Many of us were attracted to CCL because of our support for an economic approach to climate policy: Carbon Fee & Dividend. Many of us were also attracted to CCL through its core values rooted in bipartisanship. Colorado’s CCL Conservative Policy Caucus is concerned about the tag line that’s been adopted for CF&D policy: “Polluters Pay. People Get a Carbon Cashback………. Polluters shouldn’t use the air as a trash can.” (follow link to see full context)
On several levels, we are concerned this tag line is hindering and misleading.
Hindering: The term “polluters” has a negative connotation and casts all industrial emitters in a prejudicial manner. Are we not the polluters through our demand for goods and services? The overall tag line has a punitive connotation.
Here in Colorado, we are working hard to engage with decision makers who rely heavily on the economic benefits (direct salaries and tax revenues) of coal and O&G. Will this tagline impact our ability to build and maintain meaningful relationships? And how will it resonate with conservative MOC’s during our lobby meetings? Does this tag line paints us as an organization that wishes to demonize and punish the fossil fuel industry, rather than the “pragmatic climate organization” we have been working hard to develop. Furthermore, how does this tag line promote the needed support from conservative MOCs to pass this policy in congress?
Misleading? CF&D is a market-based economic tool designed to accelerate CO2 emission reductions, not a punishment for industrial emitters. One of the virtues of CF&D is that the fee on fossil fuels diffuses through the economy to effectively tax the carbon footprint of all goods and services. It’s not about a smokestack from a corporate polluter. The policy focuses on fossil fuels at the point of extraction, not on the pollution corporations cause, because it’s us that pollute the air.
We are interested in any thoughts readers of this forum may have about our concerns with this tag line.
Hi @Ron Dickson. My perspective is that “polluters pay” is just a factually accurate description. In most other instances, when an industry is responsible for pollution, they have to either pay to mitigate or clean up that pollution (think about air pollution regulations or Superfund site cleanup costs, for example). And greenhouse gases are air pollutants, per the Clean Air Act and EPA and Supreme Court decisions.
While consumers might use the products that are made by the polluting industry, we don't consider ourselves responsible for the pollution generated during the manufacturing process. We expect the industry to pay for the mitigation or cleanup of any such pollution that they are responsible for, and to pass that cost along to consumers. And we at CCL want the same principle to apply to carbon pollution.
And finally, “make polluters pay” is a pretty popular message across the political spectrum, which is one of the reasons we chose to use it (we have a great marketing/comms team that studies this sort of thing!).
Hi @Dana Nuccitelli - The fossil fuel industry certainly bears some responsibility for climate change, but so do its customers. We do hold industries responsible for pollution generated during the manufacturing process, and that’s part of solution being applied, requiring O&G producers to reduce methane leaks and shift, electrify operations where they can, invest in carbon capture, etc.
But this fee isn’t attached to fossil fuel manufacturing, it’s attached to the product that millions of consumers buy directly and thousands of other businesses buy to manufacture our food, products, etc. Polluters pay is an accurate description of the fee if we’re labeling all producers and users (i.e., virtually everyone) as polluters, but we’re not. The marketing campaign explicitly says “corporate polluters pay”, and it explicitly targets fossil fuel companies.
I’ve been a CCL member and active CF&D lobbyist since 2017. For six years, carbon fee & dividend was described as a price signal. Now it’s being marketed as a punishment. That may be popular, as you say. Personally, I’d love to wake up in the morning and know that I’m blameless in this, that it’s all the fault of a few evil companies. But the sharp turn from an economic message to a populist message undermines the work I’ve been doing to build relationships and position the bill in my conservative-majority, fossil fuel district.
This policy, which I support, is transparently designed to phase fossil fuel companies out of business. Calling them names while we’re doing it seems to be a violation of CCL’s Core Values: “We take the most generous approach to other people as possible – appreciation, gratitude, and respect…”
CCL is evolving, a natural course of events. I find this shift disorienting, but I understand that it may work better for the organization overall. I hope that volunteers will get new training and updated bill strategy from Ben & Jen.
