Luke Brinker has an excellent piece in Salon.com about the challenges Tom Steyer will face in a potential candidacy for Barbara Boxer’s Senate seat in 2016. This piece describes Mr. Steyer’s affiliations with groups whose most important goal seems to be cutting the budget deficit at the expense of the social safety net.
http://www.salon.com/...
I will make a point about our national debt. Those alive today and those who will be born owe an unknowable debt to past generations for the creation of the knowledge, institutions, devices, infrastructures, medical therapies, etc. that have enhanced the quality of our lives as well as our longevity. Are the unborn generations to inherit these assets without any debt? Previous generations invested heavily in our future but were unable to pay the bill in full for these priceless gifts to each of us. OK. So some debts are species threatening.
I deeply appreciate the peerless leadership that Tom Steyer has shown on climate change and his support of many progressive candidates. And I want to thank him for opening his Forbes 400 checkbook. However, I agree with Luke Brinker that he can do more as a private citizen to publicize the imminent danger of global climate change and mobilize Americans and the planet to make mitigating the effects of global warming a family priority. Yes, we all can do more.
I reviewed the Center for the Next Generation IRS 990 filings for 2011 and 2012 at Guidestar.org and have concluded that Next Generation was founded sometime during 2010 or 2011. The Center for the Next Generation has received about 10 million USD during its short life. The Steyer family & Next Generation are feeling their way, leaning what works and finding what does not generate a sufficient ROI.
The Center for the Next Generation is one of many blaring alarm clocks crying to awaken Americans and the world to the threat of global climate change. I believe NG is striving to reach its full potential. Few US Senators have time for anything but the business of the Senate.
I’m guessing that the Steyer family fortune is based upon brains, leveraging assets and luck. Can a 50 million USD investment be leveraged to create 10 or 50 or 100 billion dollars in unplanned investments by home owners, for-profit and non-profit executives, etc?
100,000,000,000 USD investment in renewable/sustainable energy producing assets while flooding malls, shopping centers, strip malls (not strip joints), town squares, etc. with hundreds or thousands, if not, tens of thousands of volunteers telling their fellow Americans about how global climate change will slowly alter their life style and dramatically change the health, economic prospects and expected life span of their children and grand-children. Those countless volunteers will be inspiring their friends and neighbors to…
If I were on the board of a company whose profits depended upon a healthy and viable fossil fuel industry I would carefully review planned investments if North Americans are investing more than 100,000,000,000 USD annually in renewable and sustainable energy. Of course, it will take several years (I estimate 5 years) to reach this level of investment and after 7 years we will have created a half a trillion dollars in unplanned sustainable and renewable infrastructure investment. That is investments that are unplanned today.
It is estimated that 145 billion USD is spent annually on global deepwater infrastructure. At what point does drilling in the Artic, mining Canadian tar sands, deepwater fossil fuel exploration and development, etc. not produce the expected ROI that justifies that level of risk and uncertainty? Very large, national and unexpected investments in sustainable/renewable energy producing assets will cause stakeholders to rethink their positions in fossil fuel assets.
Next Generation’s mission to confront the risk of climate change while enhancing the prospects of America’s children and families dovetails with a plan whose goals I have briefly described. Several years ago I read that the Steyer family donated 50 million USD to found the Steyer-Taylor Center for Energy Policy & Finance.
I will give you a hint of how Next Generation or any philanthropist could LIGHT-UP species-saving energy investment. Do a Google search on the phrases “The Living Legend” and “Henry Frampton” and “Warlock.” What can a 1950s world traveler teach us about energizing 21st century Americans to take very seriously global climate change?
Making America Green is Kool.
It would be helpful if we could create a for-profit social networking lobby firm to replace DC's revolving door. Send the money that is spent on K-Street back to Main Street where it belongs. This would be a highly profitable venture. No client receivables. No inventory investment. We get paid upfront like media buyers.
BONUS Comments:
I recall reading that Tim Steyer thought he could raise 100 million USD for the 2014 mid-terms. He would contribute 50 million and he would raise the other 50 from others. A review of NextGen Climate Action at Open Secrets discloses that he donated 66 million USD and raised 4 million USD and change. I have found that asking people to contribute to your cause is far than asking them to vote for you.
Many years ago I called a woman at 7 in the morning before I could tell her why I was calling she said she would write a $500 check if I would promise not make fundraising until the afternoon. She said I sounded too tired to ask for money! That is in the era when the max check was 1 K.
NOTE: I'm a rotten editor so you'll have to take full responsibility for all spelling and grammatical errors you find. I did not make these errors; you find them. Finders Keepers. I’ll not weep!