Brian Williams turned over just under five minutes of Wednesday's NBC Nightly News to a live interview with former President Bill Clinton about his effort to address global warming, a fawning session which amounted to little more than pontificating from Clinton cued up by Williams, who set the tone by asking: “What does the current administration have to answer for? How much of it, in your view, is their fault?” The ostensible news hook for the segment: The “Clinton Climate Initiative's” announcement of “a global Energy Efficiency Building Retrofit Program.” The three other questions Williams managed to squeeze in between Clinton's long-winded answers to the easy inquiries: “What have you done in your personal life that contributes to better environmental health, let's say, in this country?” Clinton insisted: “I have a hybrid vehicle which I drive, which I drove to New York to work today.” Does the former President of the United States really drive his own car and not ride in a Secret Service-driven limo? And where do the agents ride in a puny hybrid? Williams didn't ask, but instead treated Clinton as an energy use expert: “For the people who find it hard to believe that replacing bulbs in their home or changing the vehicle they drive could make a difference, what's your counter-argument?” Finally, Williams turned cute: “How much of your personal time these days are you spending as, let's call it, political advisor to somebody close to you?”
The MRC's Brad Wilmouth painstakingly labored to correct the closed-captioning against the video to provide this transcript of the 4:45 segment on the May 16 NBC Nightly News made up mostly of Clinton's long, uninterrupted answers:
BRIAN WILLIAMS: Former President Bill Clinton today announced a broad initiative to make buildings in big cities around the world more energy efficient by renovating them and bringing them up to speed, at least environmentally. It is the latest gathering on the hot topic of going green, and the former President's been kind enough to duck out of what's going on across town to join us live here tonight. Mr. President, when did this reach, in your view, critical mass, and what does the current administration have to answer for? How much of it, in your view, is their fault?
BILL CLINTON: Well, I think we've known now for many years that the world was warming at an unsustainable rate, that it's caused by human activity, and that we have to try to turn it around. There's still some debate about how bad it's going to get, how soon. And some people debate whether we can turn it around in a way that helps, rather than hurts, the economy. I'm convinced we can. But, you know, we did the Kyoto climate change treaty in the middle of my second term as President. And before that, we had had an attempt to make a car that tripled gas mileage with big auto companies. We undertook to green the White House and put conservation in the federal government's programs, which took the equivalent of hundreds of thousands of cars off the road. And we added about a billion dollars of clean energy research. But I think that in the last few years, as the evidence has mounted, we've seen more tax credits, we've seen more R and D, but the administration has not been willing to, in effect, limit carbon emissions and require reduction and then create a market by pricing carbons so that we can trade carbon credits, and the really efficient companies can find the most effective way to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, and others can pay them to do it. That's what I think should be done.
CLINTON: I have a hybrid vehicle which I drive, which I drove to New York to work today. I have done an exhaustive audit on my home in New York. It's over a 100-year-old farmhouse that leaks like a sieve, and I've undertaken already over the last few years some energy efficiency measures, including replacing most of the lights with compact fluorescent bulbs. But I'm about to do a total overhaul of that with Hillary's concurrence. But I've got to do it at a time when we're going to be mostly out of the house. And, of course, my presidential library won a Silver Leads rating from the Leadership and Environmental and Energy Design and we're about to upgrade it to the top rating of platinum. So it's gonna be one of the most efficient big buildings in the entire world.
WILLIAMS: I know you're after big-ticket items like big buildings in big cities, but for the people who find it hard to believe that replacing bulbs in their home or changing the vehicle they drive could make a difference, what's your counter-argument?
CLINTON: Well, if you look at, let's just take lighting. Buildings account for 80 percent of the greenhouse gas emissions in an old city like New York, about a third in America as a whole. About 20 percent of that is straight from lighting. In a place like Las Vegas, it's more. But if everyone in America would go out and replace all their incandescent light bulbs with compact florescent ones, or the even more efficient LED ones, here's how it works. They cost three times as much, they use one-fourth as much energy, they last, depending on the price, five to 10 times as long. So if you screw them in and use them, you will save money the first year. Even after paying more for the bulbs, your net savings will be 25 to 40 percent because of lower utility rates. And you can cut the greenhouse gas emissions for buildings to approximately 20 percent. So it's a huge, huge deal.
WILLIAMS: How much of your personal time these days are you spending as, let's call it, political advisor to somebody close to you?
CLINTON: Not much. We, you know, we talk every day, of course, and I try to do some fund-raisers for her here in New York so she can be down in the Senate doing her job or be out in the primary states. And people here will normally take me in. And, of course, when we're, we talk about the big issues a lot, we talk about health care and the economy and climate change and foreign policy, as we have all of our lives. But I'm not very much involved in the day-to-day operations of the campaign. I do what I'm asked to do.
WILLIAMS: All right, Mr. President, good luck with your gathering in New York. Thank you for taking time out to talk to us tonight.
CLINTON: Thank you, Brian.
