The Political Climate: an ongoing commentary on the NH Primary and Climate Change

January 11.  Wow.  This place looks like a summer camp shut down after the season ends.  Torn Tancredo yard signs lay in the gutter. ‘Stop Global Warming’ yard signs stuck in piles of dirty snow, leaning against the rain (and its thundering, now, in January, in New Hampshire).  

Will Smith would be right at home -  they could have filmed I Am Legend in Portsmouth or Manchester now that everyone’s left town.  

Where’s everybody?  Bill Richardson’s dropped out and back home in New Mexico.  McCain has a toehold in the Palmetto State.  Romney has pulled ads from the Sunshine State in order to do battle in the Wolverine State.

How’d we do here in NH?  Science gave us a tip of the beany.  Time said a clear position on climate change was one of the 8 keys to winning NH -  putting this one issue in the same league as an endorsement from the Union Leader ! Wowee!!.

The blogosphere is choc-a-bloc with news about McCain’s global warming rhetoric in the final stretch to the gold medal (Apologies, Mittens for the lame link to the Olympics).  Here here and here for example.  And we’re stirring up the pot … here’s a sample of the emails we’ve received:

“With so many left leaning groups like yours pontificating on the global warming hoax, utilizing scare tactics based on junk science, and essentially endorsing the redistribution of wealth, we will lose our way of life.”

“Global Warming is a religion and a HOAX.  Do your own research and stop taking away American freedom and advocating the redistrubution of wealth to fund your religion.”

“Do you have any proof of any of these things occurring?  Do you think that you are educating people, or scaring them into throwing their money away?”
 

“Where were the suv’s and power companies when the dinosaurs and mastadons died and the glaciers that covered much of our nation melted?  This great earth and universe will continue to renew itself whether people populate this earth or not - so take a deep breath and exhale your carbon dioxide for the trees and plants - they need it to survive…”

Sticks and stones — but what are we to make of the wild reaction to McCain’s position?  People are ripping into him like he’s taking something away.  Freedom, baby.  IT’S MY RIGHT DRIVE MY YUKON TO PICK UP A GALLON OF MILK DOWN AT THE 7-11. 

Crazies out there.  Makes me want to fire up my two-stroke chain saw, take down some trees and build a fence …..  

Before Christmas, LCV was complaining that the media elite were dissing climate change and presidential politics.  If Russert, Stephanopoulos, and Couric won’t listen to LCV, maybe they will follow in the footsteps of one of their peers: The New York Times.

The New York Times editorial board decided to take a look at the candidates’ climate change positions in yesterday’s editorial “The One Environmental Issue.”  The editorial found that in past years Democratic and Republican strategists believed that climate change was “too complicated and forbidding an issue to sell to ordinary voters” and therefore was not an issue in 2000 or 2004 elections, but now they say, “the times have certainly changed.”

Of the Democrats, the editorial now says:

“Still, the country is a long way from a comprehensive response equal to the challenge. That is what the Democratic candidates are proposing. Senators Joseph Biden, Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama, former Senator John Edwards, Gov. Bill Richardson and Representative Dennis Kucinich have all offered aggressive plans that would go beyond the Senate bill and reduce emissions by 80 percent by midcentury (90 percent in Mr. Richardson’s case), much as called for in the United Nations reports.

Internationally, the Democrats say they would seek a new global accord on reducing emissions to replace and improve upon the Kyoto Protocol, which expires in 2012. Winning agreement among more than 180 nations will be slow-going, so several candidates, including Mrs. Clinton, have suggested jump-starting the process by bringing together the big emitters like China very early in their administrations.”

Two months ago, The New York Times first highlighted “the GOP Divide” on climate change after Mike Huckabee joined John McCain as the only Republicans to endorse a cap on carbon emissions.

This Times editorial described McCain as “authentic pioneer” in the senate on climate change, and “The other leading Republican candidates — Mitt Romney, Rudolph Giuliani, Fred Thompson, Mike Huckabee — talk about energy issues almost exclusively in the context of freeing America from its dependence on foreign oil. All promote nuclear power, embrace energy efficiency and promise greener technologies. Only Mr. Huckabee has dared raise the idea of government regulation, embracing, at least theoretically, the idea of a mandatory cap on emissions. The rest prefer President Bush’s cost-free and demonstrably inadequate voluntary approach, which essentially asks industry to do what it can to reduce emissions.”

When so much of the campaign news is focused on anything but the actual issues, it is refreshing to finally see national coverage of the climate issue and the presidential campaign.

Laura Knoy was anxious to talk with Gov. Richardson about his energy policy on “The Exchange” this morning saying “you and I could talk for 5 hours about this.”  Knoy lead the conversation off by noting that his policy calls for major investments in alternative energies and huge reductions in greenhouse gasses and asking how he plans to accomplish such goals.

Richardson responded that he’ll accomplish his goals with “an energy revolution; by mandates and by the congress and the president working together, and the American people joining too.”  Richardson then detailed familiar goals of reducing consumption of fossil fuels 50% , shifting to 30% clean energy sources and increasing fuel efficiency standards to 50mpg, all by 2020.  Richardson noted that his plan calls for energy efficiency, green buildings, schools, jobs etc. and says it’s a “massive revolution that the President has to lead.”

