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Mr. President: Time to Quit Fibbing and Spinning
I’ll always knock on doors for Obama. But on the climate, we need more than rhetoric and excuses.
Nearly two decades after writing a book that popularized the term "global warming," MoJo contributing writer Bill McKibben founded 350.org. He is chronicling his journey into organizing with a series of columns leading up to the global climate summit in Copenhagen this December. You can find the others here. And you can put yourself on the cover of MoJo's special issue on climate change here.
Two caveats. First, early in the primary season, when I was asked to join Environmentalists for Obama, I signed on immediately. I knocked on doors, made phone calls, gave money, and celebrated his victory-I think he's the best president of my lifetime.
Second, Obama has done much that's right about climate, including surround himself with a stellar staff of advisers. From auto mileage to green stimulus spending, he's done more to deal with global warming than all of the presidents combined in the 20 years that it's been an issue.
But that's a pretty low bar. And the announcement yesterday from the APEC meeting in Singapore that next month's Copenhagen climate talks will be nothing more than a glorified talking session makes it clear that he has, at least for now, punted on the hard questions around climate. The world won't be able to get started on solving our climate problem, and the obstacle is-as it has been for the last two decades-the United States.
And in fact none of this should come as a surprise to anyone paying attention. For a year now it's been clear that the president is not particularly focused on applying the political pressure that would have been necessary to reach any kind of pact, much less one that approaches what the science demands. Despite the deadline of the Copenhagen conference, Obama placed energy second on his priority list, guaranteeing that health care would occupy most of the year. He talked very little about climate, tending instead to talk about green jobs and energy security, and in the process left the door open for climate deniers to have a field day. And then-as with health care-he left it pretty much entirely up to Congress to write the necessary legislation. That kept him from having to bear the blame for a byzantine bill, but it also meant that the Senate-the body from which he came, and whose culture he had to know-could work in its usual style, without White House pressure. Which at the moment means that Joe Lieberman and Lindsay Graham are essentially rewriting the legislation, to what end no one really knows.
The real tip-off of Obama's unwillingness to lead, however, has been the endless spinning of his climate negotiators. For 12 months they have been fibbing about the science-reiterating over and over again that their goal is the "scientific standard" of 450 parts per million of CO2 in the atmosphere. That's no longer scientifically accurate-in the last two years, since the rapid Arctic melt in the summer of 2007, scientists have made it clear that a treaty that aimed at 450 ppm would be a treaty that left the planet free of ice, a planet where many current nations would disappear beneath the waves. We're at 390 now-we're already too high. The 450 number came from the various graphs and tables of the 2007 report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change-but Rajendra Pachauri, who chairs the IPCC, has said repeatedly in the last year that that science is out of date. Recently, asked why he'd endorsed a 350 target instead, he said, "As a human being, I just couldn't keep quiet in the face of all this overwhelming evidence. I know it's probably not right for me to take a position such as this, but on the other hand, I think it would be totally immoral on my part not to take a position, so I came out and said so."
By contrast, the Obama administration's position has been that a tough treaty is politically unrealistic-that the Senate would never pass it. That's certainly true, at least for the moment. But the White House is starting to use the Senate in the same way that the Bush administration used China-as a scapegoat for doing too little. You don't get to blame the Senate if you haven't pushed the Senate as hard as you possibly can. It would take a huge commitment of presidential leadership, the sacrifice of large amounts of political capital, to change political reality. It would also take a movement of citizens-which we've tried hard to build. Three weeks ago we at 350.org organized what CNN called "the most widespread day of political action in the planet's history." Many prime ministers, environmental ministers, and foreign ministers participated-heck, the president of the Maldives convened an underwater Cabinet meeting to make the point about how desperate the situation was. We asked the White House if anyone-some spare undersecretary of something-might come to one of the 2,000 demonstrations across the United States. They couldn't find a soul.
