Opinion by James Taylor
When democratic socialist Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) formally introduced a congressional resolution for a “Green New Deal,” Republicans were handed a powerful, unexpected political gift. Leave it to weak-minded congressional Republicans to find a way to screw it up.
The Green New Deal would re-make the United States via a “new national, social, industrial, and economic mobilization on a scale not seen since World War II and the New Deal.” Those aren’t just empty words. The free-market American Action Forum conducted an economic analysis of the Green New Deal and found it would cost as much as $94 trillion, or approximately $780,000 per U.S. household. The green-energy components alone would cost as much as $12.3 trillion.
Ocasio-Cortez’s asserted justification for the Green New Deal is a mythical U.S.-caused global warming crisis. She and Al Gore tell us the “science is settled,” yet global temperatures have risen less than half as much as U.N. climate models predicted, and almost exactly by as much as global warming “skeptics” have long predicted.
Moreover, during the past 150 years, as Earth emerged from the Little Ice Age, the warming climate has brought immeasurable benefits that continue today, including record crop yields, a significant increase in global plant life, and a reduction in persistently cool temperatures that kill 20 times more people than higher temperatures. At the same time, extreme weather and climate events have become less frequent and severe in recent decades.
Despite all this, a small number of congressional Republicans are vigorously pushing a Green New Deal-Lite. A Green New Deal is a wonderful thing, they say, so long as we just moderate it a little bit. Showing little daylight between themselves and Gore on climate alarmism, this cadre of Republicans is attempting to sell out President Donald Trump and his conservative voting base on the signature political issue of the day.
Just how foolish can these Republicans be? Much has been made of the 2018 midterm elections, but the most impactful lesson is that Republicans commit political suicide by embracing climate alarmism. Of the 198 House Republicans who didn’t belong to the congressional Climate Solutions Caucus, 177 (89 percent) of those seats remained Republican after the election. Of the 43 House Republicans belonging to the Climate Solutions Caucus, just 23 (53 percent) of those seats remained in Republican hands. Republicans who stayed true to their conservative base fared quite well in the midterms, while Republicans who sided with Gore on climate alarmism lost support from their political base.
Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.)—is drafting a “Green Real Deal” as a 10-percent-less alternative to Ocasio-Cortez’s Green New Deal. Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.) is calling for a “Manhattan Project” to force Americans to utilize expensive, unreliable energy sources.
The biggest difference between Ocasio-Cortez’s Green New Deal and Alexander’s “New Manhattan Project for Clean Energy” is that Ocasio-Cortez calls for a “moon shot” program and Alexander calls for a “Manhattan Project.” Big deal.
While Gaetz and Alexander claim to offer a better version of Ocasio-Cortez’s Green New Deal, the asserted differences are mere window dressing. Gaetz and Alexander emphasize that they would be more willing than Ocasio-Cortez to include nuclear power as part of their proposals.
Yet when the American Action Forum determined the Green New Deal’s energy components would cost Americans $12.3 trillion, AAF was already giving the Green New Deal the economic benefit of having nuclear power as a core component. Gaetz and Alexander’s Green Real Deal would still impose new government programs costing at least $8.1 trillion, or $68,000 per American household. By comparison, the entire federal budget in the 2017–18 fiscal year was merely $4.1 trillion.
Ultimately, Gaetz, Alexander, and their small cadre of Republican climate alarmists are seeking to undermine the conservative Republican voter base and Trump on one of his most important policy principles. Their betrayal of Trump and the conservative Republican base will almost certainly—and justly—come back to haunt them.
James Taylor is senior fellow for energy and environment policy at The Heartland Institute.
David Brower Quote:
Brower described the increasingly radical arch of his professional career to E magazine:
The Sierra Club made the Nature Conservancy look reasonable. I founded Friends of the Earth to make the Sierra Club look reasonable. Then I founded Earth Island Institute to make Friends of the Earth look reasonable. Earth First! now makes us look reasonable. We’re still waiting for someone else to come along and make Earth First! look reasonable.
http://www.activistfacts.com/person/3507-david-brower/
Well now we have AOC to make Earth First look reasonable!
