You say,”This means that our political leaders are finally going to have to make hard choices (or not, which is its own way of choosing).”
The problem is that politicians don’t really lead. The ‘follow from the front’ and get elected by promising what voters think they want, and then when in power trying to give voters what they think those voters actually need, but within broad acceptability in case their support drops away.
But many voters, even a majority of voters, do not want any climate change policies that affect their current lifestyle or that raise the cost of anything. It isn’t just in America; in England there were mass protests as a planned rise in fuel duties, and in France the ‘Yellow Vest’ mass protests, again against fuel duties and changes to farm subsidies. Germany too has regular protests about rising domestic fuel costs, especially since Russian gas was shut off.
I think it is noteworthy that Kamala Harris has avoided the whole Eco-policies minefield throughout this election, barely mentioning it or any policy details, because she knows it will lose her more votes than she would win. Americans simply don’t want it!
If people won’t vote for eco policies or any party that proposes them, and won’t pay for them, and won’t change their behaviour or reduce their fossil fuel consumption, then at some point we have to accept that our Western societies are going to drive themselves at full speed off that cliff.
There is no Plan B, no cavalry or superhero appearing from stage left, no rescuers, no survivability strategy worth the time of day. Whilst it may be an interesting academic exercise to imagine how we might get ourselves out of this mess, it means nothing if no-one wants to do it and no-one wants to pay for it.
Exactly. My sense is that we will know when we are really ready to do the work when someone in high office looks into the camera and says something like, 'Folks, the good times are gone, forever, and you are going to have to do with a lot lot less, and even then the miseries are going to pile up. It is now far too late to 'save' us, which is not possible, but we can work nevertheless to reduce some suffering. As bad as the food/gas/health crisis is now, it is going to get way way worse'. Shades of Jimmy Carter!
I like the idea, but sadly the modern reality is that such a person would face mass opposition; fossil industries, media, transportation, manufacturing, families struggling to pay food and energy bills, and any politician that wanter to get elected ever again. Everyone!
Back in the 1970's, after the 1973 oil price quadrupled and sent the world economies into a tailspin, there was a considerable movement towards sustainability, from self sufficiency to housing to transport to design....... it was a hopeful and positive and imaginative time for open-thinkers. I still have a number of excellent books from that time, written with passion and insights that are missing under today's groupthink and economic/political suppression of options. Then came the 1980's and Reagan for America and Maggie for Britain, and everyone wanted more; more money, more fun, more clothes, more cars, more holidays. Frugal living was over, and has never come back. It simply isn't fashionable anymore.
And anyway, what could such a politician do today? There simply aren't any measures that will make any meaningful difference. Climate change is happening now, and the rapid deterioration over the next 30-odd years are already set in stone.
We've all bought the ticket for this roller coaster ride, and we are strapped into our seats and we are trundling up the first ramp. We are on this ride, however scary it gets, however frightened we might be. There's no getting off now.
One hard lesson we have learned from this climate crisis is how the vast majority of people do not actually care what happens to their children and grandchildren! They would much prefer the 4x4 truck today, and the flights to some holiday a couple of times this year, and the heating or aircon turned up, and to spend their money on consumer shit rather than insulation.
In fact they would rather vote for the politician that promises more global warming that will seriously fuck up their kid's future lives, than do ANYTHING today to reduce their own carbon consumption today.
I'm no sociologist, but surely someone out there must be studying this apparently aberrant behaviour? What kind of species are we that willingly abandons our genetic future for our toys today?
Or more precisely, what king of people are we that we abandon out personal genetic future legacy for our personal comforts and pleasures today?
Or do we subconsciously realise that our game is up? That human's day is done? That there really are too many of us already, and the future needs far fewer of us on this planet? Is there some kind of inbuilt mental trigger going off that is saying, 'OK, enough. Time to stop planning for a future that'll never happen'.
Of course. But most people don't care, and even those that say they do, think they do, seem to think recycling their rubbish and riding their bikes to buy fresh veg in brown paper bags is enough. Like it's making a difference!
