Commentary

Bossange: We all need to be climate activists now

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by Josh LeClair, via Flickr

by John Bossange

By now everyone knows that “climate change” encompasses global warming, and not only refers to the long term shifts in our weather patterns, but also to a broader range of changes that are happening to our planet. Unless you were asleep this summer there is no need to document the devastating impacts that our warmer planet has had on human life everywhere. Millions of people died or are now starving, and millions more have become refugees fleeing areas of the planet now uninhabitable, for countries with more stable environments. Even here in Vermont, the summer heat dome was oppressive, the rains and floods epic, and the physical, emotional, and economic impacts were life changing for many.

It’s time we all accept the science that tells us that human beings are the cause of climate change. Burning coal, oil and gas, manufacturing goods, cutting down forests, using fossil fuels for transportation, to produce food, to power our buildings and homes, and rampant consumerism are all human activities driven by our way of life and expected conveniences with destructive consequences.

Decades of scientific research tells us that burning fossil fuels produces carbon dioxide and nitrous oxide. Deforestation removes trees that absorb CO2 from the atmosphere. The carbon stored in the trees is released back into the atmosphere. Cows and sheep produce massive amounts of methane when they digest their food. Fertilizers containing nitrogen produce nitrous oxide emissions. Fluorinated gasses are emitted from the equipment that produces these gasses, and these emissions have a powerful warming effect, far greater than CO2. Given all the evidence compiled over the decades, only a fool would deny the science now.

We must recognize that “climate deniers” and the skeptics are following the lies and fake news generated and distributed by fossil fuel companies into multiple media platforms and now, unfortunately, codified by the Republican Party’s Energy Bill, HR1. Too many people have been tricked into believing that there is no conclusive evidence that climate change is happening, that any changes in temperature are part of a natural cycle, that climate change and more C02 is good for the environment, that climate change is not that big of a problem and that we are overreacting, that making cuts in greenhouse gas emissions as recommended by scientists and the IPCC are too large, and too expensive, and that we have time to make less drastic reductions. Like the tobacco companies from the past, the fossil fuel companies of today know they are wrong and to date have not admitted that.

Yet, major US banks like Wells Fargo, JP Morgan, Citi Bank, and the Bank of America continue to finance ExxonMobil, Shell, BP, Chevron, ConocoPhillips, and other fossil fuel companies with billions of dollars for research, exploration, and most importantly for lobbying and marketing. Quietly and very effectively they have encouraged the global conspiracy theories that contend scientists and institutions involved in global warming research are engaged in a manipulative hoax, that global warming is a multi-billion dollar world-wide industry created by fanatically anti-industrial environmentalists, that climate change is a hoax created by leftist radicals more interested in socialist ideology, that too many people have invested in renewable energy companies and stand to lose billions if global warming is shown to be a myth, that environmental groups have bribed scientists so they are able to secure their financial investments in green energy, and that the threat of global warming is done just to promote nuclear power.

So how do we stay focused and act on the truth verified by climate science? We have a warming earth and in a very short time it will be uninhabitable for human life. The answer begins with actively promoting science, and believing that we can solve the crisis we created. But most important, we all need to become climate activists, challenging the propaganda and lies promoting the fake climate news.

Being a climate activist also means bringing our overly consumptive lifestyle to a pause to put economic pressure on those companies who profit from overproduction and our desire to buy so much stuff. Surely we can do with less. We must not see the GNP as the only indicator of a successful economy. That measure has been the primary driver that reinforces our overconsumption and companies to overproduce. New indicators need to include our reduced carbon footprint measured by less shopping, and less use of fossil fuels.

Big oil, coal, and gas stand to lose billions of dollars with the truth. Their lies and cover up about the true impact of fossil fuel emissions and the fear they have created about the economic fallout from green energy have put the planet on a death spiral as they earn their short term profits. Wouldn’t it be encouraging to see the banks require these companies to make massive investments in the transition to green energy? Certainly, the bankers and the executives know the truth, and they know how to make common sense and profitable investments in wind, solar, hydro, and battery development. As activists, it’s our job to confront them to do so, now.