Green (Wind) deal for our ports.
https://www.workboat.com/news/offshore/u-s-offshore-wind-industry-will-need-networked-ports/?utm_source=marketo&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=newsletter&utm_content=newsletter&mkt_tok=eyJpIjoiWTJaa1l6aGhOV1F6TkdSbCIsInQiOiJ0bkpxZnhjcVlGSzM1U05vdHN2azFwMWdzUTNGRDYxNkdRZmV2eW9zZFhDd0hrTElCWjQrT2p5VDMyT3hYTWdzdkhNWTZ6OFwvNDJDSktKWWRFeTVRbzZTWXUxSDMrUTl6T2RDczBEN0U4UENEbkFJWGE0QVVcLzdSc1B2UnlqXC9DVyJ9
This is why I voted 3rd party in the last 6 presidential elections. People say its a wasted vote but I say its a waste to vote for either of the main party crooks who you really don’t want.
I support President Trump 100%!
Won’t this be the obvious outcome of a two party system especially with people registering for D or R?
Is either/or really a choice?
Is now a good time for a sensible centrist party to be formed?
Maybe I shot down my own thoughts by using the word sensible…
These RINOS think if they just put the word “Market” into the proposal we will all roll over and ask them to rub our tummies.
Doesn’t matter to them that most people are only in the “market” because there is a government gun to your head.
It might help to start with the actual GOP proposal…
Pensacola News Journal
Whoo! so conservative you’d hardly know it had happened…
There’s not much in it for even me to disagree with.
I don’t know, David. There’s quite a bit to disagree with. Starting with #1 being a waste of time and resources, and continuing with the fact that wherever it says “investing” what it really means is “wasting taxpayer money on”. And that’s just for starters.
Use = enhanced oil recovery
First off, you ignore the carbon capture and storage part.
As for the carbon capture and use portion, we don’t need the federal government investing in something private enterprises are already doing.
Everyone is ignoring CCS without the U because it has no value. The only way to prolong coal-fired power plants is through carbon capture; which will only happen if the captured CO2 has tangible value.
The private sector is “already doing” CO2 EOR where it makes economic sense, very large oilfields with cheap access to CO2. To increase CO2 EOR, oil prices have to go up and/or costs have to go down. The Petra Nova project demonstrated that a relatively small “investment” can lower the cost of CO2 EOR.
CO2 EOR increases domestic oil production, maintains or even increases coal-fired power plant utilization and reduces current CO2 emissions. These are all stated objectives of the Trump administration.
“Everyone is ignoring CCS without the U because it has no value.” = “Starting with #1 being a waste of time and resources,”
As for “Use = enhanced oil recovery” that’s for the oil companies to pay for/deal with *NOT* the government and if it makes economic sense, the oil companies don’t need the government sticking their noses in making it less economical. Remember, we are talking about a government proposal here.
items 1, 6, 7, & 9 would be abused.
Similar to the clean water act & endangered species act, it would be abused and used simply as a tool toward means separate from the initial goal.
There is absolutely no reason, in this federation of states, to create a non-specific, but centralized, bunch of crap like this.
They could add a ban on clear cutting American forests for burning wood pellets in UK boilers.
There’s actually some good stuff in there, the problem is that there’s so much “green” crap mixed in there that the whole is unacceptable. A fixed version would look like this:
1. Deleted
2. Delete the part concerning unreliables (aka. “renewables”)
3. Gotta deal with our waste somehow, might as well figure out a way to put it to productive use.
4. “Storage”, at least if it means batteries, is unworkable on the scale needed, so dump that part – the rest is probably a good idea.
5. Keep, definitely.
6. Delete – “clean” energy is an oxymoron.
7. Delete, except for encouraging advanced nuclear.
8. Keep.
9. Delete.
10. Maybe keep.
11. Ditto.
12. Delete, expensive.
13. Delete.
14. Protecting the intellectual property of American innovators.
There, fixed – a realistic energy plan. 🙂
You only need to spend on beefing up the grid if you have more unreliable sources of power connecting to it, so that they can a) deliver power to areas of demand, and b) so that more distant dispatchable power can be used to cover renewables shortages, c) so you can dump renewables surpluses somewhere else, and d) so you can deal with the grid stabilisation required at higher renewables penetration (which is where batteries come in to some extent) – otherwise, it is largely a case of keeping it maintained with replacement investment, unless there is growing demand. Offshore wind is expensive.
Promoting building energy efficiency upgrades gave us the Grenfell Tower fire, where green with appalling economics trumped safe.
Population growth pretty much requires that the grid be “beefed up” to handle the additional demand, even if unreliables have no place on it… unless you assume that improved efficiency, both in delivering power and using it, will compensate for such growth.
