May 2010 archive

On this day in 1980, Mount St. Helens erupts in Washington, United States, killing 57 people and causing $3 billion in damage.

The 24-megaton blast demolished a 230-square-mile area around the mountain. Geologist Dave Johnson was the closest to the eruption when it blew. He was on his radio that morning and was only able to say, “Vancouver, Vancouver, this is it!” before his truck was pushed over a ridge and he was killed.

Millions of trees were scorched and burned by the hot air alone. When the glacier atop the mountain melted, a massive mudslide wiped out homes and dammed up rivers throughout the area. The plume of ash belched out for nine hours; easterly winds carried it across the state and as far away as Minneapolis, Minnesota. The falling ash clogged carburetors and thousands of motorists were stranded. Fifty-seven people died overall from suffocation, burns and other assorted injuries. Twenty-seven bodies, including that of the stubborn Harry Truman, were never found. Mount St. Helens went from 9,600 feet high to only 8,300 feet high in a matter of seconds.

Muse in the Morning

Coastline

Another rerun…

Crossposted at Daily Kos

THE WEEK IN EDITORIAL CARTOONS

This weekly diary takes a look at the past week’s important news stories from the perspective of our leading editorial cartoonists (including a few foreign ones) with analysis and commentary added in by me.

When evaluating a cartoon, ask yourself these questions:

1. Does a cartoon add to my existing knowledge base and help crystallize my thinking about the issue depicted?

2. Does the cartoonist have any obvious biases that distort reality?

3. Is the cartoonist reflecting prevailing public opinion or trying to shape it?

The answers will help determine the effectiveness of the cartoonist’s message.

:: ::

Steve Sack, Comics.com (Minneapolis Star-Tribune)

Thirty years ago, I completed a book of poetry:

                      PSALMS BEYOND THE SPEED OF LIGHT

                  VARIATIONS ON THE MYTH OF ZEUS AND SEMELE

                         POETRY FOR THE ATOMIC AGE

As usual,  I have an excess of words.  The poetry was an expression of my belief in evolution as seen through the metaphor of Zeus and Semele, and based in human acquisition of power over life and death, the atomic power which is capable of destroying life on earth.

But the attainment of this power demands a commensurate growth in consciousness (morality & awareness)to become more equal to the newly begotten physical powers.  As Einstein said, “With the splitting of the atom, everything has changed save man’s way of thinking, and thus we drift toward unparalleled catastrophe.”

Although atomic energy remains the most dramatic symbol and manifestation of man’s new found powers, we have learned that many of our scientific and physical advances can have a equally devastating effects on life on earth.

Like all life forms, humans are engaged in the process of evolution.  And today, the primary thrust of evolution is the evolution of consciousness.

The evolution of consciousness, of necessity, requires an increasing awareness of one’s position in life.  The most profound awareness is the recognition of one’s own mortality, of death.  A cat or a dog does not wake up in the morning thinking, “Gee, I’m going to die some day!”  But we do; this is required by our evolutionary growth.  

And therein lies both the rub and the salvation, or, more accurately, the key to evolution.

I hope you’ll follow me below the fold~~~

   While there is plenty of talk about the economic recovery, there is barely a whisper about what is just a few weeks ahead. It’s not any one thing. It’s a combination of three (and possibly four) different events that will deliver devastating body-blows to the economy.

  They are all being talked about, but no one that I’ve seen has put them all together.

That’s where I come in, the doom-and-gloomer, with the news that no one wants to think about, but you are better off knowing now rather than later.

Thanks to 60  Minutes for opening the public’s eyes to the Safety violations committed by BP.

BP racked up millions in fines before disaster

LEE COUNTY: A new report shows BP has the worst track record among US refineries for workplace safety violations. Why did the US government allow it to continue operating before the oil spill?

Before the oil refinery exploded, 11 workers were killed and millions of gallons of oil contaminated the Gulf of Mexico, the US government knew of BP’s history of unsafe working conditions.

According to an analysis by the Center for Public Integrity, “Two refineries owned by oil giant BP account for 97 percent of all flagrant violations found in the refining industry by government safety inspectors over the past three years.”

http://www.nbc-2.com/Global/st…

But the Deep Horizon, is not the only drilling rig, BP is operating in the Gulf Of Mexico.

BP current has at least 5 other rigs in operation, including the Discoverer Enterprise currently siphoning the spill left by the Deep Water Horizon.

Holstein, Mad Dog, Development Driller III, Discoverer Enterprise, and GSF Development Driller II

http://www.rigzone.com/data/re…

“Well, if there’s any doubt about the leadership that our military is showing, you just need to look at this F-18 fighter and the light-armored vehicle behind me.  The Army and Marine Corps have been testing this vehicle on a mixture of biofuels.  And this Navy fighter jet — appropriately called the Green Hornet — will be flown for the first time in just a few days, on Earth Day.”

Can anyone imagine a stupider way to celebrate Earth Day than rolling out yet another version of one of the most lethal fighter-bombers ever invented?

Over the past few weeks since the BP Deepwater Horizon catastrophe has put the oceans and the environment at the center of our consciousness again, we’ve been hearing a lot about what the oil leak is doing to the Gulf of Mexico.

Juan Cole put it rather eloquently earlier this month in I want My Country back from Big Oil:

We need to end the hidden government subsidies for fossil fuels and make sure their true cost, including climate change, is built into them.

Moreover, we should be generating electricity from alternative sources or natural gas (of which we have a lot) and then moving to electric and hybrid automobiles. (Natural gas burns cleaner than petroleum or coal and is probably a necessary bridge fuel to the alternatives). Going to electric vehicles powered by natural gas, wind and solar plants would be cheaper than rebuilding all the gas stations in the country. Coal should be banned altogether and its use made a hanging crime.

And, we should be matching every penny of the cost of the Gulf clean-up with a huge government Manhattan project on solar energy.

The environmental and economic costs of the oil spill are enormous, but they are tiny compared to the costs of actually burning the oil and spilling more masses of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. If you’re not alarmed about your future, it is because you have bought the cover-up of climate change, just as Obama bought a cover-up when he believed what he was told about the unlikelihood of oil spills from ocean platforms.

But something else which should probably be concerning us all is the condition our oceans are in, and have been in for many years, even prior to the oil gusher. We live in a much smaller and more fragile world than we tend to think we do, and our decades long mistreatment of our environment, our rivers, lakes and oceans, the dwindling fish and large ocean mammal populations are all very serious concerns.

Jeremy Jackson is the Ritter Professor of Oceanography and Director of the Center for Marine Biodiversity and Conservation at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography. Painting pictures of changing marine environments, particularly coral reefs and the Isthmus of Panama, Jackson’s research captures the extreme environmental decline of the oceans that has accelerated in the past 200 years.

Jackson’s current work focuses on the future of the world’s oceans, given overfishing, habitat destruction and ocean warming, which have fundamentally changed marine ecosystems and led to “the rise of slime.” Although Jackson’s work describes grim circumstances, even garnering him the nickname Dr. Doom, he believes that successful management and conservation strategies can renew the ocean’s health.

In this 18 minute talk from TED.com, Professor Jackson lays out the shocking state of our ocean today: overfished, overheated, polluted, with indicators that things will get much worse.

Jeremy Jackson: How We Wrecked The Oceans

TED.com May 2010

Full transcript below

Afternoon Edition is an Open Thread

1 BP says tube is containing one fifth of oil spill

by Clement Sabourin, AFP

2 hrs 44 mins ago