I grew up on this music ... as did many others here. Sometimes it's good to remember how far we've come.
Bob Dylan - Times They are a Changin
link to video
Lyrics -- lyricsfreak.com
Come gather 'round people
Wherever you roam
And admit that the waters
Around you have grown
And accept it that soon
You'll be drenched to the bone
If your time to you
Is worth savin'
Then you better start swimmin'
Or you'll sink like a stone
For the times they are a-changin'.
Come writers and critics
Who prophesize with your pen
And keep your eyes wide
The chance won't come again
And don't speak too soon
For the wheel's still in spin
And there's no tellin' who
That it's namin'
For the loser now
Will be later to win
For the times they are a-changin'.
Come senators, congressmen
Please heed the call
Don't stand in the doorway
Don't block up the hall
For he that gets hurt
Will be he who has stalled
There's a battle outside
And it is ragin'
It'll soon shake your windows
And rattle your walls
For the times they are a-changin'.
Come mothers and fathers
Throughout the land
And don't criticize
What you can't understand
Your sons and your daughters
Are beyond your command
Your old road is
Rapidly agin'
Please get out of the new one
If you can't lend your hand
For the times they are a-changin'.
The line it is drawn
The curse it is cast
The slow one now
Will later be fast
As the present now
Will later be past
The order is
Rapidly fadin'
And the first one now
Will later be last
For the times they are a-changin'.
Here are a few meager examples ... those Changin Times ... in which we now find ourselves:
Your first stop for comprehensive data on U.S. public opinion on climate change should be the superb fact sheet, Polling the American Public on Climate Change, published in April 2013 by the Environmental & Energy Study Institute.
Polling the American Public on Climate Change (pdf)
April 2013
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Yale and George Mason Universities
August 31‐September 12, 2012 -- Sample: 839 registered voters
• 61% would support a candidate who is for a revenue‐neutral carbon tax if it created more American jobs
• 77% think climate change should be a high or medium priority for the president and Congress
• 61% say the U.S. should reduce greenhouse gas emissions regardless of whether other countries take action
• 66% support regulation of carbon dioxide as a pollutant, down from 80% in 2008
The Carbon Tax idea used to be a non-starter. Well those
times may be a Changin ...
New Poll Finds Overwhelming Support For A Carbon Tax Over Spending Cuts For Deficit Reduction
by Jeff Spross, thinkprogress.org -- Feb 4, 2013
A recent poll found Americans would prefer a carbon tax to cutting spending for deficit reduction by a huge margin.
Commissioned by Friends of the Earth and conducted by the Mellman Group in December, the poll is the latest evidence that actions on climate change -- and efforts to tax or cap carbon emissions specifically -- are not the inevitable political losers assumed by beltway pundits. Another recent study by The Yale Project on Climate Change Communication determined that bipartisan majorities of voters felt action on global warming should be a priority, would consider a politicians’ views on the matter when voting, and support regulating carbon as a pollutant.
Among other things, the Friends of the Earth poll found that on the carbon tax:
-- Voters overwhelmingly prefer it to cutting spending. When presented with two options for reducing the deficit -- a carbon tax on “big polluters such as oil, gas, and other companies,” versus spending cuts for “programs like education, Social Security, Medicare and environmental protection” -- 67 percent favored the carbon tax. 59 percent favored it “strongly.”
-- Voters support it regardless of how it’s used. If revenue from the carbon tax is used to close the budget deficit, 70 percent favored a carbon tax, with 51 percent favoring it “strongly.” If revenue was to both shore up the budget and invest in clean energy jobs and programs to fight climate change, 72 percent favored the tax, with 54 percent in the “strongly” camp.
[...]
-- Voters support it even when they’re Republican. Not surprisingly, 93 percent of Democrats favored a carbon tax. What was surprising was that 66 percent of Republicans did.
[...]
Finally, the People are getting it ...
AND THAT only took about roughly 40-odd years ...
"Courage, Willow" ... and Perseverance too.
your small voice matters too ... so resolve to, and then dare to use it.
Sometimes it's good to remember how far we've come. And how far we have yet to go.
Travel well, my friends.