In the 1988 vice presidential debate, both candidates agreed that the Greenhouse Effect was real, man-made, and posed a serious threat that needed to be addressed. Global warming was addressed in the VP debates of 1992 and 1996. It was discussed by Bush and Gore in the 2000 presidential debate, and by Bush and Kerry in 2004. In 2008, the issue was featured prominently in the debates, with even Sarah Palin expressing support for capping carbon emissions and John McCain playing up his record in bringing up climate legislation.
And in 2012, sheer silence.
Silence not just from the Republican candidate, who openly said this September, “I’m not in this race to slow the rise of the oceans or to heal the planet.” That’s already alarming. But there has also been a stunning silence from Obama/Biden, who never mentioned it through four debates, and instead danced around the issue. When talking about green energy, for example, Obama phrased it in terms of the economy, not the climate, and did not forget to mention “I’m all for pipelines; I’m all for oil production.” That same debate, he bragged: “We’re actually drilling more on public lands than in the previous administration” even though “the previous president was an oilman.” He continued to tout his “all-of-the-above strategy” which means “we still continue to open up new areas for drilling.”
This is a far cry from his rhetoric in 2008, when upon receiving the Democratic nomination, he declared that looking back, we would say, “this was the moment when the rise of the oceans began to slow and our planet began to heal.” Clearly, the last four years have been a far cry from that. But now, even the rhetoric has been reduced to a nicely worded “drill, baby, drill.”
What do most Americans think about this? Despite the huge sums of money put into discrediting climate science, most voters in fact want more action on the issue. According to a poll conducted by Yale and George Mason two months ago, 72 percent of undecided voters said Congress is not doing enough about global warming, while only 8 percent said it was doing too much. They also take it seriously: 55 percent of undecideds considered it one of several important issues, with a further 6% saying it’s the most important.
Meanwhile, Obama blasted Romney two weeks ago for being a false “champion of coal.” Not even “clean coal.” Romney apparently does not support fossil fuels enough.
Some politicians are slaves to their constituents, listening to them and being responsive to their input. But at a time when Oxfam has warned “climate change is set to overload the humanitarian system and destroy the lives and livelihoods of people today and into the future” and a UN report estimated global warming is already responsible for 300,000 deaths a year, it’s good to know that both of our candidates have principles, and they stick to them.
– Morgan Sinclaire is a freshman biology major.
