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Hats off to Pope Francis for his climate change message

by Philip Blackwood - 09/23/15 5:56 PM ET

Pope Francis, I applaud you for listening carefully to the findings of climate science, and would like to offer another perspective from a more humble source.

In June I visited congressional offices to lobby for a price on carbon, along with 900 other volunteers from Citizens’ Climate Lobby. After my last meeting I hopped in a cab and started a conversation with the cab driver. He asked me about the drought in California, and I gave him a carefully worded analysis of what is known from the science while trying to avoid sounding like an alarmist.

{mosads}At that, I received the wisdom of my cabbie. He was clear in his forecast that California was likely to experience mass migrations as the drought continues and intensifies. He was equally clear in his expectation that Miami Beach would be inundated, and that those who leave last will be left holding the bag. He said he knows climate change is real, and the people in Eastern Turkey, where he is from, see the effects first-hand. The mountains used to be covered with snow and now they are bare. The native trees are vanishing.

I offered to share his story, and so I offer it to you, Pope Francis, as one simple story to add to the many others you have heard. Thank you for listening to the scientists; please hear the plea of the cab driver. May you change hearts and minds with your message of caring for our common home during your visit to Washington, D.C.

From Philip Blackwood, Lincroft, N.J.

Where was the debate on Ukraine?

Anybody who believes in Americanism will be frustrated and saddened by what was seen on TV Wednesday during the GOP debate moderated by CNN. All 11 aspirants for the U.S .presidency were claiming to believe in the USA providing leadership to the world, but their words sounded hollow given the fact that nobody debated Ukraine. Even CNN did not raise the issue.

The entire world knows that the U.S. is under legal obligation to protect the territorial integrity of Ukraine under Budapest Memorandum 1994. But the U.S. and its NATO European allies are doing nothing, even when Crimea has been taken by Russia and the Donbass region (Donetsk, Luhansk, etc) is with Russian-supported rebels.

This CNN Republican debate is proof that the majority of people who come to the U.S. do not come to realize the American dream but to fulfill their own dream (even as ordinary as filling their tummies and producing children, as is done by animals, too), which has nothing to do with the Americanism that once inspired mankind.

Today’s USA reminds me of the famous couplet: Bade shauk se sun raha tha zamana tum hi so gaye dastaan kahate kahate (the world was listening to your story with great interest but alas! You slept while narrating it). Americanism will never die — the only difference is that it will rise from some other part of the world. Certainly not from the USA if this debate and others going on in the U.S. is any indication.

From Hem Raj Jain, Edina, Minn.

Bush didn’t keep Americans safe

At the Republican presidential debate on Sept. 16, former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush said that his brother, former President George W. Bush, kept Americans safe. The 9/11 attacks happened while Bush was president and after he had received a daily brief warning that Osama bin Laden was determined to strike in the U.S. Bush’s inept execution of the Afghanistan and Iraq wars lead to the deaths of numerous American troops. Bush did not keep Americans safe.

From Ashu M.G. Solo, Wilmington, Del.