(Re-posted here with permission from Rabbi Gershom's blog at JewishThoreau.com)
There is a saying in the Talmud that "Once the sword is let loose in the land, it does not distinguish between the innocent and the guilty." Perhaps a corollary to this should be: Once a storm is let loose in the land, it does not distinguish between Republicans and Democrats.
Radar map of areas
affected by Hurricane Sandy,
October 29, 2012
I am referring to the hypocrisy of the 36 Republican Senators who voted against federal aid for the victims of Hurricane Sandy, yet previously voted for -- even demanded! -- similar aid for disasters in their own states. (See a list of who they are and what they previously voted for). In Jewish numerology, the number 36 is "double life," but theirs was hardly a humanitarian decision.
To me this vote was the height of hypocrisy. It makes me wonder why anybody would vote against helping their fellow Americans recover from the worst storm system to hit the East Coast since we have been recording the weather. Was this in retaliation for New York City Mayor Bloomberg's support of Obama and acknowledgement that global warming is real?
If that sounds like some sort of paranoid conspiracy theory, consider the fact that in 2011 the Republicans on the House Energy Committee voted unanimously to deny the existence of climate change. This was part of a concerted campaign on the part of the Tea Party to de-legitimize global warming in the minds of the public, starting right after Al Gore won the Nobel Prize for "An Inconvenient Truth." (Watch the PBS documentary "Climate of Doubt") And they came close to succeeding -- until Hurricane Sandy hit and demonstrated what the scientists have been predicting all along: Manhattan was going to end up under water. Suddenly climate change seems very real after all.
This time the water receded, but if the polar ice caps continue to melt, the flooding of the Coast could become permanent. 2012 marked a new low in the amount of polar ice since the advent of the satellite era (when we could observe the Earth from space.) And no amount of denial is going to stop the big meltdown if we don't stop pouring CO2 into the atmosphere.
You can't vote science out of existence. The universe is not a democracy, it simply is what it is. Nature is no respecter of party politics. Had we listened to the warnings that scientists have been sounding for decades, we might not be having these devastating (and very expensive!) super-storms now. I have argued before that climate change -- not Obamacare or Medicare or whatever -- is the biggest threat to our economy. Those who resist aid to storm victims are often the same people who have been trying to convince us that global warming is a hoax. But nature does not listen to votes on congressional committees. Nature just marches on.
It's not too late to begin changing our polluting ways, although turning the situation around is going to take a long time -- if it is even possible at this stage. Meanwhile, the very least we can do is to help those who are in the path of the storms.
How to Make Hurricane Sandy a Teachable Moment By Richard H. Schwartz, Ph.D.
In the aftermath of Hurricane Sandy, the prime concern now must be to help the many people who are suffering greatly from its effects.
At the same time we should not miss an opportunity when appropriate to respectfully and cordially increase awareness of the many important lessons related to the monstrous storm.
For example:
1. Climate change can have disastrous consequences. In addition to the tens of millions of people who are greatly suffering due to Hurricane Sandy, please also consider how food prices are spiking because the US corn crop was devastated as almost 2/3 of the US is suffering from drought, and the many houses lost and acres of forests destroyed due to severe, widespread wildfires in many states. Also, there are great potential dangers at a time when glaciers all over the world and polar icecaps are melting far faster than the worst-case projections of climate scientists.
2. We may be facing a new normal, with severe heat waves, droughts, wildfires, wild fires, and storms that are more frequent and more severe. Hurricane Sandy is the type of “extreme climate event” that global warming models predict. While some are in denial about the planet warming, we should consider that every decade since the 1970s has been warmer than the previous decade; the ten warmest years since temperature records have been kept have occurred since 1998; July 2012 was the single hottest month for the US since such records were kept in 1995.
3. It is essential that saving the planetary environment become a central focus for civilization today. Unfortunately, climate change was not even mentioned in the 2012 US presidential and vice presidential debates.
4. The federal government, through FEMA, can play a very important role in responding to disasters. However, if Mitt Romney had his way, there would be no FEMA and we would have to depend for help on the profit-driven private sector. Also, the Ryan budget would reduce funding for FEMA as well as many other programs that Americans depend on, mainly to continue and increase tax benefits for the wealthiest Americans and highly profitable corporations.
5. Republicans are generally in denial about the tremendous dangers from climate change, despite a very strong consensus in over a thousand peer-reviewed articles in scientific journals and dire warnings by scientific academies all over the world that climate change is a major threat, largely caused by human activities, and despite the many wake-up calls we have been receiving in terms of severe, sometimes record-breaking, storms, tornados, floods, heat waves, droughts, and wildfires, Anyone who thinks that climate change is a hoax promoted by liberals should visit the website of ConservAmerica (www.ConservAmerica.org), previously called “Republicans for Environmental Protection. This conservative group only endorsed four percent of Republicans in the 2010 U.S. midterm elections, because so many Republicans are in denial about climate change and other environmental threats. Paul Ryan is a climate denier and has a miserable record on the environment.
