Read These Two Stories, Then Tell Me We Can Separate Environmental Problems From Inequality

Hillary Clinton delivered her first major campaign speech over the weekend, painting climate science denial as part of the same elite obstruction that keeps wages down and public infrastructure shoddy.

It's a powerful case that brings together seemingly unrelated issues. And it's one that's more believable the more you know about how many of the ultra-wealthy simply don't care about solving America's problems:

• After California Gov. Jerry Brown ordered water restrictions in the face of crippling drought, Rob Kuznia reports in today's Washington Post that the ultra-wealthy community of Rancho Santa Fe has actually increased its water use 9 percent:

People “should not be forced to live on property with brown lawns, golf on brown courses or apologize for wanting their gardens to be beautiful,” [Steve] Yuhas fumed recently on social media. “We pay significant property taxes based on where we live,” he added in an interview. “And, no, we’re not all equal when it comes to water.”

• The Russell Sage Foundation polled the 1% (average income of $1 million or more a year) and found they're 37% more likely than the average American to say we should cut environmental protections than expand them.

As David Roberts writes at Vox, there's growing evidence that, as a group, rich people are selfish jerks.

Hillary Was For Easing Our Oil Addiction Before She Was Against It

Barack Obama recently appeared on NBC's Meet the Press and Tim Russert grilled him not on global warming, but on what he could do to artificially lower the price of gas to ensure America stays addicted to oil.

That same morning, Hillary Clinton appeared on ABC's This Week. Did George Stephanopoulos ask her about global warming or green jobs? Nope.

But leave it to a stupid voter to bring it up. I'm sure George was furious. "This is what happens when you let the amateurs ask the questions!"

VOTER QUESTION: I have -- Sen. Clinton, I actually make less than $25,000 a year, so talking about gas prices is not academic for me. I really do feel pain at the pump.

However, I do feel pandered to when you talk about suspending the gas tax. I don't think that it's really a reasonable plan, and call me crazy, but I actually listen to economists, because I think that they know what they studied.

You say that you have both a short- and a long-term plan for our energy consumption. However, since the suspension of the gas tax would encourage continued overconsumption, which could possibly cancel out any price savings and also undermine our efforts to curb global warming, and your long-term plan includes trying to, say, curb global warming, don't you feel that these two plans are in conflict?

CLINTON: No. And let me stand up, because I can see you better from this angle.

You know, actually, I'm glad you asked this question, because I want to make it very clear that we're talking about short-term relief and a long-term plan. And I have a very comprehensive, long-term plan to reduce our dependence on foreign oil, increase the mileage of our automobiles, and to do it in a way that will push us forward as a leader in the world again, which we have not been, on the issue of global warming. And I invite everyone to go to my Web site, HillaryClinton.com, and read about it.

But if you are driving on average in America this summer, you'll save -- according to Department of Energy figures -- about $70. If you are a long-distance commuter, and a lot of people in Indiana and North Carolina are, if you are a truck driver who depends upon your truck for your living, you're going to save a lot more. In fact, truckers will save about $2 billion in fuel costs.

You see, I really believe we've got to start right now demonstrating a willingness to take on these oil companies. I voted against the big oil giveaway in the 2005 energy bill. My opponent voted for it. I'm on record as taking on the oil companies. And I think having a good debate, like we're having right now in this campaign, helps to lay the groundwork for what we're going to need to do.

See, in the short term, Hillary Clinton will sell out the environment hoping to score a few votes by pandering on the gas tax, willing to recklessly encourage higher consumption (which is what's driven prices to where they are now).

But in the long term, she'll do the right thing. No selling out the environment or pandering then. Really. Trust her.

If you don't know why cutting the gas tax is a horrible idea on every level, read this Tom Friedman column, it explains it much more clearly and wryly than I could.

What's More Important, Global Warming or Louis Farrakhan's Endorsement?

Yesterday I wrote on Raising Kaine:

Voters don't care about global warming, so the candidates don't talk about it, so it doesn't come up at the debates.

Right? That's what the Conventional Wisdom is in Washington. And of course, the Conventional Wisdom is never wrong.

But what if it actually works the other way around? Let's try the conventional wisdom backwards. The coal industry sponsors the debates, so global warming doesn't come up. The candidates don't get a chance to talk about it, so it's not on the minds of voters.

There have been five presidential debates on CNN this year, all sponsored by the coal industry. Total number of climate questions asked? Zero. And the Sunday morning talk show hosts aren't doing much better. Sounds like the coal industry is getting what it's paid for.

Will tonight's debate on MSNBC be any different? We'll see.

Did Tim Russert and Brian Williams ask about global warming? Or renewable energy? Or anything even vaguely related to the environment?

No, no, and no. But they were busy talking about other critical issues of national importance, like who Louis Farrakhan endorsed.

So it was up to the candidates to sneak in a few planks from their climate action platforms. From Hillary Clinton:

I helped to pass legislation to begin a training program for green collar jobs. I want to see people throughout Ohio being trained to do the work that will put solar panels on roofs, install wind turbines, do geothermal, take advantage of biofuels, and I know that if we had put $5 billion into the stimulus package to really invest in the training and the tax incentives that would have created those jobs as the Democrats wanted, as I originally proposed, we would be on the way to creating those.

You know, take a country like Germany. They made a big bet on solar power. They have a smaller economy and population than ours.

They've created several hundred thousand new jobs, and these are jobs that can't be outsourced. These are jobs that have to be done in Youngstown, in Dayton, in Cincinnati. These are jobs that we can create here with the right combination of tax incentives, training, and a commitment to following through.

And from Barack Obama:

We have to look at energy and the potential for creating green jobs that can not just save on our energy costs but, more importantly, can create jobs in building windmills that will produce manufacturing jobs here in Ohio, can put rural communities back on their feet by working on alternative fuels, making buildings more energy efficient. We can hire young people who are out of work and put them to work in the trade.

But hey, I shouldn't be too hard on the mainstream media. If they did their jobs and properly covered the environment, why would you need to read The Green Miles? So in that case, thank you, Tim Russert and Brian Williams, for refusing to talk about global warming!