Nirvana’s Krist Novoselic on Three Questions Politicians Should Answer
In the decades since Nirvana ended, bassist Krist Novoselic has become an outspoken voice for political reform. His latest venture is collaborating with two former Congressmen — a Democrat and a Republican — on a new campaign dubbed 3 American Questions. Its goal is to compel political candidates, from potential members of Congress to would-be presidents, to address major issues that stretch across party lines: the national debt, climate change and U.S. citizens’ faith in the elected government.
Novoselic got involved when retired Congressman Brian Baird, a Democrat from Washington State and a friend of the bassist’s, reached out to him. The politician had served alongside a Republican from South Carolina, Bob Inglis, who had voted on a bill that would address global warming and, Novoselic says, was subsequently voted out. “That was, like, heresy,” the Nirvana member asserts on a late March morning from his home in southwest Washington. Baird and Inglis came up with the questions and presented them to Novoselic.
The bassist is the chair of an organization called FairVote, which seeks to promote fairness in U.S. democracy, and over the past six years he’s been taking Washington State University’s online courses in social science. He’ll get his bachelor’s degree in May.
With a polarizing election season underway, and seats in the House and Senate becoming available later this year, Novoselic tells Rolling Stone he was eager to help the campaign. “You look at your Facebook timeline, and it’s just GIFs saying, ‘Look at this atrocity of political corruption,'” he says. “We want to go beyond grandstanding and pandering, and ask these three questions: What are you going to do about climate change? What are you going to do about political reform? What are you going to do about the debt?”
Most liberals aren’t focusing on the national debt as an issue, and many Republicans deny that climate change is real and want the government to disappear altogether. Are you trying to piss people off with these questions?
These ideologies are always clashing, but the 3 American Questions campaign is bipartisan and that’s what I like about it. It’s about asking people, “What can you do?” Instead of jumping on some bandwagon. They’re meant just to be proactive.
3 American Questions is the opposite of running covert attack ads on any individual candidate. It’s about transparency. It will provide information. Where do candidates stand on climate change? Where do they stand on the debt? Where do they stand on political reform? Hopefully, they’ll reply, and we can put together an objective analysis of where they stand and leave it up to voters. If they don’t really answer the question, don’t vote for them.
How would you answer the climate-change question yourself?
I just do the basic things, like just consolidate trips, and saying, “Let’s just not go anywhere.” I could see nature clear-cut, looking out my window here. We cook from scratch. We don’t eat a lot of prepared, processed food, so there’s way less packaging. You can only do the best you can do, as long as you’re not crusading. It’s a big, big challenge.