What about deaths from cold weather? What about deaths from snow and rain on slippery roads. Do not forget the occasional lightning strike or forest fire. And do not forget normal deaths :one in 80 dies from natural causes every year.. This is tragic!
Kudos to Michael for focusing on what is clearly a devastating human problem and placing it is the context of the incessant hyperbole concerning climate. Growing up in the USA we see ads advertising sugar, nicotine, alcohol, and rich fatty foods. We grow old seeing ads for diabetes, cancer, weight loss, etc. The objective of wealth creation drowns out all others. The same has been true with respect to carbon emissions. Trillions of dollars have been generated by emitting carbon and now trillions are generated by managing the climatic consequences of emissions on climate, it as if that were entirely under our control. No large interest group and no national wealth creation comes from stopping drug commerce. Some might argue that, actually, while drugs destroy lives, by and large they continue to drive our national economy in fundamental ways. It is therefore an uphill fight.
Thank you for your powerful analysis, Michael. In addition, I believe that the drug problem includes untreated addictions to nicotine and alcohol. Both nicotine and alcohol serve as "gateway drugs" to more powerful drugs for a vulnerable fraction of the population. Furthermore, based on first-hand observations, the vulnerable population includes those with untreated mental depression who are self-medicating. At age 57, my father died of alcoholism. As a nation, we were supposed to take the funds that previously were utilized for insane asylums and fund community-based mental health programs. That has not happened. One recent result near where I live was the killing of San Luis Obispo, CA Police Detective Luca Benedetti by a mentally ill man named Eddie Giron armed with an assault rifle. My wife heard the gun battle.
Michael: Yes, climate is not the touted "existential threat" of our lives. But, there are no deaths that can be directly attributed to global warming... Zero. The propaganda of climate-related natural disasters being death threats has no scientific basis.
What about deaths from cold weather? What about deaths from snow and rain on slippery roads. Do not forget the occasional lightning strike or forest fire. And do not forget normal deaths :one in 80 dies from natural causes every year.. This is tragic!
Kudos to Michael for focusing on what is clearly a devastating human problem and placing it is the context of the incessant hyperbole concerning climate. Growing up in the USA we see ads advertising sugar, nicotine, alcohol, and rich fatty foods. We grow old seeing ads for diabetes, cancer, weight loss, etc. The objective of wealth creation drowns out all others. The same has been true with respect to carbon emissions. Trillions of dollars have been generated by emitting carbon and now trillions are generated by managing the climatic consequences of emissions on climate, it as if that were entirely under our control. No large interest group and no national wealth creation comes from stopping drug commerce. Some might argue that, actually, while drugs destroy lives, by and large they continue to drive our national economy in fundamental ways. It is therefore an uphill fight.
Thank you for your powerful analysis, Michael. In addition, I believe that the drug problem includes untreated addictions to nicotine and alcohol. Both nicotine and alcohol serve as "gateway drugs" to more powerful drugs for a vulnerable fraction of the population. Furthermore, based on first-hand observations, the vulnerable population includes those with untreated mental depression who are self-medicating. At age 57, my father died of alcoholism. As a nation, we were supposed to take the funds that previously were utilized for insane asylums and fund community-based mental health programs. That has not happened. One recent result near where I live was the killing of San Luis Obispo, CA Police Detective Luca Benedetti by a mentally ill man named Eddie Giron armed with an assault rifle. My wife heard the gun battle.
Michael: Yes, climate is not the touted "existential threat" of our lives. But, there are no deaths that can be directly attributed to global warming... Zero. The propaganda of climate-related natural disasters being death threats has no scientific basis.
Los Angeles Ecopolitics Columnist