I've been thinking a lot about what Gore had to say at The Economic Club of Chicago dinner Wednesday night (superbly diaried by ReEnergizer here). He repeated the refrain: "the climate crisis is not a political issue, it's a moral issue" as though the two are mutually exclusive. I believe this is a fallacy. For contradiction, one need not look far: I think we would all agree that health care for children is a moral issue, but it is also clearly a political issue right now.
I know Gore really wants Democrats and Republicans to be able to come together on this issue. He pointed to our tackling the hole in the ozone layer under Reagan, the recent initiative by Schwarzenegger in California, and the fact that he has more Republicans than Democrats on the Board of the Alliance for Climate Protection. But the truth is, no one in the Bush administration or the Republican leadership in Congress is listening to people like Brent Scrowcroft (one of Gore's Board members). In fact, as Paul Krugman recently noted (in a column I diaried here), those in power in the national Republican Party are deeply and firmly invested in Global Warming Denial:
Climate change is, however, harder to deal with than acid rain, because the causes are global. The sulfuric acid in America’s lakes mainly comes from coal burned in U.S. power plants, but the carbon dioxide in America’s air comes from coal and oil burned around the planet — and a ton of coal burned in China has the same effect on the future climate as a ton of coal burned here. So dealing with climate change not only requires new taxes or their equivalent; it also requires international negotiations in which the United States will have to give as well as get.
Everything I’ve just said should be uncontroversial — but imagine the reception a Republican candidate for president would receive if he acknowledged these truths at the next debate. Today, being a good Republican means believing that taxes should always be cut, never raised. It also means believing that we should bomb and bully foreigners, not negotiate with them.
So if science says that we have a big problem that can’t be solved with tax cuts or bombs — well, the science must be rejected, and the scientists must be slimed. For example, Investor’s Business Daily recently declared that the prominence of James Hansen, the NASA researcher who first made climate change a national issue two decades ago, is actually due to the nefarious schemes of — who else? — George Soros.
The national Republican Party -- which is controlled by the right wing and funded heavily by Oil and other energy companies who have a strong interest in denying the scientific evidence -- will not give up its obstructionism on measures to combat the climate crisis until it sees that there is a heavy electoral price to be paid for its stance. That is why this is an inherently political (as well as moral) issue right now.
In his new book "The Conscience of a Liberal," Paul Krugman's recounting of the politics of the New Deal provides a perfect historical parallel. One might think that raising the nation out of widescale poverty in the midst of the Great Depression was a moral issue, but it was clearly a political one at the time. The Republican Party and its wealthy backers fought Roosevelt tooth and nail on every aspect of the New Deal. Roosevelt, whom the right called "a traitor to his class," didn't worry about finding common cause with Republicans who disagreed with his moral view. Here's what he said in NY's Madison Square Garden shortly befor the 1936 election:
We had to struggle with the old enemies of peace -- business and financial monopoly, speculation, reckless banking, class antagonism, sectionalism, war profiteering.
They had begun to consider the Government of the United States as a mere appendage to their own affairs. We know now that Government by organized money is just as dangerous as government by organized mob.
Never before in all our history have these forces been so united against one candidate as they stand today. They are unanimous in their hate for me -- and I welcome their hatred.
The Republican Party of today is frighteningly reminiscent of the 1936 version. The way to find common ground with them is to beat them to a pulp on the issues where their stances are clearly to the detriment of a majority of the country (as we're doing on children's health care) and, in the case of the climate crisis, the entire world. If we do that, they will eventually come around and we will have common ground ON OUR TERMS.
Proof? Here's President Eisenhower in 1954, elected after the Democrats held the White House for a whole generation:
Should any political party attempt to abolish social security, unemployment isurance, and eliminate labor laws and farm programs, you would not hear of that party again in our political history. There is a tiny splinter group, of course, that believes you can do these things. Among them are H.L. Hunt... a few other Texas oil millionaires, and an occasional politician or business man from other areas. Their number is negligable and they are stupid.
Of course, that "negligable," "stupid" "splinter group" is in complete control of today's Republican Party and will remain obstinately so until they see that there is an overwhelming political price to be paid (one midterm election won't do it).
At one point in his speech, Gore seemed to recognize the power of the climate crisis as a political issue because he cited it as one of the issues on which the opposition to John Howard is campaigning very successfully in Australia (up 14 points in the polls with less than 6 weeks to go).
Gore also pointed to Roosevelt's successful retooling of the auto industry to make planes for WW2 as an example of how quickly the nation can move when it recognizes a crisis. But Roosevelt could not have persuaded Ford and GM to give up making cars as an ordinary citizen. It was because he had the power of the presidency that he could do this. If Gore wants to combat the crisis before it is too late (and of course he does) he will need this power. As Markthshark eloquently explained in this diary, there is only so much citizen Gore can do.
If the next President is not as focussed on this issue as Gore (and who is?) or is easily swayed by lobbyists (cough, Hillary, cough), or is, God forbid, a Republican (because we nominate someone who depresses our base while turning out theirs -- I feel that cough coming on again), Gore can kiss all his (and our) hopes of preventing irreversable global catastrophe goodbye. (The crisis MUST be dealt with at the BEGINNING of the next President's term or the accumulation of CO2 and melting of the polar ice caps will reach a tipping point from which it will be impossible to recover. See here for more.)
So the climate crisis IS a political issue and Gore will need the power of the presidency to solve it.
Please join me in writing and calling Gore's office and insisting that he run before state filing deadlines preclude him from getting on the ballot:
Office of the Honorable Al Gore
2100 West End Avenue, Suite 620
Nashville, TN 37203
615.327.2227