@Ron Dickson, I believe we need to be responsible and accountable. And as a conservative, this concept resonates with me . See tinyurl.com/lhourtrash
A good tag line elicits emotion. And this tag line certainly does a good job of that! But it depends on your perspective as to the personal emotion each of us feels when we read this tag line. Your response presents a technical / intellectual argument to an emotional issue.
I think it’s also worthwhile to review the history of this tagline and its origin. My understanding is that it originated from Potential Energy. If that’s not correct, please let me know.
Potential Energy’s key finding: “The data clearly showed that one message moves the whole world significantly: protecting the planet for the next generation.” The study also states: “The data says that fear versus hope is the wrong debate. The big motivator is protecting what we love.”
My quick read of the results indicates “Polluters Pay” had 59% approval in the US according to the study. I wonder why we have picked the less popular tag line. Why wouldn’t we pick the tag line that moves the largest number of people? How do we build consensus and support for CF&D policy with a tag line that is disagreeable to 41% of the respondents? CF&D has proven to be a heavy lift. Don’t we need every ounce of support we can muster, including conservatives? I’d love to hear more about how we selected on the “polluters pay” tag line.
@Ron Dickson CCL's messaging on carbon fee & dividend has evolved in the 10+ years we've been advocating for it. New research has clarified that 'polluters pay' is the most persuasive message that applies to this specific policy and we're also seeing evidence of that in the real world.
Potential Energy Coalition's comprehensive message testing released earlier this year explains a bit why this framing works across people of all political leanings (see page 10, titled 'Fight pollution, not climate change'). And, we are seeing this messaging increasingly used by members of Congress on both sides of the aisle when they talk about putting a fee on carbon pollution.
That's not to say that we have to use this exact message for every audience that we speak with. It's possible to soften the frame from ‘stopping polluters’ to ‘stopping pollution’ and highlight that we don't have to be dependent on dirty energy that is overheating the planet because there is clean and fast energy available if you are speaking to an audience that needs that approach.
@Lesley Beatty
I am conservative and believe the polluters should pay. The polluters are the general public. They would see increased prices in their every day lives which will in turn help them make better choices. I realize they get a check at some later point, but hopefully that has no bearing on anything as it would defeat the purpose of the bill and of our being here. "Polluters pay" is a traditional environmental expression, associated with the left and anti-business. It probably would not go over that well with a conservative audience, but maybe the message can be adjusted for different audiences. I don't necessarily agree with the way I think most people interpret it, ("Polluters pay") but there will be different interpretations. the pollster is saying this works and they know best. I want what works.
Effectiveness of the Polluter Accountability narrative varied significantly across nations, with almost zero effect in the United States. Figure 22 on page 29 shows lift in support by country from the Polluter Accountability narrative. It’s very effective in the global south, which brings up the average.
US-specific data is presented more fully on page 90. CCL members from the United States might want to take a look, and I would urge the CCL messaging team to do that. There are a number of interesting findings. Potential Energy is doing very good work in this space. Appendix 3 on page 93 drills down deeper on support in the US for various policies.
I support marketing EICDA by focusing on pollution. The best I saw was a slide from a march in which a CCL chapter carried a sign saying "tax pollution, pay people". That pretty much sums it up. I know "tax" is a forbidden word, but use a synonym. The current outward-facing pitch on CCL's EICDA website doesn't do that. It incorrectly characterizes the policy by stating that fossil fuel companies are the only polluters, and it separates those companies from "people". Divisiveness sells, holy wars get people jazzed up. I understand the marketing.
For what it's worth, I agree with the sentiments expressed here stating that “Make Polluters Pay” will hurt CCL's credibility with conservatives. I'm not sure why we would want to adopt messaging that is going to make it harder to work across the isle, when that already seems like a hard enough task.
It feels relevant to mention that I tend to lean more liberal and personally don't have a problem with “Make Polluters Pay”. But I think the most important thing we need to be doing in CCL is finding and promoting climate solutions that both sides of the isle can agree on, and I don't think this slogan helps to get us there. In fact, I think it hurts that effort.
