Polar ice caps are melting at a faster rate than predicted and massive ice shelves appear ready to collapse. Insects throughout the globe, so critical to the food web and plant pollination, are declining at a rate of 2.5% per year. Insect populations are on the verge of collapse, heralding Rachael Carson’s Silent Spring. The planet is being denuded of forests at a rate of 650,000 square miles per year. Nearly 20% of the oceans coral reefs have died. Coral reefs support 25% of all marine life on Earth and 90% of these important spawning grounds will be gone in 30 years. The number of ocean fish, marine birds and sea mammals shrunk by half between 1970 and 2012. Dozens of species of plants and animals are going extinct every single day, a rate of extinction that is thousands of time greater than normal.
The Earth as we know it is very ill. Many life-sustaining systems are starting to shut down, and the unsustainable rate of human consumption is the proximal cause.
This is the greatest challenge America faces in the 2020 election season. It is a global challenge, a national challenge, and ultimately a local and personal challenge as well. No one is untouched by it. No one is immune. If we don’t act boldly, and in concert with our neighbors, to curb our consumption and exploitation of natural resources, nature will act to radically reduce and possibly eliminate our species. The planet will go on and rebuild a new ecosystem, but the universe will have lost perhaps the only creatures capable of admiring creation.
It’s that time again to talk about electoral politics. Politicians in both parties are already positioning themselves to run President and a host of other elected positions. Leaders in both political party leaders and corporate media networks are creating the frameworks and parameters within which our choices must lie. Only candidates who can largely maintain the status quo will well-funded by the wealthy elite. Only the candidates who appear acceptable, electable, pragmatic, down-to-earth will win our support. Little will be said of our existential crisis because consumption equals profit.
Saving the planet will require massive upheavals for the worlds exploitive, extractive economies. I’m afraid that the actions required can only be disruptive to be effective. The steps we need to take will surely result in upending and redistributing global wealth and yet what choice do we really have? The time for tinkering around the margins is long past. Even the time for organized civil, peaceful actions is drawing to a close. We may not have many election cycles left to install all the bold, insightful leaders this world needed to avert disaster.
So who is radical enough to lead us? Who really recognizes what is at stake? Who is honest enough to admit that they are powerless to bring about the changes we need through their own skills and their electoral mandate alone? Who is best qualified to organize the millions and millions of civilian activists it will take to out-match the powerful entrenched interests that profit from business as usual.
There are so many things we must confront and change on a scale that ranges from global actions to personal choices, yet at every point we are blocked by self-serving special interests. This has to change. We have become the army of change in this fight for our survival.
This is the greatest challenge America faces in the 2020 election season. It is a global challenge, a national challenge, and ultimately a local and personal challenge as well. No one is untouched by it. No one is immune. If we don’t act boldly, and in concert with our neighbors, to curb our consumption and exploitation of natural resources, nature will act to radically reduce and possibly eliminate our species. The planet will go on and rebuild a new ecosystem, but the universe will have lost perhaps the only creatures capable of admiring creation.
It’s that time again to talk about electoral politics. Politicians in both parties are already positioning themselves to run President and a host of other elected positions. Leaders in both political party leaders and corporate media networks are creating the frameworks and parameters within which our choices must lie. Only candidates who can largely maintain the status quo will well-funded by the wealthy elite. Only the candidates who appear acceptable, electable, pragmatic, down-to-earth will win our support. Little will be said of our existential crisis because consumption equals profit.
Saving the planet will require massive upheavals for the worlds exploitive, extractive economies. I’m afraid that the actions required can only be disruptive to be effective. The steps we need to take will surely result in upending and redistributing global wealth and yet what choice do we really have? The time for tinkering around the margins is long past. Even the time for organized civil, peaceful actions is drawing to a close. We may not have many election cycles left to install all the bold, insightful leaders this world needed to avert disaster.
So who is radical enough to lead us? Who really recognizes what is at stake? Who is honest enough to admit that they are powerless to bring about the changes we need through their own skills and their electoral mandate alone? Who is best qualified to organize the millions and millions of civilian activists it will take to out-match the powerful entrenched interests that profit from business as usual.
There are so many things we must confront and change on a scale that ranges from global actions to personal choices, yet at every point we are blocked by self-serving special interests. This has to change. We have become the army of change in this fight for our survival.
