This Moment on Earth (2 of 3 free samples)

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COPYRIGHT
This Moment on Earth by Kerry and Heinz Kerry. Copyright 2007 by John Kerry and Teresa Heinz Kerry.
All Rights Reserved. Sharing not permitted.

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INTRODUCTION (CONT'D)

In truth, environmentalism isn't dead, it's just being reborn--the very idea of what it means to be an "environmentalist" is being revolutionized. People from all walks of life, without concern for party or ideological lines, are coming together in unprecedented numbers across the globe. They are doing so with greater urgency and on a bigger scale than ever before. There is an acceleration of grassroots energy driven by a new shared acknowledgment--we are running out of time on a host of issues. People not only see a potential tipping point on global climate change, they also fear tipping points elsewhere--in air pollution, deforestation, fisheries depletion, and ocean pollution to mention a few. Not only has this awakened a new cross-cultural, cross-generational level of activism, it has attracted a record amount of investment--hundreds of millions of dollars--and major corporate leaders who are committed to a new course.

The new environmentalist knows that caring about the environment can no longer be mislabeled as caring less about national security, the economy, health care, family, education, profit, or community. Rather, the leaders of today's new environmental movement understand these issues are all connected: that the damage we are doing to our environment injures everything important to us as well as each of us individually. "The environment" is no longer to be dismissed as some sort of nonhuman world of snail darters and lab rats and abstract measurements of our water or atmospheric quality. It is much, much more--it is what we put into our bodies, and it is what we put into the very things that make our lives possible.

This new environmentalism is a cause in which Washington is but one part of the solution. Progress can only occur through partnerships between and among states, local governments, communities, and businesses, and most importantly, it can only occur with the leadership of visionary and gutsy individuals.

Above all, we want this book to expose the false choices--the straw men--put forward to purposefully slow or reverse progress in environmentalism and politicize the debate. Today, many Americans who care about the environment don't think of themselves as environmentalists simply because a lot of money has been spent by the other side to brand the word as a negative and define them as "unrealistic extremists," zealots who put narrow interests above common sense. No more: The new environmentalists are farmers, ranchers, mothers, fathers, evangelical Christians, and bottom-line businesspeople, all of whom are unrestricted by party label.
In fact, the premise that addressing environmental challenges is "liberal," whereas denying those challenges is "conservative," is refuted by the whole history of the conservation movement, by the growing ranks of conservative religious leaders demanding an agenda of "creation care," and by traditional green activists who are adopting increasingly business-friendly and politically practical choices.

The idea that America must choose between environmental progress and economic growth is refuted by the "green innovations" already on display by entrepreneurial pioneers and reflected in the vast new markets developing for clean energy technologies. For example, in 2006, the founder and chairman of Dell computers, Michael Dell, a Republican, explained to Time magazine that he was encouraging every one of Dell's customers to pay a little more for their purchases so the surplus could be spent planting trees to create what some would call a "carbon neutral" transaction. Michael Dell cited the importance to him of his company's Greenpeace ranking--he saw it as a business asset as well as a moral choice. When asked whether he saw himself as an environmentalist, his answer was telling: "I don't like to consider myself very often. . . . But I do have a lot of trees."

When the founder of a highly successful company suggests he will build the company's customer base by offering them the chance to pay the equivalent of a voluntary tax, to be devoted to a positive environmental contribution, it's clear that a substantial change of attitude has taken place in a few short years. Dell is not alone. In January 2007, the New York Times reported that ten major companies had banded together with environmental groups to form the United States Climate Action Partnership, an alliance that plans to call for firm nationwide limits on carbon dioxide emissions. The companies include some household names--Alcoa, BP, Caterpillar, Duke Energy, DuPont, FPL Group, General Electric, Lehman Brothers, PG&E, PNM Resources--and are based all over the country, in Florida, New Mexico, California, North Carolina, and beyond.

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