The political environment we live in today is remarkable. If you’re in agriculture, you must feel downright threatened. By now you’ve heard of the “Green New Deal,” which is an offshoot of President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s New Deal in the 1930s. A freshman congresswoman, Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) produced a House resolution, which in my view is nothing more than a wish list for a utopian society, which doesn’t exist.
In the last few weeks we’ve covered the EAT Lancet Commission that wants to save the climate by reducing meat from your diet. We have the dietary guidelines debate coming up, which in the past has tried to do the same thing. On Tuesday, Feb 12, Democrat presidential hopeful, Sen. Cory Booker (D-NJ), said Americans must eat less meat and the industrial meat complex isn’t sustainable. And now we have the Green New Deal. These attacks on animal agriculture are coming from everywhere.
Climate change is at the center of the resolution. Even though it’s short on details, it does give a rough framework of actions and desired outcomes, which are the opposite of our market-based economy. They wish to transform the U.S. to a 100 percent renewable energy system in 10 years and do away with the carbon fossil fuels-dominated system we have now. They don’t seem to be concerned about what the rest of the world is doing on these climate issues.
According to the bill, if we don’t deal with climate change immediately and drastically, there will be mayhem to come; global devastation and a total breakdown for the environment and societies. It’s not a question of IF we should make some changes, it’s that those changes are necessary to save the planet.
If we transform to 100 percent green energy there will be lots of jobs created—jobs to tear down the carbon energy infrastructure and jobs to install the new green infrastructure. They want to limit individual personal travel and create a larger mass transit system, with bullet trains, which California has been trying to develop over the past 10 years.
The government will provide jobs, at a living wage, and be the employer of last resort. And the equality card is being played. They say that there is a large racial wealth divide and that white families have 20 times more wealth than black families on average.
As far as agriculture is concerned, this Green New Deal proposes working collaboratively with farmers and ranchers in the U.S. to reduce pollution and greenhouse gas emissions from the agricultural sector as much as technologically feasible. This includes “supporting family farming” and “by investing in sustainable farming and land use practices that increase soil health and building a more sustainable food system that ensures universal access to healthy food.” However, the use of commercial fertilizers and pesticides would have to go because they are derived from oil and gas.
The social and economic desires of this bill are out of control. I doubt that much will come out of it but it’s remarkable that 67 members of Congress have signed on to support it. It makes me wonder if these Congress people get out much; I think they live in a vacuum.
We must keep reminding ourselves that they didn’t get elected because they are the smartest people in the country. They were just smart enough to get elected. Now we’re hearing a lot of noise about doing away with the Electoral College, which has been the mainstay of the republic. A simple popular vote where majority rules would tear this country apart.
When supporters compare the Green New Deal with FDR’s New Deal, they were right that we made investment to spur economic growth. Government is already spending a bunch on green energy. Germany invested big in green energy and now gets 29 percent of its power from wind and 38 percent from coal and has created a tremendous burden on its manufacturing economy with high energy costs.
I’m all for investing in infrastructure that will help America produce. Just think about how much commerce the Interstate Highway System has produced, or the water and dam infrastructure has done for agriculture in the West. But then look at the perplexing water situation in the Klamath basin.
I’m fine with green energy, but 100 percent isn’t realistic, and there is climate change, which farmers and ranchers are acutely aware of, and there are extremists on both sides of the issue. Mother Nature hands out enough risk to agriculture. We don’t need the ideological risk too. — PETE CROW
