Our democracy and country cannot prosper if we continue to elect politicians who argue against scientific evidence; they will doom our country to be a second-rate or worse nation.
Larry C. Kindsvater, Falls Church
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●The Aug. 20 front-page article on the political ramifications of the arguments over climate change quoted several people who said human activity is causing global warming and recounted data on global temperature statistics (as if that proves anything about human causation). It also cited two well-known skeptics of this claim. Were those skeptics allowed to explain why they are skeptics? No, they were only allowed to say that climate change is a political issue. Well, duh.
When will The Post present the real arguments and let its readers decide whether there is a “consensus”?
Donna Fitzpatrick Bethell, Washington
The writer was the undersecretary in the Energy Department from 1988 to 1989 and serves on the board of the Science & Environmental Policy Project.
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●The statement “Any clear indication on where the United States is headed ... will have to wait until after the 2012 election” in the Aug. 15 news story “Obama facing opposition to international agenda” caused me to raise an eyebrow. Why is the future of our planet conditioned on political agreement and the reaction of voters in the next election?
We’ve just seen what happens when Congress waits until the last minute to take action. Unlike with the debt ceiling, there is no tangible deadline for dealing with climate change, but the failure to reduce emissions will have far greater consequences than the lack of a reduction in spending.
Rather than waiting for a better hand to be dealt to it, the Obama administration should do the best it can with the cards it has now by figuring out the best way to maneuver with Congress. One idea is a tax break for companies that show progress in reducing emissions. If the GOP is really opposed to raising taxes, surely it wouldn’t object to this or any similar proposal.
Akshay Deverakonda, Herndon
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●It is vital to address climate change now, and this includes ramping up production of sustainable energy as well as creating the infrastructure to contain catastrophic changes, such as rising seas. As a bonus, doing so could be a wonderful way to reduce unemployment, because we must create more jobs now to secure a more sustainable and safer future. This could be our Works Progress Administration or Marshall Plan moment. We can put people to work and at the same time save ourselves from disaster.
Frances Thompson McKay, Washington
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