# How much would a green new deal actually cost? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [February 8, 2019, 11:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-much-would-a-green-new-deal-actually-cost/829204 "2019-02-08T23:46:12Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 7
**Author:** ![XT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/xt/32/456_2.png) [@XT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/XT)\ **Post date:** [February 14, 2019, 3:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-much-would-a-green-new-deal-actually-cost/829204/121 "2019-02-14T03:15:12Z")
> [@Exapno\_Mapcase](#): > > Do you – all of you – understand that arguing the cost of specific elements of a utopian set of goals makes as much sense as arguing about the cost of implementing the Futurist Manifesto? > > Yes, the GND in its entirety is unrealistic. So was the Civil Rights movement in 1954. It’s been 60 years and that’s still going on. I don’t know how much it cost, but I think the price was worth the benefits. BTW, the same people who are screaming about the GND are the people who screamed about civil rights. They were wrong then and you are wrong now. > > I admit that conservatives won out against civil rights a lot of the time. You’re probably very proud of that. But my guess is that we’ve learned some lessons from that and we’ll make it much harder for you this time. Wow…that’s a huge strawman (worse really), equating those opposed to this pretty ridiculous (by your own admission) troll of the Republicans with opposing civil rights. You are trying to equate one to the other…sort of like those who snipe at vegans by pointing out that Hitler was a vegetarian. It’s ridiculous, regardless. I’m hoping that, like a lot of my posts, you were under the influence when you posted this… ---
**Author:** ![Exapno\_Mapcase](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/exapno_mapcase/32/1051_2.png) [@Exapno\_Mapcase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Exapno_Mapcase)\ **Post date:** [February 14, 2019, 4:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-much-would-a-green-new-deal-actually-cost/829204/122 "2019-02-14T04:02:25Z")
> [@XT](#): > > Wow…that’s a huge strawman (worse really), equating those opposed to this pretty ridiculous (by your own admission) troll of the Republicans with opposing civil rights. You are trying to equate one to the other…sort of like those who snipe at vegans by pointing out that Hitler was a vegetarian. It’s ridiculous, regardless. I’m hoping that, like a lot of my posts, you were under the influence when you posted this… I don’t get high from drugs. I get high by exposing conservatives for what they are. ---
**Author:** ![Shodan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9f8e36/32.png) [@Shodan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shodan)\ **Post date:** [February 14, 2019, 8:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-much-would-a-green-new-deal-actually-cost/829204/123 "2019-02-14T08:05:55Z")
So, goals we can’t achieve, at a cost we can’t determine. And we have to sign on, or we are against civil rights or something. Do you recognize, at all, how that sounds to someone other than a True Believer? Regards, Shodan ---
**Author:** ![septimus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/septimus/32/410_2.png) [@septimus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/septimus)\ **Post date:** [February 14, 2019, 3:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-much-would-a-green-new-deal-actually-cost/829204/124 "2019-02-14T15:44:35Z")
I just read Gail Collins’ latest column in the _N.Y. Times_. It contains an amazing example of Republican hyperbole. > [@](#): > > The [green new deal] memo — which seemed to have been accidentally released — was taken down, but Republicans demanded that it be discussed in endless detail. Senator Cotton claimed that the media, by failing to continue obsessing over it, was “ **complicit in the Stalin-like or 1984 technique of disappearing it, sending it down the memory hole.** ” (Truly, there is almost nothing he doesn’t like that won’t get compared to Stalin or Nazism. At the very beginning of his maiden Senate speech, Cotton claimed limits in defense spending reminded him of how “Adolf Hitler had taken power in Germany.”) I report. You deride. ---
