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Dear Mr. Paulson,
You arguably are one of the most powerful, famous, and networked men in the world, with many important accomplishments. I am the completely ordinary, middle class, volunteer steward of 53 acres of publicly owned, remnant floodplain woodland situated on the banks of the Des Plaines River.
Based on your eponymously named Institute’s website, you apparently spend much of your time as a “thought leader” working to somehow combine free-market growth with the urgent necessity to mitigate carbon emissions and save biodiversity, while I spend many days studying, thinking about, and working, hands-on, to protect and increase the biodiversity of this small patch of actual land. For example, this very morning, before breakfast, before I was aware of your op-ed in the New York Times discussing solutions to the epochal, mass extinction event humanity is causing, I read a report about the likely effects of climate change in Illinois, including the poor adaptation prospects for white oaks—an important group of tree species in northern Illinois, species depended upon by literally hundreds of wild, non-human species. Swamp white oak, Quercus bicolor, is a major component of my woodland. One of these trees, perhaps 150 years old, is a favorite roosting spot of a great horned owl couple. It’s a personal mission—I want these trees, these birds, and their progeny to thrive far into the future. For that, they and all the other denizens of that place will need a well-functioning ecosystem.
Later today, while you are doing whatever it is thought leaders do, I’ll be cleaning seeds I’ve collected at my site to then sow later this fall…
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