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The Planet Has A Fever. If Your Baby Has A Fever, You Go To The Doctor. If The Doctor Says You Need To Intervene Here, You Don't Say, `well, I Read A Science Fiction Novel That Told Me It's Not A Problem.'... You Take Action.

-Al Gore

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The Planet Has A

Al Gore

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The Planet Has A Fever. If Your Baby Has A Fever, You Go To The Doctor. If The Doctor Says You Need To Intervene Here, You Don't Say, `well, I Read A Science Fiction Novel That Told Me It's Not A Problem.'... You Take Action.

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More From Al Gore

We All Know The Leopard Can't Change His Stripes.

And Just As The False Assumption That We Are Not Connected To The Earth Has Led To The Ecological Crisis, So To The Equally False Assumption That We Arenot Connected To Each Other That Has Led To Our Social Crisis.

There Are Skeptics Who Do Not Come To Their View Because They Have A Source Of Income From Carbon Polluters.

In A Free Society, There Comes A Time When The Truth - However Hard It May Be To Hear, However Impolitic It May Seem To Say - Must Be Told.

There Comes A Time

The Climate Crisis Is Not A Political Issue; It Is A Moral And Spiritual Challenge To All Of Humanity. It Is Also Our Greatest Opportunity To Lift Global Consciousness To A Higher Level.

Israel Has Its Own Right As A Nation To Defend Its National Security.

National Security

The Truth Is That We're At A Critical Juncture In The History Of Our Species And If We Don't Act Soon, We Could Inhabit A World We Don't Recognize Anymore. But The Most Important Truth Is That We Are Capable Of Stopping Climate Change Before The Worst Of Its Consequences Are Locked In. The Solutions Exist - All We Need Is The Will To Do Something About It.

I Took The Initiative In Moving Forward A Whole Range Of Initiatives That Have Proven To Be Important To Our Country's Economic Growth, Environmental Protection, Improvements In Our Educational System.

Atheists Have Just As Much Of A Right To The Public Discourse As Any ... People Of Any Religious Faith In This Country.

...it Is Appropriate To Have An Over Representation Of Factual Presentations On How Dangerous It Is, As A Predicate For Opening Up The Audience To Listen To What The Solutions Are, And How Hopeful It Is That We Are Going To Solve This Crisis.

Someone Who Expresses A View That Is Contrary To The View Of The Overwhelming Majority Should Be Allowed To Stand Undisturbed As A Monument To Our Commitment To Free Speech.

(george Bush) Betrayed This Country! He Played On Our Fears. He Took America On An Ill-conceived Foreign Adventure Dangerous To Our Troops, An Adventure Preordained And Planned Before 9/11 Ever Took Place!

We Now Face The Prospect Of A Kind Of Global Civil War Between Those Who Refuse To Consider The Consequences Of Civilization's Relentless Advance And Those Who Refuse To Be Silent Partners In The Destruction. More And More People Of Conscience Are Joining The Effort To Resist, But The Time Has Come To Make This Struggle The Central Organizing Principle Of World Civilizations.

One Tragic Example Of The Loss Of Forests And Then Water Is Found In Ethiopia. The Amount Of Its Forested Land Has Decreased From 40 To 1 Percent In The Last Four Decades. Concurrently, The Amount Of Rainfall Has Declined To The Point Where The Country Is Rapidly Becoming A Wasteland.

The Misconception That There Is Serious Disagreement Among Scientists About Global Warming Is Actually An Illusion That Has Been Deliberately Fostered By A Relatively Small But Extremely Well-funded Cadre Of Special Interests, Including Exxon Mobil And A Few Other Oil, Coal, And Utilities Companies. These Companies Want To Prevent Any New Policies That Would Interfere With Their Current Business Plans That Rely On The Massive Unrestrained Dumping Of Global Warming Pollution Into The Earth's Atmosphere Every Hour Of Every Day.

I Think That Asserting That Former President Obama Wasn't Born In The United States Was Just The Height Of Irresponsibility, Of Course. And Donald Trump Corrected That One. There Are Others That Have Yet To Be Corrected.

The Bush-cheney Administration Had Betrayed Some Basic American Values. So There Was Hunger For Change.

I Doubt Nuclear Power Will Play A Much Larger Role Than It Does Now.

The Truth Is That We're At A Critical Juncture In The History Of Our Species And If We Don't Act Soon, We Could Inhabit A World We Don't Recognize Anymore.

I'm Still Trying To Figure Out Exactly What President Trump Represents In American Politics. But, If Nothing Else, He Represents A Way For Tens Of Millions Of People Who Were Desperate For Change To Just Turn The Table Over And Say, We Want To Start Over Again. But It Is A Challenge For Our Democracy. It Definitely Is. But, Again, The Remedy Has To Be Devoting Enough Attention To Restoring The Way We Make Collective Decisions In This Country.

The Spiritual Sense Of Our Place In Nature... Can Be Traced To The Origins Of Human Civilization... The Last Vestige Of Organized Goddess Worship Was Eliminated By Christianity.

The Congress Is Virtually Incapable Of Passing Any Reforms Unless They First Get Permission From The Powerful Special Interests Who Are Most Affected By The Proposal.

Our Civilization Is Experiencing Unprecedented Changes Across Many Realms, Largely Due To The Rapid Advancement Of Information Technology. The Ability To Code And Understand The Power Of Computing Is Crucial To Success In Today's Hyper-connected World.

