Bill McKibben—one the most important environmental activists of our time—says the recent Paris climate agreement “falls short.” Paul Krugman, who presents himself (with pretty solid credentials) as the Conscience of a Liberal, sees it differently, calling it “the best climate news we’ve had in a very long time,” and adding that it “gives us real reason to hope in an area where hope has been all too scarce.” Which one is right? Both.
In order to achieve the necessary progress on climate change, we need each of these kinds of voices, as well as the harsh criticism of James Hansen, the father of climate change awareness, who thundered against the deal as “bullsh*t … just worthless words. There is no action, just promises.”
I’m not a climate scientist (hmmm, those words sound familiar), but I do understand politics. Just as those who criticized the New Deal from FDR’s left gave him more room to present his programs as representing a moderate compromise, those who criticize or even condemn the Paris agreement do the same for it. Additionally, by making clear that Paris is far from ideal, people like McKibben and Hansen keep the pressure on those leaders who claim to be interested in saving our planet, pushing them to stick to or—heaven forfend—even exceed the deal’s targets. These activist critics help move the Overton Window as far as possible in the correct direction.
The praise from progressives like Krugman matters as well because it contrasts the real (if incomplete) improvements Democrats make with the obstructionism of a Republican Party he characterizes as “spiraling ever deeper into a black hole of denial and anti-science conspiracy theorizing.” With the withdrawal of Republican South Carolina Sen. Lindsey Graham from the presidential race, ThinkProgress offered this uplifting headline: “It’s Official: None Of The Remaining Major GOP Candidates Accept Climate Science.”
Ponder that for a moment.
This is why we must remember that—while we simultaneously fight to drag the Democratic Party leftward—even today’s Democrats are fundamentally better than the alternative Election Day will offer us. We should criticize individual Democrats, their proposals, their legislative compromises, and the whole party when they are not progressive enough, and when they are too beholden to corporate interests. The correct solutions for our country are progressive ones, not centrist, Third Way half-measures. That’s why we must make progressive voices the dominant ones within the Democratic Party.
But we progressives need to avoid breeding cynicism by spreading the idea that electing Democrats will produce the same results as electing Republicans. That is almost never true—from the White House on down. As the above paragraph makes clear, I’m not advocating an equivalent of Reagan’s so-called “11th Commandment,” i.e., that we should never criticize a fellow Democrat.
My 11th Commandment for progressives would be “thou shalt not say there is no difference between the parties.” On climate change, for example, ask yourself whether anything like the Paris accord would have even happened under a President Romney, or whether a President Rubio—now trying to run as the “mainstream” alternative to the more naked extremism of Cruz and Trump—would implement the accord in a way that resembles what a President Sanders or Clinton would do. While the Paris accord may fall short of the kind of action we need right now, it is also far, far better than what a Republican president would have given us, and it is something on which to build.
Democrats have our differences, and it is right that we debate them in a substantive way during the primaries. It is also right that we progressives fight to see that our ideals and our proposals win the day in every arena of government—from the legislature to the regulatory agencies, from domestic to foreign policy. We must remember, however, that those differences—real as they are—pale when compared to the differences between our party and those who would take our country in the exact opposite direction.