Massachusetts loses more than snowfall when it loses winter
Climate scientists just reported that Massachusetts will start experiencing less snow and warmer temperatures during its winters altering our climate and hurting our economy. And with Project 2025’s anti-environmental policies, Republicans are gearing up to make it worse within just 180 days of capturing the White House.
If you’ve ever stepped outside into an 18-degree day with a windchill that makes it feel like -6, you might be tempted to celebrate less frigid winters. But hold the confetti canons for a minute.
There’s a real economic toll that comes from global climate change. In a state like Massachusetts, warmer winters hurt local farms. While we’re known for medical technology and colleges, over 20,000 Bay Staters work in the farming industry, mostly on family farms. With wetter weather due to rain (as opposed to slower melting snow), our growing season changes as does what we can grow.
The bumper sticker isn’t kidding when it says “no farms, no food.” Hurting small family farms also increases the market share of big Agribusiness, which creates even more environmental threats and puts more families into debt.
Warmer weather also means more ticks and more tick-borne diseases in humans and other animals. Fields I could roll in without picking up a tick in the summer are now impossible for my daughters to bike through without picking up at least four ticks (once over a dozen).
Our climate is a global security issue. Even George W. Bush’s Defense Department—no friend of the environmentalists—in 2003 said that climate change should be considered a matter of national security. Politicians have been able to turn a blind eye to the ecological impacts of our bad policies, but they creep closer to home with every hurricane, flood, and wildfire.
We are beyond needing to listen to scientists: we can observe the effects with our own eyes. Yet, Republicans are still coming up with plans to scale back environmental policies. Project 2025 includes a platform to eliminate large segments of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and three offices within the Department of Energy, and roll back Green energy parts of Biden’s popular Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, among other things.
While Project 2025 claims to be rolling back federal environmental regulations in the name of states’ rights, they’re simultaneously trying to prevent states from adoption aggressive climate security policies like California. The hypocrisy of the “states’ rights” talking point is evident.
As with other segments of Project 2025, the anti-environmental stance is deeply unfavorable with voters. Right-wing hedge funds and billionaires who invested in Project 2025 don’t seem to know or care that their programs are not compatible with the will of the voters. Christian Nationalist politicians are happy to push this agenda because not only do they know what’s best for us, they feel empowered to force us to comply.
What remains to be seen is whether through politicking and gerrymandering they’ll have enough electoral success to implement these disastrous programs. Hopefully, enough Americans will acknowledge that climate change policy shouldn’t be led by what is looking like an apocalyptic death cult every day.
