This is outrageous. California’s elected officials in the House of Representatives are blaming environmental protections for the drought.
Throwing around the phrase “man-made drought,” House Speaker Boehner and CA House Reps. Kevin McCarthy (R-Bakersfield), Devin Nunes (R-Tulare) and David Valadao (R-Hanford), are using the drought as an excuse to attack environmental protection laws. On a recent visit to California, House Speaker John Boehner even made the ridiculous accusation that environmentalists “favor fish over people.”
I’m not always sure where to start with climate change deniers, but I can give you one option right now: Tell your representatives not to let their colleagues play politics with California’s drought.
Any meteorologist will tell you that the current drought in California is caused by a giant pocket of air off the Pacific Coast that has blocked the winter storms that typically bring rain to California and snow to the Sierra.
So when elected officials blame environmentalists for the drought, it’s pretty obvious that they’re not really looking for solutions — they’re just taking advantage of the situation in order to promote their anti-environment agenda.
California has been through enough — the last thing we need is to be caught in the middle of a political power grab. Tell your representative to stand up to these shenanigans and start working on real solutions for our country.
You know what’s interesting? These politicians talking about “the man-made drought” are the very same people who deny the very real science of man’s contribution to climate change. And while the drought — like any single weather event — cannot be said to have been “caused” by climate change, we do know that severe weather events are worsened by climate change, and that if we don’t take action now, climate change will bring more frequent, and more severe, droughts. We also know that we’re running out of time to reverse our course.
To quote President Obama, “We don’t have time for a meeting of the Flat Earth Society.” It’s time for all of California’s reps to get their heads out of the sand and stop wasting time on thinly veiled political maneuvers.
Join me and CLCV in calling for an end to the madness: Tell our state legislators that we can’t afford to play politics with the drought. We need real solutions for California, and for our nation.
