Ever since the 2000 election (at least) we’ve been hearing about red states and blue states, that unfortunate artifact of our antiquated winner-take-all electoral college system (why not “one person-one vote”, as in South Africa and Iraq and other bastions of democracy? Seems simple enough. But I digress.)
In reality, the country is more like a tapestry of various shades of purple, with scattered primary-colored highlights. But our two-party system tends to act like a kids’ game of crack-the-whip (showing my age here), pushing our elected representation, and our range of options, toward the two far ends of the spectrum. Unfortunately, this polarization has derailed nearly every public discussion about the environment we’ve had over the last decade or two (it wasn’t always that way — President Nixon signed the Endangered Species Act, for example). To a visitor from outer space this would surely seem odd. What could be a more clearly common interest among disparate people than health of the global ecosystem–the single thing we all share? The centrality of an environmentally informed perspective to homeland security, energy independence, long-term economic sustainability, and darn near everything else that concerns us is not a partisan issue. At least it shouldn’t be.
Somewhat suddenly, there are unmistakable signs that we are beginning to emerge from the darkness. Green is becoming purple. To wit:
