On climate change, both denialism and fatalism are mere postures, not serious points of view.

Opinion|This year’s Republican platform should be just one sentence

On climate change, as we swelter through this heat wave, both denialism and fatalism are mere postures, not serious points of view. With evidence of human-induced global warming all around us, hopeful realism is our only choice.

A relentless and punishing heat dome has settled over the Midwest and Northeast, roasting half of the country, day after day. The first named storm of the hurricane season made landfall in Mexico on Thursday morning and is bringing heavy rain and flooding to Texas. Florida is struggling to recover from record-setting rains that caused widespread flooding. New Mexico and California are battling to contain huge wildfires. And all of this is happening in June — before summer even begins.

It is true that no single weather event, including this oppressive heat, can be definitively blamed on climate change. But it is also true that no single case of lung cancer can be definitively blamed on cigarette smoking — yet the percentage of U.S. adults who smoke has plummeted from 45 percent in 1954, before the deadly correlation between smoking and cancer was widely understood, to just 12 percent today, according to Gallup. Anyone who claimed there is no link would be dismissed as a dangerous........

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