The End is coming

Starting tomorrow, 100 heads of state from countries around the world will meet in Bella Center, the largest conference center in Scandinavia. There will be about 15,000 participants and the Copenhagen police are expecting as many as 50,000 protesters — and as a result, over half of Denmark’s police force is in Copenhagen for this event.

Apparently every hotel in the greater Copenhagen area has been booked for months, and many people are hosting participants in their homes. Obama will make an appearance at the conference. It’ll be brief, but this is the second time in three months that Obama has been to Copenhagen, so the Danes aren’t unhappy about that. (He was here for the Olympic committee meeting in early October, which also took place at Bella Center.)

We live across the street from Bella Center. We’ve watched over the last few months as the preprations have intensified. Every entrance is heavily guarded. We’re sure to see many a protester, many a cop, and — mostly likely — some trouble. Last week we got a note form the building management announcing that extra insurance has been taken out on the building, and advising residents to make sure their private policies are up-to-date.

COP15, as it is called, is a big deal. Or it should be anyway. And yet many are opposed to any action to cut pollution, and are hoping the conference is finished before it starts. They claim that the science behind climate change research is completely bogus. Global warming is a conspiracy designed to halt free enterprise and unleash the governments age-old desire to enslave its citizens. It’s concocted by liberals and elites to destroy America. (I may be summarizing, but I’m not exaggerating.)

Opponents don’t say that the predictions are exaggerated. They say they are completely fabricated, which is strange because most of them don’t normally distrust scientists. If scientists were to announce that a meteor the size of a continent headed straight for us, these same skeptics may express doubt, but they would at least consider the posibility. Better yet, if scientists were to predict that the DOW would hit 100,000 by 2020, these same skeptics would be singing the praises of each scientist involved. But not in this case. This prediction is so repugnant — and the solutions so very hard on polluting industries and lifestyles — that it calls for complete and utter denial.

This is not happening. This is not happening. This is not happening.

Granted, predicting the future is not a perfect science, and internal email recently made public by activist hackers brings up questions, but even if the predictions prove only to be 20% correct, we’re still talking about a global disaster. One that could have been avoided, or at least dampened. And despite the denier claims, there is ample evidence of warming. Kiribati is the canary in the coal mine — a country that is current working on relocating its citizens, because the sea is quite simply rising.