It’s Getting Hot In Here

We have entered a new phase of global warming politics, where policies are being fought over at a federal level that will have serious ramifications on the economy, environment, and the viability of various industries. Unfortunately, the current vehicle and the way the debate has been framed has been divisive within the climate movement. The Lieberman-Warner Climate Security Act has been fracturing many of the traditional green groups, but in something we haven’t been noting as much - it has also been fracturing many in the corporate and business world.

The Climate Security Act, as it stands now, does not meet scientific tests or climate principles - such as the 1Sky Principles. The green groups know this - but they have divided along various lines - some fighting from the outside to make it much stronger or kill it and return next year with something better (such as Friends of the Earth and their Fix or Ditch Campaign), while others are trying to use their advocacy teams to strengthen it from within (Such as NRDC). This is how politics are played…but politics without principle isn’t worth much.

Recently, there have been some very bitter debates, within this community and elsewhere, around issues such as carbon capture and sequestration, the role of emissions allowances, and the targets of the bill.

However, if we can rally around some common principles that we can agree to fight for, even if we take different strategies - perhaps we can cool down a little bit.

Comprehensive Climate Policy should (IMHO - please comment if you want to modify them):

• Solve the Problem: Meet Science-based reduction levels
• Fund the Future: Promote the development and deployment of clean technology and design
• Green Justice: Create green collar jobs in communities that have been marginalized
• Economic Justice: Not be an undue burden upon low-income and working families
• Environmental Justice: reduce complementary pollutants and impacts from dirty energy

There are many forces at play in federal climate policy and the big green groups that have been fighting a rearguard action for years are scared but excited at the progress they have made over the last few years. We need to shift the political reality on the ground, because we aren’t going the get the change we need in Washington without a political shift.

What I think we worry about is if in the political meatgrinder that is Washington DC (which I have had around 20 years of experience in) will cause our advocates on the hill to compromise too much, too early, and set us back for precious years we don’t have.

However, the schedule is getting tight and despite what many groups say…the simple fact is that any bill worth a damn will get vetoed by bush. The real value of Lieberman-Warner is that we are finally realizing that climate legislation is complex and getting these issues aired is essential. But it will only be valuable if we can rally around a common set of principles and decide instead of fighting all the time and casting suspicion at each other - we can have different roles and that we should build some trust among each other. Continue reading ‘Climate Policy Heats Up: So what are some principles to stay cool?’

So, if you are regular reader of It’s Getting Hot in Here, you may have noticed that I have been a little absent recently. Why, you might ask, as what could be more exciting than sharing information with the youth climate movement? Well, I have been working on a project behind-the-scenes that I want to share with you all.

I have been working on launching Fired Up Media. Let me take you for a spin. Fired Up Media just won Project Slingshot for our Youth Action TV proposal, so we are terrifically excited and want to tell all of you about what we are doing!

What is Fired Up Media? Fired Up Media is a growing network of videographers, editors, and journalists reporting from the front lines of the youth climate movement and disseminating through the Fired Up Virtual Newsroom. The network has grown out the diverse media projects of the youth climate movement, such as It’s Getting Hot in Here, I Shot Power Shift, and CSSC TV.

Fired Up Media is harnessing dynamic advances in digital communications and new media, creative social entrepreneurship, and existing youth media on and off-campus to build a revolutionary media network. Read more here.

What do we do? Fired Up Media is launching two major projects this summer, Fired Up: Youth Action TV and Fired Up Africa.

Read more after the fold.

Continue reading ‘Introducing Fired Up Media’

I have been listening to the Breakthrough Institute and Joe Romm from Climate Progress bickering over a recent Nature article about the magnitude of carbon emissions cuts required and if our current path will get us to where we desperately need to go. Unfortunately, we seem to have constructed a circular firing squad, again, magnified by the hostile rhetoric tossed around. The real problem we have is that we are hitting a discontinuous period, one that we will live our lives in, one that is “Off-the-Charts”. Under Business-as-Usual, carbon emissions go through the roof and we stew in our own effluent. However, declining availability of conventional fossil fuels will raise both their price and the impact on the environment per unit of energy delivered. The problem is NOT Peak Oil, but rather Peak Habitat (for Humanity).

Then, we have the astounding growth in population (which is leveling off), in development, in the spread of information technology, the spread of pandemic disease, in the spread of low-cost weaponry and transnational criminal organizations, in the mapping of the human brain and the manufacturing of biological organisms, and of course the understanding of physics and nanotechnology. Head spinning yet? Continue reading ‘Give Me a Break’

Editor’s Note: This is a guest post by Ted Glick

Three weeks ago in a Future Hope column I wrote about how similar Obama and Clinton are when it comes to positions on issues. That hasn’t changed. But I also said this:

“It may be that if Obama becomes President, the political forces he has unleashed—particularly among young people and the African American community—will come to constitute a progressive political bloc that, by means of independent pressure from below, will make it difficult for him to accommodate to the conservative and corporate interests—with whom he has significant connections—who will undoubtedly lean on him.”

