DAILY QUICK READ - JULY 7, 2016

What Good Are Zoos – Another Reason

Small victories, but they each make a difference.  Two great zoos working to save species from extinction and plan for their reintroduction into the wild.

A hopeful new study shows the Endangered Species Act has been extremely successful in stabilizing and increasing threatened or endangered bird populations, including two Pacific Island species that have been in the care of Chicago-area institutions since the mid-1980s.

The nonprofit Center for Biological Diversity released its report titled "A Wild Success" in June. Among the findings: 85 percent of birds protected by the Endangered Species Act have recovered in the continental U.S. Populations in the Pacific Islands have also shown recovery, but to a lesser degree at 61 percent.

Roughly three decades ago, the Lincoln Park Zoo and Brookfield Zoo set up critical captive breeding populations of two bird species native to the Pacific Island of Guam – the Guam rail and Guam kingfisher. These birds “would have been lost to extinction if not for dedicated captive-propagation programs,” the report states.

The Lincoln Park Zoo currently has four Guam kingfishers and one Guam rail in captivity. There are 16 Guam kingfishers at the Brookfield Zoo.

Experimental programs to reintroduce these birds in the wild are under way, specifically on the islands of Rota and Cocos near Guam. However, the wild populations aren’t yet well established, which is why the birds are still classified as extinct in the wild by the International Union for Conservation of Nature.

Bionic Bugs – Tiny Terminators

This is just a bit creepy.  Explosive detecting bugs, OK.  But, what’s next – having your house bugged takes on more literal meaning.

Researchers at Washington University in St. Louis hope that in the future, cyborg locusts could play an important role in defense in national security.

Baranidharan Raman, assistant professor of biomedical engineering, and his team are actually biologically engineering locusts to be able to detect the scent of explosives and let us know.

The project is being done under a 3-year grant funded by the Office of Naval Research.

Because locusts detect smells through their antennae, the researchers will implant electrodes into the locusts’ brains to read the electrical activity passing through their antennae. To transmit this electrical activity data, each insect will be equipped with a tiny backpack that acts as a transmitter.

Couldn’t Happen to a Better Person

Just because Donald Trump doesn’t believe in climate change doesn’t mean his estate isn’t going to be under water.

On a hot and lazy afternoon in Palm Beach, the only sign of movement is the water gently lapping at the grounds of Mar-a-Lago, the private club that is the prize of Donald Trump’s real estate acquisitions in Florida.

Trump currently dismisses climate change as a hoax invented by China, though he has quietly sought to shield real estate investments in Ireland from its effects.

But at the Republican presidential contender’s Palm Beach estate and the other properties that bear his name in south Florida, the water is already creeping up bridges and advancing on access roads, lawns and beaches because of sea-level rise, according to a risk analysis prepared for the Guardian.

In 30 years, the grounds of Mar-a-Lago could be under at least a foot of water for 210 days a year because of tidal flooding along the intracoastal water way, with the water rising past some of the cottages and bungalows, the analysis by Coastal Risk Consulting found.

Starvation Is An Option

Over fishing and climate change will have a tragic impact on nearly a billion people in the near future.

The world has to solve an impossible conundrum: the amount of fish coming out of the ocean peaked in 1996, yet the world’s population will grow to a peak of 10-billion by 2050. About half of that population will live near the Equator and will rely on fish. But, largely as a result of illegal fishing and overfishing, the food source will have plunged.

That means 845-million people will be denied this protein source and critical micronutrients, according to a report, Fall in Fish Catch Threatens Human Health, in the peer-reviewed journal Nature.

Previous research into the fall in fish stocks has looked at what happens when people lose their primary source of proteins.

Climate change will exacerbate the problem, according to the Harvard research. Floods and droughts are happening more often in this region. This is destroying crops on land, leaving the ocean as the last source of staple food. In these cases, the team said: “Fishing for food has become an act of desperation.”

It’s been suggested that aquaculture can be the solution for declining fish stocks. On an industrial scale, it would allow natural fish stocks to recover. But, said the researchers, developing countries do not have the resources to do this. They also found that farmed seafood ends up being sold in Europe and North America.

