A few weeks ago, a bunch of folks interested in environmental issues were whapping our hands into our heads lamenting a recent poll showing growing skepticism about global warming. And while that is certainly concerning, there is good news coming out of Pew also. More below the jump.
Polls, polls, polls! All of us political junkies love polls. Here are a few nice ones from California:
Wait! Those are masts, right? I'm no sailor, so what do I know?
And then there are these kinds of Poles:
From Ponzan, Poland. But I digress.
The polls I'm referring to speak of strong support for Clean Energy. Joe Romm at Climate Progress discusses it here. The gist of the article:
In the new polls, likely 2010 voters were asked:
"Congress is considering an energy plan that has two key parts. One part would require factories and power companies to reduce their emissions of the carbon pollution that causes global warming by 17% (20% in MO) by the year 2020 and by 80% by the year 2050. The other part would require power companies to generate 15% of their power from clean energy sources like wind and solar by the year 2025. Would you favor/oppose this entire plan?"
The results:
75% of voters in Michigan favor.
68% of voters in Ohio favor.
67% of voters in Missouri favor.
And this goes along with other polls showing 6 in 10 support action on clean energy. This is definitely the way to sell this initiative. Many people don't understand global warming, and really don't need to. They understand the need for clean energy (and hopefully, the jobs that go with it). And, they understand that coal is dirty and leads to billions in health costs related to air and water pollution. I'm guessing that most folks aren't sold on the notion of "clean coal" either.
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On another topic for my DK Greenroots friends...
I read Firedoglake.com several times a week. It's a good liberal blog, but there is scant coverage of Kerry/Boxer, climate change, cap & trade, etc., over there. Why is this important? There are lots of liberal blogs, right? Sure, but Jane Hampsher (the founder of FDL) gets on TV these days as much as Markos. There are lots of eyes on that blog.
Any of our great writers over here (I'm thinking of you Adam, RL, MB, Patriot, Sven, etc.) should think about posting over there once in awhile. The FDLers are active and have contributed a lot on HCR. They should be doing the same stuff on enviro issues.
I posted a summary of Kerry/Boxer over there and am getting some pushback from folks who think it's worse than doing nothing. Check it out if you're interested.