Time to reverse Trump’s backward stance on climate change

As concern over climate change reaches a crescendo this week at the United Nations General Assembly in New York, the contrast between action and denial couldn’t be any starker than it is here in the U.S.

The nation with the singular capacity to lead the world to a solution is in the hands of a man who has no regard, and possibly no understanding, of science; no appreciation of longterm consequences and no apparent interest in the natural environment.

From the start of his presidency, when he announced his intent to withdraw the U.S. from the Paris Climate Accords, Donald Trump has dragged the U.S. backward, away from policies designed to prepare for and allow Americans to prosper in a future less dependent on fossil fuels.

“Dragged” is the right term, because many of the Trump administration’s moves to dismantle environmental protection and carbon curtailment are opposed by the very parties Trump claims to be liberating. Four automakers that reached an agreement to voluntarily comply with California’s higher autoemissions standards are facing an anti-trust action by Trump’s Department of Justice.

As young people concerned about the climate future massed in rallies around the world on Friday, Trump planned to skip the U.N.’S climate summit on Monday in favor of his own meeting down the hall, scheduled by himself to talk about his efforts to protect religious liberty.

Religious liberty is important, too. But Trump’s move to counter-program against the climate summit with an orchestrated chorus of praise for his support of fundamentalist groups has to be seen as an election-minded call to his anti-science base.

As it happened, on Monday Trump changed his mind and dropped by the climate summit after all, but only for about 10 minutes on his way to his meeting.

Meanwhile, Greta Thunberg, the 16-year-old Swedish activist whose solitary “climate strike” outside the Swedish parliament last year sparked a worldwide youth movement, delivered an emotionally charged address to the summit. She spoke in highly personal terms, blasting world leaders for failing to act sooner to reduce carbon emissions.

“How dare you! You have stolen my dreams and my childhood with your empty words,” she declared.

Youth rallies around the world, including in Columbus, featured a similar tone of generational conflict: By failing to take climate change seriously enough, adults are ruining the future for children.

It is a divisive approach that has sparked a predictable backlash. Critics claim the young activists are being manipulated by cynical adults.

Young people are, in fact, emotional and subject to manipulation, and the accusatory message of Thunberg and the movement she inspired are off-putting to some.

But regardless of rhetorical style, the facts bear the young protesters out. Despite a decade or two of voluntary efforts to reduce carbon emissions, progress in the U.S. is slow and global emissions reached an all-time high in 2018.

And the damage no longer is speculative; rising sea levels are forcing communities from the Marshall Islands to Miami to adapt. Heat, drought and floods are disrupting agriculture. Increasingly more-violent storms are causing unprecedented damage.

At the very least, responsible leaders should adopt solid solutions that already exist. A carbon tax would drive development of energy alternatives and its proceeds could help communities already being affected.

Concern over climate change isn’t hysteria; urgency is not just appropriate. It is essential.