Thanks ggelsrinc for the video, very interested by the small part of the topex/poseidon animation, I found it for the whole earth here:
It's one of my favorite videos on global warming and Peter Sinclair has many good ones. If you are interested in altimetry and don't know about it, I recommend Aviso.
http://www.aviso.oceanobs.com/en/The video contradicts itself about whether more than half of the sea level rise in Norfolk is from ground subsidence or actual sea level rise. The explanation that Norfolk was built on wetlands is lacking, in fact most of our older cities are at least partially built that way. Norfolk is located on the edge of a 35 million year old bolide impact crater, the largest in the US, so it is unique in those regards. A smaller impact located off New Jersey has been dated to the same period and is thought to be part of the same event. The bottom line is Norfolk has the largest Naval Base in the world built in an area that is very sensitive to sea level rise for a number of reasons. That area is also very important for ship building.
My take on the North Carolina thing is it was just a politician doing a job for special interests and not a statement against global warming. North Carolina is not typical of the US and the fact that the real estate money interests were defeated shows that view is not typical of North Carolina. I was stationed in North Carolina at Camp Lejeune for 90 days less than two years, in fact my first son was born there. The residents of North Carolina are sensible people, but I must admit some of their politicians have been lacking and that's too often the situation in many places on Earth. I can find and post the politician's name who sponsored that NC legislation, but it doesn't even deserve the dignity of a search. The politician worked in the real estate industry and they were the major financial supporters. My view is corruption is endemic to human civilization and as long as an area of Earth has people, there will be corruption. It's a human disease of undetermined pathology (joking), probably because it's internal. Fortunately, there are areas on Earth where corruption doesn't seem so endemic, but it's there and requires eternal vigilance to suppress.
When I discovered that video, the thing that impress me was the reinsurer. I stopped the video and located the sources for the documentation, because I was involved with deniers in political forums. Since the discussions (more often arguments) involved the costs of going green, it's only sensible to present evidence of costs going back to 1973. It is amazing that risk managers were years ahead of scientists in their concern. I remember concern about CO2 emissions being briefly mentioned in a Physical Geography course in '75, but scientists weren't concerned with global warming back then. People in the insurance business have their specific interests which are very different than the interests producing energy. By people, I'm not talking about the workers, but that industry is often owned by old money accumulated through centuries, meaning long before the industrial revolution. If you want to picture insurance, picture casino, because they both have to be set up so the house never loses! I have found evidence of climate change in actuary data that the people in the business knew long ago and when I say I've found it, it only means I can confirm what others saw is obviously there.
Now if you think the US is so bad, let's try to put it in perspective! The US cut carbon emissions at 4 times the rate as Europe did last year and China increased it's emissions by one and a half times as much as the US cut. Europe needs to set up infrastructure to eliminate coal and I don't know exactly how they will get the natural gas to do it. Since Japan also has major problems with increases in fossil fuels, the logical thing would be for North America to start exporting natural gas. A perspective should include that anything short of atmospheric CO2 reductions isn't a solution and you can't reduce atmospheric CO2 with natural gas. You can only add less. I'm not aware of any nation on Earth doing what needs to be done.