Author Archives: ThorsteTalarico

The Conservative Case for Taxing Carbon Pollution

by ThorsteTalarico Posted on May 16, 2015

Mother Jones

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This story originally appeared in Slate and is republished here as part of the Climate Desk collaboration.

Conservative climate champions are often laughed off or ignored. But what’s happening within the American political right could change everything, and fast.

Each year since 1989, the JFK Library bestows its Profile in Courage award to a public servant who takes a principled but unpopular position. This year, the award went to Bob Inglis, a former congressman from South Carolina who’s turned into America’s best hope for near-term climate action. Oh, he’s also a Republican.

As you might expect, Inglis wasn’t always a climate campaigner. In his acceptance speech last week at the JFK Library in Boston, he described how and why he changed his mind on global warming:

Inglis served in Congress for 12 nonconsecutive years, but once his children reached voting age, they persuaded him to take a closer look at climate science. Inglis traveled to Antarctica—twice—and his conversations with scientists there convinced him climate change was a growing threat that everyone, especially conservatives, needed to take more seriously. Science, plus his deep Christian faith, convinced Inglis that taking action on climate—and saving countless lives in the process—was the right thing to do. Almost immediately, he began advocating for carbon pricing: He argued that it would be good for business and the environment. He even began looking to Canada for inspiration. Since 2008, the government of British Columbia has had in place arguably the most successful climate policy on the planet. During a 2009 speech on the House floor, he called an American plan for a British Columbia–style revenue-neutral carbon tax a “fabulous opportunity.”

But his belief in the science of climate change became a liability for Inglis during the contentious 2010 primary election—an election associated with the rise of the Tea Party brand of ultraconservatism—and Inglis lost his seat in a landslide.

Since then, Republican views on climate change have inched ahead, and Inglis has made it his mission to spread the word: Protecting our planet is the ultimate bipartisan issue. “My grandfather’s legacy is kept alive by Bob’s courageous decision to sacrifice his political career to demand action on the issue that will shape life on Earth for generations to come,” said JFK descendant Jack Schlossberg, who presented the award to Inglis.

This is the point at which progressives and climate hawks might understandably get a bit cynical. But hear me out: For years now, the Republican electorate has been shifting toward accepting the scientific consensus on climate change. A recent survey showed moderate Republicans—which still make up about half of all Republican voters—are now essentially indistinguishable from the general population in terms of their beliefs on climate. More than 70 percent of Republicans now believe that human activities are contributing to global warming.

Most importantly, there’s recent evidence—and a few case studies—that point toward the root of Republican hostility toward climate action as mostly a matter of disliking the solutions on the table. That’s helped the fossil fuel industry fund a load of anti-science rhetoric and propelled climate change into the nation’s most divisive political issue. An optimist might say all that’s needed is a climate-action proposal that conservatives can get excited about.

That’s where Inglis comes in.

Essentially, Inglis is proposing cover for Republicans to vote for a price on carbon by offsetting any revenue it produces with equal or greater cuts in corporate taxes and personal income taxes. Such a proposal might turn the United States—which currently has among the highest business taxes in the world—into a tax haven and help drive economic growth. It could be tricky to pull off, but if done the right way, it would probably be popular with almost everyone and be an efficient way of tackling climate change.

In the meantime, there’s a huge gap between opinion polls and how Republican politicians vote on climate—and maybe between Republican politicians’ private beliefs and public actions. In 2013 Inglis told This American Life that he believes we could pass meaningful legislation today if his former Republican colleagues were “allowed to vote their conscience on climate change.”

Last week, I spoke with Inglis to get a clearer idea of why he’s so hopeful that Republicans could actually pave the way for bold action on climate.

“Too often the environmental left presents only the danger and not the opportunity of climate change,” Inglis told me. “Of course it’s a danger—the science is very clear. But it’s also an incredible free-enterprise opportunity, because why do we have to be dependent on these stinky fuels? Why can’t we have cleaner air? Why can’t we have distributed energy systems that light up the world with more energy, more mobility, and more freedom? Why can’t we?”

