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55 comments on The Speech I'd Like to Hear from a Presidential Candidate on Energy and Climate Change

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InJapan on June 19, 2008 - 11:23am Permalink | Subthread | Comments top

Climate Change as a political determiner is not an option. Polls have repeatedly shown that addressing climate change is not high on the list of matters that a voter wishes to have addressed, even if they fully accept that humans have a direct, partial cause to the climate changes we see now and expect in the future.

One may wonder how something so seemingly important can be discounted so greatly in the voting the booth. As Nate Hagens has repeatedly pointed out, humans highly discount the future. I propose that this is sufficient to explain the indifference the American voters have to this issue. Annual changes are too small to be obvious, and by the time one adds up 7 or 8 decades of changes, when the net change really starts becoming very obvious, most of the present voters will be dead.

If humans lived to be 750 years old instead of just 75 we would approach this differently. Alas, our lifespans are long enough to cause the problem, but not long enough to do something about it.

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eogen on June 19, 2008 - 12:23pm Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top

InJapan is right that so far climate change has not been a voting issue. Polling shows broad awareness of the issue, but as of yet it does not have enough uumph behind it to give it serious play during elections.
But I take issue that this is going to continue indefinitely. One reason for apathy is the sense that destructive changes are uncertain and far off in the future. The penny hasn't dropped yet that changing climate is already disrupting our lives and costing us money right now. As droughts, floods, storms, and other weather extremes proliferate and worsen, more and more people will begin to wonder about the disease behind the symptoms, and then global warming's issue public will grow. It would help enormously if a presidential candidate took up the issue. Only if that happens will the political press take notice and they control the bulk of the media real estate during elections. Yes, a candidate would be taking a risk, but that's called leadership.

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Prof. Goose on June 19, 2008 - 12:33pm Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top

But Eugene, if energy continues to get more expensive, what happens to environmental activism, and more importantly, its efficacy?

Part of the meme over the last couple of days in the media is that expensive oil/commodities is cutting into environmental movement's "oxygen..." Doesn't that continue to be the case...even after demand destruction kicks in?

Or does the 75% (I make the number up of course) of the shared agenda of energy and climate push forward, but with energy taking the lead because of its ability to affect short-term salience--whereas climate is tough to "see"?

Edited to add--my "75%" idea might have been inspired by Heinberg's piece on Bridging Peak Oil and Climate Change Activism.

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eogen on June 19, 2008 - 12:55pm Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top

Yes, we are at a fork in the road, and panic over oil prices could stampede politicians to toss environment under the bus (as evidenced by renewed efforts to open protected offshore sites and ANWR). It doesn't take much thought, however, to realize the folly of that path. After we've sacrificed every protected area, maybe (eight years from now) it slows the decline of domestic production, but it doesn't reverse it, and what then? The most likely scenario would be ever-increasing dependence on coal and the prospect of economic calamity in an overheated world. Let's hope that voters realize there is a shared agenda.
We've heard for decades that protecting the environment has become an American value, but so far it's been easy. Values only come to the surface when tested, and this one is about to face its biggest test ever.

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InJapan on June 19, 2008 - 9:58pm Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top

MIchael Tomasky and Rich Lowry briefly touch on the political reality of climate change on blogginheads today:

http://bloggingheads.tv/diavlogs/12072

They summarized the issue as one of abstraction (climate change many years in the future) vs. concreteness ($4 gasoline today.)

As for any synergy between peak oil movement and climate change movement - I believe that CTL alone blows any of that out of the water. With the EIA projecting CTL at several million barrels per day in future scenarios it looks likely that peak oil mitigation (if it goes down the CTL path, on top of radical expansion of tar sand development) will make CO2 reduction impossible.

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liferaft on June 19, 2008 - 12:45pm Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top

From a poll conducted 6/6 thru 6/9 by NBC-WSJ. Issues registered voters think should be the top priority of the federal government ranked in order of highest percentage:

Job creation and economic growth ...............27%
The war in Iraq ................................24%
Energy and the cost of gas .....................18%
Health care .................................... 8%
Terrorism ...................................... 6%
Illegal immigration ............................ 5%
The environment and global warming ............. 4%

Pretty much confirmation of your view. It is their pocketbook that is primarily driving the concerns of American voter.

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eogen on June 19, 2008 - 1:00pm Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top

Actually, that's not as bad as it looks since the question is the top priority of the gov. Env. and global warming are only 2% behind terrorism. As I understand it, once an issue gets more than about 11% behind it as a primary factor in determining a vote it has arrived. To repeat, some leadership by a candidate could help close that gap.

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Prof. Goose on June 19, 2008 - 1:10pm Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top

Yep, and when you do a "stacked" issue set by perceived importance, environment often falls way down (I have seen it as low as 15th on some Pew polls).

Also not surprisingly, energy/gasoline has really moved up in its primacy over the past few weeks--when energy was cheap, it was much lower of course.

http://www.pollingreport.com/prioriti.htm (pollingreport.com is a good source for this stuff, as is pollster.com)

USA Today/Gallup Poll. Feb. 8-10, 2008. N=1,016 adults nationwide. MoE ± 3.

"Now I am going to read a list of some of the issues that will probably be discussed in this year’s presidential election campaign. As I read each one, please tell me how important the candidates' positions on that issue will be in influencing your vote for president: extremely important, very important, somewhat important, or not important. How about [see below]?"

Extremely/Very Important %

The economy 89
The situation in Iraq 87
Education 81
Corruption in government 79
Health care 79
Energy, including gas prices 79
Terrorism 77
Social Security 73
The federal budget deficit 73
Moral values 69
Medicare 69
Taxes 69
The environment, including global warming 62
Illegal immigration 60

Leadership is key to keeping an issue salient, but so's the news... :(

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55 comments on The Speech I'd Like to Hear from a Presidential Candidate on Energy and Climate Change

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