**Author:** ![Exapno\_Mapcase](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/exapno_mapcase/32/1051_2.png) [@Exapno\_Mapcase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Exapno_Mapcase)\ **Post date:** [February 14, 2019, 4:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-much-would-a-green-new-deal-actually-cost/829204/125 "2019-02-14T16:26:33Z")
> [@Shodan](#): > > So, goals we can’t achieve, at a cost we can’t determine. And we have to sign on, or we are against civil rights or something. Do you recognize, at all, how that sounds to someone other than a True Believer? I have no sympathy for conservatives at all. You’ve brought it on yourselves by being against every movement for social progress in the country’s history. Now here’s a mere feel-good resolution - not a law, or even a proposed bill - that finally steps up and says that we can tackle the current problems and looming crisis. Something whose possible solutions and ameliorations, may I remind you, conservatives have been actively retarding and voting down for decades. And your response is to basically call anyone in favor of making a better future an enemy of the country. Nope. Not this time. This time we’re going to switch it around and call conservatives the enemy of the country, as they are and have been since forever. You don’t like being reminded you’re the same people who tried to crush civil rights? Well, maybe that will help you to think straight about what you’re opposing now, which is as big and important and \*overdue \*as civil rights was. ---
**Author:** ![puddleglum](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/puddleglum/32/137_2.png) [@puddleglum](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/puddleglum)\ **Post date:** [February 14, 2019, 7:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-much-would-a-green-new-deal-actually-cost/829204/126 "2019-02-14T19:47:04Z")
> [@Exapno\_Mapcase](#): > > I have no sympathy for conservatives at all. You’ve brought it on yourselves by being against every movement for social progress in the country’s history. > > Now here’s a mere feel-good resolution - not a law, or even a proposed bill - that finally steps up and says that we can tackle the current problems and looming crisis. Something whose possible solutions and ameliorations, may I remind you, conservatives have been actively retarding and voting down for decades. And your response is to basically call anyone in favor of making a better future an enemy of the country. > > Nope. Not this time. This time we’re going to switch it around and call conservatives the enemy of the country, as they are and have been since forever. > > You don’t like being reminded you’re the same people who tried to crush civil rights? Well, maybe that will help you to think straight about what you’re opposing now, which is as big and important and \*overdue \*as civil rights was. A feel good resolution that presents impossible solutions to what is pretended to be the most important issue of our time? Wouldn’t it be better to offer solutions that could actually work, instead of poisoning the well by shoe horning a socialist agenda into it? I like being reminded of it because it shows that I am powerful enough to affect things even before I was born. ---
**Author:** ![Sam\_Stone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Sam\_Stone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sam_Stone)\ **Post date:** [February 14, 2019, 8:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-much-would-a-green-new-deal-actually-cost/829204/127 "2019-02-14T20:05:12Z")
> [@septimus](#): > > I just read Gail Collins’ latest column in the _N.Y. Times_. It contains an amazing example of Republican hyperbole. > I report. You deride. If by ‘accidentally released’ you mean intentionally sent from AOC’s own mail account to multiple news sources. At first she tried to claim it was a nefarious Republican hack that changed the text. When the evidence showed that wasn’t the case, she fell back on, ‘it was an old draft’. Now it’s just an ‘accident’. In fact, what likely happened is that she sent out exactly what she intended to, and it only became an ‘accident’ after she was blindsided by the response to it. I find it hard to trust someone to coordinate the economy when they can’t even coordinate a campaign mailer. ---
**Author:** ![Shodan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9f8e36/32.png) [@Shodan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shodan)\ **Post date:** [February 14, 2019, 9:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-much-would-a-green-new-deal-actually-cost/829204/128 "2019-02-14T21:18:43Z")
> [@Exapno\_Mapcase](#): > > I have no sympathy for conservatives at all. The point is, nobody cares about your sympathy or lack of it. This isn’t about conservatives at all - it is about the garbage AOC and her compatriots think is a valid response to AGW. > [@](#): > > Now here’s a mere feel-good resolution - not a law, or even a proposed bill - that finally steps up and says that we can tackle the current problems and looming crisis. Something whose possible solutions and ameliorations, may I remind you, conservatives have been actively retarding and voting down for decades. The reason we have retarding nonsense like solar and wind as the be-all and end-all of energy policy, and being anti-nuke, is because it is stupid and unworkable. > [@](#): > > And your response is to basically call anyone in favor of making a better future an enemy of the country. > > Nope. Not this time. This time we’re going to switch it around and call conservatives the enemy of the country, as they are and have been since forever. So, you can’t defend this nonsense, so you are just going to name-call. That’s not transparent at all - no, not at all. > [@](#): > > You don’t like being reminded you’re the same people who tried to crush civil rights? Feel free to use whatever rhetorical tricks you like. Please don’t be offended if the response is giggling rather than defensive shock and awe. > [@](#): > > Well, maybe that will help you to think straight about what you’re opposing now, which is as big and important and \*overdue \*as civil rights was. This is so big and important that you can’t defend it, and get huffy when people ask about the price tag, and point out that it is an unworkable fantasy list. Good luck with that. Regards, Shodan ---
