Kerry on Climate Change and Energy Independence

Both of the last two Democratic nominees for President, the elected and the unelected, understand the importance of combating climate change. This whole speech is here. Here's the key idea in my mind:

Here’s the bottom line: within the next decade, if we don’t deal with global warming, our children and grandchildren will have to deal with global catastrophe. It is time to stop debating fiction writers, oil executives and flat-earth politicians, and actually take on the other mortal threat to America after terrorism, which, because of our oil dependence, is a decisive front in the war on terrorism.

...Our reliance on oil not only props up decaying and dictatorial regimes, but those that tolerate and sustain terrorist groups. Any long-term strategy for winning the war on terror must be matched with a determined effort to reduce our dependence on petroleum. It demands an international response, linked to the rapid emergence of new energy technologies, in order to ensure that emerging economies don't become the new enablers of Middle East autocrats. Make no mistake, our long term mission in the war on terror depends on long term energy independence. We must end the empire of oil.

Each of us can do something. And together all of us can insist on leaders who secure our energy independence, not ones who barter it away. We wouldn’t elect a candidate who said terrorism wasn’t a threat. We wouldn’t tolerate a candidate for national office who didn’t say he was committed to capturing or killing Osama Bin Laden. But for too long we’ve tolerated those who treat the threat of energy insecurity and the truth of global climate change as an inconvenient myth. Well, from now on, every American who walks into a polling place can and should vote to kick out anyone who stands in the way of energy independence.

There are so many reasons to support energy independence and combating climate change, so maybe this one will help make those rigid ideologues sit up and take notice. For too long we've been funding both sides of the war on terror, one when we pay our taxes, and the other when we pay for gasoline. Our auto companies made the mistake of siding with Big Oil and ditching fuel-efficient vehicles, and now they're paying the price in market share. Our foreign policy experts have made the mistake of siding with Big Oil too, and in so doing have funneled wealth to those who fund terror and radical Islam.

This is a good speech. I hope to see some good action. Before 2009, please.