Scott Turner: Costs of leaving Paris Agreement could be felt right here in our Valley

From space, our planet looks like a single, somewhat fragile, living globe requiring the inhabitants to have some sense of community. Obviously, this is not the opinion of our leaders. They want to put up walls, enforce travel bans, threaten to remove us from NATO and pull out of our agreement with almost the entire world on climate change.

Alienating these countries will not end well for us. Bringing this back home, we should consider a backlash resulting in a ban of all “Made in USA” products. Consider that California supplies 70 percent of the world’s almonds and about 35 percent of all processed tomatoes. It is important to think about what could happen if the European Union and others decide on a new “climate change tariff” for just those two products and the possible impact that action would have on our economy in the great Central Valley. Even if there is no direct levying of taxes on our goods there might be a movement to boycott them in world markets based on our isolationist policies. Maybe when there is a direct financial impact on our community we will decide to make a change in our leadership. Brace yourselves from the fallout.

This story was originally published June 6, 2017 at 10:56 AM with the headline "Scott Turner: Costs of leaving Paris Agreement could be felt right here in our Valley."