The elephant(s) in the room ...

If we humans do not address world population in an organized, humane and inclusive manner then wars (religious, political, ethnic), disease and an increasingly hostile environment will reduce the earth's populations in spite of us.

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After watching the greedy bankers, insurance-ers and other corporatist hacks of the US take from the taxpayer, with the help of Congress and both the Bush and Obama administrations, to refresh their own coffers I'm not sure any better outcome is possible for a species bent on such long term self destruction while fillings the pockets of a few with all the goodies as their fellow humans suffer, sicken and die.

For the southwest, it will continue to get worse.

---Update below---

Our region has already begun to heat up, Overpeck said.

"The warming has already been about 2 degrees Fahrenheit . . . That's kinda scary," he told the audience in an opening statement. "It's affecting the Southwest of the United States more than any other area outside of Alaska."
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We will have more fire and insect outbreaks, erosion from wind and water and competition among plants from non-native species, especially grasses, Breshears said.

One key problem is fire combined with non-native grasses, such as buffelgrass. When buffelgrass burns, it kills native plants, leaving more room for more grass. With each burn, more of the desert dies and more grass spreads.

"We're setting up a feedback that is very difficult to get out of," Breshears said.

Climate change even threatens to eradicate our "megaflora" of the Southwest, such as Joshua trees and saguaro cactuses. Buffelgrass kills young saguaros by blocking sun and sucking up the water the budding behemoths need.

"That's a pretty grim forecast for Tucson," Breshears said.

Despite thousands of scientists studying climate change, major questions about the Southwest remain unanswered, Overpeck said.

"One of the things we can't say is whether the monsoon will get stronger or weaker - the models are all over the place," he said.

Quotes from the Tucson Citizen -- UA prof: Global warming hitting Southwest via Arizona Geology -- Southwest to get more droughts, floods, & fires.
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By the way, the Border Reporter writes that The Tucson Citizen, Arizona’s oldest newspaper
will close unless they find a buyer. March 21 is the date given.
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Update
Not that Bush didn't speed it along with his special form of environmental abuse, Orwellian named Healthy Forests, but western forests are dying on their own as part of Global Warming's steady march across our planet.

Complexities ...

... keep scientists on their toes (metaphorically speaking).

The alkaline soil of Gubantonggut [China's Gubantonggut Desert] is socking away large quantities of CO₂ in an inorganic form.

and

Halfway around the world, researchers have found that Nevada's Mojave Desert, square meter for square meter, absorbs about the same amount of CO₂ as some temperate forests. The two sets of findings suggest that deserts are unsung players in the global carbon cycle.

Tipping Point? ...

Once summer had passed and temperatures had dropped low enough for ice to begin to regrow, 10% more ice than usual had vanished ...

So. Will there be one giant environmental tipping point (point of no return for mother earth) which is to come (or has already past) or are there many smaller chances to reverse or stave off destruction?

The Environmental Tipping Point - The restoration of the fish in the sanctuary ultimately spilled over to the rest of the island, restoring the fishing base and attracting diver tourism which in turn brings in fees to establish garbage management and other programs.

You tell me because I don't know and I'm not sure anyone does. But what we do know is that giant forces (the entire GOP apparatus, China's government, powerful corporations, etc.) are working against our survival. It's their survival also, but of course, being so powerful they assume they will survive and still be in power and plenty and what happens to the rest of the world's population is of no consequence (to them, at least).

Lording it over a dying planet seems to appeal to more than a few ...

Yesterday's QUOTES ...

... quite a few yesterdays as I have been camping in the White Mountains.

... scientists now predict that, at least among insects, global warming will take its biggest toll in the tropics--home to more than half the world's species.

... 20 percent of returning U.S. soldiers have post- traumatic stress disorder or depression

... As I often note these days, we are drowning in lies. Yet it is still no small wonder that this entire conversation about Wright, King, et al. proceeds in the almost complete absence of a discussion of what Wright has actually said, just as no one seems to remember what King actually said.

... [the chieftains of the Terror War] do not and have never cared a single instant about the freedom and well-being of the Iraqi or the Iranian people. (Or the American people, for that matter.) They are engaged on a long-range project of perpetual war toward an eventual goal of iron-clad military domination of a strategic portion of the world's energy supplies and distribution, and the establishment of America's "unipolar domination" over geopolitical affairs.

crAZy Person: Jon Kyl


In fact, the only way McCain's bankrupt domestic policies will not cause one misstep after another is if he confines himself to whistle-stop tours of gated communities and medieval castles.

Global warming? What global warming ...

... New research shows that oxygen is vanishing from ever-larger swaths of the oceans. If the trend continues, it could disrupt marine ecosystems.

And why wouldn't the trend continue? We are no longer what we were when we put a man on the moon, are we? It's not like we value education, science and logic, is it? After all look at what we put in the White House.

The human race may have a long time to consider their folly as the earth dies under their feet. I doubt that anyone really knows when the point of no return will be reached. There are just too many variables. But some think we've already passed it.

Finally, science is using its collective brain cells to come up with ideas ...

