November Rain

A Return To Blogalia

Now where was I?

This summer I was busy researching for various lectures, and writing Amazine, my Mets blog, which really took off. During the World Series I helped WFAN producer Ray Martel (who reads Amazine as it turns out) pull together an historic interview with Tigers' pitcher Mickey Lolich. Ray is a great guy, we talked several times. He read my Lolich piece in Amazine and figured I was the only man in the world who knew where Lolich was. Even major league baseball doesn't know apparently. As it turns out, I did, and set up the contact. By the way, Mickey called me and said not to give out that number ever again, so I ripped it up. I will tell that whole story later on. It was an historic moment in sports journalism.

On Tuesday, October 31st, I spent the whole day creating a huge marionette puppet theater on a porch in Fishkill to scare the kids on Halloween. Over a hundred kids came to answer questions from the Talking Pumpkin and win candy, and be scared by moving objects. There was a Mets fan in a black coffin that tapped his fingers on the coffin waiting for next year. I have photos somewhere. And there was a floating pumpkin, lit from the inside, and a cloth pumpkin that rose up out of the mail box, and an old Hopi elder rocking in a rocking chair smoking a cigar. There was also a spider who lowered down and rang a bell. Some kids were so scared they ran away without getting any candy. Also a witty conversation with the minister of the church down the street on Biblical characters.

I also had a great coaching session with AB, and gave her the Magic Flute vocal score as a present.

On Wednesday, November 1st, All Saints Day, I did research on all the Global Warming news coming out of the UK, and put together some stuff.

On Thursday night, November 2nd, Day of the Dead, I created a powerpoint about Gordon Brown and the UK Green Revolution. I attended the current edition of my brainchild "Citizenship Thinktank" for the only time this year, and Dan was there. We watched a great Bill Moyers segment on sweatshops. I presented my short powerpoint on Gordon Brown and "Bush's Worst Nightmares" (7 of them, I will post later, most of it about global warming) and then the longer one on the beginnings of slavery. Dan and Dawn gave me a ride to my car.

Friday, November 3rd, again, working away at the index, getting as much of that to email offto Oklahoma as I could before Canada. I had heard some Native Americans rumoring that Bush would set off some kind of global disaster and declare martial law if the elections were going badly. Kind of a crazy idea, but I took it seriously, because they were going badly for him, and put at least some of my house in order.

Last weekend I was in Ottawa for the 93rd birthday of William Commanda, and I sang happy birthday for him (an unofficial version, naturally I wouldn't violate anyone's copyright laws) with his daughter Evelyn on stage. Over cake I showed her my letter from Chirac. She didn't see the signature and was reading it in French, and while translating, said to me, "It seems you have touched this man's heart very deeply with what you have written." Tommy said, "It's Jacques Chirac..." "Who?" "You know, the President of France. That's who wrote it."

I also attended the Water-Life Conference sponsored by Commanda's Circle of All Nations, and met some really fascinating people. Several there had organized cross country walks for raising awareness about water, one man had canoed across Canada. During the seminar, news came out that Domtar was planning to expand their damming operations on Chaudiere Falls.

I caught a cold while being detained briefly by customs people near Montreal, and it got worse over the weekend, and was particularly bad going through customs on the other end. The highlight of the trip (I am being facetious) was sitting up in a chair for three hours in the Montreal bus station being forced to listen to elevator music until dawn. I got back to Poughkeepsie on Monday and the class had a session on global warming and other current events.

Tuesday November 7th I voted early at my local church, and an old friend was working there. I went to Poughkeepsie for errands and it looked good for the dems, but I had no idea how good. I was keeping a close eye on it. I saw some middle aged Republican-looking business men walking aimlessly along the highway, I guessed at the time that they were trying to find their polling place. Now I wonder if they got advanced word of the Democratic sweep and were contemplating jumping under a truck.

I went to a friend's house to watch TV and watched the New Jersey channel and followed the Menendez election, which looked to me like evidence the Hispanic vote just jumped to the Democrats. Things really didn't start hopping til 10PM, and then it was pretty exciting. I watched the whole thing until 2 AM, or later. I was truly astounded. A great moment in history. It was a revolution with no leader, no media hype no ideology or dogma, just a sea change, a groundswell of individuals all following their intuition. This is what some political theorists (Naomi Klein) a few years ago called the leaderless cell, and predicted it would bring down Bush sooner or later. They say Hillary had alot to do with key upset races in the senate, namely Whitehouse upsetting Lincoln Chafee and Webb in Virginia, but I think it was more than that, I think it was a miracle of democracy in action. To say the system works is a little hasty, but it sounds nice on the tongue. We'll see what happens over the next two years.

I also had a very creative coaching session with budding opera star AB. I had her sing chromatic, whole tone, and diminished scales while I improvized impressionistic chords on the piano behind her notes. She sounded wonderful. We also went through Queen of the Night several times. The scales helped.

Wednesday November 8th, I taught class and led global warming discussion, which was one of the best, really eye-opening. Then a student asked what President Bush had said to the nation about this impending crisis, I said, "nothing really,except that it doesn't exist." And then I explained about the Luntz memo of 2000, and how that shifted the course of history concerning global warming. I asked if anyone wanted to watch Will Ferrell's faux interview as Bush, speaking to the nation on global warming (in the absence of any real interview by Bush) and they were very insistent on seeing. I showed it at the end after some usual technical delays, and the next professor came in during my time as he often does, and did not look amused. I thought it was totally appropriate as an ending to a very substantial class.
I asked both classes if other profs were leading them in discussions about global warming, and only one student said yes.
In the evening I coached Karioke Karen in a wonderful three hour recording session at No Parking Studios with Dean Jones as engineer. Everything went near perfect and Karen recorded five songs. The mixing still needs to be done. There were some emotionally satisfying moments for all three of us musically. K is a natural on the Supremes songs and I suggested we use Momma Told Me (Love Takes Time) as the first cut. More next week!

Thursday November 9th, took a relaxing walk in the warm sun, and then made it to the bank and the post office just in time to pay bills. Then more indexing, etc. on Native New Yorkers.

Friday November 10th, slept in to try to cure persistent flu symptoms, got to school and had great class outside, another warm day. We were on sidewalk, and it was time for me to do my chalk talk creation of Stonehenge, and was able to draw the diagram on the pavement in chalk, in alignment with the sunset as it was actually happening! That was a once in a lifetime opportunity, I suppose, and I really enjoyed it! When the sun actually went down, it got cold and so everyone wanted to come in, which was fine. I needed the black of the blackboard on the wall to show the patterns of stars on the horizon, so it worked out perfectly.

I worked on the index and powerpoint until all hours.

Saturday November 11th 2006, I went to see the Bob Dylan exhibit at the Morgan Library with a musical friend, and it was quite comprehensive. Then I went to see a revival of Theo Harder's musical "The Marriage Broker." She was there, and came in sitting behind me. When it was over she took a bow to great applause.
I hadn't seen her in a while, and I turned around to applaud her. She stared at me and said, "Evan?" And reached out to shake my hand in the middle of her composer bow. She said, "I'm so happy that you've come!" She came and sat with me and we talked music and I told her I thought the play was ingenious and so was the music. Actress Beth Holland sat in front of me. Later, the Musical Matchmaker in the musical, played by Woody Regan, told me he had actually matched her and her husband together and he played at their wedding, and that qualified him to play Cupid in this magical theater piece somewhat along the lines of Waiting For Godot, in that the entire piece involves a female usher and back up rehearsal pianist and a customer waiting for the star to arrive. The star never arrives, but the amount of fictional detail in the ruse is terribly imaginative as it unfolds. By the end, you realize that most of the people you thought were in the cast never existed.

Then it was time to get back home, very late of course.

Sunday November 12th I spent in the lab and the library, working on the Native New Yorkers index and got it down to five letters. That took most of the day. I also worked on a power point for an upcoming presentation on the native history of waterways around Manhattan, but found I did not have a copy of an earlier overlapping powerpoint, so I had to stop. I called my son and told him I had a dream where he wrote a novel that was published and it looked alot like The Fountainhead (which I'd bought him in Chicago, appropriately enough) It was a thick paperback with small pages. There was a characture of him on the back, some exaggeration, but flattering. The title was "The Wisdom of Baseball." He said in fact he was working on a novel, which I didn't know. He added that if he ever used that title, it would be years down the road. I thought it would be a good retitling for my Mythobaseballogy, the meaning of which escapes most readers.

I saw Igor and he said his Political Thought website is active again, and that Dan B was involved. We talked about Joe Lieberman and his unusual overthrow of a Democrat.

November 13th, 2006, four days until the 56th anniversary of the enthronement of the Dalai Lama, in case you were planning to celebrate it. November 17th falls on a Friday this year, I hope it is a portal for further transformation of our nation and all our people. I showed the movie Kundun to my class today, the life of the Dalai Lama, which included that fact. I had a talk with Louie McCroskey about Egypt and the civil rights movement after class. He seemed tired; basketball season is just days away.

Earlier today worked on the powerpoint on Manhattan waterways, and the pieces finally started to fall together, as I found themissing material. I gave Louie (my neighbor) a jump start, he seemed in a really good mood.

April 18th, Gaia Conspiracy Continues

The Gaia Conspiracy Continues
By Evan Pritchard

Two different sets of facts are beginning to emerge in the media concerning Global Warming; one, that it is really happening, and two, that there really is a cover-up about it really happening. Of course the media plays this game where it cooperates with the cover-up until a certain point, and then it reports on those people covering it up, in a sense, reporting on its own reporting. The Washington Post, however has taken a courageous stance of late and has outed lots of closet greens.

Here is the Washington Post article on the cover-up of James Hansen. It is quite remarkable on how critical it is of the Bush administration, and with what placement. This tone has continued during this past week unabated.

