Happy Friday! I realize that I keep track of the days of the week based on what deliveries are coming. On Tuesday, I get a CSA delivery of microgreens.?? Wednesdays is bread day from the Lyon Bakery, a local shop in my community. ??Thursdays I get dairy from my friend’s creamery delivery (they aren’t taking new clients so I add my wishes to her order). ??Fridays are WEEK EN REVIEW days (a special virtual delivery from me to you) and Saturdays we get ice cream delivered from a local producer.??
Spotlight on Spokespeople: You know and love Tyler Gillette, one of our original Spokespeople, for his funny memes. (Hey Tyler, maybe in quarantine you can make us some more. I think I speak for everyone when I say we could use a good laugh.) Since he started working with us in early 2018 (in other words, approximately ten years ago in covid time), he’s been published in the Cleveland Plain Dealer and the Columbus Dispatch and he was one of our first EcoRight Speaks interviews. (Thanks to Wen, who met him in person before any of us on the team got a chance to.)
Well, he comes at us this week with a new thought piece, Translating DeWine’s COVID-19 Leadership to Climate Change. In the editorial, he notes the swift manner in which Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine responded to the coronavirus, implementing social distancing orders before the rest of the country was (and before the state had its first reported case). “In his COVID19 response, DeWine has exemplified the Love and Honor code that he and I and countless other alumni were taught as students at Miami University. It’s refreshing to see a conservative governor take charge in the face of troubling scientific evidence and make the tough decisions he did,” Tyler writes. “Just like Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan followed DeWine’s lead on COVID19, DeWine could follow Hogan’s bold lead on climate change. And just like the rest of America looked to him on COVID19, we might follow his same energy to unite other conservatives across the country pushing for a price on carbon, the most efficient and economical way to combat climate change.”
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Double trouble: A new public opinion survey released by the George Mason University Center for Climate Change Communication and the Yale Program on Climate Change Communication found that even amid the COVID-19 crisis, “a record-tying 73% of Americans think global warming is happening. Only one in ten Americans (10%) think global warming is not happening. Americans who think global warming is happening outnumber those who think it isn’t by a ratio of about 7 to 1.” While there was a small dip from a November 2019 survey in the proportion of Americans “very worried” about climate change, the results of the current survey are “remarkably consistent” with the previous results, “with several indicators of public engagement actually reaching record levels.”
From the New York Times story on the report: “Americans, Dr. [Ed] Maibach said, have until recently ‘accepted the reality of climate change but saw it as a distant problem,’ both far away across the globe and far in the future. The latest survey shows ‘the majority of Americans see climate change as a clear and present threat to the health of people in their community,’ he said. ‘It’s a threat that’s come home.'”
And for humor:
The American mind can, apparently, worry about walking and about chewing gum at the same time.https://t.co/jDXXT1KaWO
John Schwartz (@jswatz) May 19, 2020
Choose your #EcoRight Quarantine House: Putting together this fun activity was almost as stressful as mapping out seat arrangements for my wedding. For the record, I am hanging out in House 4 with my governor Larry Hogan and climate scientist Katharine Hayhoe, though if they ran out of space, I’d take House 1 as well because who wouldn’t want to hang out with Bob Inglis and Rep. Brian Fitzpatrick is my birthday twin. Maybe Houses 1 and 4 can share a backyard so we can have an #ecoright BBQ.
Did you choose a House? If so, let us know where to find you! (Unrelated, the book Seating Arrangements by Maggie Shipstead is really good.)
??Sing it! I love finding creative content about climate change and carbon pricing, so h/t to our member Cynthia L. for sharing The Seastars and their smash hit, Carbon needs a price tag. May this tune stick in your head all day as it has in mine.
Allies in action: Heather Reams from Conservatives for Responsible Energy Solutions appeared in Newsweek with the editorial, Republicans are leading on clean energy. “Conservative-led carbon-reduction solutions continue to be offered on Capitol Hill and, combined with policies promoting clean energy jobs, could help drive our economic recovery. But more Republican lawmakers need to get on board or otherwise risk being left behind by votersespecially younger ones,” she writes. “As Congress continues to grapple with meeting the ongoing public health and economic needs of a nation reeling from COVID-19, conservatives on Capitol Hill should be working to put Americans back to work in one of the most high-growth, high-potential fieldsclean energy.”
Also…long time EcoRight friend David Jenkins of Conservatives for Responsible Leadership was quoted in a Washington Post story about the Trump administration, in response to the coronavirus crisis, reduced royalty payments and suspended leases for oil companies drilling on federal lands, while simultaneously imposing retroactive rent on wind and solar generators. Warning: he doesn’t mince words.
“Not only does this boneheaded move shortchange American taxpayers and Western states at the worst possible time, it incentivizes oil production during the worst oil glut in history. That is the absolute last thing the market needs right now,” Jenkins said in a statement. “This is just another stark example of this administration’s bumbling pandemic response, one that is fiscally irresponsible and tone deaf to the most basic market principles.”
This week’s must listen: We love these Yale Climate Connections 90-second interviews, especially when they feature one of our own. Bob Inglis is up in the latest, which I won’t preview because it’s literally 90 seconds and you can listen to anything for 90 seconds.
That’s it for us this week. Wishing you all a happy and safe Memorial Day weekend.