Inglis attributes the polarization in American climate politics to the choice of words that climate advocates often use that evoke the danger associated with climate change and the implied judgment for denial and lack of action. “The problem with that is: Denial is a pretty good coping mechanism for threats like death,” he said.

Instead, Inglis thinks it’s time to be optimistic about climate change. He says the most exciting aspect of working for action on climate is the potential to “light up dark places in the world” with clean energy. That, when combined with a shift in rhetoric away from “doom and gloom” of the left, may be enough to persuade Republicans to get on board.

Inglis repeatedly invoked the idea that a bold plan to fight climate change could recapture a sense of the American exceptionalism that Kennedy exemplified in his moonshot speech at Rice University in 1961. In that speech, Kennedy said going to the moon was “an act of faith and vision,” but “we must be bold.” That’s exactly how Inglis feels about the need to tackle climate change: with uncertain technology, and uncertain political support, and uncertain science. “If you can put it in the context of opportunity and calling to light up the world, then you get that moonshot kind of optimism and determination,” Inglis said.

Inglis believes an American price on carbon could quickly motivate other large economies, like China and India. “We need the leading economy in the world to say, ‘We just priced carbon dioxide in our economy. We’re going to collect it if you’re shipping things in here. Now what are you gonna do?’ The rest of the world would then follow suit,” he said.

That’s why Inglis thinks a US carbon tax is more important than the UN Paris summit this December—which has a big profile but pretty unambitious goals.

His “most positive scenario” for near-term action on climate: a Republican president in 2016. That would set up a top-down push for Republican-led climate legislation, as long as the right candidate is elected, of course. He offered three possible names:

Lindsey Graham: According to Inglis, there are “some good things Lindsey has said and is saying about climate change.” I agree.

Jeb Bush: “I know from personal interaction with him that he’s a careful, analytical fella,” Inglis said. Bush recently broke with the pack, saying he was “concerned” about climate change.

Rand Paul: “Libertarians really believe in accountable, transparent marketplaces, and the energy marketplace is not transparent right now. They’re getting away with socializing their soot and passing to future generations the cost of climate change. That’s a market distortion,” Inglis said. With billions of dollars in subsidies to the fossil fuel industry each year, it’s not a stretch to suppose Paul would take the opportunity to reduce the size of government via a libertarian argument for climate action.

Now, Inglis may be a few years ahead of his time here, but it’s increasingly unfathomable that the Republican Party would nominate an out-and-out climate denier. Even though climate change isn’t yet a top-tier issue, voters are now less likely to vote for a candidate who opposes action to reduce global warming. In fact, every major demographic is in favor of regulating greenhouse gases, even if it causes an increase in their energy bills—except for Republicans over 65. As younger voters gain clout, Republican opposition to climate change among the electorate is fading.

Together with evangelical Christian climate scientist Katharine Hayhoe and the retired Navy Rear Adm. David Titley, Inglis represents the forefront of the American conservative zeitgeist on global warming. It’s interesting to note that they’re also all infectiously optimistic. Hayhoe, who’s in the midst of an indefinite speaking tour, primarily to conservative audiences, recently told me that when it comes to action on climate change among those on the right, “There is a dam effect. Once the dam is breached, there could be rapid change.”

After speaking with Inglis, I have to agree. It’s refreshing to hear anyone—especially a Republican—actually hopeful on climate. My wife and I had an hourslong conversation following the interview. Her main takeaway: “Why can’t more people think like him?”

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The Conservative Case for Taxing Carbon Pollution

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Don’t Call Them "Climate Deniers." Call them "Climate Optimists."

by ThorsteTalarico Posted on July 11, 2014

Mother Jones

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This story originally appeared in Slate and is republished here as part of the Climate Desk collaboration.

Las Vegas is parched. A 14-year drought has left Lake Mead, the local water source, dangerously low. It has dropped 100 feet in the past decade. If it drops 12 more feet, federal water rationing rules will kick in. Some climate scientists predict that will happen in the next year. And most believe the situation will only worsen over time.

