I’ve been reading about climate change lately.  I’ve been trying to make sense of the number discrepancies and the diametrically opposing views about a subject that seems as if it should be pretty straight forward.

Some people are convinced the carbon dioxide emissions being spewed from autos and power plants worldwide is collecting in the atmosphere and causing, among other things, the ice caps to melt.  Others are convinced global temperature fluctuations are just a normal cyclical occurrence.

Both sides site their opposing statistics and their scientific experts but, it seems to me, for a lot of people the issue boils down to an emotional, us versus them scenario with an almost religious fervor.  Sometimes the issue seems reduced to name calling and ad hominem attacks just like it used to be on the playground in elementary school.

Skeptics think of proponents as tree-hugging alarmists just looking for another world threatening crisis; proponents think of skeptics as anti-intellectual luddites with their heads buried in the sand.

Well, whether or not human-caused global warming is as dire as some claim it seems to me we could all do a little more to reduce our carbon footprints and ease the pressure on Mother Earth.