Friday, February 02, 2007

A Change in the Political Climate

There is no longer any doubt in the mainstream media about Global Warming, or Climate Change, or whatever one wants to call it. The subject was even the headline story on the Nightly News with Brian Williams (NBC) twice this week.

The first hit came from Rep. Waxman's hearings on the political control of science information in the current administration. The second time was with the report today from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.

I don't think that there is any real doubt about what is happening and why. The real question is one of what we are going to do about it. It is not just a matter of reducing the carbon footprint of our daily lives, as some viewers of Inconvenient Truth imply. It will affect everything we do. Areas now being farmed may become too arid to support agriculture. Coastal areas will inevitably become inundated. It is how we react to the crisis that will determine if we are really fit to be the survivors. It is time to reread Jared Diamond's "Collapse."

I have little faith in the current political process in the US being able to deal the extreme severity of the dislocations in society. The only political solutions will by necessity be Green.

3 comments:

Lisa said...

I heard Ted Glick of the Climate Crisis Coalition
http://climatecrisiscoalition.org/

on KPFK and he said it is crucial, of course, for the people to be on top of the corporate interests about the non-sustainable answers the corporate interests are putting forward: nuclear powers, ethanol, and so- called "clean coal," which still leave control in the hands of the corporations, vs. the more decentralized solutions of wind power, solar power, geothermal, etc.

Wes said...

According to information published in High Country News Jan 31 issue, "Big Coal remains big..." Just how big is it? "Last year, US coal mines set a new record for production, with Wester producers pulling 30 million tons more coal out of the ground than in 2005."

Do not look to the Democratic Congress to do much, since the new Chairman of the House Committee on Natural Resources is Nick Rahall, from the Coal producing state of West Virginia. Rahall is pretty good otherwise, but coal drives the economy of his state.

Wes said...

Chuck Dudley (GP - MD and member of the Eco-Action Committee) has posted his analysis of the IPCC report here.