DOV TALES
by Dov Burt Levy

When I moved into my home in Salem three years ago, my then six-year-old granddaughter Emily and I spent a few hours walking around the neighborhood. Emily later exclaimed, "You live 12 houses and one church away from the ocean, Sabi." (Sabi is a diminutive of saba, grandfather in Hebrew.) I smiled and told her how good she was in both arithmetic and geography. Now she is almost old enough for me to tell her that in 50 years, when she will still be younger than I am today, that my house, most of Salem, and, in fact most of the coast from Florida to Nova Scotia, could be under water.

Yes, Sabi's house will be drowned. That is, unless the world — led by the United States, followed by China, India, and other industrialized nations — does something dramatic to contain the conditions causing global warming.

Al Gore calls it "an inconvenient truth" that we ignore at our grandchildren's peril. I saw his film of the same name last night. Had Gore been as warm, sincere, articulate and forceful on the campaign trail in 2000, he might be president today. Instead, he has to begin the film by saying, "I'm Al Gore. I used to be the next president of the United States." The line always gets a chuckle.

Or perhaps not. The hanging chads, the misprinted ballots in the Jewish counties in Florida where Jewish retirees officially voted for Pat Buchanan when they came to the polls to vote for Gore, would have probably cost him the election anyhow.

President Bush well deserves the low standing he holds today with the American people. But, while Bush was mis-leading the nation, Al Gore has spent his time running around the world with a great multi-media presentation that lays out the case for global warming and asking the world to choose to save the planet rather than destroy it.

Rush out to see this important film. You will learn a lot about the threat, the reality, the damage already done, and what must change.

Fifty years ago, I was stationed at the southern tip of Greenland, at Narsarssuak Air Force Base. We could see the polar ice cap and the snow-topped mountains through Greenland's pristine air. Then, it was less than a mile north of the base. All is gone today; the ice has been pushed north by a dozen miles.

Where has the ice gone? Melted into the world's seas, inching up the water levels, day by day, year by year. Similar defrosting happens every day in Antarctica, a larger ice cap than Greenland's.

If the only consequence of the ocean swelling were loss of land mass — say, the coasts of the United States, all of Holland and many other countries — that would be tragic enough. But factor in the weather changes that produce hurricanes, tornadoes, floods, fires and droughts, and the extinction of plant, animal, and insect species, and you are talking about a world gone to hell as we know it.

I checked out what National Geographic (neither a firebrand environmental group nor one with political ties) had to say about the Gore film. In a May 25 article, Stefan Lougren interviews Eric Steig, an earth scientist at the University of Washington. The following Gore claims are confirmed as scientifically true, and not, as some opponents have charged, just political hype.

Global warming is making hurricanes worse, with the number of category four and five storms (think Katrina) almost doubling last year.

Sea temperatures are rising, killing fish, coral and other ocean life.

Deaths from global warming-induced heat waves could double to 300,000 per year in the next 20 years.

Sea levels could rise by more than 20 feet due to the loss of shelf ice in Greenland and Antarctica.

And for the readers who want to know the Jewish component in every issue, think of what a 20-foot rise of water in the Mediterranean would do to Israel, which probably has a larger percentage of its people living within 10 miles of the coast than any other country, save small island nations. Say goodbye to Haifa, Tel Aviv, Ashkelon and all the towns, villages, kibbutzim and other farms and industries in between.

Will plain people, from all walks of life and political persuasions, rise up and say, "Enough!" to the CO2 emissions causing this world-threatening devastation? Or will my Emily, and all your grandchildren, suffer mightily and curse us for our unthinking disregard of their lives and future?