The summer heat wave broke records coast to coast. Britain saw 104 degrees for the first time in recorded history. Europe burned. China rationed power. Here, the Southwest hit 115, the Midwest cooked corn into dust, the East strained power grids.
Leaders called it “extreme weather.” Scientists called it climate change. Politicians called it “opportunity for innovation.” Ordinary people just called it unbearable.
Infrastructure meant for the twentieth century can’t handle the twenty-first. Asphalt buckles. Rails warp. Homes without air conditioning turn lethal. Rich households buy generators. Poor households pray the grid holds.
This isn’t the future. This is now. And yet Congress still debates whether the planet is warming as if thermometers are partisan.
The climate doesn’t need your belief. It demands your adaptation. And adaptation is expensive. Which means, in America, survival is means-tested.