Democratic Bak

bak

change name 12/17 -ic

taf lost a

this is a node (somewhat neglected?)

see tag  w/ small d

see Sellout  and Left

also climatehawk

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tool: <a href="https://environmentamerica.org/page/ame/environmental-scorecard">https://environmentamerica.org/page/ame/environmental-scorecard</a>

Sadly, Democrats and Republicans don't agree on much these days, including the need to protect our environment. It shouldn't be this way, it didn't used to be and we're doing all we can to make sure it's not this way in the future.

But, as we release our environmental scorecard for 2017, we want to not only applaud the Democrats who scored 100 percent, but also cheer on those members of both parties who boldly stood up for our planet this year.

Overall, the U.S. Senate had a score of 47 percent and the U.S. House of Representatives scored 45 percent, which does not bode well for our air or water.

The good news is that 139 members from the two branches voted with us 100 percent of the time, which means our planet and our families are represented by a lot of real environmental champs.

And on a number of issues, the environment received bipartisan support. In particular, a cadre of Republicans in the U.S. House supported funding to make public transit available and to ensure that the <a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/tag/epa" style=" text-decoration-line: none;">EPA</a> had enough money to do its job protecting our air and water. In the Senate, limiting <a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/tag/methane" style=" text-decoration-line: none;">methane</a> pollution was the big bipartisan winner.

Unfortunately, with 145 of our federal decision-makers scoring 0 percent, it's obvious we have a lot more work to do to make sure our elected officials represent the majority of Americans who want to see a cleaner, greener, healthier planet for future generations.

<a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/environment-america-scorecard-2515982183.html">https://www.ecowatch.com/environment-america-scorecard-2515982183.html</a>

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"the fall"?

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<div>"CLEAN" MONEY</div>

<div><a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/past/docs/politics/polibig/eastbusi.htm">https://www.theatlantic.com/past/docs/politics/polibig/eastbusi.htm</a></div>

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B. The Democrats’ Response: Mixing Business with Politics

The disparities between the Republican and Democratic Parties’ respective

fund-raising capabilities began to change when Tony Coelho, a little-known

congressman from California, became head of the DCCC in 1981.38 Over the

course of the previous decade, the political power of business and labor had

grown dramatically.39 Recognizing this growth, as well as the fund-raising gap

between the parties, Coelho set out to turn the DCCC into an effective fundraising

business, modeled after its Republican counterpart.40

He did so as the growth of PACs accelerated, both in number and influence,

reflecting a backlash against the political victories of consumer and

environmental interests in the 1970s.41 Although PACs had been around since

1944, their growth took off after the Nixon administration.42 Capitalizing on

Democratic control of the House in 1981, Coelho targeted PAC managers and

ruthlessly traded political access for cash.43 During his first year as chairman,

Coelho started the Speaker’s Club, a group that received audiences with

members—including House Speaker Tip O’Neill and other influential

Democrats—in exchange for a $5,000 membership fee.44 Despite Coelho’s

efforts and the fact that PACs typically give to incumbents, business PAC

money began to increasingly flow toward Republican candidates when it

appeared as though the Republican Party might regain control of the House in

1982.45

Instead in the 1982 elections, the economy soured and Republicans lost

twenty-six seats in the House.46 When the Democrats retained, and actually

increased, their majority in the House, Coelho stepped up his efforts to reclaim

business donations by convincing business and labor PAC leaders that

supporting incumbency yielded better political returns than supporting

candidates based on ideology.47 An emboldened Coelho “stressed over and

over” to business PACs that “Democrats retained a commanding majority in

the House and that the committees important to business continued to be

headed by Democrats.”48

His aggressive tactics in wooing business PACs away from the Republican

Party were compared to a Tammany Hall-style shakedown.49 As one account

relates:

Coelho set up candidate forums at which PAC directors could

look over the party’s prospects. Lobbyists and candidates all milled

around in a big room wearing name tags . . . .

Coelho didn’t rely wholly on the supposed business credentials of

his candidates, however. He announced he would record names of

those who didn’t support candidates he deemed worthy. It was as

though a traffic cop were stopping cars to sell tickets to the policeunion

ball.50

By 1983, just two years after Coelho was appointed DCCC chairman, the

Committee tripled its fund-raising from $2 million to $6 million.51 The

sources of the funds were highly concentrated:

Coelho liked to boast that half his money came through the mail,

from small donations with no strings attached. In gross terms, that

was true. But [finance director Terry] McAuliffe’s numbers show...

