Republican Presidential Candidates on Climate
Republican Presidential Candidates on Climate
As the Republican presidential candidates barrel toward their first debate under the shadow of a front-runner facing dozens of felony charges, The New York Times examined their stances on seven key issues.
I wouldn't consider voting for any of these people in the general election, but I recognize that people often live in gerrymandered districts, and therefore vote in Republican primaries in order to have some influence over their local representatives. For people living in such a district, choosing a least-bad candidate is a way try and moderate the Republican party just a bit.
Candidates are listed by poll-based estimates of their support, which makes it rather clear that Republicans as a whole have sought to reject any kind of meaningful path to zero greenhouse gas emissions.
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Trump: His actions as president may have caused irreversible damage to the global climate.
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DeSantis: He has supported efforts to adapt to the effects of climate change, but not to prevent it.
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Scott: He acknowledges climate change but rejects most efforts to stop it.
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Ramaswamy: He opposes all government efforts to reduce carbon emissions.
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Haley: She supports carbon-capture technology but has denounced efforts to reduce emissions.)
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Pence: He claims climate change is exaggerated and would prioritize domestic energy production.
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Christie: He supports action on climate change with some caveats.
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Hutchinson: He denounces government mandates but supports private renewable energy development.
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Burgum: He has supported carbon-capture as governor, but what he would do as president is unclear.
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Hurd: He acknowledges that climate change is a major threat, but what he would do is unclear.
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Suarez: He has pursued significant emission reductions in Miami.
Baffling that some still either choose to ignore the problem or outright oppose any efforts to mitigate it. Climate change shouldn't be a political issue. It will be an existential issue.
I wouldn't really call it baffling: the Republican party operates as a patronage machine, with people who made their money extracting fossil fuels being key patrons.
Largely anecdotal but my experience is the people I know that were soundly in the "climate change isn't real and it's just a hoax" camp are now pretty much all in the "okay it's probably real but just a natural thing that happens to the earth. Happened before and will happen again. It has nothing to do with us." So it makes sense that a person with that mindset would ignore the problem or even acknowledge it straight on but refuse to actually do anything about it.
Still baffling tho...
"Alright fine, my house is burning down around me, but it wasn't arson, it's just an electrical fire! I'm just gonna hang out on the sofa and watch Fox."
A reminder that the Republican Party is the only climate-denying major political party in the world.
They're all assholes. The United States is the one country that can lead climate reformation on a global scale and they're worried about dicking their opponents. My children deserve better.
Carbon capture is a scam.
Either say "pollute what you want into the atmosphere but then you are responsible for carbon capture to remove it" or get fucked.
Carbon tax is the best solution.
Carbon capture is supposed to capture carbon before it's released into the atmosphere.
But yeah, it's a scam, because it's real easy for polluters to say they're capturing without actually capturing.
It would certainly work, but hasn't had the support to get through Congress. So the Democrats passed an almost-all-carrots approach in the Inflation Reduction Act
It's scientifically and physically possible but it's not economically possible.
Throwing money into a hole isn't going to make it the solution. We need to fund it because it is a need solution for the future. But at them moment we are far better fixing other problems.
Basically we got a hole in the ship and water is pouring in. Some oil CEO fuckwit wants to design a pump to get the water out and tells everyone that letting water in isn't a bad thing. In fact it's a good thing because if we ignore it we have more resources to go towards this pump.
A reminder that the Republican Party is the only climate-denying major political party in the world.