CNBC News: Heat wave overloading power grid. Drought killing US crops. Global warming destroying ocean's fish.

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On CNBC News tonight: Heat wave overloading power grid. Drought killing US crops. Global warming destroying ocean's fish.

"Global warming is a crock" - Paul Davis

"Deforestation is not a problem any more" - Paul Davis

"Global pollution has been reduced" - Paul Davis

"Y2K will be a bump in the road" - Paul Davis

-- a (a@a.a), June 08, 1999

Answers

Paul Davis is a crock!

Paul Davis is a problem!

Paul Davis is polluted!

Paul Davis will be a bump in the road! BEEP BEEP ZOOOOOOoommm bump bump

-- Road Warrior (Home@ward.bound), June 08, 1999.


You like bad news don't you "a", no matter who spins it?

-- b (b@b.b), June 08, 1999.

No b, this is just "news". The "bad news" will come shortly, after we have all failed to heed the warnings because our "big brains" were too busy "making money", as cpr says.

-- a (a@a.a), June 08, 1999.

"perspective is lost in the spirit of the chase"

-- (workathome@atl.ga), June 08, 1999.

And you have perspective still hanging out in Atlanta, Ga? That place is so far behind you'ld better think about who's gonna do the chasin'

-- Feller (feller@wanna.help), June 09, 1999.


Sheeese, if they think it's hot NOW.....

-- Will continue (farming@home.com), June 09, 1999.

I know what I am about to tell you will not be politically incorrect, but the blanket statements you are, in my experience, untrue.

Our U.S. forests on the west coast are far more dense than they ever were prior to European influence. This is largely due to fire suppression, modern silvaculture (plantation reforestation) and bans on harvest. Our local area was a natural "mosaic" pattern caused by lightning strikes that created patches of meadow and light burned undergrowth. Now, the Forest Service is actually setting burns in an attempt to remove the undergrowth and emulate natural patterns.

One of the biggest problems in the last decade for our western anadromous fisheries (salmon, steelhead) has been the cyclical occurence of the "southern oscillation." This interferes with the ocean's "upwelling" of food for the salmonids. Another large problem is the presence of hatcheries in native salmon producing watersheds. These have spread desease, have altered the genetics of more robust natural spawners through "drift" diminishing natural immunities (coadaptive gene complex) and have created "rearing density" mortality by competing with natural spawners.

-- marsh (siskfarm@snowcrest.net), June 09, 1999.


If it's any consolation Feller I moved here from NYC two and a half years ago. At least I've been showing improvment...

-- (workathome@atl.ga), June 09, 1999.

Here's an opposing view, marsh:

Rainforests Being Annihilated For Wood And Hamburgers http://www.yesworld.org/info/rainforest.htm 6-8-99 When we eat rainforest beef, we don't pay the whole price at the cash register. Every four ounces (a average hamburger) is responsible for the destruction of 55 square feet of tropical rainforest, the loss of 1,000 pounds of vegetation, and the death of between twenty and thirty forms of life.

Tropical rainforests cover less than 6% of the land on our globe, but house more than half of our world's plant and animal species, and contain 80% of the Earth's land vegetation.

It took up to 100 million years for the tropical rainforests to evolve. It has taken only forty years to destroy more than half of them. Every second, a football field sized chunk of lush tropical rainforest is gone forever. Every year, we lose another 20 million acres. Tropical rainforests once covered 14% of the land on our globe. But because of pressure from industry, consumerism, and greed, tropical rainforests now cover less then 6% of the Earth's land. Destroying the rest of our rainforests could be one of the most tragic mistakes in the history of human existence.

In every acre of rainforest that's destroyed, huge numbers of plants and animals die too. Any one of them could be the last of its kind. In the last hundred years, our forest practices have caused up to a million species of animals and plants to be extinguished forever. While the extinction of some species is a natural occurrence, it is now happening 10,000 times faster than it did before the appearance of human beings.

Steer Clear of Rainforest Beef

Rainforests are often cut down or burned so that cattle can be brought in to graze. As they chew up the grass that tries to grow on the deforested land, their hooves stomp on and wipe out the last of the vegetation. Soon the land is no longer suitable even for grazing cattle. Then the ranchers move further into the rainforest, cut down more trees, and the stomping and chewing starts all over again. This is the process that has already destroyed much of the rainforests in Latin America. In 1960, 130,000 square miles of these thriving forests covered Central America. Today, less than half of that remains. When we eat rainforest beef, we don't pay the whole price at the cash register. Every four ounces (an average hamburger) is responsible for the destruction of 55 square feet of tropical rainforest, the loss of 1,000 pounds of vegetation, and the death of between twenty and thirty forms of life. When we choose to eat less (or no) meat, we are making a powerful choice for the rainforests.

