Our World and Everything in It

As a quarter million people flee the fires of the Santa Ana winds in southern California, Atlanta’s water supply dwindles and without relief will be gone by January, and floods and tornadoes have steadily pummeled the middle of our country. It’s a little obvious something’s up. Is it global warming and how worse can it get? A lot.

In light of all that’s happening, I searched global warming on the internet and there was a whole new cache of naysayers. Something set them off and I’m thinking it was Al Gore getting the Nobel Prize. I was a little surprised. I checked again today and the opposition has leveled off. Looks to me like the fossil fuel industry turned up the heat against going green. For a few days their bloggers put out a surge of propaganda like: Global warming is a U.N. conspiracy. Watching the news about California tonight, I don’t think so, and when are we going to start thinking about the other guys, especially other Americans?

Global warming affects the entire population of the world and everything in it. Isn’t it wiser to err on the side of caution if things aren’t certain? Besides what’s wrong with cleaning up after ourselves, the outcome of which would be:

The oil money that feeds terrorism will literally dry up.

We get away from fossil fuels for good. No more of the landscape will be destroyed with incessant stripping and drilling.

We could get agriculture involved. Instead of subsidizing them for loss, part of their land will be set aside for wind and solar farms bringing in alternative income.

A new economy gives everyone a chance at new jobs. New investments can be made in the stock market. New people will be able to offer new innovation to sustain us for years to come, creating more jobs.

Disease will dwindle. Clean up the air, earth, and water and possibly ease someone’s suffering.

Low utility bills or none at all. Trying to cut back on energy use, my last combined gas and electric bill fell even more. I paid $103.00 last month for my gas and electric. I’m home all day. The PC is going, TV is on, and an air cleaner. I haven’t taken everything off of standby yet…another TV, Roomba, printer, stereo, DVD player, etc. But by changing my light bulbs, unplugging the old fridge in the garage, adding two overhead fans in the house, regulating my window coverings, and hanging my laundry out on a line, what a difference!

Finally, if we do heat up all at once, chances are our power grids won’t hold up. So we’ll be miserable. Wouldn’t it be better to use that which is going to fry us to cool us? Solar energy could run our a/c units, keep the fridge going, and many other things like boil water.
 

Sorry about the last post. I pasted it from notepad and it still globbed all the paragraphs together. This is easier to read I’m sure. 

Not long ago I was reading about China and the fear of a Dengue Fever outbreak there. I heard of Dengue Fever but couldn’t recall anything about it. So I looked it up. It’s a painful disease that people can get from mosquitoes that can be fatal. Just the other day I open up my web browser and the front page was about a Dengue Fever outbreak racing through South America. South America is too close for comfort. I think it’s funny we’re not hearing anything about it here when its so bad there that there is fear of a pandemic.

Scientists said Dengue Fever is reaching record levels in South America and the Caribbean as the rainy season continues. Officials are doing whatever they can to curb the outbreak before it has an impact on the economy as tourists are reluctant to visit countries where they have to worry about mosquito bites. It was reported that hundreds of thousands of people have been afflicted and 200 have died from Dengue in South America. There is no vaccine, and virtually no cure. The problem is we aren’t hearing anything, so our health officials and doctors aren’t on the alert for it if someone does bring it here. My fear is that not long ago 9 states were under water from constant floods. The residual water laying around in stagnant pools just screams for mosquitoes and Dengue Fever.

The disease is also called Bone Break Fever because it causes intense pain in the joints. The article stated “A deadly hemorrhagic form, which also causes internal and external bleeding, accounts for less than 5 percent of cases but has shown signs of growing.” It’s feared that it will get worse because tourists and people moving about are passing around 4 different strains of the disease. A person might suffer and recover from one strain, but become exposed to another. When that happens, it becomes likely that person will develop the hemorrhagic form.

Over 630,000 people have suffered from Dengue in South America so far with over 12,000 getting the deadly hemorrhagic type. Dengue Fever has more than doubled in Mexico also at some of the most popular tourist destinations like Puerto Vallarta, Cancun, and Acapulco. 
It was thought Dengue Fever was almost irradicated until now. It’s causing serious health problems in the Dominican Republic and Puerto Rico right now. And the only way to keep it contained is for people to vigilantly use mosquito repellent which is almost impossible to get people to do all the time and everywhere.
Mosquito born diseases are on the rise world wide. DEET the best defense for controlling mosquito populations was banned years ago because it was found to cause birth defects and all types of problems for small children. There has been little else developed since to take its place, another thing I find odd. We can plan a new strategy for walking on the moon, create batteries from viruses, but no one has a replacement for DEET without all the side effects? 
Read more about Dengue Fever:
 http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070929/ap_on_re_la_am_ca/dengue_epidemic.
 

A really large article and headline made the front page of the Detroit Free Press entitled “Deadly Chain Reaction.” It is about predator/prey studies done on the Isle Royale on Lake Superior. The predator is the gray wolf and the prey is the moose. Moose populations are way down and not because of the wolves. Moose numbers are beginning to decline due to increased tick populations, which weaken them so they become easier prey to the wolves.

