EMBARRASSING STUPIDITY ON DISPLAY AT GOP DEBATE

September 28,2023

Some of us were not smart enough to ignore the Fox News “debate” of the GOP hopefuls last night `.                                        and watched their chaotic performance. I plead guilty. I had seen enough after about 55 minutes. 

The “debate” did reveal the embarrassing stupidity of several of the war monger neo-conservative “hold over from Bush” class of candidates. Their answers to the questions regarding support for the Ukraine War was revelatory.  It seems clear some remnants of the war monger element are still alive in the old GOP.  These folks—Pense, Haley (who would even send special forces troops into Mexico a close ally and economic partner.) , and Christie, simply have learned nothing from our awful history in foreign policy over the last decades.  One wonders where have they been? Thankfully, these candidates all  have GOP voter-support only in the single digits..  They eagerly support the un-winnable  war in Ukraine. For them, the US policy-goal is to degrade and destabilize Russia, a nation seen as an intractable enemy. Their reasoning is irrational. 

Ukraine has lost about 20% of its most industrialized and valuable Black Sea coast to Russia. That area will be very difficult to take back. Ukraine’s  so-called “summer offensive” failed. That failure has been exposed, not by media reports, which control, ignore, and hide such information, but by the actions of the Biden Administration itself. As the war effort stagnated in Ukraine, the US Administration has consistently escalated the conflict by increasing the number and destructive capacity of weapons, as well as their range. Ukraine now has  our best armor, tanks and top fighter-airplanes. We have also provided them with iternatinally banned and illegal cluster bombs. These are all signs of desperation which simply  underscore the fact that Ukraine is NOT winning. 

There is no possible “winner” in this war. Ukraine can not defeat Russia. The outcome can only be either a political compromise and territorial settlement —-or a wider NATO vs Russia Nuclear War.  The latter result would be a disaster for all of Europe and the western world. The result would be the horror of a radioactive, smoldering failed state on the border of eastern Europe with an angry and nuclear-armed Russia, under the control of even more radical elements in Moscow.  

Think back to the decisions of of the “geniuses” in the US State Department and Washington, DC that made similar decisions about Libya in 2011, and the awful outcome there.  Only this war in Eastern Europe would be much bigger and much worse.  

But evaluating the candidate’s stated rationale for this war—one recognizes that they have none.  The idea that our goal is to destabilize and weaken an eastern European nation..with the largest arsenal of nuclear weapons on Earth and simply hope that after we achieve this goal that all of Europe will be safe  ——is so ridiculous— it deserves no response. 

Europeans take note.  You will be the close neighbor of another failed state  the USA war-monger neo-conservative interventionists will have created not in Ssouth America but in the heart of Europe.

NO MORE AID TO UKRAINE—PEACE POSSIBLE WHEN USA MONEY ENDS.

 

September 27, 2023. 

DEMOCRATS AND SOME REPUBLICANS IN THE SENATE ARE PROPOSING AN ADDITIONAL $6 BILLION DOLLAR AID PACKAGE FOR UKRAINE AS PART OF A STOP-GAP DEAL TO END THE BUDGET IMPASSE. A BAD IDEA. 

Some in Congress support blank-check spending in Ukraine, with no `end and no accountability for how these funds are spent. Continued blank check funding only incentivizes the war. 

Ukraine is awash in foreign money. The USA alone—the largest donor,—has sent Ukraine over $120 billion dollars in cash, aid and outright gifts, while the EU and NATO added an additional $30 billion. Canada donated $10 billion, Poland $5 billion, and many other nations added to this largess.   Today,  the total amount of monetary aid to Ukraine hovers at @ $200 billion dollar mark. This for a nation with a population of only 40 million.   Two hundred billion dollars for Ukraine is equivalent to a handout of about $5,000 for every man, woman and child in Ukraine.  ($200,000 million/40 million = @$5,000 dollars for each Ukrainian citizen).   Before the war in 2021, Ukraine’s entire gross domestic product was just $ 200 billion dollars.  This nation is being swamped with cash.

Then too, almost all of that cash and investment is completely unaccounted for.  As a result of this “free for all” windfall of loans, gifts, and  money, inflation in Ukraine is rampant. In July 2023, inflation in Ukraine surged above 18%. While money poured in to the nation in 2020, GDP soared to over 19% above  its pre-war level.  As a consequence of this tsunami of cash reports of corruption skyrocketed, even being reveled by official government sources.  Ukrainian elites have been exposed buying multimillion dollar properties in “millionaire resort towns” such as Gstaadt, Switzerland.  Zelenskyy has a $4 million dollar real estate portfolio of city apartments, several commercial properties and five parking facilities. Domestically, with so much money in the hands of corrupt officials,—home and business properties  prices in Ukraine, even in-war torn regions, have risen in value by 75% in less than two years. Why? 

