NYT, LA Times, Politico Shocked, Shocked That Democratic Candidates Running On Climate Issue

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For instance, the New York Times reported Thursday that “across the country, there’s been a small explosion of political ads about global warming.” The paper points to ads by Steve Sisolak (D), running for governor of Nevada, by Sean Casten (D), running for an Illinois house seat, and “by more than two dozen other candidates in tight races.” But the Times article opens by claiming, “Conventional political wisdom says you don’t talk about climate change on the campaign trail. That’s mostly because it’s a deeply polarizing issue.”

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Back in 2011, Stanford public opinion expert Jon Krosnick and his colleagues analyzed the 2008 presidential election and the 2010 midterm elections to compare the performance of candidates who supported climate action with those who opposed it. “Democrats who took ‘green’ positions on climate change won much more often than did Democrats who remained silent,” explained Krosnick. “Republicans who took ‘not-green’ positions won less often than Republicans who remained silent.”

Nonetheless, some members of the media appear shocked by candidates who choose to campaign on a winning issue this cycle. On Tuesday, the L.A. Times reported that, “in a year when Democrats hope to make major gains, climate and clean energy have been pushed into a starring role in campaign ads in several parts of the country.”

However, the piece goes on repeat the assertion found in many mainstream media assessments: “For years, conventional wisdom among political strategists has labeled climate change as a politically weak issue, a concern of environmental activists but not the mass of voters.” To be clear, if there has been a (mistaken) belief “for years” that voters don’t care about this issue, that (misguided) “conventional wisdom” has being driven in part by the fact that [link:https://thinkprogress.org/tv-media-hurricane-florence-misinforming-public-on-climate-change-889551935ce1/|the media itself has been ignoring or downplaying the climate issue for years.
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https://thinkprogress.org/media-candidates-election-climate-change-clean-energy-10768e736319/