If you were anywhere between the Bronx and Saratoga Tuesday night and Wednesday morning, you’re still drying out.
Parts of a band that runs along Interstate 87 in New York got as much as 9-1/2 inches of rain in the overnight period. Massive flooding. Buildings washed away.
Get used to it.
Climate change is no longer in the warning stage. It’s here, and the deluge New Yorkers felt and heard is just one more indication that we might passed the point that this is fixable.
And if you’re of a certain age – say, mine – you know that this is very real. I’ve been saying for years that I’ve noticed storms are getting more dynamic as time passes. The lightning is brighter. The thunder is louder. The rain falls in sheets. The wind blows harder.
But, of course, we live in a country run by deniers. Starting with the orange gasbag at the top. What happened in upstate New York isn’t even on his radar. He could care less.
He’s too busy losing a war for oil, whose persistent use triggered this climate crisis. He sent American forces, the pride of our nation, to battle over a commodity that we should be finding ways to avoid using.
It’s killing us and he’s killing them.
I’m not knowledgeable in climatology. Frankly, I don’t know a whole lot about science in general.
But I do know that the evidence points to a problem. A big one. Despite what Trump, his tame cabinet and the sycophant Republican politicians say.
If I’m a Democrat candidate, I’m saving the videos of ravaging weather for my campaign ads. I suspect every congressional and state legislature candidate has at least one instance of recent ridiculous weather in her or his district.
And then say that while it’s an uphill battle, we can still do things to fight.
We can commit to more electric vehicles on the road. We can commit to bolstering mass transit and getting creative with the options to get people from place to place.
We can commit to boost alternative energy sources – solar and wind.
We can commit to improving infrastructure – in particular, we can figure out what it takes to stop roads from flooding in extreme wet weather. It’s hard to stop it when there’s 10 inches of rain in 24 hours, but two inches in a day shouldn’t instantly mean you can get from here to there.
The weather is going to become more extreme, at least for the rest of my lifetime. Big rain. Big heat. Big cold – climate change also means clippers from the Arctic have an easier path to sweep into the middle of the United States. Which also means big snow.
It feels like banging your head against a wall when you hear dopes chant “Drill, baby, drill” or “Trump digs coal.” But it beats the alternative – just watching the climate get worse and giving up.
Our children and grandchildren will never forgive us for letting this happen. They shouldn’t. When it comes to climate change, we’re all wet.
SUBJECTISM 