answer is "yes."
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@Laurence Bachmann and where does India fall on your “list”. Care to share your data on how we are a fare greater polluter than China. Saying it doesn’t make it true
@john fisher, try to read up and understand what the rest of the world is already doing about the climate.
AOC must energize her cohort of youth. If so, and if oppressed minorities who suffer most under GOP policies join them at the polls, this election will be a rout. If not, all bets are off on their future.
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@Michael “oppressed” minorities? I’d love to be a minority in this country w/all the doors that are open to you if you simply show up for work
Please Dems run on the Green New Deal. Most of what Friedman says in this essay is based on hysterical environmental hyperbole. The sun comes up and its climate change to these folks. There is no evidence that storm intensity or frequency has increased, none. Yet every storm is now related to climate change. Yes the climate is changing, it has always changed and we are clearly affecting it. We can with common sense approaches mitigate this anthropomorphic change, but the socialist command and control approach will not work, will produce a crippled economy that will not be able to afford to address climate change. Look at Europe today. Germany, who implemented an aggressive environmental agenda, has increased CO2 emissions and the highest energy costs in Europe because their government lead plan does not work. Compare the US, at 20 year lows for CO2 and a booming economy, much of that lead by natural gas production increases from fracking that have allowed electrical power to be generated by natural gas. Bless the free market, our oil and gas industry and the good ole US of A.
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@Mark V Thank you. Add Friedman to the list of the Trump re-election Committee
@Mark V. Be careful, Mark. Your ignorance of the facts is showing every time we have California fires that run for months and Midwest floods of the 500-year quality that occur every two years and the hurricanes of the century that happen once or twice a season. OKC? Could that be Oklahoma where fracking has introduced thousands to an earthquake a day? Perhaps that’s good for heart health? Provides the jolt that gets you up every morning?
A "Green Real Deal" does not really bother me that much. And separating it from the leaping socialism of the "Green New Deal" will be essential in selling it across the political divide. Bottom line, many of the green initiatives make good climate and economic sense, but the "red initiatives" being proposed along with them make the entire thing a non-starter, at least for this capitalist.
2
@Southern Man. We already have “socialistic” legislation and have had it since the Great Depression! Social Security, all those infrastructure creations that brought electrification to the South and the West were done by the government — not by the “free market.” Our federal road system and before that the support that gave railroads the “rights” to land; in recent times we got Medicare and Medicaid, we paid for public housing so that we wouldn’t have to have millions without housing and living on the streets of our cities. Our aerospace accomplishments were done with federal monies — not private enterprise. Not all were spectacular successes, but all were government initiated and supported.
I really wish that people would learn something about history before they go showing off their ignorance about what “socialism” is and what it does. The kind of “socialism” they hate is the ownership of production by the government, which is something we’ve never done and are unlikely to do. What we and other smart Western nations do is to use the combined power of voters to pay for “goods and services” that the society needs but cost too much for individuals to pay for as individuals. The Green New Deal comes up now because of the vast inequality that has allowed some to live very well while the rest of society “pays” for their lifestyle. Learn some history —
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"Animals moved to higher ground," much smarter than people, who build or live in floodplains. Hey, it's a bit late to make much of a difference, put the energy and capital into adapting.
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@I'se the B'y
Adapt or perish. Pretty straight forward.
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@I'se the B'y
We're killing the oceans. We're next. Moving to higher ground will not change that.
Humans can NOT Control the Climate of the Earth, that is just crazy thinking. The earth has been here for Billions of years, and ALWAYS Changing, they claim it was only 10,000 years ago that much of North America was ice covered, so why did the Ice melt?, Human Intervention?, I don't think so. They claim that about 6,000 years ago, what is now the Sahara Desert, was covered by a Freshwater Lake the size of Iowa. Folks say that sometimes the earth will tip a bit on it's Axis and things will change, what is the Liberal proposal to control that?
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@hank48188, yes the climate has changed often. And the world itself will survive. It's just us humans who want to survive now. Already from the beginning of 1900 we were warned fossil fuels would change the climate. So try to understand the difference of the earth surviving and we as humans living on this earth.
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@hank48188 if you take some time to read up on the science regarding this topic, you may understand what is going on here. Scientists who have studied the climate over the life span of the Earth saw a natural cycle of heating a cooling cycles in our climate. Starting in the late 19th century, they saw a trend start that defied the natural cycles. Nearly all of the research that has been conducted since then has confirmed that this new trend is being caused by human activity; the burning of fossil fuels and destruction of forests. I don't know about you, Hank but I have grandchildren. I will err on the side of protecting our environment. If I am wrong; our air and water will be cleaner than if we did nothing. I can live with that.
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@hank48188
These were and are normal, natural perturbations and changes in earth's climate due to many natural forces. What we see now is a thousands times increase in the carbon blanketing our world that could only be caused by human activity, mostly industry. This is completely different than the ice age (actually there were many more than one) or shifts in general climate over millenia. Go to a class in geography of and development of our earth. Your ignorance of these issues may cost your great grandchildren much in the future.
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'Climate Change' is a meaningless term and should be replaced by 'Man Made Global Warming'!
The democrats should use these three graphs to prove that global warming is man made.
1. Industrial production over time
2. Green house gasses (CO2) over time
3. The world's average temperature over time
All three graphs show that as industrial production has increased, CO2 has increased and as a result the world's average temperature has increased.
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As a Republican with a practical environmentalist attitude Mr. Friedman’s editorial is a welcome voice. There really needs to be a bipartisan effort to effect a working plan to counter climate change and ecological disaster. Accordingly the political landscape must adjust. Unfortunately the standard bearers on both sides are tainted. So to move forward the Dems need people with broad credibility (not AOC who is green in the true meaning of the word) so that Trump can climb on board and of course claim it was his idea.
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I love Mr. Friedman's articles and he's nearly always spot on...but it's not facts that drive the right-wing climate debate, it's dogma. I truly think conservative voters in Iowa and Oklahoma and the like care much more about "owning the libs" than they care about how much their state produces wind power. You gotta understand, Mr. Friedman...these people don't care about a green agenda -- at all. In fact, because liberals tout it, they despise it. Change that first and maybe we can talk. Otherwise, dogma rules the day in the right-wing.
12
I’m not sure even Donald Trump can deny climate change, but for most of us, and probably the reality of it, is that this isn’t going to radically change the way most people are living right now, these changes are 75 to several hundred years away, it’s difficult to get people to radically change their lives on something they know more than likely not affect them, and maybe not even their grandchildren
I’m not sure even Donald Trump can deny climate change, but for most of us, and probably the reality of it, is that this isn’t going to radically change the way most people are living right now, these changes are 75 to several hundred years away, it’s difficult to get people to radically change their lives on something they know what more than likely not affect them, and maybe not even their grandchildren
Pardon the pun, but peoples minds just don’t think on that small of a timeline, a glacial pace
@There 75 to 100 years?! These changes are happening now - and more quickly than expected. And it's not a linear progression. As various tipping points are reached these compound problems throughout the system.
It feels like we've under-estimated how bad things are going to be.
11
The radical changes you’re talking about or a lot closer than 75 years. Migration shifts due to coastal flooding in a place like Bangladesh can cause no end of disruption in a region where you have two nuclear adversaries. That’s just one example and it will take place in the next 10 years.
1
It's always difficult to sell bad news as a winner.
Time for CC to get the news coverage it deserves.
Time for scientists to debate deniers.
Time for politicians to look beyond CC as a opportunity to tax
Without addressing the above, selling CC by blaming rare weather events on CC is a hard sell.
2
Contrary to the headline of this column, Climate Change is not the key to defeating Trump, Trump is the key to defeating Trump.
Last month Gallup asked the question, as they have monthly, "What do you think is the most important problem facing the country today?" Only 15% pointed to Economic Problems. Of the 83% pointing to Non-Economic Problems, 29% pointed to the Government/Poor Leadership, 16% to Immigration, 7% to race Relations, 7% to Healthcare, 5% to Ethics/moral ...Decline, and only 4% to Environment/Pollution.
Defeating Trump by pointing to issues that Democrats think the nation should be concerned about is not a path to defeating him. As the polls suggest, the issues embodied in the Green Deal are only of prime importance to few. Trump's behavior and policies are what concerns most Americans.
And while Trump concerns most Americans the economy does not. Come election time if GDP growth continues to decline while Trump continues being Trump that is what can defeat him if Democrats can decide on a candidate that is least objectionable to most.
2
@GerardM
You really have to look at how these polls ask questions.
Only 15% pointed to economic "problems" because their arent many "problems". The economy is doing great, thanks to Trump.
Ask if the economy in general is an issue, and that number jumps to the mid 80's.
Its the economy, stupid. Always was.
@Sports Medicine
GDP growth was 2.9% for 2018, the same as in 2015, except that Trump financed that growth with $trillions of deficit spending.
This year the IMF is projecting GDP growth at 2.3% and in 2020 1.9%. That's why Trump wants guys like Cain in the Fed who will promote more deficit spending.
That's based on Trump's business experience that resulted in four bankruptcies.
Thanks for giving progressive Americans of all political persuasions a political template to campaign for a green future. As you note, a green energy future not only will provide many jobs but will help save the planet. It is existential if America wants to preserve its coastal areas, its beaches, and its natural resources. I envision a project to create parks and natural barriers that will enhance our country’s beauty and recreational infrastructure, but also protect our vulnerable low lying areas from devastation. As JFK would have orated, let’s meet these challenges with American ingenuity and let’s use the reality of climate change as a true opportunity to create a better future for our children.
We must begin now!
5
@IN. The green future described will enslave most 3rd world countries to a life of poverty and prevent them from lifting themselves out of their misery. It will result in massive deforestation as energy needs in the third world are met by burning wood instead of coal. How we have progressed to the lunacy based upon a earth climate change of less than 1 degree is amazing, especially when NO SCIENTIST can tell us how much change is natural and how much is generated by humans...I think we better worry about real problems like the pending detonation of the super volcano under Yellow Stone, because it is going to kill millions and block out the sun for years creating a super ice age. The Green Deal is a DUD and anybody pushing that agenda needs to get a grip on reality.
4
@James, They claim that Blowout at Yellowstone is way overdue, I live in Michigan and hope that happens after I'm gone because it will be terrible!
@James: Maybe you can tell us a bit more about your experiences with the unprecedented flooding that Houston has seen in recent years.
Just be aware that Mark Gaetz is also calling his proposal a Green Real Deal. Sure, it is encouraging to see that someone who is behind Trump 100% and wanted to destroy the EPA is now acknowledging climate change. But look at the details of this Green Real Deal, which prominently states the U.S. should not pick winners and losers and says nothing about phasing out fossil fuel dependence or setting the timetable we desperately need. The Green New Deal needs work before it can reasonably be called a serious proposal, but let's make sure it's ambitious and gets us where we need to go by 2040.
5
Ask your Member of Congress to co-sponsor the Energy Innovation and Carbon Dividend Act - HR 763 - which is in Congress right now. Effective, bipartisan and good for the economy. It's time to get the right economic policy in place, and everything else can build on that.
3
In past national crises, American citizens had the benefit of real journalists who presented the truth to the audience. Cronkite and Safer on the how the government wasn't being truthful about the Vietnam War. Woodward and Bernstein on how the Nixon administration was using the national security apparatus for political gain.
Today, our media function as stenographers, just stating that one side says this, the other side says that, we can't tell you what's really true. They won't tell you that one political party is completely owned by the fossil fuel industry; it's led by people who think turbine noise causes cancer and that a snowball is evidence there's no climate change.
Remember, in 2016, the TV news media offered thousands of hours covering Hillary's emails and Trump's insults, but only a few minutes on climate change. Climate change is not a sexy topic and doesn't attract viewers. Trump understands that and it's one major reason why he is likely to be re-elected.
13
@Dario Bernardini the end of civilization is sexy stuff. Cli-fi is going to away lots of young minds, just as The Handmaid’s Tale has energized a different part of the Resistance.
The glorious diversity of life on Earth that those of us who are still alive now remember fondly is much diminished. Rachel Carson's "Silent Spring" came out 57 years ago. I wrote a book report on it when I was in high school. Bill McKibben's "The End of Nature" appeared 27 years later when my son and daughter were 10 years old. Al Gore's "An Inconvenient Truth" documentary warning came out 17 years after that, just 2 years before my first grandchild was born. I am a vegetarian, an organic gardener, an active water protector. I recycle, use no plastic, have LED light bulbs in my home. It's not enough. Saving what's left of life on Earth will take grit, determination and courage from absolutely everyone. Our "leaders" have failed us over and over in the service of power and greed. Let's do something about that.
41
Great message to satisfy the 30% or so of people who read daily news from an edited source, but a hard sell to low-information voters. This must be a component of a winning strategy against Trump, but it is inadequate alone.
12
I think that in addition to mandating carbon free targets the GRD should include big subsidies for carbon capture, battery technology and revamping the grid. These would further align the carbon producing states, eg Texas, with the plan and create thousands and thousands of jobs. It would also expand our imports of new technology. Finally, coupled with a very large infrastructure package it would not only prepare the US for the coming irreversible environmental changes by already unleashed carbon but also provide foundation for the economy for a long time to come.
3
@Daniel Salazar -- you don't want to create irrational subsidies -- they have bad outcomes; look at the ethanol -from-corn subsidies.
Set a price on carbon and let engineers and scientists and the market work it out.
"Revamping the grid" means what? If it just means subsidies to existing grid operators for installing "smart meters" (one program we have seen) -- it accomplishes nothing beyond subsidizing grid operators.
If however you mean constructing a 48-state HVDC transmission network capable of moving large amounts of electricity across the continental USA, that would have great value, and would need to be a government program (done perhaps with a mechanism like the Federal Highway system), because utilities won't do anything coordinated on this scale like their own (just as states didn't build coordinated interstates without the federal government).
Paying off states for nothing is a very bad idea. Furthermore it isn't Texas that's the big problem here: oil and gas production notwithstanding.
3
@Daniel Salazar, California ranked 3rd in barrels of oil produced in 2014.
@Lee Harrison
thanks great comments.
I think the subsidies are necessary as we do not have time to let the market work it out. We are already going to hit 2 degrees and without rapid action we are in danger of hitting 4-6 degrees.
With regard to the grid, your ideas are right on.
Paying off states goes on all the time. It's their Senate votes that matter to get the legislation passed. Without, TX, LA, ND, SD and OK it could be done but much easier with.
A viable, economical, green energy source IS going to be developed in the next 10 years. IF China, Japan, or some other country develops that source first, they will reap trillions, while the U.S. National Debt will just grow larger and larger. We have always been in the forefront of technological development. If we did a "Manhattan Project" for renewable energy, WE could be the ones reaping trillions. This is the how we get out from under our $20+ trillion debt. So what is Trump doing? Looking to the past and surrendering the future to our global competitors.
31
I like the proposed ad's. That would hit.
And if you frame it within an argument about the number of JOBS all green programs are producing, which already vastly exceed all the jobs in coal and the like, it would make the argument a killer. I suspect even Trumpy Bear would flip when confronted by it.
I say do it. Indeed with one eye on the horizon and seeing what's going on in the air, water and ground I say do it NOW! We are running out of time. All indications are that Mother Nature is about set to redress the balances we have thrown so badly out of wack.
So do it NOW while we still have time to mitigate the spanking from Mother; one we are destined to receive for all that we have done to this Paradise, the Earth. Doing so will be an acknowledgement of all that we have done wrong, and might, MIGHT, lessen the punishment we are on the cusp of receiving from a very upset, very angry, Mother.
A justified spanking is coming folks. But setting in place a Green Deal will help lessen the blows. So let's work together and start doing it right now.
John~
American Net'Zen
15
If my memory serves me all of the predictors in 2016 predicted we would have another Clinton as president.If we were dealing with a logical and rational electorate Freidman would be right but we are not. Trump lies to his base daily and they love it and him unconditionally. I think if you want to beat Trump you start educating everyone not in Trump’s base what Medicare, Social Security and the interstate highway system really is. When Trump brands the left as socialist it would be wise to inform the public how socialism affects their daily lives. Trump is going to lie about the Green Deal so much the voters other than his base will start believing him.Beating Trump will not be take rationale or logic it will take our maneuvering him. Jen Bush and the other candidates thought they could use rationale and logic in 2016 and look what we got? Trump! Trump created the so-called crisis at the border and now he wants to be the savior who saves us from the Brown Horde? Have forgotten Trump sent the army to the border to repel the invasion in 2018? Trump has already floated the notion that windmills cause cancer. Take back the majority in Congress and take The White House first and then we can build all the windmills we want to. Insanity is said to be doing the same thing and expecting a different result. Hillary showed the Good,herself, and the Evil,Trump,only to have Trump win.
20
@Steven McCain..There's nothing wrong with your memory.Trump did everything a candidate should do not to be elected. Yes the Electoral College helped him to a degree. The reality is that he should not have gotten enough support to make it through the Primaries. The thinking of too many American voters at that time and even now...simply defies any other explanation than that too many of us like things as they are. Too many of us including the GOP agree with Melania...they Don't Care...and they wonder...Why Do You?? Support for Trump or the GOP is simply...Un American !!