The view from inside Las Vegas’ Mandalay Bay Resort and Casino, however, is considerably rosier. That’s where scientists, activists, and bloggers have assembled this week for the Heartland Institute’s 9th International Conference on Climate Change, which I’ve been following via live stream. It’s the world’s largest gathering of “climate skeptics”—people who believe, for one reason or another, that the climate change crisis is overblown.

It’s tempting to find irony in the spectacle of hundreds of climate change deniers staging their convention amid a drought of historic proportions. But, as the conference organizers are quick to tell you, they aren’t actually climate change deniers. The majority of this year’s speakers readily acknowledge that the climate is changing. Some­ will even concede that human emissions are playing a role. They just think the solutions are likely to be far worse than the problem.

“I don’t think anybody in this room denies climate change,” the Heartland Institute’s James M. Taylor said in his opening remarks Monday. “We recognize it, but we’re looking more at the causes, and more importantly, the consequences.” Those consequences, Taylor and his colleagues are convinced, are unlikely to be catastrophic—and they might even turn out to be beneficial.

Don’t call them climate deniers. Call them climate optimists.

They aren’t an entirely new phenomenon. Fossil-fuel advocates have been touting the advantages of climate change since at least 1992, when the Western Fuels Association put out a pro­–global warming video called “The Greening of Planet Earth.” (It was a big hit with key figures in the George W. Bush administration.) Naomi Oreskes, co-author of Merchants of Doubt, traces this line of thinking even further back, to a 1983 report in which physicist Bill Nierenberg argued that humans would have no trouble adapting to a warmer world.

As global warming became more politically polarized, however, coal lobbyists and their shills largely discarded the “global warming is good” approach in favor of questioning the science behind climate change models. These days the liberal stereotype of the climate change denier sounds more like James Inhofe, the Republican senator from Oklahoma who dismisses “the global warming thing” as “the greatest hoax ever perpetrated on the American people.” (He still appears to believe that.)

There are still a good number of Inhofe types at the Heartland Institute’s conferences. But the pendulum of conservative sentiment may be swinging away from such conspiracy theories. Over the past few years, a concerted campaign by climate scientists and environmentalists, backed by mountains of evidence, has largely succeeded in branding climate change denial as “anti-science” and pushing it to the margins of public discourse. Leading news outlets no longer feel compelled to “balance” every climate change story with quotes from cranks who don’t believe in it. Last month, the president of the United States mocked climate deniers as a “radical fringe” that might as well believe the moon is “made of cheese.”

The backlash to the anti-science movement has left Republican leaders unsure of their ground. As Jonathan Chait pointed out in New York magazine, their default response to climate change questions has become, “I’m not a scientist.”

It’s a clever stalling tactic, allowing the speaker to convey respect for science without accepting the scientific consensus. But it’s also a cop-out, and it seems unlikely either to appease the right-wing base or to persuade the majority of Americans who have no trouble believing that the climate is changing despite not being scientists themselves. At last count, 57 percent told Gallup they believe human activities are to blame for rising global temperatures. That’s up from a low of 50 percent in 2010.

Eventually, then, top Republicans are going to need a stronger answer. And they might find it in the pro-science, anti-alarmist rhetoric exemplified by the climate optimists. Those include Richard Lindzen, the ex-MIT meteorology professor who spoke at the institute’s 2009 conference and is now a fellow at the libertarian-leaning Cato Institute.

In a 2012 New York Times profile, Lindzen affirmed that carbon dioxide is a greenhouse gas and called those who dispute the point “nutty.” But he predicts that negative feedback loops in the atmosphere will counteract its warming effects. The climate, he insists, is less sensitive to human emissions than environmentalists fear.

Fellow climate scientists have found serious flaws in his work. Yet it retains currency at events such as the Heartland conference, where skeptics’ findings tend not to be subjected to much skepticism themselves. (While several of the speakers are in fact scientists, few are climate scientists, and their diverse academic backgrounds make it difficult for them to engage directly with one another’s research methods.)