Don't Buy Tropical Hardwoods

The United States is the world's number one importer of processed tropical timber. We see teak, mahogany, and other rainforest hardwoods almost every day in doors, tables, desks, bookshelves, disposable chopsticks, houses and sometimes even our paper. The developed world's huge demand for exotic timber is wiping out tropical rainforests all over the world. In most cases oak, fir, maple, or pine can be grown locally and sustainably, costing us less money. As consumers, we can avoid tropical wood products such as rosewood, teak and mahogany. Who Is Responsible For Rainforest Destruction? We can blame certain multi-national corporations, who take advantage of the situation and see an opportunity to make some quick bucks. Or we can point our fingers at the people whose actual hands are on the chain-saws. Many of these people, driven by hunger and poverty, destroy the forests because it is their only hope of making enough money to survive (usually with cattle or mining). But one thing is certain: we all become infinitely poorer when we lose our rainforests.

The destruction of our rainforests is too complex to blame on one person or one company, on one industry or one government. It has its roots in a way of relating to the world. Many of us live in environments created by and designed for humans. Because of this, we may come to believe that the world is made for us. We may come to value trees only for their wood and paper, and animals only for their meat, milk or eggs. Some people are beginning to see that this attitude doesn't work. They are realizing that the Earth is a community in which we are participants, not a commodity to use and destroy. As individuals change how they see the world, the solutions begin to emerge. Sometimes the solutions are even better economically. A recent study by the World Wildlife Fund showed that Brazilians could make between three and 100 times more money from a properly managed rainforest than by current methods which destroy the forests. A well-managed forest will provide valuable goods and money on-goingly, whereas cattle, mining, dams, and timber make the land only valuable for a brief time, after which it becomes worthless. Properly managing a forest includes the sustainable harvesting of things like Brazil nuts, cashews, rubber, resins, and wild tropical fruits, ecological tourism, and more. In our attitude towards the rainforests, as with so many issues humanity faces, we have many choices. We can choose to think and act for short-term financial profit, or for the long-term survival of life on Earth. Even though our rainforests are confronted with enormous problems, we're lucky. Why? Because we still have enormous rainforests to explore, mountains to climb, a great diversity of species to discover and protect, and many priceless jewels of nature to preserve. And we have something else that we might not have a few years from now: time. If we act now, we still have the time to create the changes we want. Let's use it.

-- a (a@a.a), June 09, 1999.


I couldn't resist -- workathome@atl.ga.....I'm sure your doing your best :)

-- Feller (feller@wanna.help), June 09, 1999.


Perhaps if there was reasonable, realistic, affordable and equitable regulation of US domestic resource industries, the market forces would not exist that make it profitable for third world countries to convert their rainforests to supply US consumers with food and fiber products.

Several of our regional lumber mills have moved to Mexico or near the Sacramento port to receive raw imported product either domestically unavialable or unprofitable to harvest (due largely to regulation.)

Mexican beef is imported and held in feedlots for a short time, to be sold to the consumer as US beef. As I understand it, much of the South American beef that might have involved deforestation is imported as canned beef. IMHO, those who are concerned should support HR 1144, "The Country of Origin Meat Labeling Act of 1999," sponsored by Congressman Helen Chenoweth. The bill would close loopholes to inform consumers as to the country of origin of meat. Statistics show that Americans eat over 320 million pounds of meat imported from all foreign countries every month but less than 1% of foreign beef ever gets inspected.

The grassroots bill is supported by small producers. If you're going to impose heavy environmental and food quality regulations on domestic producers, at least buy their product and don't turn around and buy foreign products that were produced without such restrictions.

-- marsh (armstrng@sisqtel.net), June 09, 1999.


marsh,

Find me a can of corned beef that says Texas instead of "Product of Argentina" on the bottom and I'll buy a few cases. But, time is short.

-- Carlos (riffraff1@cybertime.net), June 09, 1999.


Carlos, can't, but you could look for the Bumble Bee tuna label that tells you it was caught by American fishermen. Last year all the canneries (but BB) refused American tuna at the docks and bought only Asian tuna.

This is happening across the board to small domestic food producers to force them out. (IMHO the grassroots "environmental" movement might examnine why the environmental grantmakers are funded by grants from giant multi-national corporations.) People have no idea how we have increasingly become more and more dependent on other countries for our raw food and resources. y2k will highlight those vulnerabilities.

