Is Climate Crisis About to Topple a Government?

Simulposted at Daily Kos

And not just any government, but a nuclear armed government. A government that is at the very crux of our “National Security.”

From McClatchy

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan – The humanitarian and economic disaster caused by the worst floods in Pakistan’s history could spark political unrest that could destabilize the government, dealing a major blow to the Obama administration’s efforts to fight violent Islamic extremism.

The government’s shambling response to floods that have affected a third of the country has some analysts saying that President Asif Ali Zardari could be forced from office, possibly by the military, which has ruled Pakistan for more than half its 63-year history.

Other experts caution that the state itself could collapse, as hunger and destitution trigger explosions of popular anger that was already seething over massive unemployment, high fuel prices, widespread power outages, corruption, and a bloody insurgency by extremists allied with al Qaida.

Of course no one could have anticipated that Climate Crisis could be THE determining wild card factor in the Great Game of geo-politics. That all of the considerable efforts of the CIA and the Pentagon to assassinate their way to political stability in Pakistan could be massively disrupted by something that, due to Republican propaganda, half of America doesn’t believe exists!

Oh wait….The Pentagon itself did

WASHINGTON – The changing global climate will pose profound strategic challenges to the United States in coming decades, raising the prospect of military intervention to deal with the effects of violent storms, drought, mass migration and pandemics, military and intelligence analysts say.

Such climate-induced crises could topple governments, feed terrorist movements or destabilize entire regions, say the analysts, experts at the Pentagon and intelligence agencies who for the first time are taking a serious look at the national security implications of climate change.

Recent war games and intelligence studies conclude that over the next 20 to 30 years, vulnerable regions, particularly sub-Saharan Africa, the Middle East and South and Southeast Asia, will face the prospect of food shortages, water crises and catastrophic flooding driven by climate change that could demand an American humanitarian relief or military response.

The floods will recede, but in an amazingly short time EVERYTHING in Pakistan has changed.

Pakistan’s prime minister now says some 20 million people are affected by the worst flooding to hit the country in over a generation.  This figure is much higher than the 14 million estimated by the United Nations.

In either case, the number is huge.  The U.N. refugee agency is warning the enormous crisis facing Pakistan is still unfolding.  Spokesman Adrian Edwards says the after effects of this catastrophe will be felt for years to come.  

“There continues to be massive destruction as the bloated rivers flow southwards across the plains and the crisis, in our view, will not be over when the flooding recedes due to homelessness, hunger and illness.  The rationale for our presence in Pakistan relates to the fact that it is the biggest caseload of refugees that we deal with in the world and displaced persons,” he said.  

Pakistan’s population is around 170 million, not counting Afghan refugees. What happens to an already unstable country when suddenly over 10% of it’s population is devastated? An event like this, events which will only increase around the globe as the effects of Climate Change start manifesting….and multiplying… due to feedback acceleration loops, really do show how fragile all the best laid plans of mankind are predicated on a stable world. And how the world is quickly, much more quickly than we are apparently willing to recognize, admit, or plan for, becoming unstable due to Climate Change.

Let’s revisit that Pentagon study.


Such climate-induced crises could topple governments, feed terrorist movements or destabilize entire regions, say the analysts, experts at the Pentagon and intelligence agencies who for the first time are taking a serious look at the national security implications of climate change.

Of course it cannot be proven (eye-roll) that the hottest year on record, Pakistan’s flooding, Russia’s fires, huge ice melts, plankton disappearing, ice calves the size of Manhattan, bleached and dying coral reefs….or even biblical plagues of locusts are related to our changing climate.

The fact that all of these events have been modeled, predicted, and forecast for decades, and that every reputable scientist in the world now agrees that Climate Change is caused by humans should not be allowed to influence the political debate in the US Senate, where 41 Republicans and no doubt a couple of “Democrats” are literally holding the future of our planet in their hands.

The fact that less than 50 people are holding the fate of 7 billion people hostage due to their ideology, greed, and desire to remain employed is of course, something that absolutely nothing can be done about. The Spirit of Comity in the Senate and the political hit that Obama might take for fighting against the insanity of the Republicans is obviously far more important than any other consideration, even the future of the human race, and should not be challenged for any reason.

If after all, the supposedly sane people in Congress and the White House stood up and exposed them for what they are, point out what they are doing, call them out and actually fight back against them….it could upset the delicate balance of American politics….and all the well laid plans of the Democrats, who are allowing the insanity of Republicans and fears of mid term electoral losses to hold the future of the world hostage.

Any action, any challenge to the status quo, any sanity would obviously upset the apple carts of American politicians and cause them to be discomfited.

And what could possibly be more important than that?

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“I have a difficult task tonight,” Gore said. “I want to call you to action but I have to begin by telling you what you know, in all candor – the United States government in its entirety, largely because of the opposition in the United States Senate to taking action on clean energy and a solution to the climate crisis, has failed us.

In July, Democratic leaders in the Senate called off any efforts to pass climate legislation because they said they considered the Gulf oil spill to be a larger more important crisis.

“In the last few months and weeks, the United States Senate has failed to meet the challenge of the climate crisis,” Gore said. “The Senate announced just last month that they would not take up comprehensive climate and clean energy legislation bringing to a temporary disappointing and frustrating halt a fight that we have been waging for the past year and a half and really longer – comprehensive legislation is now likely not to be debated when the Senate returns from the August recess.”

