Monday, November 28, 2011

Godfather's Pizza and Al Gore



The graph shows a partisan change in approval of Godfather's Pizza since Herman Cain declared his candidacy for the Republican nomination (context here).  Republicans like his former company a lot more now, and Democrats a lot less.

I have in the past been pretty dismissive of claims from right-leaning and other analysts that Al Gore's prominence in climate change activism has much to do with Republican denial of climate reality.  Godfather's Pizza argues in favor of those claims, though.

Obviously, opinion on cheap pizza and on the fate of our climate involve different levels of moral responsibility.  If Republicans react poorly to Gore's warnings, that reflects poorly on them and not Gore.  Still, efforts like the We Can Solve It campaign might need a lot more reinforcement:




Of course, Gingrich has backed off of his earlier interest in reality.  There's only so much you can do, if the Republican leadership is so unwilling to do much anything at all.  Maybe there are a enough younger Republican leaders, people like Chris Christie (or maybe others like Romney and McCain if Romney loses next year), to join in the leadership on the climate movement.  Otherwise it's up to the public.