In the past few years fact upon fact has been presented to the people that we are screwing the planet up and apparently are willing to do nothing about solving the problem. The problems are so immense a starting point is hard to find. So let's just pick one problem and concentrate on what we are within our power to fix.
The Ocean is a good choice where the problems are easiest to see (at least some of them) . Up and down the shores of the Pacific die offs of all kinds of critters from shell fish to mammals are showing up our beaches. Species like sardines, anchovies, shrimp, oysters, crabs, seals, sea lions, tuna, sharks, whales are showing up dead.
In yesterdays post I showed you this graph
Now look at the surge upward since 1950, over 100ppm more today than just 65 years ago. I think few realize just what the effects of that huge increase has on the oceans. It raises the PH or the acidity of the ocean to levels that start to have detrimental effects particularly on hard bodied species like oysters and crabs. These effects can be seen by the naked eye but somethings we see only the after affect and scratch our heads as to why. Sardines for instance have all but disappeared with no absolute cause yet figured out.
Adding to water chemistry problems the ocean levels are rising along with the temperatures. On top of that usually warm water on our pacific coast has caused die offs along our shores. Fresh water pouring into the ocean from ice melting at our poles and glaciers which changes water chemistry in our most fragile northern waters.
The Pope's letter on the climate drew fiery phrases from the neocon non believers aided by the climate deniers club . Most of what the Pope pointed out were clearly common sense , but that's what must be missing from a lot of the world, no common sense.
Another post by my favorite Archdruid triggered this piece and he covers a lot more than just climate change. He touched on one of my favorite topics ,Education. A quote from his article follows: because recent “reforms” in the American public school system have replaced learning with rote memorization of disconnected factoids that are then regurgitated for multiple choice tests.
Common Core education is just that memorizing a lists and then plugging the right answer to the test question that was used to give you the facts. Many states are bailing out of this Arnie Duncan nightmare that has set education back decades.
The Druid comments on the bad decisions being made by our leaders I think points to our leaders not being able to think things thru to a logical conclusion. Depending on propaganda to cover their tracks. An example We attacked ISIS a force of 5000 we said, we then killed 10000 of them and now there are 20000 left. Math equal to their thinking ability.
Our latest Game of Thrones event , Ukraine where we led and funded a coup to cause Russia to do something stupid so we could go to war. Once again flawed logic led the day causing all of Asia to band together economically and military which has made our Tip to Asia undo able.
Once again our leaders were playing checker while Russia and China were playing chess.
You know we have messed up when our leading military minds to step right up and start talking a first strike nuclear event. I would suggest they take a good long look at the military capabilities of China and Russia. We are looking arrogant and stupid and most of the world sees it.
I would have to say the main problem is most people don't study or ask questions regarding anything, just listen to what they want to hear and say "It has happened before, so no big deal"! "There is nothing I can do about it" I will be dead before **** happens, so why should I worry about it"
ReplyDeleteThis apathy needs to be changed
Good point on education. Of course this was once again greedy people privatizing education curriculum to make money for themselves at the great expense of the public good. Greedy individuals have gotten away with this in the prison system and military.
ReplyDelete"They will think of something." Well said, I have heard that so many times. I translate that to mean "I see Rome burning and I don't want to talk about it."
Climate change is responsible for killing our oceans by raising the temperature and creating the largest ever toxic algae blooms. Fukushima nuclear waste is also if not more so responsible for the killing of our oceans.
Here is an article where a Fukishima employee was interviewed regarding ongoing radioactive water being released into the Pacific Ocean:
After The Media Has Gone: Fukushima, Suicide and the Legacy of 3.11
The Asia-Pacific Journal, Vol 10, Issue 19, No. 2
By Makiko Segawa
May 7, 2012
Continuous Dumping of Contaminated Water
Possibly angry at this situation, on April 21st a 62-year-old nuclear worker broke the silence on the continued leakage of contaminated water from Fukushima Daiichi. Speaking to me, he requested anonymity for fear of losing his job. He supervises a construction site aimed at building a new facility to extract radioactive materials such as cesium and strontium from the contaminated water used to cool the plant’s crippled reactors. He revealed that the current facility removes only cesium and that other radioactive materials such as strontium cannot be cleaned up.
He expressed astonishment at the scale of the cleanup operation. “You know how much contaminated water is stored at the Fukushima Daiichi site? It is 200,000 tons. It is an enormous amount!” “In reality,” he said, raising his voice, “it is impossible to store that much water on site. So, it is obvious that some of the contaminated water has been leaked into the ocean.”
“Everyone there knows that the amount of water is huge but does not speak about it. Anyone who works there understands that nothing can be done except to leak the water!” he stressed. “Everyone criticizes North Korea for its missiles. But what about Japanese morality? The contamination will spread all over the world, reaching to Kamchatka, Hawaii and the U.S. soon,” he added.
Toward the end of our conversation, he said, “You know, in Japan, there is ‘honne’ (honest feeling) and ‘tatemae’ (polite-face). “Our tatemae is that we are doing our utmost to stop the leakage of contamination, and our honnne is that we are dumping massive amounts of contaminated water into the ocean.”
June, 2015, and millions of gallons per day are still being leaked into the ocean and we don't even know what is happening inside the reactors. This is just the continual spraying to keep the rods cooled.
So our leaders focus on starting another world war instead of the environmental crisis. Well there is a lot of money in war. Maybe if we make carrying for our environment really profitable for the military manufactures, the prison privateers and the forest clear-cutters we could employ more people and do good in the world.
~Heidi