"We have to, in the next 10 years, get off this exponential curve and begin to decrease the rate of growth of CO2 emissions," Hansen explains. "And then flatten it out. And before we get to the middle of the century, we’ve got to be on a declining curve.
"If that doesn't happen in 10 years, then I don’t think we can keep global warming under one degree Celsius and that means we’re going to, that there’s a great danger of passing some of these tipping points. If the ice sheets begin to disintegrate, what can you do about it? You can’t tie a rope around the ice sheet. You can’t build a wall around the ice sheets. It will be a situation that is out of our control."
If you haven't heard Hansen before, it's not surprising. The Bush administration has been censoring him for the past five years. Even as he did this interview, a NASA representative had to be present to tape the interviews. It was probably an intimidation effort, but it didn't stop Hansen from laying out the truth.
At lunch today, a salesman that calls on me brought up the issue, and I could tell that the episode had a profound effect on what he thought about global warming. Hopefully, he's not alone.
Look, global warming is the greatest threat facing not just the United States, but the entire world, and we need to take the lead on this issue. We're not doing that, in fact, we're a big fat anchor slowing down the rest of the world's efforts. It's got to change, and it looks like the only way to do that is to elect more Democrats, or at least, smarter republicans, because the guys running the show right now are never going to lift a finger to stop this impending disaster.
Actually, I sometimes wonder if global warming is responsible for this administration's economic policies. After all, your children won't have to pay for our current debt if they're dead, now will they.
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