Hello there, traveller! Wouldn’t the news be easier if it was in GIF form? I have good news for you! It is! Last week, we talked about flag burning, and I was called a “partisan hack” in the comments section! Don’t you just love free speech?
What was I talking about? Right. Climate change. Earlier this week, Donald Trump’s decision to appoint climate-change denier Scott Pruitt as head of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) sparked intense, rightful criticism among the global science community. Several scientists spoke with the Independent. Dr. Rush Holt, the chief executive of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, compared Pruitt’s stance to denying the existence of gravity.
“If a person jumped off a building because he said gravitation is only a theory, one would say he is delusional,” Holt said. “So too, any policy maker who would base national policy on denial of climate science because there is ‘debate’ would be called dangerously irresponsible.”
Science is not a belief. It doesn’t matter what a politician believes when it comes to indisputable facts supported by data. To believe otherwise is irresponsible.
The concept of global warming was created by and for the Chinese in order to make U.S. manufacturing non-competitive.
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) November 6, 2012
Here are the irrefutable facts that climate change is real. Sources used: NASA, Scientific American, and the EPA.
According to a study by the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organization, supported by NASA and the National Ocean Service, global sea levels have risen 6.7 inches in the last century. The rate in the last decade is nearly double that of the last century.
Four different research groups (including NASA and NOAA) have shown global temperatures rising over the last century.
Most of the warming has occurred in the last 35 years, with 15 of the 16 warmest years occurring since 2001. As I’m sure you’ve heard, 2016 is on pace to be the hottest year ever.
It's really cold outside, they are calling it a major freeze, weeks ahead of normal. Man, we could use a big fat dose of global warming!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) October 19, 2015
Most recently, devastating and dangerous fires in Gatlinburg,Tenn., and throughout the California coastal region this summer made national news. The National Wildlife Federation has cited global warming as a cause for these fires.
While humans often start the fires, drier conditions (due to rising temperatures), increased fire seasons, and increased frequency of lightning have all worsened these fires to the point of devastation.
In the last 50 years, the U.S. has also experienced less rain than ever, which has increased the severity and length of droughts.
In 2012, 81 percent of the U.S. was living in abnormally dry conditions, which resulted in $30 billion dollars in damages. In California and other arid states this drought is a daily reality.
The extent and thickness of Arctic Sea Ice has declined rapidly over the last few decades. So much so that record low sea-ice levels in November of this year—a time when sea ice typically is at its highest year round—caused a shrinkage by 19,300 square miles of ice.
Think shrinkage doesn’t matter? A British Antarctic research station called the Halley VI had to be moved last week due to a giant chasm that formed in the ice that would cut the team off from the rest of the continent.
These are just a few of the very obvious and trackable ways climate change has affected our lives. Heck, even Leo DiCaprio knows that the future in in sustainable energy. DiCaps met with Ivanka last week to discuss a framework for how the incoming cabinet can be more sustainable to the environment.
If you don’t believe me—and one in four people don’t—take it from this Weather Channel reporter who sufficiently owned Brietbart last week, when they used a video of her to say that climate change is a hoax.
If you are part of the 25 percent of the country that refuses to believes these facts, that’s fine. Just don’t come crying to me when the only polar bears you see are on Christmas Coca-Cola bottles.
Climate change deniers will see before long. You know, when we’re all swimming for our lives.