EU For Ivory Trade

South Africa is leading the block that wants to allow the “controlled” trade in ivory.  Most African governments are opposed to even limited trade.  Now the EU has sided with the traders.  Bad news for elephants.

Wildlife officials in nearly 30 African states say they are appalled by an EU decision to oppose a comprehensive global ban on the ivory trade.

In a position paper released on 1 July, the European commission said that rather than an all-encompassing ban it would be better to encourage countries with growing elephant numbers to “sustainably manage” their populations.

An existing global embargo on ivory sales is due to end in 2017 and Zimbabwe, Namibia, South Africa and Botswana are pushing for it to be replaced with a decision-making mechanism for future tusk trading, at the Convention on International Trade in International Species (Cites) conference in Johannesburg this September.

DAILY QUICK READ - JULY 6, 2016

Painted Dogs- Enthusiastic

Brilliant predators, dedicated family creatures and, no matter what, they are dogs.  And, dogs are cool.

“They are the most enthusiastic animals,” said Rosie Woodroffe of the Institute of Zoology in London, who has studied wild dogs for the last 20 years. “Other predators may be bigger and fiercer, but I would argue that there is nothing so enthusiastic as a wild dog,” she said. “They live the life domestic dogs wish they could live.”

In 1997, while devising an action plan to help save the wild dog species, Lycaon pictus, Dr. Woodroffe felt anything but exuberant. Wild dogs were considered among the most endangered of Africa’s mammals; Dr. Woodroffe had yet to see one in the wild, and she feared she never would.

“I remember sitting on my kitchen floor thinking, ‘They’re going to go extinct,’ ” she said. “They have such a massive requirement for space in a world where human populations are only increasing.”

“Everything I thought 20 years ago was, if not entirely wrong, then certainly inaccurate,” said Joshua R. Ginsberg, the president-elect of the Cary Institute of Ecosystem Studies in Millbrook, N.Y., who was Dr. Woodroffe’s adviser. “Wild dogs turn out to be far more resilient than anyone expected.”

We Need More Mines

Exploiting the environment in the most sensitive places.  Why?

There are few places in this country more beautiful than the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness in Minnesota, which is contained by the equally staggering Superior National Forest. So, naturally, it's just the perfect place to drop a massive copper mine.

Over the weekend, former vice president Walter Mondale and Teddy Roosevelt IV wrote an op-ed in The New York Times calling our attention to this free-market brainstorm.

At issue is the renewal of a couple of 20-year-old leases granted to a Chilean mining behemoth. But the proposed mine is just the biggest part of a general struggle in northeastern Minnesota between the people charged with keeping public wilderness pristine and extraction companies waving the promises of fees and jobs around in a tough economy. In June, the U.S. Forest Service came out against renewing the leases and set off a huge controversy concerning not only the Boundary Waters mine, but also existing iron and mineral producing facilities all over the Iron Range. Governor Mark Dayton has written a strong letter against the Boundary Waters mine.

Gap Year Colonialism

The gap year is a right of passage for many young people in Europe.  Sadly, for some it is an excuse to be real jerks.

Westerners writing about their gap year in Africa should be aware of the risks by now. After Gap Yah guy’s satire of his time in “Tanzaniaaa”, “Africaaa”, where he actually saw someone contract “Malariaaa”, travellers have had to think carefully about how they talk about their year abroad.

At best they risk ridicule. At worst they will be accused of colonialism, cultural blindness and perpetuating an outdated narrative of the developing world for their own means.

But no one seemed to have warned Louise Linton, whose article “How my dream gap year in Africa turned into a nightmare” appeared in the Telegraph this week to promote a book about her experience.

Despite being in Zambia, she writes about becoming a “central character” in the Congolese war of the late 1990s – terrified of what the rebels from across the border “would do to the ‘skinny white muzungu with long angel hair’”.

She goes on to rattle through the dictionary of “white saviour in Africa” cliches: from 12-inch long spiders, “brutal tales of rape and murder”, “close encounters with lions” and helping a “smiling gap-toothed child with HIV”.

The response on social media was immediate. One tweeter known as Mr Aye Dee, said that Linton’s piece had “echoes” of Rudyard Kipling’s poem The White Man’s Burden – except of course that in 1899 people couldn’t tweet Kipling to complain about his imperialist overtones.

