All of those who supported the Orange Monstrosity know as Donald Trump – either directly by voting for the man, or indirectly by sabotaging the campaign of the one candidate that would have defeated him – you have doomed your children to live on an increasingly toxic, doomed planet.
Trump is already on record for calling human-influenced climate change a “hoax.” This past May, addressing a group of supporters in Fresno, California, he said “there is no drought.” (Au contraire – a scientific study published in the journal Nature in September of 2015 found that the drought in California has made the region drier than it has been since the state was part of the Spanish Empire in the 16th Century.) Instead, he blamed environmentalists and EPA regulations protecting a certain type of fish.
Speaking of the EPA, the person he has picked to head that agency is none other than arch-climate denier Myron Ebell of the right-wing Competitive Enterprise Institute. In a recent interview on PBS, Ebell said, “The consensus [on climate change] was phony… we believed that the so-called global warming consensus was not based on science, but was a political consensus, which included a number of scientists.” Along with the Orange Monstrosity, Ebell will be working to dismantle the EPA over the next few years.
Of course, the fossil fuel industries are jumping for joy at the prospect of a Trump presidency. He has stated that he will rescind all of President Obama’s climate change regulations while clearing the way for the controversial Keystone XL pipeline. That pipeline would transport one of the dirtiest forms of petroleum from Canada’s oil sands to refineries on the Gulf Coast.
Trump will also be dismantling all EPA regulations governing emissions from coal-fired generators – clearing the way for the reopening of dozens of coal-fired plants and the constructions of new ones. Although these climate regulations are currently being litigated at the federal level, the case is likely to go to the Supreme Court – and guess who will be appointing Scalia’s replacement – what sort of “Justice” that will be?
Worst of all, a major consequence of Trump’s actions will be that last year’s Paris Agreements will go out the window.
A former DNC staffer put it best when he screamed at DNC interim chairwoman Donna Brazile over the betrayal of candidate Bernie Sanders – the one who would have handily defeated the Orange Monstrosity: “You and your friends will die of old age and I’m going to die from climate change! You and your friends let this happen, which is going to cut 40 years off my life expectancy!”
Trump’s supporters are gloating today. Let’s see how much they will be gloating when they see their children and grandchildren dying of respiratory disease and dozens of environmental toxins on a polluted, dying planet.
By the way, Donny-boy – unless you’ve got a space ship we don’t know about and a place to go to, that will include your children and grandchildren as well.
