Alberta, February-febrero 2006
17
ALTERNATIVA Latinoamericana
ENGLISH SECTION
The earth is experiencing "massive and ongoing
changes in our climate" and "humans are playing a major
role in causing these changes." So writes Dr. Paul R.
Epstein, associate director of the Center for Health and
Global Environment at Harvard Medical School, in the
October 6 New England Journal of Medicine. "Given the
current rate of carbon dioxide buildup and the projected
degree of global warming, we are entering uncharted
seas," he warns.
Carbon dioxide is the most important of the
"greenhouse gases," which trap heat when released into
the atmosphere. According to Dr. Epstein, unprecedented
temperature elevations are having previously
unimaginable consequences. These include an
accelerating melting of polar ice caps; higher than
average heat waves that kill tens of thousands of people;
a fourfold increase in the prevalence of asthma in the
U.S. over the past 20 years; and the life-draining
"bleaching" of coral reefs, key to marine ecosystems. Dr.
Epstein's comments summarize the findings of the United
Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change
(IPCC), formed in 1988 and comprising over 2,000
scientists from 100 countries.
In 2001, the IPCC issued a report strongly indicting
human activity in the heating of the earth. Numerous
scientists and scientific bodies, including the World
Meteorological Organization and the National Academy
of Sciences, had come to this conclusion years, even
decades, earlier. (The first person known to advance the
theory of global warming due to carbon dioxide
emissions was Swedish chemist Svante Arrhenius in
1896 -- and that's not a typo.) But the IPCC statement
was a benchmark in the consolidation of an
acknowledged scientific consensus.
Carbon dioxide arises from breathing. But the
human-induced greenhouse effect results from
economics, not physiology. About three-quarters of the
greenhouse CO2 derives from modern industry's
combustion of coal and oil, and from widespread
automobile use. The remainder is due to the destruction
of forests, which act as a natural "sponge" for CO2.
It is thus unsurprising that the energy industry has
kicked into overdrive to counter growing public
awareness of the dangers of global warming. It is
bankrolling a handful of pro-industry scientists to be its
voice -- along with Democratic and Republican
politicians, as always. Thanks largely to these efforts, the
U.S. government stands as the world's leading opponent
of efforts to combat the crisis.
Capitalism: cause of the problem,
and obstacle to its solution.
Class-conscious corporate leaders
understand clearly that a movement to save the planet is
a potent challenge to their "right" to plunder for profit.
Recalling tobacco industry misdeeds, a few scientists
have accepted millions of dollars from companies like
Exxon to publicly exonerate the polluters. They argue that
science is still in the dark on the issue, long after plenty of
light has been shed. There is no reason, they say, to halt
business as usual. These scientists-for-hire typically try to
refute the notion of global warming by asserting that many
spots on earth are cooling.
Global climate is nothing if not complicated, with a
host of factors interacting with each other in ways
scientists are barely coming to understand. It's a carefully
documented fact that, on average, surface temperatures
on and over the land and sea are rising. But, at the same
time, areas of the ocean can be cooled by the melting of
glaciers and polar ice caps. And the atmosphere can be
cooled by volcanic activity and by the release of
chloroflourocarbons (CFCs), both of which can create
hazes that reflect sunlight back away from the earth.
(Paradoxically, the ozone-depleting CFCs also contribute
to overall global warming.)
On the other hand, in some liberal and
environmentalist circles where the planet's climate crisis
is accepted as reality, it is fashionable to blame the
"lifestyle" of North Americans. We drive too much and air-
condition and heat our homes too wantonly. But this
mode of living is not the result of any significant
democratic decision-making on the part of working
people. Is it "lifestyle" to accept an air-polluting factory job
when that's the only good job around? And without
efficient mass transit, automobiles may be the only
effective way to get to work.
The overindulged consumption of fossil fuels
emanates from decisions made behind the scenes by
large corporations and their government mouthpieces.
They operate according to a single law: maximize profit.
As such, they treat the planet as one large latrine. And, to
get away with it, they oppose any resistance.
The case of professors Michael Mann, Raymond
Bradley, and Malcolm Hughes, whose work was a major
foundation of the IPCC's 2001 report, is an example. The
three are the subjects of an investigatory witch-hunt by
Texas Republican Joe Barton, the chairman of the
Energy and Commerce Committee of the House of
Representatives. In 2004, Barton collected more than
$200,000 in campaign donations from the oil and gas
industry and the electrical utility industry.
The "global warming denialists," as they are
sometimes called, also reject the international Kyoto
Protocol on restricting the release of greenhouse gases.
Kyoto opponents include President Bush and fellow
Republican James Inhofe, chair of the Senate
Environment and Public Works Committee. Inhofe
declared that the science of global warming is "the
greatest hoax ever perpetrated on the American people."
Political and business opportunism.
But by now, sections of the ruling class have
decided that denying global warming is going too far for
the public to accept, and are adopting other tactics.
Democrats Clinton and Gore glowed green when they
backed Kyoto, but they were also instrumental in making
it toothless. They helped establish its three main escape
clauses for the advanced capitalist countries: the right to
purchase additional emission allowances from other
countries; the right to loosen their own emission caps by
providing new technology to underdeveloped countries;
and the placing of high caps on developing countries.
