Shifting the Debate … What To Do—UPDATED
It was fun. What was? Liveblogging JK’s appearance on The Daily Show which if you missed it, you can still watch it here and of course, as all TDS afficionados know, the show from the night before is repeated at 8 pm so you have another chance to see JK and Jon Stewart (and Lewis Black and John Oliver).
<a href=”http://video.johnkerry.com/video/flash/032607_dailyshow.html” onclick=”openWin(this.href, ‘420’, ‘420’); return false;”><img src=”http://www.johnkerry.com/i/video/032607_dailyshow.jpg” width=”223” height=”152” alt=”video” border=”0”>
Daily Show
John Kerry appears as a guest on the Daily Show with Jon Stwewart.
About the missing pictures, JK, you forgot to mention the gorgeous picture on the cover.
UPDATE #1 - I’ve been informed that we can’t use a blowup of just the picture from the book cover … copyright stuff. So you’ll just have to look closely at the book cover below or buy it for yourself!
UPDATE #2 – MORE IMPORTANT JK & THK are doing an interview on the Leonard Lopate Show on WNYC today at noon. Available to all via live streaming at the NYC site - look for the Listen Live in the left sidebar or if you’re so fortunate as to live near WNYC’s broadcast area you can tune into WNYC FM at 93.9 or WNYC AM at 820.
As for “shifting the debate”, just keep on reading.
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Another review of This Moment on Earth has appeared at The Politico website. Curiously, the review is heavily flavored by their own political predictions which really aren’t about the book. But they do conclude with this note:
They say in a wrap-up chapter written on Feb. 2, 2007: “If we put an end to the era of dirty fossil fuels, we can begin an era of substantiality
It sounds so optimistic and pure. But we all know the clock is ticking. The Kerrys’ masterstroke here is that they weave personal stories throughout these pages, glimpses of their time on the campaign trail crisscrossing America in 2004. With this book and its grass-roots spotlights, they’ve come out winners this time.- environmental, economic and political -for our nation and our world.”
I was talking about the book yesterday with someone and we agreed that what’s notable about this book is that it encompasses the next step after someone has seen An Inconvenient Truth and knows that they must do something. Not everyone needs to follow the same path—there are many ways and many places to take a next step towards a sustainable life on our planet.
There’s a new customer review of This Moment on Earth at Amazon by David Michaelson. And he noticed the same thing I did.
... Shift the debate, people. Let’s talk what to DO ABOUT IT.
I was ready for John Kerry’s book to carry the same theme…it is time to take as given the problem and move on to solutions.
That isn’t quite what I got. And at first I was disappointed… But by the third chapter I found I was taking the most notice of exactly what the Kerrys WANTED me to notice the most: the people who are fighting back. ...
Put all this together and you may not have the next step in the evolution of the environmental debate, but you certainly have one more important step forward and one that might have a wider appeal than previous books in this genre.
Add your own review of This Moment on Earth to those at Amazon. It is critical that we internalize that we each can do something in our own place and the visions don’t need to be identical. We just need to start or continue or do more of. Let’s share that understanding with others. Just scroll down to Customer Reviews and jump in.
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The interview on WNYC was quite long (I missed the first few minutes, but still caught 33+ minutes of the interview) and very thorough. Nearly all of the questions that I heard dealt either with the book specifically, or with some aspect of environmental issues in general. (Sorry that I’m a little short on details, I was multi-tasking while listening.)
The interviewer did seem to be enjoy his role as a low-key devil’s advocate, and quite a few of his questions seemed to be posed in the negative. He gave both JK and THK ample time to answer and explain though, so I can’t complain too much about his style.
I hope this can be posted on the website at some point. (Or maybe it will be on the radio station’s website.) It would be great if everyone had the chance to hear this.
I just finished listening to the NYC radio interview. What a change from previous interviews! The main topic was the Kerry’s book.
The interviewer started by mentioning that as they met at an Earth Day rally in 1990, they have been involved on this issue for a long time. Kerry spoke of how he was involved, as a kid just back from Vietnam in the first Earth Day. A friend of Kerry’s was an aide to Senator Nelson. The first Earth Day involved 20 million people and they wanted and got change.
The interviewer asked why some in DC deny climate change. Kerry said for some it was an unwillingness to deal with reality,. He gave other reasons including lack of knowledge and arrogance. Most Democrats are concerned and some Republicans, but there are not enough yet to get carbon caps. Some are leery of the cost, but they don’t consider the cost of NOT doing something. He said this was a critical moment.
Teresa was asked how thinking about the environment was different in places like Mozambique. She said that US was ahead (until recently) of most countries in having a movement. In Mozambique, she said that people learn of how finite things are very early. There is a respect for animals and the surroundings. Preventing disease that would kill you otherwise was important. The US is so well off, and huge that the immediacy is not obvious.
Teresa was asked if this was similar to the woman’s movement. Ours was early, but we still have not had a woman President. Teresa pointed out that in the US the woman led volunteer efforts. They often had real power, but it wasn’t acknowledged.