Time is getting short for humanity. Our life styles, cultural norms, and expectations must change. The world-renowned environmentalist Bill McKibben gives us until the year 2030 to reduce our carbon footprint by 50% to meet the goals set by the international Paris Climate Agreement. And even if we do that within the next six years, the sacrifices needed to reduce our climate warming activities will be a painful adjustment but provide a long-term legacy and satisfying generational commitment to our children and grandchildren.

We need to give the earth a chance to repair itself. That means not only being tireless advocates for science, challenging the climate deniers and confronting the corporate liars, but also pausing our way of living filled with so many conveniences supported and powered by the causes of the climate crisis.

What choice do we have? Our time is getting short. We all need to be climate activists now.

The author is a retired middle school principal and resident of South Burlington.

Categories: Commentary

17 replies »

  2. Not too many humans around 15,000 years ago when glaciers covered most of Ohio and then slowly receded as the climate warmed. Climate alarmists are the new ” religious fanatics’ ” who will use their new religion to chip away at the rights of all people.

    • Thank you sebastianiam for pointing out obvious facts of nature the religious zealots never understand. The Laurentide Ice Sheet is what carved out VT’s beautiful mountains and valleys. It was in that timeframe of 10,000-13,000 years ago that our beautiful lake was then the Champlain Sea. Very few inhabitants of the state realize what this area was like only 15k years ago for a planet that is 4.5b years old. That would be 15k years before the invention of the planet killing plastic straw. Can humans cause harm to nature and pollute? Absolutely! Can we change the climate of the entire planet? Absolutely not!

      I wonder if Obama’s ocean front property on Martha’s Vineyard is still above water. Just curious.

  3. The Climate Change Agenda is a scam, a hoax, a fraud. It is the new religion, a cult, that is being used as a political tool to chip away the middle-class, to destroy our Nation, to bring it into submission with the New World Order. America’s values, it’s Constitution and way of life needs to be destroyed in order for the Global Reset to be achieved world-wide. EV’s, solar panels, wind turbines, all of it, is a scam, it is subsidized with our tax money, which is being used against us. Remember WEF’s motto “you will own nothing and be happy”. Don’t forget, meat is bad, so is dairy, so are eggs, instead you will “eat the bugs”!

    Check out this video from the Epoch Times: Official Website: NoFarmersNoFood.com

    God’s Word: The Signs of the Times and End of the Age

    Matthew 24:4-8 And Jesus answered and said to them: “Take heed that no one deceives you. 5 For many will come in My name, saying, ‘I am the Christ,’ and will deceive many. 6 And you will hear of wars and rumors of wars. See that you are not troubled; for all these things must come to pass, but the end is not yet. 7 For nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom. And there will be famines, pestilences, and earthquakes in various places. 8 All these are the beginning of sorrows.

  4. Regarding “the science that tells us that human beings are the cause of climate change”, a couple of recent analyses raise some key problems. First, a recent paper found that 40% of the recorded warming since 1850 is due to more weather stations in urban areas (https://www.mdpi.com/2225-1154/11/9/179). And second, a statistician examined the IPCC claim of a 95% probability that at least half of the earth’s warming since 1950 was man-made. He discovered that they had in fact simply inverted the null hypothesis of a 5% probability that /less/ than half was man-made (https://www.thegwpf.org/content/uploads/2023/09/Fenton-Bayes.pdf). That’s a huge error. It was a fallacy to claim a 95% probability that at least half of the earth’s warming since 1950 was man-made, let alone all of it, as John Bossange implies.

  5. Regarding “the science that tells us that human beings are the cause of climate change”, a couple of recent analyses raise some key problems. First, a recent paper found that 40% of the recorded warming since 1850 is due to more weather stations in urban areas ([mdpi com] 2225-1154/11/9/179). And second, a statistician examined the IPCC claim of a 95% probability that at least half of the earth’s warming since 1950 was man-made. He discovered that they had in fact simply inverted the null hypothesis of a 5% probability that /less/ than half was man-made ([thegwpf org] content/uploads/2023/09/Fenton-Bayes.pdf). That’s a huge error. It was a fallacy to claim a 95% probability that at least half of the earth’s warming since 1950 was man-made, let alone all of it, as John Bossange implies.

  6. This is Very good .

    Documentary from some time ago .

    May be worth your Time ,

    Thanks Pastor Ed .