33 comments

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  1. how nature points up the folly of man.

  2. thaks buhdy, thanks a LOT! lol

    Except Im “depressed” (this time) over just how intensely stupid people are.

  3. it makes my head hurt again. Ass backward to bomb and kill these people for their oil/resources or geopolitical dominance and set the world on fire, to keep the oil flowing and profits from endless wars. Will they now stop bombing the Pakistanis as nature has killed so many? How can the government rationalize legislating more power and money to entities that by their nature and design can only make profit that is both pointless and unsustainable and does nothing but kill and impoverish both humans and nature.

    This is not reality based and people need to stop acting like it’s inevitable and how humans operate or that capitalism is freedom. Hard for me to grasp when they say things like Obama stopped us from going off a cliff. When the road your on ends in cliff and the car is a wreck, you need to get out of it and find a new road as new roads do exist and they may not be known to you but are better then the reality that is waiting ahead. the economy that doesn’t even sustain our society is killing the planet and we sit around and debate carbon swapping or how terrorist’s are so scary that we need to set the world on fire.

    Politics has become unhinged and the ‘economy’ that funnels money to the top is bat shit crazy at this point. Delusional politics and delusional misplaced fear.            

  4. keep pulling that lever for the guy with the (D) by his name, because, god only knows, it could be worse…!

  5. Nature and Man have been in a wild and wooly tango now for

    12,000 years. We’ve plowed ourselves into the present and somehow have convinced ourselves that America’s Material Magic is the apotheosis of Reality, when in fact it is only the last instant in a fortuituous set of circumstances.

    And ironically, this rough and tumble epoch (pre & historical) has actually been very, very kind to man: We came out of the pleistocene and have struggled to “make our mark”, or better yet to survive with our recent tool making evolutionary adaptations. Yet, after all this time, we do not know from where or whence we come.

    We moderns have totally forgotten our relationship with nature, mesmerized by our absurd self love and the camouflage of language and technology. Such is the stupidity of man and especially almost all governing entities in the world today. Modern political structures have made the modern oligarchs what they are, and they nor most of the people have any comprehension of the “present” in its natural and historical context.

    This is a total failure (at least in America) of not including morality in our historical understanding of democracy. Americans forgot that they could define democracy as they go, that Humanism, Reason, Idealism and Science were just tools like stones and hammers. Instead we fight over meanings, because there is no contextual or intutive belief that progress is more than just material enhancement.

  6. you were talkin’ about.  Here in “Alaska” we’re having yet another major flood, especially around Ames and Des Moines.  After a summer of heavy rain, we got about 8″ of rain just this week, and the flooding in some places is as bad as the 1993 flood and the 2008 flood.

  7. nice to see you back full of V & V!  And GOOD!

    Does it not strike anyone as strange that inside the course of one year or a little more, we’ve seen Haiti, Venezuela, Chili, the U.S., China, Pakistan, and the world undergoing such a climatal crisis, with hurricanes, floods and damage everywhere?  To say nothing of the oil spills, here, in China, and elsewhere?  All an accident or an event of nature!

    We have known or should have known that “global warming” was on our backs and still our own government lags/laxes behind in attempts to controvert its effects.

    Rich?  Greedy?  Rich and greedy people always need new “shock and awe” — they always need new “thrills.”  Kinda’ like alcoholism, they can never get enough!!!!  Unfortunately, it’s at the expense of the world over!  Some might even be be finding “pleasure” in the plight of the Pakistanis!

  8. All the good land will be peopleless, lotsa land out there with resources like bubblin crude my boy.

    Some might say i’m an oil man…..

  9. she – who has worked, no struggled, so long for human rights, told us, the audience, that she had only one message for us (mostly she just sang) and then she quoted:

    A Hopi Elder Speaks

    “You have been telling the people that this is the Eleventh Hour, now you must go back and tell the people that this is the Hour.  And there are things to be considered . . .

    Where are you living?

    What are you doing?

    What are your relationships?

    Are you in right relation?

    Where is your water?

    Know your garden.

    It is time to speak your Truth.

    Create your community.

    Be good to each other.

    And do not look outside yourself for the leader.”

    Then he clasped his hands together, smiled, and said, “This could be a good time!”

       “There is a river flowing now very fast.  It is so great and swift that there are those who will be afraid.  They will try to hold on to the shore.   They will feel they are torn apart and will suffer greatly.

       “Know the river has its destination.  The elders say we must let go of the shore, push off into the middle of the river, keep our eyes open, and our heads above water.   And I say, see who is in there with you and celebrate.  At this time in history, we are to take nothing personally, Least of all ourselves.  For the moment that we do,  our spiritual growth and journey comes to a halt.

       “The time for the lone wolf is over.  Gather yourselves!  Banish the word struggle from you attitude and your vocabulary.  All that we do now must be done in a sacred manner and in celebration.

       “We are the ones we’ve been waiting for.”

    — attributed to an unnamed Hopi elder

    Hopi Nation

    Oraibi, Arizona

    I’m glad you wrote this essay Buhdy – it’s quite good – and glad to see you posted it at the Orange.  

    I waver between environmental activism that may just possibly make the planet habitable for my grandchildren and just wanting to tend my garden.

    After so much struggle, our wise ones are telling us to follow the river, let go of the struggle.

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