-- marsh (siskfarm@snowcrest.net), June 09, 1999.


marsh, your posts reminded me of a book I read a couple months back. The title is The Last Gasp, by Trevor Hoyle. Zebra Books, Kensington Publishing Corp. Copyright 1983.

I had this book on my shelf for a long time before I read it because I didn't like the cover picture of a skull with a gas mask [respirator?] and the eye sockets were colored as the USA flag in the right and the USSR flag in the left. I didn't buy it, and can't remember where it came from....

Anyway, the story starts out with a Russian scientist arriving at an American scientific facility at the south pole and he is near to dead. He says a scientific formula which has to do with the growth of algae in the ocean. There is a lot of info about this as the story develops.

The premise was that with the ocean algae dying the oxygen in the atmosphere was being depleted. It was directly responsible for the majority of it, you see. The land plants only made up a small percentage. [I never researched that factoid to see if it was true. This is a Sci-fi book, remember.] Every time a scientist came forward saying something about this fact, they mysteriously died.

Well, as I read it, the governments were shown to be involved in this mess by doing things such as diverting a major natural river in Russia that allowed for the flow of the ocean current and causing the algae much problems, along with the US doing biological/chemical stuff which was causing problems on land to a similar degree.

My point, and thanks for reading this far, is that I have several times read posts such as yours and others, and this book keeps coming into mind. [I have to wonder why and don't like the train of thought that ensues!] The time frame was very short; about twenty years or so if memory serves...

You might like to read it. The ending was rather pathetic to me. Seemed like the author just got tired of writing and went super sci-fi to end it.

One thing it mentioned was the change in flora around the globe, where normal plants started to develop larger leaves and such things.

I was amazed at the fact that I had not read it for so long because of the cover, and now can't seem to get it out of my mind when I read some of the posts here or news stories about world events, y2k, etc.

Have you, by chance, heard of this book?

-- J (jart5@bellsouth.net), June 09, 1999.


No, sorry I haven't read it. Sounds interesting. If you are interested in the southern oscillation, NOAA has a website at http://www.al.noaa.gov/WWWHD/pubdocs/ElNino.html Studies as relates to fish can be found at the Pacific Fisheries Environmental Laboratory http://www.pfeg.noaa.gov/whats_new/whats_new.html

Information on the domestic 1998 tuna (albacore) season can be found at http://www.wfoa-tuna.org/1998/index.htm

-- marsh (siskfarm@snowcrest.net), June 09, 1999.



Good take there, Marsh. Some of the points you've raised are more subtle than can be appreciated by many avid environmentalists. This just points the complexity of the Earthcrisis issue -- a complexity next to which Y2K seems as checkers to chess.

But closer to the bottom line is this clip from the article that 'a' posted above: "Many of us live in environments created by and designed for humans. Because of this, we may come to believe that the world is made for us. We may come to value trees only for their wood and paper, and animals only for their meat, milk or eggs.

Some people are beginning to see that this attitude doesn't work. They are realizing that the Earth is a community in which we are participants, not a commodity to use and destroy."

While environmentalists on this forum have been castigated as not caring enough for humans, it is my contention that those of us who care for the planet ultimately care more about people than the short-sighted anthropocentrists appreciate.

The natural world, of which we are a part whether we ackowledge it, is our life support system. We trammel it at our peril --- disrespect it to our eventual doom.

Hallyx

"Carried away, perhaps by His matchless creation, The Garden of Eden, He forgot to mention that all He was giving us was an interglacial."--- Robert Ardrey

-- Hallyx (Hallyx@aol.com), June 09, 1999.


Marsh,

Logging/timber dollars raised me. I worked a brief stint as a camp cook for a crew of cutters/fallers in southeast Alaska. I cannot believe that "the western forests are more dense than before" sorry if I didn't get the quote precisely right. Folks most of you have never seen a clear cut - some foresters believe that it is the best solution for some areas and some of what they say makes sense (like reduced soil compaction as compared to frequent smaller harvests). But:

1: Many times the clear cut is not properly replanted

2: Watershed/riparian (close to a stream) areas are not taken care of and the place never (in our lifetime) heals

3: Hybrid trees (fast growing) are planted on much of the private TREE FARMS.

4: After clear cutting IF replanting occurs then it is usually done in rows (just human nature showing). Now we have a bunch of the same trees (most of the time) the same age planted in rows like a bunch of corn. Yeah, this is what I want to leave my children.

5: The burning that Forest Circus does is called "prescribed" and most likely not enough of it is done.

6: We are so efficient at removing every bit of the tree now that may be marketable that we are removing vast tonnage of what would have otherwise rotted to replenish the (in many cases) thin layer of fertile soil where that tree stood.

