Forget the empty promises of politicians like George W. Bush that they will, some day in the future, meet the promise of crafting a goal to enact a plan to confront global warming. Barack Obama recognizes that global warming is a crisis that is hurting humanity now, and so must be confronted now, not some time far off in the future. Yesterday, Obama declared,
“We cannot afford more of the same timid politics when the future of our planet is at stake. Global warming is not a someday problem, it is now. In a state like New Hampshire, the ski industry is facing shorter seasons and losing jobs. We are already breaking records with the intensity of our storms, the number of forest fires, the periods of drought.”
The larger parts of Obama’s solution:
1. Tightened mandatory fuel efficiency standards
2. A hard cap on global warming emissions
3. 150 billion dollars invested in developing and implementing clean energy technology
There are some additional elements of Barack Obama’s climate change plan I have questions about. For instance, Barack Obama calls upon the continued use of coal as a major component of America’s energy infrastructure. Obama says, “We must find a way to stop coal from polluting our atmosphere without pretending that our nation’s most abundant energy source will just go away. It won’t.”
No one is saying that the coal lying deep underground in the United States will go away. What people are saying is that we shouldn’t burn it up and release tremendous amounts of carbon into the atmosphere in the process. Deposits of uranium aren’t going away either, but that doesn’t mean that we should dig them up and make them into breakfast cereal. The existence of something dangerous does not require that it be exploited. Barack Obama’s rhetoric on coal doesn’t make logical sense, and leads me to question Obama’s integrity on environmental issues.
Still, questioning is a process, not a final destination. Look at the latest of Barack Obama’s speeches on global warming and energy, and see what you think for yourself.
That’s what Obama is saying, too. Later in that same paragraph, he says:
He wants to find a clean way to use coal, not force people to give it up altogether. In the meantime, he would impose penalties to make dirty coal more expensive. This sounds like a reasonable way to reach the real goal, which is “stop polluting” rather than “stop using coal”.
climate change….. made up lies my friends. go do your own research. the wildfires in cali put more in atmos then the last 100 years of humans….
And here we see!!! the crazy liberal lefty nutsiness!!! when will you drop your socialist rhetoric roger!!!!!!!!! climate change cannot lie because it is not!!!! human!!! qed!!!