GREEN DEALING

The future will be green or not at all. ~ Bob Brown  

Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (OAC), Sen. Ed Markley and their fellow Green Dealers may be in their ascendency. Their Feb. 7 introduction of the Green New Deal (GND) certainly got the media’s attention. So much so that it was promptly designated another key litmus test that all Democrats vying for the 2020 presidential nomination must judge. How many Dem candidates are there now? It seems like at least 23; with the list including Pete Buttigieg [mayor of Ft. Wayne, IN] but at this moment it’s merely 13 and sure to rise.

After Medicare for All appeared at the top of candidates’ litmus tests several weeks ago, it’s now just basic blue and the GND now basks as uppermost. These litmus tests are being tossed at candidates as each new “hot topic” newly emerges and the media decides it’s one that candidates must instantaneously adopt or reject. Unfortunately, most candidates readily take the bait before understanding what they’ve signed on to. These repeated tests must make each candidate feel like they’re back in high school. Ah, the good ol’ days.

Green Dealers like OAC seem to believe that shouting from the proverbial tippy-top of endangered redwood trees, combined with a fervent belief that they’re holding a royal flush of solutions, is the best way to change laws. Others, including the many more taciturn Democrats, likely disagree. OAC hopes the GND manifesto will rearrange everyone’s priorities, now. Why; because she has gladly taken the scepter of lead spokesperson for the capital “P” Progressive clan at the capital “C” US Capitol and beyond. She also sees herself as savior of the truly environmentally righteous (or is it leftous) across their much-expanded purview. This expansion comes from the nature of progressivism.

Progressivism is progressive. Over time it seeks ever larger moral advance. If progressives have their way, the list of things considered unequal, unjust and unworthy will broaden, as the scope of the GND’s “environmental” agenda has swelled. This can be a good, but. Here’s a recent example of progressivism’s progressiveness: Additional New York City regulatory guidelines to be released this week will give legal recourse to individuals who have been harassed, punished or fired because of the style of their hair. NYC will henceforth ban discrimination based on an individual’s hair style, which will now be considered racial discrimination.

Because I live way outside the DC beltway, I wasn’t aware of the GND’s initial rounds of formulation, based on gathering opinions of experts and stakeholders. There were some discussions, right? If so, it’s not obvious. Instead, it appears OAC and Markley couldn’t and didn’t say no to any progressive idea that’s somehow connected to an improved “environment” for needful people, especially workers. Beyond decarbonizing the entire US economy in 11 years, the GND’s extra-environmental commandments, er objectives include the government being responsible for:

·        guaranteed jobs, with living, sustainable wages and full benefits for all workers, including folks who have been unable or unwilling to work;

·        affordable, adequate and energy-efficient housing for all;

·        universal, high-quality health care provided by a single-payer;

·        competitive economic markets not clouded by nasty monopolies and oligopolies; and

·        high-quality, free public college tuition for all.

In other words, the GND comes in many varieties of green that will cost lots of green; likely over $40 trillion during the next decade. And these multiple, herculean goals must be accomplished by 2030, only a few proverbial ticks of the governmental clock to entirely revamp the world’s largest economy. Sir Thomas More, the creator of utopian literature 500 years ago, would be impressed with the GND.

Advocates of the GND, being fantasists, are insisting that no trade-offs will be needed nor sacrifices incurred in order to satisfy their manifesto’s objectives. Indeed, AOC has stated, “The question isn’t how will we pay for it, but what is the cost of inaction, and what will we do with our new shared prosperity created by the investments in the Green New Deal.” [Emphasis added.]

She’s not worried about how to pay for these grand objectives perhaps because progressives like her are thoroughly at one with emerging Modern Macroeconomic Theory (MMT). MMT posits that sizeable government deficit spending, which increases the nation’s public debt, isn’t a concern at all. The government can keep printing Benjamins 24/7 as long as inflation doesn’t rise to an unpleasant level.

Fiscal irony is very much alive and well in Washington. MMT’s semi-magical leftish thinking is completely in line with solidly-right Republican conservatives who happily passed their unfunded 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act that’s raised the US debt to historically high levels. This year’s federal budget deficit will be nearly $1 trillion. The 2017 tax law revealed Repubs to be hyper-hypocritical deficit scolds. They condemn “excessive” government expenditures only when it involves Democratic policy, not their own.  

