President Obama: Make Climate Change a Priority in Inaugural Address

In 2050, a seemingly remote date from the new year we just welcomed, President Obama will be 89 years old, eight presidential terms will have passed since his second term ended, his daughters Malia and Sasha will be 52 and 49 respectively, and, if we continue on our present path, the world could be 4°F warmer, risking the lives and livelihoods of millions.

President Obama, as a leader of the largest historical emitter of carbon dioxide and the second largest current emitter of that climate-altering gas, has incredible power in shaping how severe and destructive this future will be. The world of 2050 will largely be dictated by the decisions the President makes over the next few years. How he handles this unique leverage will be the most significant and lasting legacy of his administration. 

This month in his inaugural address, the President can make it clear that he understands this ever-growing threat and has the guts necessary to aggressively confront the problem to the extent demanded by the science.

Unfortunately, even now in the second decade of the 21^st century, we already have raw glimpses of the “destructive power of a warming planet,” as President Obama described the impacts of climate change in his victory speech last November.  It is not only the children of 2050 that will be forced to live with this destructive power. No—the impacts of climate change are already here and they are only going to get worse.

From the droughts that ravaged food production in the nation’s bread basket this summer, to the wild fires that destroyed homes and forests in the west and the deaths caused by hurricane Sandy, the vicious devastation of weather patterns strengthened by the steroids of a carbon filled climate is something we must contend with now.

While the Inaugural Address is not necessarily a time for specific, wonky policy proposals, the time has come for more than the vague visions about climate change the President has so far offered. He should make it clear that the time has come to put a price on emitting carbon dioxide and that creating this impediment to pollution will be a central goal of his presidency.

By framing the price early in his second term, the President can take control of the narrative from the start and preemptively confront the inevitable accusation that it will be a burden on business, which will surely come from deniers and delayers in Washington.

He can define the price as crucial to preventing a small number of dirty corporations from polluting our environment for free. He can ask citizens directly: how would you feel if your neighbor could dump his garbage into your yard without any consequences? Why can fossil fuel companies, whose reserves are capable of warming our planet five times more than what the science tells us human infrastructure can handle, do the same to our atmosphere?

Additionally, with all the focus on the long term risks of a growing deficit and the fiscal cliff, the president can present the price as an opportunity to generate additional revenue from a few industries whose entire business model is based on jeopardizing the stability of our future.  

The fiscal cliff is indeed threatening, but it pales in comparison to the world-altering risk of a runaway climate. Hurricane Sandy and the Colorado wildfires alone cost the country millions. As climate change worsens, events like this will become more common and expensive. At this point it is undeniable, the sooner we act the easier and less expensive the transition way from fossil fuels will be.    

The president in his second term can operate without the concerns about short term political viability, which hampered his first.  The next four years are an opportunity for him to act on the visionary rhetoric that has characterized his political campaigns and not on what will win the next election.

Of course, the President still must contend with a Congress defined by an obstructionist House and an immovable Senate, but that alone is not an excuse for inaction. The president’s job is to lead. As the chief executive of the country, he has a unique ability to galvanize the public and communicate why urgent and ambitious action on climate change is necessary. The Inaugural Address this month is the perfect opportunity to begin this process.  

In 2050, when President Obama’s legacy is examined, arguments over particular aspects of the tax code or discretionary spending will be forgotten. What will be remembered is whether he chose to confront the most urgent challenge of his and, more importantly, his children’s era.  

Senate Race in Massashusetts

Being a resident of Massachusetts I have remained embarrassingly aloof of the race currently going on to fill Ted Kennedy's senate seat. This is partially due to the fact that there is no third-party candidate running, aside from the Libertarian (who interesting claims to be the 'tea party' candidate) Joseph Kennedy (no relation to the Kennedy family). I can't muster the support for any of the candidates, although I passively hope that the Democratic candidate Martha Coackley wins seeing her as the lesser of the evils running (not to mention she started out as the district attorney from my county), but I would recommend voting for Kennedy or writing in a candidate to protest the lack of choice presented.