What We Take For Granted Might Not Be Here For Our Children.

I Remember As A Boy When The Conversation On Civil Rights Was Won In The South. I Remember A Time When One Of My Friends Made A Racist Joke And Another Said, 'hey Man, We Don't Go For That Anymore.'

I'm Not A Vegetarian, But I Have Cut Back Sharply On The Meat That I Eat.

The Scientists Are Virtually Screaming From The Rooftops Now. The Debate Is Over! There's No Longer Any Debate In The Scientific Community About This. But The Political Systems Around The World Have Held This At Arm's Length Because It's An Inconvenient Truth, Because They Don't Want To Accept That It's A Moral Imperative.

I Will Tell You That What Gives Me A Sense Of Joy Is Having Work To Do That Justifies Pouring Every Ounce Of Energy I Have Into It. That's Really A Blessing To Have In Your Life. And It Gives You Energy Back When You Have The Privilege Of Doing Work That Makes You Feel That Way.

The Wind And The Sun Are Free.

The Sooner We Switch Away From Carbon-based Fuel And Start Relying On Renewable Energy Sources Available In The United States, The Sooner We Will Grow Our Economy By Creating The Millions Of New Jobs That Will Come From Retrofitting Homes And Businesses, Building Smart Grids, Renewable Energy Systems And Planting Trees And All The Rest. We Need To Create A Lot Of Jobs That Can't Be Outsourced.

It's A Blessing To Have Work That Feels Fulfilling.

The Cost Reductions For Renewable Energy Continue Downward In A Very Dramatic Way. We're In The Early Stages Of A Sustainability Revolution In The Globe That Has The Scale Of The Industrial Revolution But The Speed Of The Digital Revolution. And You See It With Renewable Energy And You See It With Led Lighting, Which Takes A Fraction Of The Energy For The Existing Bulbs. All New Lights Are Going To Be Led. Electric Vehicles. There Are A Lot Of Changes Underway Right Now. I'm Excited By The Prospect, And I Look Forward To Working In The Months And Years To Come To Accelerate This Transition.

Here`s My Point. I Don`t Want You To Be In A Position Years From Now Where You Welcome Hillary Clinton And Say Actually You Did Win. It Just Wasn`t Close Enough To Make Sure That All The Votes Were Counted Or Whatever. Elections Have Consequences. Your Vote Counts. Your Vote Has Consequences.

Making Consumer Choices That Reward Eco-friendly Products And Companies Is A Great Way To Start.

Mother Nature Does Not Do Bailouts.

Political Will Is A Renewable Resource, And Everyone Can Have It In Abundance If They So Choose.

Renewable Resources

I'm Sorry I Ever Invented The Electoral College.

In Physics There's The Old Law For Every Action There's A Equal Amount Of Reaction. Sometimes That's True In Politics. If Somebody's Out There Making Nonsensical Statements, But Wielding Power Behind Them A Lot Of People Say, "well, I Need To React To That." Another Reason For The Increased Prominence Of The Climate-change Issue Is The Paris Agreement Itself. It's Not A Small Thing When Just About Every Nation In The Entire World Comes Together And Makes An Historic Agreement Like This. It's A Big Deal. And The Old Cliché "the Train Is Leaving The Station" Kind Of Applies.

Manbearpig, Half Man, Half Bear, Half Pig

The Very First Words That We, The American Nation, Spoke Were Right Here In Philadelphia. You Know Those Words: "we The People." It Wasn't, "we The Conglomerates." It Wasn't, "we The Corporations." It Was, "we The People."

You Have To Rip Your Opponent's Lungs Out And Then Move On.

Anyone Who Deals With The Climate Crisis Has An Internal Dialogue Between Hope And Despair, Because The Challenge Is So Huge And The Danger Is So Great And The Stakes Are So High. But I Have Always Resolved That In Favour Of Hope, And Actually I'm More Hopeful Now Than I Was A Decade Ago When The Solutions Were Visible On The Horizon, But You Had To Seek Reassurance That The Technology Experts That They're Coming, They'll Be Here.

The Role Of Campaign Contributions In Our Political System And The Role Of Lobbyists Have Now Reached Levels That Are Quite Unhealthy For The Operations Of Our Democracy. But The Antidote, As In Past Eras Of Lobbyist Excess, Is For More Involvement By Citizens To Build Pressure On Members Of The House And Senate To Serve The Public Interest.

The Rule Of Reason Is The True Sovereign In The American System.

You Know There's An Old African Proverb That I Made Up: "if You Want To Go Quickly, Go Alone. If You Want To Go Far, Go Together."

I Have Absolutely No Plans And No Expectations Of Ever Being A Candidate Again.

The Global Environment Crisis Is, As We Say In Tennessee, Real As Rain, And I Cannot Stand The Thought Of Leaving My Children With A Degraded Earth And A Diminished Future.

The Insistence On Complete Certainty About The Full Details Of Global Warming-the Most Serious Threat We Have Ever Faced-is Actually An Effort To Avoid Facing The Awful, Uncomfortable Truth: That We Must Act Boldly, Decisively, Comprehensively, And Quickly, Even Before We Know Every Last Detail About The Crisis. Those Who Continue To Argue That The Appropriate Response Is Merely Additional Research Are Simply Seeking To Camouflage Timidity Or Protect Their Vested Interest In The Status Quo.