About 15 years ago I volunteered for a eco campaign group in England that was taking off around the world. Lots of worthy people talking low carbon and self sufficiency. But as they became more famous, the founders would take flights all around the world to speak at conferences and set up new partner groups. Doing the good work!
The vast majority of the people are the same, in it for themselves. Not just politicians. Not just billionaires.
And that means any country with elections will have politicians that are representative of the people's wishes, and that means more CO2 emissions, more climate change and closer and closer to catastrophe.
Actually, that someone really needs to help people understand how LITTLE the will have to give up. The deadweight loss of taxing net CO2 emissions is just not that large.
By the time the grim and unforgiving laws-of-physics reality really strikes America's hyper-consumptive, hyper-polluting lifestyles it will be far too late. That's now.
This was a tough one — and so necessary. Thank you for everything you do and for modeling what it means to be a good global (and local) citizen in these times.
I agree with most of your material. The science is right. The longer a natural gas pipeline/supply chain, the more potential for leaks. The best way to handle that is stop building them. Yet people can own gas and sell it. They cannot say the same about the sun and wind.
My problem with environmental perspectives is quite simple, and it is a problem that I find in myself. The best personal response to climate change is to use less energy. Drive less, keep winters colder and summers warmer on the thermostat, don't buy CAFO meat, cut back on high carbon foods that damage the environment like palm oil and coffee, fly less (or not at all), walk or ride a bike, pay attention to the embodied carbon of the stuff you buy, and buy less of it. All these are simple, but hard to do and I will admit my own complicity. "For that which I should not do, I do; and the things I should do, I do not do." A paraphrase of Romans 7:15. We are caught in a system that we wish would end, but we don't know how because it is the only way we have lived. Our indigenous brethren, locally and globally can help us learn otherwise if we are willing to listen.
Thank you for this newsletter. In the 1970s when we read the Club of Rome report in paperback form I never thought climate change would come in my life time. Here we are....from the Kogelberg Biosphere reserve in the Southern Cape in South Africa. Sorry I can't pay, but greatly appreciate your newsletters.
Hi Bill, and hello everyone. The flooding in Asheville was not caused by the extra water, nor by the damage done to the forests by acid rain. The floods were caused by the fact that America has clearcut 97% of its forests since the 1600s. Much has been lost to roads, cities and agriculture, and people understand how that causes flooding, especially when people build on floodplains. What y'all don't realise, is that clearcutting all those private, National and State Forests has removed 90% of the biomass from each and every acre cut, forever. Only 10% of the average annual biomass grows back in a plantation. Clearcutting has cost the USA 800 cubic kilometres of living biomass, a huge sponge that used to absorb this kind of water easily. Have a look at this video, and you'll see what I mean. Luckily, this problem is also an easy solution- banning clearcutting, switching to Eco Forestry, and growing all our forests back to maturity. The US would absorb billions of tonnes of C02 more each year if they did, too. Just as many jobs. Cheers all. https://sevengenerationsforestry.ca/eco-forestry/long-forestry-video
Sometimes there are multiple causes for things. It's assumed to be certain that climate change is the only cause of intense storms. Not saying it's not a factor, perhaps significant, perhaps not, depending, but these are complex systems.
What we do know is that no one from the top levels at the "Biden" / Harris administration cares about the people suffering from the hurricane devastation. They talk about "being briefed", "talking", "monitoring", but they are not there.
Hi Ellen, I agree about multiple causes. In trying to keep my post short, I didn't mean to say acid rain or increased moisture content played no part, just not a "tipping point" part. Clearcutting, by reducing site biomass permanently by 90%, and because it covers so much ground, overwhelms the other causes. Clearcutting is the primary cause of biodiversity loss, extreme flooding and fires in North America, by a long, long way. It is also the #2 cause of global warming. #1 if you assign C02 from extreme fires. It is also the easiest solution we have to all the above problems. The logging industry loves to deflect the blame, by saying "atmospheric rivers caused floods" etc. But clearcutting is the primary cause. Did you watch the video? As for any politician, all they care about is getting elected. cheers
Thank you, Bill, anyone with two working brain cells should be able to see for themselves the climate is worse than it was a mere ten years ago and is getting worse every year.
