10/16/2019
By Michael Raffety
Brooklyn Democrat Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez says we have only 10 years left before global warming brings on the end of time. To prevent catastrophic flooding and heat, she says we must give up airplanes, farting cows and automobiles, but instead build transcontinental high speed trains. This in a nutshell is the “Green New Deal.” I assume it also means travel to Europe or Hawaii by ship only. Not sure why AOC doesn’t take the Acela train from New York to Washington D.C. It avoids taking a cab to La Guardia or JFK and going through TSA security, though as a member of Congress AOC probably gets to go through the same screening line as flight crews.
The last time we went to D.C. we took the train from New York. It’s a much pleasanter way to travel and you get to see what an economic disaster is the main part of Baltimore.
Actually, there is less time left before the global warming apocalypse.
In the Oct. 14 Wall Street Op Ed page was a small item titled Notable & Quotable, a regular column that appears from time to time. In this case it quoted the London Observer from Feb. 21, 2004.
“Climate change over the next 20 years could result in a global catastrophe costing millions of lives in wars and natural disasters.
“A secret report, suppressed by U.S. defense chiefs and obtained by the Observer, warns that major European cities will be sunk beneath rising seas as Britain is plunged into a ‘Siberian’ climate by 2020. Nuclear conflict, mega-droughts, famine and widespread rioting will erupt across the world.”
It concluded with an even shorter time period: “As early as next year [2005] widespread flooding by a rise in sea levels will create major upheavals for millions.”
We are three months away from 2020 and so far England hasn’t turned into the new Siberia and Europe isn’t sinking. The last time we visited London it was experiencing a “drought,” meaning it had gone two weeks without rain.
Of course, the Dutch are largely below sea level and live on lot of land reclaimed courtesy of their dike system and windmills pumping out water seepage. Miami keeps complaining about rising seas, but they have built on sand right along the water edge. Bet their problem is they’re losing beaches because of the high-rise luxury condos.
Speaking of sand, there’s a reason that hotels in Palm Springs are limited to five stories. Everything there is built on sand. I watched equipment across the street from our hotel digging deep for a foundation for a building. There was nothing but sand at the bottom of that pit.
The Pentagon said in about 2004 we had 20 years left, which put the apocalypse at 2024, though the horrors of the pre-apocalypse would take place next year, 2020. Obviously that aint going to happen. So, AOC has reset the end of time for 10 years from now 2029.
I don’t know why she bothered and why every Democrat candidate says global warming is an “existential threat.” I thought Barack Obama already said he had calmed the seas and ended their rise as he stood in front of a Greek columned façade.
What’s happening with the real weather? Last month I recorded 1.35 inches of rain, compared to the 146-year average of 0.53 inch. The highest September rainfall was 4.19 inches in 1918.The average high in September was 83.6 compared to the 18-year average of 86.6. The average low last month was 58.6 compared to the 18-year average of 57.9. There is no discernible trend in average temperatures. Some years in September they are in the 90s and some years they are in the low 80s.
Our generator has been running since Wednesday after my electrician Jim Young showed up in the morning to replace a dead battery and found a wire had come loose that was key to keeping the battery recharged. Today, Thursday our phone service is kaput. I called AT&T. After speaking to an actual representative I found that AT&T was depending on generators to keep its lines operating and one of its generators had run out of gas. Golly willigers, the El Dorado Irrigation District is making sure its generators are gassed up. They don’t want to run out of water or halt sewer plant operations. Near Safeway and Save Mart on Missouri Flat Road I saw a huge Veerkamp Construction Vactor truck obviously sucking out sewage from a sewage booster pump serving those areas. That’s the EID staff working every angle to make sure service continues with the aid of a lot of generators authorized long before other districts began to panic. Still the continued service depends on all customers conserving.
Since the phone company can’t maintain its landline service I am copying this column to a disk and bringing it into the Mountain Democrat since my modem is connected to the dead landline.
michaelraffety 