In an interview with Meredith Viera today on the Today Show, Al Gore assigned some of the responsibility for this to the media. His analogy was based on the fact that there are still a few people who think the world is flat, but the media does not go hunt them up in an effort to be fair and balanced in their coverage.

To a limited extent, I agree with Gore. When this style of reporting present two differing views, and there is factual evidence to say that one view is correct while the other view in merely uninformed blathering, then the role of professional journalism must be to point that out.  That is why we have "investigative" journalists.

But that does not get to the real reasons. Part of the blame must go to the way that environmental organizations have framed the issues surrounding our climate crisis and the nature of the actions that they have taken.

Most of the time, we are presented with doomsday scenarios; rising waters flooding coastal areas, tropical diseases in new places, shifting rainfall patters wiping out agriculture.  In the face of these everyone feels uncomfortable, guilty, unable to have any control over our future. The reactions are predictable.  Some will protest, others will deny.  Denial allows you to continue feeling comfortable, protest allows you to not feel guilty.  Neither does anything to provide the sense that you have any control over your future.

A report released jointly today by the Center for a New American Security and Center for Strategic and International Studies labels Climate Change as a major threat to national security and to peace.  It underscores the implications of the Nobel Committee giving the Peace Prize (not a scientific award) to Gore and the IPCC.

We need to begin by recognizing that the facts are not being present to the public.  When the Lieberman / Warner sponsored America's Climate Security Act gets mentioned, it may get reported on, analyzed, but few ever tells you that this would implement a policy that has already not been successful in the EU.  So far, the only political organization to go that far had been the Green Party.

In a press release today, the Green Party US said made this a major point.

Greens have called recent legislation on global warming, such as the Lieberman-Warner bill, inadequate and corporate-friendly.  The Lieberman-Warner bill's free emissions allowances and the use of carbon offsets to enable polluting companies meet emissions targets will delay the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions.  The European Union, which grants and enforces carbon trading permits, has failed to reduce emissions

Democratic hopeful Barak Obama, like most of the other presidential candidates, is making a big deal of cap and trade. Without access to all of that Corporate Money, Greens are free to tell the truth.

On the Republican side, global warming seems to be a major divide among their contenders with John McCain appearing to be the only major candidate who takes it seriously.

It is time that Americans move beyond protest to taking direct action on Climate Change.  It is evident that Washington will not do much more than posture and compromise.  If we are to have control over our own future we need to start at the local level.  That begins with voting for candidates, like those from the Green Party, who are out telling the truth about climate change and what we should do about it.