American government is heading for a climate-induced legitimacy crisis

Revolutions happen when a political system fails to address huge, obvious problems

The Constitution and flames.
(Image credit: Illustrated | Getty Images, iStock)

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, probably the largest scientific collaboration in human history, has produced its Sixth Assessment Report on climate change. The science is complicated and the pile of evidence is immense, but the basic conclusion is fairly straightforward: Scientists are ever more certain that the global temperature is rising, that it is caused by humans, and that all manner of extreme weather events are connected to this warming. As a pseudonymous physicist summarized, "It's real, it's us, there's strong agreement amongst relevant experts, the impacts could be really severe, we can still do things to limit the impact."

The threat is dire. Every part of the United States will be harmed by unchecked global warming — some are getting hit worse than others, but nowhere is immune — while poorer countries will have it worse still. With just one degree Celsius of warming, America has experienced a summer of rolling climate disasters. At 1.5 degrees and beyond, the damage will be much, much worse.

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Ryan Cooper

Ryan Cooper is a national correspondent at TheWeek.com. His work has appeared in the Washington Monthly, The New Republic, and the Washington Post.