developing nations

Kyle Schaap 5-07-2013

A laborer in Thailand in 2011 after the country experienced its worst flooding in years. Photo via 1000 Words/shutterstock.com

If you are reading this and are from North America — and perhaps even if you aren't — you are no doubt aware of just how divisive the issue of climate change is in the US and Canada. Experts from both sides of the issue are regular installments on the 24-hour news networks, presenting the latest data in favor of or disputing the warming of the planet. Policy experts offer the pros and cons of legislation aimed at cutting greenhouse gas emissions. Law makers debate possible action steps. Facebook posts supporting or refuting climate change turn into hotbeds of political (and sometimes a little bit of personal) attacks. Friends bicker; family relationships are strained. 

This is simply the reality of the political climate in North America, but the existence of such rigorous debate is no coincidence. If warming trends continue the way that scientists are currently projecting (four degrees celsius by the end of the century), things in North America won't look all that different. We'll probably experience more droughts, our growing zones will shift, and Michigan will have the climate of Tennessee. Even if things do get bad in North America, we have the money and technology necessary to adapt fairly well to any changes in weather patterns or growing seasons that we might experience. In short: North America can afford not to worry about climate change — at least for a while.

Cathleen Falsani 9-23-2011

Screen shot 2011-09-23 at 1.52.01 PMThe Slavery Footprint campaign launched Thursday (Sept. 22), which also happened to have been the 149th anniversary of the Emancipation Proclamation, with the goal of personalizing "the issue of modern slavery by providing people with an assessment of just how much their lifestyle depends on forced labor -- and the steps they can immediately take to help end it."

By following this LINK I was able to plug in some basic information about myself and my lifestyle -- where do I live, do I own or rent, how many children do I have, have many diamonds/leather shoes/electronic gizmos do I own, what are my eating habits, what's in my medicine cabinet, etc., -- and in just a few minutes received the upsetting news that, according to the Slavery Footprint campaigns diagnostics, 52 slaves "work for me."

Sondra Haaga 1-27-2010

America, dominating the global economy, imports more goods than it exports. What is less tangible, but possibly more important, is how America exports its values to a rapidly interconnecting global society.

Tim Costello 12-17-2009
The rhetoric soared today as rich nation leaders -- UK Prime Minister Gordon Brown, Australia's PM Kevin Rudd and Secretary of State Hilary Clinton -- urged completion of a deal to slow global warm
Tim Costello 12-16-2009
World Vision is at the Copenhagen climate change talks because this is no longer an environmental crisis alone, but a deepening humanitarian crisis.
Tim Costello 12-11-2009
In search of a global ethic and political will, in freezing weather and the most dispiriting cavernous building under cold grey Copenhagen skies, this search by 34,000 people with 3500 press observ
If anyone still doesn't believe in global warming, come to Glacier National Park. My wife Karin and I just spent two days of our vacation here.
Andy Clasper 4-08-2009
The group of 20 leading and emerging nations met at the Excel Centre in London's Docklands last week in a meeting which Gordon Brown heralded as the dawning of a new world order.