Corrupt Ukrainian entrepreneurs have access ro nearly unlimited funds for personal self- emolument and investment.  Battered war-torn homes and business properties are purchased and reconditioned for sale at massively inflated prices. This nation is awash in money. Money is fungible !! 

 For too many in Ukraine, war is a money-making proposition. Peace and compromise can only be possible when the monetary incentive for the Ukrainian elites ends.  The end of bombardment, the awful destruction, the human and societal toll, the death dealing— the threat of a nuclear exchange, will only come to an end when the incentive for war—-the US money train— ends. 

But lets not put all the blame on the greed and self-serving elements in Ukraine. Ukraine has been a cash cow for many in our own government. ( Recent revelations exposed the infamous activities of the Biden family, which is heavily invested in Ukraine.) In the Senate, we have, on both sides, many who take cash or gifts from defense industry lobbyists and do the bidding of this vested interest. Like the Ukrinan elites and just as guilty are US “war monger” politicians who are also in this dangerous war for profit and self-interest. 

HORSES (EQUUS) HUMAN HISTORY AND LANGUAGE ARE INTERTWINED

 Horses (Equus) have had a long and intimate relationship with humans.  One of my most cherished remembrances of early Long Island is that of a friendship I had with a long time local farmer and horse and mule lover—Jim.  When his own farm was retired from agricultural production—on which he used only horses and mules for power…he could not retire the team of horses and mules he had trained and used almost all of his life.  At that time several local farms had been converted from crop production to growing trees and nursery stock.  My friend JIm found work for his teams in the hundreds of acres of closely spaced nursery stock—row plantings where big wide tractors could not go.  Jim’s team of mules and horses worked to till those rows quickly and very effectively for many years. 

 Horses have been used as beasts of burden, as general transport, and as essential agricultural work-animals used to till the soil and harvest our foods and grains. They worked in mines. In wartime, they carried massive burdens, as well as the officer class to the front lines. They served famously as mounts for our western beef herders—our cowboys.  Municipal police departments use horses to safely and effectively control crowds.  Their uses have been eclipsed Yet they are still part of wild America.  Wild horses are presently found on every continent except Antartica.  In the wild they interact with the natural environment to improve soil and increase plant and animal diversity.   In the past, and not so long ago, everyone had a stable for the family horse.  In those days human-horse relations were very intimate and common. 

Today, horses continue to serve as a source of healthy exercise. They are used in sports like polo, and observer sports like horse racing.  Most recently horses are kept as service animals where they facilitate horse-rider interactions helpful to improve human pysiological well-being and realtionships which improve motor coordination, relaxation, and better mental health.   Their sounds, smells and appearance, are all part of a deep, strong bond between these patient, big and beautiful animals and their human owners,  which anyone who has had the opportunity to experience finds unforgettable.     

The horse genus Equus first evolved in North America, millions of years ago. Adapted to grasslands, the genus spread widely over North America, evolving from a tiny species no taller than a large dog, into a near-modern size horse in the Late Pleistocene. During the Pleistocene or Glacial Age (2.6 million years ago  to 12,000 years ago) when a land bridge connected North  America and Asia, wild horses expanding their range, migrated west across the Bering Strait land bridge into Eurasia.  

Perhaps the first contact between horse and  humans occurred somewhere along  the Bering Straight land corridor late in the Pleistocene.  For during that time, our own species (Homo sapiens) was migrating east  from Eurasia into North America, as horses went west  to populate and form herds in Asia and eastern Europe.  However, by 10,000 years ago, horses  horses in North America had disappeared from the fossil record, perhaps as a result of  climate change, helped on by human predators who may have hunted them—no one knows.  

But they thrived in Europe, and in the great grass-lands or steppes of central Asia between the Black Sea and the Caspian Sea.   About 8,000 years ago in what is now Kazakhstan, the people of these vast grasslands or steppes may have first hunted horses for food and skins. But they soon came to realize that they were  more valuable alive and began to use them for riding, to facilitate hunting, as beasts of burden and as a source of meat too. These people of the steppes domesticated horses. They herded horses into corrals and paddocks where they were used as a source of food, milk, skins, and to carry burdens.  

