An Inconvenient Sequel: Truth to Power Page #9

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For example, for the first time

they're learning about

the real energy balance

of the Earth.

Energy in and energy out.

Don't let anybody tell you

that we're gonna get on

rocket ships and go to

Mars and live in hermetically

sealed buildings.

We couldn't even evacuate

the city of New Orleans

when the hurricane hit there.

This is our home.

Delegates at the United Nations

Climate Summit

are expressing panic

over Tuesday's election results,

saying President-elect

Donald Trump

may threaten the future

of any international agreement

to slow catastrophic

climate change.

Trump has said he will "cancel

the Paris Climate Agreement"

and also promised to promote

coal power and fracking,

and says he will allow

for oil and gas drilling

on federal land.

A famous boxer once said,

"Everybody has a plan"

"until he gets

punched in the face."

Days into his presidency,

Donald Trump is sending

chills down the spines

of environmentalists

and some EPA employees.

This trifecta

of cabinet appointments,

all staunch

fossil fuel supporters

who've expressed doubts

about the urgency

of climate change.

For all the years

I've been involved

in this struggle, there have

been lots of setbacks.

So now we have another one.

With all these new threats,

there's never been

a more important time

to speak truth to power.

I do my best

to speak for

the public interest in solving

the climate crisis.

Even though it sounds

a little highfalutin,

I try to answer to the truth

of what needs to be done.

And each of us, in our own ways,

has the obligation

and some ability

to feel what is more likely

to be true than not.

And if you work hard enough

to get the best

available evidence,

you can feel if you're onto

what the right thing is.

And that's not arrogance,

that's just a feeling that

I think everybody

is familiar with.

And I've been

working on this issue

long enough that I feel very,

very deeply about

what the right thing is.

I'm not confused about it.

I remember vividly

when the Civil Rights

Movement first began to

pick up steam.

We saw Bull Connor

turning fire hoses

on young African-American kids,

and we asked

the older generation

why it's just and fair

to have laws

that discriminate

on the basis of skin color.

And when they couldn't

answer that question,

the laws began to change.

This movement

to solve the climate crisis

is in the tradition of every

great moral movement

that has advanced

the cause of humankind.

And every single one of them

has met with resistance

to the point

where many of the advocates

felt despair

and wondered, "How long

is this gonna take?"

Martin Luther King famously

answered a question during

some of the bleakest hours

of the Civil Rights Movement,

when someone asked,

"How long is this gonna take?"

He said, "How long? Not long."

"Because no lie

can live forever."

"How long? Not long."

"Because the moral arc

of the universe is long,"

"but it bends toward justice."

"How long? Not long."

We are close in this movement.

We are very close

to the tipping point

beyond which this movement,

like the abolition movement,

like the women's

suffrage movement,

like the Civil Rights Movement,

like the anti-apartheid

movement,

like the movement

for gay rights,

is resolved into a choice

between right and wrong.

And because of who we are

as human beings,

the outcome is foreordained.

And it is right to save

the future for humanity!

It is wrong

to pollute this Earth

and destroy the climate balance!

It is right to give hope

to the future generation!

It will not be easy.

And we, too, in this movement

will encounter a series of no's.

The great American poet

Wallace Stevens,

in the last century,

one of his lines was this,

"After the last no comes a yes."

"And on that yes

the future world depends."

Bye-bye, guys. Thank you!

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