Cynicism: Big oil’s best friend

 “Oil King Warns of ‘Green Bubble’  HOUSTON --  Saudi Arabia's national oil company is sticking fast to its expansion plans while cautioning the world against ‘wishful thinking’ on alternative energy sources.”  (Forbes.com)

Here is an important milestone:  The clean energy economy now has enough momentum to worry the oiligarchs.  Warning of “bubbles” is a smart, easy way for them to discourage energy independence; in the wake of market meltdowns and Wall Street bailouts, exploiting American cynicism is like shooting fish in a barrel.

And now that the President has embraced the clean energy economy, it’s a political football, which makes it even more vulnerable to cynics.  In our divided political culture, a new idea can scarcely draw its first breath before the political class starts digging in fer or agin it.  Once the tug-of-war starts, who knows what to believe?

So now we have an organized opposition to the clean energy economy, led by big oil and coal, and joined by a growing chorus of professional political polarizers – the party operatives, the relentless cable “news” yappers, and elected “leaders” who would rather tarnish an opponent than get stuff done. 

But if anything has the power to call us to higher ground – to bring us together at a level above our petty politics – it’s building this clean energy economy.  

Work with me here:  Just for a minute let’s suspend all our well-earned cynicism and imagine that something could really pull us together as a nation and inspire us – across boundaries of politics and class and culture -- to build a better future.  I’m not talking about an “issue;” by the time we call it that, we’re already sniping.  I’m talking about a collective mission, a unifying proposition, a “call” that we can all hear and heed. 

If it did the following three things, we might rise to such a call:  create a lot of jobs, do right by our kids, and bring out the best in us.  Can the clean energy economy do all that?

Americans spend over $1 trillion a year on energy, most of it on fossil fuels.  As supplies dwindle and climate realities bite, we’ll have to shift almost all of that investment to clean energy.  Many of the jobs created by this transition cannot be outsourced, because they are physically tied to our infrastructure – our buildings, communities, and transportation systems.  And with a strong policy commitment to expand opportunities in the clean economy – like Washington’s Climate Action and Green Jobs law – the clean energy economy can (as green jobs champion Van Jones says) connect “the work that most needs doing with the people who most need work.”  So:  Jobs?  Check.

How about doing right by our kids?  Another symptom of the compound fracture in our politics is the continuing public controversy over climate science.  In the actual science, there is little serious doubt:  climate disruption is real, driven by humans, and hurtling toward catastrophe.  But in the public square – where political agendas are core curriculum and reality is an elective – misinformation continues to swirl.  Try looking at it this way:  If every major scientific institution warns that climate disruption poses a grave threat to our future and they turn out to be right, will our kids forgive us for ignoring them because we were confused by a snowy winter on the east coast or reports about a fishy sounding email from a British lab? And, climate aside, does anyone believe that the terms of the intergenerational contract allow us to continue using up fossil fuels at our current rate and dumping their effluent into the atmosphere as if it were an open sewer? 

OK, kids are good, but what about us?   After a brief flirtation with hope, we seem to have plummeted back into frustration and resignation.  Congress is a mess.  Jobs are scarce.  We’re shaking our heads and shuffling our feet.  How can we get our mojo back?  Is there anything that would do more to restore our confidence than busting off the shackles of fossil fuel dependence and leading a global clean energy revolution?  Is there any better way to call up the best in ourselves – the ingenuity, the determination, the generosity?

Too hopey-changey for ya?  What’s the alternative to hope and change?  Fear and stagnation?  Despair and rot?  Self-pity?  By all means, let’s be angry when our leaders fail us.  Let’s hold their feet to the fire.  But cynicism just lets them off the hook.  It’s laziness posing as “realism”.

Look, I’m not saying the clean energy economy is a free ride to Nirvana.  If you’re sitting around waiting for that, you’re missing the point.  If we accept this mission, there will be challenges and distractions at every turn.  Every time there’s a bump on the road to the clean energy economy – and there will be plenty -- you can bet some fossil fuel flack or cable clown will come unglued: “Bubble! Green scam! Eco-fraud! We must continue with fossil-fuel-addiction-as-usual.  There is no other way!” 

These tactics will only blow us off course if we misread the clean energy transition as a partisan political issue.  If we embrace it as a national call – an opportunity to retake higher, common ground – maybe we can keep picking ourselves up, dusting ourselves off, and getting it done.