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Tag: Climate Change
Where Climate and Politics Meet
If the last year has been about a phase change in our planet’s climate, the next year has to be about a phase change in our planet’s politics. ~ Bill McKibben on Substack, August 22, 2023
Kamala Harris and Tim Walz are the only candidates who are engaged at the national and state levels to manage climate adaptation and the clean energy transition – both of which lead to reduction of carbon dioxide and carbon monoxide that are drivers of heating the atmosphere and thus the oceans.
Oceans have been a sink for heat in the atmosphere throughout the Earth’s history. The ice sheets at the polar caps also reflect incoming sunlight, another of Earth’s modifying functions. Both of these processes have managed to keep the Earth’s temperature at a temperature that supports life. It had been so for 4.3 million years. Humans have long benefitted from the planet’s incredible renewing forces that have made life so abundant and predictable.
Then came the industrial age and with it the burning of fossil fuels. Hundreds of years of wanton deforestation has also removed another natural carbon dioxide “sink” that once kept the Earth cool. The Earth’s temperature has been rising since the industrialization of farming and later industries that burn coal, gas, and other fuels put too much carbon dioxide in the atmosphere.
We have been made aware of this for a century. (Actually, Alexander Humbolt, in the 1799, warned people that the Earth was heating up from human induced causes.) But, I’ve learned something about humans. We are short term thinkers on the whole. When it shows up at our door, we might act but that is not even a guarantee. The problem with that kind of thinking is that once the heat is in the oceans and the atmosphere, it stays there for centuries.
I watch as so much of our heartland is being destroyed by floods and fires, and hurricanes with massive flooding events. Iconic cities and natural areas are disappearing before our eyes. And with them, our livlihoods and lives.
With the other party denying climate change, heads in the sand, while extolling how brilliant they are, please vote for the team already leading on climate mitigation and solutions for our children and all the children to come.
For two centuries the USA has been the biggest emitter and so we have contributed most to the warming of the atmosphere and oceans. Cry babies, some who hold Congressional offices, cry out that China is the biggest emitter today, ignoring our much longer contributions. We have to become adults!
Its about our generation standing up for future generations. Our Children’s Trust recently put it very succintly.
Vote for Harris and Walz as if your life depends on it, because it does.
The care of the Earth is our most ancient and most worthy, and after all our most pleasing responsibility. To cherish what remains of it and to foster its renewal is our only hope.
Photo by Susan Feathers. Pensacola Beach on Santa Rosa Island, Florida
Kamala Harris: On Climate and the Environment
Living on Earth Podcast featured a program last week reviewing Harris’s record on Climate and the Environment. Marianne Lavelle from Inside Climate News is interviewed by hosts Steve Curwood and Aynsley O’Neill.
I found this illuminating. There is much that Harris has accomplished during her service as Attorney General in California and as Vice President with the Biden Administration.
Check out Inside Climate News, a nonpartisn climate media nonprofit, for the latest on how voters view Kamala Harris’ environmental record on climate related issues.
See Trend with Youth Voters from the Environmental Voter Project Survey:
Check out the latest on climate change from NOAA. Use the table below to stay safe during the next week of record high temps. Its all about the humidity.
Return to Nature and Beauty
Voting is the most important thing we can do to protect our children’s future.
I’ve been following the Guardian’s State of Emergency newletter. Today, the Guardian reports that hundreds of scientists who are involved in the IPCC’s tracking of climate change responded to a query about the most important thing people can do to help curb a warming planet.
“The science is there, but the lack of will of politicians worldwide is retarding climate change [action],” said Prof Alexander Milner, at the University of Birmingham in the UK. ~ The Guardian
When I started this blog back in 2009, it was focused on nature and writing. I want to return to that practice now, knowing that how I vote is essential to protecting what I love most: my family, the sanctuary of woods and shoreline, the adventure of writing and reading.
During these fraught days of political warfare in America and violence and hunger in many parts of the world, I have sought that “quiet wood” through the authors who have influenced my life and offer sanity and a good way to live. I turned to Aldo Leopold last week, picking up A Sand County Almanac for another read.
As political rhetoric dominates the airways, I instead have been walking with Leopold through the months of his hunting, observing and reflection. Long ago, when his family was young and Leopold worked at the University of Wisconsin, developing their Arboretum, he bought an 80-acre, “worn-out” farm in the sand counties. Surprising his family one morning with the news, he invited his wife, daughter and sons to join him to restore it to its natural state.
Thus began the now famous experiment that literally millions of people around the world have read about, been inspired to do the same and visited the farm where the chicken coop was transformed into the now famous “shack.” Below is a photo from my own pilgrimage in 2014. You see the restored prairie grassland and maturing forest around it.
Aldo Leopold Foundation, Baraboo, Wisconsin: “The Shack” and Restored Landscape. Photo by Susan L Feathers
Here is a little of the quiet peace I found in the Almanac which sustains me through this raucous period in history. Leopold extols the virtue of early rising.
Like many another treaty of restraint, the pre-dawn pact lasts only as long as darkness humbles the arrogant.
