“Yet the case for human-driven warming, many scientists say, is far clearer now than a decade ago, when the skeptics included many people who now are convinced that climate change is a real and serious threat.
“Even some who remain skeptical about the extent or pace of global warming say that the premise underlying the Copenhagen talks is solid: that warming is to some extent driven by greenhouse gases spewing into the atmosphere from human activities like the burning of fossil fuels and deforestation.
“Roger A. Pielke Sr., for example, a climate scientist at the University of Colorado who has been highly critical of the United Nations climate panel and who once branded many of the scientists now embroiled in the e-mail controversy part of a climate ‘oligarchy,’ said that so many independent measures existed to show unusual warming taking place that there was no real dispute about it. Moreover, he said, ‘The role of added carbon dioxide as a major contributor in climate change has been firmly established.'”
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“We all got into this mess together. And now, with treaty talks underway internationally and Congress stalled at home, we need to act accordingly. Don’t spend an hour changing your light bulbs. Don’t take a day to caulk your windows. Instead, pick up a phone, open a laptop, or travel to a U.S. Senate office near you and turn the tables: ‘What are the 10 green statutes you’re working on to save the planet, Senator?’…
“Forty-five years ago, President Lyndon B. Johnson faced tremendous opposition on civil rights from a Congress dominated by Southern leaders, yet he spent the political capital necessary to answer a great moral calling. Whenever key bills on housing, voting and employment stalled, he gave individual members of congress the famous ‘Johnson treatment.’ He charmed. He pleaded. He threatened. He led, in other words. In person, and from the front.
“Does anyone doubt that our charismatic current president has the capacity to turn up the heat?”
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