To the editor:
Calls for President Trump to adopt enlightened climate change policies will fall on deaf ears.
He’s too concerned with maintaining high approval ratings among his benighted backers; they champion economic expansion at any environmental cost. Why worry about one's descendants suffering extensive environmental degradation when the immediate cost for burning fossil fuels is a bit lower than using renewable resources?
So Trump will keep tuning out the 97% of climate scientists who concur that reducing fossil fuel consumption would decrease the likelihood of extreme weather events. It won’t matter if that percentage increases to 99.9%—there’s no countering the Trump administration’s willful ignorance.
That is, unless the president suddenly becomes concerned with how history will rate him.
David Schaffer, Santa Monica
