![\"Jane](\"https:\/\/travelingboy.com\/travel\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/Jane-Fonda-1.jpg\")
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Even for those already in the climate choir, Jane Fonda\u2019s sermon last month at the National Press Club is well worth the time to read<\/a> or watch and listen to<\/a>. I\u2019ve logged loads of press club luncheon speeches over the years. This was one of the finest I\u2019ve heard. Fonda eloquently described how global warming has us up against the wall. Not just the heartfelt delivery one expects from Oscar winners, but the essential substance and slightly wicked wit woven throughout. Send it to those needing motivation to confront the stark realities before us to act.<\/p>\n Fonda\u2019s many actions include \u201cFire-drill Fridays<\/a>,\u201d protests\u00a0for which she temporarily moved to DC in September, at which she\u2019s been arrested a half dozen times. If you\u2019re around Washington, the last drill before her return to acting commitments in LA is January 10th, 11 AM at the US Capitol. Guest speakers will include Bill McKibben and Maggie Gyllenhaal.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Fonda’s speech took no prisoners, calling out a range of climate villains, including Exxon, which over forty years ago knew the truth about the effect of increasing CO2 gases and the short window to address it, and whose executives, when their scientists informed them of the\u00a0global\u00a0impacts, replied \u201cThis\u00a0problem is not as significant to mankind as a\u00a0nuclear holocaust or world famine.\u201d<\/p>\n “And they continued to drill,” said Fonda. “Exxon, Shell, Mobil, and others knew that their products wouldn\u2019t stay profitable once the world understood the risks. So they used the same consultants that the tobacco companies had used to launch a huge communications effort, to develop strategies on how to fool us.”<\/p>\n “The difference is that tobacco companies were primarily harming people who smoke. The fossil fuel companies are harming the entire planet and all its inhabitants. The companies not only hid what they knew, a coalition, together with the Koch brothers and other billionaires spent tens of millions of dollars on think tanks, like the Heartland Institute, that promote false science, sowing confusion about global warming, so that people won’t try to stop them. Their line was, and continues to be, that the, \u201cScience about climate change is not clear. And even if it were, the fault lies with governments and consumers, not with them.\u201d You see, but the thing is, these oil companies have played a big role in actively stopping governments from enacting clean energy policies, with Exxon leading the way.”<\/p>\n To claims like Toomey\u2019s that American oil and gas production is the only path to energy security, Fonda asks if it\u2019s necessary for energy security, what are we doing shipping it overseas? She quoted Oil Change International<\/a> that 45% of existing drilling wouldn\u2019t be profitable without taxpayers subsidizing fossil fuels with over $16 billion dollars a year.<\/p>\n She didn\u2019t mention it, but that\u2019s dwarfed by military expenditures underpinning escapades with oil in mind. They arguably include backing Iraq in the Iraq-Iran war of 1980-88, the invasions of Iraq, and shoring up the Saudi regime and the UAE and pumping up their ally Israel. Now we\u2019re doing that trio’s bidding with a dance in the dark with Iran<\/a>.<\/p>\n Fonda stressed the importance of workers like coal miners not being treated as stranded\u00a0assets, unlike the fossil fuels that must become stranded assets left in the ground if we\u2019re to have a chance. She\u00a0acknowledged how\u00a0overwhelming the tasks before us must seem, how disruptive and expensive addressing global warming will be. Fonda then pointed out the costs of billion dollar weather and climate events, which over the last three years exceeded $450 billion.<\/p>\n Referencing\u00a0The Grapes of Wrath<\/a>, <\/em>one of Hollywood\u2019s masterworks and one that starred her father Henry, Fonda noted the 1930s was a time of both massive financial collapse (the Great Depression) and an environmental collapse (the Dustbowl). In response to the social unrest it generated, FDR responded to those demanding government action, \u201cI agree with you. Now go out and make me do it.\u201d<\/p>\n Fonda connected political challenges then with those current:<\/p>\n “Now the rich and powerful hated the New Deal, hated Roosevelt, because it set a precedent for the federal government to play a central role in the economic and social affairs of the nation. It was criticized as fascist, as socialist. Bankers tried to overthrow Roosevelt. Big business, big railroads, big banks ranted and raved against it. But there were millions of people in the streets demanding that Roosevelt do more, because it was helping them. And, because of that, it succeeded.”<\/p>\n “The same interests that hated the New Deal are the ones telling us today that the Green New Deal is bad, that government shouldn\u2019t be so involved in economic and social regulation…But it\u2019s not the size of government that matters, it\u2019s who the government is working for. And for too long, it\u2019s been a government controlled by corporations, most particularly the fossil fuel industry. This is why it hasn\u2019t been working for working people.”<\/p>\n “And powerful forces are arrayed against the efforts to change this, just like back in the 1930s. Already, there’s a rash of new laws …that specifically criminalize protests aimed at fossil fuel infrastructure. These new laws are called critical infrastructure laws, since they reclassify fossil fuel infrastructure as critical, in order to justify harsh penalties against climate advocates exercising their Constitutional right to peaceful protest.”<\/p>\n By the way, I\u2019m not sure we\u2019re secure from a returning double whammy of both financial and environmental collapse. Pamela Martin at\u00a0Wall Street on Parade<\/a><\/em> is parsing the well-concealed tea leaves at the Federal Reserve Bank of New\u00a0York. It looks to her that in a recent short period the bank pumped trillions of dollars in cumulative loans into Wall Street trading houses, some of\u00a0them again up to their gills in derivatives. The infusions appear to be going straight into the stock market<\/a>, which has nil to do with the Fed\u2019s monetary policy mandate.