@Steven McCain: the problem with that theory is that you will not sell the US public on "socialism" by tying it up in a pretty package. We've already seen lefty liberal "socialism" at work in the welfare state, and know that all the benefits go to the left's pet constituent groups and not to average Americans. (No, nobody is going to fawn all over Democrats because of what FDR did 80 years ago.)
Anyways, don't liberals HATE the interstate system? and want European-style trains and buses, so people can be forced out of private automobiles? Come on. We've heard this tune before.
Also: the left won the Presidency and a VETO PROOF majority in both houses of Congress and blew it all on lousy worthless Obamacare with HIGH DEDUCTIBLES. We will never believe you or trust you again. You did not solve the illegal immigrant crisis. You did not build windmills or solve global warming. You did not bring us back our lost jobs. You did, in fact, nothing -- you made everything 10 times worse.
Why should we EVER trust you again?
1
I believe in the ambitions of the New Green Deal, but within its name lies part of the problem. People on the Left and Right view very differently the historic New Deal from FDR times. On the Left it is, in my view, correctly recognized for saving our society and Capitalism. On the Right it is demonized for “giveaways to others.”
Likewise the Left’s religious belief in the impending doom of fossil fuel supplies and the prediction of the demise of the planet from overpopulation have sown a discrediting of science. I remember well the story in the 79s that we will run out of fuel and food.
Add to that the cynicism now inherent toward believing in anything that requires sacrifice, and you have a gloomy outlook for the planet.
People on the Left need to wake up to the fact that change is a hard sell to the masses who reject sacrifice, especially where the Right is prepared to drive the planet off the cliff tomorrow, rather than give up riches today.
Liberals should be enjoying the gift of Trump by bringing the populace back from ultra-conservatism. Instead, we make it easier for the Right by trying to move to the Left more dramatically than is acceptable.
8
A better critique of the Green New Deal than others as it shares the same goals, praises it for getting things on the agenda, and unnecessarily goes snide just once. Also brings in the hugely important ecosystem protection dimension, and marries it with economic development and social protection that most "green economy" thinking misses. I hope Tom is right about the potential political upsides. My suggestions are: don't dismiss the need for links to housing, insurance, guaranteed jobs too quickly, although that does create communications and tactical challenges. Those linkages may prove necessary; don't forget the need to admit we don't know--yet, many of the answers and therefore we are going to have to be creative like crazy, while facing up to the usually invisible obstacles to that; there are many, many mindset barriers and problematic assumptions to doing all this, some of them even held by the good guys. See my http://greeneconomynj.org/2019/01/03/new-jersey-now-gets-climate-change-what-we-are-still-missing-why-were-not-talking-about-what-were-not-talking-about-part-4/; even beyond the welcome inclusion of ecosystems, much more can be called upon from business; and while, certainly, we can't "transform all at once," we can't not try at all as we might just figure out how to, at least partially, or lose the newly shared urgency. For the most part, Tom has been and continues to be ahead on this subject. It would help, though, if he integrates it into his other topics.
2
A Green Real Deal is also a national security issue. The history of the USA since World War 2 has been about protecting oil reserves. It supported the Shah of Iran, despots.. no need to go on. Becoming self sufficient would have been a God Send in the 50's and 60's.
6
I hope progressives and those on the far Left read this, as it not only supports efforts they believe in, but puts it in the realm of the possible. It is business friendly what has been passed in California and could do the same in many other locations. I like the proposed ads that Tom has suggested whether taken in whole or part, it is the way to move this forward and to defeat the "stable genius."
7
In the 50’s ‘Ike’ began construction of the interstate highway system spanning decades & administrations of both parties, building roads, generating employment in the auto and home construction industries. This was the last major investment into infrastructure we have made.
Somewhere in the 70’s / 80’s America became complacent. Big oil, pharma, and defense controlled & defined ‘progress’. Huge levels of lobbying.
Had we made investments into green energy we would have created new industries employing large numbers of people.
It’s not too late. We need a major program, items prioritized over years. It will require taxes, and Americans willing to invest into the future.
Perhaps this ‘tale of 2 islands’ helps.
Block Island, a small island near Providence. A public/private group looked at it’s energy situation, researching wind. 2 facts: The east coast has some of the strongest prevailing winds in the world plus a wide continental shelf extending in some areas 20 miles. Now 100 % of Block Island’s electricity is provided by wind. Note: We don’t build state of the art windmills; these were imported. Good story; could have been better.
Puerto Rico. After the recent hurricane electricity was slow to return. How has ‘PR’ generated electricity? 100% provided by diesel generators; every drop of fuel shipped by tanker. Expensive. A semi tropical island: Nobody thought of Solar?
To reiterate: Clear information. Major investment. ‘Vision’.
19
@CD Or solar which does not have the problem of noise, flashing light, destruction of birds, and what to do when the turbine needs to be replaces or the oil from its blade service pollutes your ocean or land.
I would never go to Block Island, a tourist destination, because of the turbines.
@poslug
You have very high standards. Tell us where to vacation that would allow us to have a lesser impact on the environment than Block Island - available by one hour ferry ride, powered by wind, with downtown and hotels within walking distance of the ferry terminal.
3
@poslug -- "oil from it's blade service" .... wind turbine blades are not serviced with oil.
Wind turbines do kill some birds and bats -- much less than the oil industry, or houses, or above-ground transmission lines, or domestic cats.
Modern wind turbines are less noisy than the older ones.
There are no wind turbines on Block Island. There is an offshore wind turbine array in the ocean 3.8 miles from Block Island -- they are completely inaudible from Block Island (duh), and are not so obtrusively visible either ... though your esthetic outrage may differ.
Read here:
https://www.wshu.org/post/windfarm-unlikely-tourist-attraction-block-island#stream/0
Opponents of wind energy projects sometimes worry about how wind turbines will affect the ocean’s view, making a trip to the water less appealing for people. But since the wind farm went online last year, Block Island’s Tourism Council says the turbines have actually attracted more people.
Jessica Willi, the council’s executive director, says, “We’ve definitely seen more people on the Island that have come just to see the wind farm, we’ve had businesses sprout up on the Island, boats taking people out just to see the wind farm.”
2
True, California's S.B. 100 is more focused and credible than the AOC/Markey concept. Unfortunately for the global warming/cooling/change believers, what was put out there in DC will be mocked by Trump, and not without reason. Even the sponsors didn't vote for the Green New Deal in the Senate, leaving it to lose 0-53.
Mr. Friedman himself floated this term 12 years ago, but his column today suggests that there hasn't been much work done since then to confirm provable links between things like US energy policy and an African cyclone. In Friedman's 2007 column, he mentioned that there were daffodils in DC in January that year. Since then, DC's average January temperatures have returned to the norm since numbers were first compiled in 1871 -- about 36 degrees. In 7 of 12 years since Friedman's 2007 article, the average January temp in DC has been below the long-run average of 36.
https://www.weather.gov/media/lwx/climate/dcatemps.pdf Do we therefore say that there is global cooling in DC and call it a global crisis?
Cherry-picking anecdotal observations about weather events is a problem for those of us trying to take seriously the claims of urgency about an impending collapse of the earth's complex ecosystems. Friedman's 2007 daffodil argument looks pretty daft in his own rear-view mirror, should he care to glance back.
6
Here is the way I would talk to voters about the New Green Deal.
"It is just plain cheaper than fossil fuels or nukes. And there are way more local jobs than fossil fuels or nukes. The clean air is a side effect."
7
@gratis: if it is cheaper, of course it won't cost trillions and trillions in NEW TAXES on the middle class -- right?
WRONG, WRONG, WRONG. The environmental prognosis is correct, but the political analysis is completely wrong. Americans don't care about cyclones in Mozambique or coral reefs in Australia. And 47% of American voters will vote for more pollution and more carbon because that satisfies some tribal urge to stick it to the Ivy eggheads and liberals. And only 10% max of the electorate really cares about global warming. Green energy is vitally important, but as a campaign issue, it's a loser. And the one issue even more important than global warming is the not insignificant risk of nuclear war, that's something not one in ten thousand Americans care about.
15
@Mark Nuckols
No, it's nothing about tribalism by progressives or tribalism by their opponents.
People want a better life for their kids than they have had. In this country, people know capitalism is the workers' friend.
They aren't abandoning what has been working now that our economy is -
The World's Best.
Trump's approval is now SEVEN points higher than Obama's at this stage of his administration, 53 to 46.
3
@The Observer
It appears that the "Observer" is restricting observance to conservative websites without checking any other information to challenge cognitive dissonance or delusions. Of the 2 sites claiming 52% approval rating one is rated as "very conservative" and the other is discredited by fact checking watchdogs. There are more approval rating groups besides Rasmussen.
More importantly, "a better life" for their kids" for many people is more than the economic boom which began with Obama and now continues with Trump. The rich who are reaping the benefits without concern for the environment of the entire planet are living on the high ground as the flood waters are rising. Not your problem if sitting pretty.
14
@The Observer. You couldn't be more wrong. Trump's approval rating is barely 40% right now.
9
The implications and outcomes of human-produced,
activated,
promoted and
sustained
climate changes to humans,
all other living creatures and
organisms, their homes,
normative daily living,
which threaten lives, limbs,
social systems and menschlich
values which underpin
types, levels and qualities of
equitable wellbeing for ALL,
would be usefully considered and responded to as BE ing a
"crime against humanity."
Those people-actual people, and
not only identified,
targeted, labeled
enabling systems-organizations,
need to be charged.
Arrested.
Tried.
Their words, and done- deeds;
needed ones, not considered, unplanned,
undone,
barriered from opportunities to
"Fail better," to
BE mass transmitted.
Globally.
Adjudicated and
then put to work to...
Whether this is accomplished,
or NOT, can, and will,
surely influence all of our weathers.
Daily.
Perhaps forever.
Tipping points are not just
combined-letters,
words or a
descriptive-concept.
1
The simple way for Mr. Friedman to prove his point is to show that, historically, there were never such storms, or coral bleachings, before.
This is patently false, so Trump will win on climate. Especially after explaining to voters that the Deal would cost them about 60k/year, for ever.
By the way, the recent huge US floods were due to the ground being FROZEN, that is, by too much cold. Hand waving after the fact is not science, and the climatologists never said BEFORE that global warming will bring huge winter storms with lots of snow and with the ground frozen stiff at the end of spring. In fact, they said just the contrary, over and over and over again.
The race should be for ever more affordable energy, which brings prosperity and industrial power.
"Low-lying coastal cities in America should be thinking the same."
The gauges anywhere around the US coast show that waters rise at exactly the same rate as in Lincoln's time, about 3mm/year. Uninfluenced by a huge increase in industrial emissions around the globe. Check it by yourself, the official NOAA data at The Battery, in NYC.
https://tidesandcurrents.noaa.gov/sltrends/sltrends_station.shtml?id=8518750
The NOAA site has links to ALL the gauges, all around the world. None shows acceleration, and there are peer reviewed studies which analyze ALL the gauge data, to the same conclusion.
As a physicist, I am happy that Mr. Friedman helps push the climate obsessed politicians over the edge, into political oblivion.
9
@novoad, you might want to check out this document from the same NOAA website you cite that draws on substantial analysis to conclude among other things;
- "Due to rising relative sea level (RSL), more and more cities are becoming increasingly exposed and evermore vulnerable to high tide flooding, which is rapidly increasing in frequency, depth and extent along many U.S. coastlines."
- “Today’s flood will become tomorrow’s high tide.”
And yes, a rising average global temperature for the earth will lead to some places getting warmer, some colder, and greater volatility in system predictability for everyone. You should likely stick to physics.
https://tidesandcurrents.noaa.gov/publications/techrpt86_PaP_of_HTFlooding.pdf
14
@novoad I've read enough to know that when a self-identifying physicist starts talking about climate science to be prepared to take their pronouncements-from-on-high with a grain of salt and a bushel of skepticism. Why do a lot of physicists think that being an expert in physics makes them an expert in everything?
8
@novoad That's not what's happening around the tidal basin. Water levels are rising. It IS flooding with the tides. The Kennedy Center is planning for the rise. The National Park Service and National Trust for Historic Preservation are joining forces to save the tidal basin
4
The bad news is that the rest of the world has to do something about climate change too, especially big countries like China and India, and of course Europe. The good news is if the US finally comes around, then it can take the lead, which, ironically, is probably the only way in the long-term the rest of the world can be spurred forward fast enough. The bad news is that in the short-term the US is still lagging by a huge amount.
So about that lagging. Some would argue that we have to focus on climate change amelioration and postpone making progress on other social and political and economic issues. Others would argue that climate change amelioration won't happen unless there is fundamental political and social change in the US because vested interests (fossil fuel industry) will continue to work to prevent action on climate change. Since time is of the essence, Thomas dismisses this second argument, but I think doing so is fraught with risk of failure, and he needs to carefully consider the question of how and why can amelioration happen now if it hasn't happened up until now. In other words, are the things that prevented it in the past weakened enough to be overcome?
5
@Dan
The Green New Deal proposes renewable energy and infrastructure refurbishment as a vehicle for social, political and economic change .
4
@Dan Have you been paying attention to the climate news. The US IS the ONLY country on the planet NOT a signatory to the Paris Climate Accord. China is the largest manufacturer of solar panels. Just as unbreathable air in LA spurred California to develop the most stringent air pollution standards, Chinese city pollution is doing the same thing in China. Europe is also way ahead of the US, particularly Germany.
3
It is likely there are at least two issues the young voter and future voter is deeply concerned about today. On April 20 Columbine remembers 20 years since the shooting at the school began what has been an ongoing wave of school violence. Every school administrator and every student nationwide is concerned they get through next week without incident. Gun violence is a young person's issue. And, as Friedman has made clear, a warming climate that makes life for Homo sapiens ever more fragile matters to our young people. It is way past time for our political leaders and parties to take guns and climate very serious.
9
@Rev Wayne
Great. Now if only young people would vote.
I want to believe Mr. Friedman when he declares the way to beat trump in 2020 is to drive home the sense of obligation we collectively hold to the future and to celebrate the innovations of technology we will release once we unshackle ourselves from the suffocation of fossil fuels. I am, however, a realist who is not convinced this will be the path to defeat the cynicism coarsening through the under current of trump's message to his base. He won regions of the US hit exceptionally hard in the aftermath of the 2008 housing collapse. He speaks not so much in dog whistles as in blaring trumpets that the source of America's "decline", as only he sees it, is found in those Eastern elites with their embrace of global communities supporting global markets and pondering global concerns. For his base, yesterday seems to be the better alternative for the overwhelming uncertainty of today. trump promises his base they don't have to worry about any of those global issues, he'll just build a bigger wall or impose greater tariffs to keep the rest of the world at bay.
2
Addressing climate change is going to become increasingly important for humanity. But I am not at all convinced that Trump's ignorance in this regard will benefit us in 2020. I hope that we can find common ground on core issues that the vast majority of voters deal with each day. Health care, education, infrastructure, the economy, and yes, climate change. I think most voters care about integrity in government, fairness, and the preservation of our democracy.
Before we can begin to address climate change, we need to reach down and find the intensity it's going to take in order to vote out the Trump party from all levels of goverment. In reality, Trump hasn't benefited our country in any area of policy. If we cannot find an effective way to communicate this simple fact, well, I don't need to point out the obvious here. I suggest that we be very careful and very smart about the issues that we focus on next year.
5
A successful change requires getting most Americans on board or we suffer the consequences of two steps back every other election. Republicans, or conservatives in general, are emotional thinkers. Many liberals too, it is just more rampant in their circles. Fox News, Limbaughs of the world only really generate a following on the right for a reason. If reason, data, calls for empathy for others, dramatic weather doesn’t sway them, what will? I think the solution is to recruit big names who they trust. George W Bush, James Baker, Glenn Beck, oil CEOs, etc... if they publicly support and campaign for addressing climate change and specific policies, then maybe we have a chance of long lasting, impactful changes free from politicization. Otherwise we are stuck with half measures that are for a vote every 2 to 4 years.
4
@Brandon Lurie - Brandon, I have posed this question countless times to comment writers who take the position you do in your first line.
How do you heat and cool your home?
Only 4 or 5 times in at least 2 years have I gotten answers, all from readers who do NOT heat or cool their homes using fossil-fuel based systems and fossil-fuel produced electricity.
You are my sample today. Look forward to your reply. I have a comment awaiting review that names renewable energy systems common in the Nordic countries but never named by either the Times or by readers except me.
Odd don't you think?
Only-NeverInSweden.blogspot.com
Citizen US SE
Not to point out the obvious, but we’re entering the fourth quarter with climate change. Thankfully folks from the entire political spectrum are finally taking notice.
Weather and natural disasters have no doubt helped ring alarm bells. How you talk about the topic and frame policy are equally important to this.
