writeaboutwarming

April 25, 2011 – Ohio’s new governor, John Kasich, hasn’t stopped dumbfounding opponents and supporters alike since his election. First he promised the Cincinnati Enquirer that all meetings regarding public business would be open to the public; it’s one of the reasons they supported him. Once in office, he lost no time in holding meetings closed to the public - in the case of his meeting with the state EPA, so that he could speak “candidly.” One can only assume from this that those meetings actually open to the public will not be notable for their candor. Next came SB5, now passed into law, which drastically limits the rights of teachers and other union members to engage in collective bargaining. Neither of these instances of ill-advised chutzpah can compare, however, with the governor’s support for power plant proposals to clear-cut all Ohio forests over the next 15 years, for the purpose of burning them for fuel. You read that right: according to the Buckeye Forest Council ( www.buck...

April 18, 2011 – Two states of which I have formerly been a resident are enduring weather that nearly defies description. North Carolina experienced 60-plus tornado touchdowns over the past weekend, a large number of them in the Raleigh area, where we used to live. Having grown up in the Midwest, I long since became accustomed to tornadoes as being representative of “typical” spring weather. However, that meant in “Tornado Alley,” a swath of prairie land that ran from Texas up through Wisconsin. While some of the usual places were hard hit this time around – I’m referring here to Oklahoma and Kansas – I don’t think of North Carolina as tornado country. However, my expectations rely upon decades of weather memory that are based on climate behavior that conformed with known patterns and trends. We are now in a transitional period, and the old rules don’t apply. Then there’s Texas. By every account, Texas weather is on a bender, the Forest Service helping to battle 700,000 acres of fires ...

April 11, 2011 – There’s a lot of end of the world talk out there these days. I read Chris Martenson, and I listen to Mike Ruppert, and I’ll tell you what, they are two minds with but a single thought: the sky is falling! I’m not making fun of them, and if you ask me what I think, I have to admit, they could be right. When I say “end of the world,” I don’t mean the planet’s going to implode. I mean the end of the world we all know. I mean the beginning of a period entirely unlike the current one; one of great hardship and privation, probably a time of violence and barbarism. The gentlemen of whom I speak both pride themselves on having prepared for this terrible time, and seem, if I may be forgiven for saying so, almost eager for it to start. There’s not one of us who doesn’t like being right, and they are positively aglow with the conviction of their rightness. It’s the very earnest young men who call into Ruppert’s show who tug at my heartstrings the most. They have a selfless, prote...

April 5, 2011 – I really can’t say enough good things about algore.com, not to mention its eponymous founder. Since I’m not a member of Michael Ruppert’s Collapsenet, I can’t compare the two. The Gore site is free, and I think it makes available an admirable quantity of high-quality news and up-to-the-minute information. Today, the former vice president highlights an editorial that ran yesterday at the American Medical Association’s news site, amednews.com. (If you would like to read the entire editorial, go to http://www.ama-assn.org/amednews/2011/04/04/edsa0404.htm#top ) I can think of no better way to begin than to quote the first paragraph of the editorial: “If physicians want evidence of climate change, they may well find it in their own offices. Patients are presenting with illnesses that once happened only in warmer areas. Chronic conditions are becoming aggravated by more frequent and extended heat waves. Allergy and asthma seasons are getting longer. Spates ...

March 28 – Where do the people of an irradiated nation go to get away from the radiation? Are they divided up between all nations? Can they be forced to leave their home? What if other countries are afraid of them, or feel they are unable to provide for them? Do only the obviously sick leave? How can a country that has scorned gaijin (foreigners) in the past be expected to send its citizens to live amongst them now? What will it do to all of us to simply stand by and watch them die? There’s no shortage of happier topics to write about, and I will write about them in future weeks, but I think this is a subject worthy of our attention. Oh – just so you know, I DID write the article about The Joy of Cooking , but it’s a bit longer than what I usually write for this blog, so I sent it to Transition Voice ( http://www.transitionvoice.com/ ). I hope it will appear there in the next few weeks. This question of “where do the Japanese people go to escape this developing plague” has been nagging...

March 22, 2011 – An article entitled “Green growth: Time to grasp the green future,” published yesterday in The London DailyTelegraph, a British newspaper, has me wondering whether to laugh or cry. Its approach is upbeat, and its source of information – Lord Stern, author of The Stern Review – would strike most as impeccable. Skeptic that I am not (believe me, I’m very easily swindled), the article strikes even me as pretty naïve. “For some of the biggest global companies, the debate about climate change is over.” Well, *&$^#@!, that only took 30 years!! “The world’s big insurers, retailers and miners are all taking seriously the threat that severe, man-made climate change will heat the atmosphere to catastrophic levels unless radical action is taken.” Notice who’s listed first? Big insurers. Munich Re, Germany’s largest insurance company, has been lobbying that government for decades, because of the endless payments they’ve had to make due to extreme weather. Amazing what being in...

March 14, 2011 – It’s impossible not to write about Japan, though the subject is so vast, it’s difficult to know how to grab hold of it. The miserable luck of a country that happens to straddle three tectonic plates? The insatiable appetite of tidal waves? The wreckage? The quiet courage of the Japanese people? The lack of looting? One of the inevitable consequences of this tragedy will be a shortage of food. In the near term, food aid is being provided to the Japanese people by a number of donor nations. We’ve all experienced anxiety on behalf of Japan as we look at telecasts of the mountains of refuse which aid workers will encounter. How will food get to where it’s needed? Once helicopters are no longer needed for search and rescue, they can be pressed into service. The shortage of gas that currently exists will play a role, as well. The fact that very large numbers of people have congregated in shelters ought to help. It will be up to the Japanese people to persist in...