Climate Researchers Feeling Heat From White House
By Juliet Eilperin
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, April 6, 2006; Page A27
Scientists doing climate research for the federal government say the Bush administration has made it hard for them to speak forthrightly to the public about global warming. The result, the researchers say, is a danger that Americans are not getting the full story on how the climate is changing.
Employees and contractors working for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, along with a U.S. Geological Survey scientist working at an NOAA lab, said in interviews that over the past year administration officials have chastised them for speaking on policy questions; removed references to global warming from their reports, news releases and conference Web sites; investigated news leaks; and sometimes urged them to stop speaking to the media altogether. Their accounts indicate that the ideological battle over climate-change research, which first came to light at NASA, is being fought in other federal science agencies as well.
These scientists -- working nationwide in research centers in such places as Princeton, N.J., and Boulder, Colo. -- say they are required to clear all media requests with administration officials, something they did not have to do until the summer of 2004. Before then, point climate researchers -- unlike staff members in the Justice or State departments, which have long-standing policies restricting access to reporters -- were relatively free to discuss their findings without strict agency oversight.
"There has been a change in how we're expected to interact with the press," said Pieter Tans, who measures greenhouse gases linked to global warming and has worked at NOAA's Earth System Research Laboratory in Boulder for two decades. He added that although he often "ignores the rules" the administration has instituted, when it comes to his colleagues, "some people feel intimidated -- I see that."
Christopher Milly, a hydrologist at the U.S. Geological Survey, said he had problems twice while drafting news releases on scientific papers describing how climate change would affect the nation's water supply.
Once in 2002, Milly said, Interior officials declined to issue a news release on grounds that it would cause "great problems with the department." In November 2005, they agreed to issue a release on a different climate-related paper, Milly said, but "purged key words from the releases, including 'global warming,' 'warming climate' and 'climate change.' "
Administration officials said they are following long-standing policies that were not enforced in the past. Kent Laborde, a NOAA public affairs officer who flew to Boulder last month to monitor an interview Tans did with a film crew from the BBC, said he was helping facilitate meetings between scientists and journalists.
"We've always had the policy, it just hasn't been enforced," Laborde said. "It's important that the leadership knows something is coming out in the media, because it has a huge impact. The leadership needs to know the tenor or the tone of what we expect to be printed or broadcast."
Several times, however, agency officials have tried to alter what these scientists tell the media. When Tans was helping to organize the Seventh International Carbon Dioxide Conference near Boulder last fall, his lab director told him participants could not use the term "climate change" in conference paper's titles and abstracts. Tans and others disregarded that advice.
None of the scientists said political appointees had influenced their research on climate change or disciplined them for questioning the administration. Indeed, several researchers have received bigger budgets in recent years because President Bush has focused on studying global warming rather than curbing greenhouse gases. NOAA's budget for climate research and services is now $250 million, up from $241 million in 2004.
The assertion that climate scientists are being censored first surfaced in January when James Hansen, who directs NASA's Goddard Institute for Space Studies, told the New York Times and The Washington Post that the administration sought to muzzle him after he gave a lecture in December calling for cuts in emissions of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases. (NASA Administrator Michael D. Griffin issued new rules recently that make clear that its scientists are free to talk to members of the media about their scientific findings and to express personal interpretations of those findings.
Two weeks later, Hansen suggested to an audience at the New School University in New York that his counterparts at NOAA were experiencing even more severe censorship. "It seems more like Nazi Germany or the Soviet Union than the United States," he told the crowd.

The Missing Piece


This is in addition to the Gaia coverup follies I reported on last week. There has been at least one major breaking story every day. I’m sure that its all planned that way for our entertainment. But through all this expose extravaganza, one big chunk is yet to be uncovered by the mainstream, and that is Lovelock’s new book, Revenge of Gaia. I discussed this book in my just released article in the April – May issue of NY Spirit, “Earth In Crisis” (with William Meyers) in some detail, based on reviews, and interviews, and it turns out, seems to be the only mention in print in the United States of this book.

Why do reports on ice sheets melting and glaciers vanishing and NASA administrators being tortured like Allied spies in Nazi Germany get coverage, but Revenge of Gaia does not? Why the special treatment? Because its good? In fact, that’s probably part of it….. It’s true, and the truer it is the worse it is and the greater the liability. Is just like the movie The Insider with Russell Crowe, who is probably on the phone to his agent right now saying, “I didn’t get an oscar statue for playing Jeffry Wygand (big tobacco’s leading whistle blower) . Let me do James Hansen!”

I traveled to Canada to obtain an imported copy of “Revenge of Gaia” from England, and it was expensive and was selling out. If you go on AmazonUK and pay by credit card in Sterling Pounds, it will probably come out to about $35, maybe more. It might be a good investment in the future. But by the time it arrives, the CE levels might have gone up five points.

One thing some people won’t like about the book is that it is strongly in favor of Nuclear power plants. He makes a good case, but he comes off sounding a bit biased. In fact, on Easter Sunday, Greenpeace founder Patrick Moore published an article in the Washington Post (who is breaking a lot of these stories these days) saying that he was wrong about nuclear power, and that it is the only way to replace coal based generators. I will include that article later. So that particular obstacle to the book’s acceptance is quickly dwindling, because in fact, he’s right. There have been no significant incidents involving nuclear power in the US; three mile island was a close call, but protective measures did their job. And yet no nuclear plants have been built in the US since the 1980s. This has meant trillions of dollars for the coal companies and for big oil. Coal generators also produce 36 percent of US emissions, 10% of global emissions as well. There are 600 coal fired electric plants in the US, which is 600 too many.

But that’s not why the Lovelock book is blacked out. It is a missing person because it mentions blue green algae and we aren’t supposed to know about that slimy little secret here in the US. The situation with blue green algae approaches a kind of sketchy certainty (within a huge ball park the size of the earth) one which demands specific actions which will mean less billions for oil companies and coal companies. Apparently cars are more important than people.

You see, little blue green algae don’t like cars, or at least what comes out of cars. Why do we care about a bunch of slimes? They outnumber us. And they run the planet, not us.

Carbon emissions were at about 89 ppm before the industrial revolution. They are now at about 390 ppm and rising steadily. Temperatures have risen about 2.7 degrees centigrade globally since then, (from about 56o F to about 60 o F) although people argue over this, but the temperatures are also rising steadily, some say in lock step with CE levels. This is in spite of blue green algae all over the world which has been busy trying to suck in CEs and keep the temperature down as well. According to a number of different computer models of climate dynamics, when the CEs reach 500 ppm, the temperature will reach 16o Centigrate, or about 62o F, and the blue green algae all over the world will die. This is a slight oversimplification, but that’s what the math tells us. Even with a margin of error of 10% we are still in trouble, especially if we end up on the short side of that 10%.

The algae will die mainly because the increased heat will create an ocean layer of warm water that algae can’t live in, too thick for the light to reach the algae. This will happen to varying degrees at various latitudes, in fact it is already happening. Just recently there are reports of blue green algae disappearing in the northern oceans. Just letting you know.

Running a climate without algae is like running an engine without coolant. According to the models, when the algae crashes, the temperature soars from 16C to 24C or from 62 o F to 78o F. I accidentally turned up the heating unit on the fish tank when I was a kid and left it on. When I came back a few hours later, all the fish were dead. The difference in temperature was not much different than that in Lovelocks’ computer model. I will never forget the sight of all those dead fish. I wish you could have seen them. It put me in a frame of mind to pay attention to details and to hear about warming oceans and other mayhem forty years later. That’s what will happen to the earth only worse. As the dead algae decays, it releases more methane and more carbon dioxide and that heats up the atmosphere a whole lot more. The great changes in temperature create huge wind storms around the earth, and deserts will form almost everywhere, with some rapidity. The 50% increase in hurricane activity of late has been linked to one degree rise in ocean temperatures. Imagine what 16 more degrees will do. Earth will begin to look more like the other planets in the solar system, the ones we can’t survive on either.

Another factor to consider, if you’re planning to wait out the storm, is that oceans expand considerably when heated. Some say that the ocean water has expanded 8 inches since the 1800s, so when experts say that the water volume has increased by an infinitesimal amount so far due to ice caps melting, that’s true, but misleading. If the algae goes away, we may see the water rise several feet rather quickly. And the heat will only continue to rise, as most of the things that keep planets cool get toasted in the new atmosphere, a scenario in fact just as bizarre as the different one posited in Day After Tomorrow, which took a reverse hypothesis, just so they could make a joke about Mexico.

Now Canada’s leader Harper is talking about cutting all programs to fund global warming management programs, but is leaving the bureaucrats in place with nothing to do but take home a salary. That’ll work.

This article appeared April 18th, 2006
Ottawa plan hacks green programs
MARTIN MITTELSTAEDT AND MICHAEL DEN TANDT
The new Conservative government has decided to slash spending on Environment Canada programs designed to fight global warming by 80 per cent, and wants cuts of 40 per cent in the budgets devoted to climate change at other ministries, according to cabinet documents obtained by The Globe and Mail.
The documents also say that the Conservatives' campaign promise of tax breaks for transit passes would cost up to $2-billion over five years, but would result in an insignificant cut in greenhouse-gas emissions because the incentives are expected to spur only a small increase in the number of people willing to trade using cars for buses and subways.
The section of the documents on the budget cuts, written by an unidentified government official after a cabinet meeting in late March that approved the reductions, also said the Tories want to try to claw back $260-million the Liberals had pledged to the United Nations to fund its international climate-change programs.
Federal funding for wind power, considered by environmentalists to be one of the cleanest new energy sources, "is also uncertain," the documents said.
Ryan Sparrow, a spokesman for Environment Minister Rona Ambrose, refused to confirm or deny the details in the leak, and said the government hasn't finalized its decisions on climate change.
"Once there is an announcement to be made, we'll make one," Mr. Sparrow said.
The documents were obtained by the opposition Liberals and bolster previous reports that large-scale cuts have been under way in climate-change programs, such as the highly visible One Tonne Challenge, which had much of its funding abruptly axed without public announcement in late March.
The Tories have indicated that they are ambivalent about the Kyoto Protocol to fight climate change, planning to neither pull out of the treaty nor meet its emission-reduction targets.
According to the documents, the Tories have yet to develop their unique Canadian-based set of actions.
"No process has been put in place to determine next steps on climate change or to develop the new 'made in Canada' climate plan," the documents said.
The documents said that while the Tories are trying to save money by cutting the programs designed to reduce greenhouse-gas emissions, they won't cut government staff positions, so most of the money earmarked for climate change will be going to salaries for bureaucrats.
"Only $375-million was approved for climate spending, with most of the dollars covering staff salaries until the new government determines next steps.
"What is clear is that staff will have little to do and that they will have no budgets to spend over the next year and that more cuts are coming."
According to the documents, the programs are being eliminated to help fund tax cuts, including the GST reduction the Tories pledged during the election, and to fund the transit-pass scheme.
The global-warming programs are being eliminated even though a Treasury Board review of government spending found that the vast majority of 166 such programs run by Ottawa were considered cost effective.
The review, which was begun by the Liberals and completed last fall, found only 22 programs were ineffective. The Treasury Board information was supposed to be used to reallocate funding from programs that weren't working to those that were achieving better results.
The Liberals did not deal with the review before the election, and many federal initiatives didn't have budget allocations after March 31, the end of the government's fiscal year.
Environmentalists reacted angrily to the cuts. John Bennett, a spokesman for the Sierra Club of Canada, accused the Tories of having a "slash and burn campaign."
The documents also show that senior officials in the Environment Ministry have told the government that its proposed tax credit for transit users will have virtually no impact on greenhouse-gas emissions and only a small effect on riders.
"A wide range of data suggests that people are not very responsive to changes in transit fares," said a memo prepared for Ms. Ambrose last week by officials in the office of her deputy minister. ". . . while the ridership impacts of the tax incentives are not known with precision, analysis suggests they will be low."
The six-page memo outlines five transit tax-incentive options, ranging from a 16-per-cent tax credit for all fares, at a projected cost of $2-billion over five years, to a credit for monthly pass holders only, at $1-billion, to the same credit for high-school students only, at a cost of $90-million.
The memo makes clear that the second option is the one the government prefers. But its benefits to transit users may be nullified, the memo states, because "it could be quite easy for the transit authorities to raise their fares to absorb the benefit of the tax credit."
The Canadian Urban Transit Association has estimated that the proposed tax break would increase transit use by up to 30 per cent by 2016. But in another Environment Minister memo drafted for Ms. Ambrose, ministry officials say that, based on a 1997 Canadian study, as well as a U.S. Department of Labour survey in 2004, use can be expected to increase between 2 per cent and 4 per cent. That means the effect on emissions will be negligible, the documents show.
Moving Right Along
One thing Canada has going for it is that it is building nuclear power plants. In the past, this has been controversial among the environmentally in the know, and some have foreseen possible civil war and even revolution over this issue as the blue green threshold of death approaches. But with the miraculous Easter morning resurrection of nuclear power, with GreenPeace founder Patrick Moore playing the part of John the Baptist, in that morning’s edition of the Washington Post, it is likely that such delays and battles will probably be averted. It will however take a lot of time to tear down 600 coal plants and build 600 nuclear ones in their place, remembering of course to clean up all the nuke waste and stuff it into swimming pools afterwards.

