Every day, it seems, a new extreme weather catastrophe happens somewhere in America, and the media's all over it, profiling the ordinary folks wiped out by forest fires, droughts, floods, massive sinkholes, tornadoes.

Go ahead, weathercasters and reporters: Tell Americans precisely what we don't want to hear: namely, that our self-indulgent, carbon-heavy, gluttonous and disposable lifestyle is precisely what is churning up the angry response from the skies and seas.

Wouldn't it help Americans more, in the long run, if we were forced to accept some responsibility for the environmental wreckage we prefer to assume is totally out of our control?

Jane Velez-Mitchell Quotes