By JOHN KANELIS / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com
President Biden has blasted his way out of the chute determined to make good on proclamations he made along the campaign trail.
He has a pandemic with which to deal. He vows to restore our worldwide alliances. Biden vows to boost our economy with a titanic stimulus package. Oh, and he wants to tackle climate change head-on, full throttle.
I want to explore briefly the climate change matter.
In one of his first acts as president, Biden signed an executive order returning the United States to the worldwide Paris Climate Accord, from which Donald Trump pulled this nation.
Then he named John Kerry the head of a newly created position, special envoy on climate change. Kerry comes to this task with an impressive personal and professional record: combat veteran of the Vietnam War, senator from Massachusetts, secretary of state during the second term of the Barack Obama administration.
He now takes on the role of climate change envoy to communicate with the world on policies enacted by the Biden administrationĀ dealing with climate change.
President Biden isĀ taking precisely the opposite approach to climate change than the one articulated by Donald Trump. Biden calls climate change an “existential threat” to the nation; Trump calls it a “hoax.” It isn’t a hoax. It’s the real thing. It is harming us tangibly. It poses a threat to Earth and to our ability over the long term to continue to thrive, let alone survive, on the only planet we can call home.
Biden wants to suspend oil and natural gas leases. He intends to re-energize — no pun intended — efforts to develop renewable energy sources. The president plans to restore the tougher air quality rules andĀ regulations that Donald Trump rescinded.
John Kerry doesn’t take on this task peering through sparkly glasses. He is realistic about the threat. Kerry said recently that even if we reduce carbon emissions today to “zero,” we still might be unable to reverse the effects of climate change on Earth’s environment.
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I must add an important caveat to what I hope is a concerted effort to stem to effect of climate change. Someone will have to explain to me how our military establishment will operate the equipment it uses in a climate-friendly manner. Our jets, naval vessels, and our vast array of land vehicles — tanks, trucks, fighting vehicles, armored personnel carriers — require fossil fuels to operate. If we can find our way to balance those needs with strategies that attack the existential threat many of us believe is out there … then we might be able to save the world.
I want to give President Biden a push in the direction he needs to go to attack climate change.
I donāt have a problem with working to go greener. My problem is what are the workers that just lost their jobs supposed to do in the interim? Kerry said they can be the ones to build the solar panels. Do they start on Monday? What about the oil workers already working on government lands do right now to be āretrainedā?
Itās asinine to pull the rug out from under thousands of people with no immediate plans for them.
The UN even stated weāve cut more emissions than any other country in recent years. Now, by rejoins the Paris agreement, weāll be the highest paying member. Whoās holding other countries accountable?
On your last point, since weāll no longer be self sufficient on oil and gas energy, our potential enemies now have the upper hand by simply holding our supply chain of energy if we do have a confrontation.