In 1988, the Environmental Protection Agency called a meeting of atmospheric scientists. I remember well the meeting in a theater-like lecture room in the San Francisco Bay Area. I knew the atmospheric scientists from Lawrence Livermore Laboratory, Stanford Research Institute, and local colleges. A man in a suit walked up to the lectern. He told us: Global warming is a new national problem. Human CO2 emissions cause dangerous global warming. Future research funding will focus on predicting climate disasters.