What about the politics, then? Here I think S&N do themselves and their message more harm than good. The book is an attack on a straw man environmentalist

Oh the irony. S&N are so concerned about the politics of environmentalism, but they choose to launch a political attack on the very people who are on their side.

Whatever. Ya gotta sell books, right?

"Thank God George Bush is our president." -Rudy Giuliani

I understand that the S&N arguments are more about political messaging than policy substance, but has anybody done any serious follow-up research on the polling data on which they rest their case? It just doesn't smell right to me. I'm open to being convinced otherwise, but I think Americans are on the whole much more interested in protecting the environment than S&N present them as being.

People in my state of New Hampshire, in both major parties, are seriously concerned about environmental protection and have been for quite some time. That is in part because the New Hampshire economy depends heavily on its natural environment, but also because a whole lot of people love their state, have an affinity with the natural world and their local environment, and are generally opposed to seeing that environment get uglier and shittier, or substantially different from the environment we know and love. The concern increasingly includes climate change, perhaps because average wintertime temperatures are changing faster here in New Hampshire than anywhere else in the country. Last year's relatively snowless winter threw a big scare into a lot of people.

If it is conservative to preserve beauty and beloved natural environments, and resist ugliness, then that is a good kind of conservatism, and we should embrace it. But in fact, I really don't think people are quite so hung up on 19th-century conceptions of progress based on endless growth, building and industrial development as S&N present them. Preserving and restoring the natural environment are only part of a broader progressive agenda. People are getting the idea that life can get both better and greener. The exciting contemporary trends in American ingenuity are in the direction of energy efficiencies and innovative technologies and infrastructure that can bring us a more prosperous, healthier and more pleasant life while restoring damaged natural environments and preserving healthy ones at the same time. People really do want this better life. The message is getting out, and people are getting it. We should focus on convincing those who do not yet get it, because with hard work they will get it eventually. (Consider, for example, how environmental protection fits in to the trend toward emphasis on prevention in health care reform. Prevention is a huge part of all the major plans.)

Although the idea of major public investment projects and Apollo-like programs excites me, I don't like the S&N rhetorical approach that plays into all the anti-environmentalist tropes, climate denialism, brave new environment complacency, and outdated images of old-style development-based progress. S&N want to have us believe that Americans can't be motivated to stop climate change on the merits. But apparently they can be convinced that there are a lot of crazy, hippy environmentalist suckers out there, and that like the new P.T. Barnums we should develop greener, cleaner technologies just so we can corner the market on the stupid green, clean technologies craze, and hawk this wothless stuff to all those hippy suckers. This is supposedly the direction of "national greatness." This rhetorical approach strikes me as a long term loser. It will have bite only so long as the green technologies field is not overtaken by some new area of technological opportunity. (For example, technologies designed to adapt to environmental degradation rather than help avoid it, and whose profitability requires that degradation - thus building market incentives for not doing anything about climate change into the American economy!)

So I still think the major political effort on climate change should continue to emphasize environmentalism-based appeals, rather than national greatness and global economic hegemony appeals. But I do agree that environmentalism-based appeals for climate policies probably shouldn't rely too much on the full-bore apocalypticism that moves only a limited number of people, and shouldn't focus only on the global dimensions of the threat. Environmentalists can possibly do more to identify local threats, and target the message that way. In just about every state or region, there is some local environmental feature to which people are greatly attached, often as a matter of identity, that is threatened by climate change. And there are local patterns of economic and social life, important resources, etc. that are threatened by climate change.

"It's also flat-out mistaken to claim that "S&N want to have us believe that Americans can't be motivated to stop climate change on the merits." Rather, what S&N want us to believe is that it's difficult or impossible to scare people into being motivated to stop climate change. In fact, they claim that you can motivate people to stop climate change, by getting them excited about it, as part of awholistic package.

What exactly is going to excite them? I took it that the idea is to convince Americans that there are all sorts of economic opportunities to be pursued in stopping climate change, and America can pursue greatness by becoming the world leader in exploiting these opportunities."

Umm, no. You took that to be the idea; that's not the idea. The idea is to convince Americans that stopping climate change is in our own best interest--and that includes our economic opportunities. The idea is to be inspirational.. In a crude paraphrase, the idea is to say " that we're going to stop climate change because it's the right thing to do, because by God, we're Americans, and we do the right thing! And we can do this in a way that lifts us all up—that saves the planet and produces good jobs for Americans. And that's the right thing to do."