Of course trump and the wealthy oil magnates don't care, why should they? They'll be long dead before the unlivable climate for humans arrive, even if it only takes ten years - and they don't give two hoots in hell about their offspring either.
Is anyone concerned about the lack of response from "Biden"/ Harris, while billions are given to Ukraine / military industrial complex, and people here are dying, drowning, and Kamala Harris does a photo op looking tired in front of blank pieces of paper on a private plane?
Seriously, and with respect to all, and with respect to this beautiful earth, *How can this be OK* (especially while billions of dollars are going to the military industrial complex)?
"The Dossier has found that not a single Biden-Harris Administration Cabinet official is on the ground in disaster areas, and none have expressed an intention to visit the sites most impacted by the hurricane.
President Biden spent Friday to Sunday at the beach in Delaware, according to his public schedule. On Monday, he was at the White House to celebrate the U.S. Olympic team.
When asked what he’s doing to help with the Helene response, Biden said he “was on the phone for two hours yesterday” while he was in reality just sitting on the beach in Delaware.
Vice President Kamala Harris spent the weekend campaigning and raising money on the West Coast, hosting high-dollar fundraisers and rallies in Los Angeles, San Francisco, and Las Vegas.
After some blowback, her team then released a Veep-like PR photo Monday on X, showcasing Harris on her plane (with unplugged headphones and blank pieces of paper in front of her), cosplaying a leader who is managing the Helene response.
Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg, despite being the senior infrastructure guy in the Cabinet, is once more nowhere to be found. His public schedule has not been updated since mid-August. Instead of focusing on assisting Helene victims, he is reportedly helping Tim Walz with debate prep for the upcoming vice presidential debate on Tuesday evening. Instead of assisting with disaster relief, “Mayor Pete” is in Minnesota with Tim Walz.
DHS chief Alejandro Mayorkas, who presides over FEMA, is also nowhere to be found. When Helene reached American territory, he was in California, hosting an awards ceremony for the U.S. Secret Service.
Instead of assisting with disaster relief efforts, Secretary of the Interior Deb Haaland was in Washington, D.C., Monday to celebrate the Olympic teams at the White House.
Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack is in Italy meeting with the G7 nations, discussing how to impose stringent climate change policies upon humanity.
The EPA Administrator spent last week in New York City at an event called Climate Week NYC.
The U.S. Small Business Administrator spent the weekend in Nebraska celebrating Native American tribes.
The FEMA director is the only mildly senior-level Biden-Harris official on the ground in the disaster areas. However, she is largely doing photo ops with state governors and checking boxes.
This is the reality of an administration entirely controlled by the D.C. bureaucracy. With major swaths of the country in desperate need of federal resources, there is nobody to be held accountable for deploying assets to areas of need. The cognitively-impaired president is at the beach. The vice president couldn’t care less. And the rest of their cabinet is busy fulfilling other “duties.”"
Bill if you're in Montana stumping for Testor, you're experiencing the same abnormally warm weather I have been experiencing in Gallatin and Madison counties. We had a break last night when a clipper cold front sailed through, but in another day we'll be back to this preposterously high temperatures again. We're just lucky there hasn't been any lightning recently. The forests are tinder boxes. All good arguments for global rapid heating as we speak.
If things keep getting worse on the weather front, how much longer will it be before environmentalists support taxing net CO2 emissions? We can't expect politicians to get out ahead of public sentiment so environmentalists need to start working on the public sentiment. If they had made this Job 1 since Earth Day 1, we would not be in this fix.
I suggest that we create a meme THIS IS WHAT CLIMATE CHANGE LOOKS LIKE and attach it to every story about destructive extreme weather, in every medium, whenever we can.
My grandparents built a house in Saluda, NC, in 1928, about 45 minutes from Asheville. Fortunately, the house survived the deluge, with a little bit of flooding downstairs. But the area is devastated. We were planning to take my 96 year old dad "home" this past weekend to his parents' house, and now we can't, because all roads are closed: two interstates and the state highways as well. My cousin was at the house when the storm happened: there is no power or cell service, and she can't leave, again because the roads are closed. My dad grew up also in Morganton, NC, which is under water. I didn't show him those pictures.
