In the final weeks of May, tornadoes ripped through the center of the United States day after day, destroying homes and schools, hurling trees as if they were mere matchsticks, inflicting countless injuries across communities and leaving some families to mourn their dead. This virulent tornado season is just one example of extreme weather: The past few months have also seen record cold, record heat and record flooding.
If human beings were rational, our top scientists and political leaders would be huddled together, hashing out plans and policies to try to mitigate the damage from greenhouse gases — with the goal of salvaging human life. Faced with an existential threat, a fierce peril that will alter the planet in significant ways, presidents and premiers and prime ministers would overcome their traditional enmities, as they do in the movies, and come together to save humanity.
View the complete June 2 article by Cynthia Tucker on the AlterNet website here.