EDITORIAL
In our hands
Just type the words "global warming" into any
search engine and you will find a plethora of recent articles
showing that every continent of the world is experiencing
bizarre weather or even worse as a result of what 99 percent of
scientists agree is the warming of the earth due to the burning
of fossil fuels--oil, gas and coal.
The polar ice caps are melting. Australia's Great Barrier
Reef is losing its coral. Africa, which contributes the least
to global warming, is suffering the most. Ironically, the
pollutants from more industrialized areas, which trap the
earth's warmth, also provide those areas some regional
protection from the sun's rays.
In North America, the West is undergoing severe drought
while record rains have soaked the East. In Europe,
temperatures have broken records all over. London just had its
hottest day on record. Paris has become a 104-degree oven.
Portugal and Spain have raging wildfires. Countries in Eastern
Europe where no one has air conditioners and few have needed
even fans are baking. Deaths from heat stroke are soaring.
The United States, with 5 percent of the world's population,
emits 25 percent of the world's greenhouse gases. What is the
Bush administration doing about this threat to all humanity? It
is still trying to deny the science of global warming and has
sabotaged international agreements. Even a conservative like
Christine Whitman couldn't hack it as head of the Environmental
Protection Agency and resigned.
What the world needs is a concerted effort to improve public
transit; rebuild cities with fuel-efficient housing, green
belts and parks for natural cooling in summer; eliminate wars
and the military's fuel-guzzling ships, tanks and planes; and
invest in developing practical ways to tap sustainable energy
sources.
Is it a big job? Yes. Can it be done? Yes again. Can it be
done under capitalism? Ah, there's the rub.
These days, even trying to get a few small reforms out of
the reactionary U.S. capitalist class and its political
flunkies is like rolling a boulder up a mountain. How can they
come up with a plan to reverse a problem as far-reaching as
global warming when they can't even agree on providing
something as basic as drinking fountains and public toilets in
most cities and towns?
There never was a time when humanity was more divided into
rich and poor, have and have not. How can humans unite behind a
common objective when their class and national interests are so
opposed?
The only way out of the dilemmas posed by capitalism is
socialist revolution. It takes social ownership of the economy
to be able to plan rationally and put the general good first,
before private interests. This is another tall order, but the
mounting problems of life caused by capitalism--unemployment,
racism, wars, the gutting of social services--are pushing
millions toward a break with the status quo.
Revolutionaries are by nature optimistic. They know that
popular struggle can move mountains. There is no pre-ordained
fate awaiting the human race. The future of the planet for
generations to come is in our hands.
Reprinted from the Aug. 21, 2003, issue of
Workers World newspaper
This article is copyright under a Creative
Commons License.
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Email: ww@workers.org
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