Here is that article in full. I suggest you read the whole thing. It agrees with Lovelock on the essential issue of nuclear power, but is more even handed concerning passive sources, which is admittedly a flaw in the “Revenge” book.

Going Nuclear
A Green Makes the Case
By Patrick Moore
Sunday, April 16, 2006; Page B01
In the early 1970s when I helped found Greenpeace, I believed that nuclear energy was synonymous with nuclear holocaust, as did most of my compatriots. That's the conviction that inspired Greenpeace's first voyage up the spectacular rocky northwest coast to protest the testing of U.S. hydrogen bombs in Alaska's Aleutian Islands. Thirty years on, my views have changed, and the rest of the environmental movement needs to update its views, too, because nuclear energy may just be the energy source that can save our planet from another possible disaster: catastrophic climate change.
Look at it this way: More than 600 coal-fired electric plants in the United States produce 36 percent of U.S. emissions -- or nearly 10 percent of global emissions -- of CO2, the primary greenhouse gas responsible for climate change. Nuclear energy is the only large-scale, cost-effective energy source that can reduce these emissions while continuing to satisfy a growing demand for power. And these days it can do so safely.
I say that guardedly, of course, just days after Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad announced that his country had enriched uranium. "The nuclear technology is only for the purpose of peace and nothing else," he said. But there is widespread speculation that, even though the process is ostensibly dedicated to producing electricity, it is in fact a cover for building nuclear weapons.
And although I don't want to underestimate the very real dangers of nuclear technology in the hands of rogue states, we cannot simply ban every technology that is dangerous. That was the all-or-nothing mentality at the height of the Cold War, when anything nuclear seemed to spell doom for humanity and the environment. In 1979, Jane Fonda and Jack Lemmon produced a frisson of fear with their starring roles in "The China Syndrome," a fictional evocation of nuclear disaster in which a reactor meltdown threatens a city's survival. Less than two weeks after the blockbuster film opened, a reactor core meltdown at Pennsylvania's Three Mile Island nuclear power plant sent shivers of very real anguish throughout the country.
What nobody noticed at the time, though, was that Three Mile Island was in fact a success story: The concrete containment structure did just what it was designed to do -- prevent radiation from escaping into the environment. And although the reactor itself was crippled, there was no injury or death among nuclear workers or nearby residents. Three Mile Island was the only serious accident in the history of nuclear energy generation in the United States, but it was enough to scare us away from further developing the technology: There hasn't been a nuclear plant ordered up since then.
Today, there are 103 nuclear reactors quietly delivering just 20 percent of America's electricity. Eighty percent of the people living within 10 miles of these plants approve of them (that's not including the nuclear workers). Although I don't live near a nuclear plant, I am now squarely in their camp.
And I am not alone among seasoned environmental activists in changing my mind on this subject. British atmospheric scientist James Lovelock, father of the Gaia theory, believes that nuclear energy is the only way to avoid catastrophic climate change. Stewart Brand, founder of the "Whole Earth Catalog," says the environmental movement must embrace nuclear energy to wean ourselves from fossil fuels. On occasion, such opinions have been met with excommunication from the anti-nuclear priesthood: The late British Bishop Hugh Montefiore, founder and director of Friends of the Earth, was forced to resign from the group's board after he wrote a pro-nuclear article in a church newsletter.
There are signs of a new willingness to listen, though, even among the staunchest anti-nuclear campaigners. When I attended the Kyoto climate meeting in Montreal last December, I spoke to a packed house on the question of a sustainable energy future. I argued that the only way to reduce fossil fuel emissions from electrical production is through an aggressive program of renewable energy sources (hydroelectric, geothermal heat pumps, wind, etc.) plus nuclear. The Greenpeace spokesperson was first at the mike for the question period, and I expected a tongue-lashing. Instead, he began by saying he agreed with much of what I said -- not the nuclear bit, of course, but there was a clear feeling that all options must be explored.
Here's why: Wind and solar power have their place, but because they are intermittent and unpredictable they simply can't replace big baseload plants such as coal, nuclear and hydroelectric. Natural gas, a fossil fuel, is too expensive already, and its price is too volatile to risk building big baseload plants. Given that hydroelectric resources are built pretty much to capacity, nuclear is, by elimination, the only viable substitute for coal. It's that simple.
That's not to say that there aren't real problems -- as well as various myths -- associated with nuclear energy. Each concern deserves careful consideration:
• Nuclear energy is expensive. It is in fact one of the least expensive energy sources. In 2004, the average cost of producing nuclear energy in the United States was less than two cents per kilowatt-hour, comparable with coal and hydroelectric. Advances in technology will bring the cost down further in the future.
• Nuclear plants are not safe. Although Three Mile Island was a success story, the accident at Chernobyl, 20 years ago this month, was not. But Chernobyl was an accident waiting to happen. This early model of Soviet reactor had no containment vessel, was an inherently bad design and its operators literally blew it up. The multi-agency U.N. Chernobyl Forum reported last year that 56 deaths could be directly attributed to the accident, most of those from radiation or burns suffered while fighting the fire. Tragic as those deaths were, they pale in comparison to the more than 5,000 coal-mining deaths that occur worldwide every year. No one has died of a radiation-related accident in the history of the U.S. civilian nuclear reactor program. (And although hundreds of uranium mine workers did die from radiation exposure underground in the early years of that industry, that problem was long ago corrected.) • Nuclear waste will be dangerous for thousands of years. Within 40 years, used fuel has less than one-thousandth of the radioactivity it had when it was removed from the reactor. And it is incorrect to call it waste, because 95 percent of the potential energy is still contained in the used fuel after the first cycle. Now that the United States has removed the ban on recycling used fuel, it will be possible to use that energy and to greatly reduce the amount of waste that needs treatment and disposal. Last month, Japan joined France, Britain and Russia in the nuclear-fuel-recycling business. The United States will not be far behind.
• Nuclear reactors are vulnerable to terrorist attack. The six-feet-thick reinforced concrete containment vessel protects the contents from the outside as well as the inside. And even if a jumbo jet did crash into a reactor and breach the containment, the reactor would not explode. There are many types of facilities that are far more vulnerable, including liquid natural gas plants, chemical plants and numerous political targets.
• Nuclear fuel can be diverted to make nuclear weapons. This is the most serious issue associated with nuclear energy and the most difficult to address, as the example of Iran shows. But just because nuclear technology can be put to evil purposes is not an argument to ban its use.
Over the past 20 years, one of the simplest tools -- the machete -- has been used to kill more than a million people in Africa, far more than were killed in the Hiroshima and Nagasaki nuclear bombings combined. What are car bombs made of? Diesel oil, fertilizer and cars. If we banned everything that can be used to kill people, we would never have harnessed fire.
The only practical approach to the issue of nuclear weapons proliferation is to put it higher on the international agenda and to use diplomacy and, where necessary, force to prevent countries or terrorists from using nuclear materials for destructive ends. And new technologies such as the reprocessing system recently introduced in Japan (in which the plutonium is never separated from the uranium) can make it much more difficult for terrorists or rogue states to use civilian materials to manufacture weapons.
The 600-plus coal-fired plants emit nearly 2 billion tons of CO2annually -- the equivalent of the exhaust from about 300 million automobiles. In addition, the Clean Air Council reports that coal plants are responsible for 64 percent of sulfur dioxide emissions, 26 percent of nitrous oxides and 33 percent of mercury emissions. These pollutants are eroding the health of our environment, producing acid rain, smog, respiratory illness and mercury contamination.
Meanwhile, the 103 nuclear plants operating in the United States effectively avoid the release of 700 million tons of CO2emissions annually -- the equivalent of the exhaust from more than 100 million automobiles. Imagine if the ratio of coal to nuclear were reversed so that only 20 percent of our electricity was generated from coal and 60 percent from nuclear. This would go a long way toward cleaning the air and reducing greenhouse gas emissions. Every responsible environmentalist should support a move in that direction.
pmoore@greenspirit.com
I have yet to quote from the April 3rd issue of TIME magazine directly in these articles, but it is a must read. That was the issue in which a great number of burning stories about the new acceleration in global warming were first broken into the mainstream, presumably against some opposition from mysterious forces that had clobbered some rather hefty wanna-be green publishers. It was as impressive as the Magna Carta and the Declaration of Independence in that regard.

In a few days I will release the third edition of my Proposal for Addressing Climate Change. Thank you all for your continuing advice. We certainly need to do something, and there are many things we can do that will work. I am trying to find someone who will go on the record to say how many trees of what species are sufficient to create enough oxygen for one person during the leafing season. Please send me any tidbits on that. I also plan to publish some time soon a review of Revenge of Gaia.

Watch for Eliot Spitzer’s Earth Day Speech on Saturday, April 22nd, at 5 PM. He has the best record of any elected official in the US on environmental issues. He plans to talk about global warming. Let us respect his courage on this. It is still not politically safe ground to tread for a candidate, and a victory would open doors for other political leaders.

MEDIA WATCH: THE GAIA CONSPIRACY
Copyright c for Earthwatch By Evan Pritchard

Last week, TIME Magazine did what no one else seemed to be able to do, to publish an article about the new accelerated pace of global warming, right under the noses of the Bush administration. The date on the cover was April 3rd, however it was already sold out in stores across the country by April 3rd, and everyone was talking about it. “Be Worried, Be Very Worried!: were the ominous words on the cover. On Monday, April 3rd, I went to see a screening of an unfinished documentary by “Blue Vinyl” director/producer (Toxic Comedy Pictures danielbeegold@earthlink.net) Daniel Gold, called “Melting Planet.” It was somewhat in the Fahreheit 911 tradition, but looking to be a little more mainstream, more folksy, and also informative. There were priceless interviews with born- again Christians, revving up to meet the Lord, clueless folks who never heard of global warming, and hard-working people like you and me, saying “I can hardly make a living; what am I supposed to do about it?” Gold also interviewed author Ross Gelbspan, who candidly told us how terrible it was to be an expert on global warming, and demonstrated his frustration by making a box out of cardboard to put his own publications into storage.

I had brought the TIME magazine article, and Gold took it and held it up to the audience four different times, quoting from memory what it said, “The debate is over..” I did the same thing with both of my Marist classes the week leading up to April 3rd. That TIME article may turn out to be one of the most important documents printed in the US since the Bill of Rights, however that is only true if anyone reads it and does something about it. Otherwise it will just get burned and add CO2 to the atmosphere.