We raping our forests and most of us just go along with our heads up our butts not wanting to think about the consequences. Every time you build a "stick" house or go to the lumber yard for stuff to build a picnic table (or whatever) please think first if there is a reasonable alternative (perhaps recycled old lumber?).

Stepping off my soap box now,

-- Kristi (securx@succeed.net), June 09, 1999.


Marsh,

By the way it looks like you have done a lot of research and I respect that. Also noted your address - from the Siskiyous? Beautiful area - also blessed with deep fertile soil for trees in many areas if I recall.

I am not a tree-hugger, spiker, etc. Nor am I saying that you go around with your head up your butt. My statement was mostly about the society in which we live. So many folks are so out of touch with reality. Big government and/or big business has done a really lousy job of managing the timber resource yet we seem to be stuck with it.

Sorry in advance if my previous rant offended you.

Sincerely

-- Kristi (securx@succeed.net), June 09, 1999.


Marsh you remind me of a book I read called, "The Fools In Town Are On Our Side." The point of the book was that if a group of crooks wanted to take over a town, or state, or country, all they had to do was convince the fools that everything they did was fine and they could pull off anything. Grea Book! You'd fit right in.

Hallyx is right about environmentalists caring more aout people than non-enviros. When I was recently explaining why I let certain weeds grow in my garden (for birds, bees and butterflies) and why I would not allow my land to be logged (animals, plants, bugs need homes) a woman said, "Well, it sounds to me like you care a lot more for critters than people." And I said, "Not true. The world would do just fine without human beings, but without "critters and trees" man wouldn't last a year. So I care very much for people, or I wouldn't work so hard to keep a safe haven for nature."

-- gilda (jess@listbot.com), June 09, 1999.


Whatever Marsh has said on this forum is timber-industry public relations crap.

I live in Humboldt county. There are approximately 60,000 acres of old growth redwood trees left in the world. There used to be many millions, regardless of meadows etc.

The rest are skinny little sticks just like back east. Timber harvest in Mendicino county now consist mostly of tree below 8 inches in diameter.

That nonsense about cyclical upwelling is crap. The fish nursery streams are filled in with sediment washed off the hills

He is an industry flack, period, and anything that he has said or may say here ignorant

-- Peter Starr (startrak@northcoast.com), June 09, 1999.


When my ancestors came to Wisconsin 125 years ago, my great-great- gradfather told one of his children to climb to the top of a huge tree and report back what he could see. Jacob came back down and reported that all he could see were more trees.

A true story passed down. Sadly to say, that is not the case anymore. We need to stop the madness now!!! Yuppies, quit building your fricking, big, forest raping houses.

-- Anti-chainsaw (Tree@hugger.com), June 09, 1999.


Peter, I have:

Served on a federal technical advisory committee on anadromous fish - laboring through an Instream Flow Incremental Methodology scoping process under the direction of experts from Fort Collins, Colorado; then arriving at a matrix of limiting factors for every life stage of every anadromous fish species in the watershed; and

Served on a technical advisory committee to establish and peer review a water balance and sediment regime mosel for a major salmon producing watershed; and

Served on a multi-interest watershed-based Coordinated Resource Management Planning process to achieve consensus on voluntary habitat improvements to increase populations of anadromous fish; and

Submitted technical comments contributory to establishing the State's three tiered Rangeland Water Quality process....

You don't have to agree with my opinion, but I can sincerely state that it is more than an educated guess.

-- marsh (siskfarm@snowcrest.net), June 10, 1999.


And I bet every timber company in this country -- Pacific-Lumber, Louisiana-Pacific, Sierra-Pacific, Georgia-Pacific etc. etc. etc. has a whole team of industry flacks just like you willing to sell your science for a fancy house in the burbs.

Well Mr. Marsh, the salmon are gone up, the trees are little sticks and your claims for objectivity are a bunch of crap.

I just hope that Y2K stops the voracious appetite of all the spoiled Americans who think that it is their god-given right to own a 5,000 sq. ft. trophy home made of America's dwindly stock of adult trees.

Peter

-- Peter Starr (startrak@northcoast.com), June 10, 1999.


Three cheers for Julia "Butterfly" who has lived in an ancient redwood in California for 16 months to keep that asshole Charles Hurwitz from cutting it and more like it. Mudslides have been directly attributed to clear cutting, but ilk like Hurwitz who caused the loss of millions of dollars in the big Savings and Loan debacle is above the law.

-- gilda (jess@listbot.com), June 10, 1999.

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