Author Archives: Commentary about the Blue Marble

What Is The Constitution?

16 Wednesday Nov 2016

Posted by in Government, US Constitution

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I hear people say they are strict constitutionalists. What does that mean? Do they know? Does that include the twenty-seven amendments? Who decides what it should intend?

Thomas Jefferson thought it should be torn up every ten years as the people’s thoughts of government evolved. Most people say that they were taught in civics class the constitution is a living document that changes as times change. Is that change by amendments or by the Supreme Court?

Those strict constitutionalists pick and choose the parts they like and disregard the parts they don’t like. Is the preamble a part of the legal constitution as most people believe or not as others think? Some want to keep the first ten and scrap most of the others. Is it just a coincidence that latter are usually white Republican men?

Should the Supreme Court change its opinions as the general population changes its attitudes? When the court ruled that abortion was legal, the majority of Americans disagreed. Today the majority agrees with the ruling. The majority believes in gay rights and the court agrees.

Roe vs. Wade won’t be overturned but the population wants restrictions on the second amendment and Citizen’s United. The Supreme Court is supposed to be apolitical but it isn’t.

President Obama nominated Merrick Garland, a judge both parties like. However the Republicans won’t talk with him because they decided they want a far right judge. Now President Elect Trump says he will nominate far right people to be judges.

We can’t let the far right or far left keep yanking us back and forth. The court should be moderates who keep the constitution a living document.

Who Really Won The Election?

16 Wednesday Nov 2016

Posted by in Government, Uncategorized

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Let’s hope every single one of those people who voted for Donald Trump are as happy in a few years as they are now. I saw an interview with him many months before he became a raving lunatic.

What he said was almost opposite of what he raved for the last few months. He sounded like a New York City moderate Republican. In fact, he sounded a lot like former Mayor Bloomberg – his good friend. Before he started his rants, I thought he might have been another Kasich.

So who will be in the oval office, the one who will restrict gun sales, promote international relations and trade, raise taxes to pay for infrastructure and pay down debt, or continue with what he raved later?

The Eve Of Distruction?

20 Wednesday Jan 2016

Posted by in Climate Change, Disaster, Global Warming

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I am a 69 year old highly educated science and news junkie. I studied geology, weather and climate, glaciers, natural resources, and populations. My studies were 45 years ago and the projections for population growth, immigration, and the potential for climate change related damage were prophetic. Climate change wasn’t yet an issue but we studied the greenhouse effect that made our planet livable. We projected what happened in past when the atmosphere had less CO2.

Our studies said we should be concerned about deforestation because that is how CO2 is pulled out of the air. Now we know the major factor is the oceans. Today’s conditions are that about half the trees then are gone and the ocean’s acidity levels are the highest in tens of thousands of years.

When people say climate change happened before and this time is no different is dead wrong. This disaster has started in the last few decades. Forty-five years ago we called global warming runaway greenhouse effect. We knew then if it started the result might be human extinction. However we never put together how it would happen.

At the time, Earth had about three billion people, lots of fish in the oceans, fifty percent more trees, and deserts and jungles where they had been for centuries. It was cold in winter and hot in summer. Occasional floods and droughts seldom lasted for more than a season. Today, we are eating fancy name fish we used to use as fertilizer or bait because the former food fish are too scarce. Fertile areas are becoming deserts. Each year world temperatures are hotter than the previous year. Long term droughts in many areas are common. Occasional droughts are now multi-season followed by short wet ones before the next drought.

The then three billion population is now 7.3 billion rising to 9 billion before 2040 and 12 billion by 2100. That’s over 85 million more each year. We are already building on prime farmland reducing land for food production. The U.S. Western drought has caused the farmers in the Imperial Valley to drill wells deeper and deeper. Some are already at the aquifer’s bottom. The Ogallala Aquifer, under the Plains states, is rapidly being emptied. It takes thousands of years to refill them. Aquifers around the world are being drained.

The Blue Marble is being stressed and that stress will become worse. The planet will continue to heat up. The oceans will continue to rise flooding the cities of billions, millions of acres of farmland, and many fresh water lakes. Types of food will have to change. Meat is not an efficient use of land and water. Everything will need to be grain based or chemical. Wars will be fought for what is left.

Just as millions are already fleeing wars in the Mid-East and Libya or famine and economic conditions, billions will need to move to survive. This pressure will mean wars to get or to protect what countries want or have. Social fabric around the world will unravel. Many of the most reliable programs say we have already reached the point of no return. This may truly be the eve of destruction.
coj 1-20-2016

It’s So Simple To Understand

27 Sunday Dec 2015

Posted by in Climate Change, Global Warming, Uncategorized

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For those who don’t understand what an El Nino is, it’s when Pacific Rim countries are subjected to radical changes in weather. The criteria’s basis is for the surface water in equatorial central Pacific water to be 0.9 degrees Fahrenheit hotter than normal during the winter three months. This winter is projected to be higher.

