Right-wing media outlets often portray those of us who advocate for the greening of the globe as "liberal" big-government wackos whose ideas have no place in the hard-nosed scrabble of policy debate. Their portrayal notwithstanding, the green movement is in fact one of the most common sense, community-oriented and self-reliant philosophies in the world today.
A few days ago I heard Rush Limbaugh mocking an environmental group whose solar-oven potluck had been sabotaged by cloudy weather. His description of this group evoked images of an ideologically intransigent community determined to slowly starve itself to death during extended periods of cloudy weather rather than make use of fossil fuels.
Yet those of use who advocate for green practices know that this is political propaganda at its finest. People who are seriously committed to the principles of a greener future are advocates of a common sense approach in our building, our agricultural production, and our manufacturing, and we try to base our decisions on the best available science. We are empiricists: children of the Enlightenment.
If this sounds too abstract to be common-sense, then I suggest you take a look at the National Association of Home Builders Green Home Building Guidelines. Though we often associate green homes with composting toilets, expensive photovoltaic arrays, and odd shaped homes reminiscent of a circus contortionist, a quick perusal of the guidelines reveals a different picture altogether.
In fact, green building is much more about common sense than it is about life in a hippie commune. Many of the practices described in the guidelines, like raised heel trusses and air sealing packages, are simply good design principles and solid craftsmanship. Ten or fifteen years from now, much of what is considered "green" will simply be standard business practice. Very soon consumers and regulators will demand more from an industry that has focused too much on volume, square footage, and turn over instead of focusing on the fundamentals that make a home healthy and livable.
Right of center pundits like Thomas Friedman have begun describing green in nationalistic and patriotic terms ("the new red, white and blue"), and religious leaders are now articulating their own form of environmentalism ("Creation Care"). Common sense and practical innovation are pillars of the American experience, and any assault on these values by the likes of Limbaugh and other right-wing pundits undermines their credibility as conservatives. Personally, I don’t care what we call it. If expanding our green vocabulary helps to get more Americans back on the common sense express, then by all means continue.