To my fellow Americans, please go vote for the leaders who recognize climate change and propose to continue climate safe policies. Go here for voting information. There is still time to register!
If not, Leopold’s great work may be more a eulogy to a once wondrous Earth.
Riding on this election?
Nothing less than our survival.
Aldo Leopold Shack and Restored Prairie. Photo by Susan Feathers
The rights of individuals as written in the U.S. Constitution and a system of secular governance and freedom of religion are the principles at the heart of the American Republic.
Our European ancestors and writers of the Constitution had all lived under the tyranny of kings and queens and the Church, often in cahoots with an authoritarian government.
The Constitution was written to free individuals from those bonds to determine their own lives within a system of laws and justice. Protestant or Catholic, Jew or Muslim, atheist or agnostic, Calvanist or Puritan, Amish or Mennonite, and so on… each with the freedom to pursue their religious lives. The Bill of Rights freed citizens to determine for themselves how to live their lives. As long as a citizen’s choices did not infringe on another’s, they were free to pursue ideas and courses of action to develop happiness and meaning. Actions, property, social norms were subject to laws that protect individuals’ freedoms.
This is what is unique about American governance: at its core is the belief that all persons are created equal.
At the heart of the MAGA Republican movement is the rejection of this principle. All men are not equal and, America should be a Christian country.
UNDERSTAND THAT THE INTENT OF THE MAGA REPUBLICANS IS TO END THE FORM OF GOVERNANCE ESTABLISHED IN THE CONSTITUTION.
What are the actions promised by the candidate they support:
- End all restrictions on oil and gas development;
- Slash and Burn the institutions of the Republic and replace them with an authoriarian governing system;
- Further suppress women’s reproductive rights including birth control;
- Rid the government of environmental and climate change experts, departments and regulations associated with them. We are free to kill ourselves, our families, fellow human, plant and animal lives on planet Earth.
- Support authoritarian leaders and governments. Putin and Russia, Kim Jong Un and North Korea; Viktor Orbán and Hungary; Xi Jingping and China. All enemies of democracy.
ARE YOU PAYING ATTENTION? THIS IS NOT A NORMAL ELECTION. THIS IS ABOUT THE LOSS OF OUR DEMOCRACY AND OUR WAY OF LIFE!
Listen to historian Heather Cox Richardson and historian Jeffrey Rosen interviewed by Ken Burns. Richardson published Democracy Awakening and Jeff Rosen, The Pursuit of Happiness this year. They remind us what democracy is and how we always agreed about these principles among our political parties. We debated how those principles should be carried out and protected, generation after generation. This was the American Project. Now, one party intends to destroy these governing principle for an autocracy.
A Reading Life
“A reader lives a thousand lives before [s]he dies . . . The [hu]man who never reads lives only one.” ~ George R.R. Martin
Readers of this blog know that nature is a constant theme in my writing, reading and public work. We all have our roots plunged in soil we call home as did Lauren Groff, a magnificent writer who first found her inspiration at the family farm in New Hampshire.
Groff’s recent novels The Vaster Wilds and Matrix. pose profound questions about how religious and cultural practices have led to the depletion of nature’s resilience and how both men and women contribute to it when acting from an anthropocentric view. The journeys of discovery of both female protangonists is personal, imbued with hopes and dreams in the crucible of living their lives in times when women possess little social agency.
Groff is currently writing the third in the “triptych” of stories that carry the thread of inquiry and discovery. Readers are led to consider our present predicament of killing the very thing that gives us life: the living Earth.
Here are two excellent interviews that explore how Lauren Groff came to write each story, all the complex threads of thought, stories and influences that helped her conceive these outstanding novels.
The first interview explores The Vaster Wilds which takes place briefly in Jamestown colony in the “starving time”and mostly in the American wilds in 1609 North America.
The Matrix concerns Marie de France, the first published female poet in France, a poet and deep thinker whose writings are surprisingly free of social and religious strictures on women at a time of low female agency. Many sources contributed to the final story Groff tells. I found this instructive and supportive for writers of fiction.
This lecture from the University of Notre Dame is in my view the best exploration of how Matrix evolved and the exceptional thinking of one of America’s most brilliant writers of our time.
As a writer who shares the theme of nature I am so grateful to Lauren Groff for demonstrating the power of fiction to move us to understand the deep roots of our misunderstanding.
How we solved climate change …
Get a cup of tea or java and prepare to listen to this insightful projection of how it happened. About 10 minutes.
From the great science fiction novelist and futurist, Kim Stanley Robinson, another salient message.
His recent book, The Ministry for the Future, rocked the world of people concerned about climate change. Why? Kim took on the gargantuan task of imagining how our country and the world community finally made the realization it could no longer live at odds with a living planet.
It is not a straight line by any means. But, Kim shows how the world came together to secure the biosphere from the vantage point of a person looking back to the terrible twenties from 2071.
Kim Stanley Robinson on TED TALK
This is our work.
Hope in Youth Leadership
If you are feeling overwhelmed by climate news and the threats to our democracy, NextGen America and Our Children’s Trust will hearten your spirit.