6. Governmental workers, including first responders, should be applauded for their courageous, dedicated efforts to respond to emergencies, not demonized, as many Republican politicians have been doing.
by Richard H. Schwartz, author of Who Stole My Religion?
There has been much discussion recently about which candidate Jews should support for president in 2012. Below are many important reasons that Jews should vote for Obama:
1. Mitt Romney, Paul Ryan, and other Republicans are promoting policies similar to or often worse than those that had such disastrous results during the George W. Bush administration, including converting a three-year major surplus, which was on track to completely eliminate the total federal debt, into a major deficit, creating very few net jobs (none in the private sector), and leaving the country on the brink of a depression, with an average of 750,000 jobs being lost during its last three months. Over 800,000 on its final month. Like, Bush, they want to reduce taxes for the wealthiest Americans, cut regulations, cut programs that benefit most Americans, and have a very hawkish foreign policy that might involve the US in additional wars. As Bill Clinton put it, “Romney is Bush on steroids.”
2. Republicans have obstructed efforts to get our country out of the tremendous ditch they left us in by voting no on and sometimes filibustering many Democratic proposals, some of which they previously supported and sometimes even co-sponsored. Hence, it is not surprising that a recent poll showed that 49% of Americans believe that Republican Congress members are purposely sabotaging the U.S. economy in order to defeat Obama and other Democrats, while only 40% disagree. Should we reward a Republican Party that is willing to sabotage our economy for its political gain.
3. Republicans support continued tax breaks for the wealthiest Americans and highly profitable corporations, while basic social services that middle class and poor people depend on are being cut and teachers, police officers, fire fighters, and others are losing their jobs. During the 2010 lame duck session, every Republican Senator signed a statement indicating that they would not support any legislation unless tax breaks for the wealthiest Americans were continued.Every Republican candidate during the primaries, including Romney, stated that they would not support tax increases even if there were ten dollars of cuts that they supported for every dollar of tax increases.
4. Almost every Republican is in denial about the tremendous dangers from climate change, in spite of a very strong consensus in over a thousand peer-reviewed articles in scientific journals and dire warnings by scientific academies all over the world that climate change is a major threat, largely caused by human activities, and the many wake-up calls we have been receiving in terms of severe, sometimes record-breaking, storms, tornadoes, floods, heat waves, droughts, and wildfires, Anyone who thinks that climate change is a hoax promoted by liberals should visit the website of the “Republicans for Environmental Protection” (www.rep.org), recently renamed ConservAmerica. This conservative group only endorsed four percent of Republicans in the 2010 U.S. midterm elections, because so many Republicans are in denial about climate change and other environmental threats. They are not endorsing Romney for president because he has backed away from his previous concern abut climate change as have most Republicans. So far they have only endorsed Scott Brown for a Senate seat in Massachussetts.
Paul Ryan is a climate denier and has a miserable record on the environment. Please check out
5. The Republican Party has moved far to the right under the influence of the Tea Party. There are very few moderate Republicans in Congress today. Gone are the days when there were Republican moderates like Jacob Javits, Clifford Case, John Chafee, and Arlen Specter. Significantly, there is only one Jewish Republican member of Congress, while there are about 40 Jewish Democratic Congressional members. The Republican controlled House has a positive rating from only about 12% of Americans because of their very reactionary stands on economic, environmental, and social issues.
6. Obama’s election is essential in order to prevent the U.S. Supreme Court from becoming even more conservative. There are now three justices who are in the mid-seventies, including Ruth Beder Ginsberg, who is not in good health. So, it is likely that the next president will have one or more Supreme Court picks. If a Republican president makes them, it would mean a very conservative Supreme Court for decades. The current Supreme court has struck a blow against democracy by permitting groups to spend unlimited amounts of money to support candidates.
7. Republicans are, in effect, waging a war against women. They have opposed legislation that would provide women with equal pay for equal work. Their platform opposes abortion in all cases, even if rape or incest is involved or the life of the mother is threatened. Paul Ryan and almost all Republicans have supported and in many cases co-sponsored legislation that would ban abortion in all cases and even contraception.
8. While far more needs to be done, Democrats have enacted policies that have turned the economy away from the possible depression that the Bush administration left the U.S. on the brink of. More net private-sector jobs have been created already during the Obama administration than during the entire eight years of the Bush presidency. While 800,000 jobs were being lost when Obama entered office, there now has been positive job growth in 31 consecutive months, and almost 5 million new jobs have been created during that period. The Obama administration has also had success in foreign policy, including ending the war in Iraq, killing Osama bin Laden, weakening al Qaeda. By contrast, Romney has made several gaffes in his statements about foreign policy.