Agree, climate change presents an election advantage for democrats. Go strong but to really stick with the broader electorate they need to show some nuance, rather than guns ablazing.
And while they’re at it, we need a healthy discussion and strong position on climate resilience, which at this point might be even more critical. Cause the oceans are already rising and the storms are getting much meaner.
4
Nobody thinks the Green New Deal is all going to become law in the next two years, or the next six. But if the Democrats have any sense, they won't adopt Mr. Friedman's tone of "now the adults are in the room, and here's the sensible plan -- forget that other thing." Instead, they should fully and wholeheartedly endorse the Green New Deal as an aspirational long-term goal, and /also/ present a plan that they think they can pass into law in the near future.
And, in addition to net-zero by 2045, in gradual steps, the plan should also, by gradual steps, reach an economy in which the richest American has no more than 10 million times the wealth of the poorest American.
7
@Brian Harvey
The Green New Deal will never become law, if for no other reason, it is a number of plans and ideas. FDR's New Deal was a set of guiding principles. I do not believe anything will get passed because of the understanding of Americans is so woefully poor.
1
You only need to run one ad: President Trump said the GOP is The Party of Healthcare. He promised big, beautiful and better health insurance. Where is it? Cut to a scene of an deserted Walmart parking lot with a broken crutch leaning up against a Winnebago, and a wheelchair slowly blowing in the wind. Heavy bokeh.
None of this hippie environmental stuff will fly. Why? Half of our nation doesn’t believe in the founding principles or methods of science. If climate change is a problem, it’s because God orchestrated it and he will fix it for our grandchildren. Problem solved.
4
@T. Rivers
Trump promised Mexico would pay for the Wall. Conservatives do not care.
Even when well-intentioned, any discussion of reducing atmospheric CO2 that fails to laser focus on 1) land use, and 2) shifting from industrial to regenerative agriculture, is bound to miss the point, or to be more precise, the opportunity. Which is not to say that clean energy generation, clean transport, etc. aren't good ideas, or necessary. Part of "the best way forward" is to do a lot of as many things as possible.
That said, wind turbines/solar/high speed rail do not sequester carbon. They reduce output but do not draw down carbon in the atmosphere. Forests do, planting forests does, grasslands do, and so does intensive, regenerative agriculture--synthetic fertilizer-free, pesticide/herbicide/fungicide-free, working with Nature rather than attempting to vanquish it. It comes with externalities--all positive:
reduces erosion/runoff...of topsoil and the chemicals which have contaminated our fresh waterways
less fossil fuel inputs
nutrient-dense food which...
could lead to better health outcomes
builds biodiversity
The coup de grace--regenerative Ag can build soils very rapidly, thus sequestering carbon rapidly. The only price we pay is more nutritious and better-tasting food.
8
The most astounding thing, because I spent 10 years studying the beginning of this modern nation, is that the USA resort to fight now with the most archaic problems that the old world has clearly resolved, at least in the intentionality : health care, social justice and ecology .
The 3 most important problems of the 20th and 21st century .
The USA are way behind . Still in ignorance, denial and incapacity .
5
The Green New Deal isn't going to put Trump on the defense. It's going to put him on offense. We have had natural disasters all throughout history. There is a drought on hurricanes in the US. The severity of wildfires in California has more to do with the density of the forestation and the opposition of environmentalist to cutting down trees than it does with someone using a snowblower in Cleveland. Climate change is like a religion. The scientists cannot tell us that natural disasters won't happen if we stop using fossil fuels. For all we know, we have less natural disasters as a result of burning fossil fuels.
2
@Mark A drought on hurricanes?
Wikipedia's article on "2018 Atlantic hurricane season" begins, "The 2018 Atlantic hurricane season was the third in a consecutive series of above-average and damaging Atlantic hurricane seasons, featuring 15 named storms, 8 hurricanes, and 2 major hurricanes, which caused a total of over $49.975 billion (2018 USD) in damages."
Actually, every single assertion you made is either wrong or taken out of context.
9
@Orthoducks
Wikipedia's article on "1933 Atlantic hurricane season" begins, "The 1933 Atlantic hurricane season was the second-most active Atlantic hurricane season on record, behind only the 2005 season, with 20 storms forming in the northwest Atlantic Ocean, breaking the record set by 1887."
I'm so convinced!
1
@Mark
In Conservative arguments, regardless of subject, there is a tendency to ignore both magnitude and direction. I see it in all sorts of economic articles, social unrest, as well as climate change. So, the individual facts might be accurate, but half a truth is a whole lie.
3
"100 percent carbon-free - so as to include energy sources that aren’t actually renewable, but don’t emit carbon dioxide - by 2045. So wind, solar, geothermal, biomass, large hydro, nuclear power and natural gas paired with carbon capture and storage (C.C.S.) can all play, plus whatever new clean power gets invented."
That's good, and preserving existing nuclear is important to do as we move from carbon fuels. We need the power.
Something that could win in the dry Southwest - floating solar farms. They produce power, they'd reduce evaporation from likes like lakes Shasta, Powell and Mead. The solar and the generators in the dams help balance each other, too.
https://arstechnica.com/science/2018/11/floating-solar-is-more-than-panels-on-a-platform-its-hydroelectrics-symbiont/
As to coastal and river flood areas, having to fix sewage treatment plants, sewers, roads, and having to deal with leaky coal ash and petrochemical sites will get boring and expensive after a while. As a taxpayer, I'd prefer spending on solving the problem rather than cleaning up after it.
"In Wilmington, North Carolina, tidal flooding grew to 84 days in 2016, up from two days 50 years ago... In Charleston, South Carolina, the incidence of sunny day flooding increased to 50 days in 2016, up from four days annually 50 years ago"
https://e360.yale.edu/features/as-high-tide-flooding-worsens-more-pollution-is-washing-to-the-sea
8
@b fagan -- the biggest win-win for a floating solar array is New York's Hillview Reservoir. The New York City has been fighting a stalling action against the EPA for at least a decade over covering Hillview, for sanitation.
https://www.lohud.com/story/news/local/westchester/yonkers/2019/03/19/nyc-cover-hillside-reservoir-yonkers/3213052002/
1
One of the more encouraging bits of environmental news I've run across lately is Friedman's reporting that 23 chapters of the College Republican had participated in the formation of Students for Carbon Dividends, a bipartisan group calling for national legislation to fight climate change. Nothing like the prospect of having to experience future environmental catastrophe to concentrate the mind--even when bombarded with nonsense by the current Republican in chief..
17
I hate to say it but Trump and his voters don't care about what happens in Africa. Even his supporters in the Midwest who recently were deluged would rather just take tax dollars from the urban centers to rebuild their damaged levies than support any legislation addressing climate change.
20
Thanks, Mr. Friedman, for a great column.
Bill McKibben has been a voice crying in the wilderness about climate change for years. So it was an agreeable surprise to read his essay in the April 4th issue of the New York Review of Books:
https://www.nybooks.com/articles/2019/04/04/future-without-fossil-fuels/
9
Until a price is put on carbon, forests will continue to be removed from the surface of the earth. Once they’re worth more standing , atmospheric carbon levels will begin to decline. Their destiny is to go back where they came from, the ground.
2
Sorry Mr Friedman, if Trump is defeated in 2020 it will not be because he is a climate change denier. It will because women who vote more then men recognize him for the cruel monster he is in separating children from their parents and his hoping to keep women in reproductive slavery.
7
@Edward B. Blau I would certainly hope both components help to defeat Trump.
13
People favor anti-carbon policies in the abstract but fiercely oppose them when actually enacted. A trivial gas tax sets off mass protests in France. Green legislation loses in Washington State. Few countries living up even to the very small Paris commitments. Trump is elected calling climate change a hoax and this is before any green policies are actually enacted. China and India building new coal generated plants as fast as ever. Face it. There is going to be zero carbon reduction and it's probably not going to matter. It's extremely unlikely that 100 years from now people will look back and say "if only we had reduced carbon."
4
@Leia dear lela, We can, if we had a real government, work with other world powers to pressure them on pollution and climate change, they will suffer the backlash too, All the world will. But the U.S. Is the most powerful country now and to maintain that, we need to be the leader in the effort, not the followers. The US, under trump, is growing weak, and we Americans, are losing our strength around the world.
4
@Leia
You are absolutely right when you say "It's extremely unlikely that 100 years from now people will look back and say if only we had reduced carbon."
But you are going to be right for one of two reasons. Either climate change is a giant global hoax perpetrated by the entire scientific community, so no one will care that we didn't fall for it.
Or else, it is all true and there won't be any humans left around 100 years from now to look back and say anything. We will have been the only species so intelligent that we drove ourselves into extinction, in spite of being warned of the consequences of our behavior.
Either way, one thing is certain. Humanity as a whole is incapable of long term thinking and will never be able to actually reduce carbon emissions. 2018 saw the largest CO2 emissions in global history.
3
@Leia
I wonder where you think water will come from during the summer after the glaciers are gone.
I hope people will learn about HR763
https://www.congress.gov/bill/116th-congress/house-bill/763
This is a real bill (currently before the House Energy Committee) to implement a carbon tax with 100% rebate per-capita.
There is np way to reduce carbon emissions without putting a price on them -- a carbon tax with 100% rebate is revenue neutral, and if it is rebated per capita then it becomes quite progressive: the poor don't produce as much CO2 as the average citizen, so the net effect of the tax & rebate is that they are making money. This also solves the "yellow vest" problem; an increase in the tax rate helps the poor, rather than hurting them.
In the past AOC has stated she supports a carbon tax, but she has made no statement I'm aware of about HR763 ... I am curious why.
While I support this bill, I see two problems with it:
1. this bill exempts fossil fuels used for farming. This will become a massive loophole for diversion and fraud. Less obviously it will distort carbon economics for agriculture.
I would support a transition measure that provided a tax-free fuel allowance per acre planted (depending on crop), this allowance to slowly go away.
2. This bill does not address the repeal of all the other energy/fuel subsidies, and that is in fact critical, once the carbon tax becomes significant. These all need to be ramped down as the carbon tax ramps up.
4
@Lee Harrison: if you return all the money from the carbon tax, how does it even work? oh right -- the "pain at the pump" causes people to drive less. But it also makes them furiously angry at government.
And the money you return to them? it gets spent on other things, bills etc. -- they don't remember it is to compensate them for $5 a gallon gasoline. Eventually governments see this golden pot of money and spend it on other things (see: Lotteries) and now the poor slobs are paying $5 a gallon but not getting 100% of it back anyways.
Now they hate you, the liberals who raised gasoline to $5 a gallon, with a white hot fury. And the first populist who says "I will get rid of the carbon tax" is a sure-fire winner.
Seriously you folks are taking pointers from a 29 year old ex-bartender who has never held a real full time (or owned a car, or had to put gas in it)????
1
@Concerned Citizen -- the tax doesn't return the amount each individual spent, it returns the average ("Per capita") of all the spending.
And this isn't just on gasoline, at the pump, it's on all fossil fuels at the time of production, so it carries through to all products and services that use fossil fuels.
The poor MAKE MONEY from this, because they are poor; they cannot buy as much (of anything) as those who are better off. The higher the tax rate, the more they make -- a carbon tax with 100% PER CAPITA rebate is very progressive and solves the "green vest" problem; raise the rate and they make more.
AOC is not the author of a Carbon Tax ..., though she has said in the past she would support one, she conspicuously does not support this one.
What's YOUR plan to cut carbon emissions?
1
Great idea Tom. Trump is vulnerable on global warming because the facts are undeniable, no matter how much he tries to hide the truth with bold lies. People are finally beginning to realize global warming his real economic consequences. Young people will bear the brunt of this oncoming disaster. But they have the power to turn things around, if they will only get involved and vote.
5
what a mishmash of climate alarmism, economic non sequiturs and iffy politics: should the Dems ever actually run on a Green New Deal platform (they almost certainly won't) , be ready for a 1984- or even 1972-type 40+ state blowout by GOP .
5
@daveW
you're wrong Dave. Watch and see.
@daveW: but that is precisely what is going to happen, as the left is on a social justice warrior frenzy today, with AOC and Ilhan Omar and running AGAINST Trump (vs. FOR anything positive) and their platform for 2020 will be A. reparations and B. transgender rights.
1
Brilliant article and brilliant ideas - actionable and time sensitive. How do we get this out to the masses. Few people have the ability to read and comprehend- visuals are easier to get the message across. This MUST go viral to all sections of American society- all locations all demographics everyone everywhere must see this. And that must happen within 2019. We not only have to get rid of Trump, the Senate has to be flipped to 60+ Dems
8
Trump always wants to get a bang for his buck.He is notoriously stingy.How about putting it in dollars and cents.Add up every dollar spent for remediation after climate events for a year by the National Government and the State governments and this would include losses by farmers , by homeowners and the rebuilding of infrastructure.The figure would be enormous and would be money taken out of the economy.Insurance costs are rising so high that homeowners and businesses cannot afford them.Trump’s coal and oil economy is strangling growth, not adding to it.He is living in the Stone Age instead of the tech centric 21st century.Industry is moving ahead without him-they are trying to,advance American industry and trying to catch the Chinese innovators while Trump sits around worrying that wind turbines will give him cancer.
3
Sounds good, but can a positive can-do approach counter a message of bigotry, fear, and hate? Guess we may see in 2020.
3
On internet news and commentary sites, there is a shorthand phrase for when a poster nails it.
"This. Exactly."
2
Here's the problem...the Green New Deal is now associated with Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and she's doesn't do her homework, appears to need no insights or guidance from any of her colleagues and has a particular skill at personalizing and mocking criticism/questions. A bill associated with her will never have bipartisan support.
3
@Southern Hope - Pay more attention. AOC does indeed do her homework. She has a science, as well as a political background. We are faced with two huge dilemmas: runaway global warming and runaway concentration of wealth and power. The only chance to save this dire situation is to think big, and talk boldly. The Green New Deal is the best, most hopeful template we have to address both problems.
2
@Southern Hope
That's true, but only for you and those who 'think' like you.
Aren’t you confusing AOC with someone else?
Is easy to disbelieve that climate change is not real if it hasn't come to your door, but 'what if' the climate changers are right? If there is only a 1% chance they have it right, we should engage. By the time catastrophe comes to the doubters backyard, it will be too late. For each doubter who says we can't afford the cost, the question is simply what are clean air, water and food worth to you? What's this planet worth to all of us? There will never be enough printable money to replace our one and only magnificent home.
2
The AFL-CIO is against the Green New Deal, calling it not achievable or realistic. The AFL-CIO's opposition will complicate matters for Dems who need labor support. Without the backing from unions or the business community, it will be a hard sell for Democrats to get it beyond grass-roots support. Politicians on both sides of the aisle have rejected the "Green Deal" as being too expensive. They would have struggled mightily just to get a "Green Deal" out of committee. Without the AFL-CIO it is DOA. The promise that a "Green Deal" will create millions of good jobs is only being repeated by politicians-not the economists. The government being involved doesn't guarantee success or permanent jobs. What it will probably guarantee is a great deal of fraud. Wind and solar can't scale. Coal & other fossil fuels are currently the only way we can meet the high demand for power. The electricity demand on the power grid must be generated as its needed, in real time. When the demand for electricity suddenly spikes, we need to have the means available to generate that power immediately. Fossil fuels provide this capability. If we were simply forced to generate power through only clean methods at this point, there would be rolling brown-outs and power curfews like there are in 3rd world countries. The American public won't stand for this under any condition. While many people are in favor of alternatives, they also want those alternatives to not compromise their lifestyle. This won't work.
3
@Bill Brown
A lot of what you posted about renewable energy is simply antiquated. Wind and solar can scale, energy stored, and returned as needed. Please check out Xcel Energy and Colorado. Proposals say that it is cheaper to build and store renewable energy than operate an existing coal plant It is technically and economically feasible and prices are dropping daily. Technology and economics are there. Political will, not so much, mostly because Americans are not really curious about such things.
@gratis We & (the world) will continue to use fossil fuels for the foreseeable future no matter what happens. Maybe less but still in massive amounts. It's baked into our energy grid. It can't & won't be eliminated overnight. That will take decades at best. Even though our governments now subsidize clean-power sources, efficient cars, buildings, etc... we continue to rip as much oil, coal & gas out of the ground as possible. And if our own green policies mean there isn't a market for these fuels at home, then no matter: they will be exported instead. The US is extracting carbon & flowing it into the global energy system faster than ever before. For years we've tried to simultaneously reduce demand for fossil fuels while doing everything possible to increase the supply. More efficient engines enable more people to drive more cars over greater distances, triggering more road building, more trade & indeed more big suburban houses that take more energy to heat. When climate policy starts to hurt economically, even the greenest states will back away. When policies on emissions reductions collide with policies focused on economic growth, economic growth will win out every time. Isn't that obvious at this point. Can we bring ourselves to prioritize renewables over cheap fuels? Are we willing to vote against our own self interests & approve higher taxes on fossil fuels? Absolutely not. It isn't going to happen.