They'll have another chance. With groups around the world, 350.org will help organize candlelight vigils across the planet on the weekend of December 12. Many will take place at American embassies and consulates. Not because anyone is anti-American. Because everyone remains hopeful that America will finally help lead to solve the problem that it, far more than any other nation, caused.
None of this is easy. (I haven't even mentioned the obscenely low amounts of money the administration and Congress are talking about appropriating for the foreign aid that will be required to help developing countries adapt to the global warming America has caused.) But all of it is easier than trying to deal with the world that's coming at us faster every day we don't act. Pressuring Senate Republicans (or coal-fired Democrats) is hard; pressuring physics and chemistry is harder still. In fact, it's impossible. That's why this is different than health care reform or financial re-regulation. You have to actually meet the scientific standard, not just do better than George Bush.
And of course, politically, Obama doesn't need to do it. He doesn't need to worry about environmentalists abandoning him for someone else-he'll always be the preferable choice, and I'll always be out there knocking on doors for him. But his legacy won't depend on the shiny medal the Norwegians hang around his neck next month; it will depend, more than anything else, on whether or not he really tackles the biggest problem the planet faces. There is still time for him to make the crucial difference, but not if his administration continues in fib-and-spin mode. At the same meeting in Singapore where he made it clear that Copenhagen would not negotiate a new climate treaty, he invited all the other APEC leaders to meet in 2011 in Hawaii, adding, "I look forward to seeing you all decked out in flowered shirts and grass skirts." Whatever-that sounds more like his giggly, sophomoric predecessor than the leader we desperately need.
- Posted in
40 Comments so far
Show AllDo you really think; what Obama says goes?
Like you said Bill, the "bar was already low."
A day late and a dollar short.
I would be interested in knowing what you plan to do in 2012?
Given his current job achievement record (i.e., "NADA!!!") it's inconceivable that anyone would consider keeping this President in office!
Even if environmentalists stick with Obama in 2012, it is unlikely the tens of millions of unemployed beneficiaries of the "jobless recovery" will stick with him no matter how much money the banks that are too big to fail pump into Obama's campaign.
Master, Mckibben has done as much as anyone on the planet for Mother Earth. He has worked with insight as his many great books attest and the environmental organization he founded to educate, advocate for legislation shows. His vote for Obama can be excused. I think the article is a retraction of sorts. While I would have never endorsed Obama like many did and I have worked in the environmental fold for over twenty years, I understand where it came from. The question is, will Bill play that game again in 2012, or is he finally going to stop pulling his punches and endores a Third Party candidate. I will reserve my judgement until then.
"I will reserve my judgement until [2012]."
You needn't be so parsimonious with your judgments - judgment is a renewable resource. Go ahead and splurge.
There are a few communist parties already and the biggest problem with them is that when the public finds out the Communists are for something, it assumes it is bad because the word has been demonized.
You guys are like out of touch with hard ball politics.... and historically your promised "democracy" starts with some dictator in the name of the workers and civil war.
The weird thing about this article on the environment is it mentions nothing about ending War.
I guess because war is a given and we let them have it.
Building political parties are a problem because that is the money game.
We are free by nature and we can talk freely with each other now without trying to organize a constricting structure that will end up narrowing and marginalizing most of our common dreams.
To win our freedom we must go beyond party... and into the mind.
Calling for saving the planet with War is like building a communist party or anything constructive with war.
With War all Social efforts become a failed distraction from the big business at hand... War.
I don't believe anyone waging wars in three countries gives a rat's ass about the environment. What little he's accomplished with regard to the environment (mostly spin) is more than offset by the impacts of these wars.
Maybe his mind will change when his little daughters start having severely deformed babies caused by the DU dust encircling the world thanks to his continued wars and occupations in the Middle East and Asia.
Quit Fibbing and Spinning? "Not gonna do it. Wouldn't be prudent."
Obomber is president of the USA not America( America is the Western Hemisphere).
Stellar advisors, the actual stars accomplish more for the USA enviornment than his advisors.