My grandparents would have been deeply shocked by this catastrophe: in their time, Western North Carolina was one of the most pleasant places in the country to live, with four mild seasons, temperatures rarely climbing into the 80s in summer, and so few insects that the house had no screens on the windows. But we had to install AC two years ago because the upstairs had become unbearably hot in summer. And now, I think people will think twice before moving to this "climate haven."
I hope I will be able to go there in November and check on the house and our favorite places, but I'm guessing that one of those places, Pisgah National Forest, with its beautiful waterfalls and trout streams, will remain damaged for a long time. So many uprooted trees must have come down that river. Likewise the Green River, which flooded badly only a few years ago, killing some people who lived along its banks.
Meanwhile, back in TN where I live, there was almost no rain from June to mid-September. Normally there are about four inches of rain a month, or about an inch a week, evenly distributed over the month. But instead, we had 12" of rain in May, followed by very little in June, July and August. The first real rain we've had is the remnants of Helene, and it was much needed. But it would have been nice to get it a little at a time, as we used to. I used drip hoses to keep my garden alive. It worked, but my water bill was about four times the normal amount. Somebody is making money off fossil fuels, but climate change will end up costing everybody a lot.
You say,”This means that our political leaders are finally going to have to make hard choices (or not, which is its own way of choosing).”
The problem is that politicians don’t really lead. The ‘follow from the front’ and get elected by promising what voters think they want, and then when in power trying to give voters what they think those voters actually need, but within broad acceptability in case their support drops away.
But many voters, even a majority of voters, do not want any climate change policies that affect their current lifestyle or that raise the cost of anything. It isn’t just in America; in England there were mass protests as a planned rise in fuel duties, and in France the ‘Yellow Vest’ mass protests, again against fuel duties and changes to farm subsidies. Germany too has regular protests about rising domestic fuel costs, especially since Russian gas was shut off.
I think it is noteworthy that Kamala Harris has avoided the whole Eco-policies minefield throughout this election, barely mentioning it or any policy details, because she knows it will lose her more votes than she would win. Americans simply don’t want it!
If people won’t vote for eco policies or any party that proposes them, and won’t pay for them, and won’t change their behaviour or reduce their fossil fuel consumption, then at some point we have to accept that our Western societies are going to drive themselves at full speed off that cliff.
There is no Plan B, no cavalry or superhero appearing from stage left, no rescuers, no survivability strategy worth the time of day. Whilst it may be an interesting academic exercise to imagine how we might get ourselves out of this mess, it means nothing if no-one wants to do it and no-one wants to pay for it.
Like the films used to say, ‘The End’.
Exactly. My sense is that we will know when we are really ready to do the work when someone in high office looks into the camera and says something like, 'Folks, the good times are gone, forever, and you are going to have to do with a lot lot less, and even then the miseries are going to pile up. It is now far too late to 'save' us, which is not possible, but we can work nevertheless to reduce some suffering. As bad as the food/gas/health crisis is now, it is going to get way way worse'. Shades of Jimmy Carter!
I like the idea, but sadly the modern reality is that such a person would face mass opposition; fossil industries, media, transportation, manufacturing, families struggling to pay food and energy bills, and any politician that wanter to get elected ever again. Everyone!
Back in the 1970's, after the 1973 oil price quadrupled and sent the world economies into a tailspin, there was a considerable movement towards sustainability, from self sufficiency to housing to transport to design....... it was a hopeful and positive and imaginative time for open-thinkers. I still have a number of excellent books from that time, written with passion and insights that are missing under today's groupthink and economic/political suppression of options. Then came the 1980's and Reagan for America and Maggie for Britain, and everyone wanted more; more money, more fun, more clothes, more cars, more holidays. Frugal living was over, and has never come back. It simply isn't fashionable anymore.
And anyway, what could such a politician do today? There simply aren't any measures that will make any meaningful difference. Climate change is happening now, and the rapid deterioration over the next 30-odd years are already set in stone.
