Time & Perspective Quote by Peter DeFazio

DeFazio isn’t diagnosing policy failure so much as naming the incentive structure that produces it. “Big Oil is very generous at campaign time” is less a stray jab than a blunt theory of governance: elected officials respond to donors first, voters second, and the climate crisis somewhere after that. The line works because it refuses the comforting fiction that inaction is complicated. He reduces it to a transactional clarity that feels almost rude in Washington, where euphemism is a native language.

The verb choice is telling. “Take on” frames regulation as combat, not technocratic fine-tuning, implying that meaningful action would require political risk and an enemy willing to retaliate. DeFazio’s subtext is that most leaders aren’t merely failing; they’re rationally choosing safety. The point isn’t that politicians don’t understand the stakes. It’s that the stakes they fear most are electoral: losing money, losing ads, losing the next cycle.

Then comes the sharper accusation: “pretend.” That word shifts the critique from corruption to performance. It suggests a politics designed for optics - hearings, gestures, symbolic bills - that creates the impression of motion while preserving the underlying deal. DeFazio is puncturing the bipartisan ritual in which climate is treated as a brand position rather than a governing commitment.

Context matters: a long-serving Democrat known for transportation and infrastructure battles, he’s speaking from inside the machine, not as an outsider. That insider tone is what gives the quote its bite. It’s not idealism; it’s an indictment of how elections, fundraising, and fossil-fuel power are braided together - and how “meaningful” action gets scripted out before it ever reaches the floor.