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You know it's not you have to see it to believe it - sometimes you have to believe it to see it. You have to know what you're looking for when you're seeing signs of an authoritarian takeover of your country.

Van Jones

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Van Jones
Age: 56
Born: 1968
Born: September 20
Civil Rights Advocate
Environmentalist
Human Rights Activist
Lawyer
Motivational Speaker
Pundit
Jackson
Tennessee
Anthony Kapel Jones
Authoritarian
Signs
Seeing
Looking
Country
Sometimes
Believe
Takeover
Takeovers

More quotes by Van Jones

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Most green-collar jobs are middle-skill jobs. That means they require more education that a high-school diploma, but less than a four-year degree.
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A green economy begins to replace some of the clunking and chugging of ugly machines with the wise effort of beautiful, skilled people. That means more jobs.
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Donald Trump understood the dynamics of the new media system better than the people who ran the old media system.
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Sometimes we overemphasize the political system. There are other ways to make a difference. There's technology, there's media, there's business.
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I would argue that we have a patriotic duty to move toward energy independence and clean energy. It is a matter of national security - energy security, climate security, economic security, job security, everything.
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I think we were naive during the first two years of the [Barack] Obama Administration because the Republicans didn't fight us on this point during the 2008 Presidential Election. Obama and McCain both ran on a clean energy platform. But now, uncontested lies have eroded hard-won public understanding. So, we have to go back and make the case again.
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People forget: solar panels don't put themselves up. Wind turbines don't manufacture themselves. Businesses don't retrofit themselves to waste less energy and water, nor do homes weatherize themselves.
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The government built the grid to favor one industry over others. But I don't hear any conservatives screaming about that. Folks don't understand that the elite economic interests that are holding them down are also feeding them a bunch of lies.
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People in red states and blue states can agree that we are a nation blessed with extraordinary natural wealth and beauty, which we would be foolish to waste therefore conservation and efficiency are values we all can share.
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The problem isn't that the green jobs aren't sexy enough. It's that they're not plentiful enough. A young person looking for a job isn't looking just for a sexy job, they're looking for any job.
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In the fourth quadrant (lower right), working-class people are motivated to take on green-collar jobs and start green businesses.
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Donald Trump's a great deal-maker with a lot of momentum and it will do a lot of damage to us. We are in grave peril and it's going to be terrible.
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If [Donald] Trump throws 20 million off of health care, that's going to be - if he handles this badly - and it's very hard to handle it right, then that's a - a huge advantage in the mid-terms for us.
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The time has come to move beyond eco-elitism to eco-populism.
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I had this radical idea that the police should obey the law. My view was that any human system without adequate checks and balances will tend towards corruption and abuse. That's why you have meat inspectors. Not because you hate butchers, but because of an understanding of human nature.
Van Jones
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Now, here's a good question: should serious people focus on global political instability - terrorism, failing states, nuclear weapons - or should we focus on global climate instability - droughts, floods, extreme weather? Here's the correct answer: yes, both, because climate disruption will make every other national security problem worse.
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Local politics matters a lot.
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We need to invest in job training programs, especially those that include child care, transit stipends and paid apprenticeships and internships.
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Reversing global warming will take a World War II level of mobilization. It is the work of tens of millions, not hundreds of thousands.
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Clean coal represents a breakthrough in the marketing of coal, but not in the science of burning coal.
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