Jim Hightower

Nature's Reality Confronts Bush

By Jim Hightower

ONE OF OUR more important environmental questions is this: How deeply can George W stick his head into the thawing tundra before having to admit that, yes, global warming just might be a wee bit of a problem for us?

At issue is the thin layer of ozone that encapsulates our globe. This ozone is kind of important, since, without it, the sun—how shall I put this?—would burn us to a crisp, wiping out all life on earth. Unfortunately, pollution from such things as our oil-guzzling cars is eating away this natural and essential sunscreen, causing everything from more cancer to global warming.

The Bushites, however, goaded by oil and chemical fat cats, are pretending that this isn't happening, so therefore there's no need to stop the pollution causing it. But nature has a way of rudely pricking political delusions with stark reality. Specifically, the frozen Arctic tundra is thawing due to global warming.

This is a problem for Bush—not because it pokes an embarrassing hole in his "It's-Not-Happening" posture (after all, Bush has never let reality interfere with ideology). Rather, the thawing tundra is a political problem because it's interfering with the oil giants that are drilling in Alaska. Yes—oh, cruel irony—the very industry claiming that global warming doesn't exist, is now stuck in it!

An Alaskan regulation allows heavy drilling equipment on the fragile tundra only when it is frozen solid a foot deep and covered by at least six inches of snow. Thirty years ago, these wintery conditions existed 200 days a year, but global warming has now shrunk this window of opportunity by half—too short of a period for profitable oil drilling.

But the Bushites are remaining consistently delusional—rather than facing up to the cause of the thawing, they want to allow the industry to drill even when the tundra is not frozen, thus producing more oil to cause more global warming.

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