Pinellas County is geographically a peninsula, surrounded on three sides by water...a microcosm of the entire state of Florida, itself surrounded on three sides by large bodies of water. Our home in St. Petersburg, the largest city by population among the twenty-three other municipalities located throughout the county, is approximately twelve city blocks from Tampa Bay on the east and approximately fifteen miles - give or take - to the Gulf of Mexico. It is a truly beautiful city. Other than perhaps San Diego, I can't think of another location in America where I would choose to live.
But here's apparently the rub... According to former vice-president and recent Oscar winner Al Gore, his "Inconvenient Truth" about global warming may have me and the other million plus residence of this fair county in its watery cross-hairs. If, as Mr. Gore professes (and apparently so do a cadre of credentialed individuals in like support of his contentions) the earth is indeed "warming" at an unprecedented alarming rate, it is most likely that St. Petersburg is headed for a watery bath that will eventually render much of its land mass to submersion. I am torn between panic and elation. Panic because I don't own an boat and elation because of where my particular piece of the "American dream" is located.
As fate would have it, my home is situated on a ridge of land that runs north and south through the Pinellas County peninsula, being approximately thirty-three feet above mean sea level. My home is also built on top of a block foundation that is an additional two and one half feet above grade. With these facts in mind, I figure I have a few years left before the tide comes lapping at my back door.
Here's the deal... I tend to believe that the the entire issue of global warming - pro and con - has validity. Do I believe that the earth is warming? Yes. Do I believe that this phenomena is a natural occurrence in the long and ever evolving cycle of the earth's existence? Yes. Do I think that mankind is perhaps exacerbating this documented warming trend to a detrimental degree? Yes. Do I think that the warming of the earth's surface will eventually - in this current cycle - produce increased sea levels to the point where many of the coastal cities and towns will be devastatingly affected? Perhaps. What, however, concerns me the most is not whether St. Petersburg will eventually sink below the waters of Tampa Bay, but whether America as a whole will sink beneath the waters of complacency as we as a people continue to follow a path of apathy toward those forces of evil in the world who have proclaimed that they wish to bring this great nation to its knees and eventual demise by any means possible. That real possibility scares me far more than the tide rising a minuscule amount in any given year.
I am dismayed by and disheartened with our elected national leaders who are so focused on the short-term political gains that may be immediately derived with their infighting and bickering than to cast a far wider vision of what may be accomplished through cooperative compromise. We, the people, are increasingly being left out of the equation of self-government....being regarded a pawns, dupes, and incapable of having an affective say in our own destinies. No wonder the American public cares little for the abilities of our elected leaders to seek anything other than their own self-sustaining aggrandizement. We are discouraged. We are angry. We have all but given up in the belief that man's better nature among our leaders with again come to the fore and we begin again to work together for the greater good of all of our citizens.
Some very wise person stated, "We should pray ceaselessly to God in recognition that all things depend on Him, and work together as though all things depend on us." If it can be determined factually that mankind can indeed slow if not totally reverse the worst effects of global warming, I'll do my part, as I suspect and am hopeful that the majority of reasoning individuals would follow suit. I am less assured and hopeful that our country will reach a consensus of determination that will render our nation a future in which our children and their children will live out their lives in peace. I hope and pray that I am wrong. Let the waters rise if they must. For the foreseeable future, God willing, I have no plans to build a boat dock at my back door.
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