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We Have Arrived At A Moment Of Decision. Our Home - Earth - Is In Grave Danger. What Is At Risk Of Being Destroyed Is Not The Planet Itself, Of Course, But The Conditions That Have Made It Hospitable For Human Beings.

-Al Gore

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We Have Arrived At

Al Gore

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We Have Arrived At A Moment Of Decision. Our Home - Earth - Is In Grave Danger. What Is At Risk Of Being Destroyed Is Not The Planet Itself, Of Course, But The Conditions That Have Made It Hospitable For Human Beings.

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More From Al Gore

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.

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.

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.

Humankind Has Suddenly Entered Into A Brand New Relationship With Our Planet. Unless We Quickly And Profoundly Change The Course Of Our Civilization, We Face An Immediate And Grave Danger Of Destroying The Worldwide Ecological System That Sustains Life As We Know It.

New Relationship

Every Day We Put Another 110 Million Tons Of Global Warming Pollution Into The Sky As If It's An Open Sewer, And It's Still Building Up. And The Scientists Tell Us It's A Race Against Time. We've Stabilized Emissions Globally Now For The Last Three Years, But They Need To Start Coming Down Quickly. We've Got The Momentum, We've Got The Wind In Our Sails, We're Gonna Win This.

It Is My Deep Personal Conviction That Abortion Is Wrong. I Hope That Some Day We Will See The Current Outrageously Large Number Of Abortions Drop Sharply...let Me Assure You That I Share Your Belief That Innocent Human Life Must Be Protected.

We Need To Remake The Democratic Party. We Need To Remake America.

All I'm Doing, All I Have Done For 40 Years, Is Spend Time With The Best Scientific Experts, Gain Their Confidence, And Take Advantage Of Their Patience In Explaining Things To Me Over And Over Again In Progressively Simpler Language That I Can Understand, So That I Can Read It Back To Them And Get Their Sign Off, Where They Say, "yep, That's It, Al. You've Got It." When I Understand It, I Know I Can Explain It To Other People. When The Scientists' Predictions End Up Being True, I See That As An Opportunity To Say To People, "listen Carefully To What They're Saying Now."

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

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.

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

A Leapord Never Changes His Stripes.

We're Still Putting 110 Million Tons Of Man-made Global Pollution Into The Air Every Single Day As If The Sky Is An Open Sewer. More Than 90% Of The Extra Heat Energy Is Going Into The Oceans, And That's Why Superstorm Sandy Was So Much More Destructive, That's Why The Ice Is Melting More Rapidly, That's Why The Water Cycle Is Being Disrupted And We Get A Lot More Water Vapor Coming From The Oceans Into The Sky, And That's Why We Get These Enormous Downpours And Big Floods. They Happen All The Time. Every Night On The Tv News Is Like A Nature Hike Through The Book Of Revelation.

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

The Ten Hottest Years In The Atmospheric Record, Going Back Only 160 Years, Have Been In The Last Eleven Years.

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.

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

I Remain Optimistic That Ultimately Free Speech And A Free Press Where Individuals Have Access To The Dialogue Will Have A Self-correcting Quality.

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

Today We're Dumping 70 Million Tons Of Global-warming Pollution Into The Environment, And Tomorrow We Will Dump More, And There Is No Effective Worldwide Response. Until We Start Sharply Reducing Global-warming Pollution, I Will Feel That I Have Failed.

Environmental Pollution

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.

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

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

The Scientific Evidence Of How Serious This Climate Crisis Is Becoming Continues To Amass Week After Week After Week.

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

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.

I Was Honored To Serve As An Elected Official For Twenty-four Years Of My Life. But Right Now, I Believe Our Democratic Processes Have Been Hacked. They Are Not Serving The Best Interests Of The American Public.