The advent of the domestic horse changed the economy of the steppe people.  No longer were they forced to remain in one place. They could pack up their horses with their goods, tents, and families and travel to better lands for grazing, and hunting. Their change in lifestyle gave them an advantage over other tribes. There were able to exploit the grassland environment more effectively for meat and food. They accessed more calories, and nutritious foods and were healthier, taller, and were more likely to dominate their neighbors. 

From about 6-7000  years ago these horse-based pastoralists  spread out from Kazakhstan into western Europe riding and leading  their horses. Their nomadic lifestyle, military prowess  and horsemanship permitted them to dominate those areas into which they moved. 

These “horse people” who dominated others, brought not only the horse but also the language they spoke—Indo-European.  Indo-European is the parent language of almost all the modern languages we speak in the west today. The Indo-European language and the horse spread all through Europe.  

More than 5,500 years later, the Spanish discovered and widely explored the New World. They brought horses with them to serve as mounts and beasts of burden during these incursions. Thus the Spanish speaking an Indo European language—introduced a language as well as the horse into North America. The Spanish reintroduced the horse to where it once had evolved and introduced their Indo European language to North America as well. 

Many Spanish horses escaped into the wild, to form wild bands or herds.  Others were stolen by indigenous peoples of the southern  plains, most notably the Comanche who famously adapted to the horse, just as those ancient people of the Asian steppes some 6,000-8,000 years ago had done.   More than nine thousand years after if was exterminated from North America the horse again prospered in the grasslands of the west. 

Today our wild mustangs still roam the hills and valleys of Nevada, Utah and Colorado where some say they are feral —not wild—animals introduced by man.  But history seems to suggest-they came form North America and are now back where they belong. 

TRAGEDY THAT IS LIBYA—WESTERN ADVENTURISM AND MILITARY INVASION—LEADS TO FAILED STATES

 The tragedy of lost life in Libya is overwhelming, more than 10,000 known dead and 10,000 missing, as a result of the mid-latitude storm “Daniel”, which on September 10-13 dumped 10 cm (@ 4 inches) of rain on the northeastern coast, (Cyrenaica district) of that nation. This region is essentially a desert where only a little more than about ten inches of rain falls annually. The topography of the region is that of a deeply dissected plateau. Deep ravines cut through this plateau with a main gorge leading directly to the City of Derna in northwestern Libya. It was the flooding of the deep narrow gorge of the Derna River and the failure of two dams along its course that caused a flood which struck  City of Derna where the most loss of life occurred. The tragic loss of life is the result of a modest if unusual storm, the nature of the geology of the area, and human failure to maintain essential infrastructure. The more remote but underlying cause is the past military adventurism and greed of several advanced western states which intervened in Libya’s internal affairs, encouraged a wider civil war and a change of leadership leaving behind a failed state in economic chaos that remains dysfunctional to the present time.    

The geology.  In the last 50-60 million years Africa and Eurasia have been pressed together in a “continent to continent” convergent boundary where two continental plates collide. The compression zone is one of the most active on Earth. Geologists have calculated that Eurasia is moving south into Africa at a rate of about 37 mm per year. Many other similar convergent boundaries move at only 10-15 mm per year. 

The headland where Derna is located has been under compression from Eurasia which may have begun some 60 million years ago and which continues today. These earth forces have pushed up the rocks of north-eastern Libya into a raised plateau, approximately 1,000 feet (@ 330m) above sea level. Such elevated lands are typically eroded and dissected by rain water…even in desert or desert like areas.  

Over millions of years rainfall has eroded this upland, underlain with relatively soft sedimentary marine rocks into a deeply eroded dendritic pattern of gullies, canyons and deep gorges.  From above, the ragged landscape looks much like a miniature Arizona. The Derna River gorge which flows intermittently is a dendritic (root like) rivers system carved into these raised sedimentary rocks.  The main branch of this system —the Derna River—was dammed in the last century. The Ghadaffi Regime built two earthen dams along the course of the River, one about seven miles south of the City and another at about one-half mile from the City.  The dams served to help recharge rainwater into subsurface aquifers and provide potable water and irrigation water for the City of Derna on the coast with a population @ 100,000 inhabitants. 

