Environmental Reminders

For many progressives, especially here in the South, there are myriad overwhelming issues; from health care to race, poverty to education, these are things that rightly demand our attention and action.

But news in recent weeks has provided some grim reminders about the need for us to keep in mind our role as champions for the environment. With a bit of a Southern twist to a (very) Northern story, scientists from the University of Tennessee this week published a research paper in the journal Science about the effects of climate change on the Arctic. Here's the story from the L.A. Times, by way of the Fort Worth Star-Telegram to avoid having to subscribe to see it. (In the interest of full disclosure, by the way, I work for UT.)

Why should we care here in the South, though? A walrus in Alaska doesn't mean a whole lot to your average Southerner, it's true, but this work shows some of the first signs that what we feared about global warming is true. While corporations have managed to get 20-year reprieves from using technology that they could install next week to help reduce emissions, it's more pertinent than ever.

Should we keep fighting to raise the minimum wage and start to bring our respective states out of second-tier status? You bet. But at the same time, as Southern progressives fight to bring better jobs and new opportunities to the people of our states, we need to keep a steady and persistent focus on making sure that when that new car plant goes up, it's less polluting. We may not see the benefit now, but as studies like this one show, we've got our work cut out for us in the future if we want to avoid the kind of climate change that will began to force us into a different way of life.

Being progressives, we look to the future while others look to the past. Nowhere can we better serve the interests of our region and our nation than here.