"And finally, if we ask why there are all these people who are so eagerly determined to stop climate change - why there are riches to be made from a vast market of potential customers for green and clean technologies - the only answer we can get is that a whole lot of people think, for a variety of reasons, that climate change is a very bad thing.

Yet S&N claim that Americans on the whole just don't think climate change is such a big deal. So what they are arguing is that we can get Americans very excited about, and convince them to spend fortunes on, a national project of public and private investment aimed at stopping something that Americans don't think it is that important to stop. So where is this excitement supposed to come from? The only implication one can draw from this line of argument is that S&N think that Americans who don't think climate change is a very big deal can nevertheless get very excited about the prospects of profiting from the demands of those who do think climate change is a very big deal.

Wow, look at that strawman run! "The only implication one can draw…." Gee, how about drawing the implication S&N actually draw, instead of making up an argument and trying to attribute it to S&N? Here's the implication I get from S&N: "We can excite people about curbing global warming, if it's in the context of a broader, inspiring picture—one that involves energy independence, improved transit, and a strong economy."

S&N actually cite polling data for a given moment in time, stating that global warming is pretty low as a priority for voters. Do you have data to the contrary? I'd argue that S&N are being realistic, in saying, "This polling data shows how things are. Here's how we can change voter's minds, and get people inspired about ending global warming."

[juju bean text omitted]

"Is this really going to work? How many people are really going to get excited about this investment scheme? Certainly this is the sort of thing that presses the buttons of venture capitalists. But do you think the American people are on the whole likely to sustain a national project which is essentially just a business venture? I think a much better approach is to continue to emphasize the message that stopping climate change is a hugely important thing, because the consequences of climate change will be very bad."

Why does it have to be one or the other? N&S are calling for both—and that makes sense to me.

"If we want to sell Americans on the Apollo-like project, we should tell them we need to change the structure of our economies and radically overhaul the way we use energy so that we can avoid a host of very bad environmental and economic consequences."

Because that worked so well for health-care reform in 1993?

"S&N seem very opposed to the idea of using fear as a motive, allegedly because Americans are just too damn sunny and optimistic. Well first, I find it hard to believe that the same Americans who love movies and books about apocalyptic doom and end times are too optimistic to get worried about climate change."

No, it's not because Americans are optimistic. It's because people like inspiration more than fear. Look at your own example—the people who read about "apocalyptic doom and end times" think that the doom is going to happen to the people who deserve it—for them, that's inspirational literature.

"Look at the Sputnik example, which prompted the original Apollo project. Sputnik scared the crap out of Americans. They thought the Soviets were taking over space and were soon going to be in a position to rain down nuclear weapons on the United States. That's why they were willing to spend large sums on competing in a space program."

No, Apollo started with Kennedy's inspirational call to put a man on the moon. The fear calls attention to the problem, then inspiration stirs people to achieve the solution.

"Or consider the energy independence message that S&N find politically appealing. That message also appeals to the motive of fear. Why do people want to be energy independent? Because they are afraid of the potential consequences of not being energy independent. They are afraid of terrorists and Middle Eastern wars and embargoes and all of the other threats posed by dependence on Middle Eastern oil."

Got any data on that? Sure, that's one reason. There are others. And, as I said above, the fear calls attention to the problem, then inspiration stirs people to achieve the solution.

"The risk in emphasizing the energy independence message, of course, is that many people will want to respond to it not by investing to develop green and clean technologies, but by developing existing carbon based resources in the US and North America."

Agreed. But that's pretty clearly not what S&N are calling for.

"Maybe S&N just think there is something ignoble about getting people to do something by scaring them. I don't. It's only ignoble if you are lying. Telling them that there are terrorist cells in every city when there are not terrorist cells in every city is ignoble. But telling them that climate change is real, and for reasons X, Y and Z is a bad thing, is not ignoble - because it is true. But maybe S&N personally do not think climate change is such a bad thing."