In these desert-like terranes, rainfall is infrequent and most often result from scattered—air mass type—showers. Such storms produce rainfall of about  ten inches annually in northeastern Libya (Benghazi).  Cyclonic storms are rare in this area.   When Daniel dropped nearly 4 inches of rain over a period of 24 to 48 hours in the area south of the City of Derna, runoff rain-water falling over a wide areas of earth surface below the storm clouds rapidly drained into the natural erosional system of narrow gullies and canyons where water flow increased rapidly.  The narrow channels of these drainages caused rapid filling and increased flow rates. This effect intensified as the water was directed into formerly dry stream beds where its volume and flow rate rapidly increased. As this water picks up and carries away clay silt mud and gravel, its density increases along with its ability to pick up and carry the earth and debris in its path.  This growing “water/mud tsunami” first struck the most southerly (7 mile) dam, which must have held the wall of water and mud only briefly, then as volume built up behind it,  the dam collapsed and the mass of water, mud, rock and dam structure surged downstream.   The now massive  torrent carrying, mud, rocks, torn up trees, concrete parts of the dam,  and human structures continued north  along the Derna River gorge where slammed into the northerly dam only a bit more than a half mile from the City. there with a wall of water some calculate as 30 million cubic meters of  water mud and debris, this massive biblical-like torrent exploded onto on the City of Derna, spreading out, along the main road as it picked up homes, cars, buildings, mosques and trapped  human occupants. The wall of water carrying and uprooting all before it as it spread across the urbanized coastal plain and debouched into the Mediterranean.   

The causes appear to be the result of  natural topography, poor warning systems, lack of disaster planing and lack of maintenance of infrastructure.  But the recent history of the Libya has also played a part. Thanks to the the policy of the US Bush and Obama administrations and their allies in the UK and France, Libya is today a failed state. Those dams were not serviced or repaired since the end of the Gadaffi Regime in 2011. Failed states struggle just to survive.  Infrastructure such as roads, dams, utility services  are ignored as are effective plans for emergencies. . 

Libya has the third largest proven  petroleum resources in the world after Saudi Arabia, and Russia.  Though today as a failed state it produces a little—just over one million bbl per day.  In the past western powers found the long time Libyan dictator Muammar Gadaffi a big pain in their neck.  He would not open his petroleum and mineral reserves to western exploitation, hoping to retain control over them for the welfare of Libya. For that reason, and for the fear that he would side with Soviets, during the Cold War, he was targeted for assassination  over and over from as far back as the Eisenhower Administration.  He survived  many attempts on his life, until 2011 when general uprisings of the Arab Spring spread across the Middle East and North Africa. Many claim this wide spread insurgence was in part a result of the dislocations and disasters wrought by the George Bush wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and Syria. 

When Arab Spring demonstrations occurred in Libya, the Obama Administration, under war monger Hillary Clinton and others in the State Department, saw this as an opportunity to rid themselves of Gadaffi and his entourage.  They supported the insurgents with money and guns, and watched from Washington, DC as Gadaffi was brutally killed by a mob and his administration ended.  The results of their adventurism and intrusion into the affairs of other states brought nothing good for Libyans, only chaos, destruction, division of the nation into warring factions and unending war that has resulted in stalemate and a divided failed nation.   

This last natural meteorological tragedy in Libya, the proximate result of topography and failure to repair and maintain infrastructure  is also in good part,  one of  the end results of the unwise destructive “democratization” and  intervention polices engaged in by western powers into the affairs of third world  nations. 

We have not learned our lessons after all the failures in Iraq, Afghanistan, Syria and Libya. We are still today involved in a deadly dangerous war in Ukraine, which can lead to nothing other than another divided, weakened and failed state.  Our policies kill and maim innocent people…

ON WHY ONE WALKS, TREES AND HUMAN TRAVELS

 “Faut que je marche. Parce que je comprends, quand je marche. Parce que j’apprends quand je marche. Parce que je pense quand je marche. “ Le Figaro, September 12, 2023

I must walk, because I understand when I walk. Because I learn when I walk. Because I think when I walk. 

I look askance at the bicyclists and joggers who pass me every day on my walk. 

“Riding a bicycle is so mechanically efficient”, think I, as I wave a “good morning” to a passing rider. It’s a waste of effort if you a doing it for exercise.  (I will not comment on the electric bikers who zoom past..always pedaling furiously, thinking observers will not know they are only “fake” bike riders.) 

  “ Bike riding is a great way to generate a UTI or a crushed urethra”, I murmur to myself as the next bike rider person passes by all decked out in ergonomic gloves, shiny aerodynamic shaped helmet, tinted bicycle eyewear, and skin tight low friction polyester riding pants—which show too many bulges.  

Soon I hear the “clump”, “clump”, “clump” of a jogger coming up from behind me. This passer by gets a similar mental take down.  

“Pounding the hard pavement like that can not be good for your legs, knees, or those cartilaginous cushions between those spinal vertebrae of yours” I whisper, again keeping these thoughts to myself. 