The slogan doesn’t match the policy we’re trying to sell. If we're running on polluters pay, the bill should place the fee on point source emitters (power plants, manufacturing) rather than a product most everyone uses. It's also a divisive framing that demonizes the oil and gas industry. That's likely to work at a grassroots tabling event, but it won’t work in lobby meetings with Republican congressional offices, and I don’t think it's going to be effective with all Democrats.
In my opinion, this bill strategy leaves lobby teams in a difficult position when the obvious objections are raised. It makes us look unprepared, which is a reputational risk to CCL.
To me, this framing positions EICDA as a messaging bill, rather than a policy we’re trying to move through a tightly divided and highly partisan Congress. We’ve always been in the position of bridge-builders, and this framing doesn’t do that.
@Michelle Rosinski, what about emphasis on being accountable and responsible regarding making polluters pay ? I believe it is important to highlight that we should be accountable in proportion to how much one contributes to the problem. That's why a carbon fee fits so well IMHO. I wrote an essay a while back on this topic and would be interested in feedback. It is available here - tinyurl.com/lhourtrash - and include the text below.
Let’s Be Responsible and Accountable For Our Trash
6 min read
·Oct 2, 2022
When we combust hydrocarbon fuels, they don’t just disappear. The process sucks oxygen out of the air for free and creates waste byproducts — excess heat trapping CO2 emissions — that we currently just dump in the air for free.
So let’s compare and contrast waste management for the kind we can see and smell and the kind we can’t. Then let’s consider ways to incentive all of us to better manage the kind we can’t see and smell so we can slow down and eventually stop the current increase in global heating that is bad for all of us.
TRASH MANAGEMENT — THE KIND YOU CAN SEE AND SMELL
Around 1895, New York City began residential municipal waste pick up and disposal. Because we can see garbage pile up and we can smell it, most citizens are supportive of the service, understand why there is cost associated with it, and are willing to pay for it.
In recent years, the average cost to landfill municipal waste in the US is about $54/ton. And the total amount of landfill municipal waste in the US is around 300 million tons per year.
It’s generally considered appropriate that the more garbage you generate, the more you should pay to have it collected and disposed of. For example, in the city where I live, it costs $12.25/ month for a 68 gallon trash cart, $17.10 /month for a 95 gallon trash cart, and $14.25 /month for an extra trash cart. Pickup is once a week. The price- per-amount of waste generated serves as an economic incentive for people to generate less garbage.
ANOTHER TYPE OF WASTE — THE KIND YOU CAN’T SEE OR SMELL
Let’s compare this generally accepted cost of solid waste management in our economy to what we know is a significant waste byproduct of combusting hydrocarbons fuels — CO2 emissions. Note — there are many other pollution byproducts of combusting fossil fuels that cause air pollution with the accompanying health problems, but we won’t be discussing those negative side effects and their costs here.
Currently, ZERO ($0) is the amount included in the price of fossil fuel for the excess CO2 generated from combusting it. You can generate a very small amount of excess CO2, or you can generate a very large amount of CO2. The price is still the same — ZERO. So, unlike how we treat solid waste disposal — pay for the amount you generate and need disposed — there is no financial cost for needing to dispose of a little, or a lot. Therefore, there is no economic incentive for people or other actors in the economy to reduce their excess CO2 emissions from combusting fossil fuels.
However, we also now know that the societal costs of these excess heat trapping emissions are not ZERO and are growing higher and higher as more excess CO2 is accumulated in the atmosphere. And these costs are being borne most by those generating the least amount of excess CO2 waste. The concept used in solid waste management of those generating the most waste paying the most is not being applied here.
It’s not really a level playing field if all the costs are not apparent and included in the use of a product, especially when compared to alternatives. This hidden cost has resulted in a distorted market. Not having to include the costs of excess CO2 emissions provides a substantial advantage when competing with products and solutions that don’t generate excess CO2 emissions waste when using it. Consider that nuclear, hydro, wind, and solar are energy sources that don’t produce excess CO2 emissions when generating electricity, but they are competing with combustion of fossil fuels getting a free ride paying ZERO price for the excess CO2 emissions waste being created.