While President Bush Likes To Project An Image Of Strength And Courage, The Real Truth Is That In The Presence Of His Large Financial Contributors, He Is A Moral Coward.

Co2 Is The Exhaling Breath Of Our Civilization, Literally... Changing That Pattern Requires A Scope, A Scale, A Speed Of Change That Is Beyond What We Have Done In The Past.

This Is By Far The Most Serious Crisis Civilisation Has Ever Faced.

I'm A Big Fan Of Bitcoin ... Regulation Of Money Supply Needs To Be Depoliticized.

Now We Have Things That Are Obviously False, Leading Us To War, Leading Us To Deny People Health Care, Leading Us To Ignore The Climate Crisis. We Have To Restore The Integrity Of The Democratic Conversation.

I Wrote Newspaper Articles Professionally For Seven Years, And I Love Newspapers. I'm Hopeful That New Business Models Will Emerge That Allow The Newspaper Culture To Genuinely Thrive In The Digital Age.

America's Political System Has Evolved Over The Last 50 Years In Ways That Have Enhanced The Power Of Business Lobbies.

The Survival Of The United States Of America As We Know It Is At Risk. And Even More — If More Should Be Required — The Future Of Human Civilization Is At Stake.

The Planet Is In Distress And All Of The Attention Is On Paris Hilton.

The Science Linking The Increased Frequency And Severity Of Extreme Weather To The Climate Crisis Has Matured Tremendously In The Last Couple Of Years.

We're Operating This Planet Like A Business In Liquidation.

Junkies Find Veins In Their Toes When The Veins In Their Arms Collapse. Developing Tars Sands Is The Equivalent.

The More Deeply I Search For The Roots Of The Global Environmental Crisis, The More I Am Convinced That It Is An Outer Manifestation Of An Inner Crisis That Is, For Lack Of A Better Word, Spiritual... What Other Word Describes The Collection Of Values And Assumptions That Determine Our Basic Understanding Of How We Fit Into The Universe?

In Digital Era, Privacy Must Be A Priority. Is It Just Me, Or Is Secret Blanket Surveillance Obscenely Outrageous?

I Was Born A Poor Black Child.

Well-established Theories Collapse Under The Weight Of New Facts And Observations Which Cannot Be Explained, And Then Accumulate To The Point Where The Once Useful Theory Is Clearly Obsolete.

We Face The Gravest Threat That Civilization Has Ever Confronted. It's Global In Nature And Requires A Global Solution. Increased Co2 Emissions Anywhere, Whether From China Or The United States Or From One Of The Countries That Is Burning Its Forests Like Brazil Or Indonesia.

Once The Renewable Infrastructure Is Built, The Fuel Is Free Forever. Unlike Carbon-based Fuels, The Wind And The Sun And The Earth Itself Provide Fuel That Is Free, In Amounts That Are Effectively Limitless.

The Climate, Financial And National Security Crises Are All Connected. They Share The Same Cause: Our [the Usa's] Absurd Dependency On Foreign Oil. As Long As We Need To Spend Billions Of Dollars Each Year To Buy Foreign Oil From State-run Oil Companies In The Persian Gulf, Our Problems Of A Trade Deficit, A Budget Deficit And A Climate Crisis Will Persist.

The Internet Empowers Individuals To Play A More Active Role In The Political Process, As Obama's Campaign Has Manifested.

I'm Old Enough To Know That A Red Carpet's Just A Rug, And I've Been Able To Enjoy The Pageantry Without Letting It Go To My Head.

We Are Running Out Of Time, We Must Have A Planetary Solution To A Planetary Crisis.

Global Warming Pollution, Indeed All Pollution, Is Now Described By Economists As An “externality.” This Absurd Label Means, In Essence: We Don’t To Keep Track Of This Stuff So Let’s Pretend It Doesn’t Exist.

In A Time Of Social Fragmentation, Vulgarity Becomes A Way Of Life. To Be Shocking Becomes More Important - And Often More Profitable - Than To Be Civil Or Creative Or Truly Original.

We Know That He Has Stored Secret Supplies Of Biological And Chemical Weapons Throughout His Country.

Mass Destruction

When We Respond To Threats Immediately And Take Action Right Away, It's Usually The Threats That We're Hard-wired To Respond To, The Kinds Of Things That Our Ancestors Survived.

Some People Accuse Me Of Exaggeration, So Let Me Be Clear. Those People Seek Nothing Less Than The Complete And Utter Destruction Of The American Way Of Life.

Is There Some Magic Wand They Can Wave On It And Presto! - Physics Is Overturned And Carbon Dioxide Doesn't Trap Heat Anymore? And When We See All These Things Happening On The Earth Itself, What In The Hell Do They Think Is Causing It? The Scientists Have Long Held That The Evidence In Their Considered Word Is "unequivocal," Which Has Been Endorsed By Every National Academy Of Science In Every Major Country In The Entire World.

We The Human Species, Are Confronting A Planetary Emergency-a Threat To The Survival Of Our Civilization That Is Gathering Ominous And Destructive Potential...the Earth Has A Fever. And The Fever Is Rising...indeed, Without Realizing It, We Have Begun To Wage War On Earth Itself.

Remember That The Problem Is Bigger Than The Car You Drive Or The Types Of Lightbulbs In City Hall. We Need A Fundamental Shift Away From Dirty Fossil Fuels That Spew Carbon Pollution. To Make That Happen, We Need To Put Pressure On Our Leaders To Take The Bold Actions Necessary To Move Us Off Dirty Sources Of Energy.

