OK, let’s talk about something else. Lotsa other stuff in the world besides the California recall. For instance, we could talk about global warming, and the increasing and – apparently – accelerating threat it poses. Does that sound like fun, boys and girls?

I knew you would agree!

It hit 100.2 degrees in London, England yesterday. Here in the US, that wouldn’t be major news, since every state in the Union, including Alaska, has experienced triple digit readings. But England is a cold and damp place. I lived in London for three years, and it never got above 85 in all that time. The average daytime high in August is a hair under 70F (21C). This time, they set an all-time record, and their records go back to 1659.

Forecasters say the heat wave might continue through the end of September. Temperatures at or above 100 have been popping up all across northern Europe, including 105 in Germany. Adding to the general consternation is that this comes after three months of the European equivalent of a drought.

In Iraq today, it hit 130 degrees, which is warm even for them. Thanks to the efficiency of the free market, troops over there were able to withstand the heat thanks to promises that they would have fans and air conditioning by no later than October.

Since 1980, the amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere has increased by 9.3%.

That’s a big jump. That’s a big, scary jump. Thanks to air trapped in polar ice, we have accurate records of the composition of the troposphere going back some 800,000 years, and not only is the CO2 at the highest levels, but the rate of change has never been anything within three magnitudes of what we’ve seen in just the past 25 years.

June was the third hottest on record, with temperatures running about almost exactly one degree Fahrenheit above the normal baseline of 1880-2002. However, what was startling was that the climate started out cool, but then got very hot, averaging 3.5 degrees above average on land for the last ten days.

Three and a half degrees may not sound like much, but on that scale, it represents a huge deviation from the norm. If you flip a coin ten times and get tails six times, that’s not unusual. But if that same average of 60% is holding after a million flips, then you’ve just beaten some very long odds. Scale levels variation.

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) website is unequivocal in its assessment of the present climate: "The recent record warm temperatures in the 1990's are indeed the warmest temperatures the Earth has seen in at least the last 1000 years." Contrary to what the loons on the far right claim, NOAA has no ideological axe to grind, isn’t interested in destroying technology or the American economy, and selects conclusions from the data, whereas the pseudo-scientific websites such as "Greening Earth Society" and globalwarming.org do the exact opposite, selecting evidence to support existing conclusions. The dittohead loons that infest the web had been coming out with a whole new siege of propaganda pooh-poohing global warming, and it’s these sites, run by such entities as the American Petroleum Institute and the Libertarian National Consumer Coalition, which promote that propaganda.

We live in a society hagridden with ultrawealthy and delusional fools who are fighting, tooth and nail, to defend their right to squander our lives and our planet.

Everyone knows what the main things are that we expect to see from global warming: rising oceans, melting glaciers, pronounced warming in the far north, and of course, heat waves like the one Europe is experiencing now, or the one North America had two weeks ago, or the one that Asia had last month. All those areas – some 70% of the world’s land mass and human population, experienced record or near record heat in just the past four weeks. Temperatures in India hit 120, which was a record, and it was muggy to boot. Death Valley has had 30 days this summer where it has been above 120, which is more than the average of two such days they see most years. One day it reached 129, the hottest it’s been in some 40 years. In nearby Redding, it hit 117, and Redding had the unenviable distinction of being the hottest place on earth for that particular day. Here, dew points reached 76 degrees, some eight degrees above the highest anyone remembered seeing around here, in the cool, dry mountains. Transplants from the American south showed locals the trick of putting a few grains of uncooked rice in salt shakers so the stuff would stay dry enough to pour. A commonality in South Carolina, it was news to the dumbfounded locals, who didn’t know salt COULD clump up like that.

Ninety four percent of the glaciers in the north are receding. The polar bears, never a huge population, are facing extinction due to global warming, due to the fact that the time that the ice is thick enough to hunt on has decreased by nearly four weeks a year. Polar bears eat when on the ice, starve on land. Few creatures that size benefit from an extra four weeks starvation each year. It also cuts into their birthing cycle.

Some of the less obvious results of global warming such as changes in ranges of habitat of animals, plants, and viruses are accelerating. West Nile Virus, which didn’t exist in North America a few years ago, is on the verge of being declared a major health problem. Dengue, malaria, and other tropical diseases are spreading out from the equator. Winters are getting shorter, but tend to be more vicious. Most people don’t associate bigger snowfalls and more severe cold snaps with global warming, but it makes sense when you consider that when you pump more energy into an oscillating engine, the oscillations reach a higher amplitude. Global warming means more energy in the weather engine, which means wider variations.

More droughts. More rain, too. Savage droughts hit Europe and Australia, even as India experienced the nastiest monsoons in memory.

Outside of America, blinded and propagandized by corporate control of the media and the government, global warming isn’t even considered an issue. There’s no longer any doubt that it’s happening, and it’s equally obvious that most of not all of it stems from human activities.

Anyone reading this who buys into the right wing line that signing Kyoto and striving to lower CO2 emissions will destroy the economy need only consider this: we’ve been forcing industry to clean up its act since 1972, and during that time we saw the greatest economic growth in the history of the world. Despite the big jump in population, the tripling of automobiles, and the huge increase in industrial production, we actually gained ground on pollution – even as the economy grew and grew and grew.

A joint study in 1998 between industry and the Department of Energy concluded that as a result of the Clean Air / Clean Water acts passed in 1972, America actually SAVED FIVE TRILLION DOLLARS, not only because of cleaner and more efficient use of our power, but through reduced health problems, reduced cleanup, and innovation. Clean industry is more efficient than dirty industry any time. Pollution represents waste.

Fighting cleanup efforts for the purpose of saving money is exactly the same as trying to improve your life through waste and squalor.

There have been dozens of events on earth that destroyed 90% of all life. Many of those were related to climate change in one way or another. In nearly all cases, the large carnivores died off first. The top of the food chain is the first to go. We are the top of the food chain this time. And all the previous climate changes that weren’t caused by other catastrophes such as an asteroid strike or a massive volcanic eruption happened much more gradually than what we’re seeing now.

And scientists are becoming convinced that the rate of change is accelerating far more than they expected. We may be in deeper and more immediate trouble than even the worst pessimists among us thought.

Keep an eye on your weather forecast, and fight them tooth and nail.

Before it’s too late.