1
Part of the problem is the rhetoric. First it was global warming. When that was mocked ("Gee it was 10 degrees cooler last week. What's the big deal about one degree?") Then we arrived at global climate change. And we've still gotten nowhere?
I maintain the problem is with the word, "global" which while technically accurate implies a surface issue. (Like global economy, or global companies etc.)
I suggest we call it PLANETARY Climate Change. Thanks to NASA, planetary conjures images of Jupiter and Mars. Huge rocks with depth and mass. Not Google EARTH shots of your neighborhood. We need to convey the sense of mass a physics term implying inertia to get across the massive effort we will NOW need to change, alter, or reverse the planetary disaster we are headed by the failure of leadership through their continuous mocking and denials of gravity of the problems we face and must solve as a species. If that's even possible now.
5
@Peter B Thank you.
Climate change must be tackled, fast. But to do so Trump must be defeated, and a full Congress elected. To do that, Dems have to taken on immigration, Trump's signature issue, and offer a sensible and humane response that voters can feel is right. As of today Dems don’t have a clear plan. This is a must to win. Voters don’t feel climate change, but they feel immigration. Win with an immigration plan, then address climate change.
4
@richw5: the ONLY immigration plan that guarantees total victory is the one that secures the border, mandates E-verify with severe punishments for violators and deports every single illegal alien, with no exceptions and including their illegal families.
The Democrat that figures this out is guaranteed certain victory.
1
It's difficult to reconcile this alarmism with market reality.
Why do high-end homes in low-lying US coastal areas still sell at premium prices? Why do they sell at all?
If we're really approaching or at a climate tipping point and the probabilities indicate large sea-level rises, wouldn't the market for low-lying coastal homes disappear?
And to follow the logic, why don't we see a sharp uptick in real estate prices in the specific US geographic areas identified in last year's US government climate report as the likely beneficiaries of climate change? (Yes, I live in one of these rare areas so I'm talking my own book!)
These are just two examples. The fact is that the US population at large, when making individual purchasing decisions, seems to give little weight to climate considerations.
Perhaps the large disconnect -- indeed, a chasm -- between commentators like Mr. Friedman and the public can be explained by the belief that practical solutions exist and can be implemented if needed.
Nuclear. Carbon capture and storage. Geoengineering.
These may not have the cache of wind, solar, abolishing cows, outlawing internal combustion engines, refitting every US building and other GND elements, but they have technological realism on their side.
And economic realism, because they are affordable.
Should opinion-formers seek to shift the dialog from alarmism redux to a serious discussion of realistic solutions?
4
@Stuck on a mountain
Nuclear and CCS are not affordable as practiced. Nuclear needs a whole new set of rules to be affordable. And likely a new set of technologies. There are companies working on the technologies. Who is working on the rules governing nuclear. You?
Carbon Capture and Storage adds 25% or so to the cost of electricity. About the same amount as going 100% renewable. Norway has a huge incentive to do CCS - (North Sea Oil). So far, they are talking CCS. Nobody is really doing it.
Geoengineering is at best a bridge to a future with 'negative emissions'- pulling CO2 out of the air.
Your smug certainty is wrong and is the new climate denial. Pretend you think it matters and blah blah blah delay delay delay.
Diversify your 401K. Get out of Carbon and do something that your grandchildren will approve ot.
The wind industry admits that there are negative impacts for neighbors from shadow strobing (from the blades casting a spinning shadow into homes), visual blight, "to cause or emit noise", air turbulence, wake, vibration and frequency interference. The air pressure and infrasound from those gigantic blades are the reason for some of these words written in their hold harmless contracts offered to neighbors 1/2 mile of turbines. No setbacks from turbines are over 1/2 mile in the United States. Some people have a hard time sleeping, feel the pressure in their chest, get headaches, suffer tinnitus and their ears pop. Some people have abandoned their homes.
I know we have cut our emissions in the US buy look it up, industrial wind has not contributed much.
In Iowa Alliant Energy just increased rates by 24.9% and the rural electric co-ops cannot afford to build wind turbines. MidAmerican Energy would not build them without the tax credits. They have admitted they will receive $10 billion for building wind turbines. That is $4,000,000 per turbine.
Industrial wind is a boondoggle.
3
If you take CO2 reduction seriously, you cannot leave cars out of the equasion, but that will not be appealing to the average voter. Dangerous terrain for any candidate...
3
@Tommy S
Cars last about 15 years, so it seems like it might be easier to defer radical change with them until things like new buildings and new power generation are carbon-free or close to it in more regions.
For most people, buying an electric car now has only marginal benefits over a gasoline-powered car, especially if they do not drive much or have a reasonably fuel-efficient vehicle. Since this piece focuses on the politics more than the science or engineering challenges, I would suggest Democrats would benefit from tapping the brakes on the promotion of electric cars. People can get attached to their vehicles - often by necessity - and do not need to be shunned for it.
Yeah we all love sitting in rush hour traffic breathing those fumes. We don’t want modern, fast public transit!
Yes, it is, to rationally thinking folks. Unfortunately, those who continue to support Trump, and baffle us, are irrational, according to us.
When dealing with irrational thought processes, one needs to put aside one’s own mind set, and put it into the other’s. Hence, our dismal record in the Middle East, Far East, and Eastern Europe.
That said, you can’t think like us, when you’re trying to convince them. These folks are going to have to reach their own conclusions about climate change. This, however, will never happen because there is no climate change. That’s fake news.
Refer to the top, and repeat until you are blue in the face, then repeat again. And again. ...
1
@Bags
I thought satire was dead. The Times told us yesterday about the death of satire.
Justice and sustainability are two sides of the same coin. As such, you can’t have climate justice without human justice. We have to end exploitation of people AND the environment. They are twinned. We are one. No justice, no planet. AOC and the Green New Deal understand this and are spot on.
12
The greatest of America's strengths and resources is the ability to innovate. A Green New Deal would take advantage of that, but only if we do not remain stuck on past glories.
3
It will get Trump re-elected because most voters don't see any harmful effects of warming. They may be right. Warming is real, but it may not be very harmful, and people get tired of being told the sky is falling when they can see that it is not falling around them.
2
@Jonathan Katz: For the ten thousandth time, it’s not “warming”, it’s “climate change”. That includes weather events that have nothing to do with discrete moments of “hot” or “cold”. It’s not warm when a super blizzard hits, but it is damaging and is clearly a result of the rise in greenhouse gases in the atmosphere. The effects of basic science will not be denied even if they are willfully ignored.
16
@Jonathan Katz
go see what
http://climatecommunication.yale.edu/about/projects/global-warmings-six-americas/
says about American altitudes. If 60% is 'most' then your first sentence is wrong.
People understand that Harvey and Super Storm Sandy were juiced by climate change. Ditto for coral bleaching.
As more is understood about the bomb cyclone and the wandering polar vortex, that 'most Americans' are concerned or alarmed will grow from 60%. Now deniers hide behind their tribal understanding of 'elitist scientists.' More losses accurately predicted by the NWS will give them cover to understand climate better.
Diversify your 401K - mine is doing better without carbon. A friend says that the Exxon-Mobile he inherited isn't doing all that well. Stranded assets are no joke - trying to talk them back into 'proven reserves' (likely to pump) with low grade climate-denial isn't going to work.
See you on the other side of oil addiction.
2
@Jonathan Katz The earth's system is like a giant ship that takes a very long time to turn. We have to avoid the problems up ahead by turning now.
3
A person’s upbringing and their access to outdoor recreation is a big part of their willingness to promote conservation. Look at the upbringing of Obama in Hawaii and Trump in resorts in urban areas. Without experiencing nature in person people are less inspired to care. In Appalachia so many nonprofits of a particular nature get tax exempt status on their land but politicians such as Rand Paul who proclaimed that global warming is a conspiracy against capitalism and that it was unamerican to criticize BP for the oil spill want to sell off parts of Daniel Boone National Forest. People who have spent the most time outdoors are generally not the ones with the demeanors and social skills to create change. Hopefully the corporate world will make waves in this area as some of the ESG funds like Browns do well. I wish the church and conservation movement could have more common ground. There is something about nature that transcends our differences but when people have their inevitable personal issues that usually become more pronounced as they age they are not always able to energetically promote conservation. I wish schools would subsidize trips for young children to go to parks. The deliberate litter in this part of the country is staggering and is intergenerational. I’m glad someone like Mr Friedman with sufficient clout openly opines on the need to prioritize conservation.
3
Great reed, I wish house democrats went after this issue with the focus and clarity that Trump does over immigration.
Its like many dems are melba butter-toast in comvictions while the GOP seem so certain in driving policies that are abhorent, and as a result, control the national dialogue.
3
Tom,
The next President of the United States needs to address the issue of global warming/climate change as the highest threat to global security, as well as our own, and the future of humankind and take a leadership role in the international community and international organizations to form a new world order funded and resourced to harness private and public labs and scientists in the research community to develop (1) a very, very cheap non-fossil source of electricity to compete globally with coal, oil, and natural gas, (2) provide very cheap fresh water, and (3) technologies to scrub the global atmosphere of carbon dioxide.
Initial experiments in cheaply launching very efficient solar satellites to generate electric power, convert it to low energy microwaves that would be capable of beaming the energy to antennae fields on Earth and then converting the energy to AC/DC for distribution on urban grids could provide electricity at about 2 cents per kilowatt hour about 1/5th the going fossil rate.
Retired Brookhaven National Lab scientist James Powell has been describing this system for decades at international conferences, hundreds of professional papers, and with colleagues in 2 books, "Silent Earth, Will Humans Give Up Fossil Fuels?", and a recent description, in "Spaceship Earth, How Long Before We Crash?".
This technology development program investment can be shared using the current formula used to finance the World Bank, I.M.F. and the UN. This is the real deal.
6
If the key to defeating Trump is climate change than Washington governor Jay Inslee is on to something because his whole campaign revolves around climate change. Inslee claims that we can't fix all the other problems unless we address climate change. I think he has a point. I think the big problem faced by any Democrat is that a large percentage of US population gets all its news from with the make believe world of the right wing media ecosystem and in that ecosystem climate change is not something to worry about or humans cannot do anything about it anyway. So these voters are basically unreachable on climate change. What makes Trump so difficult to defeat is that he depends on propaganda not truth and there is a large propaganda network operating in the US which is led by Fox News, Breitbart News, Limbaugh, Hannity, and Beck. This isn't how the Founding Fathers drew it up but it is here.
12
@Bob very true there is a large network fomenting alternative reality - but these people do not live in caves. As was evident during the various special elections and the mid terms since 2016, there is a large enough mass of these people who will understand and vote with their minds. You just have to reach them and get your message across in an uncomplicated non threatening way
1
@Bob Agreed! Support Jay Inslee so he can be on the debate stage. I believe his message is powerful and he could be the one to defeat Trump.
1
@ReasonableSkeptic
Good point about Inslee, I believe he needs 65,000 small donors or at least 1% in three polls to get into the debates. Whether or not his candidacy takes off it is important for him to be included in the debates because if he is in the debates climate change will get far more attention than if he is not. The fact that he has been a member of the House and a governor makes him one of the candidates with the most experience in government. The next couple of decades are really the last that climate change can be addressed with any hope of success. Somehow this is not sinking in with that many people but it really is now or never.
3
Climatologists think that a CO2 concentration of 350 parts per million (ppm) is a reasonable level that humans can live with comfortably. About 4 years ago CO2 was officially enshrined as the Ted Williams of climatology when it broke through the dangerous "tipping point" of 400 ppm. The 4 highest concentrations of CO2 ever recorded--all over 414 ppm--have been measured THIS YEAR in the middle of the Pacific Ocean at the Mauna Loa Observatory in Hawaii (elevation: 11,300 feet). In other words, these readings aren't coming from some smog-choked metropolis.
The analogy isn't perfect, but compare CO2 concentrations to human body temperature. 98.6 F is normal. At 100 F, we don't feel very well. At 104 F, we're really sick. And at 107.6 F, a mere 11% above normal body temperature, almost all humans die.
If a CO2 level of 350 ppm is "normal," what can we expect to happen when the CO2 level reaches 420 ppm--a 20% increase that will be reached in 4 years at most? We can already see and feel that our planet is running a fever at current CO2 levels. Just as a mere 3% increase in body temperature from 104 F to 107.6 F can be fatal, how can we be sure that a 3% (about 12 ppm) increase in current CO2 levels of 411 ppm to 420 ppm will not be utterly catastrophic?
As children we all learned that a single straw can break a camel's back. Let's keep this lesson in mind.
23
@WDG The analogy you refer to is not merely imperfect; it is nonexistent. CO2 concentrations in the Earth’s atmosphere bear no relationship—not even conceptually—to the scientific fact that all healthy human bodies maintain their internal temperature within the range universally accepted as ideal, precisely 97°F to 99°F. Nothing remotely similar applies to the Earth. If it did, and if climate science were as advanced as its adherents claim, then it would be possible—indeed it would be simple—to answer these questions: (i) what level of CO2 concentration in the Earth’s atmosphere is ideal?; and (ii) what is Earth’s ideal global temperature? Alas, while many have offered their opinions, which differ from one another by wide margins, no climate scientist is able to answer either question definitively, scientifically, because there are no correct answers to these questions; they simply don’t exist.
1
@WDG
Temperature is weird because zero is not zero - just ask Rudi Guiliani.
Absolute zero temperature is about -460 F. Your clever analogy is even more compelling through this lens - A likely fatal temperature of 108 F is really only about 2% above the normal of 98.6 F.
@Guapoboy -- you are making up nonsense. Life on earth depends on liquid water ... that defines a range of temperatures that is quite narrow by an astronomer's perspective.
Far beyond that, the life we have now (including us) is adapted to the ecosystems we have now, including temperatures -- so the "ideal" for all of us is what there has been.
1
On climate (as with too many issues), trump is an anchor. We need a leader.
2
@Peter Jacobsen
Anchor? More like a lead weight for a concrete casing for the mob to bury those who oppose them.
Trump's base of working class voters do not care about climate change.
They have lost relatively good paying jobs and are now if working earning half or a third of what they earned before.
They want their economic status restored.
They will not vote for a Democratic candidate like HRC who made fun of them and called them deplorables and told them they would never regain their lost status.
Whether HRC was correct or not to call his base deplorables is a separate discussion.
But his base votes and their votes gave Pa, Wisc . Mich to Trump.
Obama had carried these states in 2008 and 2012.
There are programs [that do not require reviving coal or destroying the environment] that could restore the lost economic status.
Such programs would require major modifications to capitalism.
HRC running as a lackey of Wall Street was unwilling to propose them.
If the Dems do not then Trump's base will continue to believe Trump's snake oil is their only hope and they will vote to
re elect Trump in 2020.
6
@david: Wow--I'm so glad it isn't just me. I have been advocating for significant modifications to capitalism for decades. Usually, when I express that sentiment, I am greeted with shock and disbelief because people think that I am advocating for "godless communism" etc., blah, blah, blah. I suspect that, sooner rather than later, the US and the rest of the world will be forced to come to the conclusion that laissez-faire capitalism is, in the long run, unworkable and just plain wrong for society.
2
@Peggy L. Trivilino
Spoiler alert: We've been regulating capitalism for a long time Peggy. Surely you've heard of The New Deal (FDR), The Great Society (LBJ), The EPA (Nixon), The Affordable Care Act (Obama), etc.? And much of Europe is much better at it than we in the States.
1
The modifications to capitalism required go well beyond the reforms mentioned by Miller.
We will need government programs like PWA , WPA , CCC to provide jobs and income for those left behind.
Paying for these programs will require increasing taxes on the rich which they do not want to pay.
1
Mr. Friedman
In case you haven’t noticed the battle for control of climate change is over. It was over in before the first Earth Day started in 1970. Even if we do the green deal what do you think people will do in Africa India Indonesia when they say wait a minute we want energy and we want to live like the western style. They’re going to forget the pollution erosion and the climate change. Not in my backyard is what they’re going to say. There are not enough governments and institutions on board and will stay on board against the reversing the change in the climate. This earth is resilient it’s gone through this before. Enjoy it while you’re here. It’s over.
The problem is overpopulation. USA is full. Too many people, too much pollution, too much traffic, too much noise, too many wars all due to people who want space who want more for themselves. This is in your retrievable situation. Your is just one piece of popcorn blowing in the wind.
Every evil and problem that this world has you can attribute to overpopulation. Think about it. It is so far gone we cannot even come close to reversing it.
I am stunned that you believe that toppling Trump this will solve the worlds climate change in problem. It will not!
11
Pogo, you have a point. We have met the enemy, and he/she most definitely is us.
@Pogo USA is full? Have you ever been to China or know anything about it? 4x US population in about the same area. And vast unpopulated or lightly populated areas. Or India? Also 4x US population in a much smaller area.
@Pogo: the front page LEAD ARTICLE just yesterday written by NYT staffers Emily Badger and Neil Irwin was about how the US is not growing FAST ENOUGH and the birth rites are too low, so we need MASSIVE immigration and to legalize all the currently illegal aliens, so that we can have huge population GROWTH….many, many more people.
