Beto O’Rourke: There Are Now Only TEN Years To Address Climate Change

Former Texas Senate candidate Beto O’Rourke will take your prediction that humanity has a mere dozen years to address “climate change” or face potentially catastrophic consequences, and up the ante. In an interview Monday night, O’Rourke claimed that civilization has only ten years left before rising seas and choked air threaten the very fabric of human civilization.

“We have one last chance to unleash the ingenuity and political will of hundreds of millions of Americans to meet this moment before it’s too late.” O’Rourke told MSNBC host Chris Hayes. “The actions we’re announcing today will help us get there.”

The interview was part of a rollout for O’Rourke’s environmental plan, which would see the United States spend around $1.5 trillion over the course of the next 10 — beginning with Beto’s hypothetical inauguration in 2021, hence the “ten years.” He’s not counting the next two years of Trump’s presidency.

The plan, which, like the Green New Deal, focuses on energy innovation and massive changes in American industry and infrastructure, would represent the “largest investment in fighting climate change in history,” according to CBS News.

The plan is more focused than Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s (D-NY). It avoids pushing for an almost entirely socialistic economic regime, and limits government takeover of industry to the oil and gas sector. It would also reform the crop insurance program for middle American farmers to promote a “greener” agricultural industry, and force the United States to re-enter the Paris Climate Accords, reversing one of the first Trump administration decisions.

But O’Rourke’s plan has its flaws, not least of which is the $1.5 trillion price tag, which O’Rourke says will be covered by raising taxes on the rich — a fairly common, if unreliable source of income for progressive programs.

The Paris Climate Accords, of course, have no execution guidelines, and there is no clause that forces accountability on any signatory nation, rendering the U.N. agreement fairly useless and inconsequential. Now that may not impact the United States directly, if the United States commits to its own carbon emissions reduction goal, as it already has, even under that dastardly polluter, President Donald Trump, but it does, ultimately, cut down on the effectiveness of the $1.5 trillion dollar investment.

O’Rourke’s plan, like the Green New Deal, calls for “net zero” carbon emissions by 2050. But even the GND’s vast investment and mind-boggling alterations to the American economic system would reduce global warming by a mere fraction of a tenth of a degree, because the United States is one of only several nations responsible for high carbon emissions. China, India, and developing nations in southeast Asia and Africa account for most of the carbon pollution, and while those nations are signatories to the Paris Accords, they’ve shown no interest in complying with the agreement’s guidelines (and the accords have no accountability clause that might trigger a punishment).

At least O’Rourke is gung-ho about his policy.

“We cannot afford to alienate a significant part of this country and we cannot do this by half measure or by only half of us. It can’t be Democrats versus Republicans, big cities versus small towns, we all have a shared interest in a cleaner future for this country. So I’m going to work with, listen to everyone anytime, anywhere to make sure that we advance this agenda and get to net zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050,” he said.

He added that he is “optimistic” even that the oil and gas industry will tag along on the initiative.

The post Beto O’Rourke: There Are Now Only TEN Years To Address Climate Change appeared first on Conservative Fighters.

from News – Conservative Fighters http://bit.ly/2J4tFWZ
via IFTTT