Come on! And maybe you think that global warming is a conspiracy of international air conditioner manufacturers. And maybe you shave your legs in the shapes of small woodland animals. Maybe, maybe, maybe—give me a break! It's pretty low to overtly attribute bad motives to someone, with no evidence.

Ignoring your baiting, it's not that scaring people is ignoble—it's that it doesn't work. And there's a big difference between saying "climate change is real, and for reasons X, Y and Z is a bad thing" and saying, "climate change is real, and for reasons X, Y and Z is a bad thing—so be really scared." Look, fear has its place, as I noted above. But relying on fear too much is the kind of thing that gets us into a war in the Middle East.

"Being motivated by fear is not the same thing as being pessimistic. Americans are perfectly capable of believing that climate change is a very serious threat, and that its consequences will be dreadful, while at the same time believing that it is a problem that can be licked, and addressing the problem with cheerful, optimistic confidence. But it's impossible to spin stopping climate change into a totally sunny project."

Agreed.

"And anyway, I don't see what is so cheerful and optimistic about the about the "let's get rich on the green craze" approach of S&N. The optimism in that message also rests on a bedrock of fear. It's the same sort of optimism that is expressed in books with names like Deflate This! How You Can Profit from the Coming Recession and Financial Turmoil.""

Come on. That's not what they're saying, at all. What they're saying is "We're facing a cluster of really serious problems, and there are good, smart ways to approach them that we think will work, and other ways that haven't worked so far." To use your analogy, the book title is more like "How you can earn a living and make the world a better place" or "How you can help stop global warming by having a good, ethical job."

"Rational people are perfectly capable of assessing threats, identifying the ones that are really serious, and acting in a concerted way to prevent them from materializing. But we're not going to get anywhere if we change the message and stop alerting people to how bad the threat really is."

Who are these "rational people" of whom you speak? The ones who voted for Bush in 2004? The ones who smoke cigarettes? Who eat too much? Who work at jobs that deaden their souls? Are you really unaware of the multitudes of studies showing that people don't act rationally, that rationality is often an afterthought?

And yet again, it's a strawman argument to claim that S&N want to "stop alerting people to how bad the threat really is." Yes, we have to alert people—in the context of opportunities for inspiring actions.

"You miss the point, and set up a false dichotomy, when you say that "So I still think the major political effort on climate change should continue to emphasize environmentalism-based appeals, rather than national greatness and global economic hegemony appeals." It's not an either-or game; we need both.

"S&N seem to go out of their way to mock and disparage the environmentalist appeal, and trumpet the "death of environmentalism.""

I've worked as an environmental lawyer and consultant for over 20 years, in the US and internationally, working with NGOs, governments, and business. My experience has been that since about 1991 or so, the large environmental organizations have failed to deliver, and have often created very large problems in creating a cleaner environment. You and I can disagree about this; when I read their essay on the death of environmentalism, it struck home for me like nothing has in many years. Have you read that essay?

"4. I think your final paragraph indicates that you're locked into a fear-based mentality:

"In just about every state or region, there is some local environmental feature to which people are greatly attached, often as a matter of identity, that is threatened by climate change. And there are local patterns of economic and social life, important resources, etc. that are threatened by climate change."

Aren't you really saying, "Be scared--be very scared"? And that goes to the heart of the point--unless you want people to invade Iraq, people respond more strongly, more sustainably, and more heartfully to appeals from hope, than appeals from fear.

Why are you afraid of identifying and addressing real problems? Of course we should have hope. I'm not arguing climate change is an insoluble problem. I'm totally confident it can be solved. But it is an actual problem. Fostering an attitude of denial, ignorance and avoidance is not a message of "hope". It's a rather un-grownup tactic of pollyannism. Struggling against adversity is a great and hopeful trait of the human spirit. But to struggle mightily against adversity, people first have to recognize that there is this mighty adversity out there."

Agreed, about recognizing the adversity. But why on earth do you think I'm afraid of identifying and addressing real problems. What I want to do is place those real problems in contexts where people feel empowered to do something about it. It looks like you want to scare them into doing something—and I don't think that will work. The fear catches people's attention, but then it fades out. Look at your own life, and anything you've done that has lasted. Did you go to college, get married, get a job, have children, because you were afraid? I didn't think so.

