I got a trailer from the movie, for the one who want to watch it, but I have to warn you, most of what you will see is hard to take. I’m meanning that if you are to sensible, don’t watch it, but…

If you love your planet…
If you love your children…
YOU HAVE TO SEE THIS FILM

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=2078944470709189270&q=An+Inconvenient+Truth&pl=true

Makes me sick to my stomach to think how far ahead this world would be, had the “people” gone to the streets in protest at the 2000 election.  What will it take?  Gas at my local station is $3.29.9!  That’s insane.  Unfortunately our president is also insane.  Can he be impeached for insanity?

Hopefully, everyone saw Nova’s “Dimming of the Sun”.

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/sun/

If any change is to happen the American people need to make far more noise and let their elected representatives know that they are ready for major change.  The current cost of gas at nearly $3 might actually be the spur needed to effect change.

Earlier in the Winter, Northwestern University’s Department of Neurology held a community forum on Global Warming, invited several experts from varying disciplines to discuss the issue individually, and then members of the audience were called upon to comment and ask questions of the panel.

Fred T. Mackenzie, professor of oceanography, geology and geophysics, at the University of Hawaii spoke first.  His tone was somber, like a man returning from the front lines, reporting on the atrocities of a distant war.  He started out with simple ideas that were easy enough to understand: Global warming is the result of atmospheric particles being heated up by the sun, as this light bounces off the surface of the earth.  The greater the percentage of particulate in the atmosphere, the higher the absorption rate of the particulate, the higher the average temperature.
(see http://www.northwestern.edu/science-outreach/globalwarming/index.htm)

But it was Fred’s history lesson on global climate trends which really demonstrated the impact of our modern society’s flawed ways.  The temperature on this planet has been rather constant over the past 450,000 years.  But all of that started to change, only 150 years ago.  By sampling ice cores extracted from the Vostok ice sheet in Russia, researchers have been able to retrieve carbon dioxide data from microscopic bubbles that reside within these cores, which act as environmental time capsules.  As CO2 rates began to substantially rise in the mid 19th century, mankind’s use of fossil fuels began to take hold with the onset of the industrial revolution.  And if one compares the trend of average CO2 particulate data over the past 450,000 years, our current CO2 rate now stands at 33% above the historic average.

It is easy enough to say that these conditions have “spiked” in the past, and our technology hasn’t yet found that strata in the ice core to demonstrate that these trends are “recoverable”.  Others in the media, and in the Bush Jr. administration have purported that these trends have historical precedence, though this conclusion is flawed because the data has been skewed at the behest of international corporate interests.  (see http://www.motherjones.com/news/feature/2005/05/some_like_it_hot.html)

But it might be helpful to understand how other corporate lobbies have successfully skewed results, and managed to force “debate” when indeed scientific, empirically gathered data spoke dramatically to the contrary.  The battle to regulate the tobacco industry is a prime example:

“Picture a situation in which most of the media, despite the overwhelming weight of medical opinion, refused to accept that there was a connection between smoking and lung cancer. Imagine that every time new evidence emerged, they asked someone with no medical qualifications to write a piece dismissing the evidence and claiming that there was no consensus on the issue.

Imagine that the BBC, in the interests of “debate”, wheeled out one of the tiny number of scientists who says that smoking and cancer aren’t linked, or that giving up isn’t worth the trouble, every time the issue of cancer was raised.

Imagine that, as a result, next to nothing was done about the problem, to the delight of the tobacco industry and the detriment of millions of smokers. We would surely describe the newspapers and the BBC as grossly irresponsible.

Now stop imagining it, and take a look at what’s happening. The issue is not smoking, but climate change. The scientific consensus is just as robust, the misreporting just as widespread, the consequences even graver.”

-— George Monbiot, Beware the Fossil Fools, The Guardian, April 27, 2004 (See http://www.globalissues.org/EnvIssues/GlobalWarming/Intro.asp#Greenhousegasesandemissionsresultingfromhumanactivity).

Ours is a race that is run by a media that protects and insulates her audience in order to serve her clients, and their financial agendas.  As Darfur today, and Rwanda 10 years ago have illustrated, we as a humanity are capable of diverting our attention away from unfathomable atrocities in the name of unmitigated financial gain.  But this aversion, although systemic in American culture, is not typical of our friends and neighbors abroad.  99 nations have agreed that there is insurmountable evidence proving the existence of global warming.  Oceanic, atmospheric, and terrestrial data all point to rising CO2 levels that are leading the planet to a place where our very biodiversity is not just threatened, but guaranteed to suffer a significant hit.

David Lentz, vice president of scientific affairs, at the Chicago Botanic Garden is not waiting for permission from the government to commence his battle to save endangered plants native to the Midwest.  He and his colleagues have undertaken a proactive approach via the Plant Conservation Ex Situ Program.  (see http://www.chicagobotanic.org/research/conservation/cs_exsitu.html).  Part of this project involves seed banking and harvesting of seeds that will be held in a bio vault over the coming years, in order to insure species susceptible to the ravages of global warming will be available for replanting in 200 years, after our environment stabilizes, or so he hopes.  He’s also assisted in the development of a “grassroots” program that enables individuals to collect, process and store seeds following the same principles larger efforts employ.  It’s this type of leadership that we as residents of this world need to undertake, if our children’s offspring are to find themselves in a sustainable and healthy tomorrow. 

Community involvement, campaigns that raise awareness of the critical details which are not getting airtime on Fox News are paramount.  You can approach your city council and call for change in the way local projects are executed, to ensure that environmentally friendly construction techniques are written into bi-laws.  You can order a banner to be made, and post it on your front lawn and let your neighbors know where you stand.  Learn about alternatives to fossil fuel consumption.  Educate yourself, and become a media outlet that does not disregard scientific evidence.  But most importantly, sound the alarms.  Make noise like a tornado siren in your home town.  This is an emergency, it’s not a test.  Our world can’t take much more of this abuse, and denying it doesn’t exist isn’t going to make it go away.

Further Reading:
http://www.ucsusa.org/global_warming/solutions/
http://www.usgbc.org/DisplayPage.aspx?CategoryID=127
http://www.prospect.org/print/V8/31/gelbspan-r.html