Bill White, Houston’s mayor, is a very successful politician.  And one of the most successful lines he uses with his audiences is that “Houston is a can-do city.”  He has used this line most all of the times that I have seen him appear.  And while I’m sure he believes it, it seems to me that he has multiple purposes with the phrase.  First, he uses it to galvanize a group of people he’s speaking to, to get them to buy in to the idea that he is advocating.  Second, he uses it to get the group to feel good about the city in which they live, so it’s also a subtle form of flattery – perhaps a politician’s most useful tool.  And third, he uses it to distinguish himself as a centrist pragmatic politician - getting things done - while the extremists scream and holler and, well…don’t do.
 
On March 19, Bill White appeared and made remarks with the renowned scientist and global warming author Tim Flannery at the Progressive Forum, a speaker series in Houston dedicated to bringing liberal and progressive observers to our city.  Randall Morton, the founder of this project, does a first-rate job getting the biggest names into the best downtown venues.  This, of course, is no guaranteed endeavor in a conservative state, or even in a can-do city.  And that particular Monday night, it seemed a majority of the seats in the vast lower section, where I was sitting, were, in fact, empty.  Still, it was an enthusiastic crowd that applauded both White and Flannery vigorously and throughout as they both spoke about the challenges and opportunities that the climate change dilemma presents.
 
Mayor White made some remarks in which he discussed issues related to global warming and Houston.  He talked about the recent success of backing down TXU’s coal plant ambitions, and of success in cutting butadiene emissions.  He commented on the rapid loss of forestland in the Houston area to development.  He spoke of how Michael Zilkha, a wealthy Houstonian, gave him Flannery’s book with the recommendation to read it.  And he spoke of his plans to implement sustainable practices in Houston, led by a capable new hire named Cris Eugster to be Chief Officer of Sustainable Growth, addressing issues such as upgraded building codes, a subject that I myself have discussed the need for on this show.  The Mayor indicated that he knew of few people anymore, except Texas state legislators, who didn’t accept the fact of global warming and the need to do something about it – and this includes Houston’s large energy companies.  And the Mayor spoke of the need to proceed at a pace where he didn’t, as he put it, “get chopped off at the knees.”  It was, in the main, optimistic, inspiring, and hopeful talk from a big city mayor.
 
And then, toward the end of these remarks, that were heartily supported and applauded by the small but sympathetic audience, the Mayor issued some remarks in a wholly different vein.  Since a transcript could not be made available to me, I’m forced to paraphrase here.  “Do not,” I recall him saying, “say ‘I told you so’ to those who convert to the global warming issue.”  Okay, I thought.  Fine.  I don’t see too many people gloating about this alarming issue, but okay, it’s good advice.  Then he said something like, “Do not think that demonstrations are a way to get things done.” And then finally, he admonished those who, he said, “predict that the end of the world is just around the corner,” saying that such people are “tiresome” or “grating on the nerves.”  The Mayor stated that he preferred to “get things done quietly”, his own personal style. 
 
How we persuade each other of our ideas is vital.  Optimally, it can be done civilly and courteously.  This show constantly strives to strike such a tone, and I think that in general it achieves it well.  Different people have different styles.  And of course, some people will never be persuaded.  In this country there are those who still think blacks or women should not have the right to vote, that disabled people deserve no special considerations, that gays should be re-programmed.  And there are some, including large powerful commercial interests, who will always believe that the environment is the rightful and bottomless pantry and trash dump for humans.
 
On the day of the Progressive Forum event, I had just finished reading The Weather Makers in preparation to interview Flannery, an interview that will air on this show in just a few minutes.  In a chapter entitled “Time’s Gateways” Flannery educates his readers about the dramatic changes required to constitute a change in geologic time on earth, how some smaller changes resulted in less dramatic changes in geologic periods, whereas more dramatic changes resulted in entirely new geologic eras.  And Flannery writes about how the geologic record bears witness to those often catastrophic dramas that seemed to appear from, well, from just around the corner.  At the end of the chapter, Flannery, comparing our current time to one such previous catastrophic warming period, writes, “Our modern earth stands to lose far more from rapid warming than the world of 55 million years ago.  Back then the warming closed a geologic period, while we might, through our activities, bring to an end an entire era.”  And that sentence, appearing near the beginning of the book, is far from Flannery’s last word in this vein.  The entire book is full of discussions that can only be termed ‘alarming’, for The Weather Makers is nothing if not a literary and scientific alarm bell, and one that has proved to be very persuasive, including, apparently, with our Mayor.
 
