Liz has been my number one for a while anyway, followed by Pete and Bernie… I’ll strategically vote for whichever has the best shot at the nomination among those three. If somehow none of those three is still in the mix, I’ll vote for the best among the viable candidates.
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Yeah. If the top two were clearly Pete and Biden, I’d vote Pete. Same for Kamala or pretty much anyone else, but I don’t think anyone else has the slightest chance.
I’m glad to see Beto take this tack and I think he might even really mean it, but it still comes across as a calculated move to me.
It’s a crazy thing about Beto. When I saw his authenticity in his senate race against Cruz, I was all in.
Then he got over consulted, and was like wtf happened, yeah done with you
He was pretty much out of it, and when back to being authentic, and I’m back to liking him
God damn it, be yourself. How has DNC not gotten this after Trump? Just be your fucking self.
Imagine if Obama spent a single day of his Presidency watching CNN and live tweeting any positive references to himself.
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so many climate plans out today and in recent weeks.
Most agree on the basics and the goals. Some cost more and some cost less. Only a couple emphasize innovation and technology (Pete and Yang, of course), only a few lay out a carbon tax and dividend plan (Pete and Yang, again, as well as Booker. Not Warren or Bernie, disappointingly).
I guess we’ll see if the marathon sessions on CNN tonight reveal more. Not sure I can last the entire SEVEN HOURS, but I’ll watch Castro and Yang at 2, take a lunch/dinner break, then turn it back on at 5 pm for Biden (for the gaffes!), Bernie, Warren, and Pete. Thank god I’m on the west coast.
Yeah… the carbon tax and dividend is the primary way we need to deal with climate change. I definitely believe that Warren will end up going that way because she’s smart and very capable of changing her mind… and it’s the best way to handle it.
It’s a line I consider as important as the filibuster, but since I know a lot of people (absolutely including the presidential candidates who have a lot on their plates, as well as have to put forward plans with lots of flashy stuff to win the election, and the carbon tax and dividend is boring) haven’t dug into it to any depth I don’t consider it disqualifying to not be for it yet. The filibuster is obvious enough that not easily understanding that we have to kill it with fire in 2020 is a big problem for me.
I could be persuaded on the carbon tax and dividend, but have done a lot of research and feel strongly about it. Blowing up the filibuster I believe in on a religious level.
I have faith that Bernie will support it because he (along with Barbara Boxer) introduced a carbon tax and dividend bill in 2013. He never changes his mind, so it’s pretty much a lock.
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I remember this, which is why it’s so surprising to me that he seems to have moved away from it in his published plans. Warren, too. Especially with their stances against corporate greed and influence.
Dunno, speculation is that in order for a carbon tax to have much effect the tax has to be so high that it becomes politically untenable and now there’s a history of carbon tax measures being defeated and causing strong and counterproductive reactions.
Imo, whether or not and how well they work is very clearly not obvious. Econ 101 is quite often wrong, and any contention about how well they work and effective they are is an empirical question and needs evidence. So, I’d be in favor of them for sure, but just like UBI, it’s one component of a strategy and something that needs constant evaluation.
Just shutting down coal plants/hard limits on CO2/btu works too. Environmental legislative history is full of examples of effective regulations which outright ban or limit pollution.
Something I should have added to my post above…a summary of the plans released today, highlighting a few of the differences between them.
Six Candidates Released Climate Plans This Week. What You Need to know
That’s why it’s carbon tax and dividend. You don’t get to raise much if any money off of it. That’s where it keeps going wrong politically. You start paying people the week you start collecting the tax. You pay them every week. You make sure they see the money arrive directly in their account. No one has failed to be a greedy dumbass with these things, and unsurprisingly lower class people whose budgets are stretched thin notice gas has gotten more expensive because you passed a law. They have to be compensated IMMEDIATELY or it’s going to cause a riot.
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Also, I can see pros and cons of doing it this way, but I can say from experience, we were talking about “global warming” being a national security issue way back when I was in the Air Force. I distinctly recall reading white papers about it from the Pentagon. The DoD has long recognized it internally…maybe using some of the massive defense budget on climate change is the right approach. Obviously you have to deal with the DoD bureaucracy, which makes everything less efficient, and could do more harm than good.
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The military was a pretty early adopter of solar and had some of the largest arrays in the early days. But, the military is also a HUGE CO2 emitter and the plans to drastically cut the military budget would be good for global warming generally.
And what can the military do? The solutions they could try sound pretty scary. I’m not a big fan of geo-engineering and a lot of “high tech will solve the problem” is a way of putting off what we can already do (and stopping what we shouldn’t be doing).
Yeah a big part of why I’m so pro tax + dividend is the way it would utilize current technology to start attacking carbon emissions immediately. The reality is that you get 80% of the results from the first 20% of effort. The fastest way to get the easiest 20% done is to change what stuff costs and let free markets figure it out.
This being a capitalist economy it’s very important that we use capitalism against climate change instead of using climate change against capitalism. Trying to do the latter makes doing what we need to do on climate exponentially harder as a large % of the powerful stakeholders will just instantly dig in their heels and resist… Instead of simply doing what needs doing for their own bottom lines like they are programmed to do… which is what happens with tax + dividend.
I’m for reforming capitalism, but I think it’s unrealistic to think that’s going to be some hugely rapid process. Tying something with a very tight timetable to it so that it’s reform will accelerate is just super stupid and we shouldn’t do that.
I can tell you that if you passed a carbon tax + dividend that allowed companies to buy carbon credits at 50% of the tax rate for carbon that they had offset would result in farmers getting paid to plant millions of acres of trees the day it went into effect. The dividend money would pay citizens back for the higher prices on carbon, and those that could reduce their footprint would effectively be getting paid for doing so by the people who didn’t.
I genuinely don’t see any real downside to anyone who doesn’t own a fossil fuel company or a power plant that emits carbon… and those guys very aggressive lobbying is basically responsible for the mess we’re in so I’m not remotely sorry for them.
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you can cut it, but you can also redirect it. The military budget is actually incredibly specific, and each project or program must be funded separately. when pundits and pols say “the military budget” they are adding up the trillions for dollars that are spread out across specific DoD projects.
It’s too much to go into here, but every separate program has to fight for their budget every 2 years, and there’s nothing that says that money going to the F-35 can’t be cut from that program and given instead to a Joint Climate Defense Program Office (or whatever they would want to call it) for infrastructure design and upgrades or tech research.
Obviously there’s a ton of fat to trim from the budget as it is now, but re-prioritizing has to be on the table too, I think.
Source: this was my job in the military: DoD Acquisitions
Republicans like wars, so I suggest we come up with a strict international scheme for addressing climate change then use the American military to force compliance. Then, they can root for bombing Beijing.