Leftist Magazine Editor Calls For Worsening Recession To Protect Environment – With Video

Oct 15, 2009 6 Comments ›› Erik Wong

CNS News:

Emily Douglas, Web editor for The Nation magazine, said Wednesday that making the “recession worse” and making goods “more expensive” for Americans are means to reduce consumerism and preserve the environment.

Douglas was one of three journalists participating in a panel discussion, “Covering Climate: What’s Population Got to Do With It,” which was held at the Woodrow Wilson Center in Washington, D.C. The other two panelists were Dennis Dimick, executive editor of National Geographic, and Andrew Revkin, environmental reporter for The New York Times (who participated via Web camera).

An audience member who identified herself as an employee of the U.S.
Agency for International Development, the federal agency that distributes foreign aid, asked the speakers: “Do either one of you have any idea what it’s going to take to reverse our culture of consumerism here in the United States?”

Douglas immediately replied: “Make the recession worse.”

In response to follow-up questions from CNSNews.com after the event, Douglas said that this was a “tongue-in-cheek answer.”

At the panel discussion, however, the moderator asked Douglas for her final thoughts, and she addressed both the question about curbing American consumerism and a statement an audience member had made about advocates of manmade climate-change painting doomsday scenarios.

“Well, The Nation never shies away from doomsday scenarios,” said Douglas. “So, a funny story is that when they did–they’ve done, two climate change issues, or they are going to do another one in November and they did one in 2006–and there was an article about flying. And the conclusion of the article was that if we want to have intercontinental travel, we are going to have to travel by blimps. So, I felt that was The Nation being very doctrinaire and extreme, but probably not wrong.”

She continued: “But to the point about consumption: Yeah, I think things should be more expensive and that would do a lot and certainly reflect the, you know, better reflect the price of their, their real, their real price.”

Douglas later told CNSNews.com that this response was meant to follow-up on a statement by Dennis Dimick of National Geographic “who argued that the prices of goods should reflect the true environmental cost of producing them.”

The Nation magazine Web editor defended her position on increasing the cost of goods by arguing that it would give Americans an incentive to “buy less.”

“If goods are more expensive, it stands to reason that Americans will buy less of them,” she told CNSNews.com.

When asked for an example of how her suggestions could be put it practice, Douglas told CNSNews.com: “A gas tax would be a good start.”