Politicians weigh in on climate crisis

With more and more information on climate change surfacing, many local and national politicians are taking a stance on the environment. 

By Carolyn Firestone
The Green Gazette

Al Gore addresses the climate crisis by conducting lectures on global warming. His efforts were featured in the film, "An Inconvenient Truth" for which Gore won an Oscar for Best Documentary. Photo: www.bmu.de
Sen. Hillary Clinton speaks about the environment at a "Keep Los Angeles Beautiful" rally. The event was part of the "Keep America Beautiful" campaign to get people to clean up their cities. Video: USC Annenberg School

Early this year, a report from 1,000 leading international scientists announced that global warming was human-caused, an event prompting politicians to take environmental action.

On April 2 the Supreme Court voted 5-4 in favor of the Environmental Protection Agency being allowed to regulate greenhouse gas emission from automobiles.

The vote contradicted President Bush’s statement that the government doesn’t have the right to interfere with the car companies' specific practices.

In January California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, who’s been active in the environmental cause for years, put out an executive order to lower carbon emissions by changing the standards for transportation fuels in the state of California.

On April 20, Barack Obama promoted Schwarzenegger’s proposal as a nationwide initiative by proposing the “National Low Carbon Fuel Standard." In 2004 the League of Conservation Voters named Obama “Environmental Champion” of the year. Obama’s history of involvement in the environment also includes earning the "100 Percent Environmental Voting Record Award" from the Illinois Environmental Council in 2003.

However, Obama isn’t the only democratic candidate planning an attack on global warming. Last month Hillary Clinton was on hand to help kick off Los Angeles’ city-wide clean-up as it joined the “Keep America Beautiful” campaign to get communities involved in environmental events.