First time importation of Tar Sands, Rampant Mountaintop removal, three Wars, New Drilling in pristine indigenous native Artic fisheries, Auto standards below Europes in the last Millenium and way below Europe and China now.
No more acceptance of lesser of two evils.
Give me Political Sanity or Death !
"First time importation of Tar Sands, Rampant Mountaintop removal, three Wars, New Drilling in pristine indigenous native Artic fisheries"
Add in hundreds of billions of gallons of water polluted by "fracking" operations chemicals during gas drilling in the huge Marcellus Shale region covering much of NY, PA and WV -- "proprietary" chemicals which the gas companies and chemicals producers refuse to name while the government looks the other way. These chemicals will eventually pollute the ground water and peoples' wells. Not to worry, though, because the gas companies stand to make huge profits and, after all, that is all that matters.
First, early in the primary season, when I was asked to join Environmentalists for Obama, I signed on immediately.
You was had, sucker . . . just like all the rest of us!
Not all of us, Mordechai. I hope that in the future fewer well-intentioned voters will be fooled, but it's hard to imagine any significant number of voters seeing through the propaganda and not succumbing to the usual fears.
Not me either Mordechai. I supported third party canidates and will do so in the future.But at least you know that you and many others were conned unlike most of the Obama sheeple.
Last paragraph: "And of course, politically, Obama doesn't need to do it. He doesn't need to worry about environmentalists abandoning him for someone else-he'll always be the preferable choice, and I'll always be out there knocking on doors for him."
Response: This reminds me of last week's CD article "Dear Mr. President, Try Harder and Do Better" where the writer Robert Barkley Jr. wrote that if Obama doesn't do better, the next time he votes for Obama it will be with less enthusiasm.
Conclusion: The Democratic party is banking on its supporters to maintain low expectations. Support independent parties.
Progressive, I also thought immediately of the Barkley article you reference, and for the same reason.
Elohim asks the author: "I would be interested in knowing what you plan to do in 2012?"
And elaborates: "The question is, will Bill play that game again in 2012, or is he finally going to stop pulling his punches and endores a Third Party candidate. I will reserve my judgement until then."
I pretty much skimmed the piece after the BOLD headline "I’ll always knock on doors for Obama" cracked my eyes like a swung two-by-four. Despite the polite "aw shucks" Opie Taylor admonition that Obama quit a-fibbin', McKibben is in the same breath cheerfully assuring Obama that Obama has environmentalists' gonads in his keeping, and that in any case the gonads are so marginal that Obama ought to do just fine without them!
I'm not insisting that Elohim or anyone else rush to judgement, but geez, McKibben is not exactly being coy about his intentions.
Ironically, even in the unlikely event that McKibben knocked on MY door, it's a foregone conclusion that even a McKibben would be armed with-- yup, rhetoric and promises! Later, as a loving disciple of Mother Nature surely knows, the larval caterpillars of empty promises mature into the winged moths of lame excuses.
I admit that I lack the dedicated environmentalists' sensibility, but this article is tantamount to holding Obama's feet to a pile of alfalfa sprouts.
· Yr Obd't Servant
David Brower would be rolling over in his grave just about now. Mr. McKibben, don't cha remember what Brower used to say?
"Whenever we compromised, we lost." -- the Arch Druid
All the Democrats have to do, come election time, is say "we're not the Republicans," and the liberals will line up to waste their votes. How can we expect to hold politicians accountable if we automatically give them the one thing we can withhold, our vote? Sure electing Republicans suck, but can't we see by now that this entire dynamic keeps dragging the debate rightward? Maybe the Democrats need to get the point that the progressive-liberal-left vote isn't a given any longer.
"... -I think he's [Obama] the best president of my lifetime."
This initial confession by McKibben prompted me to find out that he was born in 1960 and to reflect briefly on the level of presidential quality over those years. They all suck big time--all made war and became war criminals, while only one made any attempt to solve the disparities existing between classes and ingrained racism [I would rate Obama worse than LBJ]. And while Obama is better than Bush, that's really just a backhanded compliment.
