All due respect, but dude, there seems to be a lot of projection in your post.

Who is the "we" that is in crisis and denial? I've been part of the environmental movement for over 20 years. The people I work with have never been more panicked about climate, never clearer about the inadequacy of our policy responses, and never more hopeful about the possibility of finally setting off in a better direction. We are trying to end the use of dirty fuels in 10 years. Not bold enough? Help us be bolder, and help us win.

Are some groups still fiddling with pathetically inadequate technofixes? Sure. That's not going to stop just because you wring your hands. Please talk them out of it.

The timing and tone of the "Nuts" post is off. The most powerful and popular person on the planet has just banished the most damaging paradigm for the last 30 years, environment vs economy. Two days ago thousands of students marched on a coal plant trying to get arrested.

Our movement has always had a strong dose of Gramscian pessimism of the intellect, optimism of the spirit. Is that nuts? Of course it is, but it's also the best attitude available.

I respectfully disagree with you.  Barack Obama's election is the best thing we've got going when it comes to real action on climate.  I understand your frustration completely -- we need drastic change.  But you underestimate the difficulty of getting drastic change.

You ask why environmentalists don't all get together.  The reality is that environmental organizations have differing approaches and philosophies.  Some groups -- including EDF, NRDC, Nature Conservancy and WRI -- are already promoting a US CAP proposal that flatly doesnt go far enough. One thing we must do is push Obama to raise the bar as high as we can get it on emissions cuts -- not lower it to get an empty win.

But climate disruption is an incremental problem. The immediate impacts on people aren't clear.  We don't have millions of Americans galvanized and demanding action the way people did at the height of the Vietnam War.  I wish we environmentalists knew how to make that happen, but I don't believe for one minute that there's a clear answer to that.

What I do know is Barack Obama just signed the largest renewable energy appropriation in history, appointed people like Chu, Holdren and Browner (who do get it about climate --- read what Holdren has said on the topic), asked EPA to consider regulating carbon dioxide as a pollutant, and is moving towards legislation imposing carbon caps.

Is it enough? Will the reductions be enough to match what Hansen and others say is needed?  Probably not.  Until 2006, Republican Senate members made a guy who calls global warming a hoax chairman of the Environment Committee. The economic crisis makes a hard task much harder.

I hear where you're coming from, but what I plan to do this year is push as hard as I can for effective, science-based national legislation and regulatory action.  And I think that is a very good use of our time -- even if that alone won't be nearly enough.

... this notion that cap-and-trade is the sine qua non of being a head-in-sand-sellout. It doesn't make any sense.

I mean, you could cap carbon at 50% below 1990 levels by 2015, and 0% by 2030. That would be wildly ambitious, right? Commensurate with the problem, right?

Yes, we're probably not going to do that, but it's not because any flaw in cap-and-trade, it's because we as a culture are not prepared to face up to the task at hand. It's not like advocating different policies is magically going to change that. If we get serious about what we need to do, there are any number of policies, including C&T, that could do it.

Your hostility to c&t -- and Hansen's -- just seems bizarre and misplaced. Policy weapons don't kill people. People kill people.

grist.org

But consider how long it took to get from the Fifteenth Amendment to the Obama Presidency.

Consider how long it took to get from when it was noticed that people who smoked tended to get sick to the Surgeon General's (tentative) action.

People don't change until they have to.  Period.  All the "environmentalist" propaganda so far has just spread the word that change might someday be necessary.  When the S hits the F people will at least be reading the right book if not the right page.

Where have all the horses gone?

I fully agree that there is a heavy element of psychology at work among climate-activists, both at the individual & group levels.

I disagree with Kenny86's put-down.  He's expressing part of the problem you've described.  Which is fine! ... it takes all kinds, really.

I won't try to put any diagnostic tags on it.  We have a myriad of both professional camps promoting interpretations, and popular self-help approaches.  Those who are into the psych-nomenclature can try their hand ... but nobody's ever really nailed any of this down.  Take what good you can see in the psych-talk, and leave the rest on the book-shelf.