The interviewer mentioned how the book described a decentralized environment and he asked Kerry if the government should be there. Kerry responded that they should, but they had sometimes failed miserably and they sometimes had to fight the government. He gave an example of a Washington state farmer, who had a problem with a huge dairy with penned up cows without free range, which produced a huge amount of waste that was polluting the air and the water. They fought for years to get the hearing needed to correct it.
Kerry emphasized that the book was not political. The interviewer asaid it was not just the Republicans, pointing out that it was Michigan Democrats who led the fight against higher auto fuel standards. Kerry said that was personal – he and McCain had led the effort to change that. He spoke of a Senator bringing in a poster of a VW bug pulling a plow. Kerry spoke of not having to lose standard of living to improve this. He spoke of how when things become a crisis there is a spurt of energy, but then it stops – and there are things like the lights that automaticly turn off in Europe when you leave rooms.
Teresa said that the poorer countries won’t listen to us, if we have no commitment to change. She also said that the book tries to show the laws and explain why they were created and that sometimes good laws exist but are not applied. We need the will to apply them, not obstruct them.
Kerry was asked about city and sates global warming initiatives – were they enough. Kerry said they are good, but we need international efforts. He spoke of the coal plants in China being enough to create disaster. Problem is that India and China said we did these things when we industrialized and that we want to prevent them from industrializing. Kerry said it wasn’t true – that we are ok with them industrializing, but we need to transfer technology to do it in a cleaner way and he said we have large areas of sustainable forestry.
He agreed that Bush lowered standards because he thought they were anti-business. Some Republicans refused to stand up to special interests and equated higher standards to lose of jobs. He said that some corporations are now doing it voluntarily themselves.
He was then asked if this would be any better with a Democrat in the WH, that it wasn’t under Clinton. Kerry’s answer was that it depends on the Democrat. He then emphatically said that it would have been very different had he won the last state. He said that he wanted to put $1 billion into the auto industry and money into clean coal.
Teresa said defining it as an economic loss ignores the America does well because we invent. She quoted Nicolas Stern (UK) as saying that global warming will cost 25 times what it will cost to constrain it. She mentioned that in the UK , Thatcher got it.
Kerry was then asked why it wasn’t a bigger part of the 2004 camppaign. Kerry said they tried like crazy to make it an issue. They talked about it every speech and addressed local issues in every state. He had a major energy speech in Houston on Earth Day. Asked why it wasn’t covered – he spoke of color coded alerts that kept everyone on the edge of fear and Iraq. He did say he thought it would be a bigger issue in 2008.
Teresa was asked about the way the media dealt with candidate’s spouses. She said the coverage should be substantive and meaningful and respect the abilities of the spouse. She said the media was very different than 20 years ago and that local media covers what was said and done, while the national media doesn’t.
Kerry agreed with people who said Democrats should avoid witch hunts now that they were in power – but said that accountability is not a witch hunt. For instances, you can’t walk away from the US attorneys issue. He said that many agencies had accountability issues. He said that a lot of work was being done and spoke of the Iraq vote.
“This Moment On Earth” just went to #1 on the non-fiction bestsellers list and #8 on the bestsellers list.
Island Blue, Karennj and Fedup, thanks for the reports.
I just listened to the NYC radio interview. The Kerrys were captivating. They’re a wealth of knowledge on the environment and do a great job of explaining the issues in terms that we all can understand. The interviewer did a good job. He played devil’s advocate, but his questions were intelligent and respectful.
The point Sen. Kerry made about climate change denial nailed the circus atmosphere that some member of Congress tried to create during Gore’s recent testimony before the Senate and House. Sen. Kerry said it’s an unwillingness to grapple with reality. Call it “ignorance,” “arrogance,” “indifference” or “ideology” or a combination thereof that “prevents people from taking science and digesting it.” Mentioned James Inhofe, who believes climate change is a hoax.
Teresa mentioned enforcement as a way to show the political aspect. She said there are a lot of very good laws on the books that cover particular issues, but they’re not being applied.
Asked if the focus on the wives (of candidates is a good thing, Teresa said focus should be meaningful, should be substantive, and should respect the individual in terms of their abilities.
The interview is well worth a listen. It’s one of the best in terms of hearing the Kerrys unfiltered.
Very different Democrat, on all counts.
The interview seemed to show the Kerrys at their most thoughtful best. I’m guessing there is an audio link on this site, or theirs.
Thank you for mentioning David’s review. I hadn’t seen it.
I’m not sure if his Daily Gotham post (about his missed presence at the NYC Charlie Rose event) had his name, with his toddler saying he scared away John Kerry, but he promised a review.
He and wife are concerned scientists, so I would believe him if he said it were worthy. She is involved with weather as a degree.
I’d believe them!
I’m listening to the radio interview now. They both sound great. I’m so excited this has hit #1 nonfiction at amazon.com. WTG, JK and THK!
I’ve been incredibly busy, and am only halfway through the book.
My favorite part so far ...
Pages 13-18.
You’ll have to read it to know why.
Buy the book. It’s amazing.
I would like to start a movement to call greenhouse gas effects on Planet Earth “Global Catastrophic Meltdown” because I think it conveys what is happening better than a cozy term like “Global Warming”