Let’s look at the GND’s principal environmental objective, rapid decarbonization of our $20.7 trillion economy. I spent the majority of my career working to promote and assess energy efficiency programs and policies. I’m all in with a greener America. The GND’s objective of requiring the entire nation to produce 100% of its energy from renewable sources and produce net zero carbon emissions by 2030 is as astonishing as it is realistically unattainable. The International Panel on Climate Change (IPPC) has previously and ambitiously proposed to cut global emissions just by 40% to 60% by 2030, and hopefully get to net zero by 2050. How does OAC and her Green Dealers propose do to this in 20 less years than the IPPC? They never say; that’s for others to stress about.

For reference, in 2017 (a baker’s dozen years before 2030) just 18% of total US power generation was produced from renewable energy sources, an all-time high. In the nine years between 2008 and 2017 this renewable share of power generation doubled, an impressive accomplishment. The GND’s goal for 100% of US energy use, not just power generation (electric power accounts for about 16% of total energy use), to be produced from renewable sources, would require renewable energy to increase by 550% over the next 13 years. The Green Dealers leave reality by the side of their utopian, all electric-vehicle throughways to the future.

I have no doubts that were only one of the GND’s lofty objectives to be undertaken; it could certainly benefit us all and would create many prosperous winners in that endeavor. But there also would be losers. For example, the vast majority of workers in the coal, oil, gas and petrochemical industries (1.44 million people, over half of which are blue-collar workers) would be out of jobs. Sure, job retraining is clearly called for, but in the undefined interim that can last for a while in job retraining, such workers would be SOL. They are not likely to be happy GND campers, nor would their employers. But no worries; each of them would be offered a government-guaranteed job.

Eliminating the internal combustion engine as the transportation sector’s motive power, another GND goal, would likewise lead to numerous lost high-paying manufacturing jobs and large economic dislocation in the short- to medium-term. Transportation of people and goods accounts for 29% of US total energy use. The auto industry is one of the largest in the US, contributing about 3% to the US GDP. Three percent seems like a small number, but it works out to $620 billion in cumulative yearly economic activity. That’s not a small number to trifle with. In 2018, US electric vehicles (EVs) sales reached an all-time high of 361,300, accounting for 2.1% of total vehicle sales. Getting to 100% EVs in 11 years boggles my mind’s engine.

As always, trade-offs will be present if and when the government begins investing in GND’s vast decarbonization. Any and all trade-offs have been denied by the Green Dealers, together with dismissing the substantial costs of attaining the manifesto’s goals. Such denials weaken OAC’s Green Dealing in the jungles of Congress and make the prospect of political victory much smaller. She might not care.

However, if AOC et al. really do want to create actual legislation based on the GND, then it’s incumbent on them to transparently develop specific plans for how the GND objectives could be met by 2030; how these objectives can overcome inevitable challenges; and what trade-offs, if any, the Green Dealers are willing to make to secure decarbonization within 11 years. That process is unexciting and tedious compared to commandment creation.

Maybe OAC is playing a longer game. Fundamentally, I suspect the Green Dealers don’t view their GND as a basis for actual legislation. In this sense it’s worthwhile remembering that Nancy Pelosi has already agreed to step down as Speaker by 2022. After all, the GND will require unprecedented and very big expansions of federal, state and local government programs, oversight and regulation. This is entirely consistent with the precepts of the few elected democratic socialists, like AOC and Sen. Bernie Sanders. This future is not consistent for the majority of current Congressional Democrats. Speaker Pelosi has given the GND a “seal clap,” hardly unequivocal support. But who knows what the future will bring.

With all its practical and political challenges I imagine AOC and other acolytes see their GND more as an edict for progressives of every stripe to rally around their maypole, not as a summarized playbook for real legislation.