While Democratic policies have not always lived up to our hopes, largely due to Republican obstructionism, a return to Republican rule would be a nightmare.
9. Obama has taken many positive actions for Israel including: rejecting the Goldstone report that criticized Israeli actions in the war in Gaza; asking Congress to approve a $205 million package to help Israel build a new anti-missile defense system; successfully advocating for Israel’s admission into the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development; giving a speech in the heart of the Arab world, in which he told his listeners that they need to recognize the legitimacy of a Jewish state; stating to the UN General Assembly clearly and unequivocally that “Israel is a sovereign state and the historic homeland of the Jewish people” and “It should be clear to all that efforts to chip away at Israel’s legitimacy will only be met by the unshakable opposition of the US.”
Israeli leaders, including Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, have stated many times that the U.S. has been extremely cooperative in meeting Israel’s security needs.
Another example of Obama’s strong support for Israel is his very positive response to a frantic, middle-of-the-night call from Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu that helped free six Israelis who were trapped in the Israeli embassy in Cairo that was under attack by militant Egyptians. After they were freed, Netanyahu said: "I would like to express my gratitude to the President of the United States, Barack Obama. I asked for his help. This was a decisive and fateful moment. He said, “I will do everything I can.” And so he did. He used every considerable means and influence of the United States to help us. We owe him a special measure of gratitude. This attests to the strong alliance between Israel and the United States."
On September 22, 2011, Prime Minister Netanyahu heaped additional praise on President Obama for his talk at the United Nations, in which Obama expressed opposition to U.N. recognition of a Palestinian state, and indicated that he would veto a resolution supporting that recognition in the U.N. Security Council. Netanyahu indicated that Obama deserved a “badge of honor” for that talk.
10. President Obama has had a very positive relationship with Jews: his initial chief of staff Rahm Emanuel was Jewish and the son of Israelis; his present chief of staff Jack Lew is an Orthodox Jew; one of his key advisers David Axlerod, is Jewish, and he is also a key strategist for Obama’s reelection campaign; Obama nominated a Jew, Elana Kagan, as a Supreme Court Justice (even though that left the 9-member Court with three Jews and no Protestant members; he is the first president to have Passover Seders in the White House; Obama refused to send US representatives to Durban conferences, since they have espoused antisemitism; and Obama and his cabinet members have frequently stressed their solidarity with Jews and with Israel
.
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Outline of President Obama’s accomplishments, with citations:
In the days since Mitt Romney announced Paul Ryan as his running mate, there has been a great deal of discussion of Medicare and their economic policies on the news, but so far, very little has been said about the fact that Ryan is a climate-change denier. Romney has also said he is "not sure" what causes climate change if it exists -- and that in the face of so much mounting scientific evidence. So I thought I would share this excerpt from my new book, Who Stole My Religion?:
Why is there so much skepticism about climate change?
With all of this powerful scientific evidence confirming anthropogenic (human-caused) climate
change, why there is so much public skepticism?In 2009, only 57 percent of Americans accepted that climate
change was a problem and only 36 percent thought human activities were a
factor.Is
this merely denial, or are there more sinister reasons?
According to James Hoggan, author of Climate Cover-Up: The Crusade To Deny Global Warming, the oil,
coal, and other industries that are profiting from the status quo are
willing to go to great lengths to mislead people so that they can continue to
receive huge profits.Hoggan, who was
initially a skeptic about climate change himself, writes that it is a “story of
betrayal, a story of selfishness, greed, and irresponsibility on an epic
scale…a story of deceit, of poisoning
public judgment…”
Another clue comes from the results of a study called, “Balance
as Bias,” which considered a random sample of 636 articles about climate change
in the New York Times, Washington Post,
Los Angeles Times, and The Wall
Street Journal.More than 50 percent
of the articles gave roughly equal weight to both the scientific view and the
scientifically discredited view (that humans do not play a major role in
climate change). This would be similar to having a
debate on the shape of our planet, and giving equal time to the Flat Earth
Society.
In addition, some conservative politicians
and commentators downplay the significance of climate change.U. S. Senator James Inhofe, for example,
calls it the “greatest hoax ever perpetrated on the American people.”No wonder many folks are so confused. On one
side you have vociferously opinionated media pundits, bloggers, and politicians
like Senator Inhofe (who received close to a million dollars from the oil and
coal industries between 2000 and 2008). On the other side are the real experts,
typically more cautious in their assertions.
