It's an argument that really gets down to brass tacks about the place of the individual and the state in the modern world, and I'm too tired and too leery of following this down into the sort of usual politicized muck it ends up in. If I can keep it simple...
I just looked it up. Alabama receives $1.61 for every dollar in federal tax it pays. That's in the very top tier of federal support. California gets $0.81 back in federal support for every dollar it pays. So my taxes last year went, in some substantial part, to YOUR schools, roads, and other federally-supported programs. I'd bet you don't see it that way and the thought of living in a state that has been heavily on the federal dole since at least WWII is not comfortable. So, since several states a long ways from you have been supporting your state, city, community and life without getting a single benefit from it... on what basis can you claim no responsibility for anyone outside your town, or whatever?
You also are framing this as a problem only in the Sudan or wherever. That's the places the problem is first starting to show, because they're areas of high population in fringe-arable territory. The canaries of the world coal mine, as it were. They also have the least amount of adaptability - they can't just sigh and buy more water that year, or whatever.
But I assure you that the problem of global climate shift is coming and will roost right on your town... and mine, and all of ours. It's not someone else's problem. It's everyone's. And ignoring what needs to be done now to cope with the problem in the remaining decades of our lives, to say nothing of the lives of our children only puts potential solutions and adaptations that much further out of reach when the problem is right at your doorstep.
Effectively fighting forest fires lies more in spotting the smoke early than in having the biggest fire trucks.