In an earlier article this year, NYT staffer Farhad Manjoo argued for total OPEN BORDERS and wishes for 150 million more people including virtually the whole population of Central America.
So the left is diametrically opposed to what you say here. (I agree, but they do not.)
They want the USA to double in size, at the very minimum.
1
Where I live, an awful lot of people haven't accepted let alone internalized the threat of global warming. So it remains hard to get public buy-in.
5
@Iconoclast1956
I have been living in rural areas for the last 20 yrs. When I listen to farmers, I hear talk of longer growing seasons, new bug problems which include their worry about no pollinators and invasive species killing trees and crops. I have hear about flood damage and even salt coming up in the ground inland from the ocean. It is small town mentality that hears anti-science from their churches. But there are those who run for shelter if a plane flies high overhead, leaving contrails which they believe have guv'ment spies and/or poison in them rather than condensation in the upper atmosphere. Misinformation and fear are used to rile these people enough to fill the collection plate. Jim and Tamm Fayes live!
8
@Iconoclast1956
I wonder how much of this is sincere doubt versus either a politicized opinion or simply fatigue from people looking to extract money for themselves from the public's concern for the environment.
Environmentalists have to tread carefully because a habit of enabling scammers will simply crush the public's support for their (our) causes.
@Alan
trump and his ilk never miss a chance to con.
Yes, environmentalists were attacked at the first Earth Day in 1970 and every Earth Day since. However, the evidence grows and some are noticing between the Earth Days. It depends on who has their ears - and fears.
The Green Amendment by Maya K. Van Rossum outlines another more direct approach to preserving the right to an environment that does not make one sick. States can pass a Green Amendment and hopefully, eventually one can be added to the US Constitution.
1
I don't think a majority of Americans care about climate change. If they did they would not be driving their gas guzzlers around. They will start with themselves with reducing their own carbon foot print. Expecting others to do their part in reducing pollution and not doing the same yourself is hypocritical. The president does not go on the defensive, he will go on the offensive by blaming the overpopulation happening due to uncontrolled migration of unskilled uneducated people from corrupt failed overpopulated countries.
Overpopulation equals pollution equals climate change. Which are the 2 most populated countries in the world? Which are the 2 countries with the highest rate of polluted cities? What does climate change due to decades of pollution have to do with Trump? Okay so he did not sign the flawed Paris accord. Do you really think that signing the Paris accord would have urgently change the course of pollution in the 2 most populated countries in the world? A green real deal talk is a joke that will ensure reelection of Trump.
Key to defeating Trump is to stop dreaming about defeating Trump in the post Mueller era and start seriously proposing real practical solutions to universal affordable health care, immigration reform, crisis on the Southern border, reduction in drug trafficking, reducing national debt, ending regime change wars and bringing home 1000s of US troops home safely, tax cuts exclusively for the middle class. Defeating Trump in 2020 will be hard.
8
You do realise that highest CO2 polluting countries per capita are first USA second Australia then Canada Netherlands then Japan. Stop blaming China, India. USA & Co have been largest polluters over the last 80 years & continue to be the worst offenders.
Democrats need to convince people that making a transition away from fossil fuels will be economically beneficial and demonstrate to people that serious problems due to climate change are already occurring in the US and adaptation is very expensive. The climate graphs and climate models are alarming as is what is already transpiring in the polar regions but translating that into meaningful politics is very difficult. Also, it is the amplification of warming through positive feedback mechanisms that makes climate change so threatening, but again this is difficult to turn into effective political language. Largely politicians are left with claiming that extreme weather events will be worse and giving examples such as strong storms, droughts, etc. And stressing the need to stay under 1.5C by not exceeding a carbon budget is also difficult to convey to the public. In short, it is very a frustrating issue to explain in terms that really describe the threat scientifically. People can easily understand the threat of war but understanding the threat of climate change is far more difficult. It is why it remains a challenge and so far Democrats have fallen short of success which is not surprising given the task. Americans have met very serious challenges in the past but are failing to meet this one. It remains a political puzzle that has not been solved.
1
Without some technological breakthrough, the transition from fossil fuels will be costly. The urban and suburban middle class that drives new SUV'S, live in big houses fly on vacations, they can afford it, but not the poor.... The costs will felt by everyone, but with little discretionary income,living paycheck to paycheck, it will especially effect the poor and lower middle class... Particularly in rural areas where driving is necessary to work....Minimal Green policy has not worked well in France. And here, our protesters will likely have guns! Perhaps it's worth it, but it won't be pretty.... Pray for a breakthrough!!!
1
Wonderful piece; I just hope that your colleague Bret Stephens has the courage to read it.
10
Don't forget about the affect of climate change on the Panama Canals. The Panama Canal Authority is very focused on this issue as is the country of Panama. But they need the help of many other countries of the world. Today, less than 50 miles separate the Atlantic and the Pacific. 30 million years ago there was only one ocean. Then the Isthmus emerged from the sea. We cannot let the Isthmus disappear.
7
Jenga
That's the problem.
To give in to one, only one, liberal/progressive idea will be to accept a singular truth. That single act will bring down all the fabricated arguments that have defined the GOP.
So with the nation and the world in the balance they stick to their outdated, flawed and erroneous agenda.
Once there was true debate about the environment. The left wanted strict laws and punishments,
The right proposed market ideas such as a carbon tax. But now they won't support their own ideas because it would force them to admit climate change is real.
Then what?
Trickle down has never worked.
Immigration is essential to a strong nation.
What Mr Friedman has wrong is its not just rump that needs to be defeated, this shame of a political party needs to be wiped from the electoral map.
Once the children are out of the room the adults can make real and difficult choices for future generations
3
Nuclear power is used safely and efficiently in Europe.
US could do it even better.
But of course we’d have to get permission from the 29 year old freshman from Queens.
9
@Tuco. Ok so why did Germany eliminate this technology?
2
Fukushima fear. And that’s pretty much it. Germany however is not an island nation on the ring of fire. They simply don’t have the same risks.
2
Nuclear power is only safe when there is comprehensive government regulation. As we have seen repeatedly, left to their own devices, industries will abandon facilities and their waste products as soon as their operation becomes unprofitable. Since the US government is currently dismantling its regulatory agencies, I believe that the era of safe nuclear power has come to an unfortunate end.
7
Fortunately, the young people of the world, including those in the US who will be eligible to vote in 2020, understand that the climate scientists are just doing their job, whereas their President is not.
23
@A. F. G. Maclagan
Is only fortunate if the young people of the US do their job in 2020 by voting.
1
@A. F. G. Maclagan
Unfortunately most of those young people, terribly concerned they are about Climate Change, still won't bother to vote.
1
As a non-scientist, I put my trust in the researchers who have spent decades studying man's effect on the climate. It doesn't look good. We need to act.
But as was the case with globalization, if we don't recognize the social costs of transforming our economy to confront climate change, a lot a people and communities will pay an unbearable price. And that will undermine support for what must be done.
The Green New Deal recognizes that you can't separate energy policy from social policy. An oil field worker who no longer has a job may need training to find work building windmills. With the loss of company-paid medical coverage, a serious illness could be devastating for the worker's family. That's where universal medical care would be a godsend.
The GND envisions using the absolute necessity of confronting climate change as an opportunity to create a better, fairer America. For example, providing universal medical care would not only help workers as they transition to new jobs, but would make creating new businesses in a new energy economy easier, by removing the cost of providing medical coverage to employees. And medical care is already the number one concern of many American voters.
The Green New Deal is the Real(istic) New Deal. It recognizes the reality of people's lives. It transforms an emergency into an opportunity. It replaces Trumps endless hate and fear and resentment with an optimistic vision. And Americans love optimism.
24
Sure, the Green New Deal is aspirational and a hopeful solution to many, but Trump knows that drumming up opposition to Roosevelt-scale government expansion is a sure bet in deep red states, regardless of how beneficial it may be.
Remember, those are places where polls show huge support for the individual provisions of the Affordable Care Act, such as protections for pre-existing conditions, but the same folks say they overwhelmingly hate "Obamacare" and want it repealed. Packaging matters.
Efforts to garner public support would be far more successful if climate concerned folks started talking instead about our expanding Green Economy. It's real, it's growing, it means jobs and trade.
The fact that it may help rescue our degrading climate is (politically speaking) just icing on the cake.
3
Fire, flood and drought as well as a shortage of fresh water will impact a significant portion of the worlds economy every year. Even if every nation on Earth did everything they could to mitigate these events, it’s just too late and has been for quite some time.
4
In other words, the Green New Deal is not a Democrat or Republican issue. One thing we all aspire to. I'd argue that Medicare-for-all ought to be as well.
Both would be huge economic, proactive and inspirational boosts we all should work for. History-making. Ironically Trump could achieve this but won't.
6
So obvious: the key to addressing climate change is major regime change.
6
I think Trump is vulnerable for a variety of reasons that include the climate, but what is really scary is that he will garner millions of votes from people who refuse to believe the evidence.
7
It will be hard to wean us off of cheap carbon-based fuels like gasoline and jet fuel. Ramp up the fuel taxes now and use those taxes to encourage more forwarding looking alternatives.
10
We live in a country with terrible poverty and violence. We live in a world that is even worse. We have not made the commitments that are necessary to cure the unspeakable suffering. Instead, we keep world hunger at a distance, allowing a billion or more to live horrible lives.
You can debate forever whether the effects of ignoring climate change are worse than the effects of ignoring world poverty. But suffice it to say that both are horrible.
The people committed to ending world hunger and violence seem to me to be different from those committed to ending climate change. Those working in Africa and South Asia and Appalachia are unknown to most of us and their efforts don't spur most of us to do anything. Climate change is different -- it will affect our grandchildren, we say, lovable and deserving white people related to us.
Those who insist that climate change is the thing and let world poverty wait claim the unanimous support of science. But science can't answer these kinds of issues. Myself, I give most of my charitable contributions each year to Doctors Without Borders, because I can see the effects now. I'm more concerned with people who aren't related to me but are suffering today. If you're more committed to your grandchildren and what happens after two generations, you expose yourself to criticism and even mockery.
2
As Nickolas Kristof has pointed out, in 2019 the world has less poverty, less warfare, less disease and more opportunity than ever before. The unspeakable suffering you refer to has been dramatically reduced by capitalistic, not socialistic, performance that has moved billions out of poverty (China being the biggest example). In the US, we have been trying to reduce poverty since the Johnson administration but have not made enough progress because redistribution of money is not the answer. All cultures that emphasize strong families, stable marriages, educational achievement and hard work do well. Those areas where the population does not have that culture remain poor and will always be poor. @michjas
4
@Dr B
This libertarian trope about capitalism reducing poverty is so 18th century.
When I ask people to provide a single piece of evidence it has been capitalism per se, and not the development of new technologies, they say something like, “Well, the profit motive is the reason the technologies were developed.”
When i point out that is not “evidence,” it is opinion, they are silent.
Here’s a fact - capitalism was around for 2 centuries without reducing poverty one bit.
Then suddenly, poverty began to lessen.
What happened?
The industrial revolution.
“Critical thinking, the real national deficit.”
5
@don salmon
Looks like folks have stopped visiting these particular comments, so perhaps it doesn’t matter.
However, if anybody has access to the facts (i dont have them at hand, at the moment), there’s a treasure trove of contradictions and outright false statements in Dr. B’s comment to be responded to.
I think that the overall poverty rate since “the Great Society” programs were implemented has been reduced by 25% but I’m not sure of the exact number.
It’s a meme that is endlessly repeated by the far Right shock jocks like Rush and Ann, and it’s simply not true that they had no effect on poverty - it’s been profound.
Social Security, Medicare, and many others have had profound effects.
The truly astonishing thing is that they have had ANY positive effect, given the fact that since at least 1980 (well, really, since the 1960s) the far Right, whenever they got in power, has done everythign possible to block the effectiveness of the programs.
Imagine what could have been done if everyone had worked together to reduce poverty, provide food and shelter, and so on.
It reminds me of a great episode of Saturday Night Live, imagining what the world would have been if Gore instead of Bush had been elected -
The surplus would have kept growing, American dependence on foreign oil would have ended as renewable fuels proliferated throughout the land - Gore himself appeared on the show with quite humorous mock tears.
Www.remember-to-breathe.org
1
Certainly today most Americans have little doubt that 'something ain't right with the weather', and Democrats should highlight Republicans negligence in protecting the country from the immense & harmful effects of Climate Change..
-- However, as we saw with Hillary's failed plug against coal (when campaigning in coal country? )... the best results will come from positive & practical ideas that promote both economic and environmental benefits..
2
Excellent article! This is why, the 2020 election is crucial to our future, and the future of our children and grandchildren! We cannot afford to vote for some third party dude, we have to get serious and face the facts that our Earth is in peril.
One comments mentioned that Democrats must point out that there are good paying jobs in renewable energy, solar panels manufacturing and installation can put many to work in small towns all over America! Plus, our Tesla is built in The United Sates! Let’s build cars that are electric, Ford and GM are!
We are at a crossroads, in a time which we either step up and change....or prepare to see humanity’s end.
One more thing.....to all who want to keep immigrants out, remember those countries which will be very hard hit are the poor island nations whose citizens will be desperate to enter our country! We must act for the sake of our children and grandchildren’s futures!
3
As relevant as the GND is for our future survival, the Democratic Congressional leadership made the mistake of setting unattainable goals in the short run and were thus open to ridicule. For example, replacing all cars by 2030 with electric vehicles is economically and politically impossible, as the current average car life time is a bit over 11 years in the US, meaning that at this replacement rate by 2030 we would still have roughly half of our present number of cars, and that under the assumption that starting tomorrow people could only buy electric cars. Since roughly only 30% of our electric generating capacity is from carbon free sources, we would need a very drastic increase in solar/wind generation to have a substantial impact on reducing CO2 emissions by using non fossil fuel generated electricity to charge our electric cars.
On a global scale the issue is much worse. It is estimated that by mid century the world wide energy demand from all sources will double from what it is today. That is, we have to replace not only the present fossil fuels usage with carbon neutral and carbon free technologies, but add even larger energy capacity to satisfy the demands of an increasing world populations and the increasing needs of the developing sector of the world. I believe this can be achieved by mid century, but it requires an extraordinary commitment by all, as well as unprecedented leadership and partnerships by the US and the other economic powers of the world.
3
Let us step outside Thomas Friedman's hypothetical America and look at sociology studies regarding actual America:
The key demographic bloc with the largest heft at the ballot box in a U.S. presidential election are white middle-class Baby Boomers. This demographic bloc picks the president.
According to sociology studies, the majority of white middle-class Boomers do not deem climate change to be an imminent peril. More alarmingly, most Boomers rank very high on narcissism indices and, hence, they have little emotional concern regarding their grand-kids' future. They really don't care if there is extreme flooding or heatwaves in the 2050s because they will be "dead and happy in heaven."
In sum:
1.) A climate change pitch to Baby Boomers won't work.
2.) A "think-of-your-posterity" pitch to Boomers won't work.
4
@Sándor
We boomers began hearing the world was going to end by 1970. Then 1980. Then 1990. Now it will end exactly in the year 2031 because the models are more accurate now.
Can you learn from history?
3
@JoeG
The models are not melting the Greenland ice cap and nearly every glacier.
The models are not extending and warming your summer.
The models did not enhance Harvey by 30%. All of that was done by the CO2. More cause will get you (and your grandkids) more effect.
Diversify your 401K. Relying on carbon won't help your kids or grandkids. Pay their tuition. They are learning and understanding how continued emissions of GHGs will continue to impact their planet.
1
@JoeG. You speak truth brother! These examples over a few generations show that we shouldn't change a thing until the world actually ends. Conservatives are so smart!
At some point, we are bound to reach the conclusion that only chance for humanity to survive global warming is to restrict fossil fuel production "at its source". That is, to ensure that air pollution caused by fossil fuels consumption is reduced year-by-year by prescribed limits, we need to restrict countries from producing oil beyond prescribed limits.
That requires a global organization, such as the UN, empowered by all countries of the world. That organization needs to have the authority to set oil production quotas for all producers and strictly enforce implementation of the set quotas.
Even that is not enough, for it does not take into account the burning forests, burning peat, and methane being released from the melting permafrost. These can create enormous amount of gases, and may be difficult to forecast, so it’s hard to know what our own carbon budget is.
Four out of five states with the highest investment in renewables are red. I'm considered an ignorant non-believer because I don't believe every weather event is connected to climate change. It was 76 and sunny in Houston today because of climate change.
AOC Studied(?) economics. California is Green. I pay .11 per kwh in Texas. Californians pay between .19 and .36 kwh. That would be up to 775 dollars a month electric bill if Texas did the right thing like California. Gasoline 3.86 in California. In Texas 2.20. Who am I going to vote for?
Make no mistake about it the climate change is being used as a Trojan horse to move the world far left. Hysteria is being promoted as response to everything in life. The New Green Deal is proof of that. I've know to many Green Party types to give them any power. This might surprise you I'm so far left I would love to see the world without a stock markets but not with those creeps in charge.