COMPARING SOLID WASTE VS CO2 EMISSIONS WASTE
For reference, in 2019, the US deposited 5,260 million tons of excess CO2 into the atmosphere for free, over 17 times as much CO2 as solid waste deposited in landfills.
And for a global comparison of waste we cannot see vs waste we can see, global CO2 waste generation was 37,600 million tons in 2019, over 100 times as much as the annual global plastic waste generation that year which was 353 million tons.
Now returning to the solid waste analogy, suppose there is one product you regularly purchase and use that creates a high percentage of your trash. More specifically, let’s recognize it is fossil fuels. Remember, the current price on excess CO2 emissions is ZERO — regardless of whether you generate a little or a lot. Companies that sell you that product and big emitters that consume a lot of that product probably like that they don’t have to pay a waste disposal fee. There is no financial incentive to generate less waste emissions. There are no financial incentives to switch to other energy sources that produce less or zero CO2 emissions.
But there is a simple market-based policy solution to address this growing CO2 emissions waste problem. It can incentivize innovation, accountability, and responsibility for reducing CO2 emissions. It is to put a price on the CO2 emissions waste, similar to how we pay fees to dispose of solid waste.
More and more businesses, economists, and the general public agree — putting an economy wide gradually increasing price on carbon emissions will level the playing field. There is wide agreement that this is the most cost-effective lever to reduce carbon emissions at the scale and speed necessary. And including a carbon border adjustment will drive global participation. See these three references below for expanded details and explanations.
1. Economists Statement on Carbon Dividends — https://clcouncil.org/economists-statement/
2. CERES brings the voice of business to Congress in push for climate solutions — https://www.ceres.org/resources/news/ceos-of-major-companies-call-on-us-congress-to-set-a-national-price-on-carbon
3. What if the US taxed fossil fuels and gave a check to every American? Turns out, most of the public is into that idea — https://thehill.com/changing-america/opinion/566589-what-if-the-us-taxed-its-fossil-fuels-and-gave-a-check-to-every
LET’S BE ACCOUNTABILITY WHEN PAYING TO “PICK UP” THE EXCESS CO2 EMISSIONS WASTE
Recall that without a price on CO2 excess emissions, the industry producing fossil fuels has no financial accountability for those excess CO2 emissions created when their product is used. But the fossil fuel industry knows that globally we must reduce excess CO2 emissions and reduce them quickly. So in response, that same industry has lobbied our elected officials to receive a tax credit to incentivize them to capture and store some of those excess CO2 emissions. (See sgp.fas.org/crs/misc/IF11455.pdf.) Those tax credits increase their profits at our expense, from our tax dollars. Basically, with this tax credit policy, those industries sell you a product with a hidden cost priced at ZERO that results in them making a bigger profit because it can deposit excess CO2 waste in the atmosphere for free when their customers use the product. And then they make an even bigger profit by having the taxpayers pay them to turn around and pick up that trash from using their product.
We will need carbon capture as part of our net zero emissions solutions. Let’s pay for it the right way. Let’s pay for it in a responsible and accountable way. First, we need to include an upfront CO2 emissions fee on products that generate excess CO2 when consumed. This will provide a clearer price signal for all of us across the economy to make our own choices for products and solutions that result in lower costs and reduced excess CO2 emissions for all of us. Second, part of the fees collected upfront can be put in a reserve fund to credit those businesses when they capture and store the excess CO2 after the product is used. They are reimbursed when they pick it their trash.
Wrap-up
We understand that there is a cost to manage and dispose of solid waste. The price we pay to manage solid waste is proportional to the amount generated. This incentivizes each of us to minimize solid waste as well as find alternatives such as recycling. Let’s be accountable and responsible to understand that there is a cost to manage and dispose of combustion waste. The costs we incur to manage combustion waste should be proportional to how much we generate. This will incentivize us to minimize combustion waste by using alternatives and capturing and storing it in places where we continue to use hydrocarbon combustion.