I’ve thought back several times about the Mayor’s concluding remarks at the forum.  Who, I wonder, was he talking about?  Who are the alarmists and demonstrators?  The people in the audience?  Flannery?  Other people not there that night?  Me?  You?  Al Gore, who a few days after Mayor White’s remarks warned the US Congress of, in his words, a “planetary emergency?”  And which demonstrations or demonstrators should be avoided?  All of them in general?  The large ones that took place against TXU at the state capital a few days before the company threw in the towel on several of its proposed plants?  Bill White personally knows very well the importance of demonstrations as can-do acts of conviction and courage, for as a young man growing up in San Antonio, Texas he was witness to and moved by the black civil rights and Hispanic voting rights movements.  And yet in his remarks that night he seemed to now deny the validity of such forms of expression on behalf of the planet itself.  I simply could not understand his point, or where he was coming from.
 
When asked that night to describe some global warming success story cities in the United States – can-do cities, as it were - Tim Flannery did not name Houston, Texas.  He named Portland, Oregon, a liberal west coast city populated with plenty of demonstrators who do not hesitate to make their voices heard on liberal and progressive issues.  Houston, like all large cities, is in many ways a can-do city, I’m well aware of that. I was born here, I grew up here, I live here, I make my living here, my immediate and extended family lives here, and my children were born here.  But there are many can-do cities in this country and in this world.  And in many ways, Houston Texas has been a hasn’t done, can’t do and won’t do city: a city that hasn’t, can’t and to date won’t preserve its greens and forests (as the Mayor himself pointed out); a city that hasn’t, can’t and to date won’t protect its bays and estuaries; a city that hasn’t, can’t and to date won’t protect its prairies, bayous, and rivers; a city that hasn’t, can’t and to date won’t protect its old buildings and neighborhoods; and a city that hasn’t, can’t and to date won’t produce intelligent government regulations to govern energy consumption, transportation, building codes, material waste, and much more.
 
And, in fact, when politely asked that night by a questioner if more could be done faster, the Mayor thought for a moment, and then again pointed to the recent TXU case as a sign of dramatic change.  To be sure, the TXU case is critical, and any regular listener of this show knows that I, perhaps more than any other media personality, have devoted much time to this issue.  But the TXU case simply staved off additional global warming and pollution, but does nothing to address our current, in the ground, existing consumption profile. 
 
I think Bill White missed a golden opportunity to say the one thing he should have said to the people in that room that night: “There are only a few of you here tonight.  That is a shame.  You are here because you care enough about this issue to come hear Tim Flannery and me speak on a Monday night.  YOU are can-do people.  And we need more people like you to get this job done.” 
 
The people in that room know very well whom to listen to, how to act, and what needs to be done.  And the people in that room know very well how to get things done, because many of them have been getting them done against long and lonely odds for a long time.  They have gotten things done through personal action, quiet persuasion, and yes, even public demonstration.  They, of all people in the city of Houston, have the fewest reasons to modify their behavior.  The people in that room were citizens active in their communities who vote and teach their children to vote, and they have done exactly what needs to be done: they voted in a politician who they thought would address their issues, including global warming.  Now it’s time for our progressive politicians, including our own highly capable Mayor, to show what they can do to meaningfully, comprehensively, and perpetually protect and improve our environment - even if their knees do take a few whacks from the axe.  I voted for Bill White twice.  He seemed to me like the kind of guy who has strong knees.  And besides, the real danger now appears that we may all get our knees whacked not by moving too fast, but too slowly.
 
I’m Leo Gold.  This is The New Capital Show.