These are ideas which came to mind as I walk.  But then too, I thought of our ancient predecessors 200,000 years ago who perambulated everywhere.  Humans walked out of the Horn of Africa, north and into Eurasia.  Some turned west to populate Europe, others continued east—skirting north of the Himalayas and through the steppes of eastern Europe and into the far east, eventually, crossing the Bering Strait Land Bridge into Alaska and into North America. They continued on down through North America —crossing the narrow forested land strip into South America and onward south to  the icy continental tip near Tierra del Fuego.  If humans started in the Horn of Africa the overall distance (with no side trips) encompassed a trip of about 20,000 miles.  Nomads walking only 10 miles per day could make such a voyage in only 5.5 years.  So the whole human voyage from Africa into the entire world may not have taken even many hundreds of years.  With certainty by about 60,000 years ago humans were probably on almost every continent. Perhaps a little longer for Australia and Easter Island.  Here and there they may have boarded rafts to cross onto island archipelagos eventually peopling almost all of the continents, even isolated  Australia. It is walking that for which we humans are so well adapted.    

And thank God for trees! For trees played an essential role in our human history. Primitive fern like trees  first appear on Earth way back in the Paleozoic, during the Mid Devonian Period about 385 million years ago.  If it weren't for these majestic plants we would not be here—or at least not in our present form.   After more than  300 million years of growth and evolution, modern flowering trees spread over every continent to form vast forests. Forests created new ecologic niches for animals to adapt to. And it was in the shade-dappled canopy-above-ground, safe from terrestrial predators, an environment where food in the form of nuts and fruits were plentiful (and there was little competition) where a group of animals known as primates first appear arose some 50 million years ago during the Eocene Epoch. 

These first primitive primates, are the group of animals from which we all descend.  Its a good thing too. Adaptation for climbing and living in trees generated some useful physical characteristics, such as: having one’s eyes in the front of the head for stereoscopic vision (to accurately see the distance to an escape tree branch), and having fore legs attached to a shoulder-joint which permitted wide angle of rotation (and enabled it owner to embrace a tree trunk ), and perhaps most important of all..forepaws adapted to grasping (with a separated thumb, to hold onto smaller tree limbs)—and hang on for dear life.  These arboreal or tree living adaptations for climbing around in trees remained permanently with the primate clan. Even as the the African climate changed (Yes we had “climate change” even way back then) and forests to which the primates were so well adapted began to disappear.  

When climatic changes cause a decrease in rainfall below about 30 inches per year forests can not be sustained. In these climatic zones grasslands with scattered trees may take over from actual forests. Such bio-zones are called “savannas”.  As African forests responded and to increasing seasonal droughts and less rainfall, forest trees tended to die out and become more scattered. Grasslands grew up in the the open areas.  Limited access to extensive or continuous tree cover reduced food access of arboreal primates. To exploit adequate areas for food it became necessary for these primates to descend to the ground. 

Many of the arboreal primates living in these dehydrating forests died out with the trees they lived in, but others adapted to the new conditions by coming down from the trees to adapt to a terrestrial life—by “taking up bipedalism”.  In this new environment, the grasping hand with the separated thumb of the primate, the primate mobile shoulder joint and  stereoscopic vision were useful pre-adaptations.  Bipedal primates forced to adapt to this new environment perhaps used these physical attributes to exploit this new environment. The upright posture as well as their stereoscopic vision may have permitted more effective warning concerning predators, as well as useful information regarding potential food sources. Ability to walk over long distances increased the likelihood of encountering food sources. The grasping thumb provided a means of altering and manipulating the environment to better access food sources.  These may have been nuts and berries difficult to extract, as well as nutrient sources buried below ground, or under rocks. Eventually, the use of simple stone “tools” such as “hammerstones” were used to break open nuts and seeds and exploit the nutrients in the marrow of long bones of abandoned kill sites.   

 

The first primates to climb down from the trees and take up bipedalism (walking) in Africa, appear to have done so nearly 7 million years.  According to recent analysis of fossils from Africa, one of the earliest may have been Sahelanthropus tchadensis (See: Post cranial evidence etc, Daver, Guy Clarisse,  Nature: 609, 94-199, 2022 ).  Thus walking may be a 7 million year old practice, beating out other forms of human locomotion by many millions of years. 

