According to the government, 3.7 million Americans will soon be threatened by flooding in low-lying areas due to climate change caused by human industrial activity. At the same time, 47 percent of Americans say they don’t think climate change is a serious issue. So what about those who will be displaced? Will they believe the truth when the water touches their toes?
Search and Rescue
Ted Rall
Ted Rall is a syndicated political cartoonist for Andrews McMeel Syndication, WhoWhatWhy.org and Counterpoint. He is a frequent contributor to The Wall Street Journal, a graphic novelist and author of many books of art and prose, and an occasional war correspondent. He is, recently, the author of the graphic novel "The Stringer."
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…53% believing it is a problem is a pretty significant feat, Ted, given there is an entire multimedia machine out there that is well funded, fanatical, and spends enormous effort to convince everyone that it’s a big hoax.
Michigan has warmed over the past 20 years dramatically enough that the USDA put us in a different zone for planting and growing. . . .not that this has any bearing on anything, of course.
My sister lives in Alaska, don’t even get me started on the evidence there.
@Aggie: You’re right, could be worse. Everything could. But that doesn’t mean it doesn’t suck.
Not to worry!
We will be saved by the angels in which 77% of Americans believe.
The chap in the chair seems to have «adapted» to – no doubt, «natural»- climate change by learning to use the fish in his hands as a remote. Ain’t capitalism grand ?!!…
Henri
Of course, this little blurb of a “survey” tells you exactly nothing about what either the 47% or the 53% think. The range of opinion (and may I add, layman’s opinion) may range from the “fanatical” “nothing’s happening, it’s all a conspiracy”, to the equally ignorant “we’re all going to die, unless we’re forced into a subsistence level socialist economy right now.” Others may have more nuanced and less hysterical opinions. Please save yourselves the saliva and trouble of telling about the opinions of scientists (quote-unquote or not).
But then again, it requires a certain amount of faith to believe that “according to the government” (the same that never lies to you US citizens), around 1% of the population of the country (i.e. less than Brooklyn and Manhattan) may be displaced “soon” (a conveniently misty place in the probable future).
@Bucephalus, we’re all going to die regardless. It’s a false argument. The real questions are 1) what quality of life do we want while we’re here, 2) How much understanding of changing climate patterns and their impact on our livelihoods and future would we like to possess, and 3) do we want to work to sustain an ecosystem for the long term survival of the species, or do we not really care after we’re dead?
You are quite right that this question does not serve to give us much information at all.
@Ted…you know, about the same percentage of people who don’t believe global warming is a problem, also don’t believe in evolution. I’d like to see these statistics stratified on the bases of age.
Ever notice how “the opinions of scientists (quote-unquote or not)” is readily accepted when it allows us, for example, to view political cartoons without leaving the house, or to effortlessly spew our political opinions across the world but “the opinions of scientists (quote-unquote or not)” should be ridiculed when it suggests that our mandate for mindless hyper-consumption is hardly a rational approach to economics.
A) Ted -glad you’re enjoying your new computer
B) Up here in Canada we largely credit climate change warnings, but still a lot of the population is ‘following the money”. Too many short term jobs and high profits out of the Alberta tar sands are at stake to do anything about our ‘dirty oil’. So we’ll live with a little global warning, until we get another ‘drought of the century’.