"Give Me A Break": Elizabeth Warren Just Cut Through the Dumbest Climate Argument

[TomCADem]

Great move by Warren to attack how the RW talking point is being framed when 70 percent of the carbon that comes from three industries.

https://www.motherjones.com/environment/2019/09/give-me-a-break-elizabeth-warren-just-cut-through-the-dumbest-climate-argument/

Approaching hour six of the CNN climate crisis town hall, Elizabeth Warren broke the rhythm of the 10-candidate marathon on Wednesday.

Warren, the seventh candidate to speak to the small audience of climate activists, woke viewers up when she challenged a question from CNN moderator Chris Cuomo. Cuomo asked about President Trump’s recent rollback of a regulation introduced under George W. Bush and finalized under Barack Obama to phase out less efficient lightbulbs. “Do you think that the government should be in the business of telling you what kind of light bulb you can have?” Cuomo said.

But the real subtext of his question wasn’t about Trump rollbacks, it was one of the right’s favorite talking points: the argument that climate change requires a major personal sacrifice of individual autonomy to government control.

“Oh come on, give me a break,” Warren said with exasperation. “This is exactly what the fossil fuel industry wants us to be talking about. That’s what they want us to talk about: This is your problem.”

[marybourg]

2. It never occurred to me to leave them on longer.

I pay the electric bills.

[orleans]

3. "give me a break" is right!

i thought she was wonderful!

[SleeplessinSoCal]

4. Warren is armed with knowledge, quick thinking and

A method to cut to the chase and expose the propaganda for all to see.

[LAS14]

5. K & R

[wysimdnwyg]

6. It's about time someone of prominence states the obvious

First off, let's get a few things straight:
* Light bulbs of any kind contribute a small fraction to carbon dioxide emissions from power plants.
* CFL and LED bulbs use somewhere around 1/8th the power used by an incandescent bulb, while simultaneously lasting 10-25 times as long. (BTW, this renders the discussion of cost moot, as that $2 LED bulb ends up costing FAR less than the $0.50 incandescent.)
* LED bulbs come in a variety of colors and light temperatures, so there is no longer any complaint about the light being "too white" or "not like the old bulbs".
* Unlike CFL bulbs, LED bulbs are not hazardous.
* Many (all?) of the specialty bulbs that people claim to want so bad, like candelabra and "Einstein"-style bulbs, have LED versions. (I can attest to this as I have both in my house. I even have one that, when turned on, looks like fire as the light "moves".)

Now, what Warren did was to expose the farcical nature of any discussion about light bulbs. Because beyond all of this bullshit about which bulbs people can buy is a basic truth: If the power generation is fossil fuel-free (e.g. solar or wind), then the electricity to power your old, inefficient light bulb is still clean. Fix the source, not the symptom. If a dam is leaking, you don't worry about the flooded house downstream until AFTER you plug the leak.

[Hortensis]

8. Reminds me, when the old-technology lightbulbs were about to be outlawed,

a certain number of people on a decorating forum I visited were promising to lay in large supplies of them and never surrender their freedom, etc, by accepting new technology. It was a very nonpolitical forum, but shared outrage at this attack on democracy or whatever, and complete disregard for the grave need to address energy and climate problems, identified the reactionary right among us very quickly.

Of course, most of those old energy-guzzling, short-lived bulbs have been gathering dust in garages for years now.

[corbettkroehler]

9. It Let Her Grasp Of The Problem Shine Clearly

It was a great moment and, as a former volunteer executive with the Sierra Club, inspired me to reflect on the decades of deflections and distractions the other side has used to keep us off balance.

Remember the late 90's when the term "global warming" became so common that we heard it at least weekly on the networks' nightly news?