You Can Too!

It may seem early, but the race for President of the United States has already begun. One of the most important issues facing voters in 2008 will be how candidates stand on global warming and climate change.

Recognizing this, the League of Conservation Voters is making a push to get candidates to deal with the issue NOW. As a start, the group is trying to get 100,000 people to sign a petition to demand that all presidential candidates from all parties take a stand on global warming.

We think with a little help from the blogosphere and concerned citizens like you, we can do better than that. Why not 1 million signatures? Or better yet, 10 million?

Here’s is a sample letter the group has on its Website.

Dear Candidate for U.S. President,

The debate is over. The National Academy of Sciences and thousands of scientists worldwide agree that the planet is warming and that human dependence on fossil fuels - such as coal and oil - is the primary cause. The problem is so urgent that the next 10 years will likely decide the outcome. There is still time to rise to the challenge, but America needs the leadership to do so.

Solving global warming will place the U.S. at the forefront of developing and deploying the clean energy technologies that will dominate the 21st century. When we solve global warming, we will have established a more secure, prosperous and vibrant America.

Nothing short of our children’s future is at stake.

As you campaign for your party’s presidential nomination, we ask that solving global warming be a central message and a top priority.

To sign the petition, go to the group’s Website and fill out the form NOW!

Now that the Great Backyard Birdcount is over, it’s time to move on to other issues of concern in the news.

For starters, there’s a story moving on the wires from this morning that the European Union has agreed that the 27-nation bloc should begin implementing measures to cut carbon dioxide emissions 20 percent by the year 2020. The EU statement said the group would support a steeper 30 percent target from 1990 levels if other industrialized nations would match European efforts to curb global warming.

But EU environment ministers must still find a way to agree on how they would reach their individual 20 percent targets, according to the Associated Press. One possibility is a compromise aimed at sharing the burden so that some nations would not be required to meet binding targets.

Also, the full statement on global climate change by the American Association on the Advancement of Science is now available on the group’s Website.

Approved by the board on Dec. 9 and released Monday, the statement says, in part:

“The scientific evidence is clear: global climate change caused by human activities is occurring now, and it is a growing threat to society. Accumulating data from across the globe reveal a wide array of effects: rapidly melting glaciers, destabilization of major ice sheets, increases in extreme weather, rising sea level, shifts in species ranges, and more. The pace of change and the evidence of harm have increased markedly over the last five years. The time to control greenhouse gas emissions is now.”

Now we will see how the Bush administration responds, as well as local weatherman James Spann and the Birmingham Baptist Association.

In the interest of passing on the full science information on an issue that has been inevitably politicized, the rest of the full statement is published below.
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Editor’s Note: Here are some excerpts from an interesting unsigned editorial in the Free-Lance Star from Federicksburg.com, especially in light of our recent response to E.O. Wilson and Letter to the Church.

Should caring for the environment be a major priority for people of faith? Only a few years ago, I would have blithely answered this question “No.” Care for the natural world was not a priority of our governmental affairs work. Nor was it a priority in my personal and family life.

What changed? I changed.

I realized I was violating the biblical commands “to serve and to protect” creation (Genesis 2:15). The Hebrew words to serve, avad, and to protect, shamar, mean we must be care-takers, not just takers.

I had to turn about and go in another direction. That’s what the biblical word for repentance means.

***
Dr. E.O. Wilson, author of the recent book “Creation,” says: “If current deterioration of the environment by human activity continues unabated, half of Earth’s surviving species, plants, and animals will be extinguished or critically endangered by the end of the century. One quarter, it’s been estimated, could leave us in the next 50 years due to climate change alone.”
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The world’s largest scientific society, the American Association for the Advancement of Science, joined the public debate on global climate change Sunday at its annual meeting, issuing a statement of consensus that said, in part, “The evidence is clear: global climate change caused by human activities is occurring now and is a growing threat to society.”

The society issued the statement just weeks after the International Panel on Climate Change issued its most recent report on human-induced global warming due to the burning of fossil fuels.

“Scientists are observing the rapid melting of glaciers, destabilization of major ice sheets, rising sea levels, shifts in species ranges and increased frequency of weather extremes,” said John P. Holdren, director of the Woods Hole Research Center and AAAS president, according to the Associated Press, other news sources and the press release.

Concern focuses on carbon dioxide and other gases produced by burning fossil fuels and other processes, which accumulate in the atmosphere and trap heat from the sun, much like a greenhouse, warming the climate.

“The longer we wait to tackle climate change, the harder and more expensive the task will be,” the group said.

Holdren noted that some of the most dramatic changes are occurring in the far North where warming has occurred more rapidly than in other areas. Retreating sea ice and rising sea level are driving some natives from their villages, the group said.

On Feb. 2 the Intergovernmental Panel in Climate Change reported that global warming is so severe that it will “continue for centuries,” leading to a far different planet in 100 years.

The panel, established by the United Nations, concluded that global warming is “very likely” caused by man, meaning more than 90 percent certain.

If nothing is done to change current emissions patterns of greenhouse gases, global temperature could increase as much as 11 degrees Fahrenheit by 2100, the report said.

AAAS was founded in 1848. It reports that it serves 262 affiliated societies and academies of science, reaching 10 million individuals.

Find out more at the group’s Website: American Association for the Advancement of Science.

Scientists and economists have been offered $10,000 each by a lobby group funded by one of the world’s largest oil companies to undermine a major climate change report published today, according to the UK Guardian newspaper.

Scientists Offered Cash to Dispute Climate Study

Letters sent by the American Enterprise Institute (AEI), an ExxonMobil-funded thinktank with close links to the Bush administration, offered the payments for articles that emphasise the shortcomings of a report from the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). Travel expenses and additional payments were also offered.

The AEI has received more than $1.6 million from ExxonMobil and more than 20 of its staff have worked as consultants to the Bush administration. Lee Raymond, a former head of ExxonMobil, is the vice-chairman of AEI’s board of trustees.

The UN report was written by international experts and is widely regarded as the most comprehensive review yet of climate change science … (more below) and even more …

So much for Alabama weatherman James Spann’s rant about scientists making money to say there IS “man-made” global warming…