Climate change is a pressing security problem, not just an environmental cause. 
Just ask wildlife experts in India Sundarban islands:
" The number of tiger attacks on people is growing as habitat loss and dwindling prey caused by climate change drives them to prowl into villages for food, experts said Monday."The Security Council is sure to "remain seized" of that matter.
Considering the US Senate is deliberating at present over a "Climate Security Act" that would place limitations on US greenhouse gas emissions, I thought it would be useful to pass along the following: individual citizens can now track their contributions to climate security at the following website: Creative Citizen.com. My neighbors have often said they'd like to be greener if only there were an alogrithm to tell them how... well this isn't exactly that, but check it out anyhoo.
So a former student of mine wasn't too pleased with my take on climate change and the US elections. After some back and forth, he's convinced me to rethink / refine my original, fairly flippant argument to that effect.
My original argument (OK, more of an off-the-cuff assertion validated by a Comedy Central clip than an argument) hinged on two claims: 1) US voters care more about climate change than they did previously, and this concern cuts across the red/blue divide and 2) Obama is speaking to this constituency better than McCain.
Here is evidence to back that up. A PIPA poll in 2006 showed an emerging bipartisan consensus around addressing climate change, among other issues. And regarding McCain's climate platform v. Obama, see, among other things, this post by Matthew Yglesias.
My former student / now friend and colleague's best critique of my argument isn't actually based on refuting either of these claims. It is the following: that even if that's true, climate change will be eclipsed in the November election by other concerns that voters care more about, and that do not cut across the red/blue divide. He supports this claim with the following polling data from last February, showing "the environment" only 13th on a list of issues that voters consider "extremely important." Still, I could say that the fact it's on the list at all is suggestive. And it does show that 27% of the country thinks of it this way. The question is whether these are voters who would swing Democrat over this issue alone.
Problem with Gallup polls is they don't seem to do iterated polls asking the same questions. The actual rebuttal to my claim is not, where was climate change four months ago, it is, in what direction is it trending? And is the red/blue gap shrinking on this issue or not? Unfortunately, neither Gallup nor Pew nor PIPA can tell me whether or not I can prove my friend wrong.
Can any of you? I'm willing to be convinced.
Lisa Chamberlain reports on a strategy to -eed the burgeoning urban population o the 21st century and stem climate change. The article abstract:
"A Columbia professor believes that converting skyscrapers into crop farms could help reduce global warming and make New York cleaner. It’s a vision straight out of Futurama—but here’s how it might work."
From New York Magazine.
One of the reasons that Barack Obama is well-situated to kick John McCain's ass this Fall is that he has the most comprehensive vision for combatting climate change - truly the issue today that has the potential to unite the right, left and independents.
McCain would refuse to join a global climate change regime without India and China. Clinton talks vaguely about leading such a regime, but with her hawkish foreign policy would likely bankrupt the US in a war with Iran before she's invest seriously in climate change. Obama would put the money McCain wants to use for Mars exploration toward investment in green technology. As he puts it, "If we can go to the moon, we can replace the internal combustion engine. If we can go to the moon, we can build windmills and solar panels."
Even if this is idealistic rhetoric, it is rhetoric that will resonate with vast bipartisan swaths of the electorate this Fall - more than a Mars mission, and certainly more than obliterating innocent civilians in Iranian cities.
To compare the candidates on international law issues, click here.
In my classes on global governance, I sometimes try valiantly (though often with mixed results) to convince my students of the connection between micro-level gender relations and political outcomes.
As if the impact of the gay ban on military effectiveness wasn't proof enough, I now have evidence that the "defining security threat of our time" is caused by rampant divorce rates.
USA Today reports, in an article entitled "Marriage: Eco-Friendlier Than Divorce":
"Divorce isn't green, says a study being published today. The research... looked at international data comparing utility consumption and housing space per capita in married and divorced households. He found that divorce creates more households with fewer people, using more energy and water and taking up more space."
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