    Video was inside his link

    https://rumble.com/v39uii8-un-conventional.html

    1 month ago
    78.6K
    Introducing the Unfinished Third Geoengineering Film of Michael J. Murphy
    UNconventional Grey
    By Elana Freeland
    August 2023

    The unfinished third documentary UNconventional Grey by Michael J. Murphy has been missing in action since 2016, the year Murphy had planned to release it. It is his third film of truth-telling about Geoengineering, the other two being What in the World Are They Spraying? (2010) and Why in the World Are They Spraying? (2012).
    Michael’s targeting began in 2012 just after Why in the World debuted in Los Angeles at the Consciousness Beyond Chemtrails Conference—just as he began organizing for a third film that, unlike his first two films, would not just wake the public up but rally activists around the Aerosol Collection Project while filling in their grasp of how geoengineering entails crimes against humanity because of an operating agenda for global political power. The objective of the character assassination Michael was subjected to by the usual federally protected perpetrators and “insider” trusted colleagues was about preventing the production of his third documentary UNconventional Grey. Michael managed to rally from the post-2012 assault and to all but complete UNconventional Grey before yet another, even more brutal assault began at the same time that a remarkably similar assault began on the great Canadian activist Suzanne Maher who was spreading chemtrails awareness billboards across Ontario.
    And here we are, seven years late and minus a final edit and public debut. UNconventional Grey is now available. We can now hear the thoughtful testimony of Michael Murphy, Marvin Herndon, Patrick Wood, Scott Stevens, Allan Buckmann, Max Bliss, David Lewis, Ed Griffin, Princess Basma Saud of Saudi Arabia, Rosa Koire, Cynthia McKinney, myself, etc. Rosa Koire is now dead (May 31, 2021), as is Michael Murphy (July 22, 2020). Both Michael and Rosa were critics of globalism; both died young.
    It is imperative to emphasize that the classified Geoengineering program entailing weather engineering, chemical / electromagnetic engineering, geophysical engineering, directed energy weapons, surveillance and neural engineering, nanotechnology and digital synthetic biology, and hiding and detecting exotic propulsion craft and plasma lifeforms has been run by the CIA under various names since Bernard Eastlund, PhD, was building the powerful ionospheric heater HAARP in Alaska in the 1990s—back when Rosalind Peterson was a California USDA crop inspector and raising her voice against U.S. Navy sonar and the chemical jet trails making a murky cloud cover. In September 2007, Rosalind spoke at the UN 60th Annual DPI/NGO Conference on “Climate Change: How It Impacts Us All.” She died of cancer on February 4, 2018.
    The public is mostly unaware of the danger surrounding classified programs like Geoengineering. Kidnapping, homelessness, accusations of “drug addiction,” internet defamation, murder and mayhem sound decidedly unscientific. Had UNconventional Grey come out in 2016—just four years before the global CV-19 medical / Big Pharma psyop run by the United Nations (UN), World Economic Forum (WEF), and World Health Organization (WHO)—would people have been awake enough to realize what it meant?
    UNconventional Grey builds a picture of how Geoengineering—not the “climate change” cover story—leads straight to the UN “sustainable development” / carbons / Agenda 21 / 2030 master plan. In fact, Geoengineering with all of its political muscle is the price of admission to world government as well as the biggest transfer of wealth to the rich ever.
    Gratitude to the anonymous person who stumbled upon Michael’s third film, thus flinging his vision upon the waters of chance so that we might take courage from it.

    THE WEBSITE does not exist since the movie was never finished.

  7. What is Agenda 2030?

    This all started back in 1972 and a report entitled ‘The Limits To Growth’, by New Hampshire’s Donella Meadows, sponsored by The Club of Rome. Of course, it was Rachel Carson (1962 Silent Spring) and biologist Paul Ehrlich (1968 The Population Bomb) who instigated the movement early on.

    Then, in 1991, The Club of Rome went all in with ‘The First Global Revolution’, the precursor to todays Agenda 2030. As an Epoch Times documentary illustrates, the global elitists (i.e., the World Economic Forum and others) were looking for a straw man to replace the ‘Cold War’ as its raison d’etre. The USSR had collapsed, and some other boogeyman was needed to be the next enemy.

    Consider this quote from ‘The First Global Revolution’ report.