**Author:** ![Exapno\_Mapcase](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/exapno_mapcase/32/1051_2.png) [@Exapno\_Mapcase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Exapno_Mapcase)\ **Post date:** [February 14, 2019, 9:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-much-would-a-green-new-deal-actually-cost/829204/129 "2019-02-14T21:40:35Z")
> [@Shodan](#): > > The point is, nobody cares about your sympathy or lack of it. This isn’t about conservatives at all - it is about the garbage AOC and her compatriots think is a valid response to AGW. The reason we have retarding nonsense like solar and wind as the be-all and end-all of energy policy, and being anti-nuke, is because it is stupid and unworkable. > So, you can’t defend this nonsense, so you are just going to name-call. That’s not transparent at all - no, not at all. > Feel free to use whatever rhetorical tricks you like. Please don’t be offended if the response is giggling rather than defensive shock and awe. > This is so big and important that you can’t defend it, and get huffy when people ask about the price tag, and point out that it is an unworkable fantasy list. > > Good luck with that. We’re going to build the wall and Mexico will pay for it! [following by thousands of people screaming approval] I think conservatives lost all credibility to scorn feel-good tactics many years ago. I, along with many others, have been saying for years that we should adopt some of these tactics. People do want to feel good. They want to hear that the future will be better. And they don’t really care about the fine details. Well, now it’s happening. You don’t care about views on conservatives? So what? They’re not aimed at you but to remind progressives that conservatives have written themselves out of the conversation. My aim in post #120 was not to blast conservative posters but to remind the progressive posters that arguing with conservatives is a lost cause. The GND resolution is particularly silly to defend in terms of dollars and cents because the actual projects that will be building blocks will be tiny and limited in the beginning. We’ll find out what works and what doesn’t and adjust appropriately. All that matters is doing something rather than letting conservatives drag us backward to doom. Conservatives have spent decades refusing to discuss the future. They realized they got more votes by spreading fear about the present. And they know the demographic clock is ticking, ultimately dooming them to minority status, so they don’t want to think about the future in the first place. And most of all, conservatives don’t want to be confronted with the realization that progressives have finally grown a spine and are standing up and willing to do whatever it takes to move the country to a saner future. The only thing people should be hearing from progressives for the next two years is “we have a plan for a better future” and “jobs, jobs, jobs.” Here’s a slogan for you: “Tax the wealthy: Life will be better and the conservatives will pay for it!” ---
**Author:** ![XT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/xt/32/456_2.png) [@XT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/XT)\ **Post date:** [February 14, 2019, 10:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-much-would-a-green-new-deal-actually-cost/829204/130 "2019-02-14T22:19:27Z")
> [@Exapno\_Mapcase](#): > > I don’t get high from drugs. I get high by exposing conservatives for what they are. I guess you don’t get high then, as this was a major fail IMHO. I seriously don’t know what you were thinking. I was going to go with a more heated response, but you are one of the posters I usually read as thoughtful and insightful, so I’m going to chalk this up to an anomaly and move on. I hope you do as well and you don’t try in the future to use that sort of ridiculous strawman association to make your non-point. There are so many GOOD points, like the one you made earlier you could use that you don’t need to resort to that sort of horseshit. YMMV of course. ---
