First, the Bad News
January 22nd, 2007 by Carbon CoalitionThe Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change has reevaluated former conclusions about human impact on climate change. Their previous assessment, published in 2001, estimated that there was a 66-90 percent chance that human activities were responsible for recent warming. The new report, scheduled for release on February 2nd in Paris, is expected to confirm a much stronger relationship–a 90 percent chance that humans are significantly influencing climate change. (Read the entire article from the New York Times.)
Tomorrow night the President will deliver his much-anticipated State of the Union address. There has been a lot of speculation that he will use it to address the issue of global warming. Yet Ben Lieberman of the Heritage Foundation reminds us that a bold statement in last year’s address, “America is addicted to oil,” only made “people expect extreme action, and there really hasn’t been” any. Betsy Loyless of the National Audubon Society says, “We have a White House that has yet to deliver on its own rhetoric about ending our dependence on fossil fuels, and up to now has placed its emphasis on Big Oil.” Bush is expected to call for an increase in the use of ethanol, but he will probably not touch on limiting greenhouse gas emissions. (More about this from Eileen Claussen of the Pew Center, in an NPR interview yesterday.)
Many are looking to the President to take action, but former Vice President Al Gore says “this really shouldn’t be approached as a political issue.” National Public Radio’s “Living On Earth” interviewed Gore at one of his “An Inconvenient Truth” slide show trainings in Nashville, Tennessee. Gore believes that there needs to be a change “in public opinion that [will] make it possible for political leaders in both parties to do what’s necessary.” If Bush pays attention to the news–evangelical Christians, congressional members, and corporate leaders all calling for action against climate change–then maybe he will see that public opinion has changed and now it’s time to take political action.
Of course, there’s noise coming from NH as well…On Saturday, Foster’s Daily Democrat published “Seacoast Residents Take Aim at Global Warming.” If it’s true what Gore says–that we “need to go to the grassroots level…to the maximum extent possible”–then Saturday’s article seems the latest evidence that NH is on the right track.