For years CCL has been training us to be respectful to everyone. The motivational interviewing courses are fantastic. The inclusion of Braver Angels into CCL provides CCLers even more training on how to take a loving, gracious approach to those with different views. Now CCL has a marketing campaign that demonizes “corporate polluters.” I am not sure I can be part of an organization the demonizes specific industries or groups.
I am the polluter. I make choices every day to buy products that use fossil fuel. If CCL could lobby to get EICDA enacted, the costs of my pollution will be placed on me, where it belongs.
Hi @Larry Howe. Again, I don't personally have an issue with “Make Polluters Pay” or with being held accountable for all of my trash. However, I don't believe I'm the target audience that CCL needs to convince. My concern is that this messaging may alienate many conservatives, which could undermine efforts to build broad, bipartisan support for environmental initiatives.
I believe that working with conservatives is crucial for creating positive environmental outcomes that will withstand the test of time and survive regime changes. Perhaps there’s a way to frame this message that resonates more with conservative values, such as emphasizing personal responsibility, economic incentives, or national security. This approach might help bridge the gap and create a more inclusive and enduring movement.
Question for this group: has anyone tried using the messaging from the headline in conversation to see how it resonates? I would be interested to hear how it lands when you use it. Here's a suggested experiment if you're up for it:
- Pick a low stakes conversation partner (someone who will love you no matter what OR someone who you will never see again 😉)
- Sell the idea of ‘polluters should pay when they pollute’ by stating it confidently and emphatically, eg. ‘Right now, the way that we make energy creates pollution that is dangerously overheating the planet. It's not right that we're risking our kids' futures this way. Polluters should pay when they pollute so that we can move to clean and safe energy.’
- Observe: how do they engage with carbon fee and dividend when it is introduced through this frame? Note: do not ask them what they think of the message that you used or how they'd improve it. As humans, we're pretty bad at understanding what influences us.
- Report back – what worked well? what didn't work well?
I don't see the point in that, it depends on your target audience. You are cherry picking in your example. If you are running for president, and that is what we are doing, then which constituency are we targeting today.
Hi @Lesley Beatty, to your good suggestion, guessing about messaging is no substitute for testing. I hope that CCL's funding will improve under new leadership, and that some resources will be made available to your department for more systematic focus group testing of our messages.
By the way, as you well know, one message doesn't have to suit all audiences. As long as we don't contradict ourselves, we can tailor messages to different audiences. There's nothing wrong with using different words or emphasis with groups based on their ideological or political leanings.
@Jonathan Marshall
So when you say different audiences, what does that mean, it is always the same audience. polluter pays is a sound bite for the left. The sound bite I use is Conservation is Conservative !
I am reading a lot about how “Polluters Pay” polls well. The problem I see has nothing to do with how a slogan polls.
The problem I see is that the statement on this CCL website is both misleading and inaccurate. This is the inaccurate statement:
“The Energy Innovation and Carbon Dividend Act (H.R.5744) charges corporate polluters a fee for the carbon pollution they put into our air. The money collected goes to Americans in the form of a monthly 'carbon cashback' payment to keep things affordable.”
The bill does not charge corporate polluters a fee for the carbon pollution they put into the air. That is just a false statement pure and simple. The bill charges a fee when the fossil fuel is extracted, before it becomes pollution. We the people, who pollute, pay a higher price for using the fuel and causing the actual pollution.
The misleading statement is “Polluters pay. People get a carbon cashback." It implies that polluters and people are a different group.
@Mark Fackler, I see your points. I think these two key points are important to to get into the message:
- When purchasers use these products (fossil fuels) as directed, it generates pollution.
- The pollution is proportional to how much is used by the given purchaser and therefore so is the fee - that is the fee is not socialized across all users of the products. Depending on how the seller chooses to pass the fee on to the buyer, those who purchase and use more, generally will pay more. Those who use less, or use alternatives that don't pollute, will pay less.
