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Up to the 2008 election the Republican party platform called for reducing fossil fuel use, establishing a Climate Prize for scientists who solve the challenges

by tzs 10mo ago

Up to the 2008 election the Republican party platform called for reducing fossil fuel use, establishing a Climate Prize for scientists who solve the challenges of climate change, a long term tax credit for renewable energy (with specific mentions of solar and wind), more recycling, and making consumer products more energy efficient. They wanted to aggressively support technological advances to reduce the dependence of transportation on petroleum, giving examples of making cars more efficient (they mention doubling gas mileage) and developing more flex-fuel and electric vehicles. They talked about honoraria of many millions of dollars for technological developments that could eliminate the need for gas powered cars. They also mentioned promoting wireless communication to increase telecommuting options and reduce business travel. All that was gone by 2012. I'm not sure what caused the change.

g-b-r 10mo ago
Oh come on, Bush was the first disaster in the fight against climate warming. His "win" might be one of the most impactful sliding doors in the human history.
bertjk 10mo ago
Fracking. Before fracking people were worried about "peak oil", and being dependent on unfriendly governments for our basic energy needs. Then with fracking we realized we are actually sitting on huge available oil reserves, and peak oil quickly became a quaint outdated concept.
- rob74 10mo ago
  That may be part of it, but as your parent comment mentioned, the Republicans weren't only worried about peak oil and being dependent on unfriendly governments, but also about climate change. Of course, none of these three problems went away, the point where fossil fuels will be exhausted just got pushed further into the future, and the fact that it will take more and more effort and environmental damage to get to the remaining resources is also undeniable. But yeah, I guess your answer still applies indirectly: Fracking -> stronger interests by US oil companies -> money to the Republican party -> fossil fuel friendly regulations.
- blindriver 10mo ago
  The US is now the largest exporter of oil in the world.
- casey2 10mo ago
  Fracking has nothing to do with energy. When you look at EROI oil from a gusher is around ~100:1. For solar 10-25:1, wind 20-50:1, Fracking is 10:1 and most of that doesn't end up as diesel It's useful for the plastics and petrochemical industry, but it's not going to make the country energy independent, even including battery costs wind still trounces.
  - jtbaker 10mo ago
    Isn't LNG a byproduct of the fracking process - and natural gas has taken over a good chunk of coal's role in our electricity generation?
    - defrost 10mo ago
      Extracting LNG may or may not be via fracking, and may come from conventional or unconvential fields. The largest LNG gas fields currently producing are not being "fracked", eg: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/South_Pars/North_Dome_Gas-Condensate_field https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/South_Pars/North_Dome_Gas-Cond...
- CGMthrowaway 10mo ago
  Speaking to the grandparent comment, fracking is precisely what earned US "energy independence" for the first time ever, in 2011.
  - maest 10mo ago
    > earned US "energy independence" In a very myopic way.
    - CGMthrowaway 10mo ago
      With the benefit of hindsight, yes. A lot of money was lost in the fracking boom after the price of oil crashed
- kneelesh48 10mo ago
  [dead]
- zingar 10mo ago
  Not that it changes your point, but the other day I met a republican who said he doesn’t think climate change is a thing but peak oil, now that’s something to worry about. The longevity of this plus the “no anthropogenic climate change” nonsense is astounding. Armchair climate sceptics are happy to seriously stick to talking points that are so out of date that even the oil industry doesn’t use them anymore.
  - mlrtime 10mo ago
    So you met a person, they told you their Party Affiliation, then went to tell you how it isn't "real". Sorry I don't believe your paraphrasing of this person's real thoughts and ideas. I'm sure these people exist, but it doesn't mean anything. I could equally go find someone crazy saying the world is going to end this year.
    - tzs 10mo ago
      > I'm sure these people exist, but it doesn't mean anything. One of those people is the current President of the United States.
      - miguelazo 10mo ago
        Along with most of the people who voted for him.
    - taskforcegemini 10mo ago
      >I could equally go find someone crazy saying the world is going to end this year. Given current events, one doesn't have to be crazy to believe this
V__ 10mo ago
Obama was elected, which made some people very angry: > Here’s John Boehner, the likely speaker if Republicans take the House, offering his plans for Obama’s agenda: “We’re going to do everything — and I mean everything we can do — to kill it, stop it, slow it down, whatever we can.” > Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell summed up his plan to National Journal: “The single most important thing we want to achieve is for President Obama to be a one-term president.” Sure Trump took everything to an absurd level of "do the opposite of biden no matter what", but it started back then. [1] https://www.politico.com/story/2010/10/the-gops-no-compromise-pledge-044311 https://www.politico.com/story/2010/10/the-gops-no-compromis...
