by Scott Knickelbine

Created on: August 02, 2007

Are we doing enough to stop global warming? It depends on whether you consider "practically nothing" to be "not enough."

Since the outset of his administration George Bush has sent a clear and deliberate message: nothing is going to be done about global warming on his watch. And indeed, nothing has. Since taking office, the Bush administration has:

1) Ditched the Kyoto accords, preferring not to support any international efforts to curb greenhouse gases while presumably waiting for something perfect to come along;

2) Constantly suggested that somehow the jury was still out on global warming, until international scientific consensus became so urgent that this imposture just looked too clownish;

3) Quashed reports by government scientists that suggested global warming was a problem;

4) Refused to lower vehicle admission standards or raise fuel efficiency standards;

5) Extended the ability of utilities to avoid putting adequate scrubbers on outmoded coal-fired plants;

6) Given lip-service to technologies like hydrogen fuel cells and new nuclear power plants, effectively postponing any meaningful action until years - possibly decades - after Bush is out of office.

What meaningful steps to stop global warming that have been taken in the last six years have been taken almost exclusively be the states, which don't have the luxury of living in George Bush's environmental dream world. We need to act as a nation, but it's unlikely this will happen until we get a new administration.

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