CLIMATE CHANGE BY THE ELEMENTS
A live-cast in association with The Good Men Project & Lisa Hickey
With your hosts: Thaddeus Howze and Carol Bluestein
THE GREEN NEW IDEAL: How Do We Get Our Elected Officials Onboard For Climate Change?
By Thaddeus Howze | Thursday, October 29, 2020
I mentioned last week that my live-cast telephone call on climate change, Climate Change by the Elements turned two years old. When we were talking about the Green New Deal, and the ramifications for the future of climate change management in the future, we realized something very significant.
We had covered over a hundred topics and those topics were part of the Green New Deal Proposal (HR 109) but we admittedly had never read the Green New Deal proposal in depth until late this year. What we found that was gratifying was our show had covered the core elements of the Green New Deal and agreed fundamentally with the goals and premise of the proposed policy which is outlined below:
H.Res.109 – Recognizing the duty of the Federal Government to create a Green New Deal. | 116th Congress (2019-2020)
Introduced February 7, 2019 by Alexandria Ocasio Cortez
This resolution calls for the creation of a Green New Deal with the goals of:
🌳 achieving net-zero greenhouse gas emissions;
🌳 establishing millions of high-wage jobs and ensuring economic security for all;
🌳 investing in infrastructure and industry;
🌳 securing clean air and water, climate and community resiliency, healthy food, access to nature, and a sustainable environment for all; and
🌳 promoting justice and equality.
The resolution calls for the accomplishment of these goals through a 10-year national mobilization effort. The resolution also enumerates the goals and projects of the mobilization effort, including
🚧 building smart power grids (i.e., power grids that enable customers to reduce their power use during peak demand periods);
🚧 upgrading all existing buildings and constructing new buildings to achieve maximum energy and water efficiency;
🚧 removing pollution and greenhouse gas emissions from the transportation and agricultural sectors;
🚧 cleaning up existing hazardous waste and abandoned sites;
ensuring businesspersons are free from unfair competition; and
🚧 providing higher education, high-quality health care, and affordable, safe, and adequate housing to all.
If you want to stay familiar with this document which I believe will in one form or another come to signify a transformation in our thinking about climate, you should read it here:
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GREEN NEW DEAL HR 109.
https://www.congress.gov/…/house-resolution/109/text
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A CALL TO ACTION
It was gratifying to realize Climate Change by the Elements had been on the right track, talking about the most important subjects, week after week, and after two years to have covered some of the most important issues in the fight against climate transformation, environmental degradation, mega-agriculture, food production systems and future food precarity, city redesign, mass transit, plastic ubiquity, oceanic degradation, the failure of recycling and the complete dominance of the fossil fuel industry in every aspect of our lives.
Imagine my surprise to be listening to NPR at 1:00 AM this morning and have the Commonwealth Club come on featuring some of the giants in climate activism: Gina McCarthy, Annie Leonard and Tamara Toles O’Laughlin.
You probably don’t know these dynamic women, but I am going to give you fifty minutes of excellent air time with them and they will tell you what I have been telling you; the time for climate transformation is now.
There have been climate disasters this year, from coast to coast: massive 5 million acre fires across the entirety of the West Coast, from Washington State to the border of Mexico in Southern California; one of the most expensive storms in US history, the August 10, 2020 Midwest Derecho, now listed as the second most expensive storm this year at $7.5 billion dollars.
Over two million people across eight states, were affected by this storm by extended loss of power, destruction of property, and it took 13 days, after the storm to restore power to 99% of the people affected. Terry Dusky, CEO of electrical infrastructure company ITC Midwest, described the storm damage as “…equivalent of a 40-mile wide tornado that rolled over 100 miles of the state.”
With the year closing out, the financial analysis of this storm is second-highest for a 2020 US natural disaster for the year (as of October 2020,) only being surpassed by Hurricane Laura, which has a preliminary damage figure of $14.1 billion (2020 USD).