Improving energy efficiency is generally a good thing, as long as it’s not too expensive to implement… if nothing else, it’ll lower the monthly impact on my bank account, which is always a good thing. 🙂
Population growth pretty much requires that the grid be “beefed up” to handle the additional demand
except for immigration (legal and otherwise) boosting the numbers, many parts of the US are actually declining in population
NATURAL GAS: Cat people
NUCLEAR: Dog people
GOP NATURAL GAS CRYPTO-ADVOCATES: “You all need to trade in your dogs for Teacup Terriers because they have a smaller carbon footprint. And because our cats can eat them.”
Some of the items on that list are fine (“nuclear energy, especially small modular reactors,” “plastics-to-fuel,” “energy development on federal lands”).
Some of the items on that list are wasteful and useless (“tax incentives for energy efficiency upgrades, including HVAC upgrades,” “challenge grants for universities to develop actionable plans for increasing resiliency and building adaptive capacity in urban and rural areas,” etc.).
Some of the items on that list are idiotic and destructive (“carbon capture storage,” “speedy… adoption of renewable energy including solar, wind,” etc.).
But the worst thing is the underlying false assumption that CO2 emissions are harmful, when the best evidence is that manmade climate change is modest and benign, and CO2 emissions are beneficial, rather than harmful.
Q: What do you get when you mix clean, fresh water with polluted water?
A: Polluted water.
This thing is irredeemably polluted.
If Republicans want to get involved in lowering CO2 emissions, they should confine themselves to promoting nuclear energy.
Their New Green Deal Lite should be: Whenever an ageing coal of natural gas plant needs replacing, it should be replaced by a modern nuclear reactor.
Their New Green Deal Lite should also promote advanced nuclear power designs for the future.
They should stay completely away from promotig windmills or industrial solar. Don’t touch it!
This way the Republicans have a workable plan they can present to the world that doesn’t require bird killers and the ruining of the beauty of the landscape.
Even I could get behind that plan. The Green New Deal Lite Republicans better wise up.
A good comparison to the Rhino Republicans is what happened to Alberta the last 12 years or so. The Alberta Conservatives had a few incompetent Premier’s such that it led to a split in the Conservative base and elected the socialist NDP 4 years ago. That only ended last night with a resounding vote to bring back the Alberta conservatives that are now mainly united. Alberta Party notwithstanding..grrr, which cost the Conservatives at least a half dozen seats. As soon as you start splitting the vote, then it can be over real quick, which is why the Federal Conservatives may still lose to Trudeau in October.
This is the biggest fear that the Republicans should have, in tearing themselves apart with a minority of Rhino republicans…especially since the Democrats are in the midst of creating a new third party by soon having to purge their radical socialist leftists. If the Democrats get their act together, while the Republicans divide themselves trying to be left of centre Republicans hoping to syphon off right of centre Democrats, then this is how they lose the Presidency.
Conservatives buy life insurance and plan carefully for potential future problems. We hope for the best but, if we have a choice, we don’t expect angels to rescue us when/if problems arise.
For a conservative/libertarian revenue-neutral bipartisan plan to reduce fossil fuel CO2 emissions with personal market choices by all American citizens, take a close look at H.R 763, which is currently making its way through a labyrinth of House committees.
The lower 70% of income brackets would receive more money in monthly dividend checks than they would pay in higher costs for goods and services, i.e., their carbon dividend minus carbon tax would be positive .
The top 30% of income brackets would receive exactly the same amount in monthly dividend checks as the lower 70%, but because on average they are responsible for more fossil fuel fuel emissions their monthly dividend checks would be less than the tax they pay for the increased cost of goods and services.
Before you say you have a bridge to sell me, read the bill at:
https://www.congress.gov/bill/116th-congress/house-bill/763
Sponsored and introduced by Rep. Ted Deutch [D-FL-22] on 01/24/2019
Cosponsored by Rep. Francis Rooney [R-FL-19] on 01/24/2019
The Carbon tax will cause prices to rise across the board.
So who will repay the taxpayers for all the extra expenses they incur because every price they pay for anything has increased because of the Carbon tax? I don’t think those extra expenses are covered in the Carbon tax bill. The poor ole consumers will just have to pay the higher prices.
The Carbon Tax is Dead on Arrival. No genuine conservative would support such a thing.
Yep… and the “carbon dividend” would be spent before it could be refunded to taxpayers.
And WHY should ANY Americans be forced by this democrat-socialist bill to pay ANY higher prices for goods and services and energy than today?
Ah – So the lower 70% get more money (er, get subsidized money from the minority to pay the majority)?
So the lower 70% are PAID by the minority by an unneeded democrat program to vote for the democrats to continue their subsidy?
Currently there is no scientific justification for any proposal for curbing carbon dioxide emissions as the climate models make no predictions.