There Are Many Who Still Do Not Believe That Global Warming Is A Problem At All. And It's No Wonder: Because They Are The Targets Of A Massive And Well-organized Campaign Of Disinformation Lavishly Funded By Polluters Who Are Determined To Prevent Any Action To Reduce The Greenhouse Gas Emissions That Cause Global Warming Out Of A Fear That Their Profits Might Be Affected If They Had To Stop Dumping So Much Pollution Into The Atmosphere.

I'm Very Familiar With The Importance Of Dairy Farming In Wisconsin. I've Spent The Night On A Dairy Farm Here In Wisconsin. If I'm Entrusted With The Presidency, You'll Have Someone Who Is Very Familiar With What The Wisconsin Dairy Industry Is All About.

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

The Oil Industry Has Outpaced The Building Of A Public Consensus Of The Implications Of Climate Science.

Mother Nature Does Not Do Bailouts.

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.

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.

Speaking From My Own Religious Tradition In This Christmas Season, 2,000 Years Ago A Homeless Woman Gave Birth To A Homeless Child In A Manger Because The Inn Was Full.

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

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.

We Must Also Promote Global Access To The Internet. We Need To Bridge The Digital Divide Not Just Within Our Country. But Among Countries. Only By Giving People Around The World Access To This Technology Can They Tap Into The Potential. Of The Information Age.

Having Worked On Climate Crisis For Almost 40 Years Now, I've Seen Good Days And Bad Days. And Through All Of That Time, The General Trajectory Has Been It's Getting Worse, It's Getting Worse. But In The Last Ten To 20 Years, There's A Second Development; The Solutions Are More And More, And More Available. So Having This Broad Overview That I've Developed Over A Long Period Of Time, I Now See The Evidence That The Solutions Are Available. We're Gonna Do This.

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.

The Will To Act Is A Renewable Resource.

Renewable Resources

Having Cameras Follow You Is Something That Requires A Little Personal Adjustment, But You Actually Do Begin To Forget They're There. It's Impossible To Maintain That Awareness All The Time, And When You're Going Through An Emotional Or Absorbing Experience, You Really Don't Have Any Spare Attention To Think, "got To Remember That The Camera Is Rolling."

My Fellow Americans, People All Over The World, We Need To Solve The Climate Crisis, It's Not A Political Issue, It's A Moral Issue. We Have Everything We Need To Get Started, With The Possible Exception Of The Will To Act, That's A Renewable Resource, Let's Renew It.

Believe In The Power Of Your Own Voice.

I Used To Have A Military Officer Travelling With Me At All Times With A Suitcase - Referred To As The Nuclear Football - In Case It Had To Be Used.

Unless We Stop Dumping 70 Million Tons Of Global Warming Pollution Into The Atmosphere Every 24 Hours, Which We Are Doing Right Now ... The Continued Acceleration Of This Pollution Would Destroy The Future Of Human Civilization.

I've Learned The Importance Of Changing People's Minds At The Grassroots Level So That Whoever Does Run Will Have A Much Better Chance Of Encountering Public Opinion That Reaches A Critical Mass And Brings About A Change Not Only In White House Policies But In The Congress And In The State Legislatures And All Around The World.

What Changed In The United States With Hurricane Katrina Was A Feeling That We Have Entered A Period Of Consequences.

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.

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

As Many Know, The Chinese Expression For "crisis" Consists Of Two Characters Side By Side. The First Is The Symbol For "danger," The Second The Symbol For "opportunity."

...the Debate Among The Scientists If Over. There Is No More Debate. We Face A Planetary Emergency. There Is No More Scientific Debate Among Serious People Who've Looked At The Science...well, I Guess In Some Quarters, There's Still A Debate Over Whether The Moon Landing Was Staged In A Movie Lot In Arizona, Or Whether The Earth Is Flat Instead Of Round.

You Know The Old Saying: You Win Some, You Lose Some... And Then There's That Little-known Third Category.

David Agus Is One Of America's Great Doctors And Medical Researchers, A Man Dedicated To Improving The Health Of As Many People As He Can. Written In A Style And Format That Will Truly Engage Readers, The End Of Illness Presents A Dramatic, New Way Of Thinking About Our Own Health-a Way That Could Lead To Greatly Improving The Quality Of Life For Millions, Starting Right Now.

