Environment key in 2016 national elections
I love my grandchildren and you probably love yours as well, if you’re lucky enough to be blessed with a wonderful family. I care about what their future may look like, which is why I’m worried about this election.
We must become better stewards of the earth. There have been 11 record-setting hottest months in a row and the arctic ice cover is melting at an alarming rate.
There are more clear indications that something dramatic is taking place. For those who say that temperatures have changed before, here is an amusing, but scientifically accurate chart, covering 20,000 BCE to the present, marked with historical events to provide some scale. (http://xkcd.com/1732/) This chart over the past 22, 000 years has been compared to a hockey stick because the rise has been so sudden. This version provides three scenarios on where the temperatures go from here and it depends entirely on what we do as inhabitants of our beautiful planet. We do not have time to waste.
National Parks are America’s best idea. Our national forests, our state parks, state forests and other wildlands all play a role in moderating climate change because of the trees and other plant cover.
Our public lands also offer places for us to enjoy and are the “Real America.” The vast majority of Americans agree that protecting our public lands is important. For local proof, 75 percent of Florida voters approved a constitutional amendment to use money from fees to buy and maintain public land in our state. But the Republican platform includes provisions to sell off public lands. Once it’s gone, we’ll never get it back.
Right now Koch Industries is staking claims just outside our fabulous Grand Canyon Park to mine for uranium. The mining would ruin the whole area and the Colorado River that runs through the park would carry their toxic waste.
Donald Trump says climate change is a hoax and would dismantle the Paris Accord on climate change. He also wants to dig more coal, drill for more oil and frack for more gas, which all have devastating environmental consequences, instead of looking forward to renewable energy sources.
It’s not just tree huggers like me that are alarmed about the threat to our planet. Pope Francis, said, “God gave us a bountiful garden, but we have turned it into a polluted wasteland...” Three-hundred-seventy-five scientists, many Nobel Laureates, wrote an open letter warning about Trump and climate change.
Because of our grandchildren and their children, the environmental issues are the most important issue in this upcoming election. At the end of this election cycle no matter who wins, both Trump and Clinton will continue to be rich elites. Lobbyists will still be plying their trade, and big corporations will still have enormous influence. But this year is different. And not because the Republican candidate calls climate change a hoax and his party’s denialism. What’s new is Democrats are going on the offense.
Climate action is a prominent plank in the Democratic Party platform. They’ve made the stakes clear: A vote for Hillary Clinton is a vote for planet Earth.
One last issue: Vote NO on Florida's Amendment 1 for Solar. Unlike Amendment 4 in the primaries, which 73 percent of the voters approved, this one is sponsored by utility monopolies to protect their shareholders and would make it more difficult and more expensive for people to add solar energy sources on their houses, in parking lots and elsewhere. The wording is confusing, but vote no.
Ginny Stibolt, who lives in Clay County, holds a master’s of science in botany and is the author “Sustainable Gardening for Florida”(Florida Press 2013) and “The Art of Maintaining a Florida Native Landscape”(Florida Press 2015) and co-author of two other books with Melissa Contreras and Marjorie Shropshire. She lives in Green Cove Springs.
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