Earlier this fall I was fortunate enough to hear Van Jones speak at the SVN fall conference. Van Jones was the Green Jobs Czar that Obama appointed only to be ousted by people who felt he was too controversial for the job. Prior to being appointed he founded Green For All that promotes green jobs in inner city communities solving both unemployment and the development of a green industry. He also wrote the Green Collar Economy that outlines his vision on how this could be done. I had not heard anything from him since his resignation from the White House appointed position and was curious if he had any remorse and what he thought of the current political and economic climate. What he said I found quite profound. He started out by talking about how disasters like the BP oil spill demonstrated what can happen from a perceived insignificant cheat from someone in the BP office that created catastrophic results and untold environmental and brand damage.

Here are highlights of the talk:



However, if one looks at the law of the universe this also means that perceived insignificant positive things can also have astronomical effects based off of the perceived insignificance of hope. If it works successfully negatively it can also work in positive ways. He remarked that those in the green movement tend to look at the coal and oil business as the big evil empire. But we cannot categorize them as such.  We also need to honor the 80,000 coal miners as heroes who risk their lives and their health for our benefit. They are the reason why we can turn on our lights and power our homes. Yet we have also created an equal amount of jobs positions (80,000) in the wind industry and 46,000 in the solar industry. There has also been 36,000 renewable energy enterprises created nationally. These are examples that things are working successfully for the green economy. But what happened to the movement that Obama cultivated during his presidential campaign? What happened to that momentum? Van explained that during the presidential election the Obama campaign was a well oiled machine that had 80 on staff.  Once Obama was sworn in as President the congress took over responsibilities on outreach and direction. The staff that kept in touch with supporters online and was successful in mobilizing volunteers and outreach has been reduced to 8 people. The 15 million person email list was given to the National Democratic Party but they and have been undisciplined with the use of it. The movement that Obama had created suddenly had no ability to communicate because of the leadership loss. As president, Obama needs to make tough decisions of mobilizing people and cut deals with republicans. Many see this these deals as a loss in integrity or broken promises. Those 15 million people had hope and now feel pained from the loss of their hope. They thought they had a home and had won with the election. Van reminded the audience that Obama’s message was “Yes We Can” not “Yes He Can”. Where did WE go?  Van feels that we can still fix this and can build on the community of love and support. We have voices but need to build a new platform and community to share common goals.

Van Jones talked about how the tea party built a platform successfully. They united people on values. The Democratic party tends to focus its energies on policies and individuals. These are very difficult to unite a movement. We need to go back to talking about heart based values and our intention to inspire children of all species. The rise tea party noise was not the rise of hatred but more the collapse of hope. They did not get larger they go louder. We didn’t get smaller we got silent.  2011 will be a gut check to see how we respond as a movement. Van stressed we need a platform to create stories that matter and need a partner in government. If we don’t ask how will we get it. No industry movement has made it without a government partner. It is not about right vs. left but about past vs. future and welfare vs. work and the redistribution of wealth vs. methods of new wealth. If done right these will sell themselves both on the congressional floor and in the world of business. I agree. Do you?