NY Times article: "YOU don’t have to be a climate scientist these days to know that the climate has problems. You just have to step outside"

A Ray of Hope on Climate Change - NYTimes.com

YOU don’t have to be a climate scientist these days to know that the climate has problems. You just have to step outside.
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Over the last several years, the governments of the United States, Europe and China have spent hundreds of billions of dollars on clean-energy research and deployment. And despite some high-profile flops, like ethanol and Solyndra, the investments seem to be succeeding more than they are failing.
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Even natural gas, a hotly debated topic among climate experts, helps make the point. Thanks in part to earlier government investments, energy companies have been able to extract much more natural gas than once seemed possible...

At the recent peak, in 2009, all federal spending on clean energy — including money for research and subsidies for households and businesses — amounted to $44 billion. This year, Washington will spend about $16 billion. The scheduled expiration of a tax credit for wind, originally signed by the first President George Bush in 1992, would help reduce the total to $14 billion next year, and current law has it continuing to fall in 2014.

...This summer’s drought has affected as much of the country as the Dust Bowl drought.