Year 3, Month 4, Day 27: While You’re Up, Would You Get Me A Beer?

An article in the NYT is picked up by the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette; apparently some people are actually putting the pieces together. Huh. Who’da thunk it?

Scientists may hesitate to link some of the weather extremes of recent years to global warming — but the public, it seems, is already there.

A poll due for release on Wednesday shows that a large majority of Americans believe that this year’s unusually warm winter, last year’s blistering summer and some other weather disasters were probably made worse by global warming. And by a 2-to-1 margin, the public says the weather has been getting worse, rather than better, in recent years.

The survey, the most detailed to date on the public response to weather extremes, comes atop other polling showing a recent uptick in concern about climate change. Read together, the polls suggest that direct experience of erratic weather may be convincing some people that the problem is no longer just a vague and distant threat.

Nothin’ to see here, folks. Move along, move along. Sent April 18:

While a majority of Americans are finally accepting the idea that global climate change is real, there’s no corresponding recognition of environmental reality in the air-conditioned halls of Congress. Perhaps our representatives should meet in one of the hundreds of locations across the country that have experienced record-breaking weather extremes this year. Perhaps they should spend less time listening to the corporate lobbyists and conservative “think-tanks” who are dictating fossil-fuel-friendly legislation, and pay more attention to the expertise of climate scientists who have been predicting exactly these sorts of weather anomalies as a consequence of the runaway greenhouse effect.

Yes, Americans are finally connecting the dots between climate change and extreme weather — but it is alarming, astonishing, and ultimately depressing that on this issue, our politicians will be the last to come to their senses. Our representatives aren’t just unwilling to lead — they aren’t even willing to follow.

Warren Senders