Opinion: Climate change is a real issue in this election

Set aside for a moment the devastation that has hit the Southeast after back-to-back hurricanes. Turn instead to what’s happening in our little corner of the planet.

Studies suggest the human body can’t survive outdoors in sustained temperatures of 120 degrees Fahrenheit or more. And yet, Phoenix, Ariz., just endured a summer that included 56 days of 110-degree temps. And here it is October and they’re still cooking under 100-degree days.

Over here in New Mexico, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration reported August was the hottest on record for both Arizona and New Mexico. This year is on track to be the hottest year globally.

Seems the only thing hotter than our weather is this year’s presidential election, with two candidates who couldn’t be farther away from each other on the issue of climate change.

Kamala Harris sees it as an existential threat. Donald Trump sees it as BS.

Of course, if climate change were the biggest issue of this election season, it wouldn’t even be close. Harris would win hands down, not because she has some magic formula for fixing this problem, but because she’s willing to try. Her opponent has for years been the denier in chief when it comes to this issue.

Central to this election, for better or worse, are two other issues that are directly related to climate change — the economy and immigration. Unfortunately, too many Americans can’t see the economic value in a massive clean energy investment, while also failing to recognize the displaced humanity that’s going to arrive at our borders as sea levels rise.

Too many are voting for short-term solutions when we need to be looking to the future.

I learned long ago that the best way to predict a person’s future behavior is by examining their past behavior, so let’s look at Harris and Trump in the context of this critical issue.

Trump has been calling climate change a hoax for years now. As president, he did nothing to address it. Less than nothing, actually, by reversing some important steps toward addressing climate change.

And now, as one climate disaster after another comes down on us, he’s still working hard to minimize it — promising instead to “drill, drill, drill” for more fossil fuels as soon as he’s put back in office.

Meanwhile, Harris was the tie-breaking vote in the Senate in 2022, when the biggest clean-energy and infrastructure bill in American history was passed.

She recognizes the severity of the issue and promises to do more about it if elected our next president.

It’s more than disconcerting that Trump has opted to politicize the hurricanes’ recovery efforts in North Carolina and Florida — it’s disgusting. The misinformation he’s spewing could cost the victims of either or both storms greatly.

Politics aside, it’s not too late to deal with climate change. Technology itself is at a “tipping point,” with Carbon Dioxide Removal (CDR), which removes carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, and Solar Radiation Management (SRM), which limits the amount of solar radiation hitting the earth’s surface, both under development, while affordable advancements are being made every day in wind, solar, batteries and more clean energy sources. All this demands a sizable investment in the here-and-now, with benefits to pay off in the long run.

But of course, politics is in the way of all this, and our next president will either keep us here, which is not sustainable, or push us into a future in which we clean up and take better care of our planet.

Tom McDonald is editor of the New Mexico Community News Exchange. Contact him at:

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