We've all bought the ticket for this roller coaster ride, and we are strapped into our seats and we are trundling up the first ramp. We are on this ride, however scary it gets, however frightened we might be. There's no getting off now.
I would add this:
One hard lesson we have learned from this climate crisis is how the vast majority of people do not actually care what happens to their children and grandchildren! They would much prefer the 4x4 truck today, and the flights to some holiday a couple of times this year, and the heating or aircon turned up, and to spend their money on consumer shit rather than insulation.
In fact they would rather vote for the politician that promises more global warming that will seriously fuck up their kid's future lives, than do ANYTHING today to reduce their own carbon consumption today.
I'm no sociologist, but surely someone out there must be studying this apparently aberrant behaviour? What kind of species are we that willingly abandons our genetic future for our toys today?
Or more precisely, what king of people are we that we abandon out personal genetic future legacy for our personal comforts and pleasures today?
Or do we subconsciously realise that our game is up? That human's day is done? That there really are too many of us already, and the future needs far fewer of us on this planet? Is there some kind of inbuilt mental trigger going off that is saying, 'OK, enough. Time to stop planning for a future that'll never happen'.
I'd really like to know.
Question meant with respect, does it bother you that the elites and pop stars talking about climate change fly around the world in private jets?
Or that the Biden Harris administration shows complete lack of care?
https://www.dossier.today/p/the-entire-biden-harris-cabinet-is
Of course. But most people don't care, and even those that say they do, think they do, seem to think recycling their rubbish and riding their bikes to buy fresh veg in brown paper bags is enough. Like it's making a difference!
About 15 years ago I volunteered for a eco campaign group in England that was taking off around the world. Lots of worthy people talking low carbon and self sufficiency. But as they became more famous, the founders would take flights all around the world to speak at conferences and set up new partner groups. Doing the good work!
The vast majority of the people are the same, in it for themselves. Not just politicians. Not just billionaires.
And that means any country with elections will have politicians that are representative of the people's wishes, and that means more CO2 emissions, more climate change and closer and closer to catastrophe.
1,000% agree with your comments...and your questions as to both motivation and absence of concern about the fate of their own family members.
Actually, that someone really needs to help people understand how LITTLE the will have to give up. The deadweight loss of taxing net CO2 emissions is just not that large.
Taxing CO2 emissions is already corrupted, and 'too little, too late'. I think we are way past that.
Exactly. The theme music for this era should be drawn from Mozart's Requiem Mass.
By the time the grim and unforgiving laws-of-physics reality really strikes America's hyper-consumptive, hyper-polluting lifestyles it will be far too late. That's now.
You are absolutely right. Foot to the floor, right off that cliff.
This was a tough one — and so necessary. Thank you for everything you do and for modeling what it means to be a good global (and local) citizen in these times.
I agree with most of your material. The science is right. The longer a natural gas pipeline/supply chain, the more potential for leaks. The best way to handle that is stop building them. Yet people can own gas and sell it. They cannot say the same about the sun and wind.
My problem with environmental perspectives is quite simple, and it is a problem that I find in myself. The best personal response to climate change is to use less energy. Drive less, keep winters colder and summers warmer on the thermostat, don't buy CAFO meat, cut back on high carbon foods that damage the environment like palm oil and coffee, fly less (or not at all), walk or ride a bike, pay attention to the embodied carbon of the stuff you buy, and buy less of it. All these are simple, but hard to do and I will admit my own complicity. "For that which I should not do, I do; and the things I should do, I do not do." A paraphrase of Romans 7:15. We are caught in a system that we wish would end, but we don't know how because it is the only way we have lived. Our indigenous brethren, locally and globally can help us learn otherwise if we are willing to listen.
Thank you for this newsletter. In the 1970s when we read the Club of Rome report in paperback form I never thought climate change would come in my life time. Here we are....from the Kogelberg Biosphere reserve in the Southern Cape in South Africa. Sorry I can't pay, but greatly appreciate your newsletters.
