From Heartbroken to Hurricane

I haven't had the heart to write this week because that organ feels alternately numb and wrung out. The latest executive order by 45 rolls back protections on our air, water and climate, jeopardizing the health and well-being of my sons and daughter, of everyone's sons and daughters.  After the hottest year on record, where Denver's March temperatures were nearly 10 degrees above normal, to see our putative leaders backpedal on such important standards boggles the mind, breaks my heart.

National Resources Defense Council president Rhea Suh said  the rollback was "A senseless betrayal of our national interests" (Denver Post, 2A, 3/29/17). In the same article, Colorado Senator Michael Bennet said "this anti-climate Executive Order is a direct assault o the health of our children and on the clean energy economy." I believe them both. The planet is moving forward to renewables, and the next economic wave will benefit countries like Germany and China, who are making giant leaps in the production and installation of technologies that harness the power of sun and wind. Our country will fall behind, desperately scrambling to bring back jobs in obsolete industries such as coal.

How much money did the fossil fuels industry give to 45? How much to his Cabinet? How can they morally justify the destruction of our planet and mortgage our children's future to a dying industry?
I have to believe that these actions are the last throes, a final paroxysm, a death rattle of both fossil fuel dependence and denial of the real science of climate change. I have to believe that the scientists, the forward-thinking populace, the new industry leaders will eventually triumph.

And so I turn my attention to what my friend, poet and Pastor Dale Fredrickson, calls "a hurricane of resistance." I'm leaving this blog entry to pledge more money and support to  NRDC, the Sierra Club, Greenpeace, and lawmakers who support true forward movement and progress as opposed to outdated dependencies. We don't need to experience the smog of Beijing, the polluted water of Bangkok, to recognize the dangers inherent in removing our protections. We remember, and we will resist.