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The American government should take an active role in stopping climate change

"I then further read under the category of "What's Not Certain" the EPA states it is not certain about "Determining the relative contribution to climate change of human activities and natural causes."" But in the section about what they do know, they say that they know that it's happening, and they know that it's caused by humans. They're just not certain about how much humans contribute, percentagewise. "Furthermore, the EPA's research is under suspicion anyway. There are two EPA workers who are highly critical of the EPA's memo on carbon gas. The are critical of both the substances of and the process behind the agency's proposed findings" The fact is, there is scientific evidence supporting climate change and the fact that it is caused at least significantly by humans. If you want to take a memo that may or may not have been slightly unsupportive towards the climate change plight and construe it so it looks like it is destroying years of scientific conjecture, well, I'm sorry, but that's not how it works. Do I wish that climate change wasn't happening, you bet I do. But unfortunately that's not the case. "Additionally, in November of 2009, over 1,000 emails and more than 2,000 documents from the Climate Research Unit of the University of East Anglia were posted on the internet." Oy gevalt! You went there... To answer your argument, yes, I am aware of the scandal, but no, I do not believe that it means anything, other than the fact that deniers are going to be that much more difficult to deal with. As I said, it would be really nice if you were right, but the sad fact is that years of scientific conjecture are not going to change because of a few emails. These emails are just a red herring of sorts. But to claim that they overturn years of science and research is ludicrous at best. "We are talking about an average over a long period of time to determine warming. Everyone would agree that one hour or one day of higher than normal temperatures does not constitute as a long enough time to establish global warming." You are correct, but the increased incidence of unusual occurrences and records make it clear that something is happening. For example, we have always had El Nino events, but they have become much more common and much stronger in recent years. If we didn't have that trend, an El Nino year would just mean that the south Pacific was warm at that particular point. Now, it means that the south Pacific is getting warmer, and it might not go back. "The EPA report you continue to quote says that it is uncertain in "Projecting future greenhouse emissions and how the climate system will respond within a narrow range." If your coveted EPA cannot project future climate changes, how can you?" Greenhouse emissions are from people, my friend. We don't know how society will be in the future, and so we can't know how the climate will change if we don't know what we're going to be putting into the system. "They continue to explain they aren't certain about "Improving understanding of natural climatic variations, changes in the sun's energy, land-use changes, the warming or cooling effects of pollutant aerosols, and the impacts of changing humidity and cloud cover."" I'm sorry, but Merlin does not run the EPA. You can try to tell Lisa Jackson that she needs to take psychic lessons. My point is, there is a fine line between following scientific trends and predicting the future. We can't study things that haven't happened yet, or are so new that we can't have seen the results. That is why they invented CFC's in the first place; because they didn't know that CFC's eat up the ozone layer. "There are major scandals around covering up and hiding evidence that global warming does not exist." I agree with that whole statement except all of it. There are minor red herrings around scientific secrecy, most likely so other scientists won't discover what they're trying to discover before they discover it. Yes, I know that that's unfortunate, but it by no means disproves or even hurts the case for climate change. "The EPA even admits that it is unclear as to how the human race effects climate change." I believe that to be a gross misinterpretation on your part. They are certain that humans, in some way or another, affect climate change. They just don't quite know exactly how or how much. "I must defer back to you yet again after you read all this compelling evidence and explain that the burden or proof is yours to prove and without it, American Only regulations cannot be expected." You have shown me your "evidence," but the burden of proof is, in fact, upon yourself to show how that "evidence" can be applied as anything other than a mildly interesting piece of information. I'm sorry, but a memo and some emails can't just negate every single piece of information I gave you. If that was how life worked, we wouldn't get anywhere. It is really irresponsible to interpret facts like that, because you are completely ignoring the vast majority of facts. (Can you tell how much I enjoy the argument that it is a scandal/hoax?) "This 'hand picking' of evidence to prove climate stability and then a large spike in change raised many questions across the scientific community." Once again, how is this anything but a slightly interesting piece of trivia. You can analyze and scrutinize all of the more controversial aspects to the world's end, but you really need to look for the big picture. Basically, what I'm saying is that I really could care less about these so-called "scandals" because they do absolutely nothing to my argument, which you seem to have completely lost track of. "very continent for someone who's data is the reason we have this global warming debate today." So, what you're saying is that, whether or not this was a hoax, this graph made us realize and study something which is very real. If you think that this is the only research that has been done, I don't see how you can be qualified to debate this. The fact is, the vast majority of the evidence that we have is absolutely real, peer reviewed data from independent labs. So, I don't want to hear about your scandals or conspiracy theories, because you are completely missing the point. The fact is, any data or theories opposing the idea of climate change absolutely pale in comparison to all of the evidence and conclusions that climate change is a very real problem with very real consequences and very real ways to prevent it. It is ignorant and irresponsible to deny that. As I said earlier, if there is any reasonable evidence that climate change is caused by humans, there is absolutely no reason to not be more responsible in what we do, just in case. Every single other country is leaps and bounds more responsible than the US in terms of environmental issues. Obviously it would be virtually impossible to spontaneously get 300 million people to be more responsible, so that's why the government needs to step in. There is nothing that says that the US has special rights to spew greenhouse gases into the environment at our own expense as well as the expense of the rest of the world. That is irresponsible. That is selfish. That is just incredibly, astoundingly, disgustingly stupid. It is an incredibly easy fix, and there is nothing more important. What kid doesn't grow up without wanting to save the world? Well, my friend, environmental protections very literally save the world. I would like to thank my opponent for making excellent arguments and, admittedly, being much friendlier than I. While my opponent has done a wonderful job, his arguments were completely unsupported by no fault of his own, but because there is nothing to support them with. It is a fact that humans cause climate change, and the government can very easily alleviate our impact. Therefore, there is absolutely no reason to not vote PRO. Thank you.