We watched snowmakers at a ski lodge in Utah watching moths in their headlights in January, waiting in vain for 26o or lower, so they could make snow. We saw the native peoples of Shishmarif, watching the permafrost melt and begin packing for the mainland. We watched Heidi the Weather Channel expert find a way to announce back in 2004 that Global Warming was “real.” We learned that the US is producing 4 billion tons of carbon emissions a year. We watched as a “Death of Environmentalism” movement caught hold.

TIME’s article was, to say the least, timely! But Gold said that one of the most important writings on global warming was a little-known memo, that has become known as “The Luntz Memo.” It was written in 2000 by a consulting company advising the Republican re-election campaign, and it said, basically, “As long as the public doesn’t believe there is a consensus, the debate will continue.” It advised the Republican party leaders to keep attacking the uncertainty of the science involved.

This is exactly what has happened during the last six years, and with great effect. And yet, according to Gold, our majority in Washington took things one step further and had government and corporate lawyers with no background in science, rewrite Exxon-funded (and other funded) studies, removing all language that sounded certain, and inserting the uncertainty that the situation, according to the Luntz Memo, required. Then the politicians would comment on the uncertainty with a dismissive air.

Global Warming
“The scientific debate remains open. Voters believe that there is no consensus about global warming within the scientific community. Should the public come to believe the scientific issues are settled, their views about global warming will change accordingly. Therefore, you need to continue to make the lack of scientific certainty a primary issue in the debate, and defer to scientists and other experts in the field.”
The Luntz Memo.
(page 137)


According to Gold, James Hansen had appeared before Congress with this message way back in 1988, (That was before carbon emissions had even reached 1990 levels, which the signers of the Kyoto agreement now long for nostalgically) and read from his research stating that global warming was a fact. He was treated like a “doomsday nut” and dismissed. 1991 to 1995 were consecutive record heat years. Late in 2005, he began his tirades again, and was accused of being disloyal to the President. Now his reports must pass across the President’s desk in the feared Oval Office before he can read them.

I stated that Lovelock’s book was released on February 2nd, in the UK and yet seemed to have disappeared in the US. Gold agreed, and said he has been looking for it, and asking people in the book industry, but had not heard anything at all.

Lovelock said that his book “Revenge of Gaia” would be published on February 2nd, 2006, ie: Ground Hogs’ Day because in pagan tradition, that is the day on which prognostications are made, predictions of the future. That’s the day the groundhog sees his shadow. It was also announced that the US publication by Penguin Putnam would be on March 2nd. The book was released around February 2nd in the UK to rave reviews, however the US publication never happened. In fact it is not listed in the on-line books in print, nor have any booksellers in the US been notified of its existence. Rumor has it that Basic Books will pick it up in the fall. It is currently on sale in Ottawa, Canada and consumers have described it as a “small but expensive import,” about 140 pages and $30 Canadian currency. As of this writing, I have not met anyone in the US who has seen it.

Penguin USA has the rights to publish a book by a famous author, his most important book, and a sure best seller. However, they don’t publish it. One must consider the possibility that they got stepped on, however Penguin Putnam is a giant of the publishing industry and very independent at that. They try to live up to the legacy of Ian Ballantine.
When this scenario was mentioned to an employee of Penguin Putnam, they said no one could step on this company, that it would make the New York Times. Welll……..

Andrew Revkin, top science writer for the New York Times, wrote an important article in which he talked about the melting of the ice of Greenland, and said that the rise in ocean levels was now irreversible. He said it could possibly raise the ocean 20 feet above current levels, destroying much of Florida and many of the great coastal cities of the US. This article was posted on the internet at the NY Times site as part of the “Science Section” and dated March 24th, a Friday. It apparently only appeared in one local late edition of the Times. Many of the facts and findings were the same or similar to those mentioned in Lovelock’s book. Apparently the BBC broadcast the same or similar story to Revkin.

One of the few sources to bring this information to the internet is Common Dreams. They quote from British papers on this issue, as nothing else is available. Here are some excerpts from websites regarding James Lovelock and the Gaia Theory, plus Jack Todd Thomas Lovejoy, James Hansen and others.


Here are some quotes from Lovelock


The Independent Jan 16th

“We are in a fool’s climate, accidentally kept cool by smoke, and before this century is over, billions of us will die and the few breeding pairs of people that survive will be in the Arctic where the climate remains tolerable.” James Lovelock

“She (Gaia) has been there before and recovered, but it took more than 100,000 years.” Lovelock

“Had it been known then (in the time of Charles Darwin) that life and the environment are closely coupled, Darwin would have seen that evolution involved not just the organisms, but the whole planetary surface. We might then have looked upon the Earth as if it were alive…” Lovelock

“..So what should we do? ….realize how little time is left to act; and then each community and nation must find the best use of the resources they have to sustain civilization for as long as they can.” Lovelock

“We should be the heart and mind of the Earth, not its malady. So let us be brave and cease thinking of human needs and rights alone, and see that we have harmed the living earth and need to make or peace with Gaia. We must do it while we are still strong enough to negotiate, and not a broken rabble led by brutal war lords…” Lovelock

“We will do our best to survive but, sadly, I can’t see the US or the emerging economies of China and India cutting back in time and they are the main source of emissions. The worst will happen and survivors will have to adapt to a hell of a climate.” Lovelock.


James Lovelock is an independent environmental scientist and Fellow of the Royal Society. The Revenge of Gaia, scheduled for release Feb. 2nrd 2006 is published by Penguin. He was part of a NASA team in 1965 to look for life on other planets.

Lovejoy heads the H. John Heinz III center for Science Economics and the Environment. He is the author of Global Warming and Biological Diversity.”
Article by David Ignatius Common Dreams

“Lovejoy fears that changes in the Amazon’ ecosystem may be irreversible.” David Ignatius, Common Dreams.

He describes a snowball of drying factors that is happening, and drought is spreading.

Elizabeth Kolbert in the New Yorker ran a three part series last spring, mentioning the shrinking of the Arcitic sea ice by 250 million acres since 1979; the first thawing of the permafrost in 120,000 years. In a recent article “butterfly lessons” she showed how these creatures are moving to new habitats.


Dr. Charles David Keeling, a Scripps marine chemist was the first to confirm the buildup of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere in 1957. It has risen more than 14% since that time. Scripps Oceanographic Society

It has been discovered that the ice age ended abruptly 15,000 years ago, as temperatures rose 16 degrees in less than two decades. From Scripps Oceanographic Society


QUOTABLE QUOTES REGARDING GLOBAL WARMING

“It may seem impossible to imagine that a technologically advanced society could choose, in essence, to destroy itself, but that is what we are now in the process of doing.” Elizabeth Kolbert, New Yorker

“An Antarctic ice shelf that was 200 metres thick and had a surface area of 3,250 square kilometers has broken apart in less than a month.” BBC 3/19/02

“We knew what was left (of the Larsen B ice shelf) would collapse eventually, but the speed of it is staggering.” David Vaughan, a glaciologist at Cambridge.

“Scripps scientists have discovered an 1800 year cycle of oceanic tides that appears to drive changes in earth’s climate….strong tides bring cool conditions to the sea surface..weak tides lead to less cold water mixings and warming periods on Earth. Research at Scripps has shown that Earth is currently in a period in which a natural rise in global temperature..combined with warming from the greenhouse effect will push the planet through an era of rapid global warming.” Scripps Oceanographic Society:

“James Hutton (1726-1797) the father of geology, once described Earth as a kind of superorganism.” Oceansonline.com

“We are in a fool’s climate, accidentally kept cool by smoke, and before this century is over, billions of us will die and the few breeding pairs of people that survive will be in the Arctic where the climate remains tolerable.” James Lovelock

“She (Gaia) has been there before and recovered, but it took more than 100,000 years.” Lovelock

“Climate-change scientists have been warning about the rise in temperatures reaching a “tipping point” when carbon and methane locked up in the Amazon rainforest and Arctic ice would be released into the atmosphere as the climate becomes warmer and drier.” The Scotsman Jan 17 2006

“I would agree we are committed to a certain amount of climate change already. We cannot stop what’s happening, all we can do is slow it down.” Dr. Richard Betts, Climate modeler, Devon

“I don’t think anyone could put any sort of figure on how many people will survive.” Dr. Richard Betts.

“The collapse of the Gulf Stream appears to be unlikely to happen at least in the next 100 years, but it’s theoretically possible it could happen. It’s low probability, but would have a high impact.” Dr. Richard Betts

“Lovejoy fears that changes in the Amazon’ ecosystem may be irreversible.” David Ignatius, Common Dreams.

“People will be killed by climate change in this century. I’d be reasonably confident in that statement.” Dr Myles Allen, Oxford University.

“If the Arctic was to start releasing vast amounts of methane…it wouldn’t necessarily be a planet-destroying event.” Dr. Myles Allen

“Everything he (Lovelock) is writing has to be taken very seriously. Its not just some Doomsday Prediction.” John Schellnhuber, Director of the Potsdam Institute for Climate Change Research.

“Many human lives are at stake if we don’t do anything about global warming.”
John Schellnhuber

“We could cut carbon emissions by 90 per cent by 2030..just within the realms of possibility..the tipping point is probably around 2025..just last year there was a new study saying British soil has become a source of carbon. Things can happen very quickly and far sooner than we are expecting…Last year there was a big conference in Exeter and what came out of that is we have only ten years in which we can take some meaningful action.”..If we do not do anything in that (timeframe) we might as well forget about it. Once we get to a certain point with global warming, its out of our hands.” George Monbiot British environmentalist The Scotsman Jan 17th 2006

Note: Jack Todd is also called John Todd and his group is called Oceans Ark, and has built amazing “green architecture” sites all over the world. Nancy Jack Todd is his wife who is an equal partner, and is writing a book. She is editor of Annals of Earth and Vice President of Ocean Arks International. She can be reached at (508)548-8161



The Famed Hansen-NASA Censorship Article

Here is a now-famous article about James Hansen by leading science writer Andrew Revkin.



By ANDREW C. REVKIN
Published: January 29, 2006
The top climate scientist at NASA says the Bush administration has tried to stop him from speaking out since he gave a lecture last month calling for prompt reductions in emissions of greenhouse gases linked to global warming.


