Williams is wrong, Earth is fragile

Walter Williams' recent syndicated column sounded like a bunch of climate change denying rhetoric. Yes, mankind still exists after some large volcanic eruptions a long time ago, but that has nothing to do with the slow-motion major disaster going on now.

Climate scientists with NASA's orbiting carbon observatory estimate we're pumping heat-trapping greenhouse gas at a rate of 30 billion to 40 billion tons of CO2 into the atmosphere every year - and it is increasing. You'd have be naive to think this wouldn't have a negative effect on Earth's climate. Earth's atmosphere isn't endless; it's a thin layer of particular gases that protect us, held close to earth by gravity. These gases are in different quantities, with carbon dioxide having one of the smallest quantities at roughly 0.04 percent. With the amount we're adding to that annually, the percentage is increasing.

You don't have to look very hard to find this kind of information, but you rarely find it in any headline news. Our political leaders don't talk about it because there's too much money still being made in the fossil fuel industry. I think a lot of people try to play this problem down because fixing it is looked at as a costly inconvenience. The most dangerous thing we can do is think someone else is going to fix our global warming problem. Earth is fragile.

Dave Speltz

Swisher