I was shocked in the presidential debate that Harris gave staunch support for fracking. I was under the impression that democrats are against fracking, and remember people being critical of Fetterman for supporting it.
I also grew up in an area that was heavily impacted by the pollution from fracking. People who worked in the field were seen as failures of moral character who chose profits over the health of their children. How is it that both major parties are now in support of it? I feel like I must be missing a piece of the puzzle.
What’s more disappointing is that she had been historically anti-fracking. Tossed all of that out though, I suppose.
On one hand, I get it. To ensure herself a smooth election, keep the funding from your enemy.
On the other hand, fuck man I just want a President with policy that won’t destroy the planet.
Oh I thought the sign was going to say “we have to sacrifice everything we believe in for the incredibly narrow issues going on in a single state because of the Electoral College, that’s how democracy works you dumbfuck” but my eyes are getting bad
It’s because of the electoral college. Most states give all their electoral college votes to whomever wins the state rather than dividing the votes equitably. This means Pennsylvania – a swing state – will go either all-red or all-blue. The state has a lot of fracking, and a lot of people making money off it, so Democrats are trying to appease pro-fracking to get votes.
The people getting harmed by fracking are stuck without anyone on their ‘side’, but will presumably be more likely to vote blue because that side favors more regulation and pro-environment stuff. Note that all Harris said was she wouldn’t ban fracking. She didn’t say she wouldn’t make it difficult to do. My guess is any attempts to make it cleaner will get crushed by Congress and the Corrupted Supreme Court that has sided against Unions, workers, citizens, and the planet – all to favor of their sugar daddies. So even if the next President wants to do something about fracking, it would be a hard to actually do anything.
That and because there are Democrats who are bought by the oil companies, just like Republicans.
Putting the time and money towards promoting cleaner energy instead of banning older, dirtier energy. Don’t let perfect be the enemy of good.
Nothing about supporting fracking is ‘good’
What’s good is that it might get them in office so they can continue making incremental progress.
I got a heat pump this year because of the $3000 tax credit they passed - no chance of more incentives like that under Trump.
this is one time I side with the NIMBY’s.
fracking is awful and we need to kick the oil habit anyhow. it absolutely fucks up the local enviroment, and destroys the water table. the full name is literally hydraulic fracturing… because the process is basically taking something you can’t normally get oil out of, pumping in a shit load of water until the bedrock shatters to fucking hell.
it lets you get to the oil, sure, but it also releases the oil (and all sorts of other shit, like gases) so that it gets into wells and everything else.
Basically the only people that are pro-fracking are the assholes that are perfectly okay fucking over every one else, and the assholes that take their money.
Money
The Democrats won’t win an election while opposing fracking. O&G is far FAR too powerful to let that happen. If Harris stood firmly against fracking, then the opponent would win - be he (and it will be a he) Trump, Musk, or David “Son of Sam” Berkowitz.
No, I’m not exaggerating.
Pennsylvania is a swing state and likes fracking politically. As Republicans support fracking, this could be the one issue that convinces some Pennsylvania voters to vote Republican over Democrat.
Liberals aren’t on the side of anyone but billionaires, be they neoliberals, conservatives, or “post-liberals.”
The sooner you accept that the more American politics will make sense.
I’m not convinced democrats have been completely against fracking. I think it’s location based as fracking does or can have extreme negative consequences on the surrounding environment, so doing it around a major city aquifer probably isn’t the greatest idea. Fracking out in the middle of nowhere might be more positively embraced.
It’s pretty cool how my family, who are in Kansas, said that they couldn’t understand the risk I take, of earthquakes, living in the Bay Area, California. It’s also pretty cool how they now have earthquakes because of fracking in Oklahoma. The world is awesome, lemme tell ya.
Sigh.
they now have earthquakes because of fracking in Oklahoma
Why are you making me defend fracking? Gross. But yeah, that’s not how geology works. How many miles down are they injecting the
poisonsolution?
When they needed PA to win the election.
There isn’t any pollution from fracking, though.
If you can’t believe the assistant gynecologist, who can you believe
I thought the problem was that fracking produces oil, which is processed and burnt for energy ultimately releasing excess carbon? Idk it’s been a while since I’ve caught up with climate science :/
Fracking is usually for natural gas I think
Fracking is used for oil and for natural gas. And it absolutely pollutes local water supplies, aside from also using a shit ton of water, causing tremors, and wrecking wildlife habitats.
If there’s one benefit for it, it’s that it improves energy independence because it allows us to tap more difficult wells cost-effectively.
But that’s a bit of a stretch, because divesting away from fossil fuels also improves energy independence.
Maybe try typing the word you’re talking about into Google before speaking so confidently out of your ass. What are you, Ace Ventura?
She’s still a politician. It’s easy to put her on a pedestal because she’s NOT Trump, but without him, how excited would you really be about Harris?
Fracking has granted the United States independence from OPEC, and turned the US into the largest exporter of oil. This, the US now has the pricing power on the world oil market. This has huge geopolitical implications.
Back in the 2000s it was completely different. All of the geopolitical wonks were pushing renewable energy as a means of OPEC independence. And now that independence has been granted, but we still have the oil.
Meanwhile, as others have stated on this thread, the immediate problems from fracking have been mostly fixed, including the earthquakes. Long term, I don’t think anyone knows what’s going to happen with all of that dirty wastewater going back into the ground.
So on balance, there’s a good reason for the leadership in both parties to be on board with fracking: oil still rules the world, and fracking lets the United States rule the oil markets.
Yeah, and I’m fine with that short term. But only if it’s very short term and only if we use it as a brief reprieve to build out renewable energy faster than otherwise. That seems unlikely
