Trump has no answer for that. He doesn’t believe the climate science that NASA is telling him is true. He is trying to bring back coal precisely when wind, solar and efficiency are becoming cheaper, cleaner, healthier alternatives — precisely when four of the five biggest wind states are red states and precisely when China has committed itself to owning the clean power and electric car markets of the future! He’s trying to force the U.S. auto industry to bring back gas guzzlers when the last time we did that — from the 1980s to the 2000s — Japan and Korea bankrupted Detroit and we enriched petro-dictators from Venezuela to Russia to the Arab world to Iran.

Trump is the president who’s throwing away our umbrella right before the storm.

Sure, Trump will sneer that “green” is girlyman, uneconomic, unpatriotic and vaguely French. But Democrats can easily counter that green is globally strategic, locally profitable and working class — green is the new red, white and blue. That message can play today in Rust Belt battleground states like Michigan and Ohio. One recent clean energy industry study found that 714,257 people in 12 Midwestern states work in renewable energy generation, clean transmission, energy efficiency, clean fuels and advanced transportation. Some 108,000 in Ohio alone do, compared with 38,000 in the coal, oil and gas fields.

The Democratic message could start with some simple math: There are currently 7.6 billion people on the planet, and in 2030 there will be 8.6 billion — another one billion in just over a decade! If even half of them get cars, have air-conditioners and eat high-protein diets like Americans now do, we will devour and burn up the planet beyond recognition. So what does that mean? It means clean energy and efficiency have to be the next great global industry or we’re going to be a bad biological experiment, whether there is climate change or not. Does anyone — other than Trump — believe that America can continue to dominate the world economy and not lead the next great global industry, but leave that to China?

The Democratic strategy should be built around putting together the performance standards, research and carbon pricing to achieve what Energy Innovation C.E.O. Hal Harvey calls “the four zeros.” These are, Harvey explains: 1. “A zero-carbon grid. Right now, Republican states like Texas and Wyoming dominate the U.S. wind industry and are reaping most of the jobs and environmental benefits. That should go national. 2. Zero-emission vehicles. When you combine a zero-carbon grid with electric vehicles, bingo, you have zero-carbon transportation. 3. Zero-net energy buildings. What if you could build a well-insulated home, put today’s inexpensive solar panels on the roof and, over the course of a year, produce as much energy as you consume? Fantastical? No. It’s now the law in Santa Monica, and getting most of the way there is already feasible — and cost-effective — throughout the country. 4. Zero-waste manufacturing. New techniques in manufacturing, such as 3-D printing or advanced chemistry, can slash waste — and waste is a tax on both the budget and the earth.”

Now that’s a platform worth running on, and it’s one that can do what Democrats need most: make them the party of strengthening the working class and American security.

Clean power, clean cars, clean manufacturing and efficient buildings make everything we want to achieve in our society easier. They can lower our health care costs, cut heating bills for the poor, drive 21st-century innovation, foster decent jobs, mitigate climate change, create more competitive export industries, weaken petro-dictators — and enhance U.S. national security and moral leadership.

Let Trump fight that idea. If Mother Nature keeps on this destructive track into 2020, well, Trump’s favorite mantra about strong women, “Lock her up,” will look awfully silly.

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