Archive for climate change

“Once again, [the Oklahoma tragedy] will soon be forgotten and our politicians will return to bashing teachers.”

guns cartoon arm teachers

Today’s Los Angeles Times letters to the editor, because our voices matter:

Re “Oklahoma twister ‘was a monster,’” May 21

It is heartbreaking to read of homes destroyed, lives upended, children killed and hundreds left homeless. We know that, without effective action to combat climate change, these events will become more frequent.

And yet the political leaders of Oklahoma are right-wing ideologues who either reject the idea of global warming or question its effects on weather catastrophes. What will it take to get them to realize that their inaction will lead to more disasters?

President Obama and the Democrats cannot wage the battle against climate change without support from GOP lawmakers. How many more of these disasters can we clean up before we run out of resources to do it?

Linda Winters

Culver City

***

Once again, as in other school tragedies, we learn that teachers at Moore, Okla., put themselves between their students and extreme danger. Once again, parents tearfully thank teachers. And once again, this will soon be forgotten and our politicians will return to bashing teachers.

The tragedy in Oklahoma should become a permanent reminder that we must not allow our teachers to be scapegoated or reduced to numbers on a standardized teacher evaluation form. Teachers who are willing to give up their lives for our children should not be treated so shabbily by a self-serving political establishment.

Dennis M. Clausen

Escondido

Cartoons of the Day- Oklahoma Tornado

oktorn

Joe Heller

oktorn1

Christopher Weyant

oktorn2

Mike Smith

VIDEO: Obama’s Organizing for Action launches campaign to shame climate sceptics in Congress

climate change Congress

organizingforaction (the group that came together to support President Obama’s political agenda post-election):

The science on climate change is clear, but too many members of Congress are in complete denial. It’s time to call them out: http://OFA.BO/1BggUG

Message from Organizing for Action, to Congress: You can’t be that ignorant. No, seriously. Shame on you.

No matter what part of climate change the ignorami in Congress fail grasp, or why, how can they object to cleaning up the air we breathe and the water we drink? I’m betting they could even make a profit doing that, which is really all they care about anyway, no matter who they hurt, deprive, or sicken in the process.

Via The Guardian:

The video mainly features Republican members of the House of Representatives who are notorious for denying the existence of climate change, or positing bizarre notions about its causes.

However, it also includes some national figures such as the Florida senator Marc Rubio and House speaker John Boehner, whose views on climate are not that broadly known.

climate change hoax voteclimate change orgs who deny zeroH/t: Taegan

Hate flying? Blame greenhouse gases. Climate change may boost turbulence.

turbulence airplane scare

Via ABC15 from an April 2012 report. Please watch all the way to the end.

I’m no fan of flying, partly because of my many nerve-wracking experiences during episodes of severe turbulence and sudden drops. No matter how I try to talk myself out of surrendering to irrational fear, no matter how many times people tell me how safe flying is, the next bumpy flight reminds me all too much of a scary flight to England years ago that ended in spontaneous passenger applause out of relief that we landed safely.

Those rocky trips are only going to get worse, according to the Los Angeles Times:

Turbulence will be stronger and occur more often if carbon dioxide emissions double by 2050, heating up the atmosphere, according to a study by British scientists published last week in the journal Nature Climate Change. [...]

From 1980 to 2008, 298 passengers on U.S. airlines were injured and three died because of turbulence accidents, the [the Federal Aviation Administration] said.

The study by scientists at the universities of Reading and East Anglia said the chances of running into turbulence over the Atlantic will increase 40% to 170% by the middle of the century, with turbulence strength increasing 10% to 40%.

The study showed that airline emissions are a big contributor to worsening turbulence, and that “for the first time how climate change could affect aviation.”

Buckle up.

What I will not write about today

frustrated2

One of TPC’s contributors, Andy Marquis, linked me to a couple of the items that I will not write about today, and I included his comments. See, sometimes I get so frustrated and/or disheartened and/or annoyed by some of the news stories of the day that I can’t bring myself to write about them.

Here are a few recent reports that made my blood pressure hit the roof. I am avoiding delving into them at length out of concern for my physical and mental health:

GA seniors push for integrated prom: Yes, “students at Wilcox County High School have two separate proms– one for whites, the other for students of color.” As Andy said, I thought it was 2013 not 1963.

