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Extreme Weather Watch: December 2013 – Power Outages, Canceled Flights, Bitter Cold, Freezing Rain

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By John Lawrence

Snow, sleet, freezing rain and extreme cold left millions of people without power in the US, Canada and western Europe. December 2013 was packed full of bitter cold, snowy and icy extremes which resulted in pile-ups on the highways, canceled flights and people trying to survive bitter cold with no heat in their homes.

Winter Storm Cleon produced a significant bout of freezing rain and sleet across the Dallas-Ft. Worth area Dec. 5-6. Freezing rain and sleet accumulations of up to 1.5 inches led to nasty travel conditions. Hundreds of flights were canceled by the icy weather. In addition, more than a quarter million customers were without power in northern Texas.

The first phase of Winter Storm Cleon hammered parts of northeast Minnesota with heavy snow Dec. 2-4. Two Harbors, Michigan took the title as the location that had the most snow from Cleon with a total of 35.6 inches. Just down the road in Duluth, Minnesota, Cleon dumped 23.3 inches of snow. This was the sixth largest three day snowfall total on record in the city.   [Read more…]

An Analysis of The City of San Diego’s Climate Action Plan

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By John Lawrence

The City of San Diego has developed an elaborate Climate Action Plan (CAP), the goal of which is to reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions.

The County of San Diego has one too as does the City of Chula Vista as does the Port of San Diego as does SANDAG as does the University of California at San Diego as does the San Diego County Water Authority. In fact, as mandated by the state, almost every political jurisdiction in the state has developed a CAP. The CAPs in general are long on bureaucracy and time frames and short on specific mandates and orders for compliance.   [Read more…]

Extreme Weather Watch: November 2013 – Super Typhoon Hits Phillipines, Tornadoes Wipe Out Another Midwest Town

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by John Lawrence

Super Typhoon Haiyan

Super Typhoon Haiyan, the largest typhoon to hit land in human history, impacted the Phillipines on November 7 with winds exceeding 200 miles per hour along with torrential rain. The lives of 25 million people were affected. As many as 10,000 may have lost their lives. It was the equivalent of a Category 5 hurricane, and the only difference between it and a hurricane was its name. Hurricanes are called typhoons in certain parts of the world and cyclones in others. Since they are the same weather phenomenon, why confuse people? In this era of globalization let’s globalize the names too and call them all hurricanes.   [Read more…]

Public Banking: How a Public Bank Could Benefit San Diego – Part 4

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By John Lawrence

In this fourth part of our series on Public Banking (check out Parts 1 – 3 here, here and here), we explore how a Public Bank could benefit the taxpayers and citizens of the City of San Diego.

To recapitulate, the Public Bank of San Diego (BSD) would be owned by the City of San Diego and would provide functions similar to the Bank of North Dakota which is the nation’s only public bank as of this date. All BSD deposits would be guaranteed by the full faith and credit of the City of San Diego.   [Read more…]

Global Warming: How to Kick the Fossil Fuel Habit – Part 1

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By John Lawrence

This article is based on an excellent book by Tom Rand: “Kick the Fossil Fuel Habit – 10 Clean Technologies to Save Our World.” It contains great information at a reading level that even an elementary school child can comprehend. And there are many superb pictures too. It is a wonderful resource in the numerous technologies that are in the process of ridding the world of fossil fuels – some of them hardly known to the literate public. At least I wasn’t aware of them, and I consider myself somewhat knowledgeable about global warming and what we can do about it. He identifies ten different technologies. We will devote an article to each of them. Part 1 will deal with solar.

Most everyone is aware of solar panels. The sun provides the earth with an enormous amount of energy which we are learning how to convert into energy to power our cars and our homes. A square yard of desert absorbs as much energy over a year as you can get out of a barrel of oil. In fact a barrel of oil contains energy from the sun that was absorbed millenia ago and stored as fossils. An area of desert the size of the state of Connecticut absorbs enough energy to replace the entire oil output of the OPEC countries. The technology to convert this energy to power output useful to humans is available today.   [Read more…]

Extreme Weather Watch: October 2013 – Fires Burn Down Australia

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By John Lawrence

Australia has had its hottest year on record, and the warm temperatures combined with dry conditions have sent over 100 wildfires whipping across the southeastern Australian state of New South Wales. The fires have caused a deep haze to descend over Sydney, Australia’s largest city, and spurred the deployment of more than 1500 firefighters across the region. Hundreds of homes were either burned or damaged. The fires impacted 82 of Australia’s parks and protected areas, including the Blue Mountains, a UNESCO World Heritage Site. More than 311,000 acres were burned in New South Wales, and damage is set to exceed $100 million.