We have had Prophets for millennia.  I would not be surprised if they existed in various guises, back in the Stone Age.

Generally, prophets 'get no respect'.  Usually, their prophesies are hit n miss, too.

It's nothing to take personal.  You and other activists often don't see yourselves as 'corny old' prophets, but the role you are playing is the same ... just gussied up in science-studies ... and the 'occupational hazards' & exposure to negative attitudes are the same, too.

Ken, here's the basic truth:  Disaster is something we have all faced, personally & collectively, pretty much all along.  The fact that you & others 'see' a climate-disaster coming, simply is not enough to impress much of the population.

Older folks lived through the prolonged threat of Nuclear oblivion.  We could have been horribly maimed, and the planet messed up.  We lived it (and to a lessor degree, we still do).

Bird flu remains a real threat.  National Geographic projects that 360 million could die.  The U.S. government has published concerns that widespread withdrawal & hiding could so damage the economy, important parts of it would be very slow recovering ... or may never.

There is another important side to all this stuff, Ken, and that is, people - individually & collectively - respond far more competently & impressively, when there is actually a gun in their face;  when they are actually standing hip-deep in mud;  when the fires are actually roaring down the California canyons.

Ok - the oceans rise.  Ok - the forests dry out.  Ok - the floods wipe out towns.  Ok - stuff happens, and folks are a lot better responding to it than they are at listening to warnings and modifying their lives, before hand.

If the concern is for the wildlife that will be imperiled, then focus on how to protect & save samples.

For how long have we known, Ken & all, "You can lead a horse to water, but you can't make it drink".  It's a helluva lot tougher yet, to get people to do what you think is in their better interests.  

Ain't gonna happen, Ken ... "Earth to Major Ken...".  You know the deal:  People are going to do & live as they damn well please.  There is no argument on Earth, there is no special combination of words that will convince them to suddenly follow your advice.

You are doing you role as the prophet, the messenger, but the price of the role you have selected is that most of the time, you will find yourself & your warnings cheerfully ignored.  That's the way it is, and has been all along.

The trade part we absolutely hate.  That way lies corporate corruption and insider manipulation and another bubble.

A cap far out there will be "adjusted" according to the political winds.  I would rather see incremental goals, say 3% efficiency/conservation gains per year in all GHG/energy sectors + 3% conversion to renewable energy.  

Make it a yearly falling cap?  Maybe that would be more effective with the CnT skeptics?

If we missed the yearly cap, then we could adjust the incentives and regulations.  Increase mileage and building standards a bit faster, or increase subsidies into proven technologies, or build more bike trails and commuter rail.

A cap is hard to believe in.  It's like a 10-year plan in the old soviet system, hehey.   The corporate trader preffered method is a commie conspiracy?  Hehehey.

http://amazngdrx.blogharbor.com/blog John Schneider, Northern Wisconsin

(excepting David, to whom I will respond elsewhere)

Setting aside where one sits on the spectrum of relative risk (I'll simply accept Hansen, but no one who responded above is going to argue that we're not in some form of crisis), those who complained about my doomishness do not answer the specific questions I posed about why US environmentalists have not taken elementary steps to marshal forces.

We're x years way from cataclysm and yet our major organizations can't form a council to coordinate what we do? I'm sorry, but I find this inexplicable - or did until I read more on cognitive dissonance.

We control billions of dollars in assets. Why isn't that money being put into one last effort before it is too late?

If we do less than this, does this not indicate something is awry? Do you who complained, not think that we might significantly improve our position and power if we shifting all our staff onto one joint effort and put, let's say, 10 times as much money into climate campaigning as we are now? Of course we would. And the fact that we were doing this would send a Mcluhan-esque message far more powerful that anything we actually said!

