Defeat it.

Editor,

I have been watching "Victory at Sea" and "The World at War" on my computer. Leaving aside the unimaginable scale of destruction, suffering, and death that WWII wrought across the globe, one's eyes bulge at the enormity of the industrial effort, the huge manufacturing output -- thousands upon thousands of ships, tanks, planes, trucks, guns, boots, bombs -- and everything else under the sun to prosecute the war. And this was done at the height of the Great Depression at a cost of 400 times the GDP of the U.S. at that time.

Now imagine if this country today declared war on global warming. Imagine if we simply ignored the phonies who try to make people believe that burning and burning fossil fuels is not destroying the planet that we live on. Imagine if the U.S. committed itself to installing solar panels on every rooftop in America -- and the batteries to smooth that power. Imagine how many people would be employed building solar panels, transporting them, and installing them. Imagine how much GDP would increase with that boost of government borrowing injected into the economy. Whatever multiple of GDP we borrowed would decrease by simple arithmetic as our GDP grew and grew as a result. Same with electric cars, smart grid, high speed rail, wind energy, and other solutions to our energy needs.

The problem with this country is that the buggy whip makers have bought our government, dominate the conversation with transparently bogus and self-serving arguments, and refuse to allow new ideas to flourish or society to advance.

Our grandparents are rolling over in their graves at the lousy job we are doing of taking care of this country's future. We are being stifled and will ultimately be destroyed by reactionary fools, when all it would take to reverse this sorry situation is the courage and determination to mobilize ourselves -- as a nation, not individualistic greedy predators -- declare war on global warming and mobilize to defeat it.

Re: "Big Business Leaves Deficit to Politicians" (7/6/2011)