During the later part of the first decade of the new millennium people looked no further than their own immediate sphere of influence to determine their happiness.  They looked at their bank balance, attended their kids birthday parties and on occasion invited family or friends over for dinner.  On their sabbath many attended religious ceremonies at their places of worship.

World leaders got caught up in international struggles and strife.  A few tyrants were able to distract strategic thought with drum beating tactics meant to declare their strength to their followers.  Resolution of the larger image eluded them all.

Tens of thousands of containers dumped into the oceans over the last 80 years began to corrode releasing their hazardous materials into the ecosystem.  Hundreds of thousands of tons of matierals.  Thousands of barrels of mercury.  Weapons of war.  Fuels in ships sunk in battles long forgotten.  All began to leach into the environment and the food chain.   Dwindling populations became ever more consumed with the toxins.  The scarce resources that left were not fit for consumption.   The ocean's became so acidified that commercial fish populations went extinct about 2050.  People began to starve.

The United States led the world to focus on human rights, democracy and freedom.  Tyrants with a great deal of wealth behind them were able to distract them considerably during last minutes of the 20th century.   It consumed their time and energy that might otherwise have allowed them to see the light.  Big business spent millions on advertising and 'infomercials' to "educate" the public about how good their entrenched position was.  The public bought in because their busy lives didn't allow them to think to deeply about the real issues.  They were more concerned with tomorrow's work schedule or tonights TV schedule.  How to pay tomorrow's bills.  Debts mounted and focus increased on solving financial problems.  Individuals felt helpless and no one in positions of power sought to tell them otherwise.  Business, corporations and associated disciplines became mechanisms strictly to extract profits without concern for ethics and certainly without regard to the biosphere.  After all the biosphere is huge, how can one company adversely affect that?  Consequently no one took action that mattered and entrenched positions were allowed to continue under the auspices of 'fixing the problems later'.  In the years to come we are going to reduce emissions even more.  We have made great strides in reducing greenhouse gases but look how much we are going to lower them next year.  The people listened and believed.  After all - they said it on TV.  They got kids to say it too.

Russia slipped back into old ways as leaders became self absorbed with maintaining power and control.  Space was a nationalistic endeavor that supported military R&D.  Entreprenuial spirit was crushed.  The people struggled against "the system" instead of diversified pursuits.  When the problems began to cascade they were caught completely off guard.

Canada and Mexico focused on their relationships with the United States.  They each drove policies and practices that further drained the resources of the United States providing yet further distractions from large scale issues.  The big picture was again lost.

China continued to embrace western ways.  The allowed new businesses in and allowing some segments of their population to enjoy the fruits of those labors.  Democracy still eluded their people.  Human rights were not observed.  Their efforts remained centered with a decidedly nationalistic approach.   Their military remained intertwined with their space programs.  China's industrial might fought hard to fuel the growth that these new business opportunities brought with them.   New sources of energy came on line in an attempt to keep up with demand.  They built the largest hydroelectric generation facility on the face of the Earth.  So large in fact it is one of the few structures visable from orbit.  Pollution was rampant but because of human rights in China - progress came first and the people second.  The environment was never even considered.

India worked hard to push education of its people.  The per capita population of PhD's there was higher than anywhere on the planet and for all of that knowledge the continued to build power generation plants that consumed hydrocarbons with greenhouse gases belching from their stacks.  They were too focused on job migration and undercutting salaries of American and European workers to see beyond their country's economic boom.

The Middle-East remained clenched in ideological warfare with various factions fighting for power.  Religeon was used as a tool for violence and to terrify people who did not have the experience base to make any other judgements.  They never even looked beyond their own audience much less considered a systemic issues.  These are the kinds of problems that tyrants and dictators cannot solve.   They lack the diversified support from across their entire population.  So consumed were they, they didn't even understand what was happening to them and they blamed everyone else for the problems.

