Global warming

On Tuesday, March 21, when the city faced an early spring, winter-like storm, The Indianapolis Star ran a piece from the Smithsonian magazine (“Alaska native village suffering meltdown”) describing the plight of a community literally losing ground as Arctic ice melts. The article notes that the residents are being referred to as some of the first refugees from global warming.

The next day, with our snowfall still much in evidence, the Varvel cartoon in The Star reflected the by-now-expected notice of an apparent contrast between current local weather and a perhaps commonsensical view of what climate change should look like. In the drawing, a potential attendee stands in a snowy scene reading a sign declaring “Global Warming — Meeting Postponed.”

But it’s doubtful global warming itself has been postponed much lately. On Feb. 19 and again on March 19, the CBS program 60 Minutes aired interviews with prominent scientists on the subject. NASA researcher James Hansen described heavy government censoring of his reports.

When asked how he responds to federal decision makers’ refusals to accept his findings without further study, Bob Corell, recruited by President Reagan in 1987 to study global climate, said the science by now is clear, but “I’m not arguing their policy, that’s their business …” And very much the business of an informed citizenry, too.