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

I Flew On Air Force Two For Eight Years, And Now I Have To Take Off My Shoes To Get On An Aeroplane.

You Can Say The Earth Is Flat, But It Doesn't Mean You're Going To Fall Off The Edge.

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

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.

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.

I Am Old Enough To Know That A Red Carpet Is Just A Rug.

A Lot In The Faith-based Community, A Lot Of Fundamentalist Groups Are - Are Now Saying, You Know, The Earth Is The Lord And The Fullness There Of, And We Have An Obligation To Be Good Stewards Of The Planet.

I Think That We Should Ban So-called Junk Guns. I Think We Should Ban Assault Weapons Like The Weapons Used Here [in Fort Worth], Yes. I Think That The Kinds Of Weapons That Have No Legitimate Use For Hunting Or The Kind Of Weapon That A Homeowner Would Use, I Think They Should Be Banned, Yes, Those Kind Of Weapons.

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

Renewable Resources

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

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.

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.

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

Our New Technologies, Combined With Our Numbers, Have Made Us, Collectively, A Force Of Nature

Third World Nations Are Producing Too Many Children Too Fast...it Is Time To Ignore The Controversy Over Family Planning And Cut Out-of-control Population Growth.

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.

Most People In Politics Draw Energy From Backslapping And Shaking Hands And All That. I Draw Energy From Discussing Ideas.

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.

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?

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

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

Mass Destruction

Adopting A Central Organizing Principle Means Embarking On An All-out Effort To Use Every Policy And Program, Every Law And Institution, To Halt The Destruction Of The Environment.

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.

I Do Genuinely Believe That The Political System Is Not Linear. When It Reaches A Tipping Point Fashioned By A Critical Mass Of Opinion, The Slow Pace Of Change We're Used To Will No Longer Be The Norm. I See A Lot Of Signs Every Day That We're Moving Closer And Closer To That Tipping Point.

It Is Just Human Nature To Take Time To Connect The Dots, I Know That. But I Also Know That There Can Be A Day Of Reckoning When You Wish You Had Connected The Dots More Quickly.

We Are Close To A Time When All Of Humankind Will Envision A Global Agenda That Encompasses A Kind Of Global Marshall Plan To Address The Causes Of Poverty And Suffering And Environmental Destruction All Over The Earth.

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

The Warnings About Global Warming Have Been Extremely Clear For A Long Time. We Are Facing A Global Climate Crisis. It Is Deepening. We Are Entering A Period Of Consequences.

The Truth About The Climate Crisis Is Still Inconvenient To The Large Carbon Polluters. And So They Want To Bob And Weave And Dodge The Truth, And Pretend Like It's Still A Big Controversy, And It's Not. They Want To Pretend That This Is Up For Debate. Like, Whether Or Not The World Is Round Is Up For Debate, Or Whether The Moon Landing Really Took Place.

Future Generations May Well Have Occasion To Ask Themselves, "what Were Our Parents Thinking? Why Didn't They Wake Up When They Had A Chance?" We Have To Hear That Question From Them, Now.

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.

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.

As President, I Will Bring All The Parties And Stakeholders Together. I Am Going To Come Up With A Solution That Respects The Environment And Does Not Cause An Upheaval In The Economy.

Population Growth Is Straining The Earth's Resources To The Breaking Point, And Educating Girls Is The Single Most Important Factor In Stabilizing That. That, Plus Helping Women Gain Political And Economic Power And Safeguarding Their Reproductive Rights.

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

The Moral Imperative To Make Big Changes Is Inescapable...that What We Take For Granted May Not Be Here For Our Children

We're Putting 70 Million Tonnes Of Pollution Into The Atmosphere Every Day, Trapping An Enormous Amount Of Extra Heat From The Sun Inside The Earth's Atmosphere. It's Threatening To Push The Planet Past A Tipping Point Beyond Which Climate Change Would Be Difficult To Stop

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.