Scientists estimate that greenhouse emissions
must be reduced by 50 to 70 % from current levels to
stabilize the planet's environment. But Clinton and Gore
supported Kyoto's virtually meaningless goal of cutting a
mere 10%, over several years, of what's needed.
Meanwhile, beginning around 1999, a few oil
companies started to abandon an Exxon-dominated
pseudoscience front group called the Global Climate
Coalition. BP Amoco and Shell helped form the Business
Environmental Leadership Council, announcing that they
"accept the views of most scientists" about global
warming. Their strategy is to advocate voluntary caps on
emissions. The Pentagon, for its part, is studying how
climate change will affect its approach to "protecting
national security." NASA even provides educational
materials about global warming on its website. And
several U.S. and Canadian entrepreneurs are already
anticipating hitting the jackpot when enough of the Arctic
has melted for them to build ports for holiday cruises.
End private ownership of energy!
Advanced capitalist countries are the biggest
polluters. Yet the crisis is felt most deeply in poor
countries. Industrialized countries emit about 90 percent
of the greenhouse gases, and the U.S. is the leading
offender. With a mere 4 percent of the globe's population,
it spews about 25 percent of the atmospheric pollutants. It
accounts for 25 percent of the world's total consumption
of fossil fuels; about 25 percent of this is military-related.
But under-industrialized countries are most at risk
because they lack a protective infrastructure, including
early warning systems and adequate public health
facilities. An astounding 96 percent of all deaths from
natural disasters occur in underdeveloped countries.
The solution to the crisis must begin with the goal of
"halting the extraction, mining, transport, refining, and
combustion of fossil fuels," says Dr. Epstein. But with solar
and wind power and other renewable sources accounting
for only 1 percent of U.S. energy investment, there is little
reason to expect the corporations to abandon a fossil-fuel
economy any time soon.
Socialists stand for the survival of humanity and we
defend the rights of the most oppressed. We oppose the
relentless drive for profits because it threatens all of life.
Decisions about energy production and consumption
must be made by those who have no interest in enriching
a tiny minority of the world's population at everyone else's
expense. To accomplish this, the narrow, private, and
undemocratic economic interests of the energy
corporations must be taken entirely out of the equation.
This can occur only if they are nationalized under the
democratic control of workers and working farmers.
This is an idea worth warming up to.
Steven Strauss ( Freedom Socialist)
Global warming:
sacrificing
tomorrow for today's profits
Even without a
majority
Harper can still dismantle,
de-regulate, and quietly
undermine Canadian
standards.
There was an almost audible sigh of relief in many
parts of the country when Stephen Harper was denied a
majority government. After all, how much damage can
even an earnest right-wing ideologue do with only a slim
minority?
Sadly, quite a bit.
First, Harper effectively has a majority for at least a
year, since no party will be ready to face him in an
election. Of course, he'll tread carefully during this period,
since his eye is on winning a majority.
He's discovered that the most effective way to sell
unbridled capitalism is to camouflage it.
Still, Harper can do a lot of damage to Canada's
relatively progressive social and political systems without
entering into any high-profile battles in Parliament.
George W Bush accomplished much of his agenda
by appointing right-wing radicals who rolled back
progressive regulations governing the environment, food
and drug inspections and the legal system.
Harper could do the same. His government could,
as business has been urging, adopt US drug and
biotechnology testing, dismantle plans to meet our Kyoto
targets, and ease up on environmental regulations,
particularly those that could stall development of Alberta's
oil sands Washington's key hope for reducing its Middle
East oil dependency.
Harper could also press forward with ongoing talks
aimed at integrating Canada more with the US, and could
sign an energy-sharing deal ensuring Washington even
greater access to our energy.
There is also a lot Harper could do to weaken
medicare, without taking a direct shot at the Canada
Health Act. He could allow private medicine to flourish.
Indeed, his promise of a "wait-time guarantee" for health
care will deliver patients into the arms of private health
providers.
Until now, Canada has managed to resist some of
the worst aspects of the right-wing tide of Thatcherism
and Reaganism that swept Britain and the US despite
vigorous efforts here by corporate-funded organizations to
push us down the same path.
Harper has been in the thick of those organizations,
serving as head of the anti-medicare National Citizens
Coalition. Back in 1989, he urged the Reform Party to
become "a modern Canadian version of the Thatcher-
Reagan phenomenon."
He doesn't talk like that now. Like other
sophisticated right wingers, he's discovered that the most
effective way to sell unbridled capitalism is to camouflage
it.
At a conference in Vancouver last fall, medicare
opponents openly discussed how to repackage their
message to make it more palatable to Canadians. As the
Star's Thomas Walkom reported, one privatization guru
told the crowd they'd have more success selling private
medicine if they pitched it, not as a way for the affluent to
jump the queue, but as a way to "strengthen" medicare.
If Harper keeps his views wrapped in the garb of
moderation, he'll have a good shot at winning a majority.
And then our unique Canadian social system, preserved
against great odds, will be in the hands of a man who's
devoted much of his life to figuring out how to destroy it.
Linda McQuaig (Straight Goods)