I’ll take a wild guess that Sarah Bloom Raskin’s March 15 decision to withdraw her bid for a key post on the Federal Reserve Board was not something that rocked your world. Or even registered on your radar. Because, quite possibly, you’re never heard of Sarah Bloom Raskin.
That’s understandable given everything else that’s going on, like Putin strafing apartment buildings. But when a well-qualified two-time federal alumnus (ex-member of the Federal Reserve, ex-deputy Secretary of the Treasury) feels compelled to pull her name from Senate consideration because of stonewalling Senate Republican opposition (plus Joe Manchin, natch), even though she was twice unanimously confirmed by the Senate for her previous economic posts … well, it’s worth wondering what the heck happened.
What made this esteemed individual, now a Duke University law professor, suddenly and supposedly ill-qualified to serve as vice chair for supervision at the world’s most powerful central bank? And, more broadly, what does this episode say about President Biden’s fragile political standing?
In the eyes of the Republican (plus Manchin) obstructionists, here is Raskin’s inexcusable sin: She believes that climate change issues should be factored into our economic policies.
Heaven forbid.
Last September, she had the temerity to suggest that federal regulators should “ask themselves how their existing instruments can be used to incentivize a rapid, orderly, and just transition away from high-emission and bio-diversity destroying investments.” Now, you and I might not deem those remarks to be particularly inflammatory; in plain English, she was suggesting that cleaner energy would be good for the economy – a stance echoed by economists worldwide. As she told Biden, in her Tuesday letter withdrawing her nomination, “This is not a novel or radical position … Any vice chair for supervision who ignored these (climate change) realities – which are manifesting themselves every day across this country – would be guilty of gross dereliction of duty.”
The problem, of course, is that gross dereliction of duty is central to the Republican brand. Flat-Earth climate change deniers populate the ranks of the GOP, and it just so happens that every Republican member of the Senate Banking Committee (which has quizzed Raskin) has taken money from our high-emission special interests – to wit, the fossil fuelers who in the pursuit of profit are making climate change even worse. As for Democrat Joe Manchin … and I’ll try to say this as delicately as I can … he is a fossil fuel whore. During the current donation cycle, he has taken more money from fossil fuelers than any other senator. That’s aside from the fact that his family’s fortune was in coal.
You have to feel a smidgen of sympathy for Biden. Sane Americans want him to tackle climate change with every tool at his command, but he can’t even get his Federal Reserve nominee confirmed. Raskin’s sin of telling the truth bestirred the fossil fuel moguls and several conservative dark money groups that the president is powerless to stop.
They got what they wanted. As the Axios news site pointed out March 15, “Not having her in the powerful role of vice chair of supervision means big banks will have less (but not zero) reason to worry about continuing to finance fossil fuel projects.”
Raskin’s withdrawal is a telling symptom of the tragic refusal to face reality. Just a few weeks ago, in a comprehensive new report (already widely ignored), the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change concluded that in many ways it’s already too late to save ourselves. UN Secretary General Antonion Guterres, summarizing the report, said: “Nearly half of humanity is living in the danger zone – now. Many ecosystems are at the point of no return – now.”
This doesn’t matter a whit to the Republicans (and Manchin) who have long been bought and paid for. The climate change warnings have long fallen on deaf ears. Indeed, Raskin’s concerns about economic impact have been front and center in virtually every government report since 2008 – when the Bush administration released its National Intelligence Assessment on the National Security Implications of Global Climate Change. This report, which confirmed that climate change is real (duh), warned that rising temperatures and sea levels would likely trigger political and economic instability in global hot spots.
And the Pentagon has weighed in on these issues, in great detail, with “defense reviews” in 2010 and 2014. The latter report said:
“As greenhouse gas emissions increase, sea levels are rising, average global temperatures are increasing, and severe weather patterns are accelerating. These changes, coupled with other global dynamics, including growing, urbanizing, more affluent populations, and substantial economic growth in India, China, Brazil, and other nations, will devastate homes, land, and infrastructure. Climate change may exacerbate water scarcity and lead to sharp increases in food costs. The pressures caused by climate change will influence resource competition while placing additional burdens on economies, societies, and governance institutions around the world. These effects are threat multipliers that will aggravate stressors abroad such as poverty, environmental degradation, political instability, and social tensions …“
Then, in 2016, a nonpartisan group of senior military and national security experts at the Center for Climate Security warned in their own report that climate risks “are accelerating in their likelihood and severity,” with economic, social, and security repercussions. They endeavored to point out: “There’s absolutely nothing political about climate change.”
Well. If that were the case, Sarah Bloom Raskin would’ve gotten the job she deserved.
Dick Polman, a veteran national political columnist based in Philadelphia and a Writer in Residence at the University of Pennsylvania, writes at DickPolman.net. Email him at dickpolman7@gmail.com.
From The Progressive Populist, April 15, 2022
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