Zambians and Africans from around the continent were furious as Linton’s piece started to circulate online. “Hell hath no fury like an African scorned,” tweeted BBC presenter Sophie Ikenye.

The Duke of Cambridge

Tusk Award finalists.  Individuals working to save wildlife in Africa.

The economic security of millions of African people relies on the tourism industry, with around 80 per cent of tourism revenue in Africa coming from people watching wild animals. If current poaching rates continue, diminishing opportunities for tourists, the impact on the future development and prosperity of large parts of this continent will be incredibly damaging.

That is why I am so proud to congratulate the three Tusk Award finalists [see below] for their tireless commitment to preserving Africa’s important natural heritage.

Since its formation in 1990, Tusk has raised £30 million for a wide range of projects across Africa. These not only aim to protect wildlife, but also help to alleviate poverty through sustainable development and education among rural communities who live alongside wildlife. The Duke of Cambridge became royal patron of Tusk in 2005 and supports its work both privately and publicly.

Cathy Dreyer, South Africa

Cathy Dreyer started her career more than 17 years ago with South African National Parks (SANParks), as a conservation student. There she developed a deep concern for black rhino which has shaped her career in conservation.

Olivier Nsengimana, Rwanda

Dr Olivier Nsengimana, a survivor of the Rwandan genocide, taught science in secondary school for several years before being chosen by the government to attend veterinary school. He works as a field veterinarian with the gorilla doctors. Through his project Saving Endangered Grey Crowned Cranes, Olivier hopes to inspire the next generation of young Rwandans to help with the conservation of the country’s wildlife and natural heritage.

Rachel McRobb, Zambia

“I am one of those lucky people in life who finds fulfilment just being in wild places surrounded by wildlife,” says Rachel McRobb. “The possibility of losing this in South Luangwa and other parts of Zambia is enough for me to fight the daily battles involved in running a wildlife conservation NGO in Africa and managing an anti-poaching unit.”

DAILY QUICK READ - JULY 5, 2016

Slow Motion Disaster

One third of Adélie penguin habitat unfit by 2030. 

Though Adélie penguins (Pygoscelis adeliae) call Antarctica their home since 45,000 years ago, time in which they’ve seen several drastic changes in the climate, anthropogenic climate change might put populations to the ultimate test. After studying how colonies fared over a 30-year-period, researchers believe as much as 60 percent of the current Adélie penguin habitats might become unfit by the end of the century.

Megan Cimino, one of the lead authors of the study published in the journal Scientific Reports, says the current trends suggest 30 percent of the animal’s colonies will be in jeopardy by 2030, and 60 percent will be impacted by 2099. Near the U.S. research facility at Palmer Station on the West Antarctic Peninsula (WAP), a penguin colony has already dropped by 80 percent since the 1970s.

Voter Frustration

Republican insistence that climate change isn’t real and the media’s unwillingness to do their collective job result in the most important issue of the 21st century being ignored.

As the primary election season turns toward a head-to-head between Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump, there is increasing anger and frustration over the nature of the contest. A Guardian call-out to online readers in the US asking them to reflect on the race so far was met by a barrage of criticism on the tone and substance of the world’s most important election – with the two main parties, individual candidates and the media all coming under heavy fire.

Of the 1,385 who responded to the call-out – from all 50 states – one in five expressed discontent at the relative silence from candidates around a subject that they believed to be of supreme and epochal importance. They noted that much of the Republican debate has either focused on blatant denial that climate change even exists or on how to unpick Barack Obama’s attempts to fight global warming, while on the Democratic side both Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders have raised the issue but have rarely pushed it to the top of the political agenda.

This ideological gap also plays out in public opinion research which uses a nationally representative sample of respondents. Last year, Pew Research Center found that 76% of liberal Democrats said that “global warming is a very serious problem” compared to 14% of conservative Republicans.

That is perhaps a reflection of a fundamental disagreement among Americans about the reasons for, and even existence of, climate change. Pew found that 64% of Democrats believed global warming was caused by human activity while only 22% of Republicans agreed.

Koch, Exxon and the Rest of the Liars

Antarctic ice is not a contrary indicator.  It is predictable and there are complex systems and reasons for the lack of Antarctic ice reduction.