Hi Bill, and hello everyone. The flooding in Asheville was not caused by the extra water, nor by the damage done to the forests by acid rain. The floods were caused by the fact that America has clearcut 97% of its forests since the 1600s. Much has been lost to roads, cities and agriculture, and people understand how that causes flooding, especially when people build on floodplains. What y'all don't realise, is that clearcutting all those private, National and State Forests has removed 90% of the biomass from each and every acre cut, forever. Only 10% of the average annual biomass grows back in a plantation. Clearcutting has cost the USA 800 cubic kilometres of living biomass, a huge sponge that used to absorb this kind of water easily. Have a look at this video, and you'll see what I mean. Luckily, this problem is also an easy solution- banning clearcutting, switching to Eco Forestry, and growing all our forests back to maturity. The US would absorb billions of tonnes of C02 more each year if they did, too. Just as many jobs. Cheers all. https://sevengenerationsforestry.ca/eco-forestry/long-forestry-video
Sometimes there are multiple causes for things. It's assumed to be certain that climate change is the only cause of intense storms. Not saying it's not a factor, perhaps significant, perhaps not, depending, but these are complex systems.
What we do know is that no one from the top levels at the "Biden" / Harris administration cares about the people suffering from the hurricane devastation. They talk about "being briefed", "talking", "monitoring", but they are not there.
https://www.dossier.today/p/the-entire-biden-harris-cabinet-is
Hi Ellen, I agree about multiple causes. In trying to keep my post short, I didn't mean to say acid rain or increased moisture content played no part, just not a "tipping point" part. Clearcutting, by reducing site biomass permanently by 90%, and because it covers so much ground, overwhelms the other causes. Clearcutting is the primary cause of biodiversity loss, extreme flooding and fires in North America, by a long, long way. It is also the #2 cause of global warming. #1 if you assign C02 from extreme fires. It is also the easiest solution we have to all the above problems. The logging industry loves to deflect the blame, by saying "atmospheric rivers caused floods" etc. But clearcutting is the primary cause. Did you watch the video? As for any politician, all they care about is getting elected. cheers
Thank you, Bill, anyone with two working brain cells should be able to see for themselves the climate is worse than it was a mere ten years ago and is getting worse every year.
Of course trump and the wealthy oil magnates don't care, why should they? They'll be long dead before the unlivable climate for humans arrive, even if it only takes ten years - and they don't give two hoots in hell about their offspring either.
The climate crisis is no longer abstract or distant. It’s happening now, in real-time, and the choices we make today will define our future 👌
Is anyone concerned about the lack of response from "Biden"/ Harris, while billions are given to Ukraine / military industrial complex, and people here are dying, drowning, and Kamala Harris does a photo op looking tired in front of blank pieces of paper on a private plane?
Seriously, and with respect to all, and with respect to this beautiful earth, *How can this be OK* (especially while billions of dollars are going to the military industrial complex)?
https://www.dossier.today/p/the-entire-biden-harris-cabinet-is
"The Dossier has found that not a single Biden-Harris Administration Cabinet official is on the ground in disaster areas, and none have expressed an intention to visit the sites most impacted by the hurricane.
President Biden spent Friday to Sunday at the beach in Delaware, according to his public schedule. On Monday, he was at the White House to celebrate the U.S. Olympic team.
When asked what he’s doing to help with the Helene response, Biden said he “was on the phone for two hours yesterday” while he was in reality just sitting on the beach in Delaware.
Vice President Kamala Harris spent the weekend campaigning and raising money on the West Coast, hosting high-dollar fundraisers and rallies in Los Angeles, San Francisco, and Las Vegas.
After some blowback, her team then released a Veep-like PR photo Monday on X, showcasing Harris on her plane (with unplugged headphones and blank pieces of paper in front of her), cosplaying a leader who is managing the Helene response.
Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg, despite being the senior infrastructure guy in the Cabinet, is once more nowhere to be found. His public schedule has not been updated since mid-August. Instead of focusing on assisting Helene victims, he is reportedly helping Tim Walz with debate prep for the upcoming vice presidential debate on Tuesday evening. Instead of assisting with disaster relief, “Mayor Pete” is in Minnesota with Tim Walz.