So humans, or at least  the genus “Homo” in Homo habilis (“Handy man”) evolved from earlier bipedal primates a bit more than 2 million years ago (and died out about 1.4 MYA) . Another even closer relative Homo neanderthalis arose some 400,000 years ago and became extinct around 40,000  years ago.  While our own species of great ape, Homo sapiens arose some 200,000 years ago and has lived on to the present. This one species now dominates the Earth with over 8 billion individual members.   

The adaptations for life in trees permitted the primate species to walk, eventually, very effectively, but the human body is not well adapted to running.   With a body originally adapted for tree living we have done quite well, with an arboreal skeleton, unsuitable flat feet, only two legs,  and an awkward, upright, clumsy mode of running.   For animals well adapted to running look at the adaptations of a chetah, wolf, leopard, all of whom have four legs, powerful thrusting “hip” muscles, a horizontal flexible spine for thrust, and can run with little friction and great ability to absorb the vibrations and shock from striking the hard earth—by running their toes . We are second class runners all hands down.  So don’t ever attempt to outrun a four-footed animal..even a lumbering Black Bear.  

We do have adaptations for walking fast, and for walking for long distances. They are our very effective cooling system—our skin. Humans evolved in a dry savanna climate and as a result developed an excellent system to cool the body.  We have millions of sweat glands in our skin.  each of these glands pumps water (and nitrogenous waste) onto the skin surface where it evaporates into the air. Evaporation requires heat. Each thimble-full of water (about a gram or one cubic centimeter) requires nearly 540 calories of heat to change it to a gas or evaporate it. That heat is absorbed from the human skin surface, cooling the skin and the blood with which it is supplied. As long as our bodies can evaporate the water on the surface of our bodies into the air— we cool our blood very effectively…better than most mammals.  

However, in humid climates, the air is often saturated with water (relative humidity close to 100%). In these circumstances evaporation is reduced or completely retarded, very little or no evaporation occurs and our bodies heat up.  Of course water (sweat) accumulates on the skin surface.  A hand fan can cool the body by blowing some saturated air away from the body…but its use is limited.  Too cool effectively we need dry air!   Most fast running mammals have no sweat glands are though they are much faster runners…in desert and savanna climates humans can continue to pursue them..but eventually the prey mammals overheat and slow down.  Thus ancient humans and modern desert hunters such as the Kung could effectively chase down antelope and other ungulates which they have targeted. 

So for these reasons I proudly walk, understand, learn and think—not like those other speedsters racing by!   

UN CLIMATE SUMMIT—ONLY WINDOW DRESSING?

 On September 20, 2023 UN Secretary General Antonio Gutteres will host the 2023 UN Climate Summit in New York City.  It will likely be thoroughly reported on and touted by the NY Times and other legacy press outlets as a great success.  The UN Summit  will fit into the NY Times’ editorial agenda better than one they recently decided to downplay or ignore.

That of US Secretary of Energy Jennifer Granholme’s electric powered “Great American Road Trip”. It was a short one—from North Carolina over the border to Tennessee, but all did not go well. Hoping to underscore the practicality and usefulness of electric vehicles for the traditional American road trip, Granholm staged an electric car motorcade.  But the trip had recharging troubles all the way.  The well publicized trip, got the Secretary back to DC safely, only because it quietly  included a huge gas guzzler SUV— just in case.  The rest of us who can not afford an electric vehicle AND a gas powered SUV to visit grandma in Florida  can take note…

Secretary Granholm and the other participants for Gutteres’ Climate Summit will all surely arrive in New York via fossil fuel guzzling private jet or propeller airplanes, diesel powered helicopters, or gasoline powered  motorcades. Perhaps a few like Granholm (?) might drive up in the Ford 150 “Lightning” she had someone drive during her Tennessee trip.   

However, the difference between participant’s transportation and arrival  method will mean very little. All these vehicles still depend on fossil fuels —some by burning fuel directly under the hood— or others permitting the national electric grid to burn fossil fuels so electric vehicles may travel to a recharge site—and take a few hours out of the trip time to recharge their batteries. That is if that charging venue is even in existence in that rural town, is functioning, and not in use by others.   

Then too, let’s not forget that the nation’s electric grid is fossil fuel dependent to the tune of about 73% of the power it uses.   But the owners and drivers of these “green” vehicles will be happy to inform you that even with that “73% problem” they try to ignore —electric vehicles do produce about 15% less carbon “footprint” than a gas driven one. (Though those numbers do not include the “carbon costs” of recycling the old vehicle, and building and transporting the new electric vehicles.) That 15% seems small potatoes to me.

