SANDY PUTS CLIMATE CHANGE BACK IN THE CONVERSATION

[Q JINN]

http://www.washingtonpost.com/melinda-henneberger/2011/10/13/gIQAqZQz

Sandy puts climate change back in the conversation
By Melinda Henneberger
Published: November 1

You know that mom cliche of yesteryear about the kid who lacks the sense
to come in out of a good hard rain? As a country, we've been that
clue-free child for decades, determined to pretend that whatever "freak
storm" we've just been through is nothing we'll ever have to worry about
again.

Vice-presidential nominees Lloyd Bentsen and Dan Quayle debate in 1988.

In fact, while the flood risk has been rising, we've been regressing.
Way back in 1988, there was not only a question about climate change
during a vice-presidential debate, but one of the visionaries in the
running that year boldly replied that that summer's drought had
certainly "highlighted the problem that we have."
"The greenhouse effect is an important environmental issue," the
aspiring veep said, and "it's important for us to get the data in to see
what alternatives we might have to fossil fuels."
"Therefore," concluded J. Danforth Quayle, "we need to get on with it."

Flooding in Hoboken, N.J., this week.

For all we've learned in the years since then, about rising, warming
waters and melting arctic ice, we never really have gotten on with it.
Somehow, other issues are always pronounced more pressing. In 2000, even
the man who's since made a crusade of saving the planet barely mentioned
it. At the time, Al Gore's advisers patiently explained to me that the
environment ranked a pitiful 13th among concerns expressed by voters,
and thus was a poor use of the candidate's platform.

Post-Sandy, though, some politicians are stating the obvious. "There's
been a series of extreme weather incidents," said New York Gov. Andrew
M. Cuomo (D). "That's not a political statement; that's a factual
statement. . . . I would like to say this is probably the last
occurrence we'll have, [but] I don't believe that. I said to the
president kiddingly the other day, we have a 100-year flood every two
years now."

New York Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg (I) went even further on Thursday
when he put his lips together and finally pulled climate change into the
presidential race: "In just 14 months,'' he wrote in his surprise
endorsement of President Obama, "two hurricanes have forced us to
evacuate neighborhoods --- something our city government had never done
before. If this is a trend, it is simply not sustainable." The climate
is changing, Bloomberg observed, and while one candidate "sees climate
change as an urgent problem that threatens our planet, one does not."

Cuomo discussing preparations for Hurricane Sandy last Sunday.
Of course, seeing and doing something about it are two different things.
But on this issue, there's no comparing the two men: Obama set higher
fuel-efficiency standards and tightened mercury emissions, and Mitt
Romney, well, he used to think emissions from coal plants were killing
us, but doesn't any more. During the second debate, he accused the
president of not exactly being, "Mr. Oil, or Mr. Gas, or Mr. Coal,"
which is I guess how Romney does hope to be known. I'm afraid that my
friends who expect Obama to devote himself to saving the environment and
addressing the root causes of poverty in a second term are dreaming. I
haven't heard him promise anything of the kind. But the
fossil-fuel-hating Romney of '03 isn't coming back, either --- and when
he says deregulation would be a cornerstone of a Romney presidency, I
tend to believe him.

We can never get back the years we've spent in denial, of course. Back
in '06, I wrote about a park ranger in the Grand Tetons who told a group
of us that though no one studied the glaciers there any more, "You can
see from aerial photos that they have receded dramatically in the last
30 years, due to warm weather in the park and elsewhere." Elsewhere, as
in all over the planet?


Obama with New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie (R) surveying storm damage
this week.

"I don't like to call it" climate change, the ranger answered, "because
some people don't believe in global warming, and I've had people get
very upset with me for calling it that. So now I just say 'warm
weather,' because no one can argue with that."
Wrong, Ranger Bobette. I'd argue that our refusal to call climate change
by its name has led us straight to the unhappy spectacle of Romney and
Obama debating who is the greater friend of the energy lobby.

In August, climate-change expert James Hansen apologized in The Post
that his warnings in 1988 --- back when both Bentsen and Quayle freely
acknowledged that there was a problem --- had been so far off. As in,
had been so wildly over-optimistic. "For the extreme hot weather of the
recent past," he said, referring to the European heat wave of 2003, the
Russian heat wave of 2010 and the droughts in Texas and Oklahoma last
year, "there is virtually no explanation other than climate change."

Yet one of the few patches of common ground in American politics is
scorched: After driving past mile after mile of burned up corn in
Indiana this summer, I asked both Senate candidates in that state
whether it wasn't time to talk about --- you know, climate change.
Republican Richard Mourdock: "No; Alaska's having the coldest summer on
record. Weather is different every year." Democrat Joe Donnelly: "I
don't talk about that. That's a conversation for another day."
At last, that day is here, and anyone who says otherwise is standing out
in the rain still.
**
Melinda Henneberger is a Post political writer and anchors the paper's
She the People blog. Follow her on Twitter: @MelindaDC.