The GOP hates Surya Namaskar

It turned out that the midterm election was not about punishing the party and its candidates who explicitly supported or failed to stand up against the insurrection on January 6th a year ago.  Even abortion rights that the Supreme Court overturned did not become a rallying cry for voters.  People have practically abandoned Ukraine from the political discourse.  And, climate change was not even talked about as a high priority.

As always, crime and immigration were played up.  And, of course, the price of gas.

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We are screwed!

There was one moment when President Biden spoke about climate change and renewable energy and, therefore, about coal.  Biden said on November 4th, a mere three days before the election Tuesday:

Folks, it’s also now cheaper to generate electricity from wind and solar than it is from coal and oil.  Literally cheaper.  Not a joke. 

I was just — and so we can accommodate that transition.  I was in Massachusetts about a month ago on the site of the largest old coal plant in America.  Guess what?  It cost them too much money.  They can’t count.  No one is building new coal plants because they can’t rely on it, even if they have all the coal guaranteed for the rest of their existence of the plant.  So it’s going to become a wind generation. 

And all they’re doing is — it’s going to save them a hell of a lot of money, and they’re using the same transmission line that transmitted the coal-fired electric on.  We’re going to be shutting these plants down all across America and having wind and solar.

Biden is correct in claiming that it is getting awfully inexpensive to produce electricity from wind and solar, and over time we will be shutting down coal plants across the country.

There are such facts.  And then there is politics.

Recall what happened when Hillary Clinton spoke about the dying days of coal during her presidential campaign?  Her opponent, tRump, jumped on it and promised that he would make sure that coal does not go away.  Guess who won the contest?

In his column, David Leonhardt wrote in 2019:

The G.O.P.’s radical turn means that climate activists can no longer search for a compromise between the two parties, in the hope that their leaders will try to sell it to skeptical voters. Republicans have made clear that they will instead stoke the skepticism for their own ends. Doing so pleases the oil and coal industries, which are generous campaign donors. It also helps win elections.

So, when President Biden spoke about shutting down coal plants, one would expect Republicans to push back, yes?

It was a Democrat who immediately pounced on Biden's words.  A Senator.  Joe Manchin "erupted" reports CNN:

Manchin, a West Virginia Democrat who has longtime ties to the coal industry, seized on the comments in a statement on Saturday, calling them “not only outrageous and divorced from reality, they ignore the severe economic pain the American people are feeling because of rising energy costs.”

“Comments like these are the reason the American people are losing trust in President Biden and instead believes he does not understand the need to have an all in energy policy that would keep our nation totally energy independent and secure. It seems his positions change depending on the audience and the politics of the day. Politicizing our nation’s energy policies would only bring higher prices and more pain for the American people,” Manchin continued.

With Democrats like Manchin joining forces with Republicans, it is clear that our future depends on what state and local governments are able to push through.  In this framework, the race for the governor's mansion in three states matters a lot, argues this Washington Post report.  The three states are New Mexico, Michigan, and Massachussets.  Interestingly enough, the Democratic gubernatorial candidates in these three states are women: Michelle Lujan Grisham, Gretchen Whitmer, and Maura Healey.  All three women won their contests.

I suppose that yet again it will be left to women to clean up the mess that men leave behind!  But then, maybe we won't be screwed?

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