But that is not all. These climate participants will drive into the City on roadways paved with asphalt-a thick gooey by-product of the fossil fuel industry. The “rubber” tires of their motorcars or electric vehicles are made from fossil fuels too. The automobiles themselves are colorized with paints from fossil fuels, and use metals extracted from ores by fossil fuels, then  wrought into useable iron and copper and aluminum by fossil fuel furnaces. The plastic that makes up much of the modern low weight vehicles themselves is all derived from petroleum. The automotive seats and the interiors are finished with fabrics, cushioning and “faux” leather all chemically generated products sourced from fossil fuels. 

 The well dressed participants are likely wearing fossil-fuel-derived footwear (soles and uppers), Their clothing is likely heavy with petroleum derived rayon, nylon, polyester and even faux leather belts to hold up their pants—or skirts. Even the underwear participants are wearing —even if it is composed of natural silk or cotton, the threads that hold it together are polyester and dependent upon fossil-fuel-derived-chemicals. The female participants will primp and powder their  faces, line their eyes and color their lips with cosmetics—all which use petroleum too. 

These folks are all arriving with the express purpose of denigrating  and eliminating all these existentially essential and ubiquitous products we use daily and are surrounded with. Their plans call for us all to give up all of these products and work-saving systems  we are so familiar and dependent upon.  

Ignoring these facts they are gratified and content to think of themselves as being the nation’s most intelligent, progressive, “scientific”do gooders.  Then they will go home —to their fossil fuel heated abode, composed of fossil fuel derived, sourced and transported materials. They will rest their heads and fall into a peaceful dream-filled sleep on a fluffy Latex Dunlop  foam pillow, and stretch out on a Gel Foam and Memory Foam mattress (all derived from petroleum). They will sleep away soundly, blithely unaware they are living in a fossil fuel world, a world so completely dominated by the one product they so ferociously want to eliminate. With even its pollution— a fossil product.   Sadly they ignore history and reality. All our food, all transportation, our supply chains of fuels, goods,clothes, our manufacturing sector our entire economy depends on fossil fuels..

Humans have long ago lived through the Stone Age—the Copper Age—the Bronze Age—and Iron Age.  Eighty years ago we quickly passed through the “Coal Age”.  And like it or not— we all now live in the Age of Petroleum.  

The Petroleum Age gave us so many advantages. Its huge energy source enabled us to ignore the fearful  prognostications of Malthus’ trap or population bomb— to produce— via petrochemicals and raw energy—more and more  food—so that our human population has surged above the 8 billion mark.  We grew fat and happy  with billions of more mouths to feed, and more and more mineral extraction industries and more manufactured materials to sell to our surging populations.  

But the poison pit within the luciouos fruit of our system is that: each person on Earth requires the equivalent of about 13 bbl petroleum each year—every year of their life—to live in our high tech world. Thus each one of us and every added human produces so much more carbon dioxide to enter our atmosphere and cause warming.   We did it with our technology and our fecundity.     

Like the Granholm Great American Electric Road Trip, the UN Climate Summit is  “only for ‘window dressing’ purposes”.  It will solve no problems. Make no breakthroughs. pWe are not ready to turn back the clock to the age of rubbing sticks together for warmth, or walking south to visit grandma in Florida. 

Our petroleum dependent economy will require changes that will take a long, long time to occur.  It can not be put in place overnight. The necessary new technology, new industries and new ideas will require a vibrant powerful—fossil fueled—economy—not one limping along in scarcity and decline.  

 The necessary changes must be an evolutionary change..our very existence and survival insists on it.     

RAGWEED SEASON IS HERE!

 September 7, 2023

Ragweed, a common, invasive, unspecialized weed-pest, which like the human species, survives and thrives on its fecundity and invasiveness. 

Ragweed (Ambrosia artemisiifolia) is a native, annual plant which grows to almost a meter (3 ft) tall and which, due to its rapid growth, seems to appear as if by magic in late summer.  Its leaves are  characteristic and set it apart.  The often 3-6 inch long, lance-shaped (in outline) “toothy looking”leaves are wider at the base than at the tip and are deeply lobed. When grown in the shade the leaves take on a fern-like appearance. In general, viewed from a distance they do give a ‘raggedy’  appearance. I presume its original common name was “ragged weed”, only later was the name modified to “rag weed”.  The stems are hairy and may turn pink later in the season. The plants terminate in a green granular spike of tiny green flowers.  Staminate (male) flowers form on the upper part of the spike. These appear as down-turned, green “cups” which form the copious yellow pollen in the late summer or early fall. Any disturbance to the plant at these times generates the release of a cloud of yellow dust (pollen) which drifts off in each current of air.  Ragweed attracts no bees or butterflies—it produces so much wind born pollen that it assures itself and the  species of more than adequate pollination.  This is one reason why it is so common in the urban environment—it can grow in low humidity, poor acid soils, and it needs no wild insect pollinators. Each plant which emerges in the spring can produce tens of thousands of tough woody coated tiny seeds by fall. The seeds have no particular dispersal adaptations except their tough coat which permits them to lie dormant and viable in the soil for tens of years. They are so numerous that moving soil, animal burrowing, natural soil movements, and human activities (soil adhering to boots or vehicle tires) disperse them effectively.