- CGMthrowaway 10mo ago
  History rhymes.
- tim-tday 10mo ago
  As far as I can tell they hated Obama not for what he did, said or believed. Those things were quite middle of the road. They hated him for what he was.
  - slater 10mo ago
    But his tan suit!!
  - junofan 10mo ago
    Didn’t help that he showed up at his first couple Senate meetings gloating about winning the election. And tried to set working hours for his former colleagues. Among other things.
    - boston_clone 10mo ago
      "Other things" most obviously being the racism caused in part by significant cognitive dissonance that uniquely affects white supremacists when having a black president.
    - rob74 10mo ago
x0b4dc0d3 10mo ago
You’re not sure? In a word: Greed. In two words: Crony Capitalism. The spend on “non-renewable“ energy is significant to the domestic economy. In 2023 (most recent year I could find), consumer spend on energy in the US was $1.6T (https://css.umich.edu/publications/factsheets/energy/us-energy-system-factsheet https://css.umich.edu/publications/factsheets/energy/us-ener...) with at least 82% of that being fossil fuels - the remainder being “renewables” and nuclear energy (https://www.eia.gov/todayinenergy/detail.php?id=62444 https://www.eia.gov/todayinenergy/detail.php?id=62444). This does not include billions in subsidies and infrastructure investment. “Going green” would threaten the American Greed Machine by cutting upwards of $150B in taxes annually, interfering with the individual, corporate, and government gains from the stock and commodities markets, causing short-term inflation due to commodity value spikes, and long-term deflation due to renewable energy being relatively very low cost to generate after the infrastructure is in place. Last, but certainly there is more, the US exports a massive amount of oil and gas. Divesting from fossil fuel production would have a significant impact on GDP (find your own source). This is why the US doesn’t invest in infrastructure that doesn’t generate significant ongoing income like it once did - it simply doesn’t make enough money. We only act once it is falling apart. It is all about the money, man. That money is power. It keeps the Corporatocracy and those at the top of it in charge, the US as the primary reserve currency and allows the US to have a huge, formidable military.
- tzs 10mo ago
  That was all true long before 2008 so doesn't explain why the Republican platform changed nearly 180 degrees on this between 2008 and 2012.
  - shevy-java 10mo ago
    Well - greed explains this though. Plus, you can also run fake-policies - the USA has done so numerous times before. Flip-Flopping happens in both parties there.
    - graeme 10mo ago
      Human greed has existed as long as humans have existed. "Grr greed" is an easy answer that's popular these days but by itself it can't explain a change as it's a constant factor in us as a species.
xbmcuser 10mo ago
Fracking and access to cheap gas and oil
philamonster 10mo ago
Republicans. Remember them?
kristopolous 10mo ago
I don't think anyone's nailing this right It's manufactured grievance. Opportunists politicize losing positions for political gain because they're inherently anti-elite, anti-establishment and upset experts and the informed. Upon this antagonization is conflict which brings on drama, eyeballs, and advertisers. It's an attention flywheel that brings loyalty, builds a moat, and sets a differentiator...
megaBiteToEat 10mo ago
> All that was gone by 2012. I'm not sure what caused the change. It was all lies to try and win elections.
giwook 10mo ago
Big coal got involved. Undoubtedly one or more billionaires in the dirty energy industry would have seen their substantial wealth dwindle to the mere single-digit billions and started paying politicians a lot of money. There's simply no other explanation because to actively kill clean energy projects that are 90% complete and is not only cleaner than coal but also now cheaper is simply illogical and irrational.
jmyeet 10mo ago
So John McCann did run on reducing fossil fuel usage and promoting a greater mix of energy technologies but I wouldn't say that changed by 2012 per se. McCain himself was the anomaly that didn't match earlier or later candidates. For example, Bush did open up ANWR to drilling, even though that was purely symbolic and nobody is going up there to drill or has done in the 20 intervening years (apart from some minor exploratory drilling by Chevron). Also, I'd say McCain's policy was more based on a national security argument than a climate argument. As others have pointed out, fracking changed everything. In 2008 we were a huge net importer of oil. Now we're a huge net exporter. Mines (including oil wells) are huge wealth concentrators. A handful of very wealthy people benefit hugely from resource extraction. And the US government, as a whole regardless of party, represents the interests of large corporations both domestically and overseas. Anyway, Bush (either one) didn't run on renewable energy. Neither did the candidates that came after. 2012 was just a reversion to mean.
fuzzer371 10mo ago
A black man was elected president.

