Four years later we have a president talking seriously about environmental legislation (though he’s having a tough time with some of it). Progressives control both the legislative and executive branches of government and there’s talk of permanent progressive majorities (though it makes me cringe, given our recent past).

A cynic might point out it took a Katrina, a series of sex scandals, a perfect storm of economic struggles, and a president who criminally overstepped his authority.

I hope it won’t take that much your country, but I think it’s a sign that political fortunes can change in relatively short order. Four years may be a long time – especially when it may already be too late – but I didn’t think you all were tied to the same rigid election cycle we were. You know things can change. I know you’ll keep plugging away, as you say, and you’ll do a great job doing it.

You’ve already made a difference. I should know.

Hopefully, one day you’ll look back on all of this with some amount of satisfaction and pride – like some activists of the mid to late 1960s in the US fighting for civil rights. We probably won’t get it perfect, and we’ll suffer for it. But hopefully it will be better than it could have been, just like these last 40 years have been since the heroic words and deeds of MLK.

In the mean time we’ll keep plugging away, as I know you will… nudged, pushed, and cajoled by people like you: our social conscience.

This is a brilliant comment… Thanks! I soft-pedaled this study after recently feeling the wrath of a family member who doesn’t appreciate my candor. But I had thought of it in the same terms you mention… We’ve used up our quota.

Just like the professionals working this campaign, I’ve also been though a recent period of discouragement during which I could hardly write about climate change for the very reasons you’ve mentioned… It feels like the battle might already be lost. But I’ve regrouped, and decided to keep fighting as hard as I can because I want to be able to look my nieces and nephews — and any future children — in the eye.

The situation in Canada is so disappointing that I want to scream. The Conservatives are a killing us (and our economy while they’re at it), the NDP are too busy playing politics to see what’s really happening, and the Liberals under Michael Ignatieff are woefully misinformed. My only hope is that Iggy might be smart enough to change his mind, though it certainly doesn’t sound like it so far.

And alas, the Green Party still doesn’t stand a chance.

It’s funny… I downloaded the Gwynne Dyer podcasts through iTunes in January (readers: by subscribing to CBC’s Ideas, or by following the link), but haven’t yet listened to them… He’s long been one of my favorite journalists and commentators, but my partner thinks I’ve been far too immersed in climate change minutia over the winter, and needed to take a break. She’s right. But I think we’ll listen to them soon.

These studies, while invaluable, are ultimately profoundly discouraging if only because they expose the inevitability of what’s coming. They certainly reinforce the scenario depicted so well by Gwynne Dyer in his 3-part, CBC Radio “Ideas” documentary, “Climate Wars.” If you haven’t listened to it you should because it’s the most realistic and the most chilling outlook of what lies ahead in a matter of just two decades.

With our own NDP denouncing carbon taxes and the Libs bowing in awe of the Tar Sands, proclaiming bitumen the key to national unity and Athabasca Canada’s economic spine for the 21st century, there’s nobody in our True North Strong and Free offering any realistic hope of change.

It’s sad to talk to professionals in the climate change business who quietly confide that, while they’re still giving the cause their all, to themselves they’ve already given up all but the slightest hope we’ll sort this out in time.

Quite frankly, I’m with them. The irreversible changes you’ve already noted, such as the demise of the Himalayan glaciers transforming India’s and China’s key agricultural rivers into seasonal streams is enough. Dyer’s documentary (you really need to check it out) reveals that we’re concentrating on the wrong tipping points. Long before we get to an environmental, climate change tipping point, we arrive at a humankind tipping point – global war. The front lines are now emerging between India and Pakistan, China and Russia – all four of which share one thing in common – nuclear arsenals. Couple nukes with drought-fueled massive social upheaval and, well you can guess the point. The Pentagon gets it. So does Britain’s Ministry of Defence.

And on that cheerful, Monday morning note, I’ll bid adieu.