Keeping Rhetoric Fair By Understanding False Dichotomies

The statement to the left here is very much worth reading, as it speaks so beautifully to the core reason that the nation is so divided at this point.

The mayor refers to what’s called a “false dichotomy,” not unlike, “You’re either with me or against me.”  (No, there are a great many people about whom I couldn’t care less.)

There are no people who want an insecure border.  There are no people who want lawlessness.  There are no people who don’t care who is coming into this country, and for what purpose.   

Insofar as I’m in clean energy and not national security, nobody’s asking me what I propose happen at the border.  But guess what?  I face a very similar set of false dichotomies when I speak in public.  People ask: Craig, why do you…

• Favor preserving the environment over a strong economy?  (There is no reason to pick one over the other when there is ample evidence that investing in cleantech, the defining industry of the 21st Century, will build a very strong economy.  In fact, a far larger economic danger lies in ignoring this megatrend.)

• Want to punish consumers with higher taxes on certain products?  (Programs like Carbon Fee and Dividend are revenue neutral; on average, the consumer receives back exactly what he paid in taxes.  The word “punish” is better reserved for the vast damage that’s being inflicted on all consumers, rich and poor, young and old, via wrecking the environment and driving up the rates of disease.)  

• Propose a big, intrusive government that turns the U.S. into a police state? (Most of what I’m proposing requires no more government.  The Carbon Fee and Dividend program, e.g., would be administrated by the IRS with its current apparatus. If additional government regulation is needed to keep this society from frying and poisoning itself, that’s a price I’m willing to pay.) 

• Want to kill jobs in the fossil fuel industry? (The fossil fuel industry is dying, regardless of what you or I or anyone else does about it.  Fortunately, as discussed above, many more jobs will be created in solar, wind, efficiency solutions, electric transportation and the rest than will be lost as dirty fuels are phased out over time.)

If we can keep the rhetoric fair, we’ll enjoy more meaningful conversations, and we can get somewhere in solving our problems.  Imagine that.