Meanwhile, the media,
leaning over backward to be perceived as balanced and reasonable, often gives
equal time to both “sides” of the issue — even though the vast majority of
climate scientists, virtually all peer-reviewed articles in respected scientific
journals, and statements from scientific academies worldwide agree that the
scientific probability is extremely high that climate change poses an existential
threat to life as we know it — and that we are the cause and the
potential solution.
Waiting for 100% agreement means doing nothing
Many
people do not understand that scientists rarely, if ever, all agree 100% on
anything.As pointed out with the “Flat
Earth Society” example above, there will always be a few fringe dissenters,
even on commonly accepted facts.Nor do
people always understand that in science, a “theory” is not merely somebody’s
made-up opinion.Rather, it is a
hypothesis that is supported by documentable evidence.The confusion over what scientific “probability” and
“uncertainty” actually mean was addressed in a letter signed by 255 leading
scientists that appeared in the May 2010 issue of the respected journal Science:
We are deeply disturbed by the
recent escalation of political assaults on scientists in general and on climate
scientists in particular.All citizens
should understand some basic scientific facts.There is always some uncertainty associated with scientific conclusions;
science never absolutely proves anything.Whensomeone says that society should wait until scientists are absolutelycertain before taking any action, it is
the same as saying societyshould
never take action. [Emphasis in original] For a problem as potentially
catastrophic as climate change, taking no action poses a dangerous risk for our
planet.
Climate
expert Lord Nicholas Stern of Brentford, former chief economist at the World
Bank and former advisor to the British Prime Minister on economic matters, concluded
in a major study of the potential economic effects of climate change that spending
one percent of gross national product now to reduce climate change could prevent
the necessity of spending five to 20 percent of gross national product later on
to address the many harmful effects of climate change.
If we
follow the strenuous recommendations of climate scientists, we have the
potential for a far better, environmentally sustainable world. However, if we
follow the advice of the skeptics and do not try to address climate change
soon, we will likely end up with a climatic cataclysm.
Is climate change
merely “liberal politics?”
Another reason there is so much skepticism about climate
change, despite the strong scientific consensus surrounding it, is the bias of Fox
News.An internal e-mail written in
December 2009 and published by liberal-media-watchdog group Media Matters for
America, on December 16, 2010, revealed that Bill Sammon, Fox News’s
Washington bureau chief, told Fox journalists to “refrain from asserting that
the planet has warmed (or cooled) in any given period without IMMEDIATELY
pointing out that such theories are based upon data that critics have called
into question.It is not our place as
journalists to assert such notions as facts, especially as this debate intensifies.”
While it is true that there
have been a few examples of scientific error and misbehavior among climate
scientists, these have been unfairly seized
upon and exaggerated by climate change deniers. Follow-up investigations have
demonstrated that the mistakes were honest ones, and there
were no efforts by the scientific community to mislead the public.
The so-called
“Climategate” scandal has been shown to be a bogus accusation.Numerous investigations of the scientists in
question concluded they were guilty of nothing more than failing to fully share
their data with their critics and of making rude e-mail comments about
them.Investigations were carried out
by the U.S. Department of Commerce's Inspector General, by the British House of
Commons' Science and Technology Committee, and by an independent inquiry panel
convened by the British University of East Anglia, among others.An Associated Press review of the e-mails in
question found no evidence that the scientists in question faked anything.
Many people dismiss
climate change as just “liberal politics.”They give more weight to the views of Glenn Beck, Rush Limbaugh, and
other reactionary commentators than to the scientific consensus.These climate deniers should be made aware
of the previously mentioned, little-known group, “Republicans for Environmental
Protection (REP).”There is an
abundance of material about climate change and other environmental threats at
their website (http://www.REP.org), including responses to many of the questions that
climate deniers (and sincere skeptics) raise.
While REP is very committed to the election of Republicans, they were
only able to endorse 19 out of over 500 Republican candidates (less than 4
percent!) for Congress and governorships during the 2010 midterm U.S.
Elections, because so few of these candidates have positive records on the environment.*
Both REP and a sister
group called ConservAmerica (http://www.ConserveAmerica.org)** share the slogan
“Conservation IS Conservative.”These
groups deserve much greater recognition and their
voices heard.Climate change is not a partisan, political issue, but arguably
the greatest moral, environmental, economic, and social justice issue of our
time.
Richard. H. Schwartz
(excerpted from Who Stole My Religion? Revitalizing Judaism and applying Jewish values to Help Heal our Imperiled Planet, pp. 180-183)
** since publication of Who Stole My Religion, REP.org and ConserveAmerica have merged as ConserveAmerica. Either web address takes you to the same website.
See also Rabbi Gershom's article Vote Romney-Ryan and kill the planet for an excellent analysis of Ryan as a conspiracy theorist and Romney as an energy Luddite.
