All of us in Iowa have seen firsthand why climate change would be a disaster for the economy. However, the Republican party has consistently refused to take climate change seriously even though inaction could leave us eventually with an uninhabitable planet.

As scientists have warned us, time may be running out. Yet delay is what we will get from a Republican administration or even from a divided government. I thus urge everyone who cares about this issue to vote not only for President Obama, but for a Democratic House and Senate.

If Democratic candidates took the trouble to explain climate change to voters and made it central to their campaigns, I believe they would win elections all over the country.

Voters who don’t think climate change should be a priority should ask themselves this: If scientists all over the world said that a particular airplane had a 98 percent chance of crashing, would many of us let our children get on that plane or board it ourselves? Scientists at major universities are telling us that if we want to stabilize our climate, we will almost certainly have to find a way to reduce our dependence on oil and coal. Soon.

I think we should listen to them and vote accordingly.

Barbara Bazyn

Chelsea