Letters And Politics: a green New deal
Letters & Politics seeks to explore the history behind today’s major global and national news stories. A look at burning political issues and debates and their historical context within the US and worldwide, hosted by Mitch Jeserich.
To fight climate change, we need another stimulus package, a green stimulus package.
Government spending to generate jobs is a strategy pioneered in Depression America. The President called it the New Deal. Now the United Nations wants governments to spend on green jobs to combat climate change.
Michael Renner from the WorldWatch Institute explains how this idea has been around since as least 2010 to an ABC Radio National audience in this archived Life Matters bradcast.
The concept finally made it to the good ol' U.S. of A.
Join two experts on the New Deal for a conversation about the history of the depression era and the set of policies put in motion by . A history that can inform us of the ideas behind the Green New Deal.
Guests:
Gray Brechin is the founder and Project Scholar of the Living New Deal hosted by the UC Berkeley Department of Geography. He is the author of Imperial San Francisco: Urban Power, Earthly Ruin.
Richard Walker is professor emeritus of geography at the University of California, Berkeley. He is the founder of the Living New Deal — a research project in Geography at University of California, Berkeley. Professor Walker is the author or co-author of several books including The Capitalist Imperative, The New Social Economy, The Conquest of Bread, The Country in the City, and The Atlas of California.
Listen to the conversation on Letters and Politics
Is a Green New Deal politically viable?
This is all heady stuff, and it’s important to remember that Ocasio-Cortez's proposal is really just a draft resolution for the House to create a special committee to work out the specifics—specifics that could change a lot over the next two years. Actually making sure that the Green New Deal lives up to its promise of saving our troposphere, and our economy, will require grassroots pressure on senators and representatives from every corner. In other words, soon enough there will be sit-ins outside a lot of offices on Capitol Hill—not just Pelosi’s.
Climate change and income inequality might seem unrelated. But it’s important that any nationwide economy-boosting program boost the right kind of economy—that is, one that doesn’t depend on polluting the air and water. It’s also going to be hard to persuade the average American that climate change is our most urgent nationwide priority if their social media feed is a constant stream of GoFundMe campaigns for their friends’ medical bills, or they have to sit down and breathe into a paper bag every time they think about whether they can retire before dying first.
So, what specifically is in Ocasio-Cortez’s Green New Deal?
Ocasio-Cortez has a draft proposal posted on her website that offers some basics, though it’s clear that the plan is still very much an outline.
So who's afraid of The Green New Deal?
The Green New Deal Threatens Congressional Dinosaurs with Extinction
Jill Stein on THE GREEN NEW DEAL, ahead of the curve?
And, last but not least, CNN gaslights Med4All, Green New Deal & Kamala Harris
Comments
Good bunch of new perspectives
Happy to hear from you again.
Thank you. "Leave us recall" that FDR's New Deal, or
a good chunk of it, had the government's hiring people, not subsidizing prospective private employers who profess a green goal. The former results in jobs 100 times out of 100. The latter does not, although it may make some rich people richer.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solyndra
Leave us also recall that Democratic babbling about a Green New Deal refers to a proposal of stolen from a Green Party candidate, based broadly on the Green Party's Four Pillars and Ten Key Principles, with his own specifics. "New, new" Democrats,,anxious to appropriate Bernie's appeal*, stole the concept, then promptly diluted it before waving it around.
Further, Democrats may be just as cynical about their Green New Deal as Obama was when he campaigned on a strong public option's being the only way to control costs of health insurance, then, flipped seamlessly to "the public option's only a sliver" only seven months after his first inauguration.
I can only pray to the Pod of Truth and Justice that the UN will not be not that cynical about green jobs or as wasteful of public dollars in pursuit of "green jobs." Ya wanna create a job, UN? Work at one or employ someone to work at it. Don't look for public bodies to funnel public dollars to private entities.
Think Amtrak, Fannie Mae, charter schools, etc. versus the federal government employing artists and architects to build and decorate those enduring beautiful art deco public buildings (a good number of which have since been purchased by Difi's real estate developer honeydo, btw), create iconic posters, give wonderful concerts, etc.
Sure, some wealthier people may whine about socialism, while the less wealthy and environmentally conscious get jobs. So what? As long as a program is working, I welcome their whining. And, if public solutions to crises weren't broke when banks were closing, Wall Streeters were jumping out their high pie in the blue sky windows, and the entire nation was rapidly circling the drain, sped by Republican policies, it ain't broke yet. Pure corporate altruism, on the other hand....
Anyway.....no more Solyndras. Thanks ever so.
I hate the stardom that the media
builds and then attacks. The GND is needed but only if it doesn't become another vehicle for billionaires to capitalize on a crisis.
"Religion is what keeps the poor from murdering the rich."--Napoleon
GND and a Command Economy
Or a planned economy, if you will. It is the only way to make the radical change that is required. The Invisible Hand will not work, and in fact would exacerbate the problem that the free market economy has created in the first place.
It is right to be very wary of placing so much power in a central planning board. Think of Stalin's 5 year plans and such. There is however, a strong precedent for this type of action to propel serious GND action. It was called WWII.
The New Deal set a great example for how to save Capitalism AND save working people from the harsh outcomes for working people that capitalism produces. What occurred with the onset of WWII was that we transitioned to a full-fledged Command Economy. The War Production Board essentially took over the economy and in doing so proved the utter uselessness of the ownership class. They did not like that. That is why they moved so aggressively to ensure that the economy moved back to private "free market" control.
The key to the success of the WPB was that it was acheived through a (mostly) democratic process. Although primarily made up of CEO's, there was a seat for Labor. The military planners did all the heavy lifting. Anyone who got out of line was dealt with swiftly.
There were price controls, wage controls, production controls, ect, ect. The results were spectacular. We produced the materials needed to complete the task of winning the war. We need to do this again to win the war on climate change, even if is too late.
We will need this kind of public policy mechanism to have any chance of saving the planet. We did it in the 1940's to stave off Hitler and Imperial Japan, we should be able to do it again to save the world.
Nice post, PhBF. Great to see your stuff.
Thanks for the picture of Sewell Avery
He was before my time. I had no idea (and did not learn from his Wikipedia entry) that he was a major American fascist. (To be fair, a reference from that page gave me the information.)
I appreciate adding these facts to my knowledge of the American right wing. My take on Wikipedia, that is yet another arm of the corporate propaganda system, is confirmed by their avoidance of the ugly truth about what sounds like a despicable person.