In the Atlantic, we had at one point this year five hurricanes in existence simultaneously. Superstorms around the planet drenched cities in Japan, Korea, and India. The world’s weather is growing more unpredictable and destructive. Our ability to match and challenge these disasters socially, culturally and economically, is being overwhelmed by the sheer intensity and constant assault year-round of new climate disasters with every change of season.
This is the time to get onboard fighting for a change in how our government confronts this existential crisis, made even worse by the assault of the coronavirus. Now, more than ever, the virus has revealed the challenges which must be met, working toward creating wholesale changes, not tiny piecemeal fixes and adjustments.
Our climate podcast started before anyone thought we should be talking about climate in a podcast and I believe we do it better than any network, any cable station and if we are keeping score, and we are, we produced more hours of climate change reporting than all of the United States major news providers combined.
I know Facebook is supposed to be about fun and connecting with your friends and family. I consider you my friends and family and want you to have a world for your kids and my kids to grow up in; one which won’t make them sick, one where they don’t have to avoid consuming a recommended daily allowance of microparticulate plastic in their food and water.
Before I unleash Gina McCarthy, Annie Leonard and Tamara Toles O’Laughlin upon you in an outstanding broadcast, I want to ask you to do three things:
1️⃣ Come and listen to the show. Join us live every Thursday. We didn’t have a show today because we wanted to be be ready for the debate. Next week we will be back and talking about the Green New Ideal – How Do We Get Our Elected Officials Onboard For Climate Change?
2️⃣ Support the show and its performers through subscriptions to The Good Men Project. You can also support the showrunner through my Patreon: http://patreon.com/ebonstorm
3️⃣ Listen to the following NPR broadcast to see just how important the next ten years will be to climate change. The world is changing while we watch and those changes which were supposedly twenty, thirty, fifty years down the road have already been seen THIS YEAR.
We can expect the pace of climate transformation to continue to accelerate. For example, in as little as two to three years, the Arctic Circle may experience it’s first year with NO ice in the Arctic Ocean in ten thousand years. I am asking you to take sides with me: Let’s be on the side which says: I will not leave to my children a hellscape, instead, I work toward a world they can steward effectively for their children and generations to come.
Join us. Bring a friend.
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CLIMATE CHANGE BY THE ELEMENTS:
Next Show: October 29, 2020
Thursday, 5:00 PM PDT / 8:00 PM EDT
Dial in: 701-801-1220 | Log in: 934-317-242(#)
Chime in, with a round table of interested parties trying to learn how to bring the conversation of climate change to every table, every workplace meeting, and every casual acquaintance.
Climate change isn’t just about you and me. It’s about getting the world’s greatest polluters and abusers to deal with the part of the equation on climate change which belongs to them.
Individuals in the United States taken collectively are responsible for 30% of the pollution, wastes and irresponsible behavior in our society today. The remaining 70% is the work of big energy, big agriculture, big pharma and the billionaire set, who believe they are rich enough to despoil the planet and no one can stop them.
We can. There isn’t any other choice.
Join the call next week on Thursday. Bring a friend.
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THE COMMONWEALTH CLUB | NPR
Climate Ambition with Gina McCarthy, Annie Leonard and Tamara Toles O’Laughlin
Broadcast Length: 50:59
A presentation from the Commonwealth Club featuring Gina McCarthy, Annie Leonard and Tamara Toles O’Laughlin held on September 22, 2020.
How are the leaders of some of the nation’s biggest environmental organizations responding to a year of race and health crises?
Groups such as the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC), 350.org and Greenpeace helped move climate onto the presidential agenda last year, pushing Joe Biden and other Democrats’ stances on bold action.
Now, organizers and advocates are backing recovery plans that bolster clean energy jobs, help strengthen communities and dismantle systems that exploit people and the planet. How enthusiastic are they about Joe Biden’s $2 trillion climate plan?
Can activism finally bring America’s political ambitions in line with climate science?
Join us for a conversation on the state of our climate with Annie Leonard, executive director of Greenpeace, Gina McCarthy, CEO of the NRDC, and Tamara Toles O’Laughlin, North America director of 350.org.
https://www.commonwealthclub.org/…/climate-ambition…
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