**Author:** ![Exapno\_Mapcase](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/exapno_mapcase/32/1051_2.png) [@Exapno\_Mapcase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Exapno_Mapcase)\ **Post date:** [February 15, 2019, 2:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-much-would-a-green-new-deal-actually-cost/829204/131 "2019-02-15T02:37:20Z")
> [@XT](#): > > I guess you don’t get high then, as this was a major fail IMHO. I seriously don’t know what you were thinking. I was going to go with a more heated response, but you are one of the posters I usually read as thoughtful and insightful, so I’m going to chalk this up to an anomaly and move on. I hope you do as well and you don’t try in the future to use that sort of ridiculous strawman association to make your non-point. There are so many GOOD points, like the one you made earlier you could use that you don’t need to resort to that sort of horseshit. YMMV of course. I’m hurt. Not because you think so little of my argument but because I’ve been saying the same thing for years. And you don’t remember. _sob_ And where has thoughtfulness and insight ever gotten me, or the progressives? It’s Trump style for now on. Except we’re substituting hope for fear. And that makes all the difference. ---
**Author:** ![septimus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/septimus/32/410_2.png) [@septimus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/septimus)\ **Post date:** [February 15, 2019, 4:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-much-would-a-green-new-deal-actually-cost/829204/132 "2019-02-15T04:30:02Z")
> [@Sam\_Stone](#): > > … I find it hard to trust someone to coordinate the economy when they can’t even coordinate a campaign mailer. So now the 28-year old bartender has been asked to “coordinate the economy.” Got it. AOC … AOC … AOC. The President is a criminal jackass who has surrounded himself with sycophants and other criminals. Ross, Chief Criminal of the Commerce Dept., who has used his position in illegal trading, is, as recently posted here, alleged by a federal judge to be trying to subvert the upcoming census. Even _the very post you quoted_ mentioned Gopster Cotton’s spouting of “complicit in the Stalin-like or 1984 technique of disappearing it, sending it down the memory hole.” But no mention of Cotton’s absurd spoutings. No mention of criminals like Wilbur Ross who are turning the U.S.A. into a banana republic. All we want to talk about is … AOC. Got it. ---
**Author:** ![Shodan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9f8e36/32.png) [@Shodan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shodan)\ **Post date:** [February 15, 2019, 2:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-much-would-a-green-new-deal-actually-cost/829204/133 "2019-02-15T14:30:04Z")
> [@Exapno\_Mapcase](#): > > I, along with many others, have been saying for years that we should adopt some of these tactics. People do want to feel good. They want to hear that the future will be better. And they don’t really care about the fine details. So “will this work” and “how the dickens will we pay for all this” are “fine details”? 😃 > [@septimus](#): > > AOC … AOC … AOC. The President is a criminal jackass who has surrounded himself with sycophants and other criminals. Ross, Chief Criminal of the Commerce Dept., who has used his position in illegal trading, is, as recently posted here, alleged by a federal judge to be trying to subvert the upcoming census. Again, you are missing the point rather badly. Changing the subject is not going to work. If the GND is a stupid idea, it does not become less stupid no matter what you think Trump did. Even if you get your wish, and Trump is dragged off in handcuffs and sent to Gitmo, solar and wind will not scale up to meet the needs of the world economy. High speed rail does not become economically viable when a Republican goes to prison. “Trump is bad” is not evidence that the GND is anything more than a fantasy. _:shrugs:_ At least, if the word comes to an end in twelve years, we will have a definite end to the Mueller investigation. I’m not sure anything else will do it. Regards, Shodan ---
**Author:** ![Ramira](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ramira/32/344_2.png) [@Ramira](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ramira)\ **Post date:** [February 15, 2019, 2:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-much-would-a-green-new-deal-actually-cost/829204/134 "2019-02-15T14:44:15Z")
> [@Shodan](#): > > If the GND is a stupid idea, it does not become less stupid no matter what you think Trump did. Even if you get your wish, and Trump is dragged off in handcuffs and sent to Gitmo, **solar and wind will not scale up to meet the needs of the world economy**. emphasis added **This is a stupid and incorrect statement** The solar and wind production are indeed on the way to scale up to meet the needs of the world economy - not solo but that is not the fundamental question, but certainly on the market basis competing with and replacing the hydrocarbon generation of the electricty and in specific industrial power provision (thus the heavy capital investment of many cement producers in new production facilities in the wind plants to go with the cement production.) It is not disagreed that the GND sketch as it is described in the press is a stupid idea, but that does not make the bolded statement less incorrect and stupid itself as asserted like that. ---