With that said my interest in the race was recently sparked by a video posted by the Republican candidate Scott Brown. In the video clever editing is used in order to juxtapose a clip of president John F. Kennedy announcing his planned tax cuts with the candidate Brown elaborating on the positive effect these cuts would have for the economy. From a propaganda perspective, this tactic could prove to be very effective for the candidate. The Kennedy name has a lot of weight in Massachusetts and by portraying himself as a Representative of JKF's values (something he certainly could not due with Ted Kennedy) he successfully can make use of this influcence.

This, however, does not account for the fact that the connection of those tax cuts to modern reality are historically false. The top bracket income tax today is around half of what it was in 1963 when Kennedy proposed his tax cuts. Not to mention that wealth has become more concentrated in the top tier since then and the tax cuts were proposed during a time of relative economic prosperity, quite different from today.

This argument follows in a similar vein to the one that is heard quite often today, that tax cuts will result in economic prosperity, something that it seems the Bush administrations policies seem to contradict. This argument also ignores the fact that President Obama's far too small stimulus was significantly comprised of tax cuts.

I am no expert on this issue, but I generally subscribe to a Keynesian view of this subject. It seems to me that at a time of economic distress (like the past few years), private interests will be less willing to spend money due to financial precarity and that tax cuts (especially when directed at corporations and the rich) serve only to take money away from essential public institutions.

But like I said I'm not expert and would be very interested in reading suggestion and a discussion on this issue.

Obama's Nobel Prize and What it Means

Let's put this in perspective: the United States is still occupying Afghanistan and Iraq and conducting illegal military action in Pakistan. The United States is still the leading producer of green-house gases. The United States still supports China, Israel, Saudi Arabia and numerous other practitioners of the most grievous human rights abuses in the world. The United States still executes more people per capita than any 'first would' country. The United States still allows millions to die due to lack of or inadequate health insurance. How does this warrant anyone representing the power structure of the United States winning the Nobel Peace Prize?

First, it is absurd that any siting U.S. president can possibly win the Nobel Prize. Since the end of World War II Presidents of the United States (not too mention Teddy Roosevelt and Woodrow Wilson the only other sitting presidents to win the prize) have led the country in human rights abuses that warrant trial much more than awards.

But this is not the debate you are going to hear when the Nobel Committee's decision is discussed by the corporate media. In the U.S. both the presidents critics and his supporters are far more concerned with the image than the reality of this situation. The president did not ask to be awarded the prize and has remained humble while accepting it, But the media, far more concerned with theater than reality, is going to be portraying the President as some ego-maniac, messiah once again stealing the spot light (which can be seen here, here and here). We are going to seen this debate cast in light of Obama and his personality rather than true questions about America and its unpeaceful practices which these commentators have nothing to gain by challenging. Ultimately these attacks are going too outweigh any benefits the prize will bestow on the president.

I am not going to attack the entire idea of the Nobel Peace Prize as I believe that the majority of the time it goes to deserving individuals (just consult the list). However, their are numerous examples of individuals who deserved the award not receiving (the most notable and frequently cited being Gandhi) and other examples of those who did not deserve the award winning it. The most tragically comic Henry Kissinger who received the award in 1973 while the U.S. was still engaging in illegal bombings of Cambodia. His counterpart in Vietnam Le Duc Tho refused the award saying that his country had not yet received peace.

With this understanding, there are numerous individuals who certainly did deserve the award this year (some listed here) and did not receive it. Europe, apparently not getting the memo from the United States media, is still in the grips of its own delusion about the president. Obama has encouraged this delusion with some impressive rhetoric especially his Egypt speech, but until these words are reinforced by some real actions the president is a long way from deserving this honor. However, if he can use this as a challenge to fight for peace, as he said he would, this may end up being a good thing.