For a number of years now, climate change skeptics have argued that there’s a key part of the Earth’s climate system that upends our expectations about global warming, and that is showing trends that actually cut in the opposite direction.

This supposed contrary indicator is the sea ice that rings the Antarctic continent, and that reached a new all-time record extent of  7.78 million square miles in September 2014 (see above). As that record suggests, this vast field of ice has been expanding in recent years, rather than shrinking. That means it’s doing the opposite of what is happening in the Arctic, where sea ice is declining rapidly — and also that it’s doing the opposite of what we might expect in a warming world.

Scientists don’t fully understand why Antarctic sea ice is growing — suggested explanations have posited more glacial melt dumping cold fresh water into the surrounding seas, or the way the Antarctic ozone hole has changed the circulation of winds around the continent. In a new study in Nature Geoscience, though, researchers with the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) in Boulder, Colo., along with colleagues from the University of Washington in Seattle and Australia, suggest that the phenomenon is simply the result of natural variability of the climate system — driven, in this case, by changes in the tropical Pacific Ocean that reverberate globally.

…the new study finds that in the small minority of climate change simulations that do happen to correctly capture these natural changes in the Pacific, and the global warming “slowdown” to boot, there is also growth in Antarctic sea ice. These are the models, it appears, that happened to get the role of natural variability in the Pacific right — or more specifically, to get the timing right for a phase shift in this ocean.

Not So Black and White After All

If an octopus can only see in black and white, how does it manage to change colors to blend into a wide variety of backgrounds?

Despite having a single type of visual pigment in their retinas, cephalopods can blend with their multi-coloured surroundings easily fooling both prey and predators. This has stricken many scientists as a paradox. Christopher Stubbs, a Harvard professor of physics and astronomy, thinks he has some clues as to how the creatures manage this feat. His research suggests cephalopods might be able to detect colour after all, but in a very unusual way akin to how a digital camera dithers back and forth to create a crisp image.

…octopuses, squids or cuttlefish might be exploiting a physical phenomenon called chromatic aberration. Also known as “color fringing” or “purple fringing”, this common optical pattern occurs when a lens is unable to bring all the wavelengths of colour to the same focal plane or when the colour wavelengths are focused at different positions in the focal plane. What happens is the various colour wavelengths travel at different speeds passing through the lens, resulting in an image that is blurred or has coloured edges (red, green, blue, yellow, purple, magenta).

DAILY QUICK READ - JULY 4, 2016 - HAPPY 4TH OF JULY

Look at all the trouble these 56 men started!

  

Bottled Water – Why?

The stuff isn’t any better that what comes out of the tap in most U.S. cities.  Of course there are exceptions, but maybe we should be fixing them and not filling the world with useless plastic bottles.

Nestlé is planning to open a bottled water plant in Phoenix. Yes, drought-stricken Phoenix, Arizona.

According to the Associated Press, Nestlé Waters will treat the city’s tap water and bottle it under its Pure Life brand. The plan is to extract about 35 million gallons of water in its first year to produce 264 million half-liter bottles.

Unsurprisingly, many people are wondering why it is necessary to bottle water in the middle of a desert when Arizonans can just drink it from the tap.

“Arizona is in drought conditions and with more people moving here each day it is imperative that we do everything we can to conserve water,” a Change.org petition signed by nearly 45,000 people states. “Even on the City of Phoenix website, we are reminded that the future of our city water supply is uncertain.”

We Can All Be Spider Man (or Woman)

Not sure about wrapping myself in spider web, but if Patagonia thinks It’s OK…then I’ll give it a try.

Spider silk’s qualities are nearly mythical. Its tensile strength is comparable to steel’s. Yet it is lighter, and can be as stretchy as a rubber band. Those traits in combination make it tougher than Kevlar. To give you an idea: If the spider webs that shoot from Spider Man’s wrists were real spider silk, the superhero could genuinely have pulled the runaway train to a halt in that dramatic scene in Spider Man 2.

So it’s no surprise that the race is on to create a synthetic version.

“We make protein microfibers, and they are inspired by nature, starting with spiders,” says Sue Levin, Bolt Threads’ chief marketing officer. “But we can riff off that in literally infinite directions.”