The normal cycle is for the surface water to cool off after a couple of years because of the upwelling of cooler deep water. The problem with this El Nino is the deeper water isn’t cool; it’s warmer than ever recorded, too. The normal cycle would mean cooler surface water creating a La Nina and moderating the weather for a couple of years. Many computer programs that have been predicting this El Nino are predicting a smaller less moderating La Nina. If they are correct, we may be reaching the feared tipping point sooner than expected.

The reason is the concept I studied in 1969. Carbon dioxide in the upper atmosphere allows the short sun’s rays to reach the surface where they warm the surface. That heat produces long rays that are reradiated back into space. However, CO2 blocks long rays so the radiated heat is kept inside. The more CO2 the less heat escapes. It’s called the Greenhouse Effect. On a cool sunny day we wear jackets to glass covered greenhouses and then have to take them off because of the sun produced heat. CO2 acts like the glass.

It’s simple; the more CO2 we produce the worse it will get. Methane from the thawing tundra is many times worse than CO2 and that’s the feared tipping point of no return.

Bad Influence

17 Thursday Sep 2015

Posted by in Bad Influence

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I have often protested the Internet’s and social media’s impact on people’s ability to have rational thought. Preposterous ideas are put out and taken as truthful. A great example is vaccinations. A discredited wacko PHD got his research of about a dozen kids printed without peer review. It was picked up by a nutty activist and spread through the internet infecting the health of thousands of kids. This crazy idea was bought by left and right wing nuts in some states and congress. Size and time has made the crap factual.

Genetic modified organisms (GMO) has taken on the same power. We are GMO. If you are religious your God modified us. If not then you go farther back in the GMO tree. Almost everything we eat today has been modified by man. Corn is grass modified by Meso-Americans. Same as potatoes and yams. Cow, hogs and poultry are GMO.

I am two foot taller than I might have been a half million years ago. Selective breeding and better nutrients has made us, our meat, and our fruits and vegetables the way we are. The old tried and true way which has not always been good for us — tobacco for one.

Without any facts or research wacky people put things on social media and weak minded people who don’t take the time to fact check believe them. Check the social media for nutty ideas at http://www.snopes.com/ to see if I’m right.

TRUMP RIGHT AGAIN

30 Sunday Aug 2015

Posted by in Immigration, Politics, Population, Uncategorized

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Donald Trump speaks the gut feelings of most people because he is not politically correct. He talks of what is wrong but seldom gives the root causes of problems the visibility needed.

He talks about illegal immigration like a wall is going to stop it. It might reduce the number somewhat but not end it.

The problem is one of numbers. The world’s population is growing at about 85 million each year. The 7.3 billion now will be over 9 billion by 2040 and over 12 billion by the end of the century. Twelve billion is optimistic and heavily dependent on birth control being widely available in Africa, Central American, Near East Asia, and Mid-East. This means religious leaders are going to have to stop trying to outgrow each other. The world does not have resources to provide for them. The odd point is the more people make, the more resources they use.

If Trump wants to really stop illegal immigration he needs to push birth control and better, safer conditions in their countries. Look at Europe’s problems with millions flooding into Europe this year. This is a problem now and will be huge in the coming decades. I think it is a cancerous situation for Europe.

Democrats are pro-birth control and Republicans are against it. Trump, who was a Democrat and is now a Republican, is for it. Even showboats can have a valid point.

Incidentally, the other 16 hopefuls don’t know how to comment on Trump’s Anchor Baby statement. Is it because one of them claims to be an Anchor Baby? Cruz’s parents supposedly drove across the Canadian border so their son could be a Canadian and an American citizen. Is his pedigree questionable? That’s a birth certificate Trump should question.

Lemmings

01 Saturday Aug 2015

Posted by in Population, Uncategorized

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Once I was naive and believed that people were truthful, that our elected leaders were honest and did what was best for us, and the only good ideas came from the U.S. of A. Now I know few of us consistently tell the truth and most habitually lie. It seems that most of our elected officials lie to us so they can stay in office and enrich themselves. When we were in grade school, we were told of great inventions and ideas from America. Now we are told that being the first to get an American patent doesn’t mean they invented it. Bell, Edison, Ford and many others stole the ideas.

We have been manipulated all our lives by those who want to get us to do something or buy something we don’t need. We were told that Iraq was involved in 9-11 and had nuclear and biologic weapons. This was in spite of contrary evidence. To disagree was unpatriotic and just un-American. We now know the black-hearted truth as to why and how we were conned.

WE were told bigger TV screens were more desirable so six foot screens were sold. Digital TVs are better than analog so buy new ones. Now the movies you were looking at on wall-sized screens, you now watch on six-inch screens. Maybe our national candy should be the sucker.

The current big con doesn’t just affect you and me; it affects the future of our planet and all life on earth. Certain groups are telling us what we can see, what we know, and what science has told us for fifty-seven years is wrong.

