Climate change, inflation present existential threats to the nation

As reported in a New York Times story published Friday in the Sun, like the Colorado, the Mississippi River is dying, and water levels are now dangerously low. That spells disaster for a crucial shipping lane that carries roughly 500 million tons of cargo each year, including much of the world’s food supply.

As barges lighten their load to navigate the shallow water, the price of food is increasing rapidly — not because of corporate taxes or an increased minimum wage, but because the river is vanishing — the victim of politicians who spent decades ignoring climate science.

Complicating the problem further is that there are no viable alternatives to carry the volume currently moved by Mississippi river barges. According to industry experts, it would take 16 rail cars or 62 semi-trucks to transport the same amount of food as a single Mississippi river-barge.

The disastrous effects of climate change are here and already causing a crisis of commerce. They’re affecting the price of foods at your local grocery store today and threatening water supplies for nearly the entire United States. And it will only get worse unless we act.

We must end the self-serving denialism: There cannot, is not, must not be room for disagreement or debate about the existence of climate change and the immediate existential threat it poses to all Americans.

And yet, according to the Center for American Progress, there are still 139 members of Congress — a majority of the Republican caucus in both chambers of the legislature, who refuse to acknowledge the existence of climate change and humanity’s role in causing it. That means they won’t take any action to solve a problem they deny exists.

If we hand even more seats over to folks who refuse to open their eyes and see the evidence that is all around them, then we are mortgaging our children’s future for ignorance and empty promises.

To be clear, we aren’t just talking about the uncertain future of freshwater for the 40 million Americans who rely on the Colorado River. We’re talking about — in our lifetimes — mass starvation, shortages of basic supplies, and inflation so rapid it will make the inflation of 2022 look like a Kmart blue-light special.

We’re staring at a future that looks like a dystopian movie.

Climate change is the linchpin that connects America’s future food, water and finances. And over half of the Republicans in Congress don’t even believe it’s real.

From 1980-1984, there were a total of 15 weather and climate events that resulted in more than a billion dollars in inflation-adjusted damage. Combined, these 15 events caused $86 billion in damages.

From 2017-2021, there were 89 events totaling $788 billion in damages. On average, each year we now spend more money cleaning up natural disasters than we used to spend in a decade.

Certainly both parties played a part in pretending the crisis didn’t exist and put short-term profits — and their political careers — over long-term sustainability. But when the forests began to burn with such intensity that they created their own weather patterns and the Colorado began to drop, and a more intense hurricane season shattered ever more cities, and 1,000year floods came nearly annually, and vast portions of the oceans were left with nothing alive to catch, Democrats woke up and issued a call to action.

For a time, some Republicans even joined them. But with the rise of Donald Trump and the takeover of the GOP by MAGA extremists, the United States withdrew from the Paris accords and resigned from its role as a leader on climate policy. That opened the door for China, India, Brazil and others to move full-speed ahead with policies guaranteed to sacrifice our children and grandchildren for a few extra dollars in the pockets of billionaires and a few cents saved on a gallon of gasoline.

Now those policies of profit are backfiring as the effects of climate change drive inflation, population migrations and insecurity of both food and water. Dairy and meat prices are increasing as grazing land dries up in the scorching sun. Wheat fields in Kansas, Oklahoma and Nebraska are withering due to drought. And in western states like California, Nevada and Arizona, which produce more than two-thirds of all fruits, nuts and vegetables in the country, taps are running dry as wells and snowmelt fade, leading crop yields to decline and prices to increase.

The planet is trying to tell us that we’re running out of time to act.

And Tuesday, at the polls, we have the opportunity to take the first step, by rejecting climate change deniers and those who would put short-term profits ahead of the long-term sustainability of the planet.

Adam Laxalt, the Republican candidate for U.S. Senate in Nevada, made millions of dollars in profits from oil companies and became a champion of increasing the use of fossil fuels. He’s claimed that policies to address climate change are “not going to address fires.” And of the seven issues he lists on his website as his top priorities, neither climate change nor water is anywhere to be found.

Similarly, U.S. congressional candidate Mark Robertson also makes no mention of water, climate change or the environment on the “key stances” page of his campaign website. Neither does April Becker. And the only mention of water, climate or the environment on Sam Peters’ website is when he talks about the business environment — making his priorities absolutely clear.

Each of these candidates wants to be your voice in the federal legislature, yet not one of them even mentions climate change, the environment or the crisis of water in the West, let alone has a plan to tackle it.

Reject them at the ballot box or inflation will continue to run rampant as we continue down the path of leaving a scorched, dead planet to our children and grandchildren.

If we hand even more seats over to folks who refuse to open their eyes and see the evidence that is all around them, then we are mortgaging our children’s future for ignorance and empty promises.