Dr. James Hansen on Global Warming
Dr. Hansen's Recent Lectures and Papers (columbia.edu)

Dr. Goklany's Papers on Climate Change
The scientist, James E. Hansen, longtime director of the agency's Goddard Institute for Space Studies, said in an interview that officials at NASA headquarters had ordered the public affairs staff to review his coming lectures, papers, postings on the Goddard Web site and requests for interviews from journalists.
Dr. Hansen said he would ignore the restrictions. "They feel their job is to be this censor of information going out to the public," he said.
Dean Acosta, deputy assistant administrator for public affairs at the space agency, said there was no effort to silence Dr. Hansen. "That's not the way we operate here at NASA," Mr. Acosta said. "We promote openness and we speak with the facts."
He said the restrictions on Dr. Hansen applied to all National Aeronautics and Space Administration personnel. He added that government scientists were free to discuss scientific findings, but that policy statements should be left to policy makers and appointed spokesmen.
Mr. Acosta said other reasons for requiring press officers to review interview requests were to have an orderly flow of information out of a sprawling agency and to avoid surprises. "This is not about any individual or any issue like global warming," he said. "It's about coordination."
Dr. Hansen strongly disagreed with this characterization, saying such procedures had already prevented the public from fully grasping recent findings about climate change that point to risks ahead.
"Communicating with the public seems to be essential," he said, "because public concern is probably the only thing capable of overcoming the special interests that have obfuscated the topic."
Dr. Hansen, 63, a physicist who joined the space agency in 1967, directs efforts to simulate the global climate on computers at the Goddard Institute in Morningside Heights in Manhattan.
Since 1988, he has been issuing public warnings about the long-term threat from heat-trapping emissions, dominated by carbon dioxide, that are an unavoidable byproduct of burning coal, oil and other fossil fuels. He has had run-ins with politicians or their appointees in various administrations, including budget watchers in the first Bush administration and Vice President Al Gore.
In 2001, Dr. Hansen was invited twice to brief Vice President Dick Cheney and other cabinet members on climate change. White House officials were interested in his findings showing that cleaning up soot, which also warms the atmosphere, was an effective and far easier first step than curbing carbon dioxide.
He fell out of favor with the White House in 2004 after giving a speech at the University of Iowa before the presidential election, in which he complained that government climate scientists were being muzzled and said he planned to vote for Senator John Kerry.
But Dr. Hansen said that nothing in 30 years equaled the push made since early December to keep him from publicly discussing what he says are clear-cut dangers from further delay in curbing carbon dioxide.
In several interviews with The New York Times in recent days, Dr. Hansen said it would be irresponsible not to speak out, particularly because NASA's mission statement includes the phrase "to understand and protect our home planet."
He said he was particularly incensed that the directives had come through telephone conversations and not through formal channels, leaving no significant trails of documents.
Dr. Hansen's supervisor, Franco Einaudi, said there had been no official "order or pressure to say shut Jim up." But Dr. Einaudi added, "That doesn't mean I like this kind of pressure being applied."
The fresh efforts to quiet him, Dr. Hansen said, began in a series of calls after a lecture he gave on Dec. 6 at the annual meeting of the American Geophysical Union in San Francisco. In the talk, he said that significant emission cuts could be achieved with existing technologies, particularly in the case of motor vehicles, and that without leadership by the United States, climate change would eventually leave the earth "a different planet."
The administration's policy is to use voluntary measures to slow, but not reverse, the growth of emissions.
After that speech and the release of data by Dr. Hansen on Dec. 15 showing that 2005 was probably the warmest year in at least a century, officials at the headquarters of the space agency repeatedly phoned public affairs officers, who relayed the warning to Dr. Hansen that there would be "dire consequences" if such statements continued, those officers and Dr. Hansen said in interviews.
Among the restrictions, according to Dr. Hansen and an internal draft memorandum he provided to The Times, was that his supervisors could stand in for him in any news media interviews.

Here is the text of a subsequent Andrew Revkin article, dateline March 24th, New York Times, which apparently only appeared in a late local edition of the New York Times.

The Lost NEW YORK TIMES Article
of Andrew Revkin

This important article by leading science writer Andrew Revkin, was published on the New York Times webpage on March 24th which is a Friday not a Tuesday, when most science articles appear and apparently only appeared in print in a local metro late edition of the Times. Here is the article in full.


By ANDREW C. REVKIN
Published: March 24, 2006
Within the next 100 years, the growing human influence on Earth's climate could lead to a long and irreversible rise in sea levels by eroding the planet's vast polar ice sheets, according to new observations and analysis by several teams of scientists.
One team, using computer models of climate and ice, found that by about 2100, average temperatures could be four degrees higher than today and that over the coming centuries, the oceans could rise 13 to 20 feet — conditions last seen 129,000 years ago, between the last two ice ages.
The findings, being reported today in the journal Science, are consistent with other recent studies of melting and erosion at the poles. Many experts say there are still uncertainties about timing, extent and causes.
But Jonathan T. Overpeck of the University of Arizona, a lead author of one of the studies, said the new findings made a strong case for the danger of failing to curb emissions of carbon dioxide and other gases that trap heat in a greenhouselike effect.
"If we don't like the idea of flooding out New Orleans, major portions of South Florida, and many other valued parts of the coastal U.S.," Dr. Overpeck said, "we will have to commit soon to a major effort to stop most emissions of carbon to the atmosphere."
According to the computer simulations, the global nature of the warming from greenhouse gases, which diffuse around the atmosphere, could amplify the melting around Antarctica beyond that of the last warm period, which was driven mainly by extra sunlight reaching the Northern Hemisphere.
The researchers also said that stains from dark soot drifting from power plants and vehicles could hasten melting in the Arctic by increasing the amount of solar energy absorbed by ice.
The rise in sea levels, driven by loss of ice from Greenland and West Antarctica, would occur over many centuries and be largely irreversible, but could be delayed by curbing emissions of the greenhouse gases, said Dr. Overpeck and his fellow lead author, Bette L. Otto-Bliesner of the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Boulder, Colo.
In a second article in Science, researchers say they have detected a rising frequency of earthquakelike rumblings in the bedrock beneath Greenland's two-mile-thick ice cap in late summer since 1993. They say there is no obvious explanation other than abrupt movements of the overlying ice caused by surface melting.
The jostling of that giant ice-cloaked island is five times more frequent in summer than in winter, and has greatly intensified since 2002, the researchers found. The data mesh with recent satellite readings showing that the ice can lurch toward the sea during the melting season.
The analysis was led by Goran Ekstrom of Harvard and Meredith Nettles of the Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory in Palisades, N.Y., part of Columbia University.
H. Jay Zwally, a NASA scientist studying the polar ice sheets with satellites, said the seismic signals from ice movement were consistent with his discovery in 2002 that summer melting on the surface of Greenland's ice sheets could almost immediately spur them to shift measurably. The meltwater apparently trickles through fissures and lubricates the interface between ice and underlying rock.
"Models are important, but measurements tell the real story," Dr. Zwally said. "During the last 10 years, we have seen only about 10 percent of the greenhouse warming expected during the next 100 years, but already the polar ice sheets are responding in ways we didn't even know about only a few years ago."
In both Antarctica and Greenland, it appears that warming waters are also at work, melting the protruding tongues of ice where glaciers flow into the sea or intruding beneath ice sheets, like those in western Antarctica, that lie mostly below sea level. Both processes can cause the ice to flow more readily, scientists say.
Many experts on climate and the poles, citing evidence from past natural warm periods, agreed with the general notion that a world much warmer than today's, regardless of the cause of warming, will have higher sea levels.
But significant disagreements remain over whether recent changes in sea level and ice conditions cited in the new studies could be attributed to rising concentrations of the greenhouse gases and temperatures linked by most experts to human activities.
Sea levels have been rising for thousands of years as an aftereffect of the warming and polar melting that followed the last ice age, which ended about 10,000 years ago. Discriminating between that residual effect and any new influence from human actions remains impossible for the moment, many experts say.
Satellites and tide gauges show that seas rose about eight inches over the last century and the pace has picked up markedly since the 1990's.
Dr. Overpeck, the co-author of the paper on rising sea levels, acknowledged the uncertainties about the causes. But he said that in a world in which humans, rich and poor, increasingly clustered on coasts, the risks were great enough to justify prompt action.
"People driving big old S.U.V.'s to their favorite beach or coastal golf course," he said, should "start to think twice about what they might be doing."
END

The following article appeared on March 20th in the Washington Post. It ties in with a number of articles that were apparently squelched elsewhere.

Early Spring Disturbing Life on Northern Rivers
By Cheryl Lyn Dybas
Special to The Washington Post
Monday, March 20, 2006; Page A05
THE GLEN, N.Y. -- The winter-old river ice is creaking and groaning, shifting position. Spring has come early to the frozen upper Hudson River, and ice-out is just around the corner.
Lilliputian wildflowers will soon line the Hudson's banks. In what are known as riverside ice meadows, an ancient cycle of ice formation and melting gives rise to swamp candles, ladies'-tresses, wood lilies and other rare, diminutive flowers. In New York's Adirondack Mountains, ice that forms on the river in winter is pushed onto its banks in spring; there it scours the sloping cobble shores, keeping them free of shrubs and small trees and leaving space for wildflowers to sprout in fragile, arctic-like ice meadows.
But the future for these floral pixies, which depend on late-melting river ice, is bleak. The number of days of ice on northeastern rivers has declined significantly in recent winters, said hydrologist Glenn Hodgkins of the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) Maine Water Science Center in Augusta.
The trend could spell disaster for the ice meadows. It also signals trouble ahead for endangered Atlantic salmon and other fish, for wetlands plants and animals, and for Northern economies, all of which are sustained by winters with icy rivers.
If the pattern continues, say scientists, only in Currier and Ives prints will ice skaters twirl across frozen New England rivers.
"Northeastern rivers have 20 fewer days of ice cover each winter now than they did in 1936," said Hodgkins, who said the total now averages 92 days. "A lot of that decrease has occurred since the 1960s."
Hodgkins has studied 16 rivers in Maine, New Hampshire and Vermont. In recent years, the data show, 12 of the 16 rivers had much earlier spring ice-out dates.
"On average, ice-out dates were 11 days earlier in 2000 than in 1936," Hodgkins said. "These changes are linked to warmer temperatures in late winter and early spring."
Winter, it appears, is melting around the edges.
Research by Hodgkins and USGS scientist Robert Dudley also shows changes in early-spring stream flow across eastern North America from Minnesota to Newfoundland. Rivers are gushing with snow- and ice-melt as much as 10 to 15 days sooner than they did 50 to 90 years ago, based on USGS records.
Hodgkins and Dudley's results are scheduled to be published Tuesday in the online edition of the journal Geophysical Research Letters.

RIVER WARMING
Since 1936, gauges in northern New England rivers have recorded a steady decline in the annual number of days of river ice, a change that threatens Atlantic salmon, wetlands plants and Northern economies.
Number of days river flows were affected by ice
River 1936 2000 Drop
Allagash 138 129 9
St. John 134 124 10
Missisquoi 123 93 30
Piscataquis 119 105 14
Fish 118 93 25
Sandy 117 104 13
Swift 107 79 28
Saco 98 81 17
Oyster 51 31 20
CORRECTION: A chart with a March 20 Science article on river ice contained an incorrect scale, making it appear that some New England rivers had fewer days of river ice than they actually did. The decrease in average annual days of river ice from 1936 to 2000 for the selected rivers is reflected in this updated chart.
SOURCE: Glenn Hodgkins, U.S. Geological Survey
WHO'S BLOGGING?
Read what bloggers are saying about this article.
• Liberal Rage (tm)
• facts and information about Flowers and Florists

So there you have it: While “Global ecological chaos” is a phenomenon that even conservative sources were admitting by the end of last year, now almost everyone is admitting to “Global Warming” as well. That is some measure of progress, very slow moving progress. I would say it was a “glacial pace,” however that term now seems to indicated great speed, not slowness.

The question is still being debated, “Has there been an organized conspiracy to squelch information about global warming here in the US?” From here, it looks like the answer is “yes,” but a fairly subtle and well-orchestrated one, based on the Luntz memo.

March Madness March 31

This evening I wrote the following April Fools email and submitted it to the Onion, although it is against their policy to print it.