Knoy then asked Richardson about mass transit, noting that NH wants to expand 93 instead of building a commuter rail.  Richardson explained that under his leadership, New Mexico built a commuter rail between Albuquerque and Santa Fe that is energy efficient, cheaper and very popular among his constituents.

Knoy added her doubts saying that some Americans don’t want to take the train. She said that Americans want to drive their SUV’s and even joked with Richardson about owning one himself.  Richardson noted that he does have a flex fuel, ethanol SUV and a hybrid and touted his plan to pursue more fuel efficient vehicles that run on cleaner energy sources so that people can drive the vehicles they want.  He stated:

“You can have it both ways if we invest in technology, if we mandate the auto companies that don’t want to do anything because they’re worried about profits; they’re not doing well, they’re not being competitive.  Look at the other foreign companies in Europe and Japan, they’re moving competitively with more fuel efficient vehicles and they’re doing well and we’re just sitting here debating if we should go to 30 mpg, that’s pathetic, by the year 2020 we should be at 50!”

After clarifying that he is for cap and trade vs. a carbon tax, Richardson noted that he has cut taxes as Governor of New Mexico:

“I cut taxes in my state, I brought in solar energy companies, renewable energy companies by saying – if you come to my state and you pay over the prevailing wage, you train our people, I’ll give you tax incentives.  As a result, we’ve got a balance budget, we’ve got a surplus, we’ve got a state that is economically doing well and attracting new industries that are clean … That’s what I would do as president, give companies those incentives.”

Lastly, Knoy asked Richardson to clarify his position on nuclear power.  After noting that he’s not a fan of nuclear, Richardson said that he wouldn’t discard it completely, but rather “instruct all our national laboratories, our scientists to come up with scientific way to safely dispose of nuclear waste… we need to find a solution to the waste.”

Richardson then made sure to emphasize that his priorities lie with renewable energy sources:

“If I were going to give subsidies, and let me just say that I would, and tax incentives and investment, it would be to renewables because they’re cleaner, I think they’re technologically more promising, especially wind energy, and I would make a massive shift away from fossil fuels…nuclear does not emit GHG emissions but I think if you look at this energy bill they’re considering, there are all these little special deals for nuclear, why should they get it?  Why doesn’t solar get it? And wind and bio-mass and bio-fuels and bio-diesel and hydrogen and natural gas?  Those are cleaner.  Why are we so reliant on these companies and these energy companies that control our political process?”

The Democrats gathered last night in Las Vegas for another debate.  Once again, the cable network host du jour guided a debate more focused on candidate in-fighting than important issues like climate change.  CNN’s tragic tabloid coverage only allowed two of the seven candidates to discuss climate change.

Barack Obama and Bill Richardson were the only participants asked about energy related issues, specifically Nevada’s nuclear waste storage facility Yucca Mountain.  Read the entire transcript.

Obama made clear that he did not support Yucca Mountain and affirmed that nuclear is not our best energy option, but it has to be “part of our energy mix.”  Obama turned his attention to climate change and emissions reduction:

“We have a genuine crisis that has to be addressed and as president, I intend to address it, and here’s what we have to do. We have to, first of all, cap greenhouse gases, because climate change is real. And it’s going to impact Nevada and it’s impacting the entire planet.  That means that we’re going to have to tell polluters, we are going to charge you money when you send pollution into the air, that’s creating climate change. That money we can then reinvest in solar, in wind, in biodiesel, in clean coal technology and in superior nuclear technology.”

Moderator Wolf Blitzer followed up and pressured Obama on what he would do with nuclear waste assuming there is no scientific breakthrough for superior nuclear technology.

“Well, right now it is on site in many situations, and that is not the optimal situation, Wolf.”  Obama countered, “But don’t keep on assuming that we can’t do something. I mean, this is about the third time where you said, ‘assuming we can’t do it, what’s our option?’  Well, but I’m running for president because I think we can do it.”

Watch Obama’s response.

“Wolf, Wolf” inturupted Bill Richardson trying to get into the energy discussion near the end of Obama’s response.  Blitzer turned to Richardson with the Yucca Mountain question.  Richardson stated: “First, the future is renewable. It’s not oil, it’s not coal, it’s not nuclear.”  He assured the Nevada crowd that he was against Yucca Mountain as Energy Secretary and he is against Yucca Mountain as a presidential candidate.

Richardson took a minute to discuss his climate and energy plan: 

“There’s a technological solution, a scientific solution. What I would do, I would turn Yucca Mountain into a national laboratory. We have the greatest brains, our national lab scientists. We need to find a way to safely dispose of nuclear waste. There is a technological solution.

But while we do that, we shouldn’t be giving the nuclear power industry all of these advantages in the Senate bills that are coming forth, or subsidies. Oil, coal and nuclear are getting most of the subsidies.

We need an energy revolution in this country — to shift from fossil fuels to renewable sources by 50 percent by the year 2020. Eighty percent reduction of greenhouse emissions, a mandate.  We need to have 30 percent of our electricity renewable.

And it’s got to be also the American people — I’m going to say this honestly — sacrificing a little bit when it comes to appliances — and when it comes to being part of an energy efficiency revolution.”

Just as the climate discussion was heating up CNN’s Campbell Brown like totally changed course to question Senator Clinton about the ’boys club’ drama. 

SPOILER ALERT :)