Even fellow establishmentarians find Obama a timid or absentee leader on critical issues.

WASHINGTON (AP) — Former Vice President Al Gore is going where few environmentalists – and fellow Democrats – have gone before: criticizing President Barack Obama’s record on global warming.

In a 7,000-word essay for Rolling Stone magazine that will be published Friday, Gore says Obama has failed to stand up for “bold action” on global warming and has made little progress on the problem since the days of Republican President George W. Bush. Bush infuriated environmentalists for resisting mandatory controls on the pollution blamed for climate change, despite overwhelming scientific evidence that the burning of fossil fuels is responsible.

While Gore credits Obama’s political appointees with making hundreds of changes that have helped move the country “forward slightly” on the climate issue, and acknowledges Obama has been dealing with many other problems, he says the president “has simply not made the case for action.”

“President Obama has never presented to the American people the magnitude of the climate crisis,” Gore says. “He has not defended the science against the ongoing withering and dishonest attacks. Nor has he provided a presidential venue for the scientific community … to bring the reality of the science before the public.”

The comments mark a turnaround for the nation’s most prominent global warming advocate, whose work on the climate problem has earned him a Nobel Prize and was adapted into an Oscar-winning documentary.

Gore toasted Obama’s inauguration with a “green” ball. He helped the White House press the House to pass a global warming bill in 2009 that would have set the first-ever limits on the pollution blamed for global warming. It died in the Democratic-controlled Senate. Gore also advised Obama before the president participated in international climate negotiations in 2009. Obama’s last-minute appearance in Copenhagen helped salvage a nonbinding deal to reduce greenhouse gases.

In the essay, Gore calls the Copenhagen result a “rhetorical agreement” that provided cover for the administration’s inability to commit to enforceable targets for global warming pollution. Without legislation, Obama couldn’t follow through on his promises to cut emissions.

“During the final years of the Bush-Cheney administration, the rest of the world was waiting for a new president who would aggressively tackle the climate crisis, and when it became clear that there would be no real change from the Bush era, the agenda at Copenhagen changed from `How do we complete this historic breakthrough?’ to `How can we paper over this embarrassing disappointment?’ ” Gore writes, referring to the talks, where 193 nations met to draft a new global treaty to reduce greenhouse gases. The 1997 Kyoto Protocol, in which the U.S. never participated and Gore helped to broker, expires in 2012.

Gore declined an Associated Press request for an interview.

Bush pulled out of Kyoto and refused to control heat-trapping pollution even after the Supreme Court said the government had the authority to move forward forcefully on this front and federal scientists determined that increasing concentrations of greenhouse gases posed dangers to human health.

Obama, by contrast, has tightened fuel economy standards to reduce global warming pollution from automobiles, included billions of dollars for climate-friendly projects in the economic stimulus package and started controlling emissions under existing law.

As recently as April, at a Democratic fundraiser in San Francisco, Obama said he was “not finished when it comes to energy.”

Mentioning the climate deniers in Congress, Obama said, “Unless we are able to move forward in a serious way on clean energy, we’re putting our children and grandchildren at risk.”

Regardless of views such as Gore’s, environmental voters may see little choice in the 2012 election. Those in the Republican field so far either deny global warming is a man-made problem altogether or say actions to address it would harm the economy. For Obama, the biggest risk is that some environmental voters may not turn out.

In his essay, Gore notes his comments could weaken Obama at a time when he already is under attack from Republicans.
“Even writing an article like this one carries risks,” Gore says. “Opponents of the president will excerpt the criticism and strip it of context.”

Bowing to political resistance from Republicans and some in his own party, Obama abandoned an effort and a campaign pledge to enact legislation that would put the first-ever limit on greenhouse gases.

In November, after Republicans took control of the House, Obama said in a news conference there were other ways to tackle global warming that wouldn’t require new legislation.

“His election was accompanied by intense hope that many things in need of change would change,” Gore writes. “Some things have, but others have not. Climate policy, unfortunately, falls into the second category.”

