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No Time for Climate at the Democrat Debate
Townhall.com ^ | October 20, 2019 | Steve Milloy

Posted on 10/19/2019 5:06:44 AM PDT by Kaslin

While some have suggested that Mayor Pete Buttigieg “won” this week’s Democrat presidential debate, there is no question who, or rather what, was the loser.

CNN and New York Times reporters did not ask any candidate any question about climate change and its offspring, the Green New Deal. It was a surprising omission. In the abstract, climate has polled as a very high priority among Democrat voters, so much so that in September, CNN televised a seven-and-one-half hour town hall meeting on climate for the candidates.

This week, both Bernie Sanders and Tom Steyer briefly protested the lack of attention to climate, but to no avail. A few other candidates mentioned the term “climate” in passing (Andrew Yang, Buttigieg and Amy Klobuchar), but the CNN and New York Times reporters did not take the bait.

The omission of climate did draw the attention of New York Times climate reporter Lisa Friedman. Noting a TV ad run during the debate by the climate skeptic Competitive Enterprise Institute (CEI) that criticized the Green New Deal, Friedman tweeted, “That CEI ad against the Green New Deal is officially the longest discussion of climate change during the 4th #DemDebate.”

Yet the Green New Deal was launched by Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez on the premise that there are only 12 years left to “save” the planet. During the debate, Sanders referred to climate as an “existential” threat. Steyer called it a “crisis.” Still, the CNN and New York Times reporters could not be persuaded to serve up a climate question to the candidates.

This should come as no surprise. Climate change has never been a political winner. The political track record is clear. Consider the following:

Why does climate have such a poor political track record? That’s easy. While people may tell a pollster that they are “concerned” about the climate or even that they support a carbon tax, when asked how much they would be willing to pay, the answer is pretty much “nothing.”

>Why does climate have such a poor political track record? That’s easy. While people may tell a pollster that they are “concerned” about the climate or even that they support a carbon tax, when asked how much they would be willing to pay, the answer is pretty much “nothing.”

In a recent Washington Post poll, for example, 60% of respondents said they supported a carbon tax. But 75% said they would oppose a 25-cent gas tax and 71% said they would oppose paying $10 more a month for electricity – both representing extremely minimal carbon taxes.

Washington state Gov. Jay Inslee, who dropped out of the Democrat race after polling at zero percent as the “climate candidate,” has now failed twice to persuade voters to pass a carbon tax in his own left-leaning state.

While the Green New Deal may sound like a good idea to many people, when you tell them what that would do to their standard of living, lifestyle and pocketbook, support all but evaporates.

The September CNN town hall on climate was a debacle for Democrats. They spent over seven hours explaining to Americans how they would take away their cheeseburgers, plastic straws, plastic trash bags, end fracking and more.

Usually politicians promise voters the moon. Climate is the one issue where they are promising voters a green hell ¾ degraded lifestyles and reduced standards of living. Democrat candidates should be grateful this week that the CNN and New York Times debate moderators spared them further self-inflicted damage to their campaigns.


TOPICS: Culture/Society; Editorial
KEYWORDS: climatechange; demonratsdebate
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1 posted on 10/19/2019 5:06:44 AM PDT by Kaslin
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To: Kaslin

Hmmm.... who won the debate?

The fact that more viewers watched NCIS than the debate indicates there was no winner. The cold hard fact is they all lost.


2 posted on 10/19/2019 5:10:55 AM PDT by bert ( (KE. NP. N.C. +12) Progressives are existential American enemies)
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To: Kaslin
I would not be surprised to find out (and cynically suspect it to be so) that the media and the Dems work out what questions will be asked (and what won't!)...
3 posted on 10/19/2019 5:11:07 AM PDT by jeffc (The U.S. media are our enemy)
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To: Kaslin

Great article! I love short, to the point with stats to back it up.


4 posted on 10/19/2019 5:11:41 AM PDT by albie
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To: Kaslin

I see the seven hour “climate” town hall as a rich source of campaign ads.

We cannot change climate. The interplay between the earth, moon, sun, and other planets is far too complex for us to understand, much less control. And the dangers of trying to block sunlight from reaching the earth or of trying to sequester carbon dioxide in forms unusable by living organisms are profound and really do pose existential threats to continued life on earth.

The focus on trying to prevent climate change is not about climate at all. It is about controlling people. Americans have been rejecting socialism since the 1800s. By taking up “environmentalism”, socialist control freaks have finally found a way to cram socialism down our throats that we do not reject quite as forcefully.


5 posted on 10/19/2019 5:19:56 AM PDT by exDemMom (Current visual of the hole the US continues to dig itself into: http://www.usdebtclock.org)
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To: exDemMom

“Climate change” is a political loser because it only appeals to the types of people that protested against the Vietnam War early on - white liberals. Whites in general are a dwindling segment of the voter pool, and the foreigners imported to replace us don’t care a hoot about the environment. In fact, they come from the most polluted parts of the world; it just isn’t a priority.

Truly a “white people problem” - and the only way to draw non-whites into the discussion is to dangle money in front of them, as in AOC’s “New” Green Deal: “It is the duty of the Federal Government to create a Green New Deal…to promote justice and equity by stopping current, preventing future, and repairing historic oppression of indigenous peoples, communities of color, migrant communities, deindustrialized communities, depopulated rural communities, the poor, low-income workers, women, the elderly, the unhoused, people with disabilities, and youth.”


6 posted on 10/19/2019 5:50:01 AM PDT by kearnyirish2 (Affirmative action is economic warfare against white males (and therefore white families).)
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To: bert

So, Ziva won the debate.


