The charge of radicalism is the default response by many Republicans to any substantive climate action. Regarding Biden administration climate policies, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell recently claimed: “Democrats say your financial pain is the necessary cost to make America more to the liking of the radical environmental left.”
But George W. Bush’s treasury secretary, Henry Paulson, who calls climate change the single biggest risk to the global economy, is not a part of the radical environmental left.
Nor are members of Freddie Mac’s Economic and Housing Research group, which reported: “(R)ising sea levels and spreading flood plains … appear likely to destroy billions of dollars in property and to displace millions of people. The economic losses and social disruption may happen gradually, but they are likely to be greater in total than those experienced in the housing crisis and Great Recession.”
And consider that a 2020 report by the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission concludes: “A world wracked by frequent and devastating shocks from climate change cannot sustain the fundamental conditions supporting our financial system.”
It’s essential that politicians recognize that the economy is a subset of nature and work to protect it. We depend on the natural world not only for a suitable climate, but also for clean water, pollination, fisheries, timber production, soil conservation, flood control and much more.
What’s radical is that, as climate scientist Bill Collins puts it, “We’re running an uncontrolled experiment on the only home we have.”
Terry Hansen
Sparta
Intent
matters
A response to Jack Ayoub. Your letter is interesting, but misses the point. Simply saying “A rifle is a rifle” (July 10) is a fact, but lacks context.
Airplanes are meant to get passengers from one place to another safely and quickly. They are not meant to fall from the sky or be flown into buildings. The former is a failure, the latter an act of terrorism.
A knife is mainly meant as a tool to help cooks in their meal preparation. If someone stabs someone with a knife, they are not using it for its intended use. A baseball bat is meant as a way to hit a ball, as part of a game. Again, if it is used in an assault, its true purpose is being perverted.
What is the purpose of a rifle, handgun or other firearm? To maim or kill something or someone. And when massacres occur, what is the weapon of choice? Often it’s a military-grade rifle that can shoot multiple projectiles very quickly and efficiently.
Your argument harks back to the western classic Shane,” where Alan Ladd’s character says that a gun is just a tool, just like any other, and it can be used for good or bad. But that tool has only one use: punching holes in something until it is dead.
I disagree that there is no answer, and that we just need to accept the status quo. The U.S. is unique in the First World in gun violence. It is time for us to stop accepting what we see as inevitable, and try to find a better way forward.
Jerry Schramm
Harlingen