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BONUS FEATURE

Al Gore Comes Out Swinging on Climate Change, Detailing Disasters and Exhorting Obama

By Brad Johnson, Think ProgressPosted on June 22, 2011, Printed on June 22, 2011

Vice President Al Gore has rejoined the public fight on global warming, issuing a issuing a clarion call to take action to address the climate crisis. Twenty years ago, he participated in the international mobilization against the future threat of fossil fuel pollution heating up our atmosphere. For decades, he and other leaders have battled the fossil fuel industry and their corporate and political allies to mobilize for a sustainable civilization. Now, the crisis of dangerous climate change is upon us. Speaking before the Games for Change festival on Monday, Gore delineated a few of the catastrophic disasters caused by our superheated climate system in the past twelve months:

Look what’s happened in the last twelve months:

– The twenty million people displaced in Pakistan, a nuclear-armed country, one of the biggest flood events in their history.

– An area of Australia the size of France and Germany combined, flooded.

– The nation of Colombia, they’ve had five to six times the normal rainfall. Two million people are still homeless. Most of the country was underwater for a portion of last year.

– My hometown, my home city of Nashville, a thousand-year flood. Thousands of my neighbors lost their homes and businesses. They had no flood insurance because there had never been a flood in areas that were flooded.

– Drought. Russia, biggest drought in their history, biggest fires in their history, over 50,000 people killed, and then all of their wheat and other food crops, along with that of Ukraine and Kazakhstan, taken off the world markets, leading to an all-time record spike in food prices.

– Texas, right now. The drought raised from “extreme” to “exceptional.” 254 counties in Texas, 252 of them were filed in the major disaster.

– Today, biggest fire in the history of Arizona, spreading to New Mexico.

– Today, biggest flood in the history of the Mississippi River valley underway right now.

At what point is there a moment where we say, ‘Oh, we ought to do something about this?’

Gore followed up by saying that the solution to the climate crisis doesn’t just involve changing to cleaner technology, but also the empowerment of women. When you “educate girls and empower women,” Gore said, “the population begins to stabilize and societies begin to make better choices and more balanced choices.”

Update

Gore’s factual litany of recent climate disasters was attacked on Fox Business by host Eric Bolling and guest Bill Kirk, CEO of Weather Trends International:

Kirk is not a climate scientist.

Update:

In Rolling Stone, Gore explains the unique responsibility of President Barack Obama:

Here is the core of it: we are destroying the climate balance that is essential to the survival of our civilization. This is not a distant or abstract threat; it is happening now. The United States is the only nation that can rally a global effort to save our future. And the president is the only person who can rally the United States.

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The better the demagog , the more dangerous the demagog—Aristophanes

But though there is no difference in this respect between the best demagogue and the worst, both of them having to present their cases equally in terms of melodrama, there is all the difference in the world between the statesman who is humbugging the people into allowing him to do the will of God, in whatever disguise it may come to him, and one who is humbugging them into furthering his personal ambition and the commercial interests of the plutocrats who own the newspapers and support him on reciprocal terms.—George Bernard Shaw

“A demagog is one who will preach doctrines he knows to be untrue to men he knows to be idiots.”— H.L. Mencken

By Tesha Miller

Can I get a witness?
Can I get an Amen?

It appeared as if the stars had properly aligned in the heavens and this relatively unknown candidate was suddenly embraced by larger and larger swaths of the population who were eager to see the actualization of his campaign promises. Even the world was enamored by the diplomatic rhetoric and the prospect of a less imperialistic US. And so was the making of President Obama.

Buyer beware.

It is not uncommon for a new President to miss a few beats, as it is well understood that he must hit the DC ground running. There are a zillion things which need immediate attention and everyone that helped get a President to his current position wants a little face time. Voters realize this and give a newly elected President a bit of latitude during their first several months in office. Running the US is certainly not a middle management job.

This slippage in moral courage, especially when it is needed most, would not be an isolated incident to President Obama, but would come to characterize the first half of his presidency. Gitmo, perhaps best exemplifies this sad truth. When confronted with signing the defense authorization act for fiscal 2011 President Obama effectively signed away the ability to pursue criminal trials for the detainees in Gitmo until the provisions expire in September. In a statement he said, “Despite my strong objection to these provisions, which my administration has consistently opposed, I have signed this act because of the importance of authorizing appropriations for, among other things, our military activities in 2011.”

