Howe Hawkins

If you are sneering at advocates of the Green New Deal as impractical dreamers, misguided fanatics or headline seeking demagogues here is a lesson from our nation’s past that should make you think again. Not only are these agitators deadly serious, but they have substantial historical precedent to back them up. Their demand that we abruptly abolish our carbon-driven economy in the space of a single decade and redesign it around renewable energy sounds wildly impractical on first blush. But a critical examination of our nation’s past strongly suggests that they have it within their reach to dramatically alter the way we choose to live as the likelihood of environmental catastrophe grows ever larger.