When our major organizations put aside organizational agendas, agree a coordinated campaign and liquidate assets to fund a massive, last-minute effort to shift American views and politics - then I would say that we have accepted reality and are acting appropriately. If we keep worrying about our 5 year organizational fundraising goals and run scores of programs other than climate, then, I submit, we have not accepted reality and cognitive dissonance is a pretty good fit.

Ken Ward (JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) //= 0; i=i-1){ if (l[i].substring(0, 1) == ' ') output += "&#"+unescape(l[i].substring(1))+";"; else output += unescape(l[i]); } document.getElementById('eeEncEmail_UFjsWAQMc8').innerHTML = output; //]]> jpgreenhouse.org

You did respond on the point of coordination, but I respectfully disagree with your point. The reason we are split over how much we must accommodate pro-fossil fuel interests is that we did not, and have not cooperated to maximize our effectiveness. I do not think, EDF possibly being the exception, that our major organizations disagree on values or goals, just strategy. Had we focused our energy and resources we would have more power, in part because setting aside our small differences tends to emphasize how important we believe the goal to be, which in and of itself increases power.

Ken Ward (JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) //= 0; i=i-1){ if (l[i].substring(0, 1) == ' ') output += "&#"+unescape(l[i].substring(1))+";"; else output += unescape(l[i]); } document.getElementById('eeEncEmail_k4A6UgT4E0').innerHTML = output; //]]> jpgreenhouse.org

A prophet is never recognized in his own country!

Where have I heard that?

The eons of time and nature was good to us down here. It was not until we become civilized that destroying our habitat become fathomable or fashionable.

"What brings anyone anywhere?  Why do men build bridges?  Why are there jets? I was hoping to have sex tonight."

I think we need to apply this basic human instinct to the problem.  Hold out the hope of actual sex resulting from climate activism?

I know it sounds extremely unrealistic, but people buy jewelry, sports cars, and deoderant based on similar false hopes everyday.  Let's go for it!

http://amazngdrx.blogharbor.com/blog John Schneider, Northern Wisconsin

The mainstream economic paradigm says it all comes down choice. We chose between income or leisure, equality or efficiency, greenhouse gas or choir practice. The other paradigm says it all comes down to struggle. So when you find that you don't really have a choice, at least you know what the other option is.

Struggle.

Sandwichman

And everyone has to take a bite, right?  Oh I got your struggle, I got your struggle right here!  

Struggle with this.   (just kidding sandman)

http://amazngdrx.blogharbor.com/blog John Schneider, Northern Wisconsin

The psychology of environmentalism effects the ongoing battle between the ecologist and the masses. The Maslow hierarchy of needs environmentalist with their theory of motivation tend to be a little more cerebral than the Freudian masses who are old brain basic instinct oriented. A lions roar will still kick in the flight or fight mechanism but and they will still drop to drink from a clear water pond even if it's filled with deadly microorganisms. Their brains are still wired for here now perception and take no heed of the tiger crouching in the bamboo just a little farther down the trail.

The eons of time and nature was good to us down here. It was not until we become civilized that destroying our habitat become fathomable or fashionable.

Attacking sincerity, even a simplistic environmental slogan on a bumper sticker, has always struck me as intellectually lazy and a little nihilistic.

it turns out hotclimatechix.com is not registered

Dada would be a very unhelpful and unskillful method of communicating right now.

Dada has its time and place, but this isnt it.  Now is the time for clarity.

On the Collapse of Cognitive Barriers, one hope is that we humans, like all living organisms on our planet, are hard-wired with the survival instinct. Given enough understandable, accurate and honest information about a particular physical danger (i.e. smoking cigarettes), we will take the steps necessary to save ourselves.

The problem, of course, is that we have very little time left, and the facts relating to 'global climatic disruption' are complex and confusing, and are easily manipulated by governments, corporations and individuals who want to keep doing what they're doing.

Grist does a great job sorting things out for us, and I for one, am very, very grateful.

Dorothy