"Anyway, why else would anybody want to halt climate change, unless they are afraid of the consequences of failing to do so? There is just no way you can spin the issue of climate change into an issue of pure opportunity, like searching for the northwest passage, going to California to prospect for gold, or developing the space tourism industry. It's more like getting people in a town to go down to the river's edge to build a levee, so that the town is not devastated after the next heavy rain. There might be some further long-term economic benefits and opportunities that accrue from preventing floods. And the guy who manufactures sandbags might have other reasons for promoting the levee. But the first order of business is preventing floods. Now, you can dance and clap and sing "Hi-ho" all you want while you're building the levee. You can approach the task with an optimistic can-do spirit. Whatever. But build the damn levee!

The climate change issue is inherently an issue of preventing some bad thing from happening. There is no way of dressing it up into something totally pretty and fear-free, and we shouldn't try."

What an interesting limitation you place on your imagination. Someone might want to halt climate change because they can see a better future—because it might lead to redistribution of income, to better jobs, to happier people, to greater international understanding, just to name a few at random.

And your example doesn't work. Building a levee is a matter of a couple of days—adrenaline will keep people going that long, when the threat is right in front of their eyes. Stopping global warming is a matter of years and decades. To my mind, a better analogy would be building a (environmentally correct, of course) canal, that will both divert away the flood waters, and help provide irrigation water for agriculture, and a recreation opportunity for people, and a social opportunity over the months it takes to build it, etc. If you build a levee, at best you get short term protection. Inspire people to build a canal—maybe you start with picture of upstream, where a city got horribly flooded last year, eh?—and you create a multitude of benefits. I know which one makes more sense to me.

So it's not a matter of "dressing it up into something totally pretty and fear-free"—it's about putting it into a context where people are inspired, and get multiple benefits.

You say:

"There are power dynamics involved. Climate change legislation threatens some extremely powerful industries, which are backed by some extremely powerful legislators and the entire executive branch."

I agree with you. My point is that the current green lobbying groups haven't been able to change that stalemate--and they weren't able to do so under Clinton, either.

Why do you think that is? How do you think we can change that? In short, what's your answer?

I think we can change it by changing the paradigm, and putting together a group that is politically more powerful than the the "powerful industries."

Both what you call "buzzwords" (and I would call a savvy combination of psychology, anthropology, and marketing) and policy proposals are necessary for that, as N & S point out.

What's going to change it is that people are going to start making lots of money reducing carbon, and that's going to get other people and countries on board. Regulatory reform that shapes the market and makes it easier for people who reduce carbon to capture the full value will help.

Ultimately the exhortations of the mainstream environmental movement, whether based on fear or chipper optimism, are epiphenomenal. Sorry if that's a bit cynical, but there you have it.

Further, you've proven Dan's point:

It's also flat-out mistaken to claim that "S&N want to have us believe that Americans can't be motivated to stop climate change on the merits." Rather, what S&N want us to believe is that it's difficult or impossible to scare people into being motivated to stop climate change.

It if it's a flat-out mistake to claim S&N say we can't just talk about climate change on its merits, then why do you insist that talking about climate change on its merits is fear mongering?

Talking about climate change on its merits means talking about things like the polar ice caps melting, and sea levels rising, and all the other horrible things that the S&N crowd says the environmentalists are dooming and glooming about.

Let's face it -- climate change *is* scary shit. You can't on one hand say it's OK to talk about scary shit and on the other accuse people of scaring the public by talking about the aforementioned scary shit.

IMHO, it's not about the way people talk about the environment; it's about the context you put environmental issues into.

Let me put it this way. If I see a particular problem as being about "my two year old is sticking things into electric sockets," then I'm going to take certain steps to fix what I define as the problem. If, instead, I see the problem as "my home isn't safe for my two year old", then I'm going to take different steps.

N&S are calling for defining the problem differently, in a way that includes the traditional environmental issues, but goes much broader and deeper.

This is what true framing is about; not about using clever words to cover up issues or persuade people, but rather to define issues in appropriate ways.

From my perspective, you're using the same kind of rhetorical tricks as the neocons--"Are you for the troops or against the troops."

I don't think I can be plainer than this:

"polar ice caps melting and the seas rising, that is, the potential effect of climate change" are just potential facts. "Scary" is your interpretation.

