There has been a series of extreme weather incidents. That is not a political statement, that is a factual statement," Andrew Cuomo, Governor of New York, said (on Tuesday after Hurricane Sandy brought the East Coast to its knees.) , "Anyone who says there has not been a dramatic change in weather patterns, I think is denying reality."

"Up With Chris Hayes" host, Chris Hayes, acknowledged this morning (11-3) that "Sandy" was a freak storm, a bad luck confluence of low-probability events that conceivably could have happened in an alternate climate that was not warming. But this climate, our climate, is warming; and, as it does, low probability events like Sandy will become more probable and more intense.

"Carbon emissions are trapping extra energy in our atmosphere and with extra energy come more extremes: higher sea levels, dryer droughts, hotter heat waves and heavier, wetter storms."

Chris goes on to say that we need a crash program now to put in place infrastructure to deal with the current dangers already surrounding us; and a serious national program to shift away from the carbon-producing sources of energy which will threaten our future. The carbon polluting entities will continue to pollute our environment, but, more seriously, will pollute our political process with newly enriched, heavily lobbied politicians.

You may think you are hearing a modern-day "Chicken Little" hollering about a falling sky. The politicians who work for the oil and coal producing concerns will try to placate. You may laugh at the need to "lower the level of our oceans", to harness the energy of the wind. You may ignore the melting of the northern ice-cap. But behind the chant of the "all is well", a chorus of scientists and serious thinkers are sounding an alarm. How many more extreme weather events must happen before we listen?