The Hurricane Klaxon Bell Rings for Us All

Why we need to talk climate reality at times like this.

Like any decent person, I hope the predictions of Hurricane Harvey ‘s destructiveness are wrong. However, it’s time for some climate truth:

Even if the storm passes over Texas this time, the next storm is coming, and we’re making it stronger by burning coal and oil.

We’re making tropical storms more destructive, we’re causing the seas to rise, we’re increasing heavy rainfall and prolonged droughts.

The continued operation of high-carbon economies (like ours here in the US) is a disaster for the world, including America. We know this.

We also know that the longer we go on with business as usual, the worse this planetary crisis will become. Delay is dangerous.

But at the very core of current US politics right now is a battle to delay the shift to a clean economy. [“Trump, Putin and the Pipelines to Nowhere,” December 2016: http://bit.ly/TrumpPutinPipelinesto...]

We know what we need to do: Cut CO2 in half every decade, starting in 2020. The next decade is critical. [“The Last Decade and You: A Raw Manifesto for the New Climate Movement,” June 2017: http://bit.ly/TheLastDecadeIntro]

We also know that the consequences of not acting are growing more ruinous for those in the path of the next storm

We know that places that suffer larger, repeated batterings in a climate-altered world will continue to decline.

The Gulf Coast is under torque in both ways: heavily dependent on the dying oil industry and at the edge of an angry sea.

If the predicted happens, and Texas gets hammered by Harvey, it may be decades in recovering economically.

But even if this hurricane proves less dangerous, coastal Texas is in on-going danger, and its danger is being magnified by politics.

Anti-environmental politics, climate denialism, attacks on science — these have real consequences. One is putting people’s lives at risk.

If Harvey and its floods plow a path of destruction across Texas, a portion of the blame falls on those who have opposed climate action.

If Texans find that their economy takes a massive, lasting hit, the politicians who refused to act and to ruggedize bear real guilt.

But so, too, do folks who voted for those climate denialist politicians over the last few decades — some of whom are about to lose homes.

Red states are going to have some serious cause to regret their cultural war on climate action in the next years.

But the costs and tragedies ahead of them will fall most heavily on those who least deserve them: the young and the poor.

And before we get too smug, those of us living in more liberal places, please remember: WE’RE ALL TEXAS NOW.

There is no part of America — not one state, not one city — that is moving fast enough to avoid dire consequences.

The storm that rises over Texas today may tomorrow become a megadrought in California, a firestorm in Oregon or a dust bowl in Colorado

The predatory delay that keeps the refineries pumping in Corpus Christi connects to that which blocks urban infill in progressive cities.

The kind of cuts we need to make demand rapid and disruptive adoption on new systems and solutions: delay is failure.

Across this whole land, my fellow Americans, we’re in a climate emergency. Some places are worse off that others; none are doing well.

Ask not for whom the Hurricane klaxon bell rings, folks: It’s ringing for each of us; it’s ringing for all.