Hope These Days

 

Barack Obama ran for the presidency on the theme of hope, when things looked hopeless.  With his background in community organizing as well as as a legislator, he ran by building a movement fueled by idealism and excitement, motivating millions of small donors and activists.

When he was elected he warned that everything was not going to change or be accomplished immediately.  He warned earlier as well that this would be challenging, requiring effort and commitment over time, and there would be setbacks.  There sure were.  But his presidency got the country out of the Great Recession.  His Obamacare was very unpopular at first, and now is very popular. Though I wished he had done more, he set the country and the world on the path committed to addressing climate distortion. He did historic things, and very positive things that unfortunately were destroyed by the next administration.

But after his presidency, I wondered what happened to his movement, and what was going to happen to the hope.

Now we know.  I believe you can characterize the young candidates who won high office on November 3, especially in the US Senate and governorships, as children of Obama. Many ran on the same template at the Obama campaign, supported by small donors and enthusiasm.  Their policy preferences may vary, but they are authentic, they are intelligent, empathetic and grounded in the same vision of America.  He joined some of them on stage at their final rallies.  Their supporters treated him as their hero.  I saw recently a reference to him as the most popular political figure in America, still.

When things looked hopeless this year, these candidates went out there and ran for office. Over and over their campaigns were described as all-out efforts to connect with voters.  They traveled to every part of their states and talked to everyone.  And listened.  And in their speeches they told the stories of those they listened to, gave those stories significance and coherence as issues and policy.  Sometimes they sounded like Obama in their commitment to work for everyone, not just those in their party, or their race, or who voted for them.  

But it's not just their Obama-like approach and values and vision of America that gives me hope.  As Sarah Longwell observed, besides being good people they are mostly good communicators.  She believes that their experience with new media like Zoom and podcasts etc. has sharpened their abilities to speak directly, as if one to one.  And this is going to be important.  Not just in the upcoming presidential election--where I'm much more hopeful the Democrats will have candidates with real leadership.  But in the severe tests of the future.

For the future itself is not a fountain of hope.  I've heard maybe six different scenarios for how AI can destroy our lives, our civilization, and perhaps our human species, in the next decade or two.  And we're still faced with the same old slow death march of climate distortion.

I noticed of course that climate distortion was barely mentioned by these victorious candidates.  They addressed the top three or four most pressing concerns of voters, and these are in their own ways threats to the lives of people and the fabric of the country, and perhaps beyond. 

Meanwhile, however, there has been the United Nation COP31 climate summit, pretty much ignored by American news media.  The outgoing Secretary General of the UN Antonio Guterres, known (as the Guardian newspaper said) as the most forthright on climate issues.  He's made many very pointed and directed statements about the extent of the danger, and he again was both blunt and eloquent in his final press conference: 

"You cannot build peace on a burning planet. You cannot eradicate poverty when climate disasters keep throwing people back in it.  You cannot promise young people a better future while destroying the natural systems on which the future depends." 

    “Climate change does not stay in its lane,” he said. “It drives anger and displacement around the world. It wipes out development gains built over decades. It pushes countries deeper into deficit. It aggravates competition for land and water.

“It fuels instability. And increasingly, it threatens the very existence of communities and countries. For all these reasons, I have never viewed climate action as just one of many other issues. Climate action is central to every aspect of the work of the UN.”

A delegation of 18 Democrats who just won election, including new members of Congress, attended the last days of COP31 to affirm that they believed the United States would rejoin global action to address climate distortion.  They were far outnumbered however by representatives of fossil fuel and related corporations, intent on preventing real action.

Once again, Guterres said that "immediate and drastic" emissions cuts are needed to avert climate change catastrophe.  And once again, we face the reality that these are not going to happen.  And the distinct possibility that the new Secretary General will be selected from those who won't talk about climate so much anymore.  (Guterres himself is a model of direct communication.  I will post his entire address to COP31 at a later date.  It is concise and important.)

The behemoth El Nino just getting started in its predicted destruction, supercharging ongoing climate distortion, may well cause catastrophe too visible to ignore, though in today's world that has to be pretty damn visible.  But the Chaos administration will try to ignore it, and certainly won't lead or level with the American people.

But if not that soon, then someday soon, the reality will be too big to ignore even in America.  And that's when we will need leaders capable of meeting the moment, and above all of communicating what needs to be done to an American public that--just as it was on issues of inequality and corruption--is ahead of political discourse on climate, and is ready for some clarity and some planning on addressing climate distortion.  It probably won't be so much about dealing with the causes, but dealing with effects. While clearly attributing those disasters and phenomena to climate distortion, which must be dealt with in total.  

So I am hopeful that these leaders can at least do that.  I don't know if it's too late or not, or even exactly what that means, just as I have even less confidence in any ideas out there about addressing the many deadly dangers of AI.  But with these new leaders, perhaps we've got a better chance.