Hosea 8:7: “For they have sown the wind, and they shall reap the whirlwind.”
The Fire
Los Angeles is on fire. “Santa Ana” winds, gusting up to 170 miles an hour (a force 5 Hurricane) with days of 100+ winds, are stoking the inferno raging through the hills and down to the sea. The video looks like some big-budget disaster movie made just down the street in Hollywood: communities aflame, desperate residents trying to get out, heroic firefighters desperate to get to the front line, water running out, apocalyptic devastation.
Wealth is of no consequence. We know some of those who lost their homes: comedian Billy Crystal, actor James Woods, celebrity Paris Hilton, along with thousands of others. Who knew that three million gallons of water in Pacific Palisades wouldn’t be enough to quench the wind whipped flames – not even close.
Disaster
It is a year of outsized disasters. Florida devastated by back-to-back hurricanes. The mountain region of North Carolina drowned in flash floods caused by that same “tropical storm”. And now, the fires that are a way of life for Northern California forest residents, are in the city, at local addresses, storming across famous roads like Sunset Boulevard and the Pacific Coast Highway. Like the folks in Lahaina (Hawaii), the only refuge for some was on the beach.
Hurricanes are more damaging, droughts more prolonged, snowstorms deeper, tornadoes more frequent, fires more intense: what’s going on?
We have sown the wind, and we are reaping the whirlwind.
Simple Science
Science shows us; we have, literally, poured gas on the fire. The source of the hurricane winds that fan the flames, drive the rain, ignite the tornados, is the temperature of the oceans. And that measurement has increased, due to the amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. We, civilization, are pumping that carbon dioxide into the air. It is the prime bi-product of internal combustion engines, the singular way we use fossil fuels, and particularly, oil.
Somehow, like a pandemic disease, the United States has managed to make this a political issue. It’s not – it’s simple science. But just the effort of writing this essay will be seen as a partisan attack. It’s simple: one side of our political divide recognizes that we need to take control of our polluting actions, and the other side simply denies that the science is “real”.
Presidential Action
The outgoing President just banned the drilling for oil along our coastlines and in our National Parks and Landmarks. The incoming President got elected, in part, by saying “…drill Baby, drill”. The short term satisfaction of saving a few cents at the gas pump, has the long term effect of pouring more fuel into the “furnace” driving the rising ocean temperatures. The rate of oceans warming up has doubled in the past twenty years, despite the best efforts of the Paris Accord (UNESCO). That is because of the increase in carbon dioxide in the atmosphere.
Since 1960, what was a “balanced” amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere has increased by a full third (NOAA). That increase holds more heat in, just like a “warm blanket” wrapped around the earth and oceans. So the earth and oceans heat up, creating more “heat energy” which is imparted to storms. It also creates a greater differential between the sea and the land, causing the increased effect of winds like the “Santa Ana” that are driving the current California disaster.
Beholden
And that was in an era of mixed American Presidents. Some showed concern for the environment, some were beholden to the polluters and loosed the reins of regulation. But this and the next decade are the critical balancing point, beyond which the amount of carbon dioxide will irrevocably alter our world. Perhaps we are already there: turn on the TV and watch what happens.
But one thing we can be sure of: the Trump Administration will do little to protect the environment, and everything it can to gain the short term economic advantages of polluting. Why should they worry about the world in twenty years, when their biggest concern is winning the next election? Their priorities are clear, win the present, and let the future deal with the fallout.
It doesn’t require a crystal ball to see what will happen. It’s happening already, today, right now. We are reaping the whirlwind, for we have sown the wind.