 

Ragweed is not nearly as common as the near ubiquitous, invasive and closely related species: Mugwort ( Artemisia vulgaris) which it closely resembles. As noted above, the leaves of Ragweed have a fern like shape while those of Mugwort are aromatic when crushed and of a simple palmate (hand) shape

Ragweed was the first plant species I learned to identify.That may be because it was the most common weed pest in the empty building lots and waste places of Brooklyn, NY in the 1950-60s. Then too, it’s “ragweed” name is so appropriate, it was easy to identify. The leaf shape does make the plant look like a “ragged weed”. 

Another reason is that this plant is one of the few tough enough to grow prolifically in a building-shadowed urban environment. Ragweed seeds often  sprout from cracks in a concrete sidewalk, or an uncared for patch of  barren soil, or just about anyplace where a teaspoon of soil in a mortar gap in a brick wall give their seeds a toe hold to germinate. That is all it needs. 

On my daily walk today, I counted 59 individual plants of Ragweed in a one-meter wide by one-mile long (1.6 Km) grass-border of the Brookhaven Rail Path. This linear area of about 1,600 sq meters is mowed only irregularly.  In this strip, grass species had grown to a height of 8-10 inches.  Other species observed, included Toad Flax (Linaria vulgaris), Queen Anne’s Lace, Bush Clover or Lespedeza, White Sweet Clover, and most commonly, Mugwort (Artemesia sp), and others. The count of  59 plants per 1600 square meters seems unimpressive—but even at low numbers Ragweed has a great impact on its surroundings, due to its impressive pollen and seed production.  (Note: on September 10—I counted 310 Ragweed specimens in a one meter wide, 1.6 Km  strip in a more infrequently mowed area than above. I noted too, that only a few of these more common plants were producing pollen at this date.) 

Many of the Ragweed plants I counted today (Sept 7) had mature staminate flowers. These appear as a sprinkling of tiny gold particles scattered over the green, upright flower spike. Each one I touched released a cloud of yellow pollen. Of the 59 plants I counted today, perhaps one-third, or about 20 were producing pollen.  Botanists claim that each plant may produce as many as a million pollen grains per day.  Each grain is only about 20 micrometers in diameter.  (A micrometer or μm is: one, one-millionth of a meter.  (Imagine the meter stick (about one yard long). It has one thousand subdivisions (or millimeters), each millimeter (mm) is about the thickness of your fingernail. If you divide one millimeter 1000 times, each of these smaller subdivisions is a micrometer (μm).  Think of 20 micrometers as about the diameter of a Ragweed pollen grain. Such tiny grains are so small that they may remain lofted in the air for long periods of time. and thus travel even hundreds of miles from their source. So today September 7, the Ragweed pollen season begins.  

These pollen grains, naturally serve to pollinate other Ragweed plants. But the enormous number of ragweed pollen grains also affect other species too. The tiny grains can act as air-borne allergens.  When humans  come in contact with this pollen—they may respond with an allergic reaction—such as: runny nose, tearing eyes, cough, even skin reactions such as hives and rashes. About 23 million Americans are said to be allergic to Ragweed pollen.  Those who are allergic may also react to certain common foods. In particular, those closely related to  Ragweed, may generate an allergic reaction.  Ragweed is a member of the Asteraceae Family (i.e. Aster, or Daisy family). So chamomile, sunflower seeds, artichokes, may trigger an oral or systemic reaction as a result of what is termed an “oral allergy syndrome”.  (Some claim other fruits or vegetables not closely related, such as mangos or cucumbers may induce a response as well, but I suspect these may arrive in you kitchen simply contaminated with ragweed pollen),

Pollen  season begins in late August or early September and lasts into November.  Unlike certain tree pollen allergies, such as oak pollen in the north and certain pine pollen in southern states, Ragweed is ubiquitous—and is found in every state in the Union. (Although in Alaska, and Hawaii, Ragweed is found but is not very common, and thus are havens for Ragweed sufferers.)