public opinion

Vox Populi and the Environment

Is Trump’s attack on environmental law riding a groundswell of public opinion? Apparently not.

Trump is pushing hard to rollback Obama’s climate change regulations, expand the use of fossil fuels, and discourage renewables.  Where does the public stand on all this?  The answer is that the public is mostly on the other side, but more needs to be done to heighten public awareness. A recent survey conducted jointly by …

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Tea Party Support for Cutting Greenhouse Gases?

Surprising New Poll Results

The NY Times reports some very interesting poll results regarding climate change. The poll shows that Americans are more likely to support a candidate who favors action on climate change, less likely to favor a candidate who takes the “I am not a scientist” line, and much less likely to favor one who calls climate …

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How the Public Views Climate Action

The public continues to support a federal action to address climate change.

A poll released last month probed American attitudes toward climate change.  The poll was released after the Obama Administration issued its proposed rules for existing power plants to loud cries of protest from industry.  The poll was conducted by Stanford University and Resources for the Future, a highly regarded think tank.  At the time, the …

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EPA Is One of the (Relatively) Popular Kids

Despite all the attacks it has suffered, EPA has a better image than either political party. Not to mention Congress.

Republicans — especially the House GOP — often lambaste EPA.  The phrase “jack-booted thugs” will stick in my memory a long time.  A recent NBC/WSJ poll, however, shows EPA is actually one of our more popular institutions: %Positive %Negative Difference EPA 40 28 +7 Barack Obama 38 40 -4 Democratic Party 38 50 -2 Republican …

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Attitudes Toward Climate Change, Environmental Science, and Clean Energy

A new AP poll reports a sharp increase in the number of people who believe that climate change is happening and will be a problem for the United States.  The biggest change was among the significant group of people who say they don’t trust scientists. Here’s the summary from AP: 4 out of every 5 …

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Environmental Values and Political Polarization

While we all wait for tonight’s election returns, it’s worth taking a look at some of the trends that driving the votes. We’re been seeing a lot of polls lately about candidates, but in some ways issues polls are more interesting.  Many people have noted the decline in support for environmental values among the public.  …

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Undecided Voters and Climate Change

If you tuned in to the Republican National Convention, you probably heard Republican nominee Mitt Romney take a stab at President Obama’s 2008 remarks about slowing the pace of global warming.  Romney allowed his line to speak for itself, and delegates and the audience erupted in laughter.  Yes, global warming was used as a laugh …

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What Drives Anti-Regulatory Public Opinion?

Distrust of regulation has surged recently, but in a one-sided and somewhat surprising way.  Here’s a graph from Gallup: The Gallup folks speculate that this is due to the GOP reaction to regulatory actions under Obama.  That does not seem to fit the graph. You’ll notice that the GOP antagonism toward regulation began under Bush …

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The Delta 101: Of Levees, Canals & Whiskey

Nearly four out of five Californians do not know what the Delta is, according to a January 2012 poll.  That’s 78 percent of the population.  And 86 percent of southern Californians have never heard of it.  Yet, 25 million people and 3 million acres of farmland rely on the Delta for at least a portion …

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Churchill’s Wisdom and Climate Change

According to Yale poll results from last month, 63% of Americans now believe climate change is real, 17% think it isn’t, and 20% say they don’t know. Where does Churchill come into this?  To see that, you have to turn back the clock seventy years to December 1941. On the eve of Pearl Harbor, only …

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