Donald Trump’s recent threat to wreak “fire and fury” on North Korea is leading to some pointed questions about a cluster of crises that also call out for attention and action.
“Which ‘fire and fury’ is the biggest threat: Donald Trump’s, North Korea’s, climate change?” asked National Observer publisher Linda Solomon Wood, in a post late last week. “Here in Vancouver, we keep breathing smoke. As the weekend approaches, British Columbia Wildfire Service braces for more unpredictable weather. Visitors from polluted cities like Mexico City or Beijing who anticipate the usual relief of Vancouver’s beautiful air will be painfully disappointed. And what we’re experiencing in the Lower Mainland pales next to the smoke that’s choking communities in B.C.’s Interior. The air quality health index measures risk from 1 (low) to 10 (very high). It registered a 49 last week in Kamloops.”
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At last count, B.C. was fighting 150 wildfires, including 20 new ones resulting from lightning in the southeastern corner of the province.
For now, Solomon Wood says she’s reveling in what sounds like a joyous (and we have to say it…well-deserved) holiday break. “When I come back to the fray, the smoke and fire will still be here. So will leaders who will take us into their choice of apocalypses if we let them,” she writes. “So rest, rejoice, and regenerate—and then return and resist, ready to demand that our leaders cool the flames of climate change and warfare alike.”