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.

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

Some Of The Most Intriguing New Research Is In The Area Of Extreme Weather Events And Rainfall. A Recent Study By German Scientists Published In Climatic Change Projects That Extreme Precipitation Will Increase Significantly In Regions That Are Already Experiencing Extreme Rainfall. Man-made Global Warming Has Already Increased The Moisture Content Of The Air Worldwide, Causing Bigger Downpours. Each Additional Degree Of Temperature Increase Causes Another Seven Percent Increase In Moisture In The Air, And Even Larger Downpours When Storm Conditions Trigger Heavy Rains And Snows.

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]

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.

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.

A Zebra Can Not Change It's Spots.

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.

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

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.

The Pacific Yew Can Be Cut Down And Processed To Produce A Potent Chemical, Taxol, Which Offers Some Promise Of Curing Certain Forms Of Lung, Breast And Ovarian Cancer In Patients Who Would Otherwise Quickly Die... 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.

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.

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.

The Era Of Procrastination...is Coming To A Close...we Are Entering A Period Of Consequences - Winston Churchill (warning About The Danger Of Appeasement

Procrastination

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.

My Parents Were True Believers In The Efficacy Of American Constitutional Democracy, And I Was Thoroughly Inculcated With Reverence For What We The People Are Capable Of Doing. The Complication In That Simple Narrative Is That As I Got Older, The Vietnam War Shook My Confidence In How Our Democracy Was Working. I Ended Up Serving In That War, But It Started With A Lie, And I Was Very Proud Of My Father For Being One Of Its Earliest Opponents.

Tobacco Addiction Sinks Its Claws In Deeply, It's Just As Powerful Of [sic] An Addiction As Heroin Or Crack Cocaine.

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

I Strongly Believe In The Separation Of Church And State. But Freedom Of Religion Does Not Mean Freedom From Religion, There Is A Better Way.

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.

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

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?

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.

There Are Some Bright Spots, To Be Sure, But The Internet Is Still In A Wild West Phase, As Was The Case During The Early Age Of The Printing Press As Well.

We Are In An Unusual Predicament As A Global Civilization. The Maximum That Is Politically Feasible, Even The Maximum That Is Politically Imaginable Right Now, Still Falls Short Of The Minimum That Is Scientifically And Ecologically Necessary.

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.

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.

I Put All My Sighs In A Lockbox

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.

George Bush Taking Credit For The Wall Coming Down Is Like The Rooster Taking Credit For The Sun Rising.

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

Like An Audience Entertained By A Magician, We Allow Ourselves To Be Deceived By Those With A Stake In Persuading Us To Ignore Reality.

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 Feel Passionate About Solving The Climate Crisis.

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

I Drive A Hybrid. Tipper And I Got A Lexus Hybrid. And We Have A Couple Of Priuses In The Family With Our Children. And I Encourage People To Make Environmentally Conscious Choices Because We All Have To Solve This Climate Crisis.

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.

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.

Judge Roberts Is A Brilliant Lawyer, A Brilliant Judge. He Is A Very Careful Judge, A Thoughtful Judge. I Would Agree With What The President Said Earlier. He Is A Decent Man. I Think Everybody Who Knows Him Likes Him.

My Plan To Put Social Security In An Ironclad Lockbox Has Gotten A Lot Of Attention Recently, And I'm Glad About That. But I'm Afraid That It's Overshadowing Some Vitally Important Proposals. For Instance, I'll Put Medicaid In A Walk-in Closet. I'll Put The Community Reinvestment Act In A Secured Gym Locker. I'll Put Nasa Funding In A Hermetically Sealed Ziploc Bag.

Researchers At The Naval Postgraduate School Have Told Us That The Entire Arctic Ice Cap May Totally Disappear In Summer In As Little As Five Years If Nothing Is Done To Curb Emissions Of Greenhouse Gas Pollution.

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

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.

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.