Only 12 years left. Better hurry. Step right up. It slices, it dices, it whitens your teeth, puts a spring in your step, a smile on your face, takes the wrinkles out of your face, lose weight, gets that raise, eases the pain. Step right up.
5
@JoeG. Can't wait until conservatives like you stop the gravy train for socialist scientists. Thanks for the clear headed advice about capitalism. Hysteria indeed!
Here's to the salvation of us all by maintaining obsessive focus on making bacon.
1
These are good ads, but I would modify them as follows. The destruction of natural habitats like the coral reefs and the wildlife areas in Africa, are not about our children not being able to see them any longer. They are about destruction of the food chain and our ability to grow crops.
In the case of the coral reefs, the reefs fed the little creatures which are eaten by bigger creatures which are eaten by the fish that we harvest. Something like 30% of the world's protein comes from the ocean.
The destruction in Africa from just one storm is indicative of the destruction of farmland that we are now seeing here in the US. If there is widespread flooding of agricultural lands, what are we going to eat? One big storm can wreak havoc on crop production. Just one.
Then we have beach erosion, loss of fisheries due to warming waters, loss of coastal real estate, i.e. peoples homes, infestation of disease carrying mosquitoes, and forest fires. Did I leave anything out?
These things are happening now. Even the US military is planning for it in their defense strategies.
So let's get real with the dangers of climate change. Just look out the window. That's how we turn this against Trump.
126
@Bruce Rozenblit The climate disruption crisis is upon us. It has been happening for sometime now. Check the dead zone at the mouth of the Mississippi. The climate disruption crisis will only accelerate from here.
We need to get busy.
Think globally act locally.
1
@Bruce Rozenblit
A very good look of what will come if we don't change is in a book I just finished via Audible called:
The Uninhabitable Earth: Life After Warming by David Wallace-Wells.
It'll give you a fuller appreciation of the dangers we are courting.
I would not be surprised to learn that Trump believes in the Sun circling the Earth, the Earth being flat, and formed some 5,700 years ago.
In the French press there are reports that Trump wants to raise tariffs on imported wine. Nothing less can be expected of a devourer of hamburgers with ketchup, held in bare hands.
3
Friedman is right on and you don't need to leave the USA to feel the affects, look at Iowa of all places for epic flooding. This is a topic that the Democrats can play up loud and strong and scary.
Everyone but the most obstinate has been forced to admit climate change is occurring just by first hand observation. This strategy hits Trump where he has got to be vulnerable... he'll repeat lies even after he's been called on them. It is an area where there are also cracks in his base... even some of them will admit there is something going on with the climate. Once you go there its hard to argue against the people who predicted it. And for what its worth, its also morally right, we have an obligation to those of our offspring alive in 2100 .
6
@Wayne
Excellent ideas, as always from Thomas Friedman.
I'm sure there are millions of voters who'd love nothing more to pound Trump. The Green New Deal makes an extremely inviting cudgel.
2
To convince as many voters as possible, why not stress the new technologies, industries, good paying jobs and energy independence that will accrue ...also, that if the US is not a leader then China and/or the EU will take advantage of the many opportunities.
Maybe replace the terms 'climate change' and 'green new deal' as well...
3
@Cal I don’t have a problem with the term climate change. It is climate change. I don’t call it global warming. Although the planet IS warming overall, some places are cooler. People don’t understand this and think it’s proof against the fact of global warming. And then there are the willfully ignorant, such as Trump, who try to claim weather is climate.
Seem to be many comments that health care issues should be the focus to defeat Trump. I agree wholeheartedly. Maybe not everyone sees healthcare as their most urgent concern. But there are plenty of people who understand the existential threat to our biosphere that global warming poses. We can focus on more than one issue can’t we? Healthcare, climate, criminality-there should be maybe 5 issues that can be easily explained and hammered home to voters. Climate and its currrent impacts on America should be on that list and I agree with Tom on the ways to frame the issues.
6
@TomPA
Since Trump is wrong about so many issues let's have both for a thorough trouncing.
2
If the Dems push climate change with its inherent cost burden on low income persons, they are playing right into Trump's hands.
For all the research done on climate change, no one has found a way of reigning it in without a disproportionate cost burden being placed on those with low incomes, as French President, Emmanuel Macron, found out.
1
@Mike Edwards The simplest, most direct way to rein in climate change by reducing fossil fuel use would be to institute a carbon tax with the proceeds distributed to every family, every human being who pays taxes. The prices of fossil fuels seen by the consumer would go up and thus be less competitive with renewable and low-carbon fuels while people on low incomes would receive funds to spend as they wish. That would enable them to, depending on circumstances, pay for gasoline, buy a more fuel-efficient car, pay for home heating, or install insulation and solar panels. Or just pay for food or school fees.
3
@Mike Edwards It will be poor people who get hurt the most. They can’t afford the ac when it’s 110 degrees outside. They can’t afford food prices going up when drought or storms hit. They can’t afford to pick up and move when their house gets flooded. If we can develop more jobs by going green the economy and the poor might benefit. It’s going to be a long haul, not an overnight transition but we have to stop, or at least slowdown the overheating cycle.
4
@Mike Edwards
But yet California has been going green for years and their economy continues to grow.
Time however is running out for the slow-and-easy solution path. We should have started going green 30 years ago when science already had the proof.
The irony of Mikes concern for those with low income is that they will also be the ones that will not be able to recover from the storms that are coming.
2
The fact that all the major accounting firms on this planet, led by those in the United States, have for some time now included climate change in their economics. And yet we have a President who ridicules its existence. Let that sink in for a second.
17
Correction: The entirety of the Republican Party mock climate change and have so since the phrase was coined. I agree it should be a reason for sober-minded folks to direct their vote elsewhere, but for that to happen Republicans will actually have to care about something other than what they see reflected back in a mirror. If climate change can't be found on their front porch of back patio...it simply doesn't exist - despite the fact it might be affecting a neighbors porch.
6
It's going to take something so far out of field, like some extreme (and I mean extreme) psycho right wingers blowing themselves up with a dirty bomb coupled with a few planned attacks where they take a large number of innocent people with them.
Remember native born, hiding in plain sight, terrorists are the biggest fear that the security people have.
This green stuff ain't gonna do it, not yet anyway, not until it hits every home in every state.
1
Republicans, especially Trump and his advisors, have greatly underestimated the growing unease many Americans have about what is happening to our climate. Even the reddest states are experiencing disastrous climate events. Ordinary people are seeing their way of life disappearing year by year. So, yes, climate change is absolutely one way to defeat Trump. The argument has to be local -- what is happening in specific communities. And the argument has to directly point to Trump's inaction and refusal to educate himself.
7
Addressing climate change should be our number 1 priority at this point. We need a President to lead on that.
5
@Carol S.
No well paying jobs should be.
Global man made climate change. Like the guy said in France a few months ago, "You're worried about the end of the world. I'm worried about the end of the month."
Everyone of those kids, demanding an end to climate change has a $600 phone with unlimited data. Do they have a clue how that data moves around? It ain't PFM.
2
@Mike that is why we have to socialize the cost and privatize the profits of a Green New Deal. Like we do with everything from stadiums for sports teams to research spending paid by public dollars whose gains are taken up by pharmaceutical companies. Convert our power plants to solar and wind as quickly as possible. Help farmers adapt by using drip irrigation and helping them with other efficiencies. Research energy efficiency strategies and designs. This is about national security as much as it is a healthier environment.
8
@JT "...socialize the cost and privatize the profits..."
Whenever I hear about GND, I can't help but think, the intent of the GND is to turn back the industrial revolution.
As best as I can recall, no invention nor process has ever been replaced by a previous process or invention. The reason for that is, purely economical. Previous iterations were less efficient.
One must consider how our society and industry are entwined. Our finance and taxation infrastructure would have be reworked. People on the periphery would also have to taken into account. Will those voters go along with eliminating their careers?
Using transportation, as an example, the petroleum industry, auto manufacturers and lending entities would have to be nearly eliminated. Gasoline taxes used for maintenance and road construction would have to from somewhere else. Taxing the Sun would be laughable.
"Research energy efficiency strategies and designs." I guess we'll have to wait for the efficiencies and designs to be completed before we can move ahead.
When I was born in 1938 the world's population was 2 billion. It now is not too far from hitting 8 billion. The year JFK was sworn in I took a grad school course in population studies, at which time I realized down the road there would be a "great re-adjustment" and thus I would never bring children into the world since, if not in their lifetime, then in their children's, there would all hell to pay. A great-great niece turned three today. On the 15th her cousin, my great-great nephew, has his first birthday. I fear for them! The last couple of weeks two whales washed ashore in different parts of the world. Autopsies revealed 54 pounds if plastic in the stomach of one and 42 pounds inside the other. Such things confirm the wisdom of my 1961 decision. Perhaps we have already passed the tipping point.
17
A majority of American voters now realize that the republican party is hazardous to our health - in every respect. Vote in 2020.
18
Trump's base has no clue where the Great Barrier Reef is or Mozambique. I used to travel hugely in Africa for business and would tell people I was just in Ethiopia and Zimbabwe and Mali and they would look at me blankly. If I added 'They are in Africa...." they might nod, but I knew that if I flashed out the world map that was in my bag, they would just stare at it.
Trump's base is like this. They are wound up by Fox News, and then him, about the murderers and rapists coming at us from Central America. What a sad reflection on what our country has become.
We need to get everyone we know wound up for November 2020, so he will be dumped hugely. No 51/49%, no hanging chads. It is up to us. We took it for granted last time. Never again.
188
@Tim. Need to stop gerrymandering and voter suppression and put money behind Democratic candidates. Hope we make it through to the election. Trump and McConnell and their kow-towing Republican legislators are actively undermining the federal balance of powers, the good functioning of our federal agencies and our federal courts.
4
This is the best summation of the problem iv'e ever read !
Nature -Art - Literature - Science - Involved Parenting - Learning - The Pride of Honor and Integrity - Joyous sex OR any basic human endeavors that make life worth living or comprehending are completely beyond the grasp of Trump for whom power and greed are his only gods!
This empty shell of a human being has an 89% approval rating among 40 million americans.
With their backing and the support of the Evangelicals we better hope the rest of us show up at the voting booths.
10
Mr. Friedman is correct that the president is vulnerable on climate change and I would also add fiscal responsibility. The president's take apparently is ignore the train bearing down the tracks, it is the problem of another generation. Why worry if I won't be around to see any of it. Even though compromise is a dirty word in Washington, the Democrats better have a more nuanced middle of the road proposal besides the Green New Deal because Trump will use his ridicule technique of finding a small hole in the proposal and its authors backgrounds, and incrementally exaggerate shortcomings with the precision of a nightclub comic putting down a heckler. He did it to an experienced politician in Jeb Bush, AOC and her acolytes won't be up to the onslaught. If I had anyone's ear, my suggestion would be take the kind of proposal that Nancy Pelosi thinks would get wide support on, and then have Trump's worst nightmare introduce and promote it. His worst nightmare, a credible veteran. Even better if the veteran is female and had a hazardous job.
5
@Kevin go to the website for Congress and read the actual text of the Green New Deal. It is not that long. Amazing how reasonable it is compared to what talking heads were saying about it.
8
@JT I have. As currently vaguely written, it would have astronomical costs that now Trump has put us on a path to financial ruin, has zero chance of ever being implemented because of how expensive it will to service debt. There are some good components in it, but I would rather Trust Pelosi to come up with something that is less of a wish list and has a better chance of both being affordable and passing.
Friedman ... time to wake up. You are not reading either the science or the zeitgeist properly.
Americans will all become vegans before they will fund a Green New Deal.
7
@Sequel
they will have too! With the scorching of the plains and other grass producing areas, the cows won't have anything to eat! That's why the fast food burger joints are trying to introduce new "non meat" burgers!!! They see the writing on the wall.
2
Don’t bet on it!
Winning Florida or Ohio is a key to defeating Trump. If the Democratic candidate wins either of those two states the electoral college map becomes very difficult for the Republicans. Climate change is a big issue in south Florida as flooding from rising sea levels is already a major problem and will only get worse. Any Democratic candidate should spend some time in south Florida highlighting the threat which will cost a fortune to combat with engineering methods which are being intensely discussed. The Cuban population in Miami tends to vote Republican but their city is in big trouble from rising sea levels. Also the heat and humidity in Florida is already hard to deal with an I think would be expected to be considerably worse due to climate change. And hurricanes are bad enough without climate change but may be even stronger and carry more moisture with climate change.
2
Let's muddy the water. Ignore the potential disaster that awaits our children while we criticize other's programs without presenting an alternative. A clever way of distracting us for the disaster in progress. I am sure your children will thank you for your wise and trenchant analysis of someone else's plan as they deal with their childrens' breathing difficulties as they scramble (or battle) for higher ground.
I agree with Mr. Friedman that the focus of the Democratic ads should be on coming generations. Here is one example:
Scene: Trump and oil company executives are meeting and having a good time
Voice: Donald Trump is 100% certain that global warming is a hoax, despite the warnings of most experts and his own administration. He is certain because his late uncle taught science, do Trump "understands these things."
Whether you are a Trump supporter or not, you have to ask yourself: WHAT IF HE IS WRONG?
Switch to scenes of natural and manmade devastation such as extreme weather, carbon pollution, collapsing icebergs, stranded polar bears, etc. Each of the scenes has images of children, some innocently playing and others in distress. (REMINISCENT OF the Goldwater atomic bomb ad).
The final voiceover is: If he is wrong, your children will pay the price. Are you willing to risk your child's life on Trump's scientific expertise?
8
Sorry, but wrong again.
The key to winning over the moderate and independent voters needed in 2020 is a consistent focus on pocketbook issues like healthcare.
Climate change is exactly the kind of complex, science-based, reality-centered issue that Trump's warp field is able to turn into political ash through ritual incantations of denial.
Bring up ACA, on the other hand, and Trump has a whole lot of 'splaining to do to the average voter.
6
@Michael Can't we focus on both issues?
5
I hope this strategy or a similar climate change appeal works. Yet, when I leave my local farmer's market this weekend, 2 out of every 3 cars will be an SUV - even though every driver understands why SUVs are a danger to the climate. Sadly, most people won't vote for change or make their own changes until they see their house floating down a river.
17
@JoeG
Joe and Bob return from a Canadian fishing trip. As they near their hometown, they see Bob's house floating down river.
Joe is dumbstruck for a moment, then says, "Bob, isn't that your house?"
Bob, in shock, says, "I knew I shoulda voted Hillary ... but, then, her emails ... "
1
1. Emotion sells, not logic and facts. “Earth Race” is a good way to frame the issue as urgent. Climate change needs to feel like a clear and present danger. Dramatize the devastation and its increasing regularity.
2. Credible endorsers. The messages you highlight need to come from a credible source. Politicians and super packs aren’t credible, but leaders from other parts of society are. Have celebrity CEOs, farmers, small business people in Houston, etc. be the spokespeople for the issue. Americans look up to them, for better or worse.
3. Social Proof. Deniers deny partly because they feel they are in the majority because of the media bubble they exist in (Fox News). Challenge the perception that a majority deny climate change by overwhelming them with numbers. Not data and facts. But real people like them who have seen the impact.
18
@David Nottoli, excellent comments from a fellow Boulderite. Thank you.
@David Nottoli
I agree with your post, just one little nit-pick: )
"Challenge the perception that a majority deny climate change by overwhelming them with numbers. Not data and facts."
Aren't numbers data, facts?
@David Nottoli
I think people predicate their political views on the people they hang out with. It's a cultural thing: "My people disdain liberals and everything liberals stand for." To remain part of your group, you espouse viewpoints that others in the group do, without necessarily examining those viewpoints. It's totally cultural. Their neighbor has to buy a Prius before you consider changing how you think. Their pastor has to concede that climate change is a threat that should drive political decisions. People need permission from within their social group to change their views. For example, my crowd is liberal, and many of my friends are farther left then I am on immigration, so I keep my mouth shut because I'll be criticized and judged if I speak up.
Healthcare is a much more vibrant topic and more day to day meaningful to the voters. That should be the main thrust for defeating Trump. Many people just do not relate to climate change.
4
Having a thoughtful, responsible, and fact based response to climate change has far greater importance than defeating DJT. The future of life on the planet is potentially at stake. Just because DJT makes everything about DJT, doesn't mean everyone else has to.
6
It is sad to witness Mr. Friedman abandon reason and subscribe to emotion and fear and the distortion it carries to formulate policy and posit solutions. The Green New Deal is an absurdist college term paper afforded support by a similar cadre of non-science oriented polemicists. This Utopian narcissism is not new it is just reckless and that it can rise above well-deserved ridicule and garner support by perhaps the most intellectually absurd Senator, Markey of Massachusetts, confirms it.
Perhaps a course in geology would be in order to provide a longer glimpse into weather phenomena over time including Ice Ages and other climate shifts due to polar movements uncontrolled by man created carbon emissions. Instead of fear, steer a conversation around facts not politicized and then continue an argument about adaptation to change.
