I appreciated your sarcastic editorial on climate, Shultz-Baker carbon taxes and Trump’s EPA plans (“Sky isn’t falling, it’s just dirtier under President Trump,” March 5). Yet your assumptions were off: Enough people wanted to gas EPA that they elected Trump, so somewhere — like Nebraska — people are happy? Pollsters report that although Americans trust the EPA to handle climate change, climate isn’t their prime voting issue. Consequently, many voters chose Trump for non-climate reasons, and now they’re horrified that he’s gassing the EPA — they thought “Chinese hoax” was just campaign drivel.
Also, conservative Nebraska ranchers helped stop the Keystone pipeline, and now they’re vowing to prevent it from proceeding. Nebraska’s legislature asked University of Nebraska-Lincoln’s climate science experts to develop a state climate change plan because rising temperatures and declining moisture threatens their agriculture. Did you highlight Nebraska because it’s home to key funders of anti-EPA efforts, and their lobbyists helped write the blueprint for destroying EPA?
Apoplectic Americans aren’t worried the sky will fall. Rather, ice sheets are melting at accelerating rates, melting may become irreversible, causing devastating sea rise. If these four years are wasted, tipping points may be passed, and Americans of all political stripes want to defend EPA’s climate work, but don’t know how.
Contact Citizens’ Climate Lobby for more information.
