The one chord that sounded most deeply today in the President's speech was that he gets it. It is the one part of the speech that is "shocking" the CNN and MSNBC commentators.
We will respond to the threat of climate change, knowing that the failure to do so would betray our children and future generations.
The President understands...... there will be no economic prosperity without slowing the climate crisis spreading over the planet.
... but none can avoid the devastating impact of raging fires, and crippling drought, and more powerful storms
The path towards sustainable energy sources will be long and sometimes difficult. But America cannot resist this transition; we must lead it
Read more: http://www.politico.com/...
The President understands...... there will be no national security in a world destabilized by dwindling arable lands and increasingly uninhabitable margins of sea and desert.
We will respond to the threat of climate change, knowing that the failure to do so would betray our children and future generations.
With urgency, the 44th President of the United States is leading. We must act now......or the future will not provide a history we can endure.
The President's complete comments on climate, and developing responses to the climate initiative, are below the squiggle.
We, the people, still believe that our obligations as Americans are not just to ourselves, but to all posterity. We will respond to the threat of climate change, knowing that the failure to do so would betray our children and future generations. Some may still deny the overwhelming judgment of science, but none can avoid the devastating impact of raging fires, and crippling drought, and more powerful storms. The path towards sustainable energy sources will be long and sometimes difficult. But America cannot resist this transition; we must lead it. We cannot cede to other nations the technology that will power new jobs and new industries – we must claim its promise. That is how we will maintain our economic vitality and our national treasure – our forests and waterways; our croplands and snowcapped peaks. That is how we will preserve our planet, commanded to our care by God. That’s what will lend meaning to the creed our fathers once declared.
From Brad Johnson at
Forecast the Facts:
"No-one wished upon this nation the offense of climate change, but from Staten Island’s stormy shores to the parched fields of Kansas, all the wealth piled by the oilman’s one hundred and fifty years of unrequited drilling is burning away. As he acknowledged today, Obama must strive on to finish the work we are in, to do all which may achieve freedom from the tyranny of fossil fuels. If he does not confront the scourge of climate change, he will let our nation perish."
From Politico:
The strong language suggests that recent efforts by environmentalists to appeal to the president’s sense of legacy on the issue have hit home.
The issue was central to the otherwise limited and brief speech, where the president spoke of the tenets of the Declaration of Independence, health care and war.
From Vanity Fair:
However, in that same spectrum of speech surprises, the president’s mention of climate change ranks on the far end of “Oh my God, what?” Yes, climate change, a terrifying, large-scale problem known colloquially around the Obama White House as: “Oh right, that."