America's Drought of Political Will on Climate Change


By Naomi Wolf
Guardian (UK)

August 8, 2012

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2012/aug/08/america-drought-political-will-climate-change

As the US faces record drought and an Old Testament-
level pestilential heatwave in the midwest, American
environmental denialism may be starting to change. The
question is: is it too late?

America has led the world in climate change denial, a
phenomenon noted with amazement by Europeans, not to
mention thinking people around the world. Year after
year, the US has failed to sign global treaties or curb
emissions, even as our status as a source of a third of
the world's carbon emissions goes unchanged.

It is fairly well-known what has been behind that
climate change denial in America: vast sums pumped into
an ignorance industry by the oil and gas lobbies. Entire
thinktanks to obfuscate manmade climate change have been
funded by these interests, as have individual
congressmen and women. Entirely typical, for instance,
is Louisiana Representative John Fleming, whose
campaigns, according to blogger John Henry, accept about
$200,000 a year from oil and gas lobbyists, and who uses
his social media pages to deny global warming.

It is weird to live inside that US denial about climate



change. Last year, for example, as tropical storm Irene



approached New York, we duly boarded up windows, put in



emergency supplies, and heard endless alarming bulletins



from the mayor's office about which neighborhoods were



likely to be submerged if the tides surged – without



ever hearing from local officials or the media a word



connecting rising sea levels with manmade global



warming. All the more weird because New Yorkers weren't



writing off portions of their downtown neighborhoods to



overflowing seawater a century ago.







It is weird, too, to watch the leaves turn red earlier



and earlier in the fall in the American northeast and



have absolutely everyone say, "the weather is strange" –



yet never see mainstream media reflect any interest in



the connection between human industrial activity and



that strangeness. And this weather map shows how



widespread and extensive that extreme weather is in the US.







But could our denial be cracking, this summer, as, in



the heartland – that most iconic of American landscapes



– broiling temperatures injure humans and cook fish in



the water? This summer a crisis has occurred (though one



that, again, is seldom reported on in terms of our



outsize contribution to the disaster), as midwestern



farmers lost vast swaths of their corn crop to scalding



heat and drought. In the American unconscious of wishful



ignorance, this disaster and loss was to be borne, as



usual, by other people far away.







But we face some serious problems in rising out of our



torpor. In "Shifting Public Opinion on Climate Change:



An Empirical Assessment of Factors Influencing Concern



over Climate Change in the US, 2002–2010", John Wihbey



shows that Gallup surveys reveal Americans' level of



concern varying widely:







"In 2004, 26% of respondents said they worried "a



great deal" about the issue; in 2007 that number



rose to 41%; by 2010, it had fallen to 28%. This



variation comes despite consensus among scientists



about the underlying data patterns and virtual



unanimity of scientific opinion."







Wihbey and colleagues' study found that this fluctuation



was caused by, among other factors, political



polarization. In other words, when one party says global



warming is a crisis and the other says all that is



nonsense, and there is no cooperation between political



elites at both ends of the spectrum, the net result is



apathy.







"The two strongest effects on public concern are



Democratic congressional action statements and



Republican roll-call votes, which increase and



diminish public concern, respectively. This finding



points to the effect of [a] polarized political



elite that is emitting contrary cues, with resulting



(seemingly) contrary levels of public concern."







They found, ominously, that the level and quality of



good information in the general media at large had



little effect on people's levels of concern – indeed,



weather events themselves had little bearing on people's



levels of climate-related anxiety or interest. Only the



combination of media coverage and expressed alarm from



political leaders bumped up public concern.







With the oil and gas lobbies pumping money into Congress



to blunt any professed concern among the political



class, that motivating union of genuine concern and



honest messaging can scarcely be relied on. The authors



conclude, dispiritedly:







"Given the vested economic interests reflected in



this polarization, it seems doubtful that any



communication process focused on persuading



individuals will have much impact."







I spent part of this summer looking at glaciers in



Alaska; in Juneau, in Tongass National Forest, park



rangers expect that a glacier there will withdraw, from



effects of anticipated climate change, in 50 years. So,



the federal government is planning for the effects of



manmade climate change, even as the White House and US



Congress remain paralysed from doing anything to arrest



the warming: the very definition of denial. If we don't



snap out of this stasis of stupidity, nothing can change



for good.