A growing powerhouse coalition lead by the Center for Biological Diversity, in partnership with Friends of the Earth, and signed by more than 300 environmental advocates, human-rights, and social justice groups--is aggressively spearheading a movement to encourage the U.S. Senate to pass stronger climate and energy legislation than the anemic bill passed by congress on June 26.
In mid-June, a highly publicized climate change report released by the White House, entitled Global Climate Change Impacts in the United States, conveyed the urgent message that global warming is happening now and that it is caused by human activity.
However, members of congress didn’t heed the warming, because they made deals and back-door concessions that ultimately weakened the final bill.
Not all members of congress were satisfied with the watered-down bill:
Rep. Dennis Kucinich (D-Oh) had this to say, “This bill is a fragile compromise, which leads some to claim that we cannot do better. I respectfully submit that not only can we do better; we have no choice but to do better. Indeed, if we pass a bill that only creates the illusion of addressing the problem, we walk away with only an illusion. The price for that illusion is the opportunity to take substantive action.”
Reaction also came quickly from the environmental community:
“The White House report highlights the scientific urgency for deep and rapid reductions in greenhouse pollution,” said Kassie Siegel, director of the Center for Biological Diversity’s Climate Law Insitute. “The mismatch between this urgency and the federal government’s response is tragic. The climate bill passed by Congress is far too weak to bring about the pollution reductions necessary to avert climate catastrophe.”
According to an August 26, 2009, press release, the Center for Biological Diversity, the main sponsor of a letter, announces the plan to have local volunteers, in a grassroots effort, to hand deliver a copy of the letter to their local senators’ office.
In the letter, the groups express “profound concern” about the House bill and ask senators to usher in “the transformational change and greenhouse emissions reductions required to avert catastrophic climate impacts.” The letter calls for legislation that:
*Reduces atmospheric CO2 concentrations to a safe level of below 350 parts
per million
*Maintains existing Clean Air Act protections against global warming pollution
*Minimizes the use of offsets and other loopholes
*Protects vulnerable populations and communities
*Promotes abundant clean energy
*Eliminates polluter giveaways
*Adheres to preexisting U.S. commitments to the rest of the world.
Here are comments from a few groups that signed the letter:
“We haven't yet seen the bold leadership from Congress that's required to solve the climate crisis,” said Church World Service Director of Education and Advocacy Rajyashri Waghray. “We're sending this letter to demonstrate broad grassroots support for such leadership.”
“We have to have a stronger climate bill than the watered-down version that passed the House,” said San Bernardino Valley Audubon Society Conservation Chair Drew Feldmann.
“There's an impressive breadth of groups on this letter, and it demonstrates that the status quo isn't acceptable. Congress must pass a bill that actually gives us a fighting chance of avoiding runaway global warming. There's no other option,” said Tyson Slocum, who directs Public Citizen’s energy program.
Interested organizations can view the letter, see who is already on board, and consider participating.
The Senate will reconvene in September and will be addressing critical issues, including health care reform, as well as—the historical climate bill. ACRES barely passed in the house of congress by a narrow margin of 219-212, which included help from eight Republicans. A tougher road block by Republicans is expected in the senate.
If President Obama expects to take a leadership role at the conference on climate change this December in Copenhagen, then he needs to walk in the door with legislation that actually has a chance of making a difference.
Mean while, polar ice caps are continuing to melt. Water conflicts are on the rise. Climate change ramifications could threaten national security. Entire glaciers are vanishing. Wildlife habitats and migratory patterns are being altered.Invasive insects and pests are increasing. Human health is being impacted by pollution and wildfires are increasing on a global level. Record breaking hot and cold streaks are happening around the world.
Members of the senate—are you paying attention?
*** For photo credit run cursor over photograph * Copyright Jean Williams 2009 * Author also writes under pen name DelilahStarling. Permission to reprint up to three paragraphs with a direct “read full story” back to this page. Contact creatinggreenpiece@juno.com
Comments
When the DOT-COM bust happened 11 years ago, a lot of people lost their shirts. Investments in junk stocks like walk-my-dog.com lost everything. Those stocks were worthless. But there were still some stocks that were based on real value, google, bestbuy, yahoo, etc., dropped in value but not to zero.
Last year, the mortgage backed securities crashed because of government required sub-prime mortgages, but not to zero. They were based on real estate that physically exists.
There has been atmospheric cooling the last 8 years, and no new high global annual temperatures in the last 11 years. When the carbon credit scheme goes bust, because earth decides to prove CO2 does not control climate, ALL carbon credits will be worthless. There will be no good carbon credits vs. bad carbon credits. Who will be holding these worthless credits after investing hundreds of billions of dollars? Power companies, manufacturers, bakeries, farmers, delivery companies, you name it. They will ALL go bankrupt.
Support for cap-and-trade is evaporating. Daily I read editorials, comments and letters-to-the-editor from all over the nation. Whereas when the House passed the bill it was maybe 2-to-1 against cap and trade, opinion now seems to be at least 6-to-1 against. The Senate will be wise to bury this unpopular, complex and risky legislation.
-- Robert Moen, www.energyplanUSA.com
I find it interesting that people who don't understand the history of the earth often use an argument about the earth in the last decade. I wonder if they've heard of the ice age, the previous ice age and the drifting of continents and think that happened in a ten years. Ten years is a blip on the screen of time for the earth. That argument just doesn't wash for anyone who has studied historical geology.
Cap and Trade should be allowed to die an inglorious death. Politicians who ignore the real facts about "climate change" will soon rue the day that they supported and perpetuated climate change propaganda. All responsible citizens want to prevent adverse impacts on the environment, but diverting political and economic assets to solve a problem that doesn't exist will do more harm to the environment than any amount of CO2 emmissions. Why? Because all of those resouces could and should be going to solve real environmental problems, e.g., deforestation, loss of natural habitat, agricultural run-off, overfishing, river and ocean pollution, and on and on, not to mention the adverse effects on human populations in developing countries from lack of energy resources. The real carbon criminals are the radical environmentalists, self-serving and dishonest climate modelers, the IPPC, unquestioning journalists, and syncophant politicians who have perpetrated this unproven nonscience.
Pertinent to my previous comment, everyone (especially "warmers") who wants to protect the natural environment should read the online article by Richard Black, Environmental Correspondent for the BBC, titled
"Hijacked by Climate Change?":
(sorry, links not allowed, you'll have to google it.)
AnimalDoctor, people working to "solve a problem that does not exist"? Man, what planet are you living on?
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