The myth of the climate moderate
After months of discussion and debate, Democrats are at an impasse on a raft of infrastructure legislation that could make or break President Joe Biden’s effort to fight climate change. The rift, as it’s framed in countless news stories, is between progressives who want an ambitious social and climate spending bill and moderates who have protested the price tag.
But there’s a problem with portraying these disagreements as a conflict between moderates and progressives. This picture leaves out the unarguable scientific reality that pollution is warming the planet at an unsustainable and dangerous rate. There is nothing moderate or debatable about the catastrophic changes that global emissions are wreaking on the climate. In August, a panel of United Nations climate scientists called it “unequivocal” that humans have warmed Earth’s skies, waters, and lands.
“It is possible to find middle ground in many areas of politics; I know, because I have done it,” Sen. Ed Markey (D-MA), an advocate of swift climate action, said in a recent press conference. “But we cannot compromise on science. There isn’t a middle ground between a livable and unlivable world.”
A narrative that pits progressives against moderates runs the risk of spotlighting climate deniers and centering fossil fuel interests. It arguably distracts from the substance of climate policies that a broad swath of Americans already support
https://www.vox.com/22709379/moderate-versus-progressive-democrats-climate
= new reply since forum marked as read
