Paul Krugman says that some of the doom and gloom scenarios of global climate change may only be years away from affecting the Southwestern United States. If this is true, then why isn't climate change the dominant public policy issue here in the US? In one paragraph Krugman sums up why we can't seem to take big steps towards curbing greenhouse gas emissions and global warming:
But the larger reason we’re ignoring climate change is that Al Gore was right: This truth is just too inconvenient. Responding to climate change with the vigor that the threat deserves would not, contrary to legend, be devastating for the economy as a whole. But it would shuffle the economic deck, hurting some powerful vested interests even as it created new economic opportunities. And the industries of the past have armies of lobbyists in place right now; the industries of the future don’t.
I hope climate change skeptics and even the deniers take a few minutes to read the rest of Mr. Krugman's column on the climate change crisis.

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