DHS chief Alejandro Mayorkas, who presides over FEMA, is also nowhere to be found. When Helene reached American territory, he was in California, hosting an awards ceremony for the U.S. Secret Service.
Instead of assisting with disaster relief efforts, Secretary of the Interior Deb Haaland was in Washington, D.C., Monday to celebrate the Olympic teams at the White House.
Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack is in Italy meeting with the G7 nations, discussing how to impose stringent climate change policies upon humanity.
The EPA Administrator spent last week in New York City at an event called Climate Week NYC.
The U.S. Small Business Administrator spent the weekend in Nebraska celebrating Native American tribes.
The FEMA director is the only mildly senior-level Biden-Harris official on the ground in the disaster areas. However, she is largely doing photo ops with state governors and checking boxes.
This is the reality of an administration entirely controlled by the D.C. bureaucracy. With major swaths of the country in desperate need of federal resources, there is nobody to be held accountable for deploying assets to areas of need. The cognitively-impaired president is at the beach. The vice president couldn’t care less. And the rest of their cabinet is busy fulfilling other “duties.”"
Bill if you're in Montana stumping for Testor, you're experiencing the same abnormally warm weather I have been experiencing in Gallatin and Madison counties. We had a break last night when a clipper cold front sailed through, but in another day we'll be back to this preposterously high temperatures again. We're just lucky there hasn't been any lightning recently. The forests are tinder boxes. All good arguments for global rapid heating as we speak.
If things keep getting worse on the weather front, how much longer will it be before environmentalists support taxing net CO2 emissions? We can't expect politicians to get out ahead of public sentiment so environmentalists need to start working on the public sentiment. If they had made this Job 1 since Earth Day 1, we would not be in this fix.
Such crucial information, and we are indebted to Bill McKibben for continually bringing it to us. Thank you, sir!
Check out John Michael Greer’s 2016 book Dark Age America subtitled Climate Change, Cultural Collapse, and the Hard Future Ahead.
I suggest that we create a meme THIS IS WHAT CLIMATE CHANGE LOOKS LIKE and attach it to every story about destructive extreme weather, in every medium, whenever we can.
My grandparents built a house in Saluda, NC, in 1928, about 45 minutes from Asheville. Fortunately, the house survived the deluge, with a little bit of flooding downstairs. But the area is devastated. We were planning to take my 96 year old dad "home" this past weekend to his parents' house, and now we can't, because all roads are closed: two interstates and the state highways as well. My cousin was at the house when the storm happened: there is no power or cell service, and she can't leave, again because the roads are closed. My dad grew up also in Morganton, NC, which is under water. I didn't show him those pictures.
My grandparents would have been deeply shocked by this catastrophe: in their time, Western North Carolina was one of the most pleasant places in the country to live, with four mild seasons, temperatures rarely climbing into the 80s in summer, and so few insects that the house had no screens on the windows. But we had to install AC two years ago because the upstairs had become unbearably hot in summer. And now, I think people will think twice before moving to this "climate haven."
I hope I will be able to go there in November and check on the house and our favorite places, but I'm guessing that one of those places, Pisgah National Forest, with its beautiful waterfalls and trout streams, will remain damaged for a long time. So many uprooted trees must have come down that river. Likewise the Green River, which flooded badly only a few years ago, killing some people who lived along its banks.
Meanwhile, back in TN where I live, there was almost no rain from June to mid-September. Normally there are about four inches of rain a month, or about an inch a week, evenly distributed over the month. But instead, we had 12" of rain in May, followed by very little in June, July and August. The first real rain we've had is the remnants of Helene, and it was much needed. But it would have been nice to get it a little at a time, as we used to. I used drip hoses to keep my garden alive. It worked, but my water bill was about four times the normal amount. Somebody is making money off fossil fuels, but climate change will end up costing everybody a lot.
So terribly sad - and two more storms already building up. What does it take for people to act?
California gives Big Oil $8 billion a year in tax breaks, subsidies, grants and other forms of financial assistance. $ 8 billion a year.