Don't get me wrong, I think this stuff is starting to happen, and we need to act to reverse it asap. But calling it "scary" doesn't make it scary; it just means you're scared.

If I run into a bear while I'm hiking, and it rears up at me, does that make the bear "scary"? Seems to me it depends--do I know how to respond? Have I ever had this happen before? Am I naturally a nervous person. Point is, it's not that the bear is scary. It's that I'm scared.

And there's a really funny contradiction in what you're saying. You're saying that the wrong framing "lost the Democrats political power" and "got us into the Iraq war", but then you say we should ignore framing!

And it's not about talking nice--it's about appealing to people's better instincts. It's about appealing to people's desires to be part of a community that does the right things. As part of that, we have to talk about what the dangers are--but in the right context.

As much as I think Bill Clinton can be a slimy triangulator, he's probably the most gifted politician of this generation. And when he said, "There's nothing wrong with America that can't be fixed by what's right with America," he was on the right track. He didn't say, "America has so many things wrong--we've got to fix them or we're going down the tubes!" And the reason he didn't say it that way is because those kinds of approaches don't work.

If you want to be scared, that's fine. As you say, we can disagree on this. But I think being scared, and trying to scare people, is a loser position. It worked for a while, for Bush and Cheney--but look where that got us.

And there's a really funny contradiction in what you're saying. You're saying that the wrong framing "lost the Democrats political power" and "got us into the Iraq war", but then you say we should ignore framing!

I didn't say "the wrong framing" did those things. The preoccupation with framing did. 

If I run into a bear while I'm hiking, and it rears up at me, does that make the bear "scary"? Seems to me it depends--do I know how to respond? Have I ever had this happen before? Am I naturally a nervous person. Point is, it's not that the bear is scary. It's that I'm scared.

No, bears are scary. A bear incites fear.

If you are in the woods, and a bear runs at you, you will be scared. It doesn't depend.

This conversation is almost as silly as S&N's.

You can have the last word, if you'd like. My last word is, "silly." 

Umm, no. You took that to be the idea; that's not the idea. The idea is to convince Americans that stopping climate change is in our own best interest--and that includes our economic opportunities. The idea is to be inspirational.. In a crude paraphrase, the idea is to say " that we're going to stop climate change because it's the right thing to do, because by God, we're Americans, and we do the right thing! And we can do this in a way that lifts us all up—that saves the planet and produces good jobs for Americans. And that's the right thing to do."

That's a wicked awesome, totally cool and inspiring message. I have no real problems with it. But that is definitely not the message I got from the S&N post. The message I got from them is that we need to bury the "it's important to stop climate change" and "saving the planet" ledes, and focus on the opportunities instead. The problem, apparently, is that if you say you are out to save the planet, then that logically implies that there is something the planet needs to be saved from. But of course to admit that is to suggest that there are things worth fearing in the world.

There is no incompatibility between the inspiration you and S&N are trumpeting and healthy fear. Inspiring people to pull together to stop a growing threat really only makes sense if you admit the reality of the threat and the fact that the threat is .. well .. threatening. FDR did a tremendous job inspiring people to pull together to defeat the Axis. They were driven to carry out this project because they had a lively sense of how absolutely shitty things would be if the Axis won the war.

You say:

No, Apollo started with Kennedy's inspirational call to put a man on the moon. The fear calls attention to the problem, then inspiration stirs people to achieve the solution.

By the time Kennedy gave his moonshot speech a consensus had already emerged about the vital need for a space program, and the policies had already been developed - and that was because of the heightened fear of the Soviets.

The fear catches people's attention, but then it fades out. Look at your own life, and anything you've done that has lasted. Did you go to college, get married, get a job, have children, because you were afraid? I didn't think so.

Not me. But millions of people work their asses off, and sock money away for their retirements, because they are scared of losing their jobs; losing their healthcare and facing catastrophic illness; and of being old, poor and destitute. So it's just wrong that fear can not motivate people to work for a very long time on very important projects. In the end, the most important reason to halt global warming is that global warming is bad - it's very, very bad. People should be afraid of it; their fear is healthy.

You and S&N seem like Scientologists. You get awfully ornery and peeved about people who won't sign on to your power of positive thinking religion.

Who you callin' thin? I put on ten pounds after I quit smoking.