Scientists With Access To Data From Navy Submarines Traversing Underneath The North Polar Ice Cap Have Warned That There Is Now A 75 Percent Chance That Within Five Years The Entire Ice Cap Will Completely Disappear During The Summer Months.

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

Eventually We'll Use A Co2 Tax Offset By A Reduction In Taxes Elsewhere Alongside A Cap-and-trade Plan, But The Degree Of Difficulty Associated With A Co2 Tax Far Exceeds That With A Cap-and-trade Plan. We're Seeing It's Hard To Get A Cap-and-trade Plan And It's Much Easier To Use As A Basis For A Global Agreement Than A Co2 Tax.

[t]he Scientific Enterprise Will Never Be Completely Free Of Mistakes. What Is Important Is That The Overwhelming Consensus On Global Warming Remains Unchanged.

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

The Choice To 'do Nothing' In Response To The Mounting Evidence Is Actually A Choice To Continue And Even Accelerate The Reckless Environmental Destruction That Is Creating The Catastrophe At Hand.

The Entire North Polar Ice Cap Is Disappearing Before Our Very Eyes. It's Been The Size Of The Continental United States For The Last 3 Million Years And Now 40 Percent Is Gone And The Rest Of It Is Going.

Consider A Clock Thermostat, And Set It So That You're Not Using Energy When You Don't Need It, When You're Out Of Your House.

Our World Faces A True Planetary Emergency. I Know The Phrase Sounds Shrill, And I Know It's A Challenge To The Moral Imagination.

I'm Not A Psychologist, And I Don't Know How To Play A More Sophisticated Role Than The One That I Have Played For Quite A Few Years, And That Is Spending A Lot Of Time With These Hard-working Scientists In The Various Fields Of Expertise That Relate To The Climate Crisis, Learning As Fully As I Can The Truths They Are Discovering, Asking Them To Explain It In Language That's Simple Enough For Me To Understand And Then Use That Language To Convey The Essence Of It, And Then Letting The Chips Fall Where They May.

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.

The Cumulative Amount Of Man-made Global Pollution That's In The Atmosphere Now Traps As Much Extra Heat Energy Every Day As Would Be Released By 400,000 Hiroshima-class Atomic Bombs Exploding Every Day. It's A Big Planet, But That's An Awful Lot Of Energy.

At Some Point, A False Belief Collides With Physical Reality.

I Pledge To You Today That As President, In My First Budget, I Will Introduce The Largest Increase In Special Education Ever.

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 Presidency Is More Than A Popularity Contest.

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 United States Has An Absolute, Uncompromising Commitment To Israel's Security And An Absolute Conviction That Israel Alone Must Decide The Steps Necessary To Ensure That Security. That Is Israel's Prerogative. We Accept That. We Endorse That. Whatever Israel Decides Cannot, Will Not, Will Never, Not Ever, Alter Our Fundamental Commitment To Her Security.

We've Seen The Bankruptcy Of Many Newspapers. We've Seen A Further Erosion Of The Line Between News And Entertainment. But I Do Believe That There Is Reason To Hope That Over Time We Will See The Higher-quality Journalism Rise To The Surface.

Incredibly, While These 18 To 20 Year-olds Cannot Legally Buy A Beer, Cannot Purchase A Bottle Of Wine And Cannot Order A Drink In A Bar, Right Now They Can Walk Into Any Gun Shop, Any Pawn Shop, Any Gun Show, Anywhere In America And Buy A Handgun.

In An Economic Recession, Naturally, When You Ask People To List Their Priorities, They're Going To Place A Higher Priority On The Immediate Economic Situation.

Economic Recession

Because These Consequences Are Distributed Globally, The Problem Masquerades As A Distraction. Because The Length Of Time Between Causes And Consequences Stretches Out Longer Than We're Used To Dealing With, It Gives Us The Illusion That We Have The Luxury Of Time. Neither Of Those Things Is True.

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.

We Have To Use Our Reasoning Capacity And Set Long-term Goals Based On Our Deepest Values.