How about something like this:
The Energy Innovation and Carbon Dividend Act (H.R.5744) in effect adds a fee paid by the seller of products that when used as directed generate carbon pollution. The more a customer buys and uses the product, the more the fee might impact them. Those who use less, or buy alternative products that don't pollute, pay less. The money collected goes to Americans in the form of a monthly 'carbon cashback' payment to keep things affordable during the transition to less polluting solutions.
Maybe someone with marketing/editing skills can find a way to shorten it. 😁
@Larry Howe
The left thinks the polluters are industry and industry is doing the paying, this is a left sound bite,
@Larry Howe I like your two key points. Your edit for the explanation of EICDA is better. I sense we could go back and forth and could find common ground on honest and respectful verbiage.
I hope CCL works to find common ground on honest and respectful verbiage.
This link
Potential Energy Coalition's comprehensive message testing
didn't work for me. Error message says it's part of Community I can't access, Drew Eyerly's Forum, I believe. Can you make the relevant content available somehow?
I would ask everyone to please consider that CCL has a great marketing team, who base our messaging on research and data. While there's nothing wrong with providing feedback, please make sure it's respectful and bear in mind that they're professionals and they know what they're doing 🤓 And you're also free to adjust the messaging you use, based on the audience you're talking to, as Jonathan noted.
I'd also just note that the fossil fuel industry has engaged in a decades-long campaign to shift the blame for climate pollution onto consumers, for example with a PR firm hired by BP in 2004 inventing the carbon footprint calculator. Consumers just need energy – we don't need it to come from fossil fuels, and a lot of those decisions (e.g. where our power comes from) are largely out of our control. And those fossil fuel companies also engaged in a many-decades-long campaign to deceive the public about the dangers of their products.
I'm not saying we need to demonize them, nor do I think “polluters should pay for their pollution” does so. But I also disagree with the “we're the polluters” framing. We're just energy consumers, and if all of our energy came from clean sources, we'd be happy about it.
@Kathy Fackler
Good points Kathy. I have never been comfortable about presenting “carbon pollution” as a term because even though it is technically correct, it never gets a good reaction from conservatives. Carbon dioxide is so ubiquitous and invisible to the naked eye that it doesn't qualify in people's minds as the same thing as smokestack pollution. It's also a good thing up to a certain concentration. I think something like “CO2 burden” might resonate better. It's an excess of something and that excess burdens the whole world.
@Dana Nuccitelli
Dana - 41% of US carbon emissions are from transportation and buildings. So “we” are polluters based on our decisions for transportation, heating, cooking, etc, which is something most people recognize. Yet many people have an initial resentment reaction when accused of being a polluter (even if it is technically correct). That's why wording is important on this issue.
@Rob Johnson. I agree that the unqualified term polluter(s) “is a traditional environmental expression associated with the left" and that usually, in that audience, it is automatically interpreted as referring to large corporate industrial companies. I spend the majority of my social time with friends from a union, progressive, (moderate socialist) background, and have become convinced that their instinctive/habitual interpretation of the term in this way is probably the result of a traditional, but deeply held, class-conflict kind of thinking, which yes, in its own way demonizes a certain type of societal organization. I therefore feel it is my/our responsibility to make sure that I ( and we? – as CCL non-aligned, or spectrum-inclusive interest group member/s) are using the term with a broader, more inclusive meaning – so as not to give the false and misleading impression that we agree with the class bias interpretation. Then I also have found that even when these same friends agree with my logical argument that as consumers who need and “demand” the use of fossil fuels are polluters who should also pay increased costs to help lower our addictive demand, they are often resistant to the implication that we/they should lobby for a congressional fee or tax to correct the dysfunctional market, and I attribute that to their acquired preference for a regulatory or executive-branch-based fiat decree that simply demands all polluting activity be declared illegal – without regard to the costs of enforcement. In PA this especially comes to a head over how to deal with fracking for methane and ethane gases, and more direct forms of pollution that activity results in. And if progressive, Green New Deal Democrats score a trifecta in the November elections, I dare predict that these will be the specific kinds of ideologically based terminological conversations we will need to engage in during our lobbying sessions. But it might mean that it will be easier to get Republicans to negotiate for a more market based solution. Praying with fingers crossed.