Any specific legislation that might have a chance of becoming law coming through Speaker Pelosi and other “establishment Democrats” will elicit cries of derision from progressives. Because Democrat decrees that could actually pass the House will be instantly declared limited, insufficient and unworthy by Green Dealers. They have already claimed the very highest green ground, even if it’s realistically and politically impossible. They’ve now planted their flag, the GND, atop an ever-green Mt. Everest, without having to worry about actually climbing it.

It will be a long time before AOC and Green Dealers might gain enough votes in the House to pass her GND. I’m not holding my exhaled CO2-filled breath. Nevertheless, she has three million Twitter followers right now who have rallied behind her and probably the manifesto. To these devotees, the GND and its 6 commandments are gospel for achieving an alleged more perfect and far greener future. Alas, I’m not one of them; I’m too pragmatic.

  

FANTASY DEMOGRAPHICS

The future is keeping you out of the present time. ~ Van Morrison 

It’s now less than 100 days before the November 6 midterm elections. The media is keen to show its viewers and readers their prognostications about who the election winners and losers will be. Media doyens have been hyperbolically stating how our world suddenly will change after this the most important midterm election since 1066.

I exaggerate. William the Conqueror’s victory in September 1066 did change British history, but he wasn’t elected subsequently. He ascended to the British throne as William I on Christmas day after he, as a Norman, had laid waste to the Anglo Saxons at Hastings.
Maybe our upcoming midterm elections might possibly slip into the “top 10 historic midterm elections” listing, beginning with the one in 1858. Does anyone remember that top 10 election? However, the ephemeral nature of midterm election victories, like those in 1986, 1994 and 2010, means you shouldn’t get your hopes up beyond 93 days.

Nevertheless, it is notable that the Democrats are now confronting a within-ranks struggle for authority. Not too long ago it was the Republicans who were fighting internecine battles between extremist, hard-right factions, like the tea partiers and House Freedom Caucus, and the more “establishment” conservatives. But now Congressional Repubs are seemingly one all too big, content political family under the erratic and solipsistic leadership of the president.

In contrast, the Dems are having their own identity crisis, skirmishing between progressives and centrist “establishment” liberals. Several primary election victories by hard left candidates have blown leftish gusts into the Progressives’ sails. A widely-publicized example is the New York City primary victory of newly-coronated political prom queen, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, a 28 year old former campaign organizer for Bernie Sanders. Ms. Ocasio-Cortez is an active member of the Democratic Socialists of American and unburdened by any previous government service.

Are Progs ascending in influence and dominance within the Democratic Party? It seems so, according to the liberal media. In the 2018 primary elections so far Progs represent 41.1% of all Dem candidates. Nevertheless, the Progs’ primary success rate (the number of Prog primary winners relative to the total number of Dem candidates) is just 11.9% to date. So far, more centrist Dem candidates are winning much more than Progs, but that’s apparently not really news. The news is all Progs.

In their move leftward the Dems have aimed at a set of assertive constituencies, including millennials, women and minorities. The Progs’ mantra emphasizes expansive government action in the name of socio-economic justice. Progs are heavily promoting policies like Medicare-for-all healthcare; abolish ICE (Immigration & Customs Enforcement agency); $15/hr federal minimum wage; preserve the Roe v. Wade decision; remedy income, wealth and evermore types of inequality; restore open internet (net neutrality); reestablish open borders; stop discrimination and promote equity based on gender, race, ethnic heritage, age and sexual preference; and support the LGBTQIA2S+ community. Community has become a significant new Blue identity word.

This mantra can be powerful and although individual pieces are eminently worthy, as a whole it’s divisive. It’s contentious because the Dems’ and Progs’ divergent “Big Tent” objectives attempt to juggle deviating racial/ethnic/social groups along with distinct socio-economic clusters of voters. Having this multi-faceted mantra often divides rather than unites their coalition of identity groups.

David Hopkins, a political science professor at Boston College, believes that many voters can simultaneously take a liberal position on one or more individual socio-cultural issues and may still believe more generally that the liberal vision, like the Progs’ mantra, requires changing the country too much and/or too quickly. Repubs no doubt will raise this issue in their campaigns, as well as how we can pay for all the federal government’s expansion. A recent cost estimate for favorite Prog programs is $42.5 trillion over the first ten years; that's almost equal to the federal government's total expected tax revenues ($44T) in the next decade. 