Upon such reflection, it's pretty clear that Obama will fail in almost all areas deemed important by progressives for reasons most of us already know, which is why many of us didn't vote for him in the first place. But Obama isn't the only failure; Congress is too. The fundamental reason for their failures is due to their choice of constituency--business bribes--and the resulting warped political philosophy that's developed over decades of fealty to that constituency. The example provided by the "healthcare debate" illustrates the totality of the alliance between business and the federal government against the real interests of the one group that should matter if this were a democracy or republic--the public at large, the commonfolk. And that alliance can be found in all other policy areas.
The conclusion is that Obama clearly works for the Corporadoes and Banksters, as does Congress, which is why nothing will be done about Climate Chaos--just as under Bush--although we will continue to be treated to a change in rhetoric on that and other subjects. A form of totalitarianism grips the federal government resulting in the loss of public control. This has yet to happen in most of the states. Thus, it is at the state-level where people still exert control that substantive policy changes can be made that can be effective. In the years since McKibben was born, the quality of some governors has far exceeded all that era's presidents. Someone once said the states were democracy's laboratory, and California, for example, has a record of forcing the federal government to adopt better policies. McKibben and others ought to continue to direct their oratory at the federal government, but their real energies ought to go into activating the states where People Power has a chance of success.
Eloquent and right on the mark.
You will not witness doubletalk like this short of intentional parody.
McKibben oozes that "Obama is the best president of my lifetime" and then proceeds to document the manifold ways in which he is clearly one of the worst--no better on the climate emergency than his Howdy Doody predecessor.
Bill McKibben's article is the political equivalent of abused-spouse syndrome. What it really says, shorn of its maudlin, euphemistic trimmings, is something like the following: "I know, Barack, that you've left me bruised and battered with your lies and betrayals. You've pummeled me time and again with your broken promises. You're really no better than that last jerk who beat me up just the same way. But I still love you, ya' big lug. You know I'll always be there for you. It cost me a lot, but there's one thing that I've got--it's my man . . ." etc., etc., ad nauseam.
It's truly sickening to see McKibben groveling at the feet of this treacherous politician who has spat on him and his movement and kicked him to the curb.
Among big-fee lecture circuit Ivy League "progressives," the ones who want to be "players" and retain their access to the corridors of Beltway power, this kind of political masochism/stupidity is a common as it is self-defeating.
With their suction cups firmly attached to Obama and the corrupt corporate Democrats, McKibben and his ilk are misleading the environmental movement--misleading it and the planet to irreversible ruin.
Until and unless this coterie of wannabe media stars and Beltway hobnobbers decisively break with the corporate-owned and -controlled Democratic Party, they are just as complicit in the impending climate disaster as the most craven coal-company CEO. Winking at and rationalizing the Obama/Democratic complicity in climate atrocities is just as criminal as actively perpetrating it.
"Bill McKibben's article is the political equivalent of abused-spouse syndrome."
I think that accurately describes anyone to the left of Bill Clinton continuing to vote for the Democrats. I bought the Obama rhetoric, but never again. If we can't withdraw our votes come election time, then we have no power over the Democrats, and the cycle continues.
Well said, vanmungo. You've nailed it. I was never fooled by Obama but have to admit I was taken in by McKibben. So he's just another Democratic party die-hard, or Obama die-hard. The Oval Man betrays everything McKibben has fought for, for over 20 years, and yet the Stockholm Syndrome prevails. Beat me, kick me, hit me, ridicule me, spit on me, ignore me, deny I exist--I'll still love you, because at least you're not A REPUBLICAN. You may act, and in fact be, exactly like them, but nominally you're not one of them, so you're just swell no matter what you do. Give me some more of those empty golden phrases about Change, Hope and all that jabberwocky. I just want to follow my bliss!
Obama is going to be a one term president.
Instead of letting the GOP take the presidency, or holding your nose and voting for the lesser of two weasels, the progressive movement should start NOW to prepare a third party candidate that will actually bring CHANGE, not just pretty words.