Our Democracy, Our Constitutional Framework Is Really A Kind Of Software For Harnessing The Creativity And Political Imagination For All Of Our People. The American Democratic System Was An Early Political Version Of Napster.

I Have Felt For A Long Time That The Pathway To Solving The Climate Crisis Is Through The Building Of A Massive Grassroots Army Of Men And Women Who Will Go Out There And Win The Conversation On Climate, And Persuade Businesses, And Universities, And Towns To Switch To Renewable Energy And To Reduce Emissions. And The Big Change From Ten Years Ago Is That People Are Way More Receptive, Not Only To The Message That We Have To Act, Not Only To The Message That Now We Can Act, We Have The Solutions Now - That's The Biggest Change - But Also Willing To Make A Commitment That We Will Act.

Humanity Is Sitting On A Time Bomb. If The Vast Majority Of The World's Scientists Are Right, We Have Just Ten Years To Avert A Major Catastrophe That Could Send Our Entire Planet's Climate System Into A Tail-spin Of Epic Destruction Involving Extreme Weather, Floods, Droughts, Epidemics And Killer Heat Waves Beyond Anything We Have Ever Experienced - A Catastrophe Of Our Own Making.

There Is The Natural Tendency That All Of Us Are Vulnerable To, To Deny Unpleasant Realities And To Look For Any Excuse To Push Them Away And Resolve To Think About Them Another Day Long In The Future.

We Ought To Approach This Challenge [of Global Warming] With A Sense Of Profound Joy And Gratitude: That We Are The Generation About Which, A Thousand Years From Now, Philharmonic Orchestras And Poets And Singers Will Celebrate By Saying, They Were The Ones That Found It Within Themselves To Solve This Crisis And Lay The Basis For A Bright And Optimistic Human Future.

There Are Good People, Who Are In Politics - In Both Parties - Who Hold This At Arm's Length, Because If They Acknowledge It And Recognize It, Then The Moral Imperative To Make Big Changes Is Inescapable.

I Take No Pleasure In The Fact That The Scientific Predictions I’ve Relayed To Popular Audiences Turn Out To Be True.

American Troops And American Taxpayers Are Shouldering A Huge Burden With No End In Sight Because Mr. Bush Took Us To War On False Premises And With No Plan To Win The Peace.

Feb. 9, 1999 Dear Friend, Without Your Previous Support, Bill Clinton And I Would Not Have Won Our Victories For The American People In 1992 And 1996. ... And To Win In 2000, I Need You By My Side.

Science Has A Culture That Is Inherently Cautious And That Is Normally Not A Bad Thing. You Could Even Say Conservative, Because Of The Peer Review Process And Because The Scientific Method Prizes Uncertainty And Penalises Anyone Who Goes Out On Any Sort Of A Limb That Is Not Held In Place By Abundant And Well-documented Evidence.

There Is An Air Of Unreality In Debating These Arcane Points When The World Is Changing In Such Dramatic Ways Right In Front Of Our Eyes Because Of Global Warming.

We Sometimes Emphasize The Danger In A Crisis Without Focusing On The Opportunities That Are There.

There Are People Who Are Genuinely Upset In The Tea Party. I Understand That. But That Movement Was Funded With Seed Money From Right-wing Billionaires, The Koch Brothers, And Promoted On Fox News, And Turned Into A Stocking Horse For The Right-wing Agenda That A Lot Of People Have Been Trying To Push On The Country For A Long Time.

Science Is Warning Us That If We Do Not Quickly Reduce The Global Warming Pollution That Is Trapping So Much Of The Heat Our Planet Normally Radiates Back Out Of The Atmosphere, We Are In Danger Of Creating A Permanent 'carbon Summer'.

I've Kind Of Fallen Out Of Love With Politics. ...whatever Experience And Talents I've Gained Over The Years -- I Think It May Well Be That The Highest And Best Use Of That Is To Try To Bring Enough Awareness Of The Solutions To The Climate Crisis And Enough Of A Sense Of Urgency That We Come Together Across Party Lines On Behalf Of Our Children.

There Are People Who Say, "god Is In Complete Control Of Everything That Happens, And If The Earth Is Getting Warmer, Then Maybe God Intends That." Well, No. God Intends For Us To Take Responsibility For How We Treat God's Creation, And If We Choose To Use The Thin Shell Of Atmosphere Surrounding Our Planet As An Open Sewer For 110-million Tons Of Global-warming Pollution Every Day, The Consequences Are Attributable To Us. And If You Are A Believer, As I Am, I Think God Intends For Us To Open Our Eyes And Take Responsibility For The Moral Consequences Of Our Actions.

Local And State Governments Have Outrun The Federal Government. The Epa Has Served Notice That It Will Enact A Rule Requiring Co2 Reductions By Major Emitters In The Absence Of Major Legislation. But It's A Blunt Instrument That Is A Little More Difficult To Use Than A Legislative Remedy.

The Physical Relationship Between Co2 Molecules And The Atmosphere And The Trapping Of Heat Is As Well-established As Gravity, For God's Sakes. It's Not Some Mystery.

I Have Always Been Fascinated With Those Who Try To Look Over The Horizon And See Things That Are Coming At Us.