I believe this mantra, together with the media’s prominent airing of it, helps explain why the percentage of voters describing Democratic candidates as “in the mainstream” fell from 48% to only 33% from 2016 to 2018. The percentage describing Democratic candidates as “out of step with most Americans’ thinking” rose from 42% to 56%. In contrast, over the same two-year period the public assessment of Republican candidates somehow remained essentially unchanged, 59% “out of step” in 2016 and 56% in 2018; 31% “in the mainstream” in 2016, 33% in 2018. These alarming numbers do not bode well for the Dems’ political goal of returning to the majority in the House and the Senate.

Adding more challenge to the Dems’ difficult goal is the continuing issue of election participation for their crucial, targeted voters. In a word, it’s dreadful. Key constituencies of the Dems, like younger and minority voters, have disproportionately not shown high voter turnout in either presidential or midterm elections. This is not a new issue. Hispanic voters in the 2016 presidential election comprised only 9.2% of the electorate and 7.0% in the 2014 midterms. More concerning is that analysts have estimated between 11% and 28% of Hispanic voters cast their ballots for Trump. Black voters were 12.4% and 11.9% of the electorate in 2016 and 2014 respectively. Young voters, aged 18-29 years, were 15.7% and 10.0%.

In contrast, white voters in the 2016 presidential election comprised 73.3% of all voters; in the 2014 midterm election white voters represented 76.9% of the electorate. Citizens 60 years and older have cast ballots much more consistently than other voters. They accounted for 33.6% and 39.4% of the electorate in 2016 and 2014 respectively. The Progs and Dems ignore white and older voters at their own peril, as they learned in 2016.

Fervent progressive advocates, glowing from their 11.9% primary success rate, dismiss actual recent voter behavior as passé. Instead, they paint a set of fantasy demographics for this November (and in 2020) where expected future demographic changes miraculously appear now which magnify millennials’ and minority voters’ potential importance. In this invented vision, young and minority voters across the US (especially in non-urban areas) will shake off their ballot-filling lethargy and vote progressive Dems into political power.

This Dem, and now Prog, imagined vision has been created more than once, but has yet to produce electoral success. Could it happen in 93 days? Maybe, but to ensure victory I ardently hope the Dems’ promote a less divisive policy agenda that doesn’t cause more centered voters to jump the Democratic ship, or just sit out the midterm. The Progs and Dems need to remember Van Morrison’s apt song lyric, so the future doesn’t keep them out of the present. 

A Post-Election Addendum. It’s Wednesday, August 8, the day after the latest set of primary elections in Kansas, Michigan, Missouri and Washington. Oh yes, there also was a special election in Ohio’s 12th Congressional district that the media obsessed about, even though the same two candidates will be campaigning against each other again for the “real” two-year House seat in just three months.

Once again, Democrat-Progressive candidates lost by big margins. In the Michigan gubernatorial race and in a Missouri House race Progs went down to defeat, despite much media play and personal appearances by Bernie Sanders and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. Neither election was close; each Prog candidate lost by about 20 points. The victorious Dem gubernatorial candidate, Ms. Gretchen Whitmer a former leader in the Michigan State Senate, said during her campaign she refused to support Medicare-for-all, and instead ran with the slogan “Fix the Damn Roads.” Ah, infrastructure.

The Ohio 12th Congressional district election remains “too close to call;” naturally, both candidates are declaring victory. The Repub candidate is leading by a slender 0.7 points, with provisional ballots still to be counted. Despite his apparent defeat, the Dem candidate’s run is being called a “triumph” in the liberal media. Nevertheless, elections aren’t played by horseshoes’ rules, being “close” to victory doesn’t provide any electoral benefit. In defeat, the Dems say this election will spur the Dems’ hopes and represents an ominous omen for Repubs in November. Why; because District 12 has been a true blue Repub stronghold for decades; their 2016 victory margin in the 12th exceeded 36 points. Today the Repubs are  pleased since their full-on Trumpist candidate is actually ahead of his Dem rival, and expects to be victorious after the remaining ballots are counted. So it goes…