Informed Comment Homepage

Thoughts on the Middle East, History and Religion

Header Right

  • Featured
  • US politics
  • Middle East
  • Environment
  • US Foreign Policy
  • Energy
  • Economy
  • Politics
  • About
  • Archives
  • Submissions

© 2025 Informed Comment

  • Skip to content
  • Skip to primary sidebar
al-Qaeda

Sanders: Climate Change more Menacing than Terrorism (Germanos)

Juan Cole 10/21/2013

Tweet
Share
Reddit
Email

Andrea Germanos writes at Commondreams.org:

In a newly published interview, Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) blasts the "unfettered capitalism" that has collapsed the middle class, and the corporate power fueling climate change, which poses a "far more serious problem than Al Qaeda."

Sanders speaking about the government shutdown’s impacts. (Photo: AFGE/cc/flickr) Speaking with economics writer Jonathan Tasini for the interview with Playboy, the 72-year-old Independent senator said that "one of the untold stories of our time is the collapse of the American middle class." It's due, in part, to "the decline of trade unions," which means that workers "have less power to negotiate contracts and less political clout."

It's a system that has brought immense inequality, he says.

"We are in the midst of intense class warfare, where the wealthiest people and the largest corporations are at war with the middle class and working families of this country, and it is obvious the big-money interests are winning that war."

It's a "hypercapitalist society," where there are even efforts to "privatize water, for God’s sake," and the function of the current health care system is "to make as much money out of it as possible," he told Tasini.

When Tasini told Sanders, "You make the U.S. sound like a banana republic in which a handful of families control all the economic and political power," Sanders responded simply, "Yes, it is. In more technical economic terms I would call it an oligarchy."

It's a system that has put corporate interests above people—and the planet.

"You have the entire scientific community saying we have to be very aggressive in cutting greenhouse gas emissions," Sanders told Playboy. "Yet you’re seeing the heads of coal companies and oil companies willing to sacrifice the well-being of the entire planet for their short-term profits. And these folks are funding phony organizations to try to create doubt about the reality of global warming."

It's "incomprehensible," he said, that "[b]ig business is willing to destroy the planet for short-term profits."

"And because of their power over the political process, you hear a deafening silence in the U.S. Congress and in other bodies around the world about the severity of the problem. Global warming is a far more serious problem than Al Qaeda."

As for any hopes Sanders supporters have that the senator will make a bid for the White House, he told Tasini, "I am at least 99 percent sure I won’t."

_________________________

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 License

—-

Mirrored from Commondreams

Filed Under: al-Qaeda, Environment

About the Author

Juan Cole is the founder and chief editor of Informed Comment. He is Richard P. Mitchell Professor of History at the University of Michigan He is author of, among many other books, Muhammad: Prophet of Peace amid the Clash of Empires and The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam. Follow him on Twitter at @jricole or the Informed Comment Facebook Page

Primary Sidebar

Support Independent Journalism

Click here to donate via PayPal.

Personal checks should be made out to Juan Cole and sent to me at:

Juan Cole
P. O. Box 4218,
Ann Arbor, MI 48104-2548
USA
(Remember, make the checks out to “Juan Cole” or they can’t be cashed)

STAY INFORMED

Join our newsletter to have sharp analysis delivered to your inbox every day.
Warning! Social media will not reliably deliver Informed Comment to you. They are shadowbanning news sites, especially if "controversial."
To see new IC posts, please sign up for our email Newsletter.

Social Media

Bluesky | Instagram

Popular

  • Israel's Netanyahu banks on TACO Trump as he Launches War on Iran to disrupt Negotiations
  • Iran's Hypersonic Missiles Hit Israeli Refinery, Military Sites, as Israel does the same to Tehran
  • A Pariah State? Western Nations Sanction Israeli Cabinet Members
  • Israel: Will Ultra-Orthodox Jews' Opposition to Conscription Bring down Netanyahu's Gov't
  • Will Iran reply to Israeli Attacks with "War of Attrition?" Will its Nuclear Red Line Hold?

Gaza Yet Stands


Juan Cole's New Ebook at Amazon. Click Here to Buy
__________________________

Muhammad: Prophet of Peace amid the Clash of Empires



Click here to Buy Muhammad: Prophet of Peace amid the Clash of Empires.

The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam


Click here to Buy The Rubaiyat.
Sign up for our newsletter

Informed Comment © 2025 All Rights Reserved