In the Democratic presidential debates, candidates promised to give a lot, but we need to ask: What will they take?
Under a “Green New Deal,” what happens to:
- Your van or SUV big and powerful enough to carry your kids, groceries, tools of your trade, camping equipment, etc.
- Your backyard grill—or your backyard in the suburbs
- Your favorite foods, especially if animal-based
- Your gas stove, water heater, and furnace
- Your air conditioner
- Your third child (and maybe the first and second one too—the population needs to decrease)
- Your job as an auto mechanic, coal miner, truck driver, petroleum engineer, rancher
- The trucks that collect garbage, deliver groceries, bring concrete to construction strikes, haul goods of all kinds
- Your business (service station, car dealership, factory that requires a lot of reliable electricity, restaurant, HVAC installation and maintenance, etc.)
- Your vacation in Hawaii (or other place not accessible by train)
- Fire trucks, ambulances, police cars?
Remember, they want zero fossil fuels—which means no internal combustion engines and electricity only from “clean, renewable” (unreliable, expensive) sources.
For more information, see “The Green New Deal: What It Means for Medicine.”