“Over increasingly large areas of the United States spring now comes unheralded by the return of birds, and the early mornings are strangely silent where once they were filled with the beauty of bird song.”
Rachel Carson wrote those words in her classic book, Silent Spring, published September 27, 1962.
It’s an ironic coincidence that just as we’re celebrating the 50th anniversary of her warning on the unforeseen harm caused by pesticides, we’re experiencing the unforeseen harm caused by fossil fuel combustion – an even graver threat to humans and the biosphere (see “An Illustrated Guide to the Science of Global Warming Impacts“).
If we stay near our current emissions path, by century’s end, the outdoors may be strangely silent in the summer in large parts of this country and the world, as most species may well be extinct and most (remaining) humans and animals stay indoors (see NASA’s Hansen: “If We Stay on With Business as Usual, the Southern U.S. Will Become Almost Uninhabitable”).
And yet the story of the century gets dwindling media coverage, at most token mention by the president, and, tragically, no mention at all in the highly watched Presidential debates.
Adam Fetcher, a spokesman for the Obama campaign, “defended the president’s silence on climate change during Tuesday’s debate” in an email to The Hill Wednesday:
“Whether it’s on the stump or at the White House, President Obama has long focused on ways to develop clean energy as a core economic pillar. By advocating for the growth of renewable energy, as he did in Tuesday’s debate, President Obama has continually called for action that will address the sources of climate change”….
Fetcher said the differences between Obama and Romney on energy should indicate which candidate is more devoted to mitigating the effects of climate change.
“While Mitt Romney questioned the science behind climate change and mocked it in his convention speech, President Obama will continue to make the case for cleaner American sources of energy that will create jobs and fight climate change,” Fetcher said.
Obama has been widely criticized for this self-imposed gag order on climate. For instance, the great climate journalist Elizabeth Kolbert had a piece yesterday in the New Yorker on this:
CLIMATE CHANGE, THE DEBATE’S GREAT UNMENTIONABLE
… the President could never quite bring himself to discuss why it might not be a good idea to burn every gallon—or cubic foot—of fossil fuels we could conceivably bring to the earth’s surface. In the midst of what will almost certainly be the warmest year on record [in the U.S.], climate change has become to the Obama Administration the Great Unmentionable, or, as the blogger Joe Romm has put it, The-Threat-That-Must-Not-Be Named.
The problem with the sort of energy debate we saw on Tuesday is not just that it’s fatuous, though it certainly is that. The problem is that you can’t solve a problem if you don’t even acknowledge it exists. The true challenge facing the next President is not how to bring down gas prices, which may or may not come down as a result of global trends. It’s how to move beyond the tired arguments of the past and act as if the future matters.
In the case of climate change, silence isn’t golden, it is fool’s golden!
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So no actual gag order, then?
No actual silence either. Obama doesn’t emphasize climate change enough but I haven’t figured out the climate progress exaggeration strategy yet.
I think there’s a fond hope that facts will trump ideology in this case. Voters who understand climate change are not going to vote for Romney. Voters who “don’t understand” climate change at this point are not thinking about facts, won’t think about facts, need to be appealed to in different ways. Obama’s calculus includes that information.
Green comes in more than one form. Greenbacks count heavily in the decision making process of a lot of people, including people who may talk a lot about climate change but make their decisions based on stodgy economics.
I have a problem with the repeated “at century’s end” use as if it’s a distant mile post in which the expectations of the worse will happen. As most of us are aware, much of the destruction to the planet and its inhabitants will happen long before that.
Likewise, we have ten years to get it right, is just another arbitrary number. In fact we have no time, but now.
Selecting distant dates gives people an easy excuse to put off any action. To coin an old Golden Earring lyric, must we wait till the bullet hits the bone?
Agree completely. This constant setting of climate change against the year 2100 is ridiculous. It promoted the idea that disaster is nearly 80 years away! Hardly. And again, NO, we do not have a decade of grace time before we need get serious. I keep hearing we have ten years of grace to get things moving.
Why, in the face of all the new evidence that we are already in a climate shift that was predicted in 2050 at the very earliest and more often than not sometime in the late 2000′s.
I think we have some serious denial going on, even among the climate science community.
The world will not end tomorrow, but we have already passed the point of no return, and all the data shows world economies are speeding up their fossil fuel use to new and higher levels with every intent to keep the increases going indefinitely. Just see the CO2 emissions data! Rate of increase is a death sentence.
I say we do not have a decade to begin to act, what we have is a decade before absolute disaster becomes a daily reality.
No way, no how, that, on the current trajectory, our civilization will get anywhere near 2100. In the Sweet Bye and Bye is more real than the 22nd century. 2100 is bulldust thrown in our eyes to make us miss the catastrophe right now, right here, which is everywhere.
To Adam Fletcher and the Obama team: We don’t accept your excuses. Yes, you are better than Romney. So what?
Maybe you want us to believe that you will do something “after the election”. We have seen little evidence of that in the last four years. You are committed to All of the Above, including gas, bitumen, and coal, and this was obvious during the debates.
The president needs to arrange a February 2013 emergency conference with China, India, and the EU. The topic would be immediate imposition of substantial carbon taxes, enforced through levies and penalties in international trade. Since we have been the major impediment, it’s up to us to do it. The president can execute this with a treaty and executive order.
