Posted on 02/13/2005 8:28:06 AM PST by rface
In the last few weeks, the world has been reminded yet again of the gravity of the climate crisis. The International Climate Change Task Force, co-chaired by Sen. Olympia Snowe, R-Maine, recently declared that "climate change is a serious and growing threat, leaving no country, however wealthy, immune from the extreme weather events and rising sea levels that scientists predict will occur, unless action is taken."
And a new study published two weeks ago in Nature — documented at www.climateprediction.net — concludes that global warming could be even more extreme than previously thought.
Yet while politicians and scientists usher in such grim diagnoses, ordinary citizens are spreading hope about a clean-energy future. We witnessed this hope here at Middlebury College last month, as we hosted over 100 leaders of the new climate movement for a three-day conference: "What Works? New Strategies for a Melting Planet."
Who are the new climate activists? Well, they are not tree-huggers. Sure, a number of shaggy-haired young folks were among us last month: This is a college in Vermont, after all! But it's short-sighted – and politically unwise – to think that the thoughtful, engaged citizens who are building this new movement are just the usual environmentalist suspects. In fact, they are strikingly diverse. They are Republicans and Democrats. They are leaders in businesses and nonprofits, in churches and religious organizations and Native American tribes, and in colleges and universities. They are rural grandparents, urban parents and schoolchildren everywhere.
A sampling of the presentations from the conference illustrates this movement's diversity:
Mary Lou Finley, a former staff member of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., taught us about updating the lessons of the civil rights movement in the age of globalization and the Internet.
Billy Parish, the founder and director of Energy Action, and Jihan Gearon, the coordinator of the Climate Justice Corps, shared their successes in planting the seeds of the new climate movement on college campuses and in communities of color.
Peyton Fleming, communications director of CERES, detailed how this Boston-based national coalition of investors is encouraging pension and retirement fund managers to pressure companies to examine the financial risks and opportunities of global warming.
Peter Senge, senior lecturer at the MIT Sloan School of Management, offered his resounding, positive vision of a clean-energy future that will create millions of new jobs.
What unites these Americans? They understand the incontrovertible evidence on the climate crisis — a grave new form of injustice that cuts across current and future generations — and are committed to doing their part to stop it. For at some not unimaginable point within this century, we will have discarded the internal combustion engine and the coal-burning power plant. We will have created millions of new jobs in a globalized economy that is powered by renewable energy. This is a great vision indeed.
The big question is, when? Can we do this soon enough? Well, if "we, the people" care enough, appreciate the urgency enough, flex our civic muscle enough – remember Dr. King's bus boycotts? – the answer is, very soon.
Here in the United States, what we currently lack is political will, at least at the national level. But as is so often the case, this emerging social movement is being led not from Washington, but from the grassroots. At the same time, our conference portends a new kind of movement, tailored to the challenges and opportunities of this new century. Yes, climate activists will do their share of marching, boycotting and petition signing. But they are also embracing new tools and ideas.
For example, three Middlebury students, in collaboration with the citizen-based Green House Network (www.greenhousenet.org), recently announced The Flat Earth Award (www.flatearthaward.org), "a humorous effort to highlight the denial of global warming by prominent public figures." By holding to light the preposterous "climate-naysaying" of this year's nominees — including Michael Crichton and Rush Limbaugh — this online resource helps to spread the word: The climate crisis is real, and we have the clean-energy solutions to stop it.
A second, even more promising, example: A coalition of campus-based climate groups (www.energyaction.net) is now partnering with leading business consultants to launch a business-savvy, Internet-facilitated campaign that will pressure Detroit's automakers to build new fleets of climate-friendly cars. In the words of one economics major at the conference last week: "Our generation is about to buy millions of new cars. We plan to help Detroit figure out how to build the clean cars that we want to drive!" In March 2004, The Economist magazine asked: "Could the next grassroots revolution in America be over climate change?" Around the country, climate activists are declaring, with strength and with passion: "Yes!"
Jonathan Isham Jr. is a member of the Middlebury College Department of Economics and Program in Environmental Studies.
some people want a "Revolution" - and it just doesn't matter what the cause is.
I've got a better idea--don't populate the world. Get busy.
Is it just my imagination or do these people make even wilder predictions as more and more scientists dispute the theories?
Climate change? It is amazing how spun up liberals get over phoney issues. We have a better chance at changing the climate by doing a global rain dance or something.
My theory is the predictions get wilder as more people ignore their doom and gloom rheotric. It is so easy to tweak an assumption or two in the computer models and make the results much worse. Good thing the actual climate is much more stable then the fraudulant models.
Titties everywhere? Pinchable derrierres?
I have also been warned about "sailing" off the edge of the world. I, and the overwhelming majority of the earth's adults choose to ignore it.
Give it a rest, aready.
Or conjure up a more believeable world crisis.
Or get a real job.
He sure tries hard to make the point that these are not environmental wackos. Too hard. Methinks he doth protest too much.
The list of people speaking sounds like a rouge's gallery of leftism. So much for this being a broad-based event.
It's all about the money.
They want to transfer wealth from Capitalist societies to failed Socialist states.
Socialism cannot compete on its own. It needs an influx of money from elsewhere to prevent its collaps.
My standard question to global warming....
Who defines the optimal temperature of the planet? I'll now ask another..... Would the scientists and politicans be willing to be banned from all related fields, all grants public and private and all public speaking or writing if their predictions are proven wrong?
and the kool-aid flowed like water. Wish they'd toss 'The Day After Tomorrow' and go back to 'Yellow Submarine' . . . ("The blue meanies really suck, man!")
"It's going to get weally weally hot!
We're not kidding this time.
Are you listening to me?"
The latest experts now claim that human-produced global warming just may have averted the next glacial period, at least temporarily.
Amen to that.
(or do those 'millions' just commit suicide? huh Pete?)
"concludes that global warming could be even more extreme than previously thought."Uh.... excuse me, BUT 'could be' is NOT a conclusion. 'Could be' is like a 'maybe so', otherwise knows as "a guess".
Dooooooomed! We are all Doooomed.
I said it first.
Global Warming…Polar Icecaps Melting!
What ever will we do without New York City?
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