The newly reopened NASA Earth Observatory reported that temperatures up to 93°F and winds gusting to 56 mph helped fan the flames. Conditions over the past six months also played a key role. This past September was Australia’s hottest on record and kept the country on pace for a record-breaking year. Average temperatures in New South Wales were a whopping 6.1°F above the September norm. It was the country’s warmest 12-month period on record as well. Maximum temperatures were even more extreme, measuring 8.3°F above normal. The fires also came unusually  early — October is still the springtime in Australia as Australia is south of the equator and has seasons opposite to ours. Springtime or no, the region was primed to burn. The hotter summer months are still ahead!   [Read more…]

Extreme Weather Watch: September 2013, Floods in Boulder and Mexico

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By John Lawrence

Boulder, CO –The rain began to fall on Monday, September 9. Experts would ultimately call it a 1,000-year rain and a 100-year flood. By Thursday September 12, Little James Creek began ripping buildings from their foundations and sending roofs plunging into basements. Roads were closed and still the rain kept coming.

In the city of Boulder, Boulder Creek was roaring at a rate of 3,104 cubic feet per second, according to Boulder police Chief Mark Beckner. Two days before, it had been flowing at a leisurely 54 cfs.

At 1:40 AM on Thursday University of Colorado officials issued a text alert ordering faculty and staff residents living in university housing near Boulder Creek to evacuate. Soon, CU and the Boulder Valley School District would both announce they were closing down.   [Read more…]

Another View of Robert Reich’s Inequality for All

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By John Lawrence

This is Robert Reich’s latest venture in an attempt to inform the American public about what’s really going on with the economy in this society. He’s tried everything else: Chancellor’s Professor of Public Policy at the University of California at Berkeley in which he teaches a course on Wealth and Poverty, a blog, where he had as many as 300 comments after each post until he shut down the comments due to a persistent vile and threatening commenter who stooped to anti-semitic comments, 13 books, the latest being “Beyond Outrage,” Secretary of Labor in the Clinton Administration, radio and TV appearances, lectures.

He also worked in the Ford and Carter administrations. Reich has always been concerned about those who are struggling to keep their heads above water, and in today’s world that includes almost all of the former members of the middle class.

The major metaphor in the film is a suspension bridge which fits perfectly over a graph of the concentration of wealth that occurred at two points in American history, the first being in 1928 and the second being in 2008. These are the two high points of the suspension bridge and correspond to the two points of peak inequality in American society after which there was a crash: the Great Depression and the Great Recession.   [Read more…]

Opening of the New San Diego Central Library: a Grand and Glorious Occasion

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Saturday, Sept. 28, will go down in San Diego history as the day the much awaited central library opened in San Diego.

The opening ceremonies started at 11 a.m. and lasted for about an hour. All sorts of dignitaries were seated on the platform, and many of them spoke. The event was presided over by Mayor pro tem Todd Gloria. The gay men’s chorus warmed up the crowd as if they needed any warming on such a beautiful sunny San Diego day. The navy band did their John Philip Sousa thing and the children’s choir sang the national anthem.   [Read more…]

Public Banking: The Antidote to Wall Street’s Domination of the Economy – Part 3

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When states and municipalities set up public banks, money and hence energy is withdrawn from Wall Street creating the perfect revolution with the result that the husk of Wall Street shrivels up and dies like a plant deprived of nutrients … without a shot being fired.

By John Lawrence

Nothing could be less radical than a public bank because the state of North Dakota already has one and it has been working successfully for the citizens of North Dakota. No one would accuse North Dakotans of being socialists or would they? No new ground to break here!

Instead of money leaving the state and going to Wall Street, money stays in the state where it is lent out in the form of student and business loans with the profits being shared by the citizens of North Dakota instead of going into the pockets of private bankers in New York.   [Read more…]

Distilling the Essence of a Tune: Jeff Hamilton Trio Sunday at the Saville Theater

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by John Lawrence

The Jeff Hamilton Trio with Jeff on drums, Tamir Hendelman on piano and Christoph Luty on bass will perform Saturday, September 29, at the Saville Theater on the campus of San Diego City College at 5 PM. If you only go to one jazz event this year, this should be the one.

Jeff Hamilton is a truly amazing drummer, a major star in the jazz firmament. Jeff was voted the Numero Uno jazz drummer in Modern Drummer Magazine’s readers’ poll. Jeff’s prestidigitation on the drum set will have sticks and/or hands flying in a way that hardly seems humanly possible but always with consummate taste and rooted in the jazz tradition.

Jeff’s marriage of power and precision, his dynamic range from whispers to raging torrents, will leave you breathless and definitely wanting more. But most of all he’s known for his melodic solos.   [Read more…]

Extreme Weather Watch, August 2013

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By John Lawrence

August 2013 was prime time for wildfires.  The Rim fire, started by a hunter’s illegal fire, burned 370 square miles in California.  About a quarter of the fire was within Yosemite National Park.  More than 5,100 firefighters were battling the flames at their peak.  The Rim fire has destroyed 111 buildings, including 11 residences.  It threatened San Francisco’s water supply.  It has so far cost $72 million to fight and it’s still burning.  Research in California’s Sierra Nevada found that rising average summer temperatures are strongly associated with an increase in acres burned.  An annual increase in average summer temperature of 1º F is associated with a 35 percent growth in burned areas.

Nationally, federal agencies have spent more than $1 billion so far this year on wildfires, about half last year’s total of $1.9 billion.  There have been 33,000 fires that have burned more than 5,300 square miles, an area nearly the size of Connecticut.   [Read more…]

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