The Planet Has A Fever. If Your Baby Has A Fever, You Go To The Doctor. If The Doctor Says You Need To Intervene Here, You Don't Say, `well, I Read A Science Fiction Novel That Told Me It's Not A Problem.'... You Take Action.

You Need To Really Scrub Your Investment Portfolios, Because I Guarantee You, Many Of You Are Going To Find Them Chock-full Of Subprime Carbon Assets.

Every Nation Has A Moral Obligation To Safeguard The Future.

Moral Obligation

Iraq Does Pose A Serious Threat To The Stability Of The Persian Gulf And We Should Organize An International Coalition To Eliminate His Access To Weapons Of Mass Destruction. Iraq's Search For Weapons Of Mass Destruction Has Proven Impossible To Completely Deter And We Should Assume That It Will Continue For As Long As Saddam Is In Power.

Mass Destruction

It's As If We Think The Laws Of Physics Are Subject To Debate And Amendment And Political Contributions Can Sway The Laws Of Physics.

If The People That Believed The Moon Landing Was Staged On A Movie Lot Had Access To Unlimited Money From Large Carbon Polluters Or Some Other Special Interest Who Wanted To Confuse People Into Thinking That The Moon Landing Didn't Take Place, I'm Sure We'd Have A Robust Debate About It Right Now.

The Good News Is, We Have Everything We Need Now To Respond To The Challenge Of Global Warming. We Have All The Technologies We Need, More Are Being Developed.... But We Should Not Wait, We Cannot Wait, We Must Not Wait.

As I Have Said For Many Years Throughout This Land, We're Borrowing Money From China To Buy Oil From The Persian Gulf To Burn It In Ways That Destroy The Future Of Human Civilization. Every Bit Of That Has To Change.

The Constant Drive For Campaign Dollars Has Distorted Decision-making In Washington, Dc, To The Point Where Our Systems Can No Longer Effectively Address Complex, Long-term Problems Like The Climate Crisis. Which Brings Me To My Other Major Concern - The Short-term Focus Of Capitalism. It Distorts The Allocation Of Resources And The Decision-making Processes Of Companies.

Many Of The Green Places And Open Spaces That Need Protecting Most Today Are In Our Own Neighborhoods. In Too Many Places, The Beauty Of Local Vistas Has Been Degraded By Decades Of Ill-planned And Ill-coordinated Development.

We Are Monumentally Distracted By A Pervasive Technological Culture That Appears To Have A Life Of Its Own, One That Insists On Our Full Attention, Continually Seducing Us And Pulling Us Away From The Opportunity To Experience Directly The True Meaning Of Our Own Lives.

Winston Churchill Aroused This Nation In Heroic Fashion To Save Civilisation In World War Two. We Have Everything We Need Except Political Will, But Political Will Is A Renewable Resource.

The Way To Bring Gas Prices Down Is To End Our Dependence On Oil And Use The Renewable Sources That Can Give Us The Equivalent Of $1 Per Gallon Gasoline.

It Should Be Lifted Above Partisanship Because It's A Question Of Survival. It's A Moral Issue.

In A Time Of Darkness, You Don't Curse The Darkness, You Light A Candle.

We're All Capable Of Mistakes, But I Do Not Care To Enlighten You On The Mistakes We May Or May Not Have Made.

To Use A Southern Euphemism, Our Space Program Has Been Snake-bit.

The Fate Of Mankind, As Well As Religion, Depends On The Emergence Of A New Faith In The Future. Armed With Such A Faith, We Might Find It Possible To Resanctify The Earth.

There Is No Doubt That The Issue Of Race Is Always Present In American Politics And In The Politics Of Any Multiracial Society. There Is Also No Doubt That For Some People It Is An Element In The Manifested Hostility To Obama. But I Don't Think It Is The Major Theme At All. Obama Is Right When He Reminds People: By The Way, I Was Black Before The Election.

As Many Of You Know, I Was Very Instrumental In The Founding Of The Internet

Now Comes The Threat Of Climate Crisis - A Threat That Is Real, Rising, Imminent, And Universal. Once Again, It Is The 11th Hour. The Penalties For Ignoring This Challenge Are Immense And Growing, And At Some Near Point Would Be Unsustainable And Unrecoverable. For Now We Still Have The Power To Choose Our Fate, And The Remaining Question Is Only This: Have We The Will To Act Vigorously And In Time, Or Will We Remain Imprisoned By A Dangerous Illusion?

Remember America, I Gave You The Internet And I Can Take It Away.

Each And Every One Of Us Can Make Changes In The Way We Live Our Lives And Become Part Of The Solution [to Climate Change]

For A Long Time, The Scientists Have Been Telling Us Global Warming Increases The Temperature Of The Top Layer In The Ocean, And That Causes The Average Hurricane To Become A Lot Stronger. So, The Fact That The Ocean Temperatures Did Go Up Because Of Global Warming, Because Of Man-made Global Warming, Starting Around In The '70s, And Then We Had A String Of Unusually Strong Hurricanes Outside The Boundaries Of This Multi-decadal Cycle That Is A Real Factor; There Are Scientists Who Point That Out, And They're Right, But We're Exceeding Those Boundaries Now.

There Are Skeptics Who Do Not Come To Their View Because They Have A Source Of Income From Carbon Polluters. I Don't Mean To Imply That They're All In That Category At All. There Are Also Those Who Are Also Not Motivated By Ideological Resistance For Any Role Of Government. But I Don't Know Of Any Arguments Or Any Presenters Of Arguments That Overturn The Consensus That I Think Have Gained Any Legitimacy.