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<h1 class=" ">Kitzhaber saga fuels conservatives' fight on clean energy</h1>

The former governor's downfall hands conservatives ammunition to use against environmentalists.

By Jonathan Topaz and <a href="http://www.politico.com/staff/elana-schor" rel="author" class="url fn" target="_top">Elana Schor   E&E?

</a>

Updated <time datetime="2015-02-18T06:27-0500">02/18/15 06:27 PM EST</time>

<time datetime="2015-02-18T06:27-0500">For years, conservatives have decried efforts at the state and federal level to support renewable energy producers as crony capitalism.

In Oregon, Gov. John Kitzhaber, they may now have their poster child.

The downfall of Kitzhaber — the Democrat who last week said he would resign because of conflict-of-interest allegations over his first lady’s consulting contracts — hands conservatives on and off Capitol Hill ammunition to use against billionaire environmentalist Tom Steyer, green nonprofit groups and national Democrats advocating clean energy.

“This is just another example of environmental activist groups attempting to influence policy under a veil of secrecy, and one more reason these groups merit additional scrutiny,” Senate Environment and Public Works Chairman Jim Inhofe (R-Okla.) said in a statement Tuesday. “Beneath the violation of public trust by the Oregon state officials, we have far-left foundations funneling significant funds to an environmental group to orchestrate this type of activism without any public disclosure.”

Sen. David Vitter (R-La.), who opened an investigation into environmental nonprofits giving during his time as the environment committee’s top Republican, on Tuesday connected the Kitzhaber investigation to “a well-funded, highly developed far-left environmental network in place to influence environmental public policy.”

“This appears to be only one key example of how far they are willing to go to advance their agenda,” Vitter, who is running for governor of the Pelican State this year, said through a spokesman.

Democrats for weeks have distanced themselves from Kitzhaber, whose fiancée, Cylvia Hayes, earned at least $213,000 on contracts closely tied to her work in the Kitzhaber administration. Most of those contracts were related to clean energy, a major priority in the governor’s administration on which Hayes served as an unpaid adviser. State Attorney General Ellen Rosenblum has an open criminal investigation into the Kitzhaber administration’s actions, and federal authorities on Friday issued a criminal subpoena to the Oregon Department of Administrative Services for information related to Hayes’ contracts.

ALSO ON POLITICO

Oregon Gov. Kitzhaber resigns

JONATHAN TOPAZ

Kitzhaber, who leaves office on Wednesday, was just beginning a record fourth term as governor.

Oregon Secretary of State Kate Brown, a Democrat, took over and became the state’s 38th governor. When asked about how committed Brown will be to clean energy in her upcoming administration, spokesman Tony Green said she wasn’t yet ready to address specific policy questions.

But conservatives are seeking to link Kitzhaber’s administration to the national green-energy policies advocated by the White House and other Democrats. They claim that Democrats have propped up failed clean-energy projects that aren’t financially sustainable without government aid, and that aid ends up financially benefiting only the politically connected companies lobbying for it.

“The skepticism is with Washington politicians picking winners and losers in the marketplace,” said Catherine Frazier, spokeswoman for Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas), who argues that government funding for clean energy projects amounts to “corporate welfare.”

Kate Brown is pictured. | AP Photo

ALSO ON POLITICO

Meet Kate Brown

JONATHAN TOPAZ

“I have no doubt that this should serve as a call for an investigation beyond Oregon’s borders,” said Christopher Horner of the Competitive Enterprise Institute, a free market think tank. Horner and others cited emails, obtained by Freedom of Information Act requests, between officials in the governors’ offices in Oregon, Washington state and California in 2013 discussing a multistate climate strategy. In the emails, state officials discuss potential funding from Steyer and former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg and indicate that White House Council on Environmental Quality staff are “interested” in the proposal.

In the past several days, both The Wall Street Journal and National Review have published opinion pieces highlighting Oregon as an example of the failures of the clean energy industry. “[T]he Hayes-Kitzhaber operation exposes the underside of the big-money, insider politics that has come to dominate the environmental movement,” the Journal wrote in an editorial, an argument congressional Republicans have also used to criticize the Obama administration’s backing of companies such as Solyndra and Fisker Automotive.