I’ve been thinking more and more about this, and I know that other activists who have the same distrust of the Democrats—distrust based on a great deal of empirical evidence and bitter experience—are doing the same. Last night, for example, I heard Amiri Baraka, a leading radical African American activist, articulate the reasons why he believed the progressive movement should get behind Obama.

Then there was the Obama quote in this week’s issue of Newsweek. Asked what he wants to accomplish by the end of his Presidency, he said “end(ing) the war. . .universal health care . . . and we will have a bold energy agenda that drastically reduces our emissions of greenhouse gases while creating a green engine that can drive growth for many years to come.” Continue reading ‘Obama vs. Clinton: A Second Thought’

What Can the New President do from Day One on Global Warming?

This is a question that will probably get asked more and more, especially as the election season heats up and campaigns like 1Sky, Green for All, and a new entry: OnDayOne, launch. But the question has enormous ramifications, particularly in the wake of the Bali climate conference, where it was so obvious how the power of the presidency can shape foreign policy, even in the face of a hostile Congress. The question is wrapped up in questions of political capital, whether the winning candidate campaigned on global warming and has a ‘mandate’, or what the actual limits of legal authority the executive branch has on these issues.

However, as soon as you start thinking about what a new president can do, especially in light of the executive activism from the Bush Administration on the behalf of Big Coal, Big Oil, the Nuclear Industry, and the most reactive voices of industry …. a plethora of options become obvious. A new president could reverse the rule change that allowed coal companies to continue mountain top removal mining and to dump their waste in mountain streams and valleys. A new president could follow Speaker Pelosi’s lead and sign an executive order calling for the federal government to go carbon neutral and green the world’s largest building and vehicle stock in the world. Heck, the post office could raise rates on junk mail and reduce it dramatically overnight. A major issue would be granting California the waiver under the Clean Air act, that they requested and were denied under shady conditions to reduce greenhouse emissions from cars and trucks.

While all of these measures would be wonderful, the three major things the president can do are much more far reaching.

1. Under the Masschusetts vs. EPA Supreme Court Decision, under existing law - the president is required to come up with regulations on global warming pollutants. [Note: The best resource on the web for this is Warming Law, bar none.]
2. The President can direct his negotiators to engage in the UN climate process and stop blocking efforts by the EU and China from making progress in building a global agreement with teeth.
3. The President can finally use the power of the presidency and the Bully pulpit to finally end our oil addiction. [Note: see section of David Sandalow's book - "Freedom From Oil: How the Next President Can End the United States' Addiction to Oil"] Continue reading ‘What Can a New President do from Day One on Global Warming?’

During the Bali Negotiations, youth from around the world took the stage to speak a simple truth to the delegates at Bali. In a press conference convened in conjunction with UNICEF, youth spoke about the effects of climate change on their homes, the need for action, and the formation of a global youth movement.

Check out the UNICEF Video:

[Editor's Note: The post - Whatever It Takes: Beyond Nonviolence generated a large amount of debate and so I wanted to respond to it - this post may not make too much sense without reading that one and the comments it generated.]

I want to bring up something that I think should always be remembered and is one of the most important lessons of human history.

Violence begets Violence.

Sometimes violence is unavoidable, when it is brought to you - as in the example of the Warsaw ghetto used by Evan in his comments for his post “Whatever It Takes: Beyond Nonviolence“. Sometimes, violence is the result of when all other options are exhausted, as we see in Nigeria among the poisoned and abused populations around energy extraction impacted areas. But violence begats violence - it degrades the spirit of the aggressor and degrades the body of the victim.

In the United States, we are committing violence upon the atmosphere - the biosphere - and those who are victimized by our emissions. But WE are the aggressors, primarily, rather than the victims in the global system.
Continue reading ‘Violence Begets Violence’

I am sitting here writing this post, listening to Al Gore give his speech at the UN Climate Negotiations. It has been a long trip here and despite the schedule and the heat I am still excited. We were sitting in the audience, talking with Kevin Knobloch from UCS and watching Kelley trying to talk with the US representative Paula Dobriansky…but we are all here to listen to Al Gore.

I was surprised to hear him lead with a reference from the Holocaust, but it is one that hits home. How we can ignore those who are the harbingers of the threat of climate change. People can ignore stories, of thsoe people like Claire Antrea - who is a young nun from Kiribati and whose home is being flooded. That these threats are coming for us and the sense of urgency must come from the factthe science is changing so fast that none of us, even in the developed world can assume we are safe.

Powerful idea and one that seems to be coming true. I will turn back to the speech, but I hoped you might be interested in a window onto the conference here in Bali.