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Drought in the USA

18:58 / 13.06.07

From the mountains and desert of the West, now into an eighth consecutive dry year, to the wheat farms of Alabama, where crops are failing because of rainfall levels 12 inches lower than usual, to the vast soupy expanse of Lake Okeechobee in southern Florida, which has become so dry it actually caught fire a couple of weeks ago, a continent is crying out for water.

It's so dry a lake caught fire?! Do you think after this and New Orleans there might be enough growing pressure on Bushgov to actually act on climate change? Will there be another dustbowl disaster like the depression?

Or will it be ignored except by bankrupted farmers?

20:28 / 13.06.07

Man, I was freaked out by the Lake Okeechobee fire. It's ultimately where my drinking water comes from, and it was ON FIRE.

The reservoir of reservoirs was on fire.

I've read a few comparisons between what's going on now and the drought leading up to the Dust Bowl -- it may be a cyclical thing, but I doubt the rising global climate is helping us any.

Closed for Business Time

21:31 / 13.06.07

Also:

One in five people in Lesotho will face food shortages in the coming year as a result of the most serious drought in the country in 30 years, international agencies have warned.

The UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) and the World Food Programme (WFP) issued a report in Rome on Wednesday appealing for international help for Lesotho. They said 140,000 Basotho will need food from the third quarter of this year, and the number will rise to 400,000 by the first quarter of 2008.

A joint FAO-WFP mission visited the country at the invitation of the Lesotho government last month, at the end of Lesotho's summer rainfall season.

"A combination of high temperatures and low rainfall created one of the worst drought situations ever experienced in the country," the mission reported.

And many other places at the moment.

Desertification is a major problem in may countries as well. In most cases created by the actions of human societies...gah..reading the wiki article on desertification makes my eyes bleed like Murderface's.

17:16 / 14.06.07

Here's a pretty fantastic (in my opinion anyway) interview with Governer Schwarzenegger about tackling climate change, and why the federal government is probably not going to get to work on the problem anytime soon.

*

18:07 / 14.06.07

I can't see it because I don't have the technology... fantastic in the sense of "living in a fantasy world" or in the sense of "absurdly good"?

20:16 / 15.06.07

Enlightening. Basically, he says the feds aren't going to get off their asses until the states (and in our case, provinces) put their own programs into place and have some significant success. Thus he's signed emissions pacts with Ontario and British Columbia, and is promoting research into clean engines, clean power.
When he got in, I was concerned he would be self-serving and self-indulgent, but this interview makes him look realistic and forward-thinking.
Absurdly good interview.