A real spider generates silk in specialized glands in its abdomen, and creates the silk strands using a spinning organ called a spinneret. Some spiders produce up to seven types of silk, each with its own purpose and attributes.

Synthetic spider silk could be used for everything from automobile parts to medical devices to performance outdoor gear, which is the area that’s attracting some of the most attention thus far. Bolt Threads recently announced a $50 million round of funding, as well as a new partnership with the outdoor brand Patagonia, which demonstrates a major vote of confidence in its technology.

Neither Bolt Threads nor Patagonia will give details on what products they’re working on just yet, but Matt Dwyer, Patagonia’s director of material innovation, promises when something does come out, it will be “awesome.”

“We think they’ve cracked the code,” he says. “For them to have come up with this capability… is just the kind of stuff that blows your mind.”

The War on Science

Right now it looks like ignorance is winning and sadly it is the media that is aiding the forces of ignorance.  Could be that the public’s right to know has been subverted by corporate interests.

Every so often a book comes along that changes the way you view the world. The War on Science: Who’s Waging It, Why It Matters, What We Can Do About It by Shawn Otto is one of those rare books. If you care about attacks on climate science and the rise of authoritarianism, if you care about biased media coverage or shake-your-head political tomfoolery, this book is for you.

In the week following the Paris climate accord, both the Democrats and the Republicans held presidential primary debates. Yet just days after 195 countries reached an historic agreement to begin rebuilding the world’s economy around clean energy, no journalist in either debate asked a single question about it.

DAILY QUICK READ - JULY 3, 2016

More Trees, Less Assholes

Tweets Don’t Save Lions

Excellent framing of the real threats facing lions in Africa.  Hint – it isn’t Minnesota dentists.

THE killing of Zimbabwe’s celebrated Cecil the Lion by a Minnesota dentist, on July 1 of last year unleashed a storm of moral fulmination against trophy hunting. People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals issued an official statement calling for the hunter, Walter J. Palmer, to be hanged, and an odd bedfellow, Newt Gingrich, tweeted that Dr. Palmer and the entire team involved in the killing of Cecil should go to jail. The television personality Sharon Osbourne thought merely losing “his home, his practice and his money” would do, adding, “He has already lost his soul.”

Unfortunately, the furor did almost nothing to slow the catastrophic decline in lion populations, down 43 percent over the past two decades. That’s because trophy hunting was never really the main problem. Lions are disappearing in Africa for a reason far more complicated and less susceptible to either moral grandstanding or easy solutions: Impoverished Africans are eating the lions’ prey and killing the lions themselves — at a rate estimated at five to 10 times the take from trophy hunting.

As a result, lions are now effectively extinct across much of West and Central Africa; two populations, totaling about 400, remain. Continentwide, only about 20,000 lions survive, according to a new report, “Beyond Cecil: Africa’s Lions in Crisis,” just issued by Panthera and another conservation group, WildAid. That’s down from 200,000 in the mid-20th century, and populations are likely to drop by half, except in southern Africa, over the next two decades.

Elephants Don’t Like Chili

Turns out not only does it keep elephants away from other crops, but it’s also a very profitable crop on its own.

Grace Kipwola is solely responsible for supporting her six kids, including paying school fees for two in secondary school. But elephants made it difficult for the Ugandan farmer to earn a steady income.

When it’s harvest season, elephants from nearby Murchison Falls National Park raid village farmlands to snack on rice and maize. “If I had a spear, I would probably have killed them,” Kipwola admits. “But now, I have no problems with them.”

What prompted her attitude change? Kipwola joined an agricultural project being implemented by the Uganda Wildlife Authority and AWF under the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID)/Uganda Biodiversity Program. The project provides support to farmers to grow chili peppers.

Greed, Greed, Greed

Columbia’s diversity under attack for cocaine, gold and timber.

Colombia is one of the world’s 17 most biodiverse countries. Due to the great variation in altitudes and climates within the country — from high mountains to pristine white sand beaches — this South American nation is home to many rich and varied ecosystems. Its 314 types of ecosystems host nearly 10 percent of the planet’s biodiversity. Worldwide, it ranks first in bird and orchid species diversity and second in plants, butterflies, freshwater fishes, and amphibians.