PRESS RELEASE: APRIL ONE, 2006

Louisiana, Texas, and Florida File Zillion Dollar Law Suit Against President Bush, Dick Cheney and Others
For Failing to Sign Kyoto Agreement, and “Negligent Failure to Curtail Global Warming In Time To Prevent Hurricane Katrina.” Other International Law Suits to Follow.

In light of recent scientific findings released in the current (April 3rd )issue of TIME magazine’s cover story “Special Report: Global Warming” (Be Worried, Be VERY Worried) by Jeffrey Kluger, the states of Louisiana, Texas, Florida, and Alabama, have now filed a law suit to recover damages from all hurricanes now seen to be caused by global warming. The article suggests there may be a link between carbon emissions and environmental disasters such as hurricanes, rising oceans, tornados, drought, and melting glaciers. The defendants listed in the suit include George W. Bush, Dick Cheney, Carl Rove, Halliburton, Exxon-Mobil, Texaco-Chevron, Unocal, Chevrolet, General Motors, Ford, and numerous others. The suit specifically cites Mr. Bush as the primary defendant for blocking the signing of the Kyoto Agreement by the US, a treaty signed by 141 other countries, and one which would have forced the US to reduce greenhouse gasses to 1990 levels by 2012. The suit implies that these reductions would have decreased the likelihood of such massive destructions as we saw with Katrina. The amount of damages is estimated at one zillion US dollars.

In response, Bush’s law office, Dewey, Cheatham, and Howe has issued a statement saying that “that tabloid” TIME magazine is an irresponsible, fly-by-night example of “yellow press,” that the scientific organizations quoted in the magazine article—Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute, SCIENCE Journal, The Evangelical Climate Initiative, NASA, the Goddard Institute for Space Studies, the University of Alaska, the University of Kansas, the University of Washington, the US Forest Service, the Jet Propulsion Lab in Pasadena, the National Center for Atmospheric Research, and Britain’s National Oceanographic Center—are all “wacko environmental nuts,” and that these four “troublemaker” states are no longer part of the US as far as the Bush family is concerned. The President stated to reporters, “That’s the last time I’m gonna send my people down there to save their sorry asses when a natural disaster hits. I swear! What a bunch of ingrates, I tell ya’”

The TIME article, in fact, does make some startling and far-fetched claims, such as the existence of global warming, and the Bush family’s indignation is understandable, given that global warming has long been regarded as a myth in White House circles. “Global what? This is the first any of us down here in Crawford ever heard about it!” as Bush said recently during a White House staff baseball game, playing against the Cuban team from the World Baseball Classic, hoping to win back some degree of respect for American baseball players after their embarrassing loss in March to other countries. Bush was pitching out of a 9 to 0 deficit at the time.

“Global warming, even most skeptics have concluded, is the real deal, and human activity has been causing it,” the TIME article says. The Bush family response was precise and devastating. “Cows farting, what about cows farting? All that methane contributes to global warming. You can’t call that human activity,” said the elder George H.W. Bush from his farm,(state withheld by request of the family) in response.

According to the article, several Greenland ice sheets have doubled their rate of slide. According to Science Journal, “by the end of the century, the world could be locked into an eventual rise in sea levels as much as 20 feet.” When confronted with this quote, a certain First Lady responded, “See, why should we rebuild New Orleans? God meant for it to be destroyed anyway! They can’t sue us! We’re royalty!”

What is the basis for TIME’s spurious claim that global warming is a reality? They state that “of the 20 hottest years on record, 19 occurred in the 1980s or later,” and that NASA claims 2005 was one of the hottest years in more than a century. TIME states that “The Antarctic holds enough ice to raise sea levels more than 215 feet.” In response, George Bush answered, “But Antarctica is so far away, that water will never reach us!”

TIME also cites evidence that the snow packs in the Rockies are melting, a fraction of what they were in the 1940s, and some snowpacks have vanished entirely. The White House Press Secretary said, “There is no tourism money in snowpacks! Who cares?”

The article reveals a number of alarming theories about “tipping points,” “feedback loops” and “boobie traps” which indicate that the warming process (in the oceans and atmosphere) is increasing by leaps and bounds and is now irreversible. But how does this relate to hurricanes? TIME states, “Ocean waters have warmed by a full degree Fahrenheit since 1970, and warmer water is like rocket fuel for typhoons and hurricanes. Two studies last year found that in the past 35 years, the number of Category 4 and 5 hurricanes worldwide has doubled while the wind speed and duration of all hurricanes has jumped 50%.”

This statement, quoted in the plaintiffs’ suit, is the only real evidence they have, and plan to call upon the authors as expert witnesses in the trial, which will be televised nationwide. The Bush lawyers have categorically denied this, and have said that there is no concrete evidence that warm water causes hurricanes. In fact, they said, “Warm water is good in a bath when you have a backache.” They plan to use Michael Creighton as their expert witness.

The plaintiffs also plan to claim that there is a connection between internal combustion and carbon emissions, and that carbon emissions are related to global warming, and that warming is related to ice melting, and that ice melting can cause ocean levels to rise, eventually flooding hundreds of coastal cities, for which they are also ready to sue. The Bush law team responded, “I hope no one is stupid enough to fall for that old trick. There is no connection between anything and anything. Next they’ll be saying we stole the election in Florida in 2000, so that Al Gore could would not apply his knowledge of the greenhouse effect and curb carbon emissions before disaster occurred, which would have hurt Halliburton and Texaco.”



To: The Onion
From: Evan Pritchard
resonancemagazine.blogspot.com
rezman7777@earthlink.net
Date: April 1st, 2006
RE: The above press release

Dear Sirs,

Please consider this “April Fools” article/press release a gift from me. Feel free to rewrite it as you see fit and publish at your earliest convenience. If you use any part of it, just let me know by email and I will pick up a copy.

Thank you

Evan Pritchard

Wednesday, March 29th, 2006: After the Whirlwind
I finally find a moment to breathe and smell the blooming earth while it lasts. The TIME magazine article (which came out yesterday, written by Jeffrey Kluger) was truly remarkable; it covered a large area, in fact the whole globe, dealt with a lot of difficult scientific issues, and kept its balance. I am also sure that it was released under unimaginable resistance from a certain gas-driven gov. Rifkin, Lovelock, etc. all were repressed here in the US. It mentioned Lovelock but not his new book. And it made Time Magazine the Jeffery Wygand of environmental whistleblowing, not me and little New York Spirit magazine. As it sits now, my article follows up nicely to this one, adding the Native American perspective, and offering the beginnings of a plan, one which I will expound on afterwards I’m sure.
This past month to six weeks has been a very strange one for me. In fact, from January 27th, when I first got the email from William Meyers with an RE that read: “Can this really be the end?” I’ve been in an upsidedown world, where I seemed to be the only one who knew the sky was really falling. That was the whole impetus for my blogging, in fact, as a quicker way to reach the public. The last week has been so busy that I have not been able to type at a computer, but have kept some record on tape while I drive.
For this whole time, my article has been scheduled to come out talking about a book that, for readers throughout North America, didn’t exist, Revenge Of Gaia. It is still a missing person, but at least the concepts will now be familiar to those who may have read TIME magazine. Whether Spitzer will really use my Global Warming speech or not remains to be seen. I will have a copy of NY Spirit sent to him right away. I will also try to get TIME magazine into the hands of a lot of people, especially my students, some of whom objected when I had them e-search James Lovelock’s dilemma back in early February, when his book was released in the UK to rave reviews. They were skeptical when the book was not released on March 2nd as I predicted. Yesterday, some students in that class seemed sheepish, or apologetic towards me, just a feeling I had; and I wonder if they saw a story on TV or read TIME magazine. I’m sure I’ve sounded like an end of the world lunatic to my undergrad friends Dan B and Igor V during the last month or so, as I shook them by the metaphorical collar and raved, “Its all about global warming!! The ecosystem is collapsing!” I hope that Igor’s unfinished symphony of liberal indignitude “Right Under Our Noses” will now take more of a priority, as this story certainly was right under our noses all along. In fact, the Hopi have been telling this story in some detail for over a thousand years. I am continually recalling the tour I made with Depsimana back in the 1990s, talking about the Hopi and the global warming predictions, finding mostly scorn and resentment from listeners. The Hopi say that wehn this tipping point is crossed, that it will lead to an all out invasion of the US and global thermonuclear war, ending all life on the planet.
One thing that was interesting, Kluger used the same term “Tipping Point” that I suggested Spitzer use in the speech I sent him. (TIME: By any measure, the Earth Is At The Tipping Point.) I referred to the Hopi “Crossroads” back in 2000 in my often read poem “Extra Innings of the Gods.” (posted at Waxpoetickle.blogspot.com) and in fact, allowing that election to be stolen was indeed the crossroads that led directly to this disaster, and Al Gore, the winner./loser, is still one of the foremost experts on global warming. I know that he has been run through the gauntlet for the last six years by almost everyone, but he knew all along what the price would be. By the looks of him, I’m sure that the FBI has been pointing their tazers, lazers, mazers, and phazers at him to try to get him to leave the country. I’m glad he’s still here. My poem Extra Innings of the Gods was dedicated to him and Al Leiter, another indestructible hero.
Just imagine the pressure that caused both Penguin Putnam and the New York Times to kill or softpedal this super -story, and the courage TIME must have had to pull it together and put it on the cover. A while ago, Wildlife Relief Fund had the story of the drowning polar bears, and Ellis and I thought it was the most haunting of images, a metaphor for what is happening to the planet at large. TIME used it on the cover.

I suspect that Rove and certain people have had inside information for a long time about this ecological collapse and have been keeping it under lock and key, part of the poetic tragedy of destroying Al Gore without defeating him at the polls. Any response to a carbon problem will hurt Halliburton, and that company has been raking in billions upon billions of dollars, making hay while their fossil fueled sun shone brightly. They will now probably use the money to build shelters for themselves. Fireproof, floodproof, bombproof shelters, making a jail for themselves more confining than the hundreds they have built for federal and state corrections departments over the last five years.

I have warned many hundreds of people, maybe thousands, about global warming, mostly through workshops and small setting lectures. I usually weave it into my story about the Native American perspective on “The Earth does not belong to us.” On April 2nd, my NY Spirit article will alert maybe 300,000. In one move, TIME has alerted 100s of thousands, and given some more credibility to my three step plan to bring CE’s down to zero, which will be harder than putting a man on Mars.

EAT Your Greens

My three step plan, only suggested in the article, and only suggested in the words I drafted for Spitzer, is as follows:

1. Green Energy
2. Green Architecture
3. Green Transportation

The first step is for NY City to convert to Green EAT, (energy, architecture and transportation) so that future generations can eat. My plan is for New York City to lead by example and cut all CE’s by 50% within six years. Then we share our findings with other cities who are also trying to cut emissions. The second step is for all the major cities in the US to follow the example. The third step is multifaceted. As all the cities in the world, and all the states and rural areas as well all strive to reach 50% of current 2006 levels, New York strives to reach 50% of 1999 levels (many scientists are using this year as a benchmark in honor of George W. Bush, in other words, to erase his legacy from the face of the planet!) within 12 years, (2018) then strives to reach zero emissions in twenty-four years (2030). Other cities and countries would then have an example to copy or improve upon.


