Can Internet Users Alter Public Policy on Climate Change?
This year, Earth Day is April 22nd.
An author and blogger by the name of Philip Harris in Maine has come up with the idea of circulating his "OPEN LETTER TO WORLD LEADER ON GLOBAL WARMING" throughout the internet to try to get users to flex their email muscles. His plan is to ask internet users to send his letter, or one of their own, to policy makers on April 22nd and to show decision makers the extent of worldwide concern over the issue of and support of the UN's recent IPCC report regarding global warming.
Mr. Harris' letter has been featured in the on-line newspaper, The American Chronicle where he is regular contributor. It also appears on his blog, http://philipharris.blog.com and has been run on numerous blogger web sites and Ezines.
Mr. Harris said that," response to the letter on climate change has been excellent. In just a few short days the letter on the Chronicle received over 4,000 views. Comments to the letter on various blog sites have also been very supportive with only a few negative comments like global warming is a myth and a government plot to take over the world." He went on to say that he will circulate the letter and this release to internet groups in the hope that they also will pass it along to other groups so that views will grow exponentially. "This could be the environmental shot heard around the world," he added and he urged forward thing media to help publicize the effort by running this release. The letter he wrote is as follows:
AN OPEN LETTER TO LEADERS OF THE WORLD ON GLOBAL CLIMATE CHANGE
The debate is over can we get to work now? The UN report on climate change should put a lot of issues to rest and perhaps even silence the censors of the scientific community. The bottom line, this planet is in trouble. Even if we all act now we will are going to experience major climate change. Anyone with a rational mind has known this for decades. We, humans, are causing change and those changes are not going to be very positive for many unless we deal with the problem in a positive way now!
Time is not on our side. What we have sown, we shall reap. The question is do we want to keep planting the same polluted seeds and make matters even more dire? It is unfortunate that most people and governments seem to need a calamity before they will act to solve a problem. Can we afford to wait for another climatic catastrophe before we get our act together? How many will have to die in some weather disaster before we believe what the leading scientists of the world are telling us?
The White House said that they are considering the information but see no change forthcoming in policy. How arrogant! Will the weather killing field have to strike even more on U.S. shores before our so-called leaders wake up? Katrina wasn't enough so what will it take? We cannot afford not to act because the cost of potential and probable disaster will far exceed any cost to address greenhouse gas emissions now. Retrofit is always more costly than building from the ground up. Exxon's recent profit statement makes it obvious that money is available from the oil giants to tackle the pressing issues now. What good are record profits without a world to spend them in? Can we truly afford to wait for governments to 'study' the findings and then take years to debate the facts? We are near, if not already past, the climatic tipping point. If the climate begins to spiral out of control, nothing we do will stop it for generation upon generation to come. That, of course, assumes there will even be generations. We have the technology to make change now. Setting standards that will not be met for ten or twenty years will be too late.
Look at the rate of industrialization in China. They are using the very technologies that got us into this mess in the first place. Add Africa and Asia to the mix and we are really in deep trouble if we do not halt the use of greenhouse emitting technologies now. The world cannot afford another industrial revolution unless it is based on renewable and non polluting energy sources.
The citizens of the U.S. and the world must demand immediate action on the parts of their respective governments to end the polluting madness. We are talking about our lives and those of our children and grandchildren. This issue is not some distant event. This issue is now!
Related Tags: policy, internet, un, climate change, ipcc, earth day
Mr. Harris was born in Massachusetts. He attended The American University in Washington, D.C. and received his degree in Political Science. His graduate work was done at the University of Northern Colorado and Howard University. While in D.C., he spent several years working for local and regional government agencies. Upon moving to Maine he worked with three governors and served as the Assistant Director of the Maine State Planning Office. He worked on a White House Task Force for the development of a National Rural Policy and later served as Rural Policy Coordinator at the Federal Regional Council of New England. He has worked on gubernatorial and senatorial political campaigns and currently works in Special Education.
Mr. Harris is co-author of the novel WAKING GOD and is a nationally syndicated and featured writer for The American Chronicle. He is working on Book II of the Waking God trilogy and writing features for literary E-zines. His second novel, A MAINE CHRISTMAS CAROL has been released by Cambridge Books. Contributing writer for UPI's Religion&Spirituality web site.
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