Spraying millions of metric tons of sulfate particles into the atmosphere could reverse some human-caused global warming, a new study shows. But the simulations also reveal that the technique, which mimics the short-term cooling effects of volcanic eruptions, could chill the planet if overdone.

Hopefully, the world 'leaders' can start to work together and help plan for the future of this world. But I won't hold my breath ... not when there are such as Bush (not that he's the only idiot) around.

Yesterday's QUOTES ...

Researchers are reporting that the ocean's biological deserts have been expanding, and they are growing much faster than global warming models predict.
... But [the top two quintiles] get 58% of the money. The bottom two quintiles, which are the place you’d most expect to have an impact, get only 21% of the money. ...

And I suppose that it may be true that this was the best Nancy Pelosi could get. But I just can’t bring myself to celebrate.
... I think the best line of the day had to be John Edwards saying that Clinton and Obama had brought their "New York and Chicago style of politics" to South Carolina."...
For a person running as a "clean" politician, on a campaign of Hope, Change and OptimismTM, [Obama's] brand of politics is fundamentally ugly (something that has been evident for many months). Given that dynamic, he feels quite comfortable routinely distorting the positions or words of Sen. Clinton with impunity in order to mislead voters, because he knows that the traditional media will more often than not parrot his talking points and trash the Clintons rather than call him on his egregious behavior.

Yesterday's QUOTES ...

So please understand, in all ways, that the greatest tragedy of global warming, this very serious and urgent climate crisis, is inaction. Is a belief in human powerlessness in the face of a problem we ourselves had the power to create. Is the blinkered moronicity that allows leaders to make decisions exactly as if money were edible. Is the trap within which the public is caught that makes it difficult to have the time and resources to do more than buy what they're offered and try to chill out a little bit every evening by the flickering glow of reality television.

And in that frustration, there's the seed of hope. We did this to ourselves. We can't change the inexorable laws of physics that are destabilizing our weather. Yet we can change each other's minds and willingness to act, we can help each other find the way out.
Apparently Zakaria and his editors at Newsweek have some difficulty with basic constructs of logic. ... that's putting it mildly.
Jackals all ...
In other words, a Clinton administration official and the entire top level of the Bush administration blew the cover of a CIA operation.

Grossman is alleged to have blown it for his corporate clients, while the Bush administration did it for a lot less: retribution, retaliation, politics. But since Grossman stayed on after the Clinton administration, he was clearly given the "loyal Bushie" test and seemingly passed.
Why is the media so alarmed that the Democratic Party is bringing out so many voters who aren't white males?

If I were younger I think I would move to a state ...

... that is not growing by leaps and bounds.

The following is a missive from the Arizona Democratic Party:

Managing explosive growth will be one of the most important chapters in the "Story of Arizona," Governor Janet Napolitano told us in her State of the State Address on Monday.

In anticipation of the doubling of our state's population in the next few decades, we have made enormous strides in the past five years, the Governor said.

"We've added 652 new lane miles of freeway, and secured hundreds of millions more dollars for transportation projects. We've implemented a forest health strategy, created our first-ever statewide drought and water conservation plan, and worked to prevent wildfires. We passed the most significant air-quality legislation in a decade. And just last month, we signed an historic agreement among the Basin States to manage Colorado River water."

Growth will continue to challenge us all, and the Governor proposed strategic initiatives to protect our resources while building the critical infrastructure to eliminate the "time tax." She said we should:

Invest in rail transit, including a Tucson-to-Phoenix line;

Build on our water conservation efforts;

Send voters a statewide transportation plan to approve in 2008 or 2009;

Send voters a plan for state trust land reform to approve in 2008;

Enact an energy and climate change bill that would move Arizona's conservation efforts forward in the following ways:

• Require utilities to get 15 percent of their power from renewable sources;
• Require that 10 percent of fuel sold in Arizona is low in carbon emissions;
• Implement statewide energy conservation standards for new construction, replacing the patchwork of local rules that exists now;
• Implement new energy efficiency standards for appliances and new standards to reduce emissions of diesel exhaust.

Growth creates opportunities, and as we grow together, we must work to grow smart at every level of government. Please voice your support for the Governor's growth proposals by writing a letter to the editor, or by writing to your state legislators to ask them for their support, too.

For more information about Governor Napolitano's State of the State Address, or a copy of the speech, please visit www.azgovernor.gov

Please note that I have no quarrel with Janet Napolitano. I doubt, even if she was so inclined, that she could change the 'growth' mentality in the state of Arizona and she is probably a better manager than any Republican we have in the state. Still I am very sad about where Arizona is taking itself. It's a beautiful state but will not be so in a few decades if the signs are correct.

We, they or whomever is going to do to Arizona what was done to California. I don't know this because I thought ahead and tried to stop it. I know this because I've lived and participated in it. Even benefited from it. Nothing (not hippies, not Edward Abbey, not global warming) will stop humans from fowling their own nest in the name of growth, economy, wealth and opportunity. Nothing until the last shoe drops, that is.

Have a good day!

The emissions thing?

The emissions thing? The health thing? The global warming thing? Texans like leading the country in everything, even pollution.

They really do make them tough in Texas.

