It has been a norm for 40 years, and given that Trump won the presidency without disclosing those tax returns, there's not much reason to suggest this won't be the new normal going forward, either. And I don't just mean specifically in terms of tax returns and conflicts of interest, but the general principle of transparency and accountability around presidential candidates that has now been exposed as being actually totally unnecessary to win.
I mean, yeah comparisons to the Civil War are pretty ridiculous, but I'd say potentially doing a irreparable harm to a decades-long tradition designed to give the electorate more insight into just who they're electing into the White House is a pretty big deal. Of course it remains to be seen whether Trump is an outlier in that regard -- I can just as well see Trump leaving office so unpopular that all future candidates will continue disclosing their tax returns just out of interest of putting daylight between themselves and Trump -- but who knows, right. We're only 120 or so days in, hard to judge what the actual permanent damage will be until long after this administration is over.
Or, those companies can go out of business because their competitors are saving money in adopting renewables and curbing their CO2 emissions.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but Obama's Clean Power Plan never actually went into effect, right? It has been tied up in courts all this time? So all of the progress made over the last several years in energy efficiency, renewables, emissions reductions, etc. have been predominantly driven by market forces and city/state initiatives, not mandates from D.C.