9
@Grant
Hmm, who should we believe? The 97% of climate scientists who say man made carbon emissions are contributing to climate change or the 3% of hacks who say it is not, 100% of which are funded by the fossil fuel industry?
Btw, I love when you guys cite the Ice Ages, which took thousands of years to change global climate a few degrees, not half centuries.
46
@Grant
We don't need courses in geology.
2
97 Percent of climate experts are in consensus that climate change is real, caused by humans and this change is happening faster than any other times the earth’s climate has changed. Like OAC said:” You might laugh at this but your grandchildren will not”.
11
I don’t think people who vote for Trump care about disasters in other countries. I don’t think they care about wildfires in liberal California or hurricanes in Hispanic Puerto Rico either. They might care a bit about the midwestern floods or the Florida panhandle hurricane though.
71
I don't think it's Trump alone - it's a generational attitude of older Americans who think differently than their children and grandchildren when it comes to climate change.
Trump, Pelosi, and the lot recognize this and are being the true politicians that they are - telling the voters what they want to hear.
1
@Linus And what statistics can you produce to back up your assertion about "older" Americans? Your post is yet another example of ageism by the benighted..We "older" Americans are very much alive to Climate Change. And you?
7
The approach is interesting but will not move voters. Until we can define a real plan that does not cause everyone to go to their corners nothing happens. All energy solutions must be on the table. Green energy is only one piece of the puzzle. Nuclear energy must also be discussed along side carbon based fuels. Without this discussion nothing will happen!!!!!!!!!!!!!! AS ALWAYS!
3
@Just 4 Play when nuclear power self insures the cost of disposing its waste come talk to us again on how it is cheap! It is actually cheaper to make a wind power plant than an equivalent nuclear power plant. Besides the risk of regulatory capture is far too great.
3
@JT
"... risk of regulatory capture is far too great …"
Yes. Bean counters with decision and veto power, and who don't understand the technology at all will make decisions and take shortcuts based not on safety, but rather on dollars. The FAA and the 737 MAX being the most recent examples of regulatory capture.
I don't fear technology, I generally don't fear most engineers, but I do fear people who allow a project such as Fukushima (LOPA) to happen.
1
All one has to do is google the “are you serious “ debate between former sec.of state John Kerry and Rep. Thomas Massie R-KY to understand the difficulty of intelligently discussing climate change in this country.
4
Pure fantasy.
The keys to defeating Trump are:
* Abandon de facto support for open borders
* Advocate enforcement of immigration laws
* Stop engaging in divisive identity politics.
* Nominate a moderate, not a leftist firebrand
7
The average American is either apathetic or an imbecile. Trump will be reelected and climate change will destroy life on earth.
6
I like Tom Friedman, but I didn't read all of his opinion. Perhaps I'm summarizing, but the way to beat any republican is to focus on issues, not hype. You will never convince a republican die-hard to vote against the party. The key to victory is focus on the issues that matter to people and then act on them and then get out the vote. Don't engage in debate - you will only play into their hands. In fact, I'd strongly recommend that the eventual democrat nominee not to debate at all - you will lose. Play to your home court advantage. There are multiple issues that will engage the electorate. Having said that, one can't be all things to all people. Seems like I recall the 1980 democratic convention when Walter Cronkite said that the democratic vote was a mile wide and an inch deep while the republican vote was an inch wide and a mile deep. Same is true today. Democrats can't please everyone, but they need to heed Walter's observation. Focus on a few key issues that play into the voter's pocketbooks and what they hope for the future - environment certainly is one, so is immigration, social welfare for the future, health care costs, etc. The next election is about domestic issues. Not the electoral college, North Korea, campaign finance reform or any other nebulous issue. The election is the democrats to lose. Get smart!
2
THANK YOU! Well stated as you always do! We can change the tide on this issue alone!
5
While there is no doubt that we are increasing the temperature of the atmosphere by releasing CO2, this worrying about effects on biology are much ado about nothing. One of the features of biology is that it can and will adapt. Additionally, this adaptation can be remarkably rapid, especially in the case of microorganisms. The changes we are causing are all rather slow and pale in comparison to the changes, often rapid, the earth has seen in its past. Yet, biology just kept on going.
Are humans and biology at significant risk from the increased atmospheric CO2 - absolutely not. Both we and biology will adapt to global warming. Will it require changes, potentially significant, in our lifestyle, absolutely. But then, this ability to adapt is what has made us so successful biologically.
2
@Rob-Chemist The biosphere will survive. It's survived five great extinctions. Nothing will wipe out bacteria, cockroaches, or rats.
Eight billion human beings, their loved ones, their economic and social institutions, their nations and flags? I wouldn't be quite so confident about *them.*
Don't know about you, but I've often found that argument accompanied with an awfully arid view of real human beings. The people who live on islands now disappearing under water. The people in tropical climates now too hot and dry to support productive agriculture. The people whose Arctic villages are disappearing with the permafrost.
They're all abstractions -- as long as they don't dare to try to cross our border to survive. Then, they'll find the migration strategies our predecessors used to adapt to Ice Ages are no longer available to them. Too bad, huh?
1
I might adjust the message. Trump's base doesn't travel to those icky foreign countries. So they've never seen a coral reef or a lion or elephant in the wild. They don't actually care. That stuff isn't real to them.
58
Although Trump’s sons did enjoy shooting lions on their safari. Maybe it will hurt them if there aren’t any left because cyclones got to them first. Nah. They already got their pelts.
10
@nerdrage
Totally agree. In fact as long as it doesn't impact them - they could care less and it's just one more way to irritate those dreaded 'libbies.' Stupidity counts, too.
7
International travel is for rich urban liberal people. Not for the deplorables.
5
Laws like the ones we need require the support of legislators and a president elected by people. National laws require the support of people in places where the majority of Republicans live as well as California or Colorado. How to garner that support? Mr. Friedman's imagined commercials declare that Pres. Trump couldn't care less about the death and destruction in Africa (or Puerto Rico, for that matter) or coral reefs, or the likelihood that the next generations will never see real lions and elephants or coral. True. The rhetorical question that follows, "Do you?" implies that you can peel off previous Trump supporters with this argument and hold him under the 46.2% of the electorate that was sufficient to elect him in 2016. What if their answers to the rhetorical question are "No, I don't care either. I have happily lived my life never seeing a coral reef and I don't expect my kids will. And so what? I've never seen the top of a mountain either." They will believe Pres. Trump's lies about wind turbines over the science because they trust him, and cancer hits home, not Australia. What hits home is what counts for them. The president needs to be raked over the coals, but not with mourning over elephants, if the Dems want to win more than what they have been winning since 2010. Dems must link flooding in the Midwest, not in Mozambique, and hurricanes in FL and NC, not Puerto Rico, whose citizens unfairly have no right to vote, to Pres. Trump's climate policies.
6
My daughter has a high end job and relocated to Germany at the beginning of the year.
Her and her husband sold their cars before they moved with the intention of buying expensive German cars at a huge discount. They will be able to ship them back to the USA after her two year stint is up. Their relo packages will cover those costs.
They bought one car. NO need for two. Great train system allows her to work in great comfort on her commutes to Munich. Stores and businesses are closed on weekends in her city of residence. People have a sense of community and they eat "Real Food"! Blue collar workers are respected and all have health care.
This country was "Every man for themselves!" Now America is "Every man and woman for themselves!" Slime works well in the corporate world, politics and even local community groups. "Big Bird" made it to the presidency. Isn't that proof enough?
We will probably make some progress over time, but hopefully not too, little too, late.
51
@Texan
We have descended into the abyss of corruption, narcissism and rapacious greed. We will certainly perish for that is what justice demands.
10
Wonderful, Mr. Friedman. More, please.
7
“Trump could care less” (about environmental concers)...play if over and over, ad nauseaum. I’d chip in to pay the cost of airtime.
5
Thanks for proposing some sane and wise arguments to use opposing Trump in 2020. Certainly sane and wise arguments will win over his base.
You think?
15
Here in the Sierra Nevada we're at 200% of normal snowpack which suggests that global warming is occurring as also seen in the horrific wildfires in California the last several years.
So how does 200% snowpack = global warming?
It's simple 7th grade science. As the upper atmosphere stays warmer it encourages water droplets to form and fall. A colder upper atmosphere would keep the precip contained at freezing temperatures and have it drop over warmer land masses as seen in the massive flooding occurring in the Midwest from Canadian frontal masses.
There will be flooding here like unseen before when that tremendous snowpack melts and flows downhill.
18
@Texexnv I think that you may want to retake your 7th grade science course. A warmer upper atmosphere keeps water in the vapor phase and decreases the formation of water droplets/ice particles. Hence, a warmer upper atmosphere would decrease precipitation. A colder upper atmosphere results in more ice particles (and water droplets) which results in more snow falling - what was observed this year in CA.
In actuality, one is most concerned with the temperature of the mid/upper atmosphere (up to around 12 km) compared to the temperature and humidity of the lower atmosphere. The most precipitation will occur when the lower atmosphere is moist and warm and the upper atmosphere cold.
1
@Rob-Chemist -- go look at the Clausius-Clapeyron Equation ... and understand the process of adiabatic lifting. Texexnv is right.
Your comment about "one is most concerned with the temperature of the mid/upper atmosphere (up to around 12 km) " has next to nothing to do with precipitation -- the upper troposphere never has much water in it (even in the tropics) because it it is too cold. Updrafts have precipitated most of their water out before that altitude.
1
@Lee Harrison You are incorrect. Look at any weather forecasting model. A key factor in predicting precipitation is the lapse rate - how rapidly the atmosphere cools with altitude. If the lapse rate is steep (i.e., it is cold aloft) you will get more precipitation than with a low lapse rate (i.e., it is relatively warm aloft). Indeed, warm air aloft is a primary inhibitor of precipitation. You have to inject much more water vapor into warm air to get precipitation than into cold air.
To put this argument more formally, precipitation occurs via moist adiabatic lifting. If you have dry adiabatic lifting, clouds evaporate and no precipitation occurs. In this latter case according to the CC equation, the temperature of the air above the cloud decreases very slowly with increasing altitude such that it can hold the water vapor generated by the cloud evaporating.
I would agree with your comment that the highest levels of the atmosphere are only important for precipitation in terms of thunderstorms. In upper atmosphere, I was including levels much lower than that, say around 7 km, where temperature and moisture level are very important.
Thomas: Thank you for your lucid cogent thoughts. Keep 'em coming. Here's hoping that your commercial concepts for democrats are put in place. Nothing could be more gratifying for the planet and the good ol' USA than to have Mr. Trump defeated, soundly, political bloody nose and all in 2020.
Tim Carney
13
Mr. Friedman -- You say "...if Democrats approach this right... they can win on this issue in 2020 and make Trump the laughingstock".
I don't know how anybody who has watched trump on TV for 15 minutes or heard or read any of the spew coming out of that hole in his face in the past 2 years can think he's anything BUT a laughingstock. Or, for some, maybe the word fool might come to mind. Or clown, idiot, cretin, pinhead, ... whatever. But somehow he "won" in 2016 (ok, it was a fluke ; he didn't win the REAL vote. And he isn't legitimate).
I fear that we've been putting way, way too much confidence in about 48% of the U.S. voters. They are people who have not, cannot and will not learn anything. If you try to present them with facts based in even obvious, common-sense, axiomatic 7th grade scientific knowledge they go glassy-eyed. Absolutely uncomprehending. Fixed pupils. If you tried to engage them in this conversation in an ER, the attending physician would walk over and declare them dead.
If the trump voters you have encountered don't fit this description, then you don't meet the same trump voters I do.
110
Tempting and attractive. But after your Pulitzer Prize-winning promises of how amiably democracy would settle upon Iraq with a little help from ourselves, I'm afraid I can never credit a rosy scenario of yours again.
4
Tom Friedman is determined to add another "miss" to his already extensive misforcasting resume. Climate change and Green New Deal will not be an election winner for the Democrats. In fact, it is the second surest loser of all the issues, trailing only encouraging illegal immigration. But the Democrats are dead set on losing that election in the most efficient and stupid way possible. Just goes to show how far detached from everyday reality they are as a group. Good job, NYT, of creating a bubble of false conscience around your readers' brains. The price will be Trump's second term.
8
Climate change is real but most of these collectivist solutions are a cure worse than the disease. Try to manage the worst impacts of climate change with technology, and increase reliance on nuclear power. Trump 's idiocy is no reason to adopt AOC's idiocy.
8
R.P., did you even read this article? He did not endorse AOC's Green New Deal but rather a different one proposed by Ernie Moniz former Energy Secretary under Obama and a Bush official of whom I am not familiar.
12
@R.P. The city of Los Angeles is about to cancel a massive natural gas-fueled power plant because they've determined that a solar plant is cheaper and more efficient. California (the leader in utilizing green tech in America) is walking away from nuclear because it is much more costly than natural gas and the risks are enormous. Solars time has come and AOC is no idiot!
3
This editorial just came out right after I watched the 5th episode of Netflix, Our Planet. It ended with David Attenborough mentioning how global cooperation is so vital to try to prevent the total destruction of the planet, and the eventual cessation of life . Throughout the episodes, the viewer watches scene after scene in mounting horror as the continual display of destruction of the planet is being made graphically clear.
It just enrages me that we have as our leader, one who is so intellectually unfit, and morally defficient at a time when this country needs a real leader. We need a president who thinks of other things besides his own self interest, and has the curiosity to want to know what is going on outside of his own personal life. We need a person who actually cares for others, and takes his responsibilty seriously enough to make a difference .
HIs attituce towards global warming is so contrary to common sense. Not only does this degenerate show dislike for the peple of his own country, but he also shows indifference towards mankind.
834
@kayakherb
I'll be watching Netflix's Our Planet and thanking you for identifying a must see.
50
@kayakherb, you wrote: "We need a president who thinks of other things besides his own self interest ...." Yes, of course we do. But to have such a president we need to have an electorate that also believes in these immutable truths. Where do we find one?
65
@Tom
This is the problem. Without a well informed electorate who consciously choose to protect the future of our children over self indulgence in the present, there is absolutely no hope.
The best way would be to educate the young and to teach them respect for the planet but it is really too late. We do not have the time remaining to enact change over a generation.
27
I retired from a Power and Water Company. They are taking green power seriously moving from coal power to solar power. Economics are driving that decision. The political ploy of trying to prevent enviable change to salve the worry of people in the GOP base will only work if enough of us who know better stay home election time. Change is coming and no Trump or blustering politician can stop that. We can turn a lemon into lemonade if we have the guts and savvy to tackle this problem head on. I see new technology, prosperity and jobs coming if we are bold enough to seize them.
14
The Green Real Deal is exactly what Representative Paul Tonko came out with just days ago. I figured that would come up in this piece, but it wasn’t even mentioned. It’s an achievable solution that focuses on the problem instead of trying to tackle everything at once.
1
Trump plays to his base, those who refuse to see climate change as anything more than a liberal abstraction. He will incessantly pound the “take away your hamburgers” gut-level mantra, and it will be highly effective with them. Democrats need to stress that our own Defense Department is extremely concerned about climate change, as are influential global powers such as China and Germany.
We should return to the Obama-era proposal of natural gas as a bridge to nuclear as a bridge to renewable energy. This sequence makes the most sense given the timescales involved in developing robust and large-scale commercially viable infrastructure for wind and solar power, including workable battery storage technology.
Jay Inslee has made climate change a central pillar of his campaign. He deserves significantly more media coverage simply for doing that.
Democrats should promote jobs programs geared to climate-change solutions, along with government-sponsored health insurance that would be tied to the individual, not the employer, in order to support transitional mobility for all workers.
Trump and his fellow Republicans have abdicated responsibility with regard to developing any proposals that rationally address climate change. All those who worry about a livable world for future generations should have that fact firmly in mind when they cast their ballots next year.
25
The future election results will be determined by who is allowed to vote. With voter suppression by the Republicans continuing, clever campaigns may not be enough to win. Mix in the electoral college and you will find trump still strong. Voting is a right, not a privilege, like check cashing, or using a credit card...
Everybody pays. Homeowners Insurance is going through the roof. Even renters help foot the bill. Someone has to pay for the floods, fires, tornadoes and hurricanes. Someday insurance companies will not even sell homeowners insurance. Someday soon.
1
The Green New Deal is useful for movement building on the left but as Thomas Friedman says we do need a Green Real Deal with priorities. However, Friedman only addressed a green grid here. What we need is a fully comprehensive climate action plan to begin a serious realistic discussion on how to proceed. I believe such a plan will be forthcoming from Washington governor Jay Inslee who is going to issue details on his "Climate Mission" which will cover every sector, electricity, transportation, buildings, agriculture, etc. Inslee has been involved with working on climate change for many years at the state and local level which is pretty much where all the action has occurred. The Republican may mock what Inslee puts out but I don't think it will bu such easy target as the Green New Deal which seems more like a democratic socialist wish list then any statement that can be translated into action at the federal level. Friedman is correct that setting priorities is needed so it is critical to keep an open mind to other ideas and not use the Green New Deal as yet another litmus test for who is progressive enough to stifle alternatives.