Virginia woman pleads no contest in death of unborn child: She faced charges of involuntary manslaughter and DUI. Andy: “‘Unborn child’ – how the fuck can you kill something that isn’t alive, idiots.” And so the endless debate over when life begins continues. I have no doubt I’ll be hearing about this one from Twitter trolls galore.

Mike Huckabee: Obama May Be Planning To Grab Guns And Launch A Nazi-Like Dictatorship: HuckaTwit does it again. Lather, wince, repeat.

More Sandy-Style Superstorms Likely Headed For Europe, Thanks To Global Warming: Why do we continue to push our luck? What does it take?

STUDY: States With Loose Gun Laws Have Higher Rates Of Gun Violence: Duh. DuhduhduhDUH.

See what I mean? So who’s up for a couple of Margs or a trough of wine?

drunk smaller

Finally! A sweet way to convince climate change deniers to change their minds: Chocolate.

chocolate easter egg

For years we here at The Political Carnival have been all over climate change deniers, the Drill-Baby-Drillers, and their focus on what goes into their wallets and from whom. We’ve pounded the disaster-in-waiting tar sands pipeline, and we’ve blasted BP.

None of that matters, though, because the oil-addicted remain unconvinced. However, there may finally be a way to change their minds: Via their collective sweet tooth.

From the Los Angeles Times:

Chocolate is a huge business, pulling in $90 billion in global sales annually, $19 billion of it in the U.S., according to market research company Mintel Group Ltd. Price increases and product innovation helped the industry grow 16% from 2007 through 2012, the firm found.

But scientists predict a looming cocoa bean shortage, intensified by climate change and botanical disease.

The International Cocoa Organization said that global production in the last growing year fell 6.1%, and it forecasts a 1.8% slide this year. That would probably cause a cocoa shortfall of 45,000 metric tons in the current marketing year ending Sept. 30, the group said.

Tighter supplies as well as rising sugar and manufacturing costs are adding to the price of truffles and bonbons.

Will the fossil fuel supporters finally see that they must alter their polluting ways once they realize that our yummy, scrumptious, to-die-for, decadent chocolate treats are in danger because of climate change?

Let’s hope these stubborn doubters are not just coo-coo, but also coo-coo for Cocoa Puffs.

bonbon appetit

Huge jump in atmospheric CO2 due to fossil fuels. So how’s that Keystone Tar Sands Pipeline coming along?

gore climate change hot in here

Recently I posted about the new State Dep’t. draft report that looks promising for backers of the Keystone XL tar sands oil pipeline. It was disheartening, to say the least, and worrisome to anyone who is concerned about bringing the dirtiest oil on earth through America. Or climate change.

This potentially catastrophic project will only add to our environmental problems, and Bill McKibben and NASA’s Jim Hansen both warn that it would be “essentially game over for the climate” if it gets the go ahead.

Why we would continue to push our luck after this Associated Press/HuffPo report is beyond me:

The amount of heat-trapping carbon dioxide in the air jumped dramatically in 2012, making it very unlikely that global warming can be limited to another 2 degrees as many global leaders have hoped, new federal figures show.

Scientists say the rise in CO2 reflects the world’s economy revving up and burning more fossil fuels, especially in China.

Carbon dioxide levels jumped…  says Pieter Tans, who leads the greenhouse gas measurement team for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. That’s the second highest rise in carbon emissions since record-keeping began in 1959. [...]

More coal-burning power plants, especially in the developing world, are the main reason emissions keep going up – even as they have declined in the U.S. and other places, in part through conservation and cleaner energy.

Did I mention there is no such thing as “clean coal”?

Think Progress:

[W]e face destructively high sea level rise, water supplies for hundreds of millions of people threatened by climate shifts, global crop declines, bleached coral reefs around the world, a rise in ocean acidification threatening marine ecosystems, and a host of other crises.

Crisis schmisis. All the Drill-Baby-Drillers care about is what goes into their wallets. And President Obama, you and your State Department might want to think long and hard about okaying the tar sands pipeline.