1-11-21
CLIMATE MEMO MONDAYS #5 by Dick Bennett
The
Leap
“The Leap Manifesto: A Call for a Canada Based on Caring for the Earth
and One Another” (full text at end of Naomi Klein’s No Is Not Enough or https://leapmanifesto.org/en/the-leap-manifesto/ ).
On 12-10-20 PBS NOVA
promoted the US government’s renewal of its moon control program with its new
generation of larger rockets enabling a greatly expanded leap into space: “Rise of
the Rockets.” The first rocket will
circle the moon. The second will land a
rocketeer to establish a permanent claim.
Each shot will cost billions.
Each will expand the US empire, recently terrestrially exposed in The
United States of War by David Vine.
But there has been no national debate over that expenditure for that
purpose. There has been no comparison
of that goal with another Leap, this one a leap for humanity, all species, and
the planet.
In May 2015, people from
many walks of life and representing diverse institutions and movements met in
Toronto to “connect the crises” and “chart a holistic vision for the
future.” An example of the connections
urgently needing resistance were “the economic interests pushing hardest for
war” that are “the very same forces most responsible for warming the planet,”
the very same “corrosive values system that places profit above the well-being
of people and the planet,” the very same forces and values that have “seized
control of the White House” (No Is Not Enough 232).
The Conference concluded
with the signing of “The Leap Manifesto: A Call for a Canada Based on Caring
for the Earth and One Another.” Its
indictment of Canada applies even more forcefully to the USA and its “record on
climate change [that is] a crime against humanity’s future.” The crimes have produced a global emergency,
in response to which The Manifesto declares sixteen principles for “decisive action to prevent catastrophic global
warming. That means small steps will no
longer get us where we need to go” (269).
The US can spend a trillion
dollars to dominate outer space, but comparatively nothing “to prevent
catastrophic global warming.”
Action: The US LEAP MANIFESTO resembles the GREEN NEW DEAL Resolutions. Demand
President-elect Biden declare a national emergency and create an Office of Climate Mobilization. (See essay by Varshini Prakash, “For a Green
New Decade,” The Nation (1-11/18-21).
Read the Congressional GND Resolution: House
Resolution 52, July 9, 2019, 116th Congress 1st Session.
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