Nowhere is this rich and complex array of life more evident than in its network of 59 national parks, which span snow-capped mountains of the Andes, the Amazon rainforests, coastal cloud forests, open savannas and the Caribbean islands. These parks hold within them archaeological treasures, uncontacted indigenous tribes, endangered flora and fauna, such as jaguars, cotton-topped tamarins, and spectacles bears, black cedar, and Colombian palm, and (perhaps unfortunately) a wealth of mineral resources.

However, the parks are also home to guerrilla insurgents and criminalized paramilitary groups that have been drawn to the wilds by the lucrative prospect of exploiting coca crops and cocaine production and illegal mining and logging. The invasion of these underworld networks has been accompanied by ecological destruction and contamination that threatens the future of some of Colombia’s most fragile protected areas.

July 3, 1863 - Last Day At Gettysburg

The army of secession attempts a final gamble and breaks itself against the Union.

DAILY QUICK READ - JULY 2, 2016

Trophy Hunting Corruption

In Tanzania there is a great deal of evidence of corruption in the granting of hunting rights and video evidence of horrific hunting practice being employed by Green Mile Safaris.  If this is trophy hunting then those who sanction it should become subjects of one of these hunts.  The video attached to this Quartz article is painful to watch.  More of the videos can be see here.

Regardless, the extraordinary natural beauty and resources of the land around Lake Natron remain a key resource to be employed on behalf of the people of Tanzania—or abused. The rights to maintain and hunt these sites are scarce resources. Now, a dispute over these hunting blocks between two safari groups backed by wealthy individuals—one, the Friedkin Conservation Fund from the US; the other, Green Mile Safaris, connected to the rulers of Abu Dhabi—has spiraled into an unsettling story of corruption and animal abuse...

The allegations—that Green Mile, a company banned from operating in Tanzania, was handed the Friedkin Conservation Fund’s hunting grounds in a back-room deal—have tarnished the administration of John Magufuli, Tanzania’s recently elected president.

Green Mile’s reputation came about thanks to a video leaked in 2014. Apparently made in 2012 to promote the company’s safari trips, the video shows repeated and brazen violations of Tanzania’s hunting laws—indeed, of the sporting norms promoted by hunters around the world eager to portray themselves as responsible stewards of the land.

Among the shocking violations in the Green Mile video are hunting with automatic weapons, having children hunt with automatic weapons, gunning down fleeing animals from moving cars, capturing baby animals and torturing dying ones, and using bait and lights at night to attract unsuspecting animals. The video was brought to parliament and became a national sensation.

Just In Time For the 4^th of July

Maybe those famous Florida beaches won’t be so much fun this 4th of July.  There’s lots of finger pointing going on, but this is hardly a new problem.  As much as Florida’s Republican governor blames President Obama, it is Floridians that generate the pollution and Republicans in Congress who refuse to fund government services.  Gov. Scott, you own this.

Waterways and beaches along Florida’s Atlantic coast have been taken over by thick, blue-green algae blooms, prompting Florida Gov. Rick Scott to declare local states of emergency in St. Lucie, Martin, Palm Beach and Lee counties.

Residents have described the foul-smelling algae as “guacamole-thick,” “god-awful” and “a festering infected creepy mess.” One resident has complained of health problems, telling Reuters, “It is affecting all of us as far as red eyes, runny nose and the ‘in the throat’ feeling.”

“It’s heartbreaking for all of us who live, work and play along the lagoon to see how the quality of the water has declined,” environmental non-profit Balance For Earth wrote on Facebook.

The source of the severe bloom is believed to stem from the polluted Lake Okeechobee, which has become a hotbed of finger-pointing.

ThinkProgress reported in February that local industries have long dumped an assortment of chemicals, fertilizers and cattle manure into the lake. David Guest, managing attorney of the Florida branch of the environmental law group Earthjustice, described the lake as a “toilet.”

The Guardian reported that algae samples from the lake taken earlier this month found levels of toxins 20 times higher than a safety threshold set by the World Health Organization.

Cars, Buses, Bicycles

We keep hearing how driverless cars with change the urban environment.  Hummm.  Maybe not.

For years we have been showing the image from the City of Müenster, comparing how much road space is taken up by cars, buses and bikes carrying the same number of people. Versions of it have been created all over the world.