Conservatives also argue that liberals — and the media — are holding the oil industry to a much higher ethical standard than the clean energy industry. “When Obama is giving tens of billions of dollars in tax breaks, this isn’t for a mom-and-pop wind or solar company. It’s for corporations,” said Charlie Pearce, a former campaign official for Dennis Richardson, the Republican who lost to Kitzhaber in November. Pearce vowed to launch a recall petition against Kitzhaber before the incumbent announced his resignation.

And the situation in Oregon also allows conservatives to target Steyer, the billionaire climate advocate that has become a major player in national electoral politics — someone who, Pearce acknowledged, has become “the Democratic boogeyman” — akin to Charles and David Koch, who support GOP candidates.

For Republicans dedicated to undercutting the network of Democratic campaign support and activism that Steyer has helped build, his ties to the Oregon scandal advance a simple but potent argument: Wealthy environmentalists are not above the same tactics they savage conservatives for using.

“I don’t object to Steyer spending his money trying to persuade people; I object to the hypocrisy,” GOP energy lobbyist and strategist Michael McKenna said in an interview. “Whether it’s criminal or not, it all smells pretty bad, and it’s a rebuke to everybody who says our side’s different from the other side.”

American Energy Alliance President Tom Pyle, whose pro-fossil fuel nonprofit is backed in part by funding from the Kochs, said in an interview that the Oregon flap is “indicative of systemic problems with all these programs” focusing on green energy.

“They’re so heavily dependent on government intervention and involvement,” said Pyle, a former Koch Industries lobbyist. “It’s beyond cronyism — bordering on corruption.”

The web of nonprofit grants and support that connects Steyer to Hayes might be indirect, but its structure mirrors the conclusions of Vitter’s report last year, which traced the financial influence of a group of wealthy green donors Republicans dubbed “the Billionaire’s Club.”

The Energy Foundation, one of two massive nonprofits that paid for Hayes’ $118,000 fellowship — income she failed to publicly disclose until questioned by Oregon media — got a $500,000 grant approved from Steyer’s TomKat Charitable Trust in 2012, according to the trust’s tax filings for that year.

The Energy Foundation steered two $25,000 grants in 2012 and 2013 to the Clean Economy Development Center, which gave Hayes her fellowship, federal tax forms show.

The GOP Senate report targets the Energy Foundation as “a quintessential example of a pass-through frequently employed” by a nationwide network of green donors working to influence federal and state policies.

The Energy Foundation said conservative attacks are skirting the issue on clean energy. “It’s unfortunate that some are using recent events in Oregon to make old, familiar attacks on clean energy work being done in the Pacific Northwest and across the nation,” the foundation said in a statement to POLITICO.

Bobby Whithorne, a spokesman for Steyer’s NextGen Climate political action committee, said the Oregon attacks are part of a broader industry campaign to twist the truth.

“It’s no surprise the Big Oil special interests and their feckless minions will blow as much dirty smoke as they can - in the last several weeks they have denied basic climate science, rejected human evolution and, in this case, ignored the actual facts,” he emailed Wednesday.

The TomKat trust’s Energy Foundation donations amounted to less than 1 percent of the latter group’s annual intake for 2013, NextGen noted, and were not permitted to be used on “legislative, lobbying or electoral purposes.”

In a Feb. 6 statement posted on its website, the Clean Economy Development Center said Hayes’ work focused on “communicating the economic benefits of clean economy projects” and that it “does not engage in any lobbying activities.” CEDC did not return a request for further comment by press time.

One of the projects on which Hayes focused during her fellowship, CEDC said, was a Gulf Coast sustainable communities project set up after the BP oil spill that won praise from the White House in 2011 for having “established a model of collaboration that brings together local communities, federal agencies, nonprofits, and businesses to rebuild neighborhoods.”

CEDC’s executive director Jeffrey King co-founded a group called Clean Economy Network that in 2011 became part of Advanced Energy Economy, another green nonprofit, of which Steyer is a co-founder and board member. The CEN’s affiliate education fund received $2.5 million in grants from Steyer’s TomKat trust in 2012, according to federal tax returns.

Former Inhofe aide Matt Dempsey, now a senior director at FTI Consulting, predicted that the Oregon scandal would come back to haunt Steyer as the hedge funder seeks to influence the next election.

“This is a black eye for his efforts moving forward in 2016,” Dempsey said.