The thing is it isn’t governance of a free country it is statist rule over society. There is no safety or future in that.
Political suicide for Republicans? What’s not to like? So long as they take One-Term_Trump with them.
Same goes for the other choice on the menu too.
Tis impossible to open the eyes of the blind, the ears of the deaf and those with broken minds led by ye whom have chosen the path of arrogant self service, deceit and political expedience.
john:2019
That is why people who haven’t voted in years came out of the woodwork to vote for Trump. He wasn’t an “Obama-lite” like Romney or the other past Republicans that lost. (A few, like Bush, even won.)
He campaigned on appealed to those in the woodwork.
No more PC cr*p. No more suppression of none PC freedoms. No more support of bogus science. NO MORE JUDGES WHO SEEM TO HAVE NEVER READ THE CONSTITUTION AND THE BILL OF RIGHTS who may not have ever heard of the Declaration of Independence.
(Sorry for the shout.)
There are big RINOS and little rinos. Weed them all out for the sake of all of us.
I Have been a climate skeptic since my first guest post here 2011 (when and why ‘woke’), and a political independent since corever.
But have become a Trumplican. Amazing how the two seem to overlap more and more.
We already had a “Manhattan Project” for green energy. It was called the Manhattan Project, and it gave us our greenest and statistically safest source of energy. It probably wouldn’t hurt to get a few examples of next generation nukes, such as Bill Gates traveling wave reactor up and running.
In my policy research I have found nuclear power to be less safe than we have been led to believe.
RINOs are why the GOP lost the House in 2018 elections.
When the GOP had the chance to fix the open-border crisis, repeal Obamacare, and end the wasteful alt-en/bio- fuel federal subsidies, they folded like a cheap suit.
Until these idiotic RINOs are drummed out of the party, the GOP will continue drift Left.
Drum them out and the Democrats will win by shear numbers, as it is a two party system and they have no where else to go.
Have you looked at the Democrat party lately, they have no more use for the RINOs than Republicans do. Heck they’re threatening to primary their own centrists. Anyone who isn’t far left isn’t welcome in the Donkey party.
“RINOs are why the GOP lost the House in 2018 elections.”
Yes, and it didn’t help that 40+ Republican incumbents decided not to run for office again. One has to wonder if all the controversy surrounding Trump during that time didn’t influence these decisions. If so, the Democrats were successful with their attacks on Trump. They managed to swing the House to themselves by telling lies about Trump. I think it’s going to swing back in 2020 because there is a lot of disgust out there with the way the Democrats have been behaving. I’ve had several Democrats tell me they were so disgusted with the Democrats that they were changing their political registration because they no longer wanted to be associated with Democrats.
Now it’s time for Trump to attack back. He’s exonerated and the Obama administration is guilty as hell. Trump will expose the truth of these matters and it’s not going to look good for a lot of Obama administration officials. I can hardly wait!
Republicans seem very experienced and polished at “Political Suicide”.
Progressive Republicans want to be loved by the Leftwing News Media. So they cow-tow to them and to their political ideas.
We see the reason progressive Republicans pander to the Leftwing. Because if they didn’t, they would get the same treatment Trump gets from the Leftwing News Media and noone wants that. So, out of fear of being attacked, progressive Republicans hold their fire and go along to get along. It’s kind of pathetic really.
“Signature political issue of the day?” Where? As in what planet?
Every poll the world over and more particularly in the US shows “climate” at or near the very bottom of people’s “political” concerns. The number one concern presently is the immigration mess, which the Left as allowing to run riot and the Right could shut down but won’t. Which tells me there’s a lot of gaslighting going on, and both sides are beholden to industries who want the influx of cheap help.
Go look on any news-aggregator board and view the numbers of comments for “climate” stories vs. practically anything else and you’ll see the polls are correct. Most people never even think about this, and sure as HELL aren’t open to giving up their cars, vacations, and heating their homes. Trust me!
Here’s a draft copy of the so called “Green Real Deal”:
https://www.politico.com/f/?id=00000169-a676-dc6b-a96d-b6f70e080000
Notice the same underlying false foundation regarding “greenhouse gases” and renewable energy as Cortez’s Green Dumb Deal.
The Green Real Deal is based on a foundation that is just as dumb as its amped up Green New Deal. It does nothing to advance understanding or action with respect to reality.
Yes, exactly. Anything based on the same premise keeps the premise alive. It gives it life and keeps it going to be built on further.
These Republicans are on par with AOC. Just smaller slices of the stupid pie. No use for ‘em.