Hold Your Breath

Phytoplankton, a tiny algae in the ocean, produces about two-thirds of  the world's oxygen, according to Sergei Petrovskii of the University of Leicester.  (This is science and above my pay grade.) 

As the oceans warm, phytoplankton dies. By 2100, a point at which my granddaughter might still be around, the production of oxygen by phytoplankton may cease. "This would likely result in the mass mortality of animals and humans." 

In my lifetime, more than 40% of the phytoplankton on Earth has vanished. We are, right now, deciding what to do about it. Should we ignore the problem and support the fossil fuel industries or should we continue breathing oxygen?

What are the odds?

Maybe our grandchildren can learn to breathe faster. 

Karl Marx had his failings, but he understood how unrestrained  capitalism works. He wrote that a capitalist will sell you the rope you need to hang him with. Right now the fossil fuel magnates are selling products that will choke their own descendants. 

We are currently in the midst of an awful medical crisis.  We must band together to fight off a virus. Global warming is a thousand times more dangerous than a virus, and our next President is unlikely to face down the fossil fuel guys.   

We'll get four years of doing nothing effective. Followed by eight years of nothing and then a lot more nothing, to paraphrase the Ramones.