Is The Climate Crisis Important Enough To You So That It Will Help Determine Who You Vote For In 2020?

Mike Siegel, the progressive candidate running for the Austin-to-Houston area corridor seat (TX-10) shakily occupied by Trump enabler Michael McCaul, put the above video together as part of his campaign to bring Texans along on the Green New Deal. It's worth listening and watching. About a month ago, Mike did a guest post here about the Climate Crisis town-hall he organized for September 21 and how environmental, labor and youth groups can work together to pass this existential program. From deep in the heart of Texas-- and in a district that includes part of the oil patch, Mike has been telling voters that "We must transition from a fossil fuel economy, and provide new opportunities for American workers. Climate change results from humans burning coal, oil and natural gas, combined with deforestation and other causes. On a planet with billions of people, and ever-increasing human development, we need our federal government to take the lead, to reduce carbon emissions and chart a path toward sustainability. We also know our economy is in trouble. A handful of billionaires control as much wealth as half the country. We’ve lost good jobs, in manufacturing and other industries, that allowed workers to support their families. Too many of us are working nonstop, for little pay, and are barely scraping by. The Green New Deal addresses both the environment and the need for good jobs. Let’s use the power of our government to build a healthier future. Let’s invest in renewable energy, and put Americans to work in the process. Let’s make our homes more energy efficient; let’s clean up polluted waterways and industrial areas; let’s create industries inside the United States that will meet the needs of the 21st century. Let's pass a Green New Deal!."

Many Democrats are afraid to be so straight forward with voters. It's what's wrong with politicians. And, in part, it's why we're so enthusiastic about wanting to help Mike get into Congress. Please click on the Take Back Texas thermometer on the right and chip in to his grassroots campaign. The DCCC had recruited a conservative Democrat to run against Mike, before he can take on McCaul.

This week, CNN hosted a 7 hour Climate Crisis discussion for the Democratic 2020 candidates. Even before the forum, Bernie had urged all the other candidates to follow his lead and pledge to ban fracking. Bernie was widely seen as the "winner" of the CNN event and, as expected, the loser was Status Quo Joe, whose campaign theme has been "Nothing Will Fundamentally Change" and who was in a hurry to get the forum finished so he could prepare for a big money fundraiser with his fracking backers.

Biden sympathizer Jeff Greenfield, writing for Politico reported that "for former Vice President Joe Biden, it was a not-quite debate with an unhappily familiar quality: a well-planned attack that left him grasping for an explanation. As with other criticisms of Biden, it may or may not have been fair. But the Democratic front-runner remains a continuing target of opportunity that he seems ill-prepared to defend. The question came from Isaac Larkin, a doctoral student at Northwestern University and a Bernie Sanders supporter, who began by referencing a study that demonstrated a 40-year history on the part of fossil fuel giants like ExxonMobil and Gulf to hide the baleful effects of carbon on global temperatures. Then he asked: 'How can we trust you to hold these corporations accountable when you are holding a high-dollar fundraiser held by Andrew Goldman, a fossil fuel executive?'... Goldman, a co-founder of Western LNG, a natural gas production company based in Houston, Texas, is co-hosting one of two high-dollar fundraisers Biden will attend in New York on Thursday. Western’s major project is a floating production facility off the northern coast of British Columbia designed to provide Canadian gas to markets in northeast Asia. Goldman and Biden have deep ties: Goldman served as an adviser to Biden while he was in the Senate and was the Northeast director of finance for Biden’s 2008 campaign." As usual, Biden fumbled and stumbled and was unable to answer the question or to communicate any kind of a vision for combatting the Climate Crisis. Vox compared his pathetic performance to Bernie: "At the forum, Sanders benefited from following Biden, who was as rambling and unfocused as he has been this whole campaign season. By contrast, Sanders was sharp and on-message, with easy command over the details of his plan. And the more intimate setting allowed Sanders moments of quiet reflection and-- especially in response to a question about fossil fuel workers-- real emotion."

Loser: Joe Biden

Compared to Warren and Sanders, the former vice president and current Democratic frontrunner didn’t offer a clear vision on climate. Biden gave long and often rambling answers about his climate plan, noting that climate groups gave it a “B+ or beyond.” He declined to join some of his opponents in supporting a nationwide ban on fracking. And he kept returning to the point that his experience talking to world leaders as Obama’s vice president would help him build an international climate coalition. In doing so, Biden seemed to suggest that whatever the US did to decarbonize ultimately wouldn’t matter if the rest of the world didn’t follow the lead.

“The fact of the matter is that we make up 15 percent of the problem. The rest of the world makes up 80, 85 percent of the problem,” Biden said. “If we did everything perfectly-- and we must and should in order to get other countries to move-- we still have to get the rest of the world to come along and the fact of the matter is we have to up the ante considerably.”

If you'd like to read Bernie Climate Change plank you can find it here. In an introduction to it, his campaign wrote that "The climate crisis is not only the single greatest challenge facing our country; it is also our single greatest opportunity to build a more just and equitable future, but we must act immediately. Climate change is a global emergency. The Amazon rainforest is burning, Greenland’s ice shelf is melting, and the Arctic is on fire. People across the country and the world are already experiencing the deadly consequences of our climate crisis, as extreme weather events like heat waves, wildfires, droughts, floods, and hurricanes upend entire communities, ecosystems, economies, and ways of life, as well as endanger millions of lives. Communities of color, working class people, and the global poor have borne and will bear this burden disproportionately. The scientific community is telling us in no uncertain terms that we have less than 11 years left to transform our energy system away from fossil fuels to energy efficiency and sustainable energy, if we are going to leave this planet healthy and habitable for ourselves, our children, grandchildren, and future generations. As rising temperatures and extreme weather create health emergencies, drive land loss and displacement, destroy jobs, and threaten livelihoods, we must guarantee health care, housing, and a good-paying job to every American, especially to those who have been historically excluded from economic prosperity. The scope of the challenge ahead of us shares similarities with the crisis faced by President Franklin Delano Roosevelt in the 1940s. Battling a world war on two fronts-- both in the East and the West-- the United States came together, and within three short years restructured the entire economy in order to win the war and defeat fascism. As president, Bernie Sanders will boldly embrace the moral imperative of addressing the climate crisis and act immediately to mobilize millions of people across the country in support of the Green New Deal. From the Oval Office to the streets, Bernie will generate the political will necessary for a wholesale transformation of our society, with support for frontline and vulnerable communities and massive investments in sustainable energy, energy efficiency, and a transformation of our transportation system. We need a president who has the courage, the vision, and the record to face down the greed of fossil fuel executives and the billionaire class who stand in the way of climate action. We need a president who welcomes their hatred. Bernie will lead our country to enact the Green New Deal and bring the world together to defeat the existential threat of climate change."

That's not Joe Biden. And we need a Congress filled with men and women like Mike Siegel aware of what the problem is and how to solve it. Right now, disgracefully, just 94 House Democrats-- out of 235-- have signed on as co-sponsors to AOC's Green New Deal Resolution-- and that number includes fakers who don't believe it in but are just afraid of primary opponents. This is especially off because all of the Democrats running for Congress backed by Blue America and other progressive groups, are backing the Green New Deal and, like Mike Siegel, campaigning on it.