And the idea that the Earth’s climate is too powerful a system for us puny humans to upset holds a certain folksy—not to mention religious—appeal. Still, the Heartland crowd is careful to frame its arguments in terms of science and skepticism rather than dogma.

The climate-optimist cause has been aided immeasurably by a recent slowdown in the rise of the Earth’s average surface temperatures. There are several potential explanations for the apparent “pause,” and most climate scientists anticipate that it will be short-lived. But it has been a godsend for those looking for holes in the prevailing models of catastrophic future warming.

“Skeptics believe what they see,” said Heartland Institute President Joseph Bast. “They look at the data and see no warming for 17 years, no increase in storms, no increase in the rate of sea-level rise, no new extinctions attributable to climate change—in short, no climate crisis.”

Meanwhile, the optimists point out, more carbon in the atmosphere means greater plant productivity and new opportunities for agriculture. In fact, Heartland communications director Jim Lakely told me in a phone interview, “The net benefits of warming are going to far outweigh any negative effects.” Indeed, the institute recently published a study arguing just that.

The climate-optimist credo aligns neatly with public-opinion polls that show most Americans believe climate change is real and humans are causing it—they just don’t view it as a top priority compared with more tangible problems like health care costs. You can imagine how eager they are to be reassured that their complacency won’t be punished.

Again, not everyone at the Heartland conference is a climate optimist. Many are still focused on disputing the basic link between atmospheric carbon dioxide levels and global temperatures. As I watched the conference, it became clear that some have little trouble flipping between the two viewpoints. “This is what they always do,” Oreskes told me in an email. “As the debate shifts, they shift.”

That makes it easy for liberals to dismiss self-professed climate skeptics as industry shills in scientists’ clothing, especially since many of them, like the Cato Institute’s Patrick Michaels, do in fact receive funding from the fossil-fuel industry. For their part, the Heartland academics tend to view most mainstream climate scientists as conflicted by their reliance on government grants.

In fact, it’s not unreasonable to see the climate fight as part of a much broader ideological war in American society, says Anthony Leiserowitz, director of the Yale Project on Climate Change Communication. The debate over causes is often a proxy for a debate over solutions, which are likely to require global cooperation and government intervention in people’s lives. Leiserowitz’s research shows that climate deniers tend to be committed to values like individualism and small government while those most concerned about climate change are more likely to hold egalitarian and community-oriented political views.

That doesn’t mean, of course, that the evidence on both sides is equal. There’s a reason the climate deniers are losing the scientific debate, and it isn’t because academia is better funded than the energy industry. All of which helps to explain how climate optimism might be a more appealing approach these days than climate denial. Models of how climate change will impact society and the economy are subject to far more uncertainty than the science that links greenhouse gas emissions to the 20th-century warming trend. The costs of mitigating those emissions are more readily grasped: higher energy bills, government spending on alternative energy projects, lost jobs at coal plants.

There are, however, a few pitfalls for conservatives who would embrace climate optimism as an alternative to climate change denial. Touting the recent slowdown in global average surface temperatures, for example, implies that such temperatures do in fact tell us a lot about the health of the climate. That will become an awkward stance in a hurry if the temperatures soon resume their climb.

More broadly, shifting the climate change debate from causes to outcomes will put the “skeptics” in the Panglossian position of continually downplaying the costs of extreme weather events—like, say, the Las Vegas drought—even as their constituents are suffering from them. In the Heartland conference’s opening keynote speech, meteorologist Joe Bastardi scoffed at the devastating wildfires that have swept across the Southwest far earlier than usual this season. “We had the wildfires in San Diego, right?” he said in a derisive tone. “I think it destroyed 80 houses, 90 houses. They had a wildfire back in October 2007 that took out 1,500 houses…When people tell me things are worse now, I say, ‘You can’t be looking at what has happened before.'”

It’s one thing to tell people global warming isn’t the source of their misery. It’s a lot harder to look them in the eye and tell them their problems aren’t that bad—especially if you’re relying on them to vote you into public office.

Originally posted here:  

Don’t Call Them "Climate Deniers." Call them "Climate Optimists."

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