Monday Open Thread
Welcome to your Monday open thread. How many of you are enjoying a three day weekend? Today is President’s Day, celebrating George Washington’s and Abraham Lincoln’s birthdays. Is anything else on your mind?
Some new studies are finding strong links between global warming and extreme weather events.
One group of researchers looked at the strongest rain and snow events of each year from 1951 to 1999 in the Northern Hemisphere and found that the more recent storms were 7 percent wetter. That may not sound like much, but it adds up to be a substantial increase, said the report from a team of researchers from Canada and Scotland.
The study didn’t single out specific storms but examined worst-of-each-year events all over the Northern Hemisphere. While the study ended in 1999, the close of the decade when scientists say climate change kicked into a higher gear, the events examined were similar to more recent disasters: deluges that triggered last year’s deadly floods in Pakistan and in Nashville, Tenn., and this winter’s paralyzing blizzards in parts of the United States.
The atmosphere is now holding 4% more moisture, which is expected of a warmer atmosphere. A second study also showed a global warming link to a specific event.
The British study focused on flooding in England and Wales in the fall of 2000. The disaster cost more than $1.7 billion in insured damages and was the wettest autumn for the region in more than 230 years of record-keeping.
The authors found that the flood was more likely when greenhouse gases were included in computer simulations than without.
“In two out of three cases we found around a doubling of risk,” said Allen.
Thismisman issue that we will continue to ignore as a nation, after all there are still public workers out there receiving pensions.
Wisconsin’s new governor Scott Walker was endorsed by a few unions – the firefighters and the state police. They were specifically exempted from the union-busting part of the budget proposal. However, they released the following in a press release (sorry the all caps is from their press release, yes they’re yelling at everyone):
I SPECIFICALLY REGRET THE ENDORSEMENT OF THE WISCONSIN TROOPER’S ASSOCIATION FOR GOVERNOR SCOTT WALKER. I REGRET THE GOVERNOR’S DECISION TO “ENDORSE” THE TROOPERS AND INSPECTORS OF THE WISCONSIN STATE PATROL. I REGRET BEING THE RECIPIENT OF ANY OF THE PERCIEVED BENEFITS PROVIDED BY THE GOVERNOR’S ANNOINTING.
I THINK EVERYONE’S JOB AND CAREER IS JUST AS SIGNIFICANT AS THE OTHERS. EVERYONES FAMILY IS JUST AS VALUABLE AS MINE OR ANY OTHER PERSONS, ESPECIALLY MINE. EVERYONES NEEDS ARE JUST AS VALUABLE. WE ARE ALL GREAT PEOPLE!!
The story gets more interesting – the WLEA has now taken down the unendorsement. Meanwhile the Greater Madison Chamber of Commerce has released a statement in support of the protesters.
Tags: Open Thread
Is Kos serious? To even read comments on the new dKos, even without logging in, you have to allow Google scripting to run and send your whole clickstream to Google?
Anybody else see the problem with Google knowing and storing which comments you read?
I don’t have a dkos account, otherwise I’d bitch and moan over there. But I used to enjoy reading the comments.
Another less scrutinized piece of Walker’s bill is examined here:
RT rortybomb – FYI #WIunion, Walker’s bill allows him to sell state energy assets with no-bids: http://t.co/E8KuDiS Good investment by Koch
No-bid fire sale of state-owned energy assets? yup, Koch is there. I read somewhere that there is a Delaware link to Koch. Did they own the Del. City refinery at some point?
Also, Theatre N is showing the movie “Inside Job” through the weekend with matinees and an evening show on Saturday. I hear this is the must see film for anyone who wants to know what happened on Wall Street/in the beltway to cause the current economic state of affairs.
Rick Jenson has to be the most vile liar on talk radio. He had to go to an unknown “news” station to misinform the public saying they are violent in Wisconsin. I have read a variety of blogs from Wisconsin and known them are reporting such nonsense. How does this man stay on the radio, does he actually believe we are all that dumb and ignorant of the facts. In fact, the police dept, put out a statement claiming the people are absolutely peaceful, cleaning up their trash etc, etc. No guns at these rallies. But if you listen to Jenson you might think he was talking about Libya not Wisconsin.
Rick Jenson has to be the most vile liar on talk radio.
Are you sure? That is a high bar.
Given his track record, the question is; why hasn’t Jensen moved up the wingnut noise machine food chain. He must be scratching his head and wondering WTF he needs to do to get noticed.
He’ll need more than his current listener base of 5 people to get his willingness to lie and personal insecurities noticed
Nancy: Koch bought the Lycra business from DuPont. Also purchased the DuPont Seaford plant, IIRC.
I just read that Detroit has to close half its schools. No money. That will mean 60 students per classroom. Yesterday I read that Illinois has to cut ALL funding for substance abuse treatment. The richest nation in the world and yet this what we do to our citizenry. America is on the fast track to significant decline.
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The public is welcome this Wednesday, Feb. 23, 2011 to hear speech by Globalist Editor-in-chief sponsored by UD’s Center for Political Communication
Breaking News: The largest sports franchise in the world, Manchester United Football Club, is now a Delaware company. The owners of the club started a parent company called Red Football LLC ,and located it in Delaware where there are no laws requiring details of ownership.
BTW, I’m surprised The News Journal is lagging on this one.
AFL-CIO Rally on Wednesday, Feb. 23 at noon. Wear Red and show up at 820 N. French Street. Some are leaving for Wisconsin to show support. Get the word out, please.
The problem in WI is the unwillingness to compromise. The teachers were willing to take financial cuts, to keep bargaining rights. If he was a smart polititian instead of a hack, he would leave the rights and take the cuts. He would gain political capital on both ends this way.