Scientists know Venus, Earth, and Mars were alike for over a billion years and probably supported at least single celled organisms. Venus’ volcanoes pumped too much sulfur dioxide into the atmosphere, disrupted the carbon cycle, and created its greenhouse effect. Mars lost most of its atmosphere and its surface water.

Goldilocks’ Earth has gone through many different disasters that wiped out all or almost all life (six are documented). Each time tens and hundreds of millions of years allowed life to start over along a different path. No major events have occurred since our earliest ancestor left the trees. Those extinction events took from a day to several millennia.

The current big con is that climate change isn’t occurring, and if it is, we aren’t the cause. First, you see the effects on the news (even FOX has to acknowledge it.) or with your own eyes by traveling around our country. Second, even scientific papers paid by fossil companies have now confirmed the planet is warming because of the added CO2 produced by burning fossil fuels. (Note the current Natural Gas Association ads on TV telling us it puts less CO2 into the air.)

Glacial ice records tell us that a little less than 3% CO2 brings ice ages and a little over brings excessive heat and drought. We are now well over 3% and getting higher every day.

On The Fence

01 Saturday Aug 2015

Posted by in Immigration

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There is no other word for it. I am on the border fence because I can see many view points of the problem,

One side of the equation is tens of thousands of children are making their way to this country from the poor crime-ridden Central American countries. A few people in those countries are very rich, some people are well off, and the rest range from poor to indescribably poor. Criminal gangs recruit or kill them. Mothers pay thousands to coyotes to take their kid across our southern border to save their lives and give them a chance for a better life. Wanting their child to have a better life is normal isn’t it?

The other side is the kids are just as illegal as the adults that come across for work and a better life. Most of the arguments on this side have to do with stealing jobs, cutting wages, burdening society, and of course, outnumbering white Americans. Compassion is limited to sending them back as soon as possible and building a Berlin-type wall guarded by gun-toting military. I wonder if they would be concerned if the people were flooding across our northern border.

I agree with most of the arguments which both sides use in the debate. The one argument that isn’t being argued is the life boat scenario. The earth has limited resources which we are rapidly using up and in spite of science, will not be able to feed twelve billion people by 2100. The United States is our lifeboat on the bigger lifeboat floating in space. We already have twice as many people as when I studied the projections in college forty-six years ago. (We are still on that track.)

The fact is the conservatives are just using the issue for political gain and contributions. They want the illegal’s sent back but don’t want to fund it. They want a wall built with guards but only if we cut social spending. NOTE: The same people want to cut the taxes for the 1%, especially the top one-tenth of one percent.

So after seeing both sides if you aren’t standing on the fence with me, then your heart is either butter or granite.

5-31-2015

Climate Change and Petroleum

01 Saturday Aug 2015

Posted by in Climate Change, Global Warming

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I bet few people have connected the dots on climate change and petroleum. Climate change is real and will devastate most of the world’s civilizations and cultures. Except for a few vocal Americans financed by fossil fuel associations, the rest of humanity knows we are causing or exacerbating the change.

The other dot is humanity has used almost a trillion barrels of oil. That is a thousand billion. Add up all the proven oil reserves, all the potential reserves, and all the maybe there numbers and an optimistic assessment is less than 850 Billion barrels of recoverable oil. Projecting when we will use the last drop is a crystal ball date. Reducing consumption by laws, cost and moral reasons make any projection worthless. But sometime in the early part of the next century is the most common date.

The line connecting the dots is that we can stretch out the world’s reserves by combating climate change. Cutting back on burning gasoline, diesel, and similar by-products reduces CO2.

The basis for today’s civilization is petroleum. We burn it to get somewhere. The car, boat and plane are made of it. Our homes and offices are filled with it. We wear it. Until a better substance comes along humanity needs every drop of petroleum for as long as we can stretch it. If humanity is still here in a century, I bet they will wonder why we wasted so much of it.

7/31/2015

What is a Hero?

01 Saturday Aug 2015

Posted by in Philosophy

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It’s a miniscule number of things that Donald Trump and I can agree on so he won’t get my vote for anything. I signed John McCain’s petition in 1999 to run for the Republican nomination. He has changed and I haven’t been his fan since.

After stating my bias against both people, I must say I agree with Trump on McCain and what defines a hero. Sports figures aren’t heroes. Few politicians are heroes. Few in the military, law enforcement, firemen, and other professions are heroes.

The definition of hero I grew up with is simple. You put your life on the line to save someone else’s life. Those professions I listed above are paid to do their job. They may be scary jobs at times but they are paid to do that job. A hero takes that huge extra step to save someone when chances of surviving are low.

A hero jumps on the grenade to save others, not the one who picks it up and throws it away — that is self-preservation. Tim McCarthy’s jumping in front of Reagan and taking a bullet — that’s heroism. The ministers who gave their life vest to five sailors on a sinking destroyer were a heroic action. A mother lying cross her child to protect it from bullets or fire — that’s expected but heroic.

You may not agree with this definition but most people are tired of the overuse of this very special term.

7/31/2015