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      in US Politics

      Democrats’ climate plan takes aim at the fossil fuel industry’s political power

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      Senate Democrats are set to release a 200-page plan arguing that significant US climate action will require stripping the fossil fuel industry of its influence over the government and the public’s understanding of the crisis.“It’s important for the public to understand that this is not a failure of American democracy that’s causing this,” said Sheldon Whitehouse, a senate Democrat from Rhode Island. “It is a very specific and successful attack on American democracy by an industry with truly massive financial motivation to corrupt democratic institutions.”A 16-page chapter of the report titled Dark Money lays out how “giant fossil fuel corporations have spent billions – much of it anonymized through scores of front groups – during a decades-long campaign to attack climate science and obstruct climate action”.The focus on limiting the industry’s political power could be the opening punch in what is likely to become a dirty fight over climate policy if Democrats take control of the Senate and the White House.The blueprint, from Senate Democrats’ Special Committee on the Climate Crisis, follows an extensive package of climate policy proposals from House Democrats. Its first two sections describe the depth of the climate problem and posit policy solutions. The third outlines how Democrats could carve a political pathway to substantive reductions in planet-heating pollution. Scores of media reports and lawsuits from states have exposed the industry’s efforts to conceal the scale of the problem and use of dark money groups to create partisan gridlock and slow a shift away from fossil fuels. But Whitehouse said the story has yet to reach the American public. “I don’t think we’ve even begun to get the news out adequately. We haven’t had proper hearings in Congress – the best we’ve had is the Senate’s all Democrats hearing with no ability to subpoena to investigate,” he said.The plan says the US is “almost alone among industrialized nations in having failed to implement comprehensive policies to reduce greenhouse gas emissions”. It directly blames the 2010 Citizens United supreme court decision that allowed industries to spend virtually unlimited sums of money to sway elections.Democrats created the Democrats-only special committee to address climate change because Republicans have majority control of the Senate and largely dictate the work of committees.The special committee recommends a three-part plan to:“expose the role of the fossil fuel billionaires, executives, and corporations in funding and organizing the groups trafficking in climate denial and obstruction.”
      “reform federal laws and regulations to require greater transparency and reduce the influence of money, particularly dark money, in politics.”
      “alert industries that support climate action to the depth, nature, and success of the covert fossil fuel political scheme.”
      Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden has said he would spend $2tn to get the US to essentially eliminate its climate pollution by 2050. He is pitching his proposal as a jobs plan to lift the US out of the economic downturn. But he does not oppose fracking for natural gas – which is the main way the US industry has grown in recent years.At the Democratic National Convention last week, climate activists were also let down by a decision to remove language from the party platform opposing fossil fuel subsidies – revitalizing skepticism about Biden and moderate Democrats’ ability to get tough with the industry.Republicans meanwhile are split on the climate issue, with some outright denying the science, many questioning the severity of the crisis, and a growing minority pitching technologies for capturing emissions from fossil fuels so they can continue to be used. Donald Trump has called climate change a hoax and rescinded essentially all of the federal government’s biggest climate efforts.The report lays out a timeline stretching back to 1977, when an Exxon scientist told company management that there was scientific agreement that humans were altering the climate by burning fossil fuels. Exxon now says climate change is “a serious issue” and denies the company misled the public.In 1988, Shell scientists acknowledged carbon dioxide emissions could be setting the planet on a path to become 2C hotter, leading to rising seas and a melting Arctic, it notes. The world is currently 1C hotter than before industrialization and on a trajectory to be at least 3C hotter.In 1986, a congressional subcommittee held hearings on climate change and in 1988 Nasa scientist James Hansen testified about the threat.Senate Democrats say oil companies responded by copying the playbook of the tobacco industry to sow doubt about the problem. They started front groups and funded think tanks like the Heartland Institute and the Competitive Enterprise Institute to deny climate science.Whitehouse was elected to the Senate in 2006, and he said everything changed immediately after the supreme court issued the Citizens United ruling in 2010. “There’s a very clear before and after,” he said.“I don’t think Americans understand enough the extent to which the fossil fuel industry has weaponized a whole variety of systems and laws that now competes with the government itself for dominance,” Whitehouse said. More

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      in US Politics

      The Guardian view on the US Democrats: Biden seized his moment | Editorial

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      There have never been two campaign gatherings like this week’s US Democratic convention and next week’s Republican one. Stripped to their essentials by the coronavirus pandemic, the 2020 conventions cannot match the energy of normal years. Yet the big speech by the presidential candidate at the convention remains a defining campaign moment, and this year is no different. The greater severity imposed by the virtual convention is also appropriate. For this is not a normal US election year. It is one in which the central contest between Donald Trump and Joe Biden will define the future of the United States and the world like few others.Because of the constraints, the Democratic convention lacked true razzmatazz. In that respect it was tailor-made for Mr Biden’s decent, stubborn but markedly unexciting political message. And yet the lack of glitz had certain advantages. It meant that the nightly coverage offered to American voters this week was more serious-minded. The televised broadcasts were full of ordinary people’s video accounts of what they are going through as a result of the pandemic, recession and racism. The format also meant that Mr Biden could use his acceptance speech to cut to the chase about the issues at stake in November’s election, rather than play up the rhetoric that would have been expected in a packed hall. In any case, Barack Obama had powerfully supplied that form of oratory the previous evening.Mr Biden nevertheless delivered an effective and successful speech. He did not mention Mr Trump by name at any point. Yet everything he said in his 25-minute address was completely explicit about the profound contrast between the two candidates. America was experiencing “too much anger, too much fear, too much division”, he said. In the heart of the speech, he zeroed in on four policy crises which together define the choice voters must confront – the worst pandemic in a century, the worst economic crisis since the 1930s, the biggest movement for racial justice since the 1960s, and the “undeniable” threat of climate change. Together, these crises faced America with a perfect storm, through which Mr Biden promised “a path of hope and light”. Such language can sound vacuous, but Mr Biden was absolutely right about the four great issues. He has also usefully cast himself as the candidate of optimism.The Democratic leader made much of his claims to be a unifier. His choice of Kamala Harris as his running mate has helped. The convention also went some way to unite this party for the task to come. There were significant speeches from defeated rivals, notably Bernie Sanders, who has rallied behind Mr Biden since the primary season ended and played his hand well during subsequent policymaking processes. Elizabeth Warren made a strong and humane contribution too. Mr Obama’s speech was a stirring reaffirmation of his belief in an American system of democracy and justice which Mr Trump has done so much to undermine and in which the faith of many natural Democrats has been deeply challenged by events including police killings. Although Mr Biden is a candidate from the heart of old Democratic politics, it is worth noting that this year’s convention had a watershed feel because it was the first for decades not dominated by the Clintons.Mr Biden will not be an inherently exciting Democratic candidate. There are good reasons for asking whether he has either the vision or the capacity to turn post-Trump America around successfully. He is instinctively happier reaching out to the middle ground than driving the new radical agenda that the times also demand. But he came through this week much better than some feared. His campaign, like his life, has shown resilience and judgment. His offer of hope and light is well crafted for such dark times. Now Mr Biden must also beat Mr Trump. Now it gets harder. The world is willing him on. More