Donald Trump has labeled a number of existential threats as a “hoax.” Thus, he has refused to deal with those threats.

If he gets the boot on Election Day and vacates the presidency next January, I am hoping the new president, Joe Biden, will take charge of those so-called “hoax” issues and start to deal forthrightly with them.

Let me start with climate change.

It’s real, man. Earth’s climate is changing to the detriment of every living creature inhabiting this fragile planet. Donald Trump has refused to recognize the threat. He continues to push for fossil fuel development, which necessarily spews more carbon emissions into the air.

Trump decided shortly after taking office to roll back the water and air quality regulations enacted by President Obama. He just could not stand the idea of Obama’s imprint being left on anything.

Trump doesn’t discuss climate change. He doesn’t feel the need to call our collective attention to the reality that Earth’s average annual temperature is rising; that the polar ice caps are melting; that sea level is rising; that coastal communities are being threatened; that nations’ deforestation endangers nature’s habitat and deprives the world of vegetation needed to replace the oxygen being consumed.

Joe Biden pledges to return the United States to the Paris Climate Accords. He promises to put climate change front and center on his agenda of issues with which to tackle. I intend to hold him to those pledges, although I have far greater faith in Biden keeping his word than anything that flies out of Trump’s mouth.

We have just one planet, ladies and gentlemen. We need to care for it. We need to cherish it. A new president can deliver on the need to deal head-on with a serious existential threat to our very existence.