There are clearly 2 (or many more approaches).

To be totally honest I agree as a biologist and conservationist that basically the Republicans are the bane of the Earth. I hate the ‘fake’ bleeding heart liberal crap too but the Republicans are a bunch of oil and coal prospectors that will butt fuck the Earth to oblivion.

It’s just that somebody NEEDS to stop this vilification of the red-neck Republican voter base/

I mean you can scream at them and try and tell them they are delusional sheeple that are getting screwed over by Republicans selling them fake massages about saving their freedoms from ‘police state regulations, because nobody should be able to tell you not to slaughter endangered species’ when really they are just getting rid of the laws that protect these damn rednecks so the politicians can come in with their oil companies and claim eminent domain and take away their farms to drill for oil.

The thing is if all you do tell them ‘they are wrong’, that ‘your guy’ is neoJesus, and they are evil for their stupid delusional beliefs they are just going to resist that much more. Instead of ostracizing all Republicans and their voter base right off the bat and expecting that to bring about consensus (which is asinine), why not try to ease them into ‘ a green way of thinking and living’ by talking strait policy and numbers. The fact that Obama or his administration put some policy into place is irrelevant to how effective that policy is. By attaching a name to a policy that automatically alienates a group right off the bat, whether that is fair or not, that is how people tend to react.

Anyway, I also got Clean Technia confused with Energy now, which is totally different (although you often feature Energy now stuff) and a little less politically charged, so my politically neutral green news source appears to be safe for now.

But the bottom line is, there is one political party that is gung ho on stopping clean energy from moving forward. And this is HUGE to hundreds of thousands of clean energy employees and thousands of jobs, not to mention all those who want to see clean energy move forward and get at least equal treatment by Congress.

I am extremely critical of Obama on a number of fronts, but when it comes to clean energy and energy effic., he’s on a diff planet from Congressional Republicans (as are most Dems).

Policy is more than a little important to clean energy industries. AWEA and SEIA are focusing almost all their time and resources these days on getting at-risk policies extended that too many Republican members of Congress want to stop. Policies that are clearly good for our economy, public health, and the environment.

The politicians and billionaires behind them need to be called out. Anyone who cares about this topic needs to know why the U.S. is lagging Europe and China on clean energy. This is a topic of most global conferences and discussions on energy matters.

I would probably be the happiest person here if we didn’t have to cover the
politics of energy any more, believe me.

And, yes, there are tons of sites that cover cleantech — however, not many
(or any) of the serious ones ignore this political problem.

Though personally I agree with you in many cases (although I tend to be a bit more realistic) and realize that energy policy is part of what this website covers, I don’t really think most people appreciate the ‘shove it down your throats’ rhetoric. We already have TreeHugger for that kind of Peta-esque BS.

Even us liberal green nuts that have wet dreams about solar panels are getting a bit tired of this sort of political tone, and how this sort of slimy feeling undercurrent pervades green industry. I initially was drawn to this site because it had a lot of technical information and up-to-date news and didn’t have all the hippie marketing nonsense that is rife in TreeHugger.

I have no problems talking about green policy per se, but then can we please about THE POLICY and not make it about glorifying a particular politician, party, or interest group.

I don’t mean to offend Zachary Shahan or anyone with Clean Technia but I am critiquing here. I mean otherwise I can just get my news from some other source.

FYI, I do enjoy reading your blog on a regular basis so keep up the articles. I just think you are stepping a little outside of your comprehension of the political picture with posts like this.

yes, there will always be people who claim the govt should spend money on anything (until they personally need help). but there are others who are going to appreciate what the govt does for the country it serves

Seriously, if you want this site to have any credibility at all, you would be best off not to make yourself look like a total tool with blog posts like this unless you are trying to target your readership base to people who live in a cave.

One commenter here alluded to public jobs vs private and you shrug it off as the person who has the job doesn’t care. No shit sherlock. What he’s implying is Bush sustained the economy with private job growth and did so without the trillions of dollars in stimulus money.

Fact remains Obama is buying jobs and that my friend is not sustainable. So in reality, he is not good for the environment.

I wonder how much money these private sector jobs that Obama has “created” cost per job?? Gee!! If it’s not cost effective it shouldn’t be done. The end does not justify the means! (We’re so broke already and “they” won’t stop spending money!!)