Climate's about us, not 'me'

Re "Forecast is dire – or is it?" (Page A1, Oct. 19): The "study" by the academic economist, funded by business interests, warning of financial concerns from following the mandates of Assembly Bill 32, is a prime example of how short-sighted people who oppose measures to alleviate the negative affects of man-made climate change seem to be.

This important issue is not about fiscal costs today, economic survival or "me." It is about the survival of the human race (at least life as we know it) and "we." Even if the effort in California did cost each household an average of $4,000 a year, that is a small price to pay toward reducing the continual man-made "carbon footprint" that contributes to the dangerous rise in temperature worldwide and resulting destruction of entire ecosystems.

We are all connected – to one another and all living things. What is needed is a "we," as opposed to "me," mentality when considering what we can do to rectify the greenhouse gas emissions we cause.

– Jon Ellison, Carmichael

CSUS dean does 'a disservice'

Re "Forecast is dire – or is it?" (Page A1, Oct. 19): The article about the California State University, Sacramento, business dean's "analysis" of the effects of global warming was disturbing. It was disturbing in that a so-called academic could use such hackneyed methods to reach his (one can only surmise) desired conclusions.

If you only use "costs" (no matter how accurately) and do not include some equal and objective weighing of benefits and opportunity costs, you have done a disservice to the public, your discipline and your institution. In my experience, this sort of pretense would have been sent back to the originator for more complete, and thoughtful, staff work.

As a corollary remark, I regret The Bee has lost Daniel Weintraub, for the same reasons cited above. I did not always agree with him, but found him, on balance, to be rigorous and honest.

– Ron Fox, Sacramento

One severe storm isn't telling

Re "Global warming's role ignored" (Letters, Oct. 17): Faith Bernstein's letter reflects a widespread misunderstanding between weather and climate. The big storm that hit California last week was indeed unusually warm and wild. However, it or any single storm event cannot be attributed to global warming.

Climate is a long-term (usually 30 years) average of daily weather. A single storm, no matter how strong, changes the long-term average only a minuscule amount. Instead, if enough of these unusual events – (droughts, floods, hurricanes, etc.) occur, then the long-term average slowly shifts and climate is indeed changing. A warmer atmosphere has more energy to drive more extreme meteorological events, and extreme weather events are indeed becoming more frequent.

The debate is not over whether the atmosphere is warming – we know it is and it's happening faster than computer models predicted. The debate is no longer over whether we are responsible. We've increased the atmosphere's carbon dioxide to levels not seen during the past 600,000 years, and this is causing atmospheric warming and increasing extreme events.

This warming trend holds incredible adverse effects for humanity and unprecedented challenges the coming decades.

– Bruce Gervais, Sacramento

Media inflated balloon story

Is this a slow news week, or what? First, several hours of major network time is devoted to a balloon shaped like a flying saucer soaring over Colorado. Then, a slip of the tongue by a child is what is takes for the police to figure out it is all a hoax/publicity stunt.

So what happens next? More publicity. Who says the media don't control the flow of information to the people? Whatever happened to Osama bin Laden, the economy, California's budget, health care reform, tax reform, etc.?

– Kent Pivonka, Elk Grove

Building better cluster bombs

Re "Army selects Aerojet for cluster-bomb project" (Business, Oct. 17): How gratifying it must be for GenCorp to have been awarded a Pentagon contract to produce better cluster bombs.