The wildfires ravaging Los Angeles have killed at least 24 people, displaced 180,000 and scorched about 160km2 — an inferno driven by fierce winds and severe drought in what should be California’s wet season. It is a sobering reminder that the climate crisis is driving wildfires to become more frequent, intense and destructive — leaving ruined lives, homes and livelihoods in their wake.
US President Joe Biden responded by mobilizing federal aid. By contrast US president-elect Donald Trump, a convicted felon who was criminally sentenced on Friday, used the disaster to spread disinformation and stoke political division.
The climate crisis knows no national borders. Deadly floods in Spain, Hawaii’s fires and east Africa’s devastating drought show that nowhere is safe from its effects. Countries must work toward the global common interest and beyond their narrow national interests. The scale of the climate emergency is such that there is a case to view all crises through a green lens.
Instead Trump’s denialism works to foment distrust about the science. He is not just aiming to delay the onset of truth. He wants to demolish it.
It is a familiar playbook: The fossil fuel industry knows the reality of the climate emergency, but chooses profit over responsibility, effectively deceiving the public while the planet burns.
The perils of weaponizing doubt should be painfully clear in the week when scientists said last year was the first to pass the symbolic 1.5°C warming threshold, as well as the world’s hottest on record.
Trump’s politicization of climate denial has supercharged it, turning skepticism into a badge of identity.
When denial becomes ideological, facts turn irrelevant. That makes concerted climate action much harder to achieve.
Trump’s return to power will not halt the US’ path to decarbonization, but it will slow it disastrously. An analysis by Carbon Brief in August last year estimated that his return could add 4 billion tonnes of US carbon emissions by 2030 compared with Democrat plans — inflicting US$900 billion in global climate damage.
To grasp its scale, the emissions surge would equal the combined annual output of the EU and Japan, or the emissions of the world’s 140 lowest-emitting countries.
Confronting the climate emergency demands more than facts; it requires dismantling the political machinery that breeds denialism. The link between the current model of economic growth and the depth of environmental collapse is undeniable. Yet in the face of the overwhelming evidence, too many on the political right cling to denial or place blind faith in the free market.
This is an age of “hyper agency” — where billionaires, rogue states and corporations wield almost unchecked power, fueling climate chaos and global instability. The mechanisms meant to hold power to account are being dismantled with ruinous consequences. Without urgent action, the next disaster will not be a warning. It will be irreversible.
While not much can be expected from Trump, the European “green deal” is too small to plug this year’s projected shortfall in private investment, let alone meet EU commitments under the Paris climate agreement. Climate denialism ought to be confronted with bold policies; business must be held accountable for its role in this crisis; and voters need to see through the rightwing populist parties who prioritize profit over the planet.
The next catastrophe is not a distant threat, it is already in motion. Only immediate and determined action can stop global heating from becoming humanity’s undoing.
Concerns that the US might abandon Taiwan are often overstated. While US President Donald Trump’s handling of Ukraine raised unease in Taiwan, it is crucial to recognize that Taiwan is not Ukraine. Under Trump, the US views Ukraine largely as a European problem, whereas the Indo-Pacific region remains its primary geopolitical focus. Taipei holds immense strategic value for Washington and is unlikely to be treated as a bargaining chip in US-China relations. Trump’s vision of “making America great again” would be directly undermined by any move to abandon Taiwan. Despite the rhetoric of “America First,” the Trump administration understands the necessity of
In an article published on this page on Tuesday, Kaohsiung-based journalist Julien Oeuillet wrote that “legions of people worldwide would care if a disaster occurred in South Korea or Japan, but the same people would not bat an eyelid if Taiwan disappeared.” That is quite a statement. We are constantly reading about the importance of Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC), hailed in Taiwan as the nation’s “silicon shield” protecting it from hostile foreign forces such as the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), and so crucial to the global supply chain for semiconductors that its loss would cost the global economy US$1
US President Donald Trump’s challenge to domestic American economic-political priorities, and abroad to the global balance of power, are not a threat to the security of Taiwan. Trump’s success can go far to contain the real threat — the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) surge to hegemony — while offering expanded defensive opportunities for Taiwan. In a stunning affirmation of the CCP policy of “forceful reunification,” an obscene euphemism for the invasion of Taiwan and the destruction of its democracy, on March 13, 2024, the People’s Liberation Army’s (PLA) used Chinese social media platforms to show the first-time linkage of three new
Sasha B. Chhabra’s column (“Michelle Yeoh should no longer be welcome,” March 26, page 8) lamented an Instagram post by renowned actress Michelle Yeoh (楊紫瓊) about her recent visit to “Taipei, China.” It is Chhabra’s opinion that, in response to parroting Beijing’s propaganda about the status of Taiwan, Yeoh should be banned from entering this nation and her films cut off from funding by government-backed agencies, as well as disqualified from competing in the Golden Horse Awards. She and other celebrities, he wrote, must be made to understand “that there are consequences for their actions if they become political pawns of
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