"I would definitely put size and safety over the emissions thing," said Howden, 55

Yesterday's QUOTES ...

But there’s got to be a better way to keep the country on its toes than scaring the tar out of us. It’s a high the American psyche can’t and won’t maintain and I wish the Feds would grasp a better understanding of this.

For about three years following the Sept. 11 attacks, the watchword was Mexico. For a little while, 2003 to 2005, it became Canada but that proved to be boring.

Then things picked up again in 2004 when a South African woman, Farida Ahmed, with pages missing from her passport, was popped crossing the Rio Grande.

That story was reluctantly let go by most congressmen and newspapers after she was held on immigration violations and deported home. Now the word coming down from Washington is that the terrorists walk among us.

Frankly, Secretary Chertoff, I wish you and the terrorists would make up your damned minds.

... Harry Reid ... took our money and support last year to become majority leader apparently so he could advance the Bush agenda as well or better than Mitch McConnell could. Harry Reid --not a poor puppy but-- a wolf in Democratic clothing?

... an international research team has discovered that during the warm period following the next-to-last ice age, when global temperatures reached at least 2°C above the current average, the seas rose by as much as 6 meters over just a few hundred years.

A good idea ...

Solar Power 101: A Community Education Series on Solar Energy begins with the first session from 6 to 8 p.m., Wednesday at the Woods Memorial Branch Library, 3455 N. First Ave.

Hope this is more than just an attempt to sell some products!

Can the Cylons of a Battlestar Galactica like future be far off?

Technology Review reports on an article in Science about running robots on real muscle power, just like the rest of us:

Researchers at Harvard University have made several small mechanical devices powered by heart muscle harvested from rats. The mechanical devices include pumps, a device that "walks," and one that swims. [...] In one example, Feinberg made a rectangular strip of plastic that curls up on itself, with the diameter of the resulting tube decreasing, then increasing again, as the muscle repeatedly contracts and relaxes. The researchers say that the device could serve as a pump. Another strip of plastic opens and closes like a pair of pinchers at a rate determined by electrical signals sent to the device. A curled triangular piece of plastic walks across the bottom of a petri dish as muscle tissue repeatedly contracts, and another triangular sheet, with a different arrangement of heart-muscle cells, mimics the movement of a fish's tail to swim through a solution.

For now "the beating muscles only survive for a few weeks."

Looking forward:

... future designs could mimic natural heart tissue in more detail to extend longevity. For example, the researchers may also try constructing a three-dimensional tissue, rather than the flat arrangement they have now. Previous experiments have suggested that three-dimensional structures may be key to the survival of the cells.

NOTE: I'm not really suggesting that the human race will have a future like that portrayed in Battlestar Galactica. I have my doubts that we are rational enough to survive our own intransigence and will annihilate ourselves long before we can travel among the stars. Sad thoughts, indeed ...

More Bush-evidence that there is no such thing as Global Warming ...

Chile's lost lake stuns scientists

What's a little dust? Arizona has plenty ...

Seems Colorado has stolen some of Arizona's dust.

And they're claiming that dust helped cause an early snow melt in Colorado?

The dust is less reflective than snow and so reduces the overall reflectivity of the area, allowing for more of the sun’s energy to warm, and subsequently melt, the snow pack. A similar effect of dark soot falling on Arctic snow is thought to speed melting there.

Now you know that our government keeps insisting that global warming doesn't exist and we all know Georgie-boy Bush is working hard to 'pertect' us all and keep us in safety (even if he has to not-torture us to do so).

So really, if Colorado was going to take our dust the least they could have done is give us some of their snow instead of letting it melt that way ...

There's the US which canNOT get its act together on handling yearly hurricanes and floods ...

And then there is the town of Gouda which "is considering whether to erect 4,000 houses--some of which might float" in an area that can be up to 6.74 meters (about 22 feet) below sea level (and falling).

Tell me again why we think we are so great but on the other hand find nothing of value other than the illusion of military might?

Article: Part I: Saving Holland --With much of its land below sea level, the Netherlands is charting a course around ominous climate-change trends by David Talbot

Another nail in the coffin of this old and dear earth of ours?

Environmental bad news in Arizona:

The American Southwest has been warming for nearly 30 years, according to records that date to the late 19th century. And the region is in the midst of an eight-year drought. Both developments could be within the range of natural events.

But what has convinced many scientists that the current spate of higher temperatures is not just another swing in the weather has been the near collapse of the sky islands and other high, formerly green havens that poke above the desert.

Fire has always been a part of Western ecology, particularly when the land is parched. But since the late 1980s, the size and reach of the fires have far exceeded times of earlier droughts. And the culprit, according to several recent studies, is higher temperatures tearing at a fabric of life that dates to the last ice age.

A lot of people think climate change and the ecological repercussions are 50 years away," said Thomas W. Swetnam, director of the Laboratory of Tree-Ring Research at the University of Arizona in Tucson. "But it's happening now in the West. The data is telling us that we are in the middle of one of the first big indicators of climate change impacts in the continental United States."

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TruthOut.org: Heat Invades Cool Heights Over Arizona Desert by Timothy Egan, The New York Times