“More than 20 years ago, a top Republican Party communications adviser wrote a memo that essentially told the GOP how to make Democrats look like fearmongers.
The adviser was Frank Luntz, the topic was global climate change, and the problem was to keep Republicans from looking like they didn’t care about the environment. Luntz advised the GOP to create doubt about climate science and say, “we must not rush to judgment before all the facts are in.””
Read more: Red States win with IRA, but the GOP wants to gut it.And so the politicization of climate science began.
Yet now, the same adviser is singing a different tune. “In 2019, Frank Luntz acknowledged, “I was wrong in 2001,” and his advice then is “not accurate today.” He said that the American people want the federal government to do more about climate change, and they want to know not just the consequences of doing nothing but also the benefits of action.”
And the GOP is playing another game. Vote NO, but take the dough.
The article points out several red states who benefit greatly from the climate portion of the IRA. Why does the GOP want to cut off its nose to spite its face?
Tidewater News and Opinion Forum 
The IRA will not change the global average temperature by 1/100th of a degree in 100 years, all it will do is redistribute wealth from the middle class to the wealthy.
The GOP is right to oppose it, but the red states would be foolish to not get what they can from it.
Ever try to get a straight answer from a climate expert?
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“The GOP is right to oppose it,”…
Wanting their cake and eating YOURS too? The hate voting FOR things, but LOVE getting that money into their state coffers.
Do they send thank you notes to the Democrats who get the money for them? Or are they like rude teenagers who don’t know how to write a thank you note?
I get it: You don’t believe the man-made effects on our climate are worth doing something about. I hope your great-grandchildren stay cool enough to forgive you for your belief in alternative facts.
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There is no point in making useless gestures at great cost that will leave us unprepared to adapt to what happens.
But tell me why you think the temperatures of the latter years of the Little Ice Age are something we should strive for?
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…”unprepared to adapt to what happens.”
You mean like Gov. Youngkin’s idea to pull out of the RGGI which provides money for resiliency projects?
How about just holding temperatures form rising even more? Or is that just too damned hard? Going to the Moon was thought to be hard once also.
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First, why do you think a world 2°C above today would not on net be better?
Longer growing seasons in Canada and Siberia could feed billions, especially combined with CO2 fertilization.
The idea that 1.5°C above preindustrial times (we are already 1.1°C over that) is disastrous is totally arbitrary.
The RGGI is the greatest scam in modern times and something I would have expected Democrats to be opposed to.
It is effectively a tax hidden in our electric bills to force people who can’t afford waterfront property to pay to protect the million dollar mansions of those who can. It is purely a wealth transfer from the poor and middle class, for whom energy costs are a greater part of their income to the very wealthy.
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“It is effectively a tax hidden in our electric bills to force people who can’t afford waterfront property to pay to protect the million dollar mansions ”
It is not just for the homeowners, but also the businesses, and in this area, that includes the military. Even the Navy is planning for the effects occurring today.
But you go ahead and keep talking about how it is only beneficial to the millionaire homeowners. Just remember that when the Compound becomes waterfront property and it is YOUR progeny that want it protected. They just might say, “Why did Grandpa NOT fight to protect our property?”
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The Compound is twelve feet above sea level, so we’re OK for a few thousand years.
The proper way to protect property built in low lying areas is through bond issuing drainage districts supported by property taxes. If the property is not able to support the needed protection, that is nature and the market telling you that the area needs to go back to nature.
The military can pay its way too.
But there is no justification requiring people who can’t even find a parking place when they drive to the beach to pay for protecting waterfront property they can’t even walk through to get to the water.
And in any case, the tenth pf a millimeter reduction in sea level rise the RGGI MIGHT provide isn’t going to make any difference.
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And if the GOP is right to oppose it, then why are they attempting to remove monies going to their states? I believe the word is “counterproductive.”
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