New Year’s Utopianism Needed Fast

As the end of human civilization begins to look inevitable, myths
that make it look desirable will grow in popularity. Enlightenment
notions of human progress will reach extinction as the long-term
planning of slow projects becomes seen as futile. Of course, we’re
almost at that point already. Were we not, we would not be destroying
the world of our great grandchildren with the mad furiousness with
which we are knowingly destroying it. That is, some of us know we are
doing it. And most of us lack the future-historical attention span to
process the knowledge. We are pounded with such a flood of infotainment
about this week that next century is unthinkable. And so we don’t think
about it, for now. But unless we very quickly think and act, global
warming will take over and violently instruct us or our children as to
what we will think about.

The loss of hope for the future will be devastating, even if
lessened by religion and already shortened attention spans. For a
moment, it will look less worthwhile to save and plan for retirement,
to research diseases, to study archaeology, to attend architecture
school, or to practice the violin. For just a second it will look less
significant to prevent torture or the proliferation of nuclear weapons.
For an instant it will seem to matter less if you are cruel to someone
else. These painful impressions will come and go, but not last long. In
part, again, this is because we are almost there already. Already we
imprison not to reform for future years but to prevent freedom this
week. Already we do not save or plan. Already we seek pleasure in the
face of a looming catastrophe that we could stop. Already our political
horizon is never further than two years. But the world of global
warming will be a leap into fatalism unlike what most of us are used
to. That alone will not, however, alter our microscopic, self-absorbed
sense of priorities, decency, manners, or ethics. We will struggle
through, recognizable, to the end. But why should we – or rather, our
grandchildren – have to face this fate?

This New Year’s let’s make a resolution together that we will accept
the responsibility that has been thrust upon us. Resolved: we will
treat global warming as a dire emergency and reverse the behaviors that
cause it before the year is out.

How will we do that? We will begin by recognizing the root cause of
global warming as a power structure that places immediate corporate
profits ahead of even the survival of the human species. We will go on
to envision the possibility of a different power structure dominated
not by corporate greed but by the needs of people. We will quickly
restore to its necessary role in our lives the all-important mechanism
of utopianism. And our utopia will be a democracy driven by the will of
the majority of a well-informed population.

We will inform each other of these facts: We must reduce carbon
emissions by at least 50 percent, not the 7 percent we have thus far
refused to live up to. By “we” I mean those of us in the United States,
where we make up 4 percent of the world’s population and produce 36
percent of carbon emissions. We are leading the destruction and can
lead its reversal. But we cannot do so with our current government.

Rather than directing the necessary shift to wind and solar energy
and mass transit, George W. Bush and Dick Cheney have led us into an
expanded use of oil and coal. They led the effort to remove the Chair
of the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change because
he favored addressing climate change. They have led efforts to water
down, censor, and block reports on global warming, eliminated funding
for a series of observation stations called the Climate Reference
Network, and defunded Amtrak and fired its president for opposing its
elimination.

Of course, we could sit back for two more years of destruction and
then elect Al Gore president, Al Gore who served eight years as Vice
President having already at that time published a book on global
warming but who for eight years did nothing to slow or reverse it, Al
Gore whose current proposals are seriously insufficient, Al Gore who
thought Joe Lieberman would make a good vice president, Al Gore who is
not even running for office, Al Gore who would face a Congress still
controlled by oil corporations.

Or we could refuse to watch two more years of destruction edge us
closer to the point of no return. We could seize this opportunity to
impose change on Washington and shake up our political system in just
the way that might allow the necessary changes to be made in time to
make a difference. We will need to begin by restoring the rule of law,
including Article 2, Section 4 of the U.S. Constitution: “The
President, Vice President and all civil officers of the United States,
shall be removed from office on impeachment for, and conviction of,
treason, bribery, or other high crimes and misdemeanors.”

We have a President and a Vice President who have lied us into a
war, spied without warrant, detained without charge, tortured,
murdered, reversed laws with signing statements, and engaged in
criminal negligence in the face of global warming. We have a duty to
remove them from office. We have an opportunity to save the world by
doing so.

We will end up with a new version of someone we just lost: Gerald
Ford. (Whimpers of “But then we’d have President Cheney” will be as
common as cries of fright over “President Agnew”.) We will compel the
new Ford to begin the repairs, and when we throw the new Ford out,
along with his party, in 2008, it will be with the newfound political
strength to lead the world in a direction we currently cannot even
dream about: utopia.