I am in my hotel room, watching on TV with a bottle of bubbly in the fridge. I took the day off for this moment! And I will remember it for the rest of my life.
It is fantastic news that the Republicans have been booted out of the Whitehouse, and likely that we will have a friendly Congress.
Why is this good news? We have a President of the worlds biggest polluter, and the country which - until Bush with his oil pals came along - was leading action on climate change.
Even though McCain was saying some good things about climate change, the fact is that we lost eight crucial years in fighting climate change under his party and he is so disproportionally funded by the biggest polluters he would have struggled to put in real change.
Obama's fundraising income coming from so many people empowers him to make real decisions, and with a friendly congress we can hope he will use this power for tackling climate change.
OK, he will be acting for America but there is little we can do here in Australia about climate change - China and India are not going to swayed by us, but America can really lead the way.
The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, security issues and the economy are almost irrelevant compared to the long term impact of climate change. This recession would be insignicant compared to what is going to happen to civilisation in a hotter, hungry, less watered world - except the fact that it may effect how much we invest in combatting climate change.
Now is a time we can hope - if America leads the way on climate change (again) our future civilisation has more chance of surviving.
Check out Climate Wars by Gwynne Dyer. Fantastic (but scary) book.
Sean is hoping
3 comments:
A Black man is now the most powerful man in the world. A historic day for diversity and inclusion.
Should the President of the United States be labelled the "most powerful man in the world" Are we not at a point where the world may not need a "super power" but perhaps a global community that works together and helps their neighbour? Perhaps that is too simplistic and naive. k
Agree on your global community viewpoint. As for that particular label, I believe it is widely regarded as factually accurate, rather than simplistic and naive.
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