Tag Archives: green new deal

“You may laugh, but your grandkids will not.”

That’s one response from Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez to critics who have been trying to mock the Green New Deal resolution of Feb. 2, and we think it shows her admirable determination in the face of the very catastrophe that the critics are hastening. Here’s a more detailed video advocating the Green New Deal.

It’s useful to recall that similar criticism greeted Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s original “New Deal” in the 1930s. It was “anti-God,” said fascist priest Charles Coughlin. It was communistic or socialistic, said others who were so well off they did not understand the pain of joblessness and hunger during those years. But the New Deal lifted the country out of the Depression and provided a long term structure for the economy in situations where laissez-faire policies had led to economic deterioration.

Similar laissez-faire polices have led not only to environmental deterioration in general but a very specific and catastrophic threat: climate change, rising sea levels and extreme weather. It’s a deep crisis unlike anything we have ever faced. To laugh in its face, to deny the science, to mock attempts to engage in dialogue, is nothing short of a nihilistic and reckless disregard for the facts.

So AOC is right to say that the grandchildren won’t be laughing.

Read the 14-page document that describes the current environmental crisis, addresses economic and health issues, and then advocates steps towards renewable zero emission power. There’s nothing radical or strange in advocating renewable technology and conservation. What’s wrong is pretending there is no need for a response, and that future generations will be fine if we just do nothing.