The only way to fight the mindless infighting on DailyKos is to not participate in it, and to actually talk about policy. And, as it were, there are good news out there!
Obama and Clinton plan to cool it
We've seen that a President McCain is not likely to be the leader this country and the world need to maintain the planet's livability for our children and the next 50 generations. What about a President Hillary Clinton or Barack Obama? Both would be a giant step forward. Unlike McCain, they have both put out detailed and comprehensive plans. (Obama's is here [pdf]. Clinton's is here [pdf].) Although you wouldn't know it from the media coverage, these plans are more important to the long-term health and well-being of future generations than the candidates' healthcare or Iraq plans.
Joe Romm is a former high ranking Department of Energy official, and he explains in great detail what the stakes are in the fight against runaway carbon emissions, and what can be done, first, in practice and next, in the political arena. And his conclusions are explicit:
The next president has a great many important calls to make:
- Appoint judges who will uphold laws to reduce emissions against challenges from the big polluters.
- Appoint leaders and staff of key federal agencies who take climate change seriously and believe in the necessary solutions.
- Embrace an aggressive and broad-based technology deployment strategy to keep the cost of the cap-and-trade system as low as possible.
- Lead a change in utility regulations to encourage, rather than discourage, energy efficiency and clean energy.
- Offer strong public advocacy to reverse the years of muzzling and misinformation of the Bush administration.
McCain is unlikely to do any of these five things. Obama and Clinton are likely to do them all.
Yes, Clinton or Obama -- and their advisors -- have thought through the climate issue a great deal, including how to overcome the traditional barriers to residential energy efficiency.
Both recognize that solving the climate problem requires commitments from the large developing-country emitters.
Perhaps most important, both Clinton and Obama have said they will bring urgency from the very top of their administrations to the enormous energy problem.
Yes, the plans are similar and comprehensive. I believe that, if enacted in total, they would work, would cut emissions sharply, while generating millions of new jobs and giving the United States leadership in what will certainly be the biggest industry of this century: GHG-reducing technologies.
This is really a "lazy quote diary", as Joe Romm's article is quite thorough and very detailed, and I can only encourage you to go read it in full. He concludes that both candidates not only have good plans, but would be equally likely to be successful in actually implementing them once in power.
Given how fundamental this topic is, this is heartening news, and if it helps put the primaries in perspective, that would be a good thing: on one of the most important topics of the next presidency, both Democratic potential candidates are excellent - whereas the Republican one is (unsurprisingly) bad.
Remember who the real enemy is - and what tasks are at hand in the near future...