Read more: http://www.politico.com/story/2015/02/john-kitzhaber-oregon-clean-energy-115287#ixzz43Glx7Gvb

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Read more: <a href="http://www.politico.com/story/2015/02/john-kitzhaber-oregon-clean-energy-115287#ixzz43GljMi2I">http://www.politico.com/story/2015/02/john-kitzhaber-oregon-clean-energy-115287#ixzz43GljMi2I</a>

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2014

- While Republican Senate candidates are nearly unanimous in their desire to either ignore or deny the existence of global warming, the major Democratic Senate candidates this cycle are more of a mixed bag.

Those in tough races in more conservative-leaning states avoid the issue of global warming or climate change on their websites. They include Sens. <a href="http://www.kayhagan.com/issues/" target="hplink" sl-processed="1" style=" box-sizing: border-box; color: rgb(57, 152, 0); text-decoration: none; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Kay Hagan</a> (N.C.),<a href="http://www.markbegich.com/priorities/economy-and-jobs/" target="hplink" sl-processed="1" style=" box-sizing: border-box; color: rgb(57, 152, 0); text-decoration: none; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Mark Begich</a> (Alaska), <a href="http://pryorforsenate.com/latest-news/" target="hplink" sl-processed="1" style=" box-sizing: border-box; color: rgb(57, 152, 0); text-decoration: none; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Mark Pryor</a> (Ark.) and <a href="http://www.marylandrieu.com/about" target="hplink" sl-processed="1" style=" box-sizing: border-box; color: rgb(57, 152, 0); text-decoration: none; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Mary Landrieu</a> (La.), as well as Kentucky candidate <a href="http://alisonforkentucky.com/on-the-issues/" target="_hplink" sl-processed="1" style=" box-sizing: border-box; color: rgb(57, 152, 0); text-decoration: none; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Alison Lundergan Grimes</a>.

Those hailing from more traditionally Democratic states fully embrace the need to confront the issue. They include Sens. <a href="http://www.alfranken.com/issues/energy/" target="hplink" sl-processed="1" style=" box-sizing: border-box; color: rgb(57, 152, 0); text-decoration: none; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Al Franken</a> (Minn.), <a href="http://www.edmarkey.com/issues/climate/" target="hplink" sl-processed="1" style=" box-sizing: border-box; color: rgb(57, 152, 0); text-decoration: none; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Ed Markey</a> (Mass.), <a href="http://corybooker.com/vision/preserving-our-environment/" target="hplink" sl-processed="1" style=" box-sizing: border-box; color: rgb(57, 152, 0); text-decoration: none; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Cory Booker</a> (N.J.) and <a href="http://www.jeffmerkley.com/about/" target="hplink" sl-processed="1" style=" box-sizing: border-box; color: rgb(57, 152, 0); text-decoration: none; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Jeff Merkley</a> (Ore.). But in swing states some candidates also discuss the issue on their websites, such as Sen. Jeanne Shaheen of New Hampshire, whose <a href="http://jeanneshaheen.org/priority/energy/" target="_hplink" sl-processed="1" style=" box-sizing: border-box; color: rgb(57, 152, 0); text-decoration: none; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">website touts the senator’s efforts</a> to “confront the global threat of climate change.”

Other Democrats don’t address the issue quite as directly. Rep. <a href="http://www.petersformichigan.com/issues/environment/" target="hplink" sl-processed="1" style=" box-sizing: border-box; color: rgb(57, 152, 0); text-decoration: none; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Gary Peters</a>, who is running for Michigan's open Senate seat, touts that he has “fought for clean air and clean water in Michigan communities” without mentioning “climate change.” Rep.<a href="http://www.brucebraley.com/landing/e131212" target="hplink" sl-processed="1" style=" box-sizing: border-box; color: rgb(57, 152, 0); text-decoration: none; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Bruce Braley</a>, the Democratic candidate for Iowa's open Senate seat, also does not refer directly to climate change on his campaign website, but he discusses his support for the Renewable Fuel Standard as a way to make “clean energy progress.”

And then there is <a href="http://www.michellenunn.com/ideas/energy-conservation" target="_hplink" sl-processed="1" style=" box-sizing: border-box; color: rgb(57, 152, 0); text-decoration: none; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Michelle Nunn</a>, the Democratic Senate candidate running in Republican-leaning Georgia. She goes squarely at the matter on her website: “We must continue to decrease our reliance on foreign oil and confront the challenges of climate change.”

