At a recent conference of polar scientists, the Arctic Report Card carried the headline: “Arctic shows no sign of returning to reliably frozen region of recent past decades” and a scientific article by NOAA coined the phrase "New Arctic" and began with the words: Shortly after the beginning of the 21st Century, the Arctic began an environmental transition so extensive that it caught scientists, policymakers, and residents by surprise. The extent and duration of these transitions define the New Arctic, characterized by the lowest winter maximum in sea ice cover on record for 2017, the persistent and record warming of sea surface temperatures across the Arctic, and the downward trend in total ice mass of the Greenland ice sheet, just to name a few.
Let that sink in.
In other news, climate change has been dropped from our national security strategy statement (the defining document concerning what threats we worry about as a nation), the mal-administration now recommends you avoid words like ‘evidence based’ if you want to get money for your project from the CDC, and the Interior Secretary humiliated a senior employee for tweeting about climate. But, as Mr Rogers said "when things go bad, look for the helpers." Please vote in 2018.
The reading list:
- Grist: the Arctic is gone.
- The New Arctic
- ThinkProgress: Trump drops climate from security concerns
- Must see movie: The Age of Consequences
- Budd Titlow on preserving journalism against authoritarianism
- Union of Concerned Scientists on the CDC word 'ban.'
- Trump drops climate from National Security Strategy
- Zinke reprimands park head for climate tweets
- Mr Rogers said "Look for the helpers"
- HOW TO CONTACT YOUR LOCAL, STATE AND FEDERAL REPRESENTATIVES
Because we recognize the necessity of personal accountability for our actions, because we accept responsibility for building a durable future and because we believe it is our patriotic duty as citizens to speak out, we must insist that the United States put a price on carbon.
Thanks for listening.
…Ted McIntyre