The Gay Rights Movement Of Recent Years Has Been An Inspiring Victory For Humanity And It Is In The Tradition Of The Civil Rights Movement When I Was A Young Boy In The South, The Women's Suffrage Movement When My Mother Was A Young Woman In Tennessee, The Abolition Movement Much Farther Back, And The Anti-apartheid Movement When I Was In The House Of Representatives. All Of These Movements Have One Thing In Common: The Opposition To Progress Was Rooted In An Outdated Understanding Of Morality.

When You Look At What Has Happened Over The Last Few Decades The Natural Fluctuations Point In The Opposite Direction Of What Has Actually Occurred. When They Run The Models And Plug In The Man-made Pollution, The Correspondence Is Exact. Beyond That, The Scale Of Natural Fluctuations Has Now Been Far Exceeded By The Impact Of Man-made Global Warming.

There's No Such Thing As Clean Coal. It's Non-existent. Theoretically, It Might Be Possible, Many Years From Now, To Come Up With A Way To Clean It As It's Burnt. But There's Not A Single Demonstration Project In The United States. [...] Clean Coal Doesn't Exist.

As Important As It Is To Change The Light Bulbs, Its More Important To Change The Laws

My Counsel Advises Me That There Is No Controlling Legal Authority Or Case That Says There Was Any Violation Of Law Whatsoever.

As It Turns Out, The Scientific Community Has Been Addressing This Particular Question For Some Time Now And They Say That Increased Heavy Snowfalls Are Completely Consistent With What They Have Been Predicting As A Consequence Of Man-made Global Warming.

When Politics Is Too Slow, Change Has To Come From Culture.

When It Comes To Climate, We Can All Make A Big Difference.

If You Allow Someone Like Saddam Hussein To Get Nuclear Weapons, Ballistic Missiles, Chemical Weapons, Biological Weapons, How Many People Is He Going To Kill With Such Weapons? He's Already Demonstrated A Willingness To Use These Weapons. He Poison-gassed His Own People. He Used Poison Gas And Other Weapons Of Mass Destruction Against His Neighbors. This Man Has No Compunction About Killing Lots And Lots Of People. So This Is A Way To Save Lives And To Save The Stability And Peace Of A Region Of The World That Is Important To The Peace And Security Of The Entire World.

Mass Destruction

I Support The Death Penalty. I Think That It Has To Be Administered Not Only Fairly, With Attention To Things Like Dna Evidence, Which I Think Should Be Used In All Capital Cases, But Also With Very Careful Attention. If The Wrong Guy Is Put To Death, Then That's A Double Tragedy. Not Only Has An Innocent Person Been Executed But The Real Perpetrator Of The Crime Has Not Been Held Accountable For It, And In Some Cases May Be Still At Large. But I Support The Death Penalty In The Most Heinous Cases.

Of All The Works Of Civilization That Interfere With The Natural Water Distribution System, Irrigation Has Been By Far The Most Pervasive And Powerful.

The Dominance Of Short-term Perspectives Has Led To Routine Decisions In The Markets That Sacrifice The Long-term Buildup Of Genuine Value In Pursuit Of Artificial, Short-term Gains.

We Are Seeing Every Night On The Television News Now A Nature Hike Through The Book Of Revelation. These Climate-related Extreme Weather Events Have Convinced The Vast Majority Of People That The Scientists Have Been Right For A Long Time. We Have To Address This.

I Think The Cost Of Energy Will Come Down When We Make This Transition To Renewable Energy.

There's An Old African Proverb That Says "if You Want To Go Quickly, Go Alone. If You Want To Go Far, Go Together." We Have To Go Far - Quickly. And That Means We Have To Quickly Find A Way To Change The World's Consciousness About Exactly What We're Facing, And Why We Have To Work To Solve It.

I Want To Extend Condolences To The Families Of Those Who Died In The Service Of The United Nations.

Civil Disobedience Has An Honourable History, And When The Urgency And Moral Clarity Cross A Certain Threshold, Then I Think That Civil Disobedience Is Quite Understandable, And It Has A Role To Play.

In The United States Of America, Unfortunately We Still Live In A Bubble Of Unreality.

I Would Kiss Tipper Much Longer.

I Have Faith In The United States And Our Ability To Make Good Decisions Based On The Facts.

It Took Me A Bit To Realize How Big The Changes Have Been In The Last Decade. In So Many Places - Electricity From Solar And Wind Is Cheaper Than Electricity From Fossil Fuels, And Now The Batteries Are Coming Down In Costs Very Quickly. So It's Very Exciting News That Needed To Be Told.

A President Who Breaks The Law Is A Threat To The Very Structure Of Our Government.

I Have A Sense Of Mission On This Climate Crisis, And I'm Trying To Pour All The Energy I Have Into It. And I Hope That I, Along With Others, Can Catalyze The Emergence Of Real Solutions To The Climate Crisis. I Think We're Making A Lot Of Progress. I Think We're Going To Win This, But It Matters How Quickly We Win It. So I'm Focused On That.

The Uk Is One Of The Only Nations On Earth That Has Actually Met And Even Exceeded Its Goals Under The Kyoto Protocol.

You Can Push Your Local Communities To Adopt More Sustainable Sources Of Energy And Environmentally-friendly Practices.

