So there’s a story in today’s Houston Chronicle loudly proclaiming that our state’s senior Senator, “Big John” Cornyn, is preparing legislation to “take on” climate change. But uh . . . there are some issues with the legislation that Big John says he’s preparing.
So I urge you to read the article first (its important to support local newspapers that are generally reliable like the Chronicle), and then come back here and read the rest of this diary.
How do you even describe Big John’s stance? I guess at least he acknowledged (finally) that climate change is real, BUT (and this is a gigantic caveat) his proposed solution only deals with carbon capture technology, and has nothing to do with cutting emissions. He also (I’m assuming just out of habit at this point) repeats old talking points about not taking appropriate action to combat climate change because of the costs (because of course he does).
So what does Big John have to say for himself? Here's his first quote: "There is a growing consensus the days of ignoring this issue are over. If we all agree that reducing emissions is important I think we have a better way of approaching that than the Green New Deal."
There's been scientific consensus for decades you asshat. Your political party is the primary reason that our nation hasn't taken the consequential and effective actions necessary to combat this. So don't give us this bullshit about a "growing consensus".
He claims to be preparing legislation to expand federal funding for carbon capture technology, but his legislation ignores cutting greenhouse gas emissions. Sounds nice in theory, but carbon capture technology, at best, can be used as a piece of the puzzle in our fight against climate change. Any realistic attempts to do something about climate change MUST include cutting greenhouse gas emissions. Carbon capture technology is just not a silver bullet, not at this stage, and almost certainly not at any stage.
And then we get to one of the real reasons, the GOP has been so blisteringly shortsighted and idiotic when it comes to even acknowledging that human driven climate change is occurring, much less actually getting off their asses to do something about it: "We can do this without passing new taxes or huge new job killing regulations." That’s some Grade-A right-wing framing right there folks.
First off, taxes and regulations aren't the most evil things in existence. They're the effing price of civilization. I for one don't want to live in some libertarian fantasy land where there are no taxes and no regulations. That's straight up dystopian nightmare fuel, despite how much the GOP and their benefactors in the 1% salivate at that prospect.
Second, combating climate change will take a monumental effort by all Americans. We have to treat this effort the moon landing of our time. That's how big it is. I'm not prepared to summarily take any potential solution off the table, but I also want our nation to be accurately informed about the costs and benefits of those potential solutions. Summarily labeling entire potential methods of combating climate change as off limits because they might require "new taxes" or "job killing regulations" is rank bullshit, and shows that whoever is making that statement is not actually concerned with effectively combating climate change.
We desperately need leaders who take this issue seriously, but once again "Big John" comes up well short and proves again that he’s “all hat, no cattle” as we Texans are fond of saying.
Additional Note- If you want to find some real experts in the field, I’d recommend looking up Michael E. Mann and Katherine Hayhoe. Both are world-renowned, and are exactly the type of folks we need leading the discussion about how to effectively combat climate change.