Barbara Boxer: “I thank also everyone who made this evening possible, and I want to say to my co-chair of the Climate Action Task Force…”

“I thank also everyone who made this evening possible, and I want to say to my co-chair of the Climate Action Task Force, Senator Whitehouse, what a privilege it is to work with him, as his passion on this runs deep; to Senator Schatz, who, from Hawaii, is witnessing climate change in real time, just as so many of us are who are from coastal States. I am so looking forward to hearing Senator Tom Udall, and I am not going to quote him but I hope he will say what he said in front of the environment committee when he was a new Member. He called attention to what is happening in the West, and all one has to do is read the papers to see the suffering that is going on. So I also want to say, because time is wasting here, that this was something that I think has caught on, that has caught the attention of people. I can tell you that well over 100,000 people--well over that-- have signed various petitions calling on Congress to wake up. I am under no illusions that our colleagues on the Republican side watched us. So let's be clear. Senator Inhofe said before he left: You are talking to yourselves, and I took great offense at that because the vast majority of the American people understand climate change is real. There is no doubt about it, no more doubt than people have that cigarettes don't cause cancer. We know this is a fact. And for us to close our eyes to this fact is closing our eyes to the people we represent and about whom we care.…”