Can we finally talk about — OH HORRORS! — Climate Change?
During grade school in the 5th grade in 1960, I remember my teachers talking about global warming and that we didn’t have much time to stop gas emissions and pollution.
That was 52 years ago!!
Between then and now, corporations have bought Republican politicians to deregulate their pollution of the environment and turn a blind eye to the rapid destruction of the planet. These politicians in bed with the polluters convinced voters that there is no such thing as global warming and the scientists have no clue what they are talking about.
Al Gore was ridiculed beyond belief for his stance on global warming. I bet you didn’t see his movie, An Inconvenient Truth? I understand. Media has avoided talking about global warming, and Fox News even ridicules it. After all, it is God’s will, not those pesky scientists who can predict what will happen. Listening to Gore is boring with his dry voice and details, so you probably had no interest in seeing his movie. But if you had listened to him in 2000 and had seen his movie, you would have been shocked to the core. You would have known 12 years ago that Hurricane Sandy was coming…and there’d be more extreme, violent ones after her.
Fast forward to Katrina, Irene and Sandy. Extreme weather is now the norm. Instead of 200 year storms, we now have them every two years…and exponentially with a vengeance.
Clarity, however, is not beyond reach. Hurricane Sandy demands it: At least 40 U.S. deaths. Economic losses expected to climb as high as $50 billion. Eight million homes without power. Hundreds of thousands of people evacuated. More than 15,000 flights grounded. Factories, stores, and hospitals shut. Lower Manhattan dark, silent, and underwater.
As we read in Atlas Drugged: Ayn Rand Be Damned!, this book of satiric fiction comes to life as we see the state of Florida hit by a devastating hurricane left helpless because FEMA has been privatized (sound familiar?), and the State has no money or even the resources to rescue the crushed and sinking state. Even the rich, who can afford the privatized rescue services, learn that all their money cannot buy services that don’t exist within their sinking State. Almost everyone and every business is crippled and needs help.
This election in 2012 is probably the most critical election we have ever had.
Mitt Romney and the Republican Party have said they want to privatize FEMA and dismantle many important government agencies like the EPA that would keep the polluters in check. With their hands in the pockets of these private companies who would “rescue us from FEMA,” Mitt Romney and his merry band of thieves aren’t concerned about America or its citizens…they are too busy lining their pockets to think about us.
Please vote to reelect President Obama who is concerned about global warming and working to do something about it. And lets all finally have this discussion and work with him to protect us from the polluters.
— Marion Young
cadesertvoice 
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