“Dear President Obama,
I am very disappointed in your recent announcement that will lift the ban on offshore drilling here. Offshore oil and gas drilling is bad for the climate, bad for our coastal areas, and will not solve our energy dependence.
Please ensure the safety of our coasts, protect our clean shores and enact a smart energy policy by reversing this decision and investing in clean energy and efficiency instead. We need to make sure that any climate bill before the Senate mandates at least 25% of our electricity come from renewable sources by 2025 and that we don't give free allowances to polluting industries like coal and oil -- promises you made during your presidential election campaign.
Please take a stand for what is right for our future and right for the World.
Jesus”
Yes, that is right, Barack has made a big mistake, I must admit it. The decision of opening some areas along the US coastline to offshore oil and gas exploration ain't getting us nowhere. No question about it. However, it's very easy to sit down in front of one's computer or TV and criticize a man that has to face a world of problems every day, meet everybody's needs and reconcile opposing forces on every matter he deals with. However, despite this one being a very WRONG move, the fact is that there is still time to make his and his energy team (lead by renown physicist an Nobel-prize winner Steven Chu) change their minds on this one. The fact is that WE ARE the ones RESPONSIBLE for consuming all that much ENERGY, for emitting all that much CO2, and as long as we do not understand the link between using our cars every single day and the increasing oil demand and worsening climate change, then we will continue to deny our blindness and take the easy way out, that is pass our problems onto somebody else, namely a certain Barack Obama these days.
The one and only solution to these and all other global issues has to emerge from the bottom up, from the people that is. WE are the ones having to exert pressure on our leaders and tell them what we want this world to be fairer and cleaner. Because OURS and no others is the responsibility to leave behind a habitable planet. Barack is just a human being (a very good one indeed, but with his mistakes, just as everybody else), but we, we are 7 billion. Imagine the power of that figure if we all move in the same direction, forward that is. Together we must and we will go, fellow men and women of this miracle we call Earth. Let's keep it that that way for our children, because they deserve their time in paradise as much we did.
Barack Hussein Obama is made of no rock nor metal but flesh, bones and feelings, just like you and me. He has made a mistake, no doubt about it, but I make myself a thousand of them every single day, and I bet you too. The nice words of the campaign have turned hard, on occasion, when facing reality. A reality that is no other than 300M Americans using ever more energy. And here lies the whole challenge we : as long as we don't realize that we cannot keep up with our current consumption rates without disrupting our planet's balance (e.g. the climatic system), no politician will ever be able to do miracles and extract energy out of nothing.
But don't you worry, my dear friend, there is no reason to despair as the key for a sustainable future lies just in our hands and the solution well within reach. It suffices with changing our attitudes and behaviors in our every day lives and motivate a hundred others each to follow suit. And that is the task of no president but OURS, peoples of today with the ideas of tomorrow. Passion, motivation and a dose of guts and we will do what is needed to change this world of ours for the better, reminding our leaders of their duty along the way. Because yes, Barack may have momentarily forgotten about his mission, but that is when we come into play to remind him of it and put things back on track.
And guess what, I'm not the only one standing for our rights:
“I’m optimistic about change happening from the bottom up,” says Emily Rideout, one of the participants in Fossil Fools Day actions in Halifax, Canada.
“The [r]evolution won’t be televised.” -Gene from Greenpeace India
“The more Love we send to the Planet and Humanity (including the people who do more harm), the more changes we will see. To change the World you have to change your Heart.” -anonymous friend on Facebook.
“... Our message is not that we can solve global warming one nice project at a time--we can't. Instead, our message is: if we can get to work, so can our lawmakers. If we can climb up on the roof and install solar panels, the U.S. Senate can do what it's supposed to do, and the UN General Assembly, and everyone else who needs to actually get to work. That process begins in April in Bolivia [People's Summit on Climate Change and Mother Earth's Rights]. The world's leaders haven't led, so we're going to have to lead for them. It's going to be a fight, and it's on now.” -Bill McKibben, co-founder of 350.org.
Because there is only one direction, FORWARD. Because there is only one way, TOGETHER.
On we go, people!!