Europe stayed too focused on consolidating economies attempting to put value behind the Euro.  They understood, fundamentally, that consolidated effort was necessary but they aligned it with the economy alone.  They probably more than the others had the chance to improve the ecology, more than the others, because real estate in Europe was such a premium.  They tended to focus on the ecology as it impacted development not how it impacted the biosphere.  So they began to swallow nationalistic pride and work on connecting monetary systems in an attempt to build a competitive front out to the global economy.  Their leaders too missed opportunities take collective action in support of the biosphere.

The Japanese did see the problem and tried to bring a solution to the world's attention with their Kyoto Protocol.  The protocol however suffered the reverse problem manifested in Europe.  They ignored what it took from an economy to support an endeavor like that.  No one saw that both must be approached in balance.  That the economic incentives must be supported along a strategic direction that solves many problems in parallel.  They too missed the larger picture.  Their good effort was lost in the avarice of entrenched positions. 

Everyone else focused on local economies and regional politics.  No one stood up for the Earth.  Everyone missed the signs.  They missed:

• Global Warming
• Gas Hydrate Deposits Explosively coming to the surface of the oceans.  This one was mis-interpreted for decades as UFOs or monsters swallowing up airplanes, ships and boats.  Despite the fact it was happening in more than one spot around the globe.  Even when it happened in front of a few scientists noses they were unable to get anyone else to pay attention.
• Permafrost continued its thawing.  Letting its stored methane and CO2 bubble to the surface.  Its broad areas stretching for thousands of miles wasn't obvious.  Unless you studied it.  Ah back to that lone scientist no one paid attention too.  After all that study isn't related to anything else.  Prove it said the entrenched business people.  They just shrugged their shoulders.
• Multi-thousand square mile areas of seas and oceans at the mouths of river deltas around the globe killed tons of marine life as their waters washed nitrates down from farms up river.  Algae bloomed, died and consumed all the oxygen in the water column.  Fish died.  No one paid attention.  After all that's under the ocean and not visible to the average person - unless you study it.  Ah back to that lone scientist...
• Political parties everywhere were caught up in "winning".  After all darn near every year is an election year.  Mid-term elections.  Primary's.  Elections for state governments.  Parts of the national government gets replaced at half cycles of other representatives.  These turn overs help assure the people that fresh blood is representing them.  It also tends to get people to focus on the process of politics and loose sight of larger issues.  Especially when millions are being supplied by entrenched business people to muddy the water.   Politics was treated like a sports team or a business.  Its our job to beat that other guy.  Politicians represent their constituents.  Business confused the general population with advertisement and disinformation that protected their positions because they felt threatened.  The constituents voted to keep their representatives in office.  They voted very quickly because they had to get back to work and then to a game their kid was in.
• Constituents never found cohesiveness of purpose.  Leadership was weak and they never really understood how to get things done.

Global warming continued to slowly increase temperatures.  Just like a frog in a kettle of water whose temperature slowly rises.  A frog in such circumstances will not notice the situation not even when its too late.  Humanity's amphibian roots caused a lack of situational awareness.   No one on Earth was prepared.  The temperatures didn't sore to blistering heights and melt the polar caps.  Not immediately anyway. 

The temperature raised just enough that CO2 contained in extremely large geological deposits, previously held by temperature based mechanisms, released into the atmosphere.  Billions upon billions of tons of CO2, methane and other greenhouse gases.  Then it got hot. Then the poles melted.  The oceans rose almost 200 feet.  Coastal areas were flooded out.  One half of Earth's population of humans were displaced because they lived within 60 kilometers of the coastline.  Coral reefs once basking in the sunshine found themselves in darkened depths.  The food chain was devastated.  Global wind patterns were shifted.  Deserts formed where rain forests once stood.  Life died.

How hot did it get?  No one knows.  The oceans haven't boiled away, yet.  Lead is still solid.  Venus though is looking more and more similar every day.