**Author:** ![Shodan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9f8e36/32.png) [@Shodan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shodan)\ **Post date:** [February 15, 2019, 2:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-much-would-a-green-new-deal-actually-cost/829204/135 "2019-02-15T14:51:15Z")
No, it isn’t stupid or incorrect. The GND wants to convert 100% to “alternative” in ten years. “Alternative” will not scale up to meet 100%, or anywhere close. Wind and solar will be niche technologies, as in your example of a cement company building a wind farm. Regards, Shodan ---
**Author:** ![Exapno\_Mapcase](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/exapno_mapcase/32/1051_2.png) [@Exapno\_Mapcase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Exapno_Mapcase)\ **Post date:** [February 15, 2019, 4:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-much-would-a-green-new-deal-actually-cost/829204/136 "2019-02-15T16:01:33Z")
> [@Shodan](#): > > So “will this work” and “how the dickens will we pay for all this” are “fine details”? 😃 One more time. That’s the official position of the Republican Party on everything. And it worked. ---
**Author:** ![Ramira](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ramira/32/344_2.png) [@Ramira](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ramira)\ **Post date:** [February 15, 2019, 4:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-much-would-a-green-new-deal-actually-cost/829204/137 "2019-02-15T16:55:53Z")
> [@Shodan](#): > > No, it isn’t stupid or incorrect. The GND wants to convert 100% to “alternative” in ten years. “Alternative” will not scale up to meet 100%, or anywhere close. Wind and solar will be niche technologies, as in your example of a cement company building a wind farm. > > Regards, > Shodan It **is stupid** and **it is incorrect** as the flat statements. If you wish to qualify to say the objective of the GND and its ten year time span is stupid and impossible there is no disagreement. But the flat statement is stupid and incorrect. Alternative is rapidly scaling up to be within reach of 70% of the new installation of electric generation and absolutely is scaling up with actual current unsubsidized capital investment (although less so in the USA land trapped in its 1950s nostalgie moment). While it is not 100% of the energy generation, it is very beyond “niche technologies”, a statement dragged from 1995 it would seems. The major ciment company examples (as in the investment plans of **Lafarge Holcim** , with the gigawatts of the direct energy consumption for the production the ciment (among the most energy intenstive industrial processes )) is the example of the Renewable penetrating on the own-capital investment for non electrict energy generation usages. But what is Lafarge Holcim, just some niche little foreign company with some small 20 billions of revenue… anyway they speak funny languages. But of course this is only the view point of the global capital investors, not the American conservatives bolsheviks stuck in their 1950s view of the world. Continue as they want, it is how it was built the USA global car company success, the inwards looking 1950s view of the evolution of the economies. Disdain, Ramira ---
**Author:** ![Darren\_Garrison](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/darren_garrison/32/92_2.png) [@Darren\_Garrison](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Darren_Garrison)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2019, 9:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-much-would-a-green-new-deal-actually-cost/829204/138 "2019-02-22T21:16:20Z")
AOC clarifies the cow issue–[what she really hopes is that people will–like–keep it real because factory farming is wild](https://nypost.com/2019/02/22/aoc-explains-why-farting-cows-were-considered-in-green-new-deal/). ---
**Author:** ![andros](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/e480ec/32.png) [@andros](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/andros)\ **Post date:** [February 23, 2019, 4:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-much-would-a-green-new-deal-actually-cost/829204/139 "2019-02-23T16:27:25Z")
Why does that bother you so much you need to not only post a NYPost link but also belittle AOC in doing it? ---
**Author:** ![Darren\_Garrison](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/darren_garrison/32/92_2.png) [@Darren\_Garrison](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Darren_Garrison)\ **Post date:** [February 23, 2019, 4:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-much-would-a-green-new-deal-actually-cost/829204/140 "2019-02-23T16:32:14Z")
> [@andros](#): > > Why does that bother you so much you need to not only post a NYPost link but also belittle AOC in doing it? Because it dsplays a Trumpian level of shallow thinking. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-much-would-a-green-new-deal-actually-cost/829204.md?page=6) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-much-would-a-green-new-deal-actually-cost/829204.md?page=8)