The next few days are filled with significance for me. Tomorrow, Thursday March 30th, I’ll be giving a lecture on death and dying in Native American culture at Vassar with Rick Jarow. Then I will conduct an ethics class at Marist that same day, discussing the parallels between Lovelock and Wygand of “The Insider,” among other things. Then Friday is April Fools Day, then Saturday is April 2nd, marking one month after the non-release of James Lovelock’s book, which has kept me in an upsidedown situation, and will also be the release date of the New York Spirit article. On Sunday April 3rd, is the Mets Presidential Opener at RFK in DC at noon. On April 5th, Tuesday, I begin the Buddhism section of our World Views class.

So now I must begin writing down the past, to recover from my memory and from Memorex itself, what I can of these dramatic past few days, as I and thousands of others, I’m sure, struggled to get this message out to the public.

Tuesday, March 28th, Teaching Peace: I slept well, got a call from DL just when I was planning to call Thunderbird, and she talked to me for a while, even after I said I had to go teach my class. I unpacked the car finally, and that took a while. I went to Marist and had lots of work materials with me. I graded some papers, and pretty much caught up for WV and V, and was about a minute late. I did a session with the computer projected on the screen and showed how to use the Microsoft endnotes program and then handed out the endnotes handout. I also showed them World Heritage Virtual Tour Panography, and it worked but the internet was slow at that moment, perhaps in response to all that is going on regarding global warming. I didn’t know that then. I tried to show Paris, only got Notre Dame up, then showed Karnak, and Luxor; enough to give them ideas. I encouraged them to use it in their powerpoints.

Then I completed the work we started on finding Shamanistic practices and views in Powwow Highway (now on DVD) by finding Taoistic teachings in the movie as well. I mostly asked them questions, and they were able to come up with good answers, and we pretty much were able to list these wisdom teachings on the board as they appeared in the movie. The spider scene was particularly fun, as there are so many levels to it. The spider is a symbol of unity and relationship, the web of life, and is therefore associated with peace. Buddy is thrown from the car as he tries to kill the spider and breaks his gun, a symbol of violence. In fact, my criminal justice students were quick to point out that his chances of getting Bonnie out of jail with a single .22 pistol were zero to none. We also briefly discussed Filbert taking $4000 to reimburse their spendings to rescue Bonnie. We took a vote and about five said he was wrong, and about nine said he was right, and the others were undecided. I said in Shamanic stories, instead of preaching to people all the right things to do, they show you all the right things to do in reverse, and show you what happens when you do the wrong things and live the wrong way, or sometimes show you ambiguous situations ethically, so that you are drawn to discuss them, sort of like the ending of Syriana.

I handed back the midterm tests, and they were by and large very good. Then I went into the development of myths through time. I obviously owe something to Joseph Campbell on this, but I have a wholly different approach, and use Pritchard’s Seven Phases of Cultural Development and show how stories tend to be rather different from one phase to the next. We got through the Shamanic and Taoistic phases, and were working through the Geomantic, when LA a bright student who also likes to be punctual, called “time.” I stopped immediately, as I had just put the last word in place for the first three phases. Next time, we tackle Religious and Philosophical and possibly Scientific.

I did a one hour search on Thomas Chambers, and found some information, and indeed he was the one who brought clapboard siding to the Dutch colony. He obviously had English roots. I found a William Chambers making clapboard siding in Mackinac Island Michigan in 1830, which is very early for Michigan. Chambers went to Troy in about 1643 and then founded what is now Kingston in 1652. His house was on Division Street and is now somewhere under one of the Hasbrouke houses as was his tombstone. He moved to Fox Hall which is still there, off of Albany Ave I think. Also clapboard. I was there once.
I also tracked Johanness Shepmoes with less success, from his family’s move from Manhattan to Hurley, NY in the 1600s.
Then I had a push from spirit to go south and see KH, to give back a copy of NAStories of the Sacred I had borrowed. I also know she has access to the colonial records for Chambers and Shepmoes. While I was there, Karen S called, one of my favorite music students, who quit lessons six months ago when her mother died. Although I have rarely been at the music school since then, it was the first time she had called, and was asking for lessons, that she really needed to get back to music as part of her healing process. She was able to come over in a few hours, and I had the time free. She was really thrilled, and had a good reconstructive lesson, in which I had her map out her brain using hums. Humming a low F vibrated her nose and lower lip, Low A resonated in her sinuses, C resonated in her ears, middle F resonated on the side of her head, as did the next A up. C resonated at “the horns,” the place where her antlers would be if she had any, and the high F resonated at the top, at the fontanelle. This exercise not only opened up the resonating cavities in her brain which make for better brighter sound and overtones, but also demonstrated to her that they existed and that they can be used consciously.
While waiting to teach Karen S, HK and I played a little catch outside by the church as it was a perfect spring day, and people who walked by were amazed to see this elder woman of the tribe tossing the baseball with such ease. In fact, last year there were some bumps and bruises as she relearned the skill. Spring training went well this time. In the meantime we connected with another young woman who wanted vocal lessons and right away, and she was able to come in on one hours notice, and got a good lesson in time before Karen S came over. It was during that lesson I developed the humming map of the brain, but only in rough form. When I see A again (who is 15) I will go into more detail. She has a high pure voice and a remarkable range, and can read notes.
After karen’s lesson I had some chili and taters and checked my email. There was a long email from James Audlin, author of The Circle of Life, and formerly of the Poughkeepsie Journal. He had read ALL of Native American Stories of the Sacred since Saturday, and had found about ten places concerning ancient languages which he took issue with. His quickness and facility with the nuances of these languages (mostly ancient Greek, with which he is obviously quite at home) was nothing short of impressive. I was looking at the wordings from the modern reader’s perspective, starting from where we are now, but he corrected this, and suggested a wording that would be based in the actual root word or concept and move chronologically forward. I responded to each of his suggestions positively, and will send the whole letter to Mark Ogilbee at Skylight for discussion. I’m sure every suggestion will have some effect on the second edition. I’m sure David Audlin would understand my interest in not losing the reader, or destroy the prose such as it is, by splitting hairs. Obviously these are spots that need more work. I also have a few friends who are familiar with ancient Greek and will give me some insight. I am interested, and spent a month in Greece studying art, but I always found the language both ancient and modern, very difficult. Most Greek people today can’t understand the ancient tongue, so Mr. Audlin’s expertise is rather treasured, especially as it kept coming up in Stories of the Sacred. He will be consulted on The Path We Follow, as well.

I headed out to the hermitage, and as it turned out, ended up house sitting. There on the table I found the just released Global Warming issue of TIME magazine. I had a paradoxical reaction when I saw the stranded polar bear on the cover; “Scooped! Thank GOD!” I didn’t really want to be the first with this story in print, but on the other hand, I am a journalist, and a scoop is hard to resist. Suddenly I felt credible again! And the feeling is one I would describe as…..incredible!

I read the whole article of course before going to bed, and woke up at 8 AM, ready to tackle my bloglag problem, my ethics papers and the Death and Dying stuff. It was a turning point in my life. The title on the cover, quite appropriately, was “Be Worried. Be VERY Worried.”

Monday March 27th, 2006: Flintlocks and Hollyhocks: It has been a very crazy and frustrating and rushed past month, and Sunday I was having trouble breathing or even eating. There had been a growing amount of unexplained conflict in my life, and I felt that it somehow had to do with my openness about the Global Warming story. I decided to have a vacation day, and get rested again so I could think clearly. I walked around outside and started feeling buzzy and very sick and threw up over and over again, mostly the soup, although the soup was exceptionally delicious at the time. I can’t explain what was happening, but the more I hurled my soup the better I could breathe. I went to Red Sky Blue Earth at noon and waited 45 minutes for Stella (who is Blackfoot, therefore a fellow Algonquin) in response to her phone call, and though a noon opening was posted on her door, she didn’t come and open, so I left my card. This is the part of Indian Time that can be a little frustrating, but I’m sure there was a good reason. I will try again later. I really enjoyed having an excuse to sit in the sun and relax and wait. I traveled down the Minisink Trail by car, and stopped and made some phone calls, and then as I passed the historic Bevier house in Stone Ridge, I saw a car that I was sure belonged to Melinda Terpenning, so I pulled in. I rang the bell, and met Melinda for the first time in person, although we’d talked on the phone at length and I was already hired to do a presentation later this year.
I was in a great mood on a wonderful spring day, and I examined the flintlock rifle over the fireplace and estimated Native owned, 1730, and she said that would have been likely. I saw a painting in one of the rooms and said 1910, and she said, “Yes, in fact, that’s when it was painted.” She showed me an ash splint basket and I said it was a “notassen,” a Lenape basket and explained how they made them. Some of the spints were red, and some had interesting designs on them, which I copied down. There were three keyboards there, and I helped identify a number of pictures and objects, mostly not Native. Then I took her on a walk up the old crossroads trail, the one on which the Bevier house was built, the one that used to go from the Esopus to the Rondout, and which crosses the great Minisink Trail at that spot. We walked a few hundred yards across a curious kind of natural pavement made of stone, towards the Rondout, towards Pompey’s Cave which is in an empty streambed, and which is at the Kyserike Burial Ground, the site of an old Lenape Village near the Rondout. Then we turned around and went back to the Bevier House, wondering how they managed to get water to drink in that landlocked spot. I said there would usually be a native village or at least a trading post at such as spot, but the lack of water would be a big problem. The Beviers might have dug a well, but we don’t know that. In any case, I lent her Native New Yorkers and No Word For Time, which I had with me. She said she’d send me some money some time. It was a relaxing way to spend an afternoon. Next thing I knew it was 5 PM and I called Shoshana, who is struggling with cancer these days. She had left a message that she was in the area, that she had just driven down the Minisink Trail, which means she just drove past me (noone knew I was there, this is rather unusual and almost humorous coincidence as she is from Manhattan, and has been a guest on my walking tours of the Minisink Trail) and she said she is now in Woodstock with some people I don’t know and wouldn’t give a number, but said they were on their way to Ashokan Reservoir to see the sun set. I kept driving, and went up 375 towards Woodstock to see if I could find her car somewhere in town, perhaps at the laundry, and I saw her car whizzing past me on 375. I made a (safe) U turn and went chasing after her. A car pulled in front of her, and slowed her down, and a car between us turned off, so when she got to the light on 28 I was able to pull beside her and honk my horn. She looked surprised. She pulled over into the parking lot there and said she did not see me flashing my lights or honking my horn. We decided to go to the reservoir together, as she did’nt really know the way or where to park or where to get a good western horizon, so I became the trail guide. I found us a perfect spot and I met her hosts, Morl and Llyn, two women from Wales. We watched the sunset and talked of the coming environmental demise, and they were perfectly well informed, and even were quite well educated concerning Planet X, which they said we might see behind the sun as it sunk to the west. We didn’t, but we had a great time, then Shoshana was hungry so I suggested a favorite Chinese restaurant, and we went.
I mentioned that a strange man had insisted on paying for a book with a brand new $100 and I took it, and one of the women said that there are a lot of phony $100s floating around and the bank won’t take them. One of the people we connected with said she’d take it and gave me change. She felt that some restaurant in the city would take it, and it would get lost in the big money laundry which is NY C. In fact, there was no way to know that this particular bill was phoney, I just had a bad feeling about it, as there had been a large number of assaults verbal ones, at that event.
We parted company and I went home and sleep brought an end to a perfect day.