Nunn's website continues:

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<div class="byline news-politics"><a href="http://robertreich.org">Robert Reich's Blog</a> [1] / By <a href="http://www.alternet.org/authors/robert-b-reich">Robert B. Reich</a> [2]</div>

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<h1 property="dc:title" datatype="" class="node-title">Why Democrats Can't Be Trusted to Control Wall Street</h1>

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Who needs Republicans when Wall Street has the Democrats? With the help of congressional Democrats, the Street is rolling back financial reforms enacted after its near meltdown.

According to the <a href="http://dealbook.nytimes.com/2013/05/23/banks-lobbyists-help-in-drafting-financial-bills/?hp" target="_hplink">New York Times</a> [3], a bill that's already moved through the House Financial Services Committee, allowing more of the very kind of derivatives trading (bets on bets) that got the Street into trouble, was drafted by Citigroup -- whose recommended language was copied nearly word for word in 70 lines of the 85-line bill.

Where were House Democrats? Right behind it. Rep. Sean Patrick Maloney, Democrat of New York, a major recipient of the Street's political largesse, co-sponsored it. Most of the Democrats on the Committee, also receiving generous donations from the big banks, voted for it. Rep. Jim Himes, another proponent of the bill and a former banker at Goldman Sachs, now leads the Democrat's fund-raising effort in the House.

Bob Rubin -- co-chair of Goldman before he joined the Clinton White House, and chair of Citigroup's management committee after he left it -- is still influential in the Party, and his protégés are all over the Obama administration. I like Bob personally but I battled his Street-centric views the whole time I served, and soon after I left the administration he persuaded Clinton to support a repeal of the Glass-Steagall Act.

Jack Lew, Obama's current Treasury Secretary, was chief operating officer of Citigroup's Alternative Investments unit, a proprietary trading group, from 2006 to 2008, before he joined the Obama administration. Peter Orszag, Obama's Director of the Office of Management and Budget, left the Obama Administration to become Citigroup's vice chairman of corporate and investment banking, and chairman of the financial strategy and solutions group.

All these men are honorable. None has broken any law. But they and their ilk in congress -- the Democrats who are now rolling back Dodd-Frank -- don't seem to appreciate the extent to which Wall Street has harmed, and continues to harm, America.

It's not entirely coincidental that the Obama administration never put tough conditions on banks receiving bailout money, never prosecuted a single top Wall Street executive for the excesses that led to the near meltdown, and still refuses to support a tiny tax on financial transactions that would bring in tens of billions of dollars as well as discourage program trading.

Democrats can't be trusted to control Wall Street. If there were ever an issue ripe for a third party, the Street would be it.

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<h1 class="parseasinTitle ">The Democrats: A Critical History </h1>

<a id="contributorNameTriggerB001JOZLZK" href="http://www.amazon.com/Lance-Selfa/e/B001JOZLZK/ref=ntt_athr_dp_pel_1">Lance Selfa</a><a href="http://www.amazon.com/The-Democrats-A-Critical-History/dp/1931859558#"> </a>(Author)</div>

<a href="http://www.amazon.com/The-Democrats-A-Critical-History/dp/1931859558">http://www.amazon.com/The-Democrats-A-Critical-History/dp/1931859558</a>

kpfa interview <a href="http://www.kpfa.org/archive/id/83639">http://www.kpfa.org/archive/id/83639</a>

2012 Platform

Romney's stance on anthropogenic climate change has wavered over the years. He recently acknowledged that <a href="http://green.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/09/05/shifting-views-on-climate-change/" target="_hplink">humans contribute to global warming</a>, but added "there remains a lack of scientific consensus."

The <a href="http://www.gop.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/08/2012GOPPlatform.pdf" target="hplink">2012 Republican platform</a> mentions "climate change" once, to downplay the issue's severity. The <a href="http://assets.dstatic.org/dnc-platform/2012-National-Platform.pdf" target="hplink">2012 Democratic platform</a> addresses climate change as "one of the biggest threats of this generation," although climate activists have criticized the platform as <a href="http://thehill.com/blogs/e2-wire/e2-wire/247257-dem-platform-backs-climate-change-regulations" target="_hplink">weaker on climate legislation</a> than the party's 2008 platform.

---

[Couple this with a new-fangled Democratic Party platform calling for expedited processing of oil and gas pipelines like the Keystone XL of Tar Sands Action/Tar Sands Blockade fame and an "all of the above" energy policy being touted by the Party at large, and soon it becomes quite clear for those with eyes to see that the people behind the taxpayer- and corporate-sponsored parties are also the people behind today's Democratic Party.] horn

As the final weeks of the <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/news/elections-2012/" target="_hplink">2012 presidential campaign</a> unfold, one of the starkest contrasts between the recently released Democratic and Republican party platforms is in climate change policy.

