The consensus in American politics today is that there's nothing to be gained from talking about climate change. It's divisive, the electorate has more pressing concerns, and very little can be accomplished anyway. In response to this evolving consensus, lots of folks in the climate hawk coalition (broadly speaking) have counseled a new approach that backgrounds climate change and refocuses the discussion on innovation, energy security, and economic competitiveness.

This cannot work. At least it cannot work if we hope to avoid terrible consequences. Why not? It's simple: If there is to be any hope of avoiding civilization-threatening climate disruption, the U.S. and other nations must act immediately and aggressively on an unprecedented scale. That means moving to emergency footing. War footing. "Hitler is on the march and our survival is at stake" footing. That simply won't be possible unless a critical mass of people are on board. It's not the kind of thing you can sneak in incrementally.

It is unpleasant to talk like this. People don't want to hear it. They don't want to believe it. They bring to bear an enormous range of psychological and behavioral defense mechanisms to avoid it. It sounds "extreme" and our instinctive heuristics conflate "extreme" with "wrong." People display the same kind of avoidance when they find out that they or a loved one are seriously ill. But no doctor would counsel withholding a diagnosis from a patient because it might upset them. If we're in this much trouble, surely we must begin by telling the truth about it.

via www.grist.org

I try not to read articles like this because I like to lean on my defense mechanisms as described above, put my metaphorical fingers in my ears, and yell "la la la la".  Lets me sleep at night (usually).  But the science keeps tugging at my attention, and telling me that we are on a fairly steady path to global ecosystem instability.

How bad might it get? We have been blessed with a long stretch of climate and biosphere stability,at least since the last glacial recession, allowing our civilization to take hold and advance. The comfortable developed societies I think have lost a proper perspective on how fragile it all is.  What will happen if the rivers run dry and food prices triple?  Looks like we may find out.

okee, back to sleep,…….wonder what the Kardashians are up to today…..