Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) has nixed a provision in a routine Senate resolution commemorating International Women's Day, reported Gail Collins of the New York Times in her Thursday column.
A provision in the resolution, very similar to one passed in 2011, said women "are disproportionately affected by changes in climate because of their need to secure water, food and fuel for their livelihood."
Cruz objected earlier this month. "A provision expressing the Senate's views on such a controversial topic as 'climate change' has no place in a supposedly noncontroversial resolution requiring consent of all 100 U.S. senators," a Cruz spokesman told the Times.
The provision merely noted "changes in climate" and did not even address the supposedly controversial question of whether climate change is caused by humans. In fact, 97 to 98 percent of climate scientists agree that climate change is anthropogenic, according to the National Academy of Sciences.
It is a scientific fact that climate change makes extreme weather events more likely, though the events themselves do not prove the existence of global warming.
The impact of climate change on women is real. Mary Robinson, the former president of Ireland and U.N. High Commissioner on Human Rights, spoke about the threat towards women in the developing world.
"Seventy to 80 percent of the farmers are women. So if the seasons are not cyclical, and they’re not anymore -- there are long periods of drought and flash flooding -- it’s women who have to adapt. Women on the whole don’t get agriculture training," she told The Daily Beast on March 8, International Women's Day.
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