While the <a href="http://www.gop.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/08/2012GOPPlatform.pdf" target="hplink">2012 Republican platform</a> mentions the term "climate change" once (while downplaying the issue's severity), the <a href="http://assets.dstatic.org/dnc-platform/2012-National-Platform.pdf" target="hplink">2012 Democratic platform</a> uses the term "climate change" 18 times. "Our opponents have moved so far to the right as to doubt the science of climate change," it declares, adding:

We know that global climate change is one of the biggest threats of this generation -- an economic, environmental, and national security catastrophe in the making. We affirm the science of climate change, commit to significantly reducing the pollution that causes climate change, and know we have to meet this challenge by driving smart policies that lead to greater growth in clean energy generation and result in a range of economic and social benefits.

</blockquote>

The <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/09/03/democratic-party-platform_n_1853120.html?utm_hp_ref=elections-2012" target="_hplink">Democratic platform</a> promotes the development of clean energy jobs, the conservation of public lands, and highlights President Barack Obama's efforts to reduce carbon pollution and advance clean air and water safeguards.

The Hill points out that the new <a href="http://thehill.com/blogs/e2-wire/e2-wire/247257-dem-platform-backs-climate-change-regulations" target="hplink">Democratic platform appears weaker on domestic climate change</a> legislation than <a href="http://www.democrats.org/about/party_platform" target="hplink">the party's 2008 platform</a>, which proposed the implementation of a market-based cap-and-trade system.

The new version also supports an “all-of-the-above" energy strategy, which includes oil, clean coal and natural gas. <a href="http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2012/09/04/democratic-party-platform-weakens-commitment-to-climate-change-action/" target="_hplink">As independent news site Raw Story points out</a>, it removes the 2008 platform's language promising to "free this nation from the tyranny of oil."

The 2012 Democratic platform goes on to claim Obama has been a leader in tackling climate change, pointing to improvements in fuel efficiency standards.

The Obama administration was recently praised for <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/08/28/new-mileage-standards-obama_n_1836546.html" target="hplink">finalizing new fuel economy rules</a>, but an analysis on the <a href="http://getenergysmartnow.com/2012/09/03/democratic-party-platform-engages-climate-change/" target="hplink">blog "Get Energy Smart! NOW!"</a> suggests that in terms of leadership, "The silence from the administration and the Obama-Biden election team on climate issues has been deafening … at least until the <a href="http://getenergysmartnow.com/2012/09/03/obama-biden-campaign-awakening-to-climate-change-as-political-issue/" target="_hplink">past few days</a>."

In addressing foreign policy, the Democratic platform promotes nation-building at home by directing attention to "crucial problems," including the emerging danger of climate change. It argues that "The change wrought by a warming planet will lead to new conflicts over refugees and resources; new suffering from drought and famine; catastrophic natural disasters; and the degradation of vital ecosystems across the globe."

It pledges to work on building an international effort to cut emissions and provide financing for developing nations to protect themselves from the effects of climate change.

Climate change is also mentioned in the Democratic platform as one of the "greatest dangers we face," requiring global cooperation.

Meanwhile, the 2012 Republican platform claims the current administration’s National Security Strategy "subordinates our national security interests to environmental, energy, and international health issues, and elevates 'climate change' to the level of a 'severe threat' equivalent to foreign aggression."

<a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/ezra-klein/wp/2012/08/30/gop-platform-highlights-the-partys-drastic-shift-on-energy-climate-issues/" target="hplink">As the Washington Post notes</a>, this is a marked difference from the <a href="http://www.gop.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/06/2008platform.pdf" target="hplink">2008 GOP platform</a>, which had a section dedicated to "Addressing Climate Change Responsibly."

U.S., <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/08/27/arctic-sea-ice-melt-2012_n_1833260.html?utm_hp_ref=climate-change" target="hplink">Arctic sea ice melted</a> to record low levels this summer, and the connection between <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/08/04/climate-change-heat-wave-global-warming_n_1742653.html" target="hplink">global warming and extreme weather trends</a> was further established.

The climate will continue to change, whether party platforms acknowledge it or not.

<a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/09/04/democratic-party-platform-climate-change-environment_n_1854579.html?view=print&comm_ref=false">http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/09/04/democratic-party-platform-climate-change-environment_n_1854579.html?view=print&comm_ref=false</a>

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