Month 11, Day 11: Just Ask The Navajo!

The Wall Street Journal notes that UN Climate Chief Figueres expects America to, you know, follow through on our stated obligation to reduce our GHG emissions significantly by 2020. While the seventeen percent figure is still too small, it’s the best we could hope for given the disastrous condition of our current politics.

Given the somewhat spotty record of the United States when it comes to actually living up to the responsibilities it has assumed, the comments of the United Nations Climate Chief are entirely apposite. Merely announcing plans to cut carbon dioxide emissions isn’t going to do the job; we need to make significant economic and infrastructural changes in the way we live and do business if our country is to prosper in the coming decades and centuries. While it’s tempting for our politicians and business leaders to grandstand for the sake of electoral expediency, our struggle to mitigate the effects of climate change cannot be carried out in the rhetorical and political arenas. Mother Nature cannot be swayed by negative ads or elaborate misinformation campaigns. Christiana Figueres isn’t alone in wanting more details on how we’ll cut our emissions by seventeen percent; a lot of us want to know.

Warren Senders