The Live Earth concerts this weekend showed an amazing outpouring of concern and ideas for stopping global warming. Watching, I found myself enraged and embarrassed that my country could be the world's worst offender in omitting greenhouse gases and my government could remain so resistant to taking even relatively small steps to address the climate crisis.
Even if Congress were to pass strong measures to curb greenhouse gas emissions this year--which is no guarantee, with folks like John Dingell (D-Auto Industry) writing initial bill language--I worry that we'll still be too slow to prevent major economic and ecological tremors. And I know that most Americans, for several years, have wanted action from Congress on global warming. It hasn't happened.
So the question is, how can we get a Congress that will act on global warming?
First, you need a compelling reason to act, but we're well past that point: as glaciers and polar ice caps melt, global temperatures rise in a feedback loop that accelerates the warming, leading to more volatile weather systems including storms and draughts, altered ecosystems, potential animal extinctions and crop failures, and rising sea levels that could jeopardize entire countries' populations. Check.
Second, you need public will. You need the people to want change, to demand action, to even make sacrifices in order to help solve the problem. We reached that point several years ago as well, and polling from the New York Times this spring (subscription req'd) shows that we're in the supermajority range:
Ninety percent of Democrats, 80 percent of independents and 60 percent of Republicans said immediate action was required to curb the warming of the atmosphere and deal with its effects on the global climate. Nineteen percent said it was not necessary to act now, and 1 percent said no steps were needed.
No doubt the Live Earth concerts made the point and highlighted the ways in which people, regardless of their government, are already making lifestyle changes to reduce their carbon footprint.
According to civics classes, that's enough: a compelling issue and the public will for our representatives to do something about it.
But nothing has happened in Congress. A handful of states have stepped up and passed laws to help curb global warming emissions, but we haven't raised fuel efficiency standards for cars, haven't cleaned and weaned ourselves from dirty coal-fired power plants, haven't... done... anything.
That's because of the third necessity, the third rail of politics: the incredible influence of the powerful special interests whose short-term profits rely on inaction towards the climate crisis. These interests dump, literally, tens of millions of dollars into fighting against any action to curb greenhouse gas emissions: the coal mining industry ($27 million since 1996), the electric utility industry ($94 million), the oil and gas industries ($151 million), and the auto industry ($94 million), collectively known as the "carbon lobby."
While these powerful special interests groups defend their right to pollute with hundreds of millions of dollars in campaign contributions and lobbying in Washington, the world gets warmer, and more carbon dioxide lodges in our atmosphere, ensuring that the problem will get worse before it gets better. Now more than ever, we need a Congress that can and will act to stop global warming.
The only way we'll have such a Congress is by eliminating the influence of the carbon lobbyists, and by removing the political campaign cash that they wield to influence our elected officials. The way to do this is through full public funding of campaigns for Congress, for state legislatures, for Governors, for city councils. If an elected official were responsible solely to the voters of his/her district and not to the powerful interests who could fund an expensive campaign, he/she could do the will of the people even when it comes into conflict with special interest wealth.
The will of the people is to fight global warming. I can only hope that we continue to build the public outcry for action and, simultaneously, enact full public funding of campaigns for Congress, via the Fair Elections Now Act, to make sure that our leaders don't waver.