by tzs 10mo ago

g-b-r 10mo ago

Oh come on, Bush was the first disaster in the fight against climate warming. His "win" might be one of the most impactful sliding doors in the human history.

bertjk 10mo ago

Fracking. Before fracking people were worried about "peak oil", and being dependent on unfriendly governments for our basic energy needs. Then with fracking we realized we are actually sitting on huge available oil reserves, and peak oil quickly became a quaint outdated concept.

rob74 10mo ago
That may be part of it, but as your parent comment mentioned, the Republicans weren't only worried about peak oil and being dependent on unfriendly governments, but also about climate change. Of course, none of these three problems went away, the point where fossil fuels will be exhausted just got pushed further into the future, and the fact that it will take more and more effort and environmental damage to get to the remaining resources is also undeniable. But yeah, I guess your answer still applies indirectly: Fracking -> stronger interests by US oil companies -> money to the Republican party -> fossil fuel friendly regulations.
blindriver 10mo ago
The US is now the largest exporter of oil in the world.
casey2 10mo ago
Fracking has nothing to do with energy. When you look at EROI oil from a gusher is around ~100:1. For solar 10-25:1, wind 20-50:1, Fracking is 10:1 and most of that doesn't end up as diesel It's useful for the plastics and petrochemical industry, but it's not going to make the country energy independent, even including battery costs wind still trounces.
- jtbaker 10mo ago
  Isn't LNG a byproduct of the fracking process - and natural gas has taken over a good chunk of coal's role in our electricity generation?
  - defrost 10mo ago
    Extracting LNG may or may not be via fracking, and may come from conventional or unconvential fields. The largest LNG gas fields currently producing are not being "fracked", eg: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/South_Pars/North_Dome_Gas-Condensate_field https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/South_Pars/North_Dome_Gas-Cond...
CGMthrowaway 10mo ago
Speaking to the grandparent comment, fracking is precisely what earned US "energy independence" for the first time ever, in 2011.
- maest 10mo ago
  > earned US "energy independence" In a very myopic way.
  - CGMthrowaway 10mo ago
    With the benefit of hindsight, yes. A lot of money was lost in the fracking boom after the price of oil crashed
kneelesh48 10mo ago
[dead]
zingar 10mo ago
Not that it changes your point, but the other day I met a republican who said he doesn’t think climate change is a thing but peak oil, now that’s something to worry about. The longevity of this plus the “no anthropogenic climate change” nonsense is astounding. Armchair climate sceptics are happy to seriously stick to talking points that are so out of date that even the oil industry doesn’t use them anymore.
- mlrtime 10mo ago
  So you met a person, they told you their Party Affiliation, then went to tell you how it isn't "real". Sorry I don't believe your paraphrasing of this person's real thoughts and ideas. I'm sure these people exist, but it doesn't mean anything. I could equally go find someone crazy saying the world is going to end this year.
  - tzs 10mo ago
    > I'm sure these people exist, but it doesn't mean anything. One of those people is the current President of the United States.
    - miguelazo 10mo ago
      Along with most of the people who voted for him.
  - taskforcegemini 10mo ago
    >I could equally go find someone crazy saying the world is going to end this year. Given current events, one doesn't have to be crazy to believe this

V__ 10mo ago

Obama was elected, which made some people very angry: > Here’s John Boehner, the likely speaker if Republicans take the House, offering his plans for Obama’s agenda: “We’re going to do everything — and I mean everything we can do — to kill it, stop it, slow it down, whatever we can.” > Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell summed up his plan to National Journal: “The single most important thing we want to achieve is for President Obama to be a one-term president.” Sure Trump took everything to an absurd level of "do the opposite of biden no matter what", but it started back then. [1] https://www.politico.com/story/2010/10/the-gops-no-compromise-pledge-044311 https://www.politico.com/story/2010/10/the-gops-no-compromis...