They continue to turn a blind eye to his latest surround of Wall Street bankers as Chief of Staff and personal economic advisers and the recent praises sung of his foreign policy, AKA war practices, by former VP Cheney. Obama tells us that he has objections to such things and by saying that, he magically gets a pass on policy enactment which would otherwise outrage. Those liberals who dare question his policy decisions are quickly mocked and ridiculed by him for suggesting that he actually stand up for those exact positions which he claims to support. When blatantly confronted with the grim reality that President Obama is not at all the brand that they went to the booth to elect, they opt out of the mess by tuning in to some fictitious left or right paradigm news show because ultimately… Obama hasn’t cornered the market on a lack of moral courage, at all.

Why Obama Is (Finally) Taking on Wall Street

 

BY ROBERT REICH

Obama on the stump, again, rubbing elbows with the working class.

[print_link]

PRESIDENT OBAMA IS NOW, FINALLY, GETTING TOUGH on Wall Street. Today he’s giving his support to two measures critically important for making sure the Street doesn’t relapse into another financial crisis: (1) separating the functions of investment banking from commercial banking (basically, resurrecting the Depression-era Glass-Steagall Act) so investment banks can’t gamble with insured commercial deposits, and (2) giving regulatory authorities power to limit the size of big banks so they don’t become “too big to fail,” as antitrust laws do with every other capitalist entity. A few days ago the White House demanded that the biggest banks repay the $120 billion or so still owed the government from the bailout.

All good, all correct, all important. The president deserves at least two cheers. Why not three? It took him over a year to finally get here. The House has already completed its work on financial reform and may be reluctant to start over. The Senate is in disarray since Chris Dodd, chair of the Banking Committee, announced recently he wouldn’t seek reelection, and is poised to compromise with Wall Street on a number of big issues. Neither chamber has shown any interest whatsoever in resurrecting Glass-Steagall or limiting the size and risk of big banks. In other words, much of the game is over.

It’s possible, of course, that Congress could go along with Obama’s new proposals. A populist backlash against the big banks is growing among Americans who can’t understand why Wall Street is back to its old ways even though most Americans are worried about losing their jobs and homes as a result of Wall Street’s massive implosion in 2008. And they’ve never been able to understand why taxpayers bailed out Wall Street while Main Street still languishes.

A cynic might conclude that Obama’s born-again populism is for the cameras. Scott Brown’s upset victory in Massachusetts revealed the strength of I’m-mad-as-hell populism in the electorate right now. Add in the $150 billion of bonuses the Street is about to bestow on itself and the outrage meter could blow. With sky-high unemployment and surly voters, Democrats have to show they’re on the side of the people, not the powerful, as Al Gore put it in the last days of the 2000 election (too late to help himself).

For almost a year now, Democratic pollsters have been pointing out how much the public hates the bank bailout and despises Wall Street. But there was no reason for Democratic leaders in Congress or the White House to pay much attention. After all, it was a Republican president and a Republican Congress that came up with the bank bailout plan to begin with. Some stalwart Republicans had grumbled about it, of course, but Republicans have always been on the side of Wall Street and big business and weren’t likely to call for strong measures to prevent the Street from getting into trouble again.

Larry Summers and Tim Geithner scuttled Paul Volcker’s plan to separate the banks’ commercial and investment functions, and didn’t want to limit the size of banks or the risks they could take on. Summers and Geithner have wanted to get the banks back to profitability as soon as possible. And Democrats in Congress have had no stomach to take on Wall Street, a major source of campaign funding.

But suddenly the winds are blowing in a different direction over the Potomac. The 2010 midterms are getting closer, and the Democrats are scared. Their polls are plummeting. The upsurge in mad-as-hell populism requires that Democrats become indignant on behalf of Americans, and indignation is meaningless without a target. They can’t target big government because Republicans do that one better, especially when they’re out of power. So what’s the alternative? Wall Street.

Perhaps I’m being too cynical. Maybe the Obama and congressional Democrats are now ready to give up Wall Street trickle-down economics and focus on Main Street trickle-up. “There are two ideas of government,” said William Jennings Bryan at the Democratic National Convention in Chicago in 1896. “There are those who believe that you just legislate to make the well-to-do prosperous, that their prosperity will leak through on those below. The Democratic idea has been that if you legislate to make the masses prosperous their prosperity will find its way up and through every class that rests upon it.” He couldn’t have said it better.

Cross-posted from RobertReich.org.

ROBERT REICH, labor secretary under Clinton, is a left-liberal.