[Note: This is a very good message to carry to Washington DC this summer!]
The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) thinks putting off efforts to reduce carbon dioxide emissions risks “catastrophic” losses for the United States’ economy and society. That’s according to a new report on the economic and environmental effects of a carbon tax CBO published Wednesday.
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Barbara Schlachter had this opinion piece published in the May 21 edition of the Iowa City Press Citizen. Click here to go to the original article
It’s the merry month of May — “Mothering Month,” which happens to include Mother’s Day.
Like most Iowans, I am hopeful that spring has finally come and we can nurture our great love affair with the earth through beautiful flowers and blossoming trees and through what have become exciting community moments: the opening of the farmers markets. It is our way of touching the earth even if we do not directly put seeds or plants into the ground ourselves.
What we touch, we value. Touch is our first bond with our biological mothers, and hopefully we all have great childhood memories of digging in the dirt and bonding with the amazing soil of Earth.
I believe connecting our own desire to give thanks for the women who brought us from their bodies into this world comes from the same impulse as revering and respecting the earth, our common Mother. Earth has always been considered feminine — it’s pretty obvious. And it is equally obvious that she doesn’t always get the respect she warrants or needs if life is going to continue to flourish.
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Science, storms, and demographics are starting to change minds among the rank and file.
By Coral Davenport
May 9, 2013
Here is a link to an article from the National Journal that offers up some hope that reality may finally be catching up to folks.
Review by Michael C. Osborne published in Grist about Andrew Guzman’s new book, “Overheated: The Human Cost of Climate Change”
Ask Andrew Guzman, a professor of international law at U.C. Berkeley, why he decided to write a book about climate change, and he says it’s simple: It’s the biggest issue of our time.
“If I didn’t write about it,” he says, “for my grandkids, I’d sound like somebody who wasn’t interested in Nazi Germany in 1939.”
Guzman doesn’t want to be painted as an alarmist. That’s why, for the book, Overheated: The Human Cost of Climate Change, he assumes that we will see a modest (and increasingly optimistic) 2 degrees C of warming. You know, so as to stay on the conservative side of things.
But it turns out that 2 degrees is enough to sound some serious alarm bells.
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This article appears in the May 5 edition of New York Magazine
Obama Might Actually Be the Environmental President
His climate-change policy has been an abject failure, says Al Gore and just about everyone else. They’re wrong. Here’s why.
Rob Hogg will be reading and signing his new book, America’s Climate Century at these two venues:
Saturday, May 4, 2:00 p.m.
Prairie Lights Bookstore, 15 South Dubuque Street, Iowa City
Saturday, May 4, 7:00 p.m.
New Bo Books, 1105 3rd Street SE, Cedar Rapids
Below is a review of the book published in the Cedar Rapids Gazette
Want to know more about climate change, but stumped about where to start?
I’d recommend the recently published book “America’s Climate Century: What climate change means for America in the 21st Century and what Americans can do about it,” by Sen. Rob Hogg, D-Cedar Rapids.
Hogg has been active in environmental issues for a quarter century; he started working on the book last year. He’ll officially release the book on Monday at the State Capitol, with proceeds from sales at that event going to the non-profit Iowa Interfaith Power & Light.
Saturday, May 4, he’ll be signing copies at Prairie Lights in Iowa City at 2 p.m. and at New Bo Books in Cedar Rapids at 7 p.m. I got my hands on an advance copy last week.
It’s a call to action, but it’s also an evenhanded look at what we do know about climate change — a 120-page overview of the science, politics and potential that will help you get from zero to well-informed in a matter of hours.
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[Diane forwarded me this press release from the Least Developed Countries group at the international negotiations under the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change, a session of which began today in Bonn, Germany. It is important to note the effect that our lack of action in the United States has around the world ]
Bonn, April 29, 2013. Inaugurating its first negotiation session, as the new chair of the group of the Least Developed Countries (LDCs), Mr. Prakash Mathema from Nepal, urges Parties to show leadership to achieve real and substantial progress on the negotiation of a 2015 treaty and to close the mitigation gap before 2020. “There is no more time to waste, so we need to stop going round in circles”, he said.
Over the long and tedious journey of the climate change negotiations, the LDC Group has continuously stressed that they will be the most seriously hit by the impacts of climate change. The effects are already being seen – we are all experiencing an increased number of droughts, severe storms, and floods. These events are increasing in frequency, magnitude and intensity, and worsening from day to day the quality of life of already vulnerable populations. Delay in action against climate change is not an option for the group.
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This Guest Opinion piece written by Bill Ferrel was published in the Iowa City Press Citizen April 17. This is a perfect opportunity for you to write a Letter to the Editor at the Press Citizen that amplifies Bill’s points. Send letters to opinion@press-citizen.com.
In Iowa, we long ago forgot about the major oil spill in the gulf, the only time we spend thinking about it is when we see those really awesome commercials telling us about how great the beaches are.
These commercials often have the most trustworthy and wholesome individual from BP standing up and reminding us of the enormous sum of money they have spent on clean-up and how much they love America and showing us by all the jobs that they create.
In Mid-February, I had the opportunity to visit the gulf coast of Louisiana — Grand Isle to be exact. And the oil most definitely is not all cleaned up. I was there, I have pictures, and oil was strewn about all over the coastline.
Now don’t get me wrong. I’m not saying that a valiant effort hasn’t been made to clean the beaches. It most definitely has, but let’s not get lulled into thinking that oil spills get cleaned up never to be seen or noticed again.
Perhaps my daughter’s words were the best reaction: “Dad, you’re not going to swim in that are you?”
Just a couple of weeks ago, we again had another significant oil spill, this time through residential neighborhoods in Arkansas. This caused the rapid evacuation of hundreds of residents, who at a moment’s notice had their lives turned upside down with no answers about how they would be righted again.
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Thanks to Harold Hensel for bringing this information graphic from the inventive Folks at the “Information is Beautiful” blog to my attention.
Download this illuminating report from the folks at Yale And George Mason University’s Project on Climate Change Communication here. For me, the main take-away, and the good news, is that Republicans and Democrats agree more than they disagree on the substantive issues of climate change. The following chart plotted from one of the data tables in this report shows this in stark relief.
The report identifies many such areas of common ground.
You can read an additional post about this report from Andrew Revkin of the New York Times’ Dot Earth Blog: Survey Finds Most Republicans Seek Action on Climate Change