January, 2010
Beware Washington's Green Craze
Carly Wilson
When I was younger my mom was always harassing me about turning the lights off when I left the room, recycling bottles and containers and not taking a ten minutes long hot shower when a three minute cool one would suffice. Is she a crazed eco-advocate screaming about saving the polar bears and not eating any animal by-products? No, she was a republican promoting one of the age-old tenants of conservatism: fiscal responsibility.
The new age of the “Green” movement is centered on commercialism: green cleaning supplies, green toilet paper, green cups, heck they've even come out with green underwear! Crazed eco-extremists have gone quite a few steps too far in their desires to protect “Mother Earth” and have become so lost in the idea of creating green products that they don't bother to look beneath the surface.
Some green products are not as sustainable as they appear. In fact, many of the newly released hybrid cars, supposedly better for the environment, require more water, materials and energy to make then regular cars.
And while this green fad is coming to an end; there are literally hundreds of green tees littering the sale racks of popular clothing stores across the country, the environmental initiatives that result from conservative ideology still thrive. Fiscally responsible individuals will still choose to reduce, reuse and recycle, but not because a scantily clad woman from PETA told them to. Conservatives have mastered the art of mutual benefit by lowering their personal expenses while wasting fewer resources at the same time. The Republican Party always has been, and always will be, the friendliest party to the environment, long after “Going Green” is gone.