NextGen America supports the Youth Vote. It made a huge difference in the 2020 election – the fight to save the soul of America and is now gearing up to influence the vote in 2024. Their mission statement is, “NextGen America’s mission is to empower young voters to engage in the political process and ensure our government is responsive to the largest and most diverse generation in American history.”
In a zoom presentation today with Doug Emhoff encouraged us to make sure the vision and investment in America through the Inflation Reduction Act is widely understood. We need to show how it is making a difference in our lives. See the Rewiring America Guide to the IRA below, a handy guidebook to understand the great deals that are now possible for families and individuals as well as businesses, nonprofits, and states and cities. It is massive in its impact IF AMERICANS TAKE ADVANTAGE OF IT. We’ve got ten years of these programs and their savings with this long lasting program. The money is available but only if each of the stakeholders from individual citizens to families to governments take advantage of it. In other words, Biden and Harris have made the Clean Energy Transition possible but we have to be the agents of change by buying an EV, making our appliances and homes more energy efficient, and helping our communities convert to more renewable power until we make the full transition. Please share with your family and friends.
Another very hopeful youth-led group initiative is Our Children’s Trust which support youth taking their governments to court for violation of their rights to a safe and healthy future. *Coming up June 12, the first constitutional trial is happening in Montana. The implication of a rule in their favor can have a massive impact on moving our slow acting governments to make serious, demonstrable actions toward a safe environment for the young generations here now and those coming behind them. Be sure to view it and share with your friends and family to make people aware of these eloquent and brave youth who are pushing adults in power to do the right thing for theirs and future generations.
Below is the Guide to the IRA for citizens. Download it for your own information and use for your family, neighborhood, business, and community.
Where do we go from here?
Photo by Susan Feathers
The previous post provided a downloadable copy of the latest IPCC report on climate change science and forecast for policymakers. It is condensed for quick reading. If nothing else, skim to the highlighted summaries.
All Bets Are Off
We are on track for massive warming. And because the Earth’s systems are complex with many hidden tipping points, we are unlikely to predict much of what might happen except that life as we know it will be greatly destabilized. What might happen then will become harder to predict.
The imperative is to halt burning fossil fuels as fast as possible. Most people don’t believe it is possible. But, the IPCC report tells us that is exactly what we must do NOW. Take heart: a plan already exists and is working we just need to do it faster. See Project Drawdown.
We are required to reinvent the way we live. Much of what we Americans refer to as modern life is fraught with stress and uncertainty. Except for the few wealthy among us, we experience everyday that we are working harder and enjoying life less. We are less healthy. We witness the beauty of the world fading before our eyes. Our democratic institutions are under attack from a vocal minority but at least in that area of our common life I think most of us are reasonable and see a way forward together. The last election proved that.
Many forces try to divide us on issues that are polarizing. We love our children and families and believe in the Golden Rule. So, we can come together. See here a short video of John Hume, the great Irish leader who made peace when no one thought it possible.
So to this majority of citizens I appeal. Gather your families and neighbors and have a good chat about how you can help move our nation to a more sustaining way of life and avert a certain catastrophe for our children. What are the elements of life that you recall you love the most? How can we simplify but also enjoy greater abundance together?
Listen to this insightful discussion about smart design based on nature on OnBeing.org with Janine Benyus who wrote about biomimicry.
Attend your local city council meeting to express your concerns. Just go. Contact your senators and express your views and ask what you can do to help. A phone call, an email, a letter to the editor. We can ALL do these simple things.
We must look for and cultivate leaders who are of this mind set. President Biden has initiated legislation in the right direction but much more needs to be done and certainly approving drilling rights in the Alaskan waters with its great biodiversity and intact ecosystem is NOT that direction.
We have to be more vocal together. We must look together at candidates that believe in the democratic principles set forth in our Constitution. Who are they? What have they done? Elect them no matter their political party. Stay off the major news channels. Read. Discuss. Think for yourself.
Until the people of Who-ville (the “silent majority”) come together to confront the GRINCH (our way of life), we will not survive, or we will live very degraded lives in the near future. Many across the world — people who have contributed the least to climate change– are already suffering. But, it is coming home for all of us soon. We must rise to it, be responsible, and act together. And, whatever you do, support our children and youth who are fighting for a future and looking to us to help make that possible.
You know what to do.
Remembering Origins
More conversation with Amitav Ghosh, author of The Nutmeg’s Curse on Emergence Magazine brings up similar themes incorporated into Threshold, a novel about climate change in the Southwest. In it, I layered the rich cultural endowment of the Tucson area, with ancient Indigenous and current day Native Nations wisdom, and Mexican American land and agricultural practices that have and continue to shape the local zeitgeist. But, like most communities in the Southwest, capitalistic systems drive commerce rendering the living Earth mute. All these ways of living mix together yet one has dominated the political and economic forces, imperiling Tucsonans to climate emergencies.
Listen to a chapter from Threshold as a major character of Mexican descent, Delores Olivarez, takes a hike up “A” mountain observing the changes in the Tucson valley that trace all these cultural ways of knowing. Thanks to Terrain.org for publishing this chapter of Threshold.
Susan Feathers 