The big thing about the tick population on the rise is that it is due to global warming. Since 2000 the weather is hotter and hotter farther and farther north, and the hottest since this study began. Michigan Tech’s predator/prey study started in 1958 on Isle Royale and is the longest running predator/prey study in history. I did not know that. Researchers are up there all the time watching the wolves and moose.

The title of the article is what is important and what I’ve been trying to get across to anyone who simply thinks global warming does not affect him or her. It will sooner or later. This is an example for the hunting industry. We don’t like to disturb money making industries in Michigan because our economy is already so bad, but if we do not start thinking of the environment over the energy bill, or the car industry, or the hunting industry, global warming just may go full circle and force the issue.

The tick/moose problem is an example. So much for moose hunting soon. One poor moose can have up to 100,000 ticks on itself. They suck the moose’s blood, weakening the animal. The moose bites at itself and has more bare patches than fur so it cannot withstand the cold in the winter or the scorch of summer. Scientists have yet to come up with anything that is effective against the tick populations. Many other migratory animals have changed behavior due to warmer weather here in Michigan also.

Maybe this isn’t enough of a wake up call for the residents of Michigan yet, but it should be, along with those 6 twisters, and what was described as the weirdest lightening many have ever seen, including my 84-year-old mother. She is not afraid of storms. She told me lightening struck my grandparents home when she was young. Nothing was grounded then, and she remembers balls of fire rolling across the floor. But she says this weekend’s lightening was strange and intense. I was out of town but friends and my mother described it as sizzling, sideways, straight up and down and all the way to the ground. 

All I can say, and have been saying is that global warming will affect everyone before too long and it isn’t going to be pretty. Ticks and tornadoes today, viruses and the return of many diseases for people and pets tomorrow. Michigan is too wooded; too wet an environment to not have deep freezes in the winter necessary to kill off things like ticks and mosquitoes. I feel bad for Mr. Moose. What a horrible way to die. I can’t stand the itch from poison ivy, let alone leach like creatures stuck all over siphoning blood. What happens if and when the ticks spread to people like the one that causes Lyme disease? I’ve already heard about the return of Cholera in parts of India. And I know that more deaths are caused worldwide by water born sources than anything else. Michigan with all of its water will be one big scientific experiment if our weather continues to get warmer year round. The hunting industry may be one of the first to be effected. It certainly is a bad and deadly chain reaction.

     There are all types of casualties we endure on a daily basis especially during times of war. Losing someone or something precious can happen moment to moment. And although our lives are upset to the point we don’t think we’ll recover, we do. I just wonder how many people realize the biggest casualty of all is happening in small increments every day that none of us will recover from if we don’t turn it around.

Our environment is taking hit after hit, and many of us still do not know that when it’s stated we have 10 years to do something, it does not mean we have ten years before we start doing something. It means if we do not start today toward reversing global warming by controlling our pollution it will be irreversible within 10 years. It’s a good idea to control pollution to begin with. By all the water bottles I see these days, I realize that everyone does get the idea that maybe our water isn’t all that clean, and probably our air.  What I also see by those same water bottles is that we really aren’t getting it at all. Where do you think those plastic bottles go? If your community recycles that’s great. If you recycle on your own, then bless you, but unfortunately only 70% of all our garbage is recycled. Those bottles end up in landfills of which there are approximately 6000 in the U.S.  Plastic takes around 500 years to decompose. Do we love our children, grandchildren, and great grandchildren? Then what are we doing?

The intent of this news blog is to be in your face about our world because we’re all in this together, and if you or my other neighbors don’t jump in and help, the experience of living won’t be what we once knew. Right now it is what it is “An Inconvenient Truth” as Al Gore aptly named it. Many of our little conveniences in life may have to be abandoned to save our earth, save ourselves. It’s a rude awakening, but the sooner we snap out of it, the sooner we turn it around. No more burying our heads in the sand or waiting for “they or them” to do something. They or them is us, all of us.

Anyone who has any questions about anything environmental feel free to blog. If you know something you don’t think the rest of us are aware of blog it. If you don’t quite believe in global warming yet let us know why. Anyone who has already adapted his or her lifestyle differently to save on anything let us know how, so we might adapt. One idea becomes a ripple that becomes a wave and the whole community benefits.

None of us are perfect angels about the environment. I still drive a gas hog, although I’m looking at all hybrids and beseeching Ford to revive the cobra body style with an electric/ethanol motor. I’m a baby boomer that wants a hybrid sports car. Any baby boomers out there want to weigh in on that? Doesn’t an environmentally friendly sports car sound good? My tip to any other gas hog drivers out there, consolidate your running around. I’m down to 2 days per week. Group up and ride to work together. Quit running your kids around and enjoy family nights. Quitting our rat race can help the environment.