CGMthrowaway 10mo ago
History rhymes.
tim-tday 10mo ago
As far as I can tell they hated Obama not for what he did, said or believed. Those things were quite middle of the road. They hated him for what he was.
- slater 10mo ago
  But his tan suit!!
- junofan 10mo ago
  Didn’t help that he showed up at his first couple Senate meetings gloating about winning the election. And tried to set working hours for his former colleagues. Among other things.
  - boston_clone 10mo ago
    "Other things" most obviously being the racism caused in part by significant cognitive dissonance that uniquely affects white supremacists when having a black president.
  - rob74 10mo ago

x0b4dc0d3 10mo ago

You’re not sure? In a word: Greed. In two words: Crony Capitalism. The spend on “non-renewable“ energy is significant to the domestic economy. In 2023 (most recent year I could find), consumer spend on energy in the US was $1.6T (https://css.umich.edu/publications/factsheets/energy/us-energy-system-factsheet https://css.umich.edu/publications/factsheets/energy/us-ener...) with at least 82% of that being fossil fuels - the remainder being “renewables” and nuclear energy (https://www.eia.gov/todayinenergy/detail.php?id=62444 https://www.eia.gov/todayinenergy/detail.php?id=62444). This does not include billions in subsidies and infrastructure investment. “Going green” would threaten the American Greed Machine by cutting upwards of $150B in taxes annually, interfering with the individual, corporate, and government gains from the stock and commodities markets, causing short-term inflation due to commodity value spikes, and long-term deflation due to renewable energy being relatively very low cost to generate after the infrastructure is in place. Last, but certainly there is more, the US exports a massive amount of oil and gas. Divesting from fossil fuel production would have a significant impact on GDP (find your own source). This is why the US doesn’t invest in infrastructure that doesn’t generate significant ongoing income like it once did - it simply doesn’t make enough money. We only act once it is falling apart. It is all about the money, man. That money is power. It keeps the Corporatocracy and those at the top of it in charge, the US as the primary reserve currency and allows the US to have a huge, formidable military.

tzs 10mo ago
That was all true long before 2008 so doesn't explain why the Republican platform changed nearly 180 degrees on this between 2008 and 2012.
- shevy-java 10mo ago
  Well - greed explains this though. Plus, you can also run fake-policies - the USA has done so numerous times before. Flip-Flopping happens in both parties there.
  - graeme 10mo ago
    Human greed has existed as long as humans have existed. "Grr greed" is an easy answer that's popular these days but by itself it can't explain a change as it's a constant factor in us as a species.

xbmcuser 10mo ago

Fracking and access to cheap gas and oil

philamonster 10mo ago

Republicans. Remember them?

kristopolous 10mo ago

I don't think anyone's nailing this right It's manufactured grievance. Opportunists politicize losing positions for political gain because they're inherently anti-elite, anti-establishment and upset experts and the informed. Upon this antagonization is conflict which brings on drama, eyeballs, and advertisers. It's an attention flywheel that brings loyalty, builds a moat, and sets a differentiator...

megaBiteToEat 10mo ago

> All that was gone by 2012. I'm not sure what caused the change. It was all lies to try and win elections.

giwook 10mo ago

Big coal got involved. Undoubtedly one or more billionaires in the dirty energy industry would have seen their substantial wealth dwindle to the mere single-digit billions and started paying politicians a lot of money. There's simply no other explanation because to actively kill clean energy projects that are 90% complete and is not only cleaner than coal but also now cheaper is simply illogical and irrational.

jmyeet 10mo ago

So John McCann did run on reducing fossil fuel usage and promoting a greater mix of energy technologies but I wouldn't say that changed by 2012 per se. McCain himself was the anomaly that didn't match earlier or later candidates. For example, Bush did open up ANWR to drilling, even though that was purely symbolic and nobody is going up there to drill or has done in the 20 intervening years (apart from some minor exploratory drilling by Chevron). Also, I'd say McCain's policy was more based on a national security argument than a climate argument. As others have pointed out, fracking changed everything. In 2008 we were a huge net importer of oil. Now we're a huge net exporter. Mines (including oil wells) are huge wealth concentrators. A handful of very wealthy people benefit hugely from resource extraction. And the US government, as a whole regardless of party, represents the interests of large corporations both domestically and overseas. Anyway, Bush (either one) didn't run on renewable energy. Neither did the candidates that came after. 2012 was just a reversion to mean.

fuzzer371 10mo ago

A black man was elected president.