History and nature are on a collision course. And we are trapped at ground zero.
As the signals from the climate become excruciatingly urgent, the Bush administration turns its back on the challenge, the U.S. press remains in denial, and the environmental establishment agonizes over its own relevance. All the while, we are, as the British paper The Independent put it, sleepwalking into the Apocalypse.
What on earth is a person supposed to do?
The existential choices are few and barren. We can try to find a safe haven in, say, New Zealand -- but there's no escaping a global threat. We can defy a history of futility and try, yet again, to appeal to the humanitarian instincts of ExxonMobil and Peabody Energy. We can go into hibernation for four more years. Or we can try, as individuals and organizations, to bring the U.S. in line with the rest of the world.
That's what a small group is attempting with today's launch of a nationwide signature-gathering drive for a People's Ratification of the Kyoto Global Warming Treaty. Last year, longtime New York-area activists Ted Glick, Connie Hogarth, and the Rev. Paul Mayer put together the Climate Crisis Coalition, an umbrella group that includes environmentalists, religious leaders, campus organizers, peace groups, and activists working on indigenous rights, environmental justice, and human-rights issues.
Every signature makes a difference. Put yours to work. Then send this information on to everyone in your address book. Our very lives depend on it.
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