Climate Change
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Talk about the need for a presidential candidate science debate leads somewhere- Back in 2008 there was mounting concern that science had always been left out of the presidential debates. This concern led to efforts to demand presidential candidates discuss these issues. Soon there was the formation of Science Debate 2008. This group, small at…
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With severe drought gripping much of the Mid-West and West, the federal government is promising relief from this “natural disaster” for agricultural producers. Soon federal funds will be flowing for “disaster relief” in the farm belt. Already farmers are permitted to graze and hay Conservation Reserve Program lands which are supposed to be, among other…
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5-milion years ago instead of 600,000 or 130,000 years ago- Recent interest in the relationship between polar bears and brown (grizzly) bears from which they emerged has been fueled by the observation of increasing numbers of polar bear – brown bear hybrids. Our recent article on this produced a number of comments, many of them…
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Is this likely response to global warming beneficial or detrimental? In 2006, Jim Martell from Idaho, was hunting in the high arctic and shot the first confirmed grizzly bear – polar bear hybrid. There had been unconfirmed reports of rare hybrids in the past, but this was the first confirmed instance. That the two species of…
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Increase since March probably due to unusual and destructive weather- After a period of general decline in belief among the general public that climate change is taking place, polls show a recent surge in believers. Very hot weather in the Eastern U.S. in March, the record breaking drought, and the sudden appearence of more than…
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Lack of precipitation and heat reflected in The Drought Monitor- Twelve years ago the National Drought Mitigation Center created the Drought Monitor. Drought Monitor blends various indicators of drought to create a U.S. map showing if any of the country is experiencing drought. It also shows how severe the drought conditions are. Supplementary maps show short term…
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Earthquakes, water pollution, political pollution, and now toxic chemicals in the air near fracking wells- It seems every day the news about the negative side effects of fracking gets worse (and the TV ads run by the American Petroleum Institute and others more manipulative). Aside from the methane in the natural gas, a number of…
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Republican Presidential candidate Rick Santorum is not content to criticize President Obama’s policy objectives from a political perspective, he’s taken to the pulpit criticizing the President’s, and an entire population of religious people, whose faith compels them to consider the environment. Santorum is at odds with his own church on environmental issues – Los Angeles Times Santorum was…