With The Green Parties Sweeping To New Heights In Europe, It's Important To Understand That The U.S. Equivalent Is NOT The Democratic Party-- At Least Not Yet

MD-05 primary voters will choose between a Climate denier and a Climate activist

On Memorial Day, the NY Times ran an important story by Coral Davenport and Mark Landler that has gone largely unseen, Trump Administration Hardens Its Attack on Climate Science. They make the point that Trump rolled back environmental regulations, pulled the U.S. out of the Paris climate accord, brushed aside dire predictions about the effects of climate change, and turned the term 'global warming' into a punch line rather than a prognosis. But what they're planning is even worse:

In the next few months, the White House will complete the rollback of the most significant federal effort to curb greenhouse-gas emissions, initiated during the Obama administration. It will expand its efforts to impose Mr. Trump’s hard-line views on other nations, building on his retreat from the Paris accord and his recent refusal to sign a communiqué to protect the rapidly melting Arctic region unless it was stripped of any references to climate change.

The U.S. Geological Survey, now controlled by Trump appointee James Reilly, widely considered the least intelligent of all the former astronauts, "has ordered that scientific assessments produced by that office use only computer-generated climate models that project the impact of climate change through 2040, rather than through the end of the century, as had been done previously." The purpose is to distort assessments of the future impact of climate change "because the biggest effects of current emissions will be felt after 2040."

In our radio segment yesterday, David Feldman and I discussed the shocking electoral success Green parties had across Europe in Sunday's elections. All the polling predicted immense gains for the Trumpist neo-fascist extremists and none had so much as mentioned the Greens. Other than in Italy, where there appears to be a genuine craving for another Mussolini-- Trump, amigo Matteo Salvini-- the neo-fascists made much smaller gains than predicted. And the big story was the unexpected victories of the Greens. Not a factor in an Italy and Austria, each bent on re-embracing fascism, nor in Hungary and Poland, where fascism has already taken root, the Greens vaulted into second place in Germany and third place in France, stunned Spain by picking up 4 of the country's 54 seats, gained another 4 U.K. seats as younger voters abandoned Labour, and picked up both EU Parliament seats and local council seats in Ireland. In fact the Green Party candidate, Ciarán Cuffe, came in first in Dublin-- by far, beating the Fine Gael candidate 63,849 to 16,473.

What Feldman wanted to know was if this Green success in Europe meant progressives would have more success in the U.S. That calls for a nuanced response. First of all-- other than on environment and Climate-- Greens aren't necessarily progressive in Europe. The sharp rise in Green voters across the better-educated countries of Europe was primarily caused by two factors. First of all voters under 40 have been growing exasperated that the mainstream right-of-center and left-of-center parties that dominate most of Europe have virtually ignored their growing concerns about the effects of Climate Change (so, same as here). But what happened Sunday was coincident with anger towards the mainstream parties on may unrelated issues-- Brexit, for example.

The politicization of young people over Climate issues is probably as strong in America as in Europe. But in Europe Green parties have been building political machines for decades. That hasn't been the case in the U.S., where Climate activists have been struggling to gain a significant foothold inside a Democratic Party that is riven with grotesque corruption and a geriatric leadership that is two generations away from "getting" the problem. In the advanced European countries the Green Party is now mainstream. Their ideas are catching fire within the Democratic Party, but the party leadership still sees those ideas as a fad. Dinosaurs like Hoyer, Clyburn and Pelosi will have to die off-- at least politically-- before those ideas and that energy came overcome opposition from the younger leaders handpicked by the older leaders to replicate themselves-- whether a Hakeem Jeffries, a Ben Ray Luján or a Cheri Bustos. When AOC took out the designated Democratic leadership's successor to Pelosi, Joe Crowley, reeking of corruption (now a scumbag lobbyist), she struck the loudest political chord for Climate ever heard in this country.

As we saw last night, one of the most potent weapons Steny Hoyer's primary opponent, Briana Urbina, is wielding against him is his own stubborn and clueless refusal to understand the urgency of dealing with Climate Change. Urbina is in her 30's; in 2 weeks Hoyer will turn 80. His home-- and K Street-- will be underwater before he groks the crucial nature of Climate Change.

Heather Grabbe, director of the Open Society European Policy Institute, a think tank, explained that "Neoliberalism has triumphed in economic policy, with both the center-right and center-left adopting it. And then the economic crisis came along... The left did not provide alternatives." Huge numbers of German voters told exit-polling firms that Climate and the environment were their top concern as they made their final decision about who to vote for. In Germany that benefited the Green Party, which took 21% of the vote while the Social Democrats (the German equivalent of the Democrats) took 15.6% and the CDU (the German equivalent of the pre-Trump Republicans) took 28.7%.

If Germany has a politician who is their version of Trump, it would be the disgusting Alexander Gauland, head of the neo-Nazi Alternative for Germany (AfD). After the elections he recognized that it was neither the CDU nor the Social Democrats but the Greens who he called "our main enemy." Aside from hating Muslims, Jews, and foreigners, the AfD hates Science and denies man-made Climate Change.

Out of 235 Democrats in Congress, only 93 have signed on as co-sponsors to AOC's Green New Deal Resolution, several of whom are non-believers, just trying to avoid primary defeats. Not even all the members of the Congressional Progressive Caucus have signed on-- not to mention Pelosi, Hoyer and Clyburn-- and the resolution is being actively opposed by the increasingly powerful Republican wing of the Democratic Party (the Blue Dogs and New Dems). Progressive leaders like Pramila Jayapal, Ro Khanna, Ted Lieu, Raul Grijalva, Barbara Lee, Jan Schakowsky, Jamie Raskin, Jim McGovern (MA), Mark Pocan and Judy Chu are on-board, but of all those dozens of freshman members, just 10 are cosponsors besides AOC-- Rashida Tlaib (MI), Ayanna Pressley (MA), Mike Levin (CA), Joe Neguse (CO), Chuy Garcia (IL), Debbie Mucarsel-Powell (FL), Deb Haaland (NM), Veronica Escobar (TX), Lori Trahan (MA) and Jahana Hayes (CT).

First-time voters in Germany overwhelmingly picked the Green Party as their TOP choice on Sunday. Why should they pick the Democrats while Pelosi, Hoyer and Clyburn-- practically, and effectively, Climate Change deniers-- lead it in Congress, not to mention Status Quo Joe?