It’s called “leadership” in the face of a crisis. If Obama is not man enough to do it, the next president who tries it may find that it is too late.
This accurately reflects whats happening…
US presidential debate…. what climate change, meh!
http://tinyurl.com/9fjajlo
Updated cartoon from the Economist on the US presidential debate is spot on…
I think Obama’s trying to focus on solutions, not on the problem. And this is commendable because it is a good way to lead. Fear does not often result in responsible action and opening up the door on the numerous nightmares about to jump out of the climate closet doesn’t really inspire confidence. Rather, especially in the current climate of division sewed by a conservative/fossil fuel driven conspiracy of denial, it would only create confusion.
That said, Obama’s attempt to steal Romney’s thunder on oil production is a very risky proposition. On the one hand it works well politically, because it plays to an issue that appeals to conservatives (thanks to oil company of Fox misinformation). But, on the other hand, it lends credence to this philosophy that all the fossil fuels should be burned. And that is a devastating view that will result in a very destructive consequence.
I think it would be best for Obama to call Romney out on his climate change denial and to paint the fossil fuels as dirty, dangerous, and depleting remnants of the last century. Stuff we’re forced to use now but stuff we have the capacity to transition away from. I think Obama should show Romney as stuck in the 19th century on these views and as ceding leadership to China and Germany. And I think that Obama should use the words — ‘if we burn all these fuels — coal, oil, gas — then we’re in for some serious climate trouble. And I want to avoid that by advancing the energy of the future.’
Something like that. But this pandering to fossil fuel interests is a dangerous game.
Robert, I think that walks the fine line pretty well.
Most of us in the climate arena, I think, understand by know that we are ‘playing dice’ with our climate. Nobody knows how/if/when, for example, the “incredible Shrinking Albedo’ of the Arctic Ice will trigger tipping points with permafrost melt/carbon emissions. Obama IS MUCH better than Romney when it comes to climate AND…he is not even CLOSE to what we need as far as leadership in this area now…the dice are loading up and the odds are becoming ever more daunting. Sorry to be macabre…but it’s where I’m at.
If Obama wins, we will know how he is going to act in his last term within weeks. I know what I expect, with pretty near absolute conviction, and it ain’t pretty.
As pointed out in the first comment, the headline of this post is misleading. “Self-imposed” gag order?
I know you’re keenly aware of the importance of framing a discussion, and you’re very adept at it. But it taints an otherwise outstanding blog when you resort to this kind of sleight-of-tongue.
Mr. Obama is not a friend to anyone who believes climate change is a major problem. His actions/inactions make this painfully obvious. He does not deserve the vote of anyone hoping for real change. Sadly, this election is void of any such hope and the best one can do is simply cast a symbolic vote in opposition to our current two party dictatorship.
Rachel Carson’s book raised a perfectly solid threat to our environment.
a. China has places where pollinating honey bees have been wiped out by pesticides, and so local farmers must hand-pollinate all flowering crops with little brushes.
b. The average child born today has a 1 in 2 chance of dealing with cancer.
So? What are you saying? ME
If Romney is elected it would be an unmitigated disaster for our country and the world in countless ways, certainly to include our climate — thus, President Obama’s reelection has to be every decent, rational person’s Number 1 priority in November. That said, the President’s actions in promoting the continued reliance on fossil fuels, his failure to advocate for climate action or attempt to educate the American people and his general lack of urgency is beyond disappointing and imperils our future. There is no real basis for believing his second term would be any different (though — call me crazy — I would continue to hope). So while I feel I must actively support the President in his reelection and am doing so in various concrete ways, I will be voting for Green Party candidate Jill Stein. I’m pretty sure she would not remain silent on climate change! I have the luxury of doing that because I live in a state the President has zero chance of losing, and I suggest others who are similarly situated to consider doing the same.
I agree that Romney’s election would be an unmitigated disaster. But let’s not place all the blame for climate inaction at Obama’s feet. What sort of legislation do you think could get through congress with Inhofe and Boehner at work?
I’ll venture that if elected, Green Party candidate Jill Stein would be far more concerned and active about global warming than Obama. But I doubt she would be as effective. The republicans would eat her alive.
What if she stood up to them, and called their bluff?
As much as I’d love to hear Obama talk about climate change, his approach has been very successful. Obama’s done more to push green energy and sustainability than essentially all other leaders combined.
Depends how you define “successful.”
David MacKay the Chief Scientist at the UK’s DECC has a saying “If we all do a little we’ll only achieve a little”.
I hope Obama does win but he’ll need to seriously up his game in his second term if he doesn’t want to go down in history as a President who understood the science but did just a little.
More like, “The problem is that you can’t acknowledge a problem if you don’t believe a solution exists.”
President Obama is more afraid of short-term political risks than long-term climate risks. He has underestimated the pace of climate change (thank-you, IPCC).
Climate consequences are at hand now.
Perhaps he also knows the time to act was 1997, and it’s now too late to avoid serious consequences?
I’m open to alternate explanations, but this is the one that seems to fit best.
It is really hard to believe that man we voted for in 2008 has stopped talking about climate change. He must have bought into the notion that scaring people doesn’t work. Perhaps it doesn’t but not mentioning the problem doesn’t work either. So either way he would been criticized. He couldn’t win. Nothing works. Still, I would rather that he talked about climate change and failed than keeping silent and failed. The later is more unforgivable.