This Would Be the Last Emergency

..It is a sign that severe drought is returning to the Amazon for a second successive year. And that would be ominous. New research suggests that one further dry year beyond that could tip the whole vast forest into a cycle of destruction.

The day before, top scientists delivered much the same message at a remarkable floating symposium on the Rio Negro, on the strange black waters beside which Manaus, the capital city of the Amazon, stands.

They told the meeting - convened on a flotilla of boats by Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew of the Greek Orthodox Church, dubbed the "green Pope" for his environmental activism - that global warming and deforestation were pushing the entire enormous area towards a "tipping point", where it would start to die.

The consequences would be awesome. The wet Amazon Basin would turn to dry savannah at best, desert at worst. This would cause much of the world to become hotter and drier.

In the long term, it could send global warming out of control, eventually making the world uninhabitable. - The New Zealand Herald

Photo: mariatorret/Flickr

A Little History of Fascism

It has been well documented that Prescott Bush (George's Grandfather) was a director and shareholder of companies that profited from their involvement with the financial backers of Nazi Germany.

People don't seem to react to that fact, but what if I told you that while Prescott Bush was profiting from the policies of the Nazis, he was simultaneously plotting a coup here in America to unseat FDR? Would that be news? The BBC has the story.

"You could have had a handful of the wealthiest peeple in the United States found guilty of treason, and sentenced to death."

And here is some more background info care of the Guardian/UK.

Aging Infrastructure Fails in NYC

Last night's steam pipe explosion on 41st Street is exactly the kind of thing The Long and Continuous Emergency expects when I wake up each morning.

This recent case is a perfect example of 20th Century infrastructure that was designed for 20th Century weather, not these violent storms we are seeing early and often here in New York during the first decade of the 21st Century. And its only 2007 folks, just wait a few more years!

Or maybe we won't have to wait? Did anybody notice that a tornado destroyed a woman's home in Islip, Long Island yesterday morning?

Commandos on U.S. Soil

The NY Times reports that secret military commandoes are on classified missions right here in the U.S.A.

And, it looks like loads of federal agencies (like the FBI) are setting up shop just outside DC's "blast zone". The Washington Post reports:
In a little-noticed migration with implications for both greater Washington and the valley, several federal agencies, including the FBI, are relocating operations to the I-81 corridor. Helping drive the shift is the government's emphasis on security in a post-Sept. 11 world, which turns Winchester's location 75 miles from Washington into a geographic ideal. It is far enough from the capital to escape the fallout of a nuclear explosion -- a distance often estimated at 50 miles -- but still close enough so that employees can get to the District relatively easily when they need to.

WOW

Research Links Lead Exposure, Criminal Activity

Just in case you actually believe Rudolph Guiliani was the reason New York City crime rates dropped over the past decade - take a look at this.

More Dead Birds

File this under more warning signs.

The only common factor is that most of the birds are emaciated, said Dr. Al Segars, a S.C. Department of Natural Resources veterinarian who's helping to coordinate efforts to collect carcasses.