The Wind And The Sun Are Free.

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

I Think The Fact That Within The Bitcoin Universe An Algorithm Replaces The Functions Of The Government Is Actually Pretty Cool. I Am A Big Fan Of Bitcoin.

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

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.

The Golden Thread Of Reason That Used To Be Stretched Taut To Mark The Boundary Between The Known And The Unknown Is Now Routinely Disrespected.

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.

The Himalayan Glaciers On The Tibetan Plateau Have Been Among The Most Affected By Global Warming. The Himalayas...provide More Than Half Of The Drinking Water For 40% Of The World's Population...within The Next Half-century, That 40% Of The World's People May Well Face A Very Serious Drinking Water Shortage, Unless The World Acts Boldly And Quickly To Mitigate Global Warming.

The Center Of The Earth Is About A Million Degrees.

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

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

I Had A Detailed Plan For My Life, But It Turned Out Life Had A Completely Different Plan For Me. And I Feel Joy That I Have Work That Feels Like It Justifies Pouring Everything I Have Into It. I Never Have Fallen Prey To The Illusion That There's Any Job With As Much Ability To Influence The Future As That Of President Of The United States, But I Do Feel Grateful That I Found Other Ways To Do Work That Serves The Public Interest.

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.

We Face A Climate Crisis Now That Is The Most Serious Challenge Our Civilization Has Ever Confronted. And The Greatest Country In The World [america] Has To Remain A Part Of This Unprecedented Global Agreement To Deal With It.

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've Been Dreaming Of This Moment Since I Was A Kid Growing Up In Tennessee: That One Day, I'd Have The Chance To Come Here To Madison Square Garden And Be The Warm-up Act For Elvis.

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 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.

I Work To Promote The Idea Of Sustainable Capitalism Driven By Long-term Considerations Rather Than Quarterly Profits, Which Seeks To Better People's Lives And The Planet Rather Than Destroy Them.

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.

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'.

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 Understand That Being Optimistic In This Age Is Challenging, But I Am Optimistic Nonetheless.

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.

I Was Recently On A Tour Of Latin America, And The Only Regret I Have Was That I Didn't Study Latin Harder In School So I Could Converse With Those People.

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.

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.

A Free Press Is The Immune System Of Representative Democracy.

Representatives

Throughout History, Religious Wars Have Always Been The Most Brutal And Cruel And Merciless.

I’ve Chosen Not To Challenge The Rule Of Law, Because In Our System There Really Is No Intermediate Step Between A Supreme Court Decision And Violent Revolution. When The Supreme Court Makes A Decision, No Matter How Strongly One Disagrees With It, One Faces A Choice –are We, In John Adams’ Phrase, A Nation Of Laws, Or Is It A Contest Made On Raw Power?

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

I Think The Ethical Standards Established In This White House Have Been The Highest In The History Of The White House.

Ethical Standards

Distributed Intelligence Is The Key To The Advancement Of Human Civilization. Dictatorships, Communist Countries, Monarchies In The Past All Eventually Collapsed Because Of Their Inefficiency In Moving Information.

Manbearpig, Half Man, Half Bear, Half Pig

In Order To Solve The Climate Crisis, We Need To Solve The Democracy Crisis.

Consider What Kind Of Car You Get. Buy Cars And Other Products That Have The Least Impact Environmentally.

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.

I Would Distinguish Between Donald Trump And The United States Of America. Although He Is President, He Does Not Speak For The Country On The Climate Change, And That Was Vividly Illustrated In The Aftermath Of His Speech Pulling The Us Out Of The Paris Agreement. Almost Immediately, Not Only Did The Rest Of The World Double Down On Its Commitments, But Also Here In This Country, Governors, Mayors, Business Leaders, They Said, We're Still In The Paris Agreement, And They're Doubling Down. A Lot Of Cities Have Now Made A Decision To Go 100% Renewable Energy.

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

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Sri Mulyani Indrawati

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