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in the Indian Ocean. I have been studying Global Warming for a while now and very passionate about. Just a few weeks ago I wrote the following:
Global Climate Change: The Real Terror Threat
Chris D. Jackson
December 13th, 2004
In 1998 Vice President Al Gore symbolically signed the United States on to the Kyoto Protocol. While in signing the treaty, the United States agreed to a 7 percent reduction in harmful greenhouse gas emissions from the levels back in 1990, a goal which would reach fruition in the years of 2008-2012. However, one stolen election and three years later, the Bush administration backed out of the protocol calling the agreement "fatally flawed". Bush’s main objection was that the protocol would hurt businesses–namely the big businesses that help fund Bush’s campaigns and write his environmental policy. This was just the initial step in his Presidency of systematically rolling back every crucial environmental policy that would intercede with his big business buddies. His unwillingness to be truthful on the issue, act on the facts at hand, and provide the leadership needed to fight this crisis has been an embarrassment to the United States in the eyes of the world. Far worse than that, his ignorance and stubbornness has put the entire world in a collision course with an unpleasant destiny that could be prevented.
We now live in a day and time in which all we hear about is the threat of terrorists and weapons of mass destruction. However, the sad truth of it all is that the threat of terrorism is very small, overblown and used to appeal to people’s fears. There have only been two major terrorist attacks on our country in the past twenty years whereas the effects of climate change are frequent and ongoing. It is true that those terrorist attacks on our country accounted for a lot of deaths and heartache, however, the threat of global climate change has done far worse things and will get even worse if we do not act. For example, in Europe during the infamous 2003 heat wave, more than 16,000 people died from the extreme heat and humidity. Most notably in the United States just this year was the extreme hurricane season which devastated the south and our eastern seaboard for two months straight. Each of those events can be attributed to the climate crisis. Don’t like relying on disasters for evidence? Try these facts. Over the last 100 years, the global sea level has risen by about 10 to 25 cm. Over the last 100 years, the average temperature has climbed about 1 degree Fahrenheit around the world. Just recently, the multinational Arctic Climate Impact Assessment (ACIA) report concluded that in Alaska, western Canada, and eastern Russia, average temperatures have increased as much as 4 to 7 degrees Fahrenheit (3 to 4 degrees Celsius) in the past 50 years. The rise is nearly twice the global average. Since 1978 Arctic sea ice area has shrunk by some 9 percent per decade, and thinned as well. Aside from the Arctic sea area melting, many of the world’s largest and most well known glaciers are melting such as the Larsen Ice Shelf, Lanin Norte Glacier, and the Grinnel and Boulder glaciers, both of which are in Glacier National Park. If there is only one thing we can agree one, it has to be that glaciers don’t give a damn about politics–they just freeze or melt. However, some people, including the whole Bush team, still deny the total existence of global warming. Never mind that most of the world’s glaciers are melting, water levels are rising, extreme weather patterns are terrorizing the world and that ten of the hottest years on record have occurred in the past thirteen years, they still discount the reality of global warming only to please their political allies. In 2003, the Bush administration even went as far as to edit out key parts of the EPA’s report on the risks of global climate change, which later led to the resignation of the EPA’s director, Christie Todd Whitman. It is clear by now that Bush and Company have no intention or ever did of fighting this serious threat. Their in futility on this issue may well go down as one of the biggest blunders in the history of the United States. As the so called world “superpower” I think we should take the first step in the world of fighting the war on climate change. What if the United States would sat on it’s hands after 9/11 and not fought those who attacked us and who threatened us? The American people would be outraged and rightfully so. It is time for this administration to stop hiding the facts about global climate change so our nation can be educated on the issue. Our future is at stake and we must act now or face serious consequences.
Now to the aforementioned potential consequences. For starters, rising temperature means that ecosystems will change which means some species may be forced out of their habitats and possibly into extinction. Second, since sea levels are rising 1 to 2 centimeters per decade, and some Pacific Ocean island nations are working on plans for the eventual evacuation of their homes. Third, as temperatures gets hotter, evaporation will increase. In effect, this will cause heavier rainfall and more erosion. Many experts also think that it could result in more extreme weather as global warming progresses. That just doesn’t mean more floods, more tornadoes, more hurricanes but more powerful ones. One estimation predicted that hurricanes attributed to global warming are more powerful by half a category. That means instead of a category 4 hurricane, it would be a category 4.5 hurricane. Should we just let this go by? Do you want to go even further? Some climatologists predict the North Atlantic drift is diminishing as the climate grows warmer, which means that areas that are warmed by the drift might face a colder climate in spite of the general global warming. It is also now feared that global warming may be able to trigger the type of abrupt massive temperature shifts which were portrayed in the movie The Day After Tomorrow. Put plainly–we must take action now! The facts are here whether the ideologues like it or not and the blood is on their hands.
In conclusion, I firmly believe that it is urgent that we embrace the Kyoto Treaty and recognize the threat of global climate change. The Bush administration needs to put partisanship aside and finally realize that it should be us leading the fight against this crisis not only because we are the number one contributor to global warming, but because it is the moral thing to do. They must also realize that the short term effects pale in comparison of the effects if we wait for global warming to reach its climax. There is an old Yogi Berra saying that applies to this administration and climate change, “It’s not what we don’t know that gets us in trouble, it’s what we know for sure that just ain’t so.” Bush has played dumb on this issue long enough. He claims to be a man of strength and morality, yet when in the face of big contributors discussing global warming, he is a moral coward because he always sides with the big contributors instead of doing the right thing in fighting the war on climate change. Bush has already asserted that he has a mandate and political capital to use after his 2004 victory. The question is, will he spend some of that capital on something as important as the climate crisis on behalf of the people of the world or will he again let this momentous time in history pass him by.
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