Drawing courtesy of Ingenuity At Bridge 8 website

What was it that President Reagan said very effectively in a political campaign? Oh yes, “There you go again.” Well, there they go again…

Today there was a “press release” about an “Energy Webinar” by what seemed to be a “balanced” organization covering the “energy” issue, especially since the source for the “press release” was the Americans for Balanced Energy Choices (ABEC). It was titled: “This Thursday: Energy Webinar to Discuss Impacts of Federal/State Climate Change Legislation and New Coal Plant Construction.”

After a brief study of the ABEC website, www.americaspower.org, it seems that the Anti-Global Climate Change (Anti-GCC) movement, which is composed of those that refuse to accept that if man is allowed to continue generating GreenHouse Gases (GHG) at the present rate, life on our planet is in peril, are now presenting their twisted point of view, which is mostly colored “Green,” but not for being environmentally conscious. Rather it is colored “Green” for the color of American Money.

The release seems to spend more time on how “good” coal was for the American people than the amount of space spent in the article discussing the Federal/State Climate Change Legislation. My nose was sensing that there would be a discussion on the “amazing good fortune of our having about 50 percent of electricity generated by coal-fired power plants.” It turns out that the ABEC’s website seemed to have twisted the discussion about “balanced energy choices” in their direction, which seems to be that of “coal.”

Before anyone gets me wrong, I feel that if we could generate electricity “cleanly,” which to me means that power plants would not emit any GHG, from coal, America would be in a very good position, with respect to enabling our country have access to one type of energy without having a negative impact on our environment, Earth. With the vast stores of coal in the U.S., it would be fantastic if someone would develop a way to burn it and not generate GHG.

You may have seen it on TV within the last two weeks and I don’t recall the name of the environmental expert that recently said that last year 5000 species had become extinct and that the previous year another 5000 species had become extinct. We have all heard the extinction forecasts for the polar bears by about 2050. The devastating effects of Katrina hitting New Orleans, the tsunamis in the far east, etc., etc., etc. are wakeup calls to us. Even though there are many individuals, organizations, and governments that are working to avert the worst effects of GCC, the good could be multiplied many fold if it weren’t for the disbeliever’s. Somehow it doesn’t seem right that our fortunes for the future should be decided by the shouting of the misguided.

Unfortunately for Americans, we now have FOX, which is a TV network that shouts the conservative point of view. In other words, that channel is a voice of the well connected. They seem to mistakenly confuse the GCC with political issues. With that being said, they constantly want to “debate” whether GCC is real or not. I ask you, does that make any more sense than debating whether 2 + 2 = 4? You would say that is a ridiculous suggestion. To that I say, well that is what the anti-GCC forces are doing when they refute the results of, at least, about 1000 environmental scientists the world over that have indicated that mankind’s activities have had a negative effect on the planet’s ability to sustain itself. I am referring to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, which has been chartered by the U.N.

So, we know what needs to be done: take action. The focus of the “We” campaign from wecansolveit.org is to start a grassroots campaign that when in high gear would give our political leaders the backbone to say “No” to GCC and to mount immediate, comprehensive activities to enable the country to meld the various GCC campaigns together into an unstoppable force.

Please join “We can solve the climate crisis” at their website: http://www.wecansolveit.org

Let’s all hope we can…er…let’s work together to solve it!