But now, as there are so many discussions about how Uber or self-driving cars will change our cities, Jon Orcutt of NYCDOT Communications and Advocacy director at Transitcenter makes the strong point that they are still cars, they still take up road space, they still probably have one person (or two in a human-controlled UBER) and are perhaps not the panacea that people are saying they are. As Brent Todorian notes, Mobility in cities is all about space. Uber and driverless cars don't solve the problem.

Here is the original from Müenster:

On July 2, 1863

As we move fully into the 4th of July weekend, remember how July 2, 1863 went for the men of the 20th Maine.  This charge by a small group on men on an obscure corner of the Gettysburg battlefield changed the outcome of the battle and, maybe, the war.

DAILY QUICK READ - JULY 1, 2016

Foreign Invaders Killing ‘Ohi’a Trees

As if Hawaii’s extinction crisis didn’t need more fuel on the fire, imported plant diseases are threatening a tree critical to many bird species.

The tree, with its iron-hard wood, is almost impossible to imagine without its signature spray of vibrant orange-red or yellow flowers with long, slender stamens.

'Ohi'a is so critical to the survival of Hawai'i's native birds that it is hard to imagine a vibrant avifauna without it. But the tree is increasingly threatened by plant diseases. 'Ohi'a rust, imported to Hawai'i in decorative flower and foliage shipments from California, is established in Hawai'i and has the potential to devastate the state's one million acres of 'ohi'a. Meanwhile, an aggressive fungus, Ceratocystis fimbriata, also known as rapid 'ohi'a death, has been identified as the cause of death of hundreds of thousands of 'ohi'a trees on over 34,000 acres on Hawai‘i Island.

Hawai'i's native birds face an uncertain future if disease overcomes the legendary 'ohi'a. So, it is essential that state and federal agencies increase the resources available to understand and deal with these disease threats, while at the same time ramping up currently inadequate biosecurity measures to prevent new diseases from getting to Hawai'i in the first place.

Exxon Invokes Their Right To Lie

Exxon Mobil claims the right to lie about what they knew and what they covered up regarding the impact of fossil fuel driven CO2 increase on climate change.  It’s a novel defense.

Does Exxon Mobil have a constitutional right to sow doubt about climate science? That’s the subject of a high-stakes legal battle playing out between dozens of state attorneys general, members of Congress, corporate executives, and activists.

Last fall, investigations by Inside Climate News and the Los Angeles Times revealed that the oil giant has decades of internal documents showing that its own scientists and executives knew fossil fuels contributed to climate change. Publicly, the company argued that the threats posed by global warming were far from certain, presumably as part of an effort to fight off regulations.

The revelations have sparked a barrage of legal actions. The attorney generals of Massachusetts, California, and New York launched investigations of Exxon, while Democratic AGs from other states have expressed their support. Some have drawn parallels to the tobacco industry’s deception on the dangers of smoking. Exxon has countered that the investigations are unconstitutional and has filed motions asking courts to block the subpoenas. “This…is about freedom of political speech,” the company recently argued in the Massachusetts case.

Have We Gone To Far?

Has global warming reached the point where we can’t stop it or do we have a chance to reverse or mitigate the effects?  We are at the last minute of the last hour.

But are the good records enough to help us deal with the bad? Global average temperatures are hitting record highs every recent month and year and atmospheric concentrations of greenhouse gases are rising steadily, to levels unheard of in human history. Arctic sea ice is vanishing at unprecedented levels, mass bleaching is killing the Great Barrier Reef and record-setting droughts, floods, heat waves and extreme weather are happening around the world.

As Prof. Stefan Rahmstorf of Germany’s Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research told the Guardian: “These are very worrying signs and I think it shows we are on a crash course with the Paris targets unless we change course very, very fast. I hope people realize that global warming is not something down the road, but it is here now and is affecting us now.”

Despite overwhelming evidence for human-caused climate change, the fossil fuel industry continues to employ shady people and organizations to fool fearful and apparently blind followers into believing the problem doesn’t exist or isn’t serious enough to worry about. Their messaging follows a pattern: Spread a simplistic lie until it becomes so discredited that few people accept it and then move on to another simplistic lie.

A bit light on reading today.  Blame an early start to the 4th of July weekend.

Before Hamilton, there was 1776.