Global Warming and You

Katrina's rapid growth from tropical depression to city-killer is visible proof that we humans are altering our climate.  We have caused enough changes to the world's ecosphere to affect massive weather systems.  This is not by any means the gentle, helpful weather control once foreseen by unrealistic science fiction writers.  Like yeast ingesting grape juice sugars and producing alcohol, we are excreting enough into our environment to threaten our own existence.

And just Who or What will get the alcoholic buzz when our ecospheric wine keg is tapped?  Not that it matters.  Yeast does not survive the wine-making process, and neither will we, if we keep it up.

Katrina should be making our President re-think his opposition to the Kyoto Accords.  It is too late to stop the changes we have made, but we can retard and even end further changes.  Instead, he is drumming up the half of the U.S. military not engaged in Iraq and Afghanistan, seeking to battle an enemy worse than climate: Avian flu.

Katrina should be making energy producers even more acutely aware that we must find better ways to meet or energy desires.  Yes, auto makers and the power industry has begun to make changes, knowing that an extinct species doesn't buy automobiles or laptops.  However, still seeing reserves in Alaska and various countries we happen to have liberated of late, perhaps they are not moving as quickly as they could.

Katrina should be making you and I more conscious, at the grass roots.  We need to look at the simple things we can do to reduce energy and fuel consumption.  As we haven't President Bush's authority to put his "X" on the line of the Kyoto Accords, we need to review our own excessive demands for comfort and convenience.  Oh, guess what:  I'm not going to suggest anything terribly new.

Seal your home well in the winter.  Then keep your thermostats low.  Our ancestors survived without central heat in their caves, so far as the fossil evidence shows.  Wearing a thick sweater and snuggling under the quilt while you watch TV isn't going top slit your throat.  Add your favorite significant other to that recipe, and you'll generate more than enough warmth to get through the night.

Walk and bicycle more.  Hey, folks, that extra layer of fat may help keep you warm in the winter, but it looks like winter may really get shorter over the next few decades.  Your fat layer will make your life shorter, too.  Urban and suburban sprawl makes this seem impractical.  There aren't that many corner convenience stores any more, after all, and many people fear traffic when they bicycle.  If there are fewer cars and more bicycles, though, neither of these things should be a problem.  The "human engines" of these transportation modes also produce fewer greenhouse gases than autos, and no dangerous hydrocarbons. 

Find recreation that does not mandate sitting alone at home.  Fewer people running fewer TV sets can be more people engaged in old-fashioned barn dances, potluck suppers, block parties, hiking, pick-up sports leagues, amateur theatricals, reading out loud to the elderly, and so on..  Yes, I know that the transportation to and from these social gatherings and exercise opportunities will be a problem, but I'm willing to bet that it will be a net gain in many ways.

Encourage public transportation to expand.  No, I don't mean that you should whisper inspiring sayings to the engine grill of that bus down the street.  I'm suggesting that you get on the bus and ride it.  Greater ridership expands the system.  Remember, supply and demand is the great Republican formula for world improvement.  I kind of hate it when a party controlled by ultra-conservative ideologues happens to be right, don't you? 

Global warming is not a government problem.  It's a problem for our entire species.  We all need to take steps against it.

Copyright © 2005 by Gregory P. Lee.  All rights reserved.  Gregory P. Lee is a writer, observer, and the proprietor of Three/Four Communications.  For a collection of Mr. Lee's opinions on the Same-Sex Marriage Debate in Massachusetts, go to http://books.lulu.com/content/88961 to buy Dear Lilburn:  A Straight White Man Harangues Against Creed-Based Bigotry.