This Saturday is the second Step It Up, a national day of action to find out who are the real leaders on global warming. Step It Up’s April 14 rally produced more than 1,400 events in 50 states, the largest global warming event in U.S. history. This Saturday’s event promises to be even larger.

The demands from Step it Up are simple: a carbon cut of 80 percent by 2050, a moratorium on any new coal-fired power plants, and five million new Green jobs. Think we can do it? Of course we can. The technology is with us today, but the political will is missing.

That’s why Step It Up and Greenpeace’s Project Hot Seat are so important. If you don’t know, Project Hot Seat is our campaign to get Congress on board with real solutions to global warming. The best bill in the House to accomplish a significant reduction in CO2 emissions is Henry Waxman’s Safe Climate Act. The bill has 142 co-sponsors. The magic number is 216, the number of votes needed in the House to pass a bill. You can help get us there by going to www.projecthotseat.org to take action.

I’ll be in San Francisco this Saturday for a Step It Up rally outside Speaker Pelosi’s office. The event will be like a carnival with a variety of attractions to educate people on global warming and get them involved. The Rolling Sunlight will be there, a moving example of the possible. The Sunlight can generate enough solar energy to power an entire concert. If you’re in SF, come by and visit us. If you’re not here, be sure to go to www.stepitup2007.org to find an event in your area.

Best wishes,

Daniel Kessler
Greenpeace Media Officer  

I’m writing as Southern California burns. There’s been a lot of talk within the environmental community and in the media about whether or not these fires can be linked to rising temperatures caused by global warming. What’s beyond dispute, however, is the scary reality that as temperatures rise, the frequency of massive fires and other horrific natural disasters will rise along with the mercury.    

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change reported earlier this year that North America's annual window of high fire ignition risk could increase by 30 percent this century. They said fires and insect outbreaks are likely to intensify as temperatures rise, which will cause drier soils and longer growing seasons. Add that to the findings of U.S. Geological Survey scientists who said recently that rising temperatures have increased the death rate for old-growth conifers, firs and pines in the Sierra Nevada, making more fuel for fires.

So what can we do? First, we can recognize our immediate vulnerabilities. Together, population growth and development into the wildland-urban interface is tempting fate. People need to make smart choices about how much land they need, how far from population centers they want to go and how their decisions affect the land, wildlife, and other people; in my mind there’s no reason to put a firefighter’s life at risk for a swimming pool and a nice view.

On a larger scale, we continue our push to make Congress take immediate action on global warming. Nov. 3 is Step It Up, a national day of action on global warming that will make it clear just who are our leaders on the defining environmental issue of our time. Please go to StepitUp2007.org  to find out about an event in your area.

 

Daniel
Greenpeace Media Officer

I am back in the office after a long day last Thursday. I have been working on environmental issues full-time for over 7 years now and yesterday was the first time I crossed a police line and got arrested.

I felt completely confident I was doing the right thing by engaging in civil disobedience to demand that our governmental take real action, not false steps to curb global warming. Global warming is the real challenge of my generation and the generations to come.

If we do not take bold and swift action now I fear to think about the future world we will live in. Last Thursday, myself and 48 other activists protested Bush and his charade of a meeting on global warming. Bush is trying to take the world in the wrong direction by working outside and not engaging in the international Kyoto Treaty process, and his meeting is nothing more than a propaganda effort to deflect international criticism.

I was there on Thursday to do my part to show that Bush does not stand for the vast majority of Americans on this important issue. If Bush was serious about moving the country forward on global warming he would sign the Kyoto Protocol, period.

A friend of mine mentioned the other night that when people engage in civil disobedience an issue has reached a tipping point, he pointed to woman rights and the civil rights movement as examples. I think that this statement rings true to an extent.

Last Thursday, I shared a cell with two women, one of them was a grandmother and the other worked at a University of Maryland, like me they had ever been arrested before. They were not the stereotype of the 'lefty environmental extremist'. Across the country people from all walks of life are taking serious and bold action to preserve the future of our planet by demanding action on global warming.

Some might think a few people getting arrested is not going to do anything. While it may be true that our protest was a completely symbolic act I believe it is important to show the Bush does NOT speak for many Americans with his criminal stance on global warming.

I have always been inspired by the bold and brave acts of people in our history like Alice Paul and John Lewis. I hope that the movement to fight global warming continues to gain momentum like other social movements. It must, we have no other option but to force action. Our survival depends on it.

 

--Kate Smolski