What Happened to Winter?
by Robert Russo
Not being a fan of cold weather I have wanted for some years now to move further south, so it's nice to enjoy springtime where on a saturday the flea markets are packed with people, others are sunbathing at Belle Isle or walking the shops in Carytown in their t-shirts, and I can see turtles swimming in the pond at Bryan Park. Daffodils are coming up, the cherry blossoms are blooming in DC, and even New Yorkers are enjoying temperatures up to 70. On the first week of January!
Over a decade ago we were all warned about global warming, and Aaron Sorkin even made a popular movie in which the President makes global warming his priority, but "resolution 455" was a complete fantasy. In the real world the research was dismissed as hooey, and now we are living with the results. Climatologists predict this will be the hottest year this planet has ever seen.* This is the first time NYC has not seen snow before New Year's since the census existed. Last week satellite images reported an 11,000-acre ice shelf had broken loose in northern Canada**, practically every major glacier studied worldwide is shrinking, and the ice cap on Mt. Kilimanjaro is gone leading the prediction that there will be no snow on any mountain on the African continent within the next 20 to 50 years. Runoff will leave vast agricultural regions in drought, increasing humanitarian crises and adding tension in already conflicted areas.***
Of the species that have already gone extinct, most are animals living in specialized environments such as 60+ species of mountain frogs (whose soft bodies absorb the conditions around them) that have disappeared from Central and South America.**** Such facts seemed obscure and dismissible in the 90’s but now it is everywhere, in every country. Armadillos have moved north into the state of Illinois.***** (I observed a colony of Southern Chorus Frogs in 2004 which had never been recorded north of NC before that spring.) People in every walk of life are scratching their heads, and soon entire industries will begin to suffer. One only has to ask whose business is dependent on stable weather conditions, and what would happen if the average annual rainfall increased by five inches or temperature by five degrees?
Here is a preview of things to come in Virginia. Biologically the southeast corner of the state is considered to be the northernmost point of the subtropical United States. Imagine a Virginia full of palmettos, spanish moss and prickly pears, water moccasins north of the James river. Alligators? Mosquitoes will increase connecting populations that would normally isolate the spread of disease, as will poison ivy and kudzu. All winter sports parks will have to convert to water parks. The smaller farmers will be the first to go as water prices skyrocket, while ocean levels rise despite the refusal of seaboard communities to invest in saltwater conversion technology. At some point the increasing tide of Northerners moving south to enjoy our climate will conflict with those who can’t stand the heat and make a real estate situation like the turnaround of homes being built and rebuilt in hurricane country.
As far as the changing of the seasons is concerned, I wonder how many people will be visiting Punxsutawney PA this year to see if the groundhog has seen his shadow, and if it’s newsworthy. Have you ever brought a deciduous plant indoors, watched it come to life in January and then wilt? People rejoice and wonder when all the trees bloom early, but we have never had to deal with trees getting sick and dying by the hundred thousand. We just expect them to be there.
Alternative theories are still being offered, such as El Nino (with it safe to say it is a combination of this year’s weather circumstances with greenhouse emissions that is pushing the thermometer over the top).* However I’d like to personally look in the face of everyone who said global warming was a myth. We will enjoy the spring-like weather, and then complain later in the year, but this country will not step up to fight the greenhouse effect. To what extent will environmental conditions have to sink to turn a voter’s head? We are parboiling this planet. To help fight global warming go to http://www.climateark.org, http://www.epa.gov/climatechange or http://www.earthinstitute.columbia.edu/crosscutting/climate.html.
*http://www.cnn.com/2007/TECH/science/01/04/britain.globalwarming.ap/index.html
**http://www.cnn.com/2006/TECH/science/12/29/canada.arctic.ap/index.html
***http://www.cnn.com/2006/TECH/science/12/18/african.glaciers.ap/index.html
****http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/01/11/AR2006011102121.html
*****http://abcnews.go.com/Technology/wireStory?id=2748559
Question of the Week: In what ways have you personally noticed the environment is changing here in VA? Please send your experiences to henrico@richmondliberty.org.
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