Courtesy of Bastrop Advertiser
Sept. 23, 2021
By Bill McCann
For decades, Republican politicians followed the lead of their benefactors in the oil, gas and coal industries by denying that global warming was occurring, despite mounting scientific evidence otherwise. Instead, they attacked the science and scientists.
Then, as glaciers melted, sea levels rose, heat waves scorched millions of people worldwide, and weather extremes unleashed killer hurricanes, floods and fires, many of those politicians took another cue from industry. They decided global warming is real, but part of a natural cycle.
Meanwhile, new scientific research continued to confirm that global warming is triggered mainly by humans burning fossil fuels and must be addressed immediately. However, congressional Republicans and their industry friends have sought to water down or scrap Democrat-proposed comprehensive climate change legislation. Many of the once-deniers now acknowledge the problem. But they say they don’t want to harm the economy just because worldwide record heat waves, drought, floods, and wildfires – made worse by global warming – are becoming the new normal, or just because July 2021 was the hottest month ever recorded.
We need more time, Republicans say. Let’s not rush into a national legislative commitment on behalf of the planet, even if the scientists, who have been right all along, warn we are running out of time. Besides, Democrats’ climate plans are too costly.
Money wasn’t a problem for the Republican-led effort that handed big tax cuts to our wealthiest residents and corporations in 2017. But mitigating the deadly effects of a warming planet is somehow too expensive. In fact, disasters fueled by climate change cost hundreds of billions of dollars yearly. For example, financial services firm Morgan Stanley reported in 2019 that such disasters cost the world’s nations $650 billion the previous three years, with North America paying $415 billion of that total. And it will get worse.
Some radical Republicans also raise a favorite bogeyman, arguing that global warming is a plot to get the country to embrace “socialism.” But they happily receive government checks, get government-supported health care, and drive on government-funded highways. Their pals in the fossil energy industries grab billions of dollars annually in government subsidies. Howling about socialist plots won’t help when that federally flood-insured beach house gets swallowed by rising tides.
Having learned from their climate-change ploy, Republicans have adopted similar tactics during the COVID-19 crisis. When COVID-19 emerged in the U.S., former Republican President Donald Trump lied repeatedly, initially saying it would soon disappear. He didn’t want the pandemic to interfere with his continuing political and money-making ambitions. Cowed congressional Republicans and those in state leadership positions nationally fell in line to keep Trump happy and keep their jobs.
When Trump and his political allies pretended COVID-19 was no big deal, it was similar to what Republicans have said for decades about global warming. When COVID-19 turned out to be a big deal, they bashed the science and the experts who were battling the pandemic. And they warned that imposing public-health measures to save people’s lives would ruin the economy. Sound familiar?
Many Republicans have opposed mask mandates that help reduce the spread of the virus that causes COVID-19, saying such mandates restrict their freedom. Trump refused to wear a mask, as have his cult followers, turning an important public-health measure into a political football. Trump and subservient Republican politicians have argued the need to keep the country open to avoid tanking the economy and throwing people out of work – while conveniently ignoring that people can’t work if they are sick at home or lying in a hospital bed with breathing tubes. Or dead. Radical Republicans seem to have a habit of putting money and politics above human life. And they don’t seem to care.
McCann is a contributing columnist for the Advertiser. He is a retired journalist and may be reached at [email protected].