"Party" is the trap
McKibben sez: "(Obama) doesn't need to worry about environmentalists abandoning him for someone else-he'll always be the preferable choice, and I'll always be out there knocking on doors for him."
***
I believe you may have just identified the problem.
Yep! If you work for Obama, then you work against yourself and the causes you support.
Obama is not, never was, and never will be a leader. He haas demonstrated that over and over this past year. Let's assume he's a one-termer and move on. We need a third party in this country--a Progressive Party. And it has to have a genuine party platform that all party members must adhere to--not like the Democrats with their conservative blue dog rogues. When people vote for a party, they have a right to know that the party will follow its own principles.
There has not been a president yet that has not been controlled----one assumes by some form of blackmail.Obomba and those behind the scenes,masters of puppetry,pulled off the big billion dollar CON on unsuspecting cult followers who fell for his IRISH WAYS,Saying what everyone wanted to hear.
His actions have been louder than his worthless words.His first acts,within days in office,play time in the drone room pressing the buttons,killed seven hundred innocents in Pakistan,sent thousands scurrying,like insects to refugeedom,and this from a Harvard teacher.It has been all downhill,since then.The junior senator,playing at being president, has been embarrassing.
It has been like building a home in a trendy gated community,using capuchins and expecting a high end result.(the windows are hanging off,the roof is about to fall to the ground and everybody has run off with the materials,while the monkeys were having their banana lunch.
So far the accomplishments of Obama have been impressive:
1) The defeat of the public option for health care and the guarantee of 46 million new customers to enhance health insurance industry profits.
2) The rapid escalation of the war in Afghanistan and Pakistan to the delight of military contractors.
3) The continuation of the war in Iraq when it faced almost certain termination.
4) The expansion of incarceration facilities in Bagram for sequestering state enemies.
5) Helping to mute the international outrage over the Gaza slaughter.
6) Legally justifying and intensifying the warrantless spying program on Americans.
7) Guiding the coup in Honduras to a successful outcome in the face of massive opposition from the world community and fierce resistance from the Honduran people.
8) The transfer of trillions of taxpayer dollars to Wall Street investment banks, which accomplished the dual purpose of restoring the profits of the ruling class and bonuses while ensure debt slavery for generations of ordinary Americans.
So why shouldn't he top off the year's accomplishments by gutting effective response to climate change? I think we should celebrate these accomplishments as they deserve.
But you have to admit that at least he isn't making the perfect the enemy of the good!
· Yr Obd't Servant
No, he's making the wretched the close competitor of the absolutley horrible.
Thank you, Boyd, for typing out the list this round.
I am repeatedly amazed at the willingness of good folks who spent good energy on 0 to make excuses for him and minimize his betrayal of all of us, but particularly of them.
I suppose that's just one effect of the best-funded con job in the history of the world.
McGibbon's waking, but seems unaware of the depths of 0bama's betrayal.
0's well on the way to gutting effective response to climate change. Witness the approvals for mountaintop removal. Witness the trademark two-step rhetoric around a response to climate change:
1. In favor? Says so. So?
2. Proposals? . . . W a i t . . . .
3. Progress? Sure, wrong direction, though: more coal, more nukes, more corporatocracy.
0's "green jobs" hooey is a delaying action. The only way 0 will move left is to provide hope that people do not have to be audacious and dissent. He will not move left nor will he go greener than necessary to quell problems his sponsors consider more serious.
We have to provide those problems before we chat with 0.
This Earth's stewardship is up to all of us - no exceptions.
The people in charge of the status quo cannot be put in charge of changing the status quo.
They are disaster capitalists and their bought reps.
They see climate disaster as perhaps the greatest money maker the world has ever seen.
A Titanic miscalculation.
Oh, how I pine for David Brower.
"He doesn't need to worry about environmentalists abandoning him for someone else-he'll always be the preferable choice, and I'll always be out there knocking on doors for him."
I canceled my decades long subscription to Mother Jones.