Activist Fasts for Action on Climate Change

On the 49th day of his hunger strike, Ted Glick planted himself in front of a white Pontiac SUV at Independence and New Jersey avenues. In view of the U.S. Capitol, he sat down in the crosswalk and locked arms with a half-dozen other protesters a third of his age.

"NO WAR! NO WARMING!" they chanted as traffic backed up, as drivers lay on their horns, as police revved their motorcycles.

"Thank you, Ted! We love you, Ted!" other protesters cried as Glick, 58, was cuffed and dragged away to join dozens of others who were arrested Monday during a nonviolent disruption near the Cannon House Office Building. Glick has been fasting since Sept. 4 (first on water only, now on water and vitamins) to call attention to climate change and summoned what energy he had to conduct Monday's protest.

Beating the climate change drum is the latest calling in a life dedicated to activism, from the year he spent in prison for his role in the Vietnam War draft resistance movement in 1970 to his campaign for a U.S. Senate seat as New Jersey's Green Party candidate in 2002. Now Glick ping-pongs between his home in New Jersey and the office of the U.S. Climate Emergency Council ( http://www.climateemergency.org) in Takoma Park, where he is the coordinator. We talked with him about his fast and his cause.

What moment convinced you that climate change should be your focus?

It was when upwards of 35,000 people died in the Western European heat wave [in summer 2003]. I was really taken aback. That, to me, was huge. If it happened anywhere, it would've been terrible, but the fact that it happened in Europe, which is one of the most developed regions, said something to me about how this was not something far off in the future.

It seems as if much more of the world is recognizing climate change these days.

The level of consciousness about the climate emergency that we are in and the activis m on it has grown tremendously. There has been a sea change within the country on this issue, but what has not yet happened -- and we just don't have time to wait for them to move at their usual pace -- is that the federal government and the Congress have just not taken action on this. City councils, mayors, states, regional associations of states are moving on this, but the federal government is not.

What do you think is so compelling about a hunger strike?

An action like this is extreme. I don't shy away from saying that's the case. But these are extreme times. These wildfires [in California] -- one thing after another keeps happening. Eight inches of rain in New Orleans, drought in Atlanta. It's just really, really scary what's happening, and yet the connections in our government in terms of the urgency are not being made with enough breadth. A fast can be a way to try to underline that.

What are your demands?

One is an immediate freeze on, followed by reductions of, carbon emissions. Second, a moratorium on any new coal or coal-to-liquid plants. Third is $25 billion allocated in fiscal year 2008 for energy conservation programs, energy efficiency programs and renewable energy programs: solar power, wind power, tidal energy, geothermal, small-scale hydro -- energy sources that are plentiful, renewable and clean.