What we (Bitterbrush Broads) think all citizens should know about climate change:

1. What climate change is, that it is real, and that most Americans believe it is real.  For an interesting take, see the 4/6/2015 New Yorker article by Jonathan Franzen:  Carbon Capture:  “climate change is seductive to organizations that want to be taken seriously…. [It] is everyone’s fault—in other words, no one’s. We can all feel good about deploring it.”
   See also the SIX AMERICAS Study.
2. Climate Change is human caused – their increased releasing of CO2 into the atmosphere.
3. Who says so?  The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.   IPCC (a blue-ribbon international group of scientists and policy makers) reports on climate change science to world leaders, scientists and citizenry.  Additionally many other scientists also conduct research report evidence for climate change.
4. Climate Change will affect us all – not just those living on the coast or in already hot climates.  Impacts will be felt differentially across the globe, and not always in ways we would naively predict.  In particular, note Central Oregon effects of climate change.
5. What can we do?
   –   Educate and Activate.  There is a huge gap between
   –   Mitigation.  We can work together at many levels to mitigate climate change effects.
   –   Adaptation. We can plan for climate change, adapting to (but not erasing its impacts.
   –  but we probably can’t “geo-engineer” our way out.  Most scientists believe that Climate Change cannot be turned around in the near term (our lifetime), but we can do so in the long term.
6. Why do we, the Great Old Broads care?