The sky is warming — Who's panicking?

Can we agree yet that the earth is warming yet? Even the right-wing pundits have started to admit it. Now we just have to agree on a cause, right? How about we start with agreeing how to react.

I've often wondered about the way our certain groups react to their beliefs. Take abortion, for example, because that's a simple, uncontroversial topic. If the atheists, and I think we can agree that the majority of them are pro-choice proponents, are right, then there is nothing but this life, there is nothing before, nothing after, and so life is the most precious thing we have. Why, then, is there no outrage from this group for the mass elimination of life? If life is the most precious possession on this planet, in this universe, then where is the outrage when it is taken before it begins?

Christian, don't worry; you're not off the hook. You see, Christians believe that there is life after this one and that it is, in fact, the more prized of the two lives. Christians also believe in this little known book called the Bible, which you may have heard of, and it says that we are "born into sin" — their words — meaning that any life ended through abortion before birth is one that is without sin, and since it is without sin, it is a life that ends in Heaven with the creator. Now, can we say that, being generous, about 40 percent of the world's population is Christian, but, after removing those who haven't been to mass since their baptism, those who show up in church on Christmas and Easter, and those who only profess faith as a safety net, we're probably really looking at about 10 percent, maybe 15 at best. Statistically, that means as many as 9 out of 10 babies aborted, had they been born to live their lives, would have died outside of the saving knowledge of Jesus Christ, as the Christians like to say, and gone to Hell. That means abortion is sending that many babies straight to Heaven, which is really what you're trying to do anyway. So when a crack addict gets an abortion instead of leaving the screaming, jonesing child on some doorstep or, worse, in a dumpster, she is guaranteeing her child a place in Heaven instead of a a life of hell before going to Hell.

What does that have to do with global warming or, as the liberals like to call it, Global Warming? Nothing. I was just wasting your time to establish a pattern.

But let's go back to global warming for a second. And let's say the liberals are right, that Global Warming is a man-made phenomenon occurring during the last 50-100 years. Is that all? So what are you all screaming about? If global warming has that simple a cause, it should have that simple a solution. And, since it has a solution as simple as reducing carbon emissions, it should be easy to show evidence and easy to implement a plan.

Conservatives, on the other hand, say this is just a natural phenomenon of the earth — at least they say that since they started admitting it was happening — and that it is simply part of a cyclical warming and cooling process. You know what else was part of a cyclical warming and cooling? The Ice Age. That's right. You see, if global warming is part of a natural, cyclical warming and cooling of the earth, then we could be looking at the opposite of the Ice Age. Holy shit! Do any of our scientists know how to prevent this? Maybe it doesn't go up much higher, but can they stop another Ice Age from starting? Any evidence we have of how the Ice Age came and went is dependent on interpretation billions of years removed from the event itself. So it could take a million years for us to freeze or boil — who knows which — or it could take a million, a thousand, a hundred, one. Who can say any of this for certain? So why aren't the Republicans pushing for full-scale climate research.

Just to confuse this point further, I happen to be a fan of economist, religious philosopher and football analyst Gregg Easterbrook, who has an interesting theory on the matter. He speculates that global warming is, in fact, a result of a reduction in the ozone layer, one that would have increased temperatures long ago if not for the man-made pollution acting as a temporary substitute. The tastefully named Gregg said it would then be irresponsible to reduce pollution without finding a way to replenish ozone, as it could accelerate the process we are already seeing. And who's studying this theory? As far as I know, only an ESPN columnist and a dime-a-dozen blogger.

As always, this opinion piece was written to encourage you all to think about what you believe, why you believe it, and how your beliefs have stood up to the influx of new evidence. And please, for the love of god, think about how your beliefs will keep all of us safe from an Ice Age or whatever its opposite is.