7 posted on 10/19/2019 5:51:14 AM PDT by real saxophonist (Yeah, well, y'know that's just like, uh... your opinion, man.)
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To: bert

At this point a mayor from any little city in America would win the debate. That Butt gig “won” is like saying Mikey Mouse won, which was predictable,


8 posted on 10/19/2019 5:58:25 AM PDT by JudgemAll (Democrats Fed. job-security in hatse:hypocrites must be gay like us or be tested/crucified e)
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To: kearnyirish2

Truly a “white people problem” - and the only way to draw non-whites into the discussion is to dangle money in front of them, as in AOC’s “New” Green Deal

**************

Nailed it!


9 posted on 10/19/2019 6:01:48 AM PDT by Starboard
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To: exDemMom

“By taking up “environmentalism”, socialist control freaks have finally found a way to cram socialism down our throats that we do not reject quite as forcefully.”

One very important aspect of “Environmentalism” is the idea of getting whites (primarily young ones) to accept a lower standard of living than we had in the past. As companies send our jobs to Asia, and bring Asians here to populate Western countries, the prospect of adding a few BILLION cars - and a few BILLION detached single family homes (in the past, both were the fruits of working full-time in the West) is simply unacceptable to the elites. Since they can’t tell the billions of Asian coolies they can’t enjoy the same fruits of their labors as Westerners do, they’ll instead reduce the standard of living in the West (this is already well underway). May young whites today accept they’ll never own a car, a home of their own, or have children - and yet there is no outcry over it.


10 posted on 10/19/2019 6:02:43 AM PDT by kearnyirish2 (Affirmative action is economic warfare against white males (and therefore white families).)
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To: Starboard

Thanks; surprisingly, it hasn’t drawn non-whites to any public demonstrations on climate - they’ll just pull the lever in the ballot box.

Unpaid work is not their thing...


11 posted on 10/19/2019 6:04:06 AM PDT by kearnyirish2 (Affirmative action is economic warfare against white males (and therefore white families).)
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To: exDemMom

I noticed that, but I ignore them. No one is Telling me what to buy.


12 posted on 10/19/2019 6:07:13 AM PDT by Kaslin
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To: exDemMom
...or of trying to sequester carbon dioxide in forms unusable by living organisms are profound...

The coal we burn is sequestered carbon and that sequestration poses no danger to anything. Sequestering the output of a coal plant also poses no danger.

13 posted on 10/19/2019 6:12:54 AM PDT by palmer (Democracy Dies Six Ways to Sunday)
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To: kearnyirish2

I think we know what ‘green’ in the GND means to most Democrat voters. Its all about the Benjamins to them.


14 posted on 10/19/2019 6:16:40 AM PDT by Starboard
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To: Starboard

Well put!


15 posted on 10/19/2019 6:28:44 AM PDT by kearnyirish2 (Affirmative action is economic warfare against white males (and therefore white families).)
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To: Starboard

While white liberal elites are funding much of the left’s agenda, I don’t believe they understand how they are being targeted by the radicals. I’ve seen renewed discussion about inheritance laws and taxation, and understand that the dwindling white population is being targeted because more and more of the tax burden inevitably falls on the non-whites filling Western countries. This is already occurring already in US cities, and increasingly in suburbs as they “fall”; for the time being, white taxpayers are funding non-white public school populations - then those whites disappear/”attrite out”, and some otherized population is stuck with the bills. Here in NJ, the governments are trying to use “affordable housing” laws to farm out the urban populations to the remaining white hosts in suburbs and more rural areas - and the cycle continues.

The “Green New Deal” is the same dynamic on a global scale.


16 posted on 10/19/2019 6:36:28 AM PDT by kearnyirish2 (Affirmative action is economic warfare against white males (and therefore white families).)
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To: Kaslin

Obama said the Global Warming Debate is over don’t you know ,LOL


17 posted on 10/19/2019 6:47:11 AM PDT by butlerweave
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To: JudgemAll
Mayor Pete is Queer....... that's all


18 posted on 10/19/2019 7:05:24 AM PDT by bert ( (KE. NP. N.C. +12) Progressives are existential American enemies)
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To: Kaslin
Low intelligent liberal voters will go for a lot of FREE stuff, not understanding that's is not really free but they aren't smart enough to figure out why.

But even dumb liberals will not go for promising them to take things they like away from them. Negative motivation does not work.

Vote for me and you get free college, free debt relief, free housing, free whatever.

But I'm also taking away your cell phones, your computers, your gaming systems, your TVs, your refrigerators, your air conditioning, your cars, your hamburgers and steaks, your plane rides, and anything else that you own that is made from or delivered by fossil fuels, which is essential everything in your life.

But you will get to live like stone age cavemen and feel smug in the fact that the climate is not going to destroy the world in 10 years.

democRATS have no idea how to sell a scam convincingly. That's why they have to avoid the subject altogether or outright lie about it to their voters.

19 posted on 10/19/2019 7:35:08 AM PDT by HotHunt (Been there. Done that.)
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To: HotHunt

Re-greta-BULL will NOT be pleased. HOW DARE THEY not even mention the greatest threat to muvver erf since the invention of nukeular weapons. She should skip more school until the delusiocrat contestants address this issue.


20 posted on 10/19/2019 10:19:19 AM PDT by rktman ( #My2ndAmend! ----- Enlisted in the Navy in '67 to protect folks rights to strip my rights. WTH?)
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