<\/p>\n Addressing the media in the room, Fonda said it\u2019s hard to get people to increase their activism in concert with others when only 43 percent of Americans report hearing about\u00a0climate change, and 23 percent say they never hear about it. She called for media to step up with\u00a0more coverage of the best practices of states and cities transitioning from fossil fuels. And\u00a0especially to drop the\u00a0\u201ctwo sides to the story\u201d narrative, given 97% agreement in the scientific community.<\/p>\n Fonda asserted that because of the fossil fuel industry, which lost the country decades of critical time to act, and shrank our carbon budget \u2014 the amount of carbon that could be burned without passing the tipping point \u2014 it\u2019s too late for moderation.\u00a0\u201cAnd given the emergency, it\u2019s those who believe in moderation, in pre-Trump\u00a0\u2018business as usual’, who are truly delusional.\u201d<\/p>\n Perhaps wisely, when aiming to convince a broad political spectrum to confront the political power of the fossil fuel industry, Fonda declined to name her favorite for President in 2020. But she allowed this:<\/p>\n “You know, I’ve said pretty clearly, it\u2019s too late for moderation. So I guess that tells you something\u2026You know, the idea that going back to what existed before Trump, I mean Trump isn\u2019t some unicorn that\u00a0appeared out of nowhere. There\u2019s a reason that he was elected. And\u00a0so the solution requires much more than going back before he was elected. It requires addressing the reasons that he was elected. And that\u2019s why I like the Green New Deal, because it\u2019ll not only solve the climate crisis, it will\u00a0address the reasons that someone like Trump could get elected in a country that is supposed to be a Democracy.\u201d<\/p>\n Asked if Michael Bloomberg, who\u00a0spent millions underscoring climate issues, was on the same side, despite often putting his money behind Republicans, Fonda replied:<\/p>\n “I like Michael. I admire much \u2014 I love his work on gun control. But I don\u2019t like the fact that he supports candidates \u2014 I mean Pat Toomey in Pennsylvania was running against a very progressive woman. And Michael Bloomberg put a lot of money into Toomey\u2019s campaign, because Toomey is good on guns. But he\u2019s terrible on climate and fracking. So there’s a lot about where Bloomberg is coming from, that I don\u2019t like. But, on top of that, I don\u2019t like people buying their way into the electoral process. We got to get money out of politics.”<\/p>\n There are some journalists, I can think of a few on both TV and radio, who are like a\u00a0terrier with a sock trying to put words in someone’s mouth until they get the talking point they want that supports their narrative. I won\u2019t imitate them now. Draw your own conclusions as to which candidate best threads the needle of Fonda\u2019s druthers, and which ones don’t.<\/p>\n Ah, but I will digress in timely fashion. A presidential candidate who is Fonda’s junior has earned the mantle of the leading climate candidate. Corporate media and a shameful number of those in Congress are working overtime to disparage the Green New Deal that Bernie champions. But the detailed version here<\/a>, including transitioning jobs in fossil fuels to work that creates green infrastructure,\u00a0will help make Bernie a home stretch closer. Fonda mentioned Yale scientist Anthony Leiserowitz telling her that 43 million Americans would do\u00a0something about climate change, but nobody asked them. Bernie\u2019s asking. His campaign is a vehicle for climate involvement.\u00a0Larger and larger swaths of the public connect the dots between shriveled crops, flooded hog farms, polluted waters, smoking forests and diminished prospects for their children. Many of them will recognize Bernie\u2019s campaign as legit action. Bernie will be ticking like a Timex as people anxious over a heating planet enable him to come from behind like Seabiscuit.<\/p>\n![\"Climate](\"https:\/\/travelingboy.com\/travel\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/Climate-Change.jpg\")
![\"Jane](\"https:\/\/travelingboy.com\/travel\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/Jane-Fonda-2.jpg\")
<\/p>\n![\"Jane](\"https:\/\/travelingboy.com\/travel\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/Jane-Fonda-3.jpg\")
That includes Exxon\u2019s undermining the 1998 International Treaty on Climate, the Kyoto Protocol. Fonda points to other bad actors, like the American Petroleum Institute, with its new video,\u00a0America\u2019s Energy Security: A Generation of Progress at Risk<\/em>, equating fracking and drilling with patriotism, as Republicans including Senator Pat Toomey of\u00a0Pennsylvania introduce resolutions to prohibit a President from implementing a unilateral moratorium on fracking, and as the Manhattan Institute, with\u00a0significant backing from fossil fuels concerns, warns of\u00a0global recession if the US bans fracking. It won\u2019t shock that Fonda advocates legal consequences for knowing deceptions and environmental damage.<\/p>\n![\"Andrew](\"https:\/\/travelingboy.com\/travel\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/Andrew-Wheeler.jpg\")
![\"Jane](\"https:\/\/travelingboy.com\/travel\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/Jane-Fonda-4.jpg\")
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![\"Jane](\"https:\/\/travelingboy.com\/travel\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/Jane-Fonda-5.jpg\")
My only complaint on Fonda\u2019s speech is\u00a0that she didn\u2019t share who brokered her soul. She turned eighty-two the week of her speech and no one would ever pick her out of a line-up as an octogenarian on a crime spree. Even allowing for star-power wealth and privilege, she’s a reminder that age is not an average of expectations for a particular number, it\u2019s a very individual matter. Though every day is a roll of the dice as we move through the casino of health breaks and genetics, we prejudge at our peril. That\u2019s whether or not one is still among, as an accomplished polio victim once phrased it for me, the temporarily-abled.<\/p>\n![\"Nero](\"https:\/\/travelingboy.com\/travel\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/Nero-Lives.jpg\")