2
A conservative green deal is not enough and not going to happen. We will fail to alter anything significantly and then it will be too late. Trying to pretend that there is a midpoint of activity would be effective in staving of climate change and would be acceptable to the GOP and conservative democrats is delusional.
Let's face it, the old people just don't care what will happen in the future because they think only of themselves.
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@Chris
Sorry Chris, but ageism does not fly in this context. There are plenty of "old people" who more than "care" but who put their bodies, their minds and their money on the line in the fight for greening our planet. Know what you are talking about before spewing this ageism nonsense.
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@Chris And there are plenty of young people who don't care enough to register and vote.
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@Chris As disgusted as I am by the flaws and failures of my own baby boom generation, I know that turning this into a battle between generations makes our chances of success even slimmer.
Purely as a matter of political strategy, the broad brush generalizations won't get us anywhere. Unless you have a strategy for winning by alienating the 40% of older people who were with you. It's going to have to be a cross-generational effort.
Want to take the lead? By all means: grab it, build the coalition, and make it happen.
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Couldn't agree with Mr. Friedman more. This is a 2020 campaign issue, along with healthcare that will resonate with the electorate, regardless of party affiliation.
And you don't have to go to Africa to point out climate change events, today if your on the eastern half of the U.s., just looked west. The 2nd "Bomb Cyclone" is on is way through the upper midwest.
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@cherrylog754
You are right to stress keeping Americans focused on climate change in America. Bring it home to them, and keep it there. After all, it is already here.
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@cherrylog754 Climate change is important. However, the key to defeating Trump is to get the immigration issue off the table. The American people are more conservative than you think. We know a scam when we see one.
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@cherrylog754
this should have been THE 2012 campaign issue!
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Look at Houston. A series of devastating storms, for which there was no provision, and two toxic oil refinery fires within several weeks. If these people don't get it and shake off the shackles of Big Oil, nobody will.
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Very thoughtful commentary, as usual, by Mr. Friedman. His strong endorsement of renewable power sources seems very logical; however, why include nuclear? It's almost like what the politicians call a poison pill.
Nuclear energy has (1) a terrible and scary history including disasters in Japan and Russia and the near disaster at Three Mile Island, (2) no practical solution for nuclear waste, and (3) extreme construction and maintenance costs.
Investing enough funds in several types of proven renewable methods such as wind, solar, geothermal and also writing reasonable legislation (including carrots and sticks) will most likely produce the needed energy more quickly, with less costs and at the same time create more good jobs.
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Trump's ignorance and overall denial of facts and science remains a clear and present danger. The corporate world, farmers, people who have experienced worsening( storms, flooding, wildfires (and even school children ) understand the importance of studying and doing what we can to minimize the effects of climate change. Perhaps if Mar-a - Lago got flooded things might change.
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Agreed. A Democratic nominee has to emphasize a handful of issues, in any order you wish:
- competence (no more drama queens)
- honesty (no more constant lying)
- climate change (no more denial)
- access to affordable healthcare (restore all ACA provisions)
- an accountable Congress
- sensible foreign policy (allies are allies, enemies are enemies)
- fair immigration policies (Americans know 'fair' when they see it)
- respect for all (stop the adolescent name-calling)
Trump is vulnerable on each and every one.
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@Phil Carson That is a winning platform.Don't know if it needs free money for people who don't work. Maybe a nod to reducing the cost of higher (further) education by grants to students (but too complex to make it free college, since the tuition costs are so different from state to state).
@Phil Carson. Not a single one of the things you name will move Trump supporters. They are emotionally glued at the hip. They are fearful, ignorant and arrogant at the same time. It is why they cling most tightly to Trump when he acts like a “strong man.” It is when they feel protected — just like all the other strong men rulers on the planet past and present.
It’s great to see an op ed acknowledge the lack of traditional communication, be it ads or
PSAs, that address climate change and what can be done to stop it. The biggest threat to the world isn’t climate change it’s the complete ignorance/denial about climate change. Whether the Green New Deal is a 100% sound bill doesn’t matter, it has done an incredible job of getting people to talk about climate change, even Fox News.
Let’s do more PSAs and wake everyone up in the waning years of hope that we have left.
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Mr Friedman, Please keep "pounding away". Please put out more well reasoned and succinct sound byte ads. I live in California not the news vacuum of the red states. Fox news drowns out the climate/economic truths. These ideas, goals, and opportunities need to be seen on highway billboards where they can not be ignored. And you are right. End them all with the tag line, "How do your kids feel about that". Red state people care about their kids.
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i would also pound trump with the fact that the foundational science behind carbon dioxide based climate change was established in the early 19th century, and it is literally unassailable. Run ads that liken him to a medieval person that denies that the earth is round.
HAMMER HIM on all this. Make him look like the utterly out of touch old fool that he is.
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@Tucker trump voters do not care what scientists say at all, not even a little bit. The Dems could hammer on that point all decade and it won't matter.
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Pelosi said recently about the Green New Deal:
"It will be one of several or maybe many suggestions that we receive. The green dream, or whatever they call it, nobody knows what it is, but they're for it, right?"
Pelosi and her fellow corporate Democrats would shun FDR. Climate change should be acted on like a monster meteor hitting our planet. The Democratic leadership though is all about kneecapping progressive candidates and ideas, so they can serve their fellow donors like the Republicans. Democrats are still pushing fracking. Pelosi is also against Medicare For All, that over 70% of the people support.
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@steve Remember what happened to McGovern in 1972? No one actually liked Richard Nixon, much less Spiro Agnew. No one thought they were telling the truth about the Vietnam War or much of anything else, except that George McGovern was dangerous because he wouldn't stand up for America against the Commies and the elites who, they claimed, supported them. Nancy Pelosi remembers. Most of the people who voted for Nixon are now dead, but having dispatched "crooked Hillary," the Republicans will now, once again, go after Democrats as socialists/communists, intentionally linking progressives with the economic stagnation, personal suffering and lack of individual freedom in old-style communist states, as unjustified as it is to do so. This tactic may work. The advantage Nixon had over Trump is that Nixon was well-informed, competent to run the Executive Branch and disciplined, not empty-headed, incompetent to run even a casino, and fickle. Don't count on that being enough to defeat him and the GOP. You don't get your agenda enacted just by being passionate about it. You have to have the votes in Congress. Pelosi knows this and supported both progressives and establishment or centrist Democrats in order to ensure that 40-seat pick-up in 2018. The same breadth of support for Democrats that worked in 2018 must remain if the House majority is to be maintained or increased and achieved in the Senate in 2020. Or is that not the overriding goal at this crucial point in our history?
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@steve
Corporations rule. That will stop when planet earth is no longer habitable. The disease is greed, the outcome death.
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@steve Be careful with your Medicare for All polling data.
https://morningconsult.com/2019/02/13/voter-support-for-medicare-for-all-tumbles-in-new-year/
https://www.apnews.com/4516833e7fb644c9aa8bcc11048b2169
I'm for it, but people who imagine that public support for it is deep and firm will walk into a Republican buzzsaw. Careful plans and unusually smart political strategies will be essential if it's to succeed.
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Achiiles heel of a heel.
Ramping up global warming is global concrete, global asphalt, and global deforestations reducing rainfall and increasing temperatures in population centers everywhere on the poor denuded globe.
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The Republicans are anti life by continuing to mock or deny climate problems. Pope Francis spoke too oil men not long ago and said you harm the environment you harm humanity. All who support Trump is harming humanity.
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Perhaps 10 Americans could place Mozambique on a map. It’s located on the southeastern coast of Africa. According to the president, the dark continent is home to you-know-what kinds of countries. And “Trump couldn’t care less.” Neither could MAGA nation, and that includes the Republican majority in the Senate.
Cyclone Idai, say many sneering at anything about a “green new deal” can’t happen here. They forget Maria and Puerto Rico. Even Harvey, who hammered Louisiana and Texas not two years ago, seems an outlier as millions of Americans are content to become soldered to the president’s border wall and the impossible immigration problem that remains insoluble.
The Democrats need to rally behind this idea of catastrophic climate events simply because, unlike immigration, we cannot control weather. We need to pay attention while there’s still time. Republicans are stuck on fossil fuels for the one percent. There are no moderates in the GOP. Democrats must hammer home the idea that we’re on borrowed time—time that edges away from us all the time. It’s not going to profit the one percent when all their money won’t be able to rebuild Houston or Miami—or Washington, D.C.
Its way past time to take lessons from places where clear warnings were fruitless. We’ll see many thousands (millions?) of deaths and ruined place names in our lifetime if we continue to scratch itches that don’t matter.
Donald Trump’s not going to be around to rescue us from our stupidity. Or Mitch McConnell.
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If Swedish school girl Geta Thunberg get the Nobel peace prize, maybe more will listen.
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@Vincent
On the contrary, that would make them even bigger laughing stock than when they awarded one to Obama prematurely.
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Trump and Republicans can continue to mock climate change — to their peril because voters, most of them anyway, are not stupid. We’ve seen the devastation wrought by pollution, and things could get much worse real soon.
I’m with AOC, a true visionary. The fact that the Green New Deal is tied to health care and other basic rights is brilliant, and one would hope that all Democrats will unite behind it. The president’s instincts are faulty, as they are on this, and his campaign could go up in flames.
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@LauraF
His base may reluctantly agree that their leader is not correct on this point.
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@Peter ERIKSON trump base is at the heart is racist. They know that even if everything else he does harms them, their neighbors and their children he is with them on that most important issue. And as long as he is they will support him.
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@LauraF
Like Nero fiddling as the world burns.
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Thank you for this column, Mr. Friedman!
My only quibble is estimating that our *grandchildren* will be the ones who care. You're optimistic.
Oh the grandkids will see devastation all right, but the more subtle effects of weather cycles will be devastating too, and much sooner. The survival of humans is fragile and far more dependent on reliable weather than most people think.
Glaciers and reliable snowpack are essential to agriculture in much of the world. There are very few areas where water storage reservoirs have anything like the capacity to collect all winter rain water for use throughout the Spring, Summer and Fall. All it takes in many areas is a short period of warm spring rain and there will be early destructive floods and no agriculture water for the year.
Moreover, early season floods like those in the mid-west this Spring that can take large areas of farm land out of production for that year even if irrigation water is available. What about every year?
We're now hearing that glaciers in North America are melting at a much faster rate than predicted as recently as 2012. Worry about ocean levels rising is unimportant in comparison to disruption of farming.
And finally, suppose farming is wiped out in localized areas due to changes in weather cycles. No big deal, right? Nope! All those people will be forced to migrate to areas where there is food. It would make our southern border immigration problem look like a crowded bus stop.
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Thanks for this, it's critical that we go forward. However, Trump will get his you know what handed to him in 2020, and fossil fuel market share will decline sharply after that. Why? Besides being toxic and GHG producing, fossil fuels will not be competitive with wind, solar, and geothermal. The reason utilities aren't converting sooner is the banks, who hold low interest, long term Power Purchase Agreements.
Unfortunately Tom, you, like practically everybody else, assumes that power plants and cars are what causes global warming. It's true, but overlooks the powerful drivers of land use emissions, caused by meat consumption, too much Soft n Fluffy from the Boreal, and, especially, too many two by fours.
We are one of the few countries that builds houses with wood, which last an average of 60 years, creating churn for loggers, construction workers, and architects. If we used inert materials like masonry, concrete, or steel (appropriate in seismic California), houses would last, and far fewer people would die in house fires. Devastated forests in Canada and here could grow back, sequestering vast amounts of carbon:
https://www.monbiot.com/2013/05/27/a-manifesto-for-rewilding-the-world/
https://thinkprogress.org/which-emits-the-most-co2-in-home-construction-steel-concrete-or-timber-a6a8b2d3370f/
The whole editorial staff needs to look into this, and it's kind of shocking you haven't so far. It could be the difference in saving civilization.
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@Mike Roddy
Add to that the fact that concrete block homes offer superior insulation.
I'm also wondering related to homebuilding, why is it even legal in California to have heat and A/C registers way up high, where they have to work twice as hard to both heat and cool? There oughta be a law....registers should be either in the floor or low on the wall.
Trumpsters can’t handled more than 3-liners. Let’s just build a massive green energy infrastructure in Pa Wisconsin and Michigan.
Sell it simply as “more jobs than Trump could ever bring, period.”
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Look at all those rich white women protesting in the photo. Don't they control like 90% of spending in US, maybe they need a mirror.
@Emily
53% of white women voted for Trump.
Some great ideas here. But, the single most important factor for each person, and their environmental impact : the number of Children you produce. Just stop overbreeding. There’s no good reason for any person/couple to produce more than two children. Want more ? Adopt, foster, etc.. “ Be fruitful and multiply “ is so last millennium, and deadly to our Planet.
Free, and easily available Birth Control. Free, sterilization upon request. Stop “ regulation “ of Abortions. And for the record, we have ONE Child. Period.
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@Phyliss Dalmatian
I agree, but have you noticed in the news coverage of people at the Texas border that many young moms have 3, 4 ,5 children? Or when the Syrians were trying to get into Europe a while back, similar.
This is a separate issue from our feelings about these people, but it is serious. We need to interact with the governments of these countries.
@Phyliss Dalmatian
You go, Phyliss! And on the record I have 0 children. : )
When Roe is overturned (yes, I meant when) the red states are going to have a lot more problems than climate change.
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@Phyliss Dalmatian
That message has been heard, but unfortunately it's the wrong people who stop breeding. Human evolution going backward.
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A clueless talking head who logs more air miles than most writing puff pieces to hype up latest fads is offering advice on how to defeat Trump. Good thing people don’t take Tom Friedman seriously any more having seen how his ‘insights’ on likes of MBS have played out.
A picture is worth a thousand words, and ones that are close to home. Just search: "https://www.nytimes.com/search?query=nebraska%20flooding&sort=best"
How many times do we want to repeat this?
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Hate to break it to you Tom but Trump’s carefuly cultivated Fascist “cult of fear, hatred and ignorance” will not be swayed by
your Green New Deal mantra.
And the fact that they might be swayed by the Siren’s call for war
against Iran will only solidify his base. Hopefully you will learn from your shameful role in promoting the catastrophe of the Iraq War.
It is time for you to clearly state your opposition to any U.S. attack on Iran. If you don’t you are a major part of the problem,
not the solution.
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Green real deal? Clever. Too bad AOC beat you to the real deal, the green new deal. Half baked measures are what you settle for. No matter that red states are making money off of wind. They’re still gonna vote for Donnie dumpster and crew. A couple of maga rallies and they will be chanting lock her up and pulling the switch for don the don. Clinton had her faults but one time she was right, they are deplorables. As for Friedman, another puff piece.
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Here's a list of 17 "brand-name" companies (among a multitude of others), instituting efforts to green it up; although some of what they promote may be based upon an eco-friendly advertising mantra, the reality is that going green affects a business's bottom line in a positive manner.
https://www.conserve-energy-future.com/top-companies-that-are-going-green.php
Conservation is key, but utilization of environmentally-friendly electricity generation may hold more influence in regards to a economically productive future; after all, nature is ultimately the basis of our economic success, and it will be difficult to change the capitalistic paradigm we live under.
Bottom line: Companies are beginning to wake up to new ways of being more successful, regardless of where they find ways to become more so.
Although Trump, sadly, has influence over individual sectors of the economy, he will have a hard time steering the larger boat against basic economic principles.
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We are pleased to announce that the Navajo Generating Station in Page, AZ., the largest coal fired plant west of the Mississippi will shut down forever this year along with the Kayenta mine that supplies it.
But, Friedman has the right approach by taking the fight NOT to Trump himself, but to Trump's base, as the posed questions here do very well.
I'd ask his base directly why they are OK, by voting for Trump, with their kids TODAY consuming more dangerous air, water and food.
I'm not sure if references to South Africa or the coral reefs will resonant with people who can't find the job rich nearest city where they can move to and improve their lives significantly.
And I don't think we need ANOTHER new Democratic moniker for a program (remember "The Better Deal?" I didn't think so; that was last year's attempt at branding.)
Green New Deal is just fine because the GOP is doing the Democrats' work for them by publicizing it. It is up to the Democrats to take control of the framing to insure it becomes a sword and not a shield in 2020.
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@Paul For REAL? Kayenta mine didn't have a good reputation in the '70s and I've shuddered when I've read about it over the years.
@ms
Yes, all true. The utility company still using the plant would have sold it to the Navajo Nation and they would have kept it running saving 700 jobs. But that utility company wanted permanent indemnity from all future clean up costs (I think the Nation put $100 million on the table for liability) but the utility company wanted permanent protection from any and all future clean up costs.
FINALLY the skies over Lake Powell will no longer have that brown cloud over it.
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@Paul Between a rock and a hard place - but I think the right decision.