    “In searching for a new enemy to unite us, we came up with the idea that pollution, the threat of global warming, water shortages, famine and the like would fit the bill…. The real enemy, then, is humanity itself.”

    These are the real ‘conspiracy theory’ folks. Watch the Epoch Times documentary.

    https://www.theepochtimes.com/epochtv/nofarmersnofood-5390883?est=7J06w27Ce09ZtmOUuQq20KT9b3n1AjagZfWpg%2BuXGc8XTyLACtXiLU4%3D

    And consider too that the so-called consensus of scientists, previously warning of the climate crises, is coming to its senses. Check out Noble Laureate Dr. John Clauser and the CLINTEL report signed by more than 1600 experts.

    https://clintel.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/08/WCD-version-081423.pdf

    You likely haven’t heard anything about these folks because they are being ‘canceled’ as we speak… just as they are trying to cancel us.

  8. John Bossange, do you have any concern about soil contamination that is happening due to expired windmills, blades, solar panels and EV batteries currently happening? What is your plan for your solar panels and EV batteries when they reach end of life?

  9. There Is No Climate Emergency, Say 500 Experts in Letter to …
    aei.org/carpe-diem/there-is-no-c

    1. Natural as well as anthropogenic factors cause warming. 2. Warming is far slower than predicted. 3. Climate policy relies on inadequate models. 4. CO2 is not a pollutant. It is a plant food…etc.

    That is just one of many many articles by experts. Some say
    this is settled science…. perhaps in their heads it is.
    We saw something recently that says models and data is
    poor and has been cherry picked on when to start the
    temp change chase. Clearly the weather seems unpredictable.
    as we cannot even seem to predict what it is tomorrow.
    Too many alarmists around us scaring our youth to death no wonder so much anxiety among our young. Adults with political motivations are harming our children with no concern.
    Such as, telling them we only have 12 years to live (AOC). Really? I am not saying all is hunky but much of this conversation is probably driven for political power over the
    masses. Lets take a break and enjoy fall in Vermont.

    John Bossange vs 500 experts. The word hoax is used allot in the weather change conversations. Wonder why.

  10. Bless your heart. You resonate with the missionary zeal of a convert awakened to scientific truth With your epiphany you have seen that we are going to carbon–kill our planet and the “stop carbon” gospel needs to be protolyzed. I must admit, however, this is somewhat reminiscent of a 7th Day Adventists’ theological argument: It’s interesting…I’ve no interest in refuting it…and it’s definitely not convincing.

  11. One would would think that someone so convinced that our modern lifestyle is destroying the world would be living off the grid, in a debris shelter, with an outdoor latrine and surviving by hunting/gathering/gardening and not have access to technology such that enables them to submit an article to a digital publication. I’m not aware of anywhere in South Burlington that has zoning such that would allow that. Just thought I’d mention that.

  12. Lack of logical thinking, serious lack of common sense, and no historical knowledge = ignorance. I remember in the 1970’s, Leonard Nimoy (Spock from Star Trek) had a show called In Search of… In 1978 an episode titled “The Coming Ice Age.” By now, we should be iced over, but I guess the science was off? In the 1980’s, it was “No Nukes” because nuclear energy was going to kill us all and destroy the planet (not to mention what the nuclear weapons could do.) However, the nuke plants still operate and more nuclear weapons are in more hands (Uranium One?). Then, it was global warming, which then morphed into the ad nauseam Chicken Little chant of “climate change.” The problem with believing this progagandized, politicized, monetized, fairytale is the folks at the UN/WEF/WHO/IMF are reaping and profiting greatly from the most ignorant, naive, and corrupted within mankind. The entire evil empire is coming down and taking a great many of these pitiful activists down into the pits of Hell with them…sad but True.

    • That’s a great point Melissa as this all started with the wildly inaccurate prediction of the Population Bomb. Followed by….

      The next ice age
      Acid rain
      Hole in the ozone layer
      The green house effect
      The rain forests
      Global warming
      Climate change
      Weather weirding
      Climate emergency
      Climate Armageddon…….

      Which all leads to eco-anxiety for the ill-informed.

  13. Everything changes….old Vermont saying…IF YOU DON,T LIKE THE WEATHER WAIT A MINUTE AND IT WILL CHANGE….or something like that….NAME ONE THING THAT NEVER CHANGES….please