Traditionally The United States Has Been The Natural Leader Of The World. That's Not Just Pride As An American Speaking; It's Just The Reality. Without The U.s. Being Involved In Paris Climate Agreement, It's Hard For The World Community To Move Forward As Effectively.

You're Going To See New Processes That Utilize Waste As The Source Of Energy, So There's No Petroleum Consumed In The Process - That Makes The Energy Balance Uniformly Positive.

From Wherever The Emissions Come, They Have The Same Effect: They Trap Much More Heat From The Sun, Melt The Ice, Raise The Sea Level, Cause Stronger Storms, Floods, Drought, Bigger Fires, Generate Millions Of Climate Refugees, Destabilize Political Systems, Threaten The Growing Of Food Crops And Cause A Number Of Other Catastrophic Consequences Which, Taken Together, Threaten The Basis For The Future Of Human Civilization On The Earth.

A Majority Of Trump's Voters Were In Favor Of Staying In The Paris Agreement. And If You Look At What's Really Happening In The Economy, The Economic Argument Actually Is Very Strongly In Favor Of The Paris Agreement. There Are Now Twice As Many Jobs In The Solar Industry As In The Coal Industry. Solar Jobs Are Growing 17 Times Faster Than Other Jobs In The U.s.

What's Really Important Is How Our Country Gets Through Trump Period, Because Nothing's Getting Done In Washington. Every Day It's Another Set Of Tweets And Another Set Of Controversies. And They're Not Getting Anything Done.

It Seems An Easy Choice - Sacrifice The Tree For A Human Life - Until One Learns That Three Trees Must Be Destroyed For Each Patient Treated. Suddenly We Must Confront Some Tough Questions. How Important Are The Medical Needs Of Future Generations?

A Low Voter Turnout Is An Indication Of Fewer People Going To The Polls.

I Believe That The Purpose Of Life Is To Glorify God.

There Was Never Any Doubt In Our Minds That Men And Women Were Equal, If Not More So.

When Our Founders Created America, It Was In The Age Of The Printing Press, When Individuals Could Freely Join The Conversation. And That Robust, Democratic Dialogue More Often Than Not Lifted Up The Best Available Evidence And Asserted What Was More Likely To Be True Than Not.

I Was In Elective Politics For 24 Years. I've Made Four National Races, Two For President, Two For Vice President. I Have Found There Are Other Ways To Serve, And I'm Enjoying Them.

Clouds Of A Different Sort Signal An Environmental Holocaust Without Precedent. Once Again, World Leaders Waffle, Hoping The Danger Will Dissipate. Yet Today The Evidence Is As Clear As The Sounds Of Glass Shattering In Berlin.

The Answer Is To End Our Reliance On Carbon-based Fuels... If We Succeed, We Create Booming New Industries, Wealth, Clean Secure Energy And Maybe We Prevent The Greatest Disaster So Far In Human History, Saving Millions Of Lives While Improving Billions More. If We Fail, Basically It's Business As Usual While Things Slowly Get Worse All Around Us.

We Must Quickly Mobilize Our Civilization With The Urgency And Resolve That Has Previously Been Seen Only When Nations Mobilized For War. These Prior Struggles For Survival Were Won When Leaders Found Words At The 11th Hour That Released A Mighty Surge Of Courage, Hope And Readiness To Sacrifice For A Protracted And Mortal Challenge.

I Wrote Newspaper Articles Professionally For Seven Years, And I Love Newspapers.

The Signs That The World Is Spinning Out Of Kilter Are Increasingly Difficult To Misinterpret. The Question Is How To Convince Enough People To Join A Critical Mass Of Urgent Opinion, In The U.s. And The Rest Of The World.

If The Only Tool We Use To Analyse What's Valuable Is A Price Tag, Then Those Things That Don't Have Price Tags Begin To Look Like They Have No Value.

Global Warming, Along With The Cutting And Burning Of Forests And Other Critical Habitats, Is Causing The Loss Of Living Species At A Level Comparable To The Extinction Event That Wiped Out The Dinosaurs 65 Million Years Ago. That Event Was Believed To Have Been Caused By A Giant Asteroid. This Time It Is Not An Asteroid Colliding With The Earth And Wreaking Havoc: It Is Us.

When Energy Prices Go Up, The Difficulty Of Projecting Demand Also Goes Up - Uncertainty Goes Up.

The Truth About The Climate Crisis Is Still Inconvenient For The Large Carbon Polluters And The Politicians Who Are In Their Pockets.

Fake News Has Been Around As Long As News Has Been Around.

Where Solar Energy Is Concerned - And Wind Energy And Battery Storage And Electric Vehicles And Efficiency Technologies - That Is What We Are Now Seeing. So, Yes, I'm Very Optimistic, But Anyone Who Works On The Climate Crisis Has An Internal Struggle Between Hope And Despair. I Won't Deny That, But Hope Has Always Prevailed In My Outlook.

Unless We Act Boldly And Quickly To Deal With The Underlying Causes Of Global Warming, Our World Will Undergo A String Of Terrible Catastrophes.

The Mountain Glaciers In Every Region Of The World Are Melting, Many Of Them At An Accelerated Rate, Threatening Drinking Supplies - Drinking Water Supplies And Agricultural Water Supplies. We Have These Record Storms, Drought, Floods, Fires, Three Deaths (ph) In The American West, Climate Refugees Beginning Now, Expected To Rise To The Hundreds Of Millions Unless We Take Action.

