Saving Florida

Miami, FL -- Florida just became the first southern leadership state in the fight to whip global warming. Governor Charlie Crist used his Florida Climate Summit on Thursday as the occasion to sign three executive orders setting out policies to combat climate change. He committed to an 80 percent reduction in global warming emissions by 2050. He also ordered that Florida adopt the California Clean Car Standards, adding a significant new state to the 14 others that have already announced their intention to adopt the landmark standards which lower global warming emissions from new automobiles by 30 percent.

Speaking yesterday at the summit, I told the charged-up audience that a tsunami is rising across America, and that it is headed straight for the beaches of the Beltway. The panels yesterday focused on leadership and success stories, and none of the speakers, fittingly, were from the federal government.

It's appropriate that Florida is the latest leader, since, as I told El Nuevo Herald, "For Florida, the difference between action now and action too late is the state's very existence. If we wait too long, much of Florida will sink beneath the rising seas, and the remainder will become wasteland."

But I warned the audience as we closed for the day, "The congressional leadership in both parties is still wondering if this tsunami is really going to sweep away the lobbyists on K Street, or if they have another year or two of business as usual to come. Florida ought to use its congressional delegation as a tsunami warning system for the nation's capital -- let them know that since Florida has already embraced clean electricity and California's clean car standards, every member of the Florida House delegation should make sure that they are standing up for these two principles in national energy legislation about to come to the house floor."