No East Coast cold spell or snowstorm goes by without a full-blast strap line on The Drudge Report. Survey show a decline in belief that global warming is real, or that it needs important action. “global temperature increases is undeniably and basically human-induced, ” it concludes. This noted increase is thanks to human-induced emissions of heat-trapping gases.”. A famous slogan of the first Earth Day was, Think Worldwide , Act Locally.”.

No place has the activist message been brought to hear more than at this corner of America’s “Left Coast.”. Seattle Town Light is a pacesetting in acquisition of new, green energy sources. At our cabin, perched on a Whidbey Island bluff, act-locally gains are perceivable — even audible : Life has come back to Port Gardner Bay, long polluted by Everett’s ” Town of Smokestacks. ” Grey whales eat the sand shrimp off my beach. Resident bald eagles drop limbs of rabbits on the garden. A dead grey whale washed ashore on a Seattle beach this week : Within its stomach were plastic bags, two sweat pants and a ball. Our hiking gang went up on the south flanks of Mount Baker last Aug. The volcano was socked in : We lifted our cups in camp. At 4:20 am, I was moved to answer nature’s call.

We were camped in a nationwide recreation area surrounded by a wasteland area and a countrywide park, all of the product of citizen activism. But the tongue Easton Glacier has retreated, quickly and latterly, from where I recollect it as a kid. The US Geological Survey has been monitoring the South Cascade Glacier for over half-a-century. It was stagnant, perhaps pulling back a touch, at the 1st Earth Day. Now, it’s retreating at a pace to suggest it may vanish by 2050.