The Symbolism - And The Substantive Significance - Of Planting A Tree Has Universal Power In Every Culture And Every Society On Earth, And It Is A Way For Individual Men, Women And Children To Participate In Creating Solutions For The Environmental Crisis.

Those Who Are Quick To Feel Disrespected Often Have A Spiritual Vacuum In Their Lives, Because They Feel Disconnected To The Love Of Their Father In Heaven.

What's At Risk [in 100 Years] If We Do Not Take Action, Truly Is The Survival Of Civilization As We Know It... Literally That Is The Case. We Have Seen Global Warming So Far Of Just A Little Bit Less Than One Degree Celsius And Look At What's Happened. Superstorm Sandy. Boulder Colorado. All These Fires. Hurricane Irene One Year Before.

The Heart Of The Security Agenda Is Protecting Lives, And We Now Know That The Number Of People Who Will Die Of Aids In The First Decade Of The 21st Century Will Rival The Number That Died In All The Wars In All The Decades Of The 20th Century.

What We've Often Seen Is That When We Americans Say, Look, We've Got To Reduce Pollution, Business - Some Businesses Complain About It, But Almost Every Time, It's Turned Out To Be Easier And Cheaper And Accomplished Faster, And They've Gained Confidence, And Then We Go Farther.

When Fear Displaces Reason, The Result Is Often Irrational Hatred And Division.

The Center Of The Earth Is About A Million Degrees.

For Me, The Most Serious Problem Is How America Became So Vulnerable To The Assertion Of Blatant Falsehoods That Drive Policy And Are Not Corrected By The So-called Immune System Of Democracy, A Free Press And A Free Democratic Discourse.

It's An Important Point, And Every Little Bit Helps Not Least Because Those Who Make Those Kinds Of Changes Are More Likely To Make Their Voices Heard As Citizens. But The Ultimate Solutions Are Going To Come Through Policies.

I Am Concerned About The Economy. I Was The First One Laid Off.

Hurricane Sandy Is A Disturbing Sign Of Things To Come. We Must Heed This Warning And Act Quickly To Solve The Climate Crisis. Dirty Energy Makes Dirty Weather.

The Consensus Is Clear. We Need An Immediate And Determined Shift To A Clean, Renewable Economy. The Continued Mass Burning Of Fossil Fuels Is Inconsistent With A Healthy, Prosperous Future For Our Civilization.

Prosperous Future

Airplane Travel Is Nature's Way Of Making You Look Like Your Passport Photo.

The Truth Is That Climate Change Is Presenting The Greatest Challenge Humanity Has Ever Faced.

...2009 Saw The Eighth 'ten-year Flood' Of Fargo, North Dakota, Since 1989. In Iowa, Cedar Rapids Was Hit Last Year By A Flood That Exceeded The 500-year Flood Plain. All-time Flood Records Are Being Broken In Areas Throughout The World.

I'm Passionate About Restoring The Efficacy Of American Democracy, Making Capitalism Sustainable, Prioritizing Advances In Technology, And Seizing The Opportunities To Use That Kind Of Innovation To Help Usher In A New Economy That Doesn't Rely On Carbon-spewing Fossil Fuels.

A Zebra Does Not Change Its Spots.

I'm Naturally An Optimist, But My Basis For Hope Is Rooted In My Understanding Of Human Nature.

The United States Is The Only Nation That Can Lead The World Toward A Solution On Climate Change.

All I Have To Do Is Be The Best Al I Can Be, Because I'm Good Enough, I'm Smart Enough And, Doggone It, People Like Me.

As Human Beings, We Are Vulnerable To Confusing The Unprecedented With The Improbable. In Our Everyday Experience, If Something Has Never Happened Before, We Are Generally Safe In Assuming It Is Not Going To Happen In The Future, But The Exceptions Can Kill You And Climate Change Is One Of Those Exceptions.

There's Such A Wide Variation In Tax Systems Around The World, It's Difficult To Imagine A Harmonized Co2 Tax That Every Country Agrees To. That's Not In The Cards In The Near Term. But The Countries That Are Doing The Best Job, Like Sweden, Are Already Doing Both Of These. I Think That Eventually We'll Use Both Of Them But We Need To Get Started Right Away And The Cap-and-trade Is A Proven And Effective Tool.

There Are Many Who Would Much Prefer That The Word 'climate' Never Be Mentioned And That The Issue Be Eliminated From Our National Conversation.

A Free Press Is The Immune System Of Representative Democracy.

Representatives

If You Look At The Way All Of The New Reform Movements Dedicated To The Public Interest Are Living And Thriving On The Internet, I Do Think There Is Still Some Considerable Hope That The Full Participation Of Individuals In That Conversation Of Democracy Can Once Again Restore The Integrity Of The Way Our Democracy Works.

I Tell You That Michael Jackson Is Unbelievable, Isn't He? He's Just Unbelievable!

In The Age Of The Internet, With All Of Its Problems, Over Time, The Very Fact That Individuals Can Join The Conversation Creates The Opportunity For The Emergence Of - For The Re-emergence Of A Genuine Conversation Of Democracy.

A Lot Of People Go Straight From Denial To Despair Without Pausing In The Middle And Doing Something About It.

John Mccain Is Now Openly Endorsing The Policies Of The Bush-cheney White House And Promising To Actually Continue The Same Policies Over Again? Hey, I Believe In Recycling But That's Ridiculous.

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