@Dana Nuccitelli
Some additional thoughts to offer…
As a member of Colorado CCL’s state Conservative group (and liaison and chapter leader for years), I’ll say that this tagline has been an emblematic topic for me for a while. Whatever studies might show, we ‘boots on the ground’ clearly feel it conflicts with our mission to advance bipartisan support for effective climate policy, and ultimately for CF&D. There has been other messaging and slogans in a similar category (on our websites, in our scripted calls to congress, in our lobbying leave-behinds) which are turn-offs to Republican MoC’s and conservatives in general. And there are good reasons for that.
When President George H.W. Bush used the phrase “polluters pay” to sell the Clean Air Act Amendment in 1989, he was referring to a market - reliant cap and trade policy for SO2- a major cause of the acid rain externality. We, on the other hand, are referring to CO2; the fundamental, embedded, unavoidable GHG externality of obtaining power from the primary energy source of our society. Note the similarities AND THE DIFFERENCES. He wanted to protect coal, protect what powered the economy. We want to change what powers the economy. What powers the energy transition for that matter. Our scope is different than what was applicable to the Clean Air Act.
https://youtu.be/R-tLEJi8hyM?si=KpYeMXntmA6EHRVB
One of the beauties of CCL is its trust & respect for the wisdom & experiences of its regular members. Here in Colorado, as I’m sure is the case elsewhere, we do participate in civic groups in our conservative districts, interact with the grassroots and grasstops folks, and are experienced liaisons to a spectrum of Republican MoC’s. We are saying respectfully that we are uncomfortable with representing that framing, that tagline. In my case, I could not continue with it. Like some others, I am in that radical middle 😊.
I see this conversation is mostly about how bipartisanship/nonpartisanship could be practiced in, and for the benefit of, CCL. We have made much progress already! Conservatives have a perspective that should be understood and factored into the thinking about climate policy and approaches to CO2 GHG reduction. Yin and yang….
Some of us feel that this tagline, the sentiment behind it, limits our best work in that respect and wish to break down the barriers a bit further. How do we prioritize the quality & integrity & creativity & and evolution of our work, compared to the potential quantity of membership we can sign up ‘on paper’ when the two present a conflict? We are a unique and powerful grassroots organization. I hope we have the ability to chart our own course together, and to correct that course if necessary.
I appreciate hearing everyones’ points of view. Thanks for the opportunity to discuss these issues.
@Lois McLauchlan, Does Colorado's CCL state Conservative group have a recommendation how to reword this that would be more agreeable? Maybe a conservative landing page could be created for the Energy Innovation Act with the revised wording.
For reference - Here is suggested wording I provided in an earlier comment:
The Energy Innovation and Carbon Dividend Act (H.R.5744) in effect adds a fee paid by the seller of products that when used as directed generate carbon pollution. The more a customer buys and uses the product, the more the fee might impact them. Those who use less, or buy alternative products that don't pollute, pay less. The money collected goes to Americans in the form of a monthly 'carbon cashback' payment to keep things affordable during the transition to less polluting solutions.
@Lois McLauchlan's comment “One of the beauties of CCL is its trust & respect for the wisdom & experiences of its regular members" has it exactly right. If we are true to that principle, rank-and-file members should feel empowered to speak up when they have concerns such as the ones expressed here. CCL's principles also say that those concerns should be raised respectfully, as Dana reminds us above. The crux of Lois's comment is that the respect should flow in both directions.
@Kathy Facklerthis long trail of comments on “polluters pay” is exactly what attracts me to CCL. Thoughtful comments from different viewpoints That make people think about how words and phrases may be interpreted. I tend to agree that the phrase polluters pay can trigger a response of “ oh it is the fault of these big companies” and deflect from our own responsibilities . One minor comment on one of the polls. “Pollsters are right” , I beg to differ or at least question , it all depends on how questions were asked, who was polled, etc
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