Sunday, March 26th, 2006: Global Upset: This was a day of much running around. I never did empty the car out, and it was a good thing, because I got chances to use a lot of that stuff from the Pequot. I was very tired and slept on and off, getting things done around the house in between much needed naps. It took a lot to unwind, and never did completely accomplish that goal. I woke up and it was half past noon. I was supposed to get all these things done and arrive at the Barnes and Nobles in Danbury CT at 3 PM. Somehow I did all this, to my own amazement. Not having to load the car helped. On the way I also listened to a wonderful Mets game in which they won 7-0 with great outings by both Pedro and a man named M. They scored mostly on singles, which is a good sign. Today, Heilman was relegated to the bullpen, because Bannister pitched better. Time will tell if this was a terrible mistake. I made my various stops and connections and then arrived a few minutes early for the book signing and story telling at Barnes and Nobles. As coincidence would have it, the lowly George Mason team beat the unstoppable UConn Huskies of Danbury (and Hartford, etc) while I was there. It was the Advance Auto Parts “Shock of the Day” and it was colossal! I shared that with Richard, who is an employee at the store, and part Wappingers. This was after my event. I also bought a book Walking On Egg Shells No More about how to live with someone with Borderline Personality. It took several of us working together to find the psychology section. We went to Christmas Tree, and I bought some very salty peanuts. My tongue had already been swollen and blistered from something I ate at the Pine Hill event, but this made it worse! But it tasted good. I got Richards sister a box of purple peeps.
The event went well. I mentioned that a lot is happening right now with the environment, and that there are books and articles written on the subject but you won’t find them here at Barnes and Nobles, and its not them to blame; someone is keeping NY Times articles and books from reaching the public on this story, but its an important story. There have been some drastic changes in the course of global warming in the last two years, and all the top experts have tried to tell us, but were stopped. Later on, the community relations man John Coultier looked on the computer books in print in the US and Revenge of Gaia was nowhere to be found. A missing person.
I explained in detail about how a researcher at the National Archives found that Chief Seattle never said “The Earth does not belong to us…” and I got them all to shout it out in unison three times.
Richard and his sister had made copies of the layout of the article in New York Spirit and handed them out to each person in attendance. That was probably the most effective part of the message. I didn’t have to say that much about it. The article said it all.
I brought the Micmac Moose drum made for me by Gil Tarbox and then introduced him. He had heard about the event through the grapevine, not through Polly Midgely, and it was just coincidence he happened to be around. There was another man there who heard about it through Polly, and a black woman and her daughter who heard about it through the papers. It was not a large crowd. Apparently that was typical for this location, one of the first Barnes and Nobles. I had a long talk with John Coultier about how B and N worked and ideas on how to get the book in the stores.
Then Richard and I and his sister went out to eat at the Windmill, a local, folksy place, and it was pretty good. I had mussaka in a deep dish covered with cheese. Richard ended up picking up the tab, which was not called for, but a nice surprise. We read the sports trivia quiz off the place mat.
Richard was a maven of the magazine, and I told him about Resonance Magazine making a comeback on the internet. I should scan the humor issue and put it on line.
We split up and I went back to the hermitage, and saw one of my favorite movies ALAMO on TV with Billy Bob Thornton as David Crockett. That went on til late and I watched in the usual fascination, but also seeing a new meaning in it in light of what I knew, then I fell asleep. They had just shown King of Hearts a few days earlier, both movies broadcasting a subliminal message to pay attention, wake up, this town is about to blow up. Both inspired me to continue in my quest to tell lots of people about global warming.

Saturday, March 25th, 2006: Pine Hill Mini-Festival: I had a dream as I woke up; a new board game called Command Center, part role playing game part board game part simulation, in which you simulate being President of the United States. The game comes in a brief case, of course, and is very complex, and intellectually challenging. There was a CD Rom disc that came with it and a red phone which played out various scenarios in your ear after you “made the call.” I dreamt that President Bush played and lost.
I arrived at Pine Hill about noon, and there were already people there, setting up for the International Cultural Festival. Apparently I was right on time. David Audlin arrived at the same time. We started rehearsing music right away, even before setting up our books on the same table. It was a little confusing, plans changing along the way, but he wanted to do a show together, backing each other up, and wanted to exchange books, and he insisted we read from each other’s book. He quickly showed me a passage from his book and I said I could pretty much read without rehearsal, and he the same. I chose for him to read the Seneca Chipmunk story, as he is Iroquois, and Gordy, the guardian of the Seneca traditions was there, in his wheelchair, waiting to hear and comment on anything Seneca. James did a great job, and Gordy was pleased. I later talked to him in the lobby and asked for his comments on the Chipmunk, and he worried his face for a minute and then flashed a big smile “I LIKED it!” And told me a story of how coyote brought the light.
The passage I read from Audlin was surprising, and very poetic, “elegiac” I’d say, very much focused on the part of the circle of life called Death. I did guitar lead on two of James’ songs, and they were rather well written, a lullaby and an “argument” song with a male and female lead. We had rehearsed my song Wanna See Us Free (which tied into my one real environmental comment about waking up) and he played lead and sang on the doo doos and chorus. That was fun! The theme was “songs from dreams,” and two of his were from dreams, as was my song Wanna See Us Free. So it was the dream theme team. Speaking of dreams, I told of my Command Center game from my dream, and as I said Bush got to play, DE anticipated that Bush lost the game. That got a big laugh. It was true, and true in real life as well. I thought, as soon as everyone realizes what’s going on with the ice caps, his career will be making ice at a country club for tips.
I also played flute behind his reading and he behind mine. I did a cedar flute solo with James on keyboards, but he decided to go atonal for some reason, and as we had not rehearsed, I was caught off guard for a minute. And when James the director said Time, I asked James if I could do No Word For Goodbye, with him on lead guitar. He seemed pleased, so I sang it in the most dramatic fashion I could, and got as many people to sing along as I could. The crowd applauded wildly, so long I didn’t know what to do with my hands.

I did okay with the books, and it was a wild an chaotic day at Pine Hill, with a lot of people saying crazy things, some of which I didn’t know how to take. One of the highlights was giving Rainbow Weaver the work number of an old friend she had not seen in years, Donna Johnson. I also saw DL and chatted for a few minutes. Afterwards I had a meeting with Mary Lou at the pizza place and we discussed the possibility of a Pine Hill Music Festival in September to raise awareness about global warming. It was a day of many meetings and conversations and planning. I decided not to announce the September 16th date, as the date of the free concert, and it was a good thing, as I still have to have room to move, or back up if it won’t work.

Then I visited Raymundo, but he was late, so I slept there until 200 in a back room, comfy actually. Then we talked til dawn, and then I made it home in one piece after a very long day!

Friday, March 24th, 2006: My Name Is Whirlwind Dreamer: Saw the end of Powwow Highway. The last scene is so moving, I never know how to make a transition, so I sang three songs on the Micmac drum by Gil Tarbox. Then we made a list of shamanistic practices in the movie. We discussed the name Whirlwind Dreamer, how it, like all the other names, had a dark side and a light side, he is the one who has the visions that all seek, but he is not grounded. And even of this “kick me” name he “is not yet worthy.”
I had a one hour meeting with my one black student who needed to change her topic at the last minute for her term paper. We decided on her Cherokee side, and we looked at maps and found that her mother was from an area not only Cherokee but Overhill Cherokee, Chocktaw and other tribes.
I taught a good lesson with Vessios at their home, and realized that L needed vocal lessons today more than guitar, so we went into vocal lessons, and also got in some of the lead playing she was practicing all week. I felt there was a first glimmer of a breakthrough. She always wants hard songs. I gave her some extra time.
I went on various errands, feeling tired and confused and a little wound up, and then realized that I was supposed to call Shoshana. I thought it was her birthday. In fact it was Ellis’ birthday too, and I had forgotten to say happy birthday. I was that tired.
I ended up at the hermitage, watching King of Hearts, a movie that had a lot to say to me this time, trying to warn the crazy people about the total destruction of the planet, fighting off the Germans, and getting mixed signals from HQ. It all was appropriate for that day, and I’m sure the program manager knew that. I’d seen this kind of thing before; hidden messages in movie schedules. This one was pretty obvious. I had seen Jeremy Rifkin’s s stunning article on the internet about the ice caps and how they were melting more rapidly then we thought possible, but it apparently never made the print edition of the NY Times. That was very creepy. That was when I really started to feel like my world was upsidedown, like I was hanging by my thumbs in terms of credibility.

Thursday, March 23rd, 2006: Meeting of the Minds: This was a long day that took me from the Pequot Museum in Ledyard, CT (on the RI border) with about six different meetings, a half hour of rushed research, and then driving to Poughkeepsie, then grading a pile of papers and then conducting a 2/5 hour class, one of the more difficult ones, and then a two hour meeting of the Citizenship Thinktank Meets the Womens Spirituality Group. We watched a film documentary called The New Heroes, narrated by Robert Redford, and we applauded at the end. I got to meet a lot of interesting people and speak about the cover up on global warming to people who were really interested in learning more. One young student talked about feeling like a bug when facing problems such as global warming, and crime and world poverty. I said that was enlightenment, and a lot of great spiritual people reached that “bug” mentality. I told the story of Gandhi’s Zero Point, which I have told many times before. When he hit the dirt after being thrown from the train he was nothing, and therefore could do anything. This was a day after the “nothing” discussion in Connecticut. I went home to Saugerties soon after that, feeling a little like a bug, but a happy bug.

Wednesday, March 22nd, 2006: Night At the Pequot: This was the day of my presentation at the Pequot Research Library in their esteemed author series, whose guest list has included many immortal names; Wilma Mankiller, Joe Bruchac, M. Scott Momaday, etc. I left my place before dawn and made it to David Kahns in Rhode Island about ten AM, an hour before he had to leave for the doctors. In that time a lot happened, and I also got a good nap, surrounded by native artifacts. I wrote a new song at David Kahns in Rhode Island, and premiered it that night. Right now I call it The Ballad of Kwan No Day. It refers to and incorporates the traditional song Kwan No Day. I worked on the song for about two hours at DK’s. I also made a phone call or two. I went to the library at 4 PM and set up my books, and pulled some books to study and photocopy for the second volume of Algonquins and Estuaries, but didn’t have time to read them. The show went on right on schedule, at 7 PM, and I was in a festive mood, and ready to have fun. At the same time, I realized that most of the audience were Algonquin scholars and I needed to educate them in order to earn my pay, and I did. I sold a bunch of books, even though the audience was not huge. David Kahn recorded the whole thing on video tape and at some point I will transcribe it. When I have time. Afterwards, I answered some questions and signed a lot of books. A woman asked if there was a person’s name for “nothing.” I told her of the word for the self chan, or otchi-chan-hau-mitch-oo, which I loosely translated as “the vessel for the light which is itself just a shadow.” But I stressed that no one is nothing, that she should not think of herself as nothing then I signed her book.

Tuesday, March 21st, 2006: The Second First Day of Spring: The second first day of spring. The weather was pretty nice.