Well, fine. He had not stayed in D.C. to fool around. He too wanted to work long hours. And now it was clear he would have Diane’s ear and her support, therefore the cooperation of anyone needed at NSF; things would therefore get done. That was the only thing that would make staying in Washington bearable.
He focused on her list:
• Coordinate already existing federal programs
• Establish new institutes and programs where necessary
• Work with Sophie Harper, NSF’s congressional liaison officer, to contact and educate all the relevant Congressional committees and staffs, and help craft appropriate legislation
• Work with the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, the UN Environmental Program, its Millennial Project, and other international efforts
• Identify, evaluate, and rank all potential climate mitigation possibilities: clean energy, carbon sequestration, etc.
This last item, to Frank, would create the real Things To Do list.
“We’ll have to go to New York and talk to people about that stuff,” Diane said.
“Yes.”
It would be interesting to watch her there. Asian martial arts were often about turning one’s opponents’ force against them. Certainly she had floored Frank that way. Maybe the rest of the world would follow.
But reviewing the list, he felt a surge of impatience. He tried to express this to Diane politely: he didn’t want to spend his time starting studies. He wanted to find where small applications of money and effort could trigger larger actions. He wanted to do things. If the weather was going to heat up, he wanted to cool it. If vice versa, then vice versa. He wanted to identify a viable new energy generation system, he wanted to sequester billions of tons of carbon, he wanted to minimize human suffering and the loss of other species. He wanted impossible things! Quickly he scribbled a new list for their mutual inspection: