On Climate Change, Environmental Groups Want Obama to Reverse Troubled Bush Legacy

Most people seem to think the economic crisis means we can't afford to be green, but reality is the opposite. What the triple crisis of finance, peak oil, and environment tell us is that we have to transition to a very different kind of society (everywhere) NOT built on cheap, non-renewable, dirty energy, and this transition will be facilitated ironically by bad times combined with governmental vision. Carbon credits generated from dirty industries will provide incentives for getting cleaner and exploring clean green alternatives, and their best destination is not just conservation but profit-and -job generating rehabilitation of the many damaged landscapes now out there, at home and abroad. Preventive health care, education, employment, environmental training will go a long way towards making peace with the bottom billion now furious about their marginalization, undermining a source of terrorism as well as environmental destruction. And this is the US's chance to become a true world leader respected by most, and envied by the rest. The 'hot, flat, crowed' world is upon us, and fate has handed us a momentous exit opportunity--lets hope Obama's up to the challenge. It may rock your world and mine, but we have only one, and its hurting.

Dr. Duncan Earle of TX 4:17PM December 15, 2008