It is unfortunate that this has come to be perceived as a left/right issue, rather than a question of science, as it was scientists, not politicians, who first raised the concern several decades ago. When Al Gore appointed himself spokesman for this issue, he unfortunately turned an important policy issue into a political issue, and it has yet to recover. Would we be responding to this issue differently if Mother Teresa had made "An Inconvenient Truth"?
30 years ago scientists also raised concerns about the impacts of acid rain from coal-fired power plants in the Midwest on the forests in the Northeast, and after a lot of political pushing and shoving George Bush I approved a market-based solution for trading pollution credits (aka cap and trade). Several decades later, the problem has been significantly reversed without any of the predicted economic displacement. Hunters and fishers in those areas benefited as a result.
A recent poll found that a majority of those polled opposed a "cap and trade" program for carbon emissions but then admitted that they did not know what "cap and trade" meant. A pretty clear indication that this issue has totally succumbed to politics.
I don't find it hard to believe we can affect the Earth's climate - we learned to fly, escape the Earth's gravity and split atoms after all. If we were able to develop enough atomic weaponery to plunge the Earth into nuclear winter (or worse) if we used it all, why it is so far-fetched to think that all of the pollution from 6.7 billion people can't affect the Earth's climate? Keep in mind that CO2 emissions are cumulative - CO2 emitted 50 or 100 years ago remains in the atmosphere, unless and until it is taken in by plant life. Looking forward, consider that there are 7 times as many people in China and India as in the US - all of whom aspire to our lifestyle. What will things be like when they achieve that goal?
Sorry to preach but like most of the issues being "debated" these days, the debate is all about politics and not the facts/science.
