From my Dot Earth posting:

A stalled-elevator speech is too improbable, but opportunities for a one-minute speech happen every day so that you can get in practice for a 40-story ride with someone influential:
—–

"Wouldn’t mind the bad weather so much except [time this for elevator liftoff] for that sinking feeling that the climate is shifting fast.

We’ve already had 50 years of more and more wildfires, and on every continent. Same thing for major floods. Probably windstorm damage as well. That’s climate change, not just bad weather moving around.

And it looks as if permanent drought is going to make the poor Mediterranean into a dust bowl. Same thing for Perth, Cape Town, and southern California. The tropics are expanding, just as the earliest climate models said they would.

         Just one quick side note! I heard Bush bragging about his economy and tax cuts and he reiterated that since he got into office we went to hell in a hand basket. No just kidding. He lyingly bragged that the economy has grown by $1.9 trillion since he took office. He neglected to mention at $2 trillion he created more debt than every President combined almost since our founding. Also that he forgot to include that in his figures because we conveniently won't start paying on it until he is gone so he doesn't have to include it in his figures and once again he is able to lie and mislead.

         Anyay, I wanted to discuss that last week when Russia declared that it had successfully planted their flag at the bottom of the Artic caiming it as Russian territory Russia was disturbed that Canada the US and others dismissed it as a joke saying that is worthless in the 21st Century. Myself I wasn't so sure as it seems like a scary ratchetting up of the race for future resources and world domination. Well attitudes are changing when recent events are taken into account.
         

I'm posting some excerpts from my translation of this article from today's El País (Madrid). I don't have much to add except that it seems like time for the world's environmental ministers to be running things instead of the defense ministers.

In other news, 9% of Spain's population now consists of immigrants from Eastern European, African and Latin American countries, and 500,000 cars left Barcelona this weekend for summer vacation, resulting in a 24-kilometer traffic jam. And it's hot. On the bright side, there's an awful lot of solar energy here if we would just use it.

El País online requires a paid subscription but La Vanguardia Digital (www.lavanguardia.es) does not for those who read Spanish and are curious about events over here.

The recent war between Israel and Hezbollah-Lebanon has claimed another casualty.  This time the victim is not an innocent civilian, and Israeli soldier, or a Hezbollah fighter.  It is the environment.  This injury may bring the most wide-ranging and lasting price to be paid for this war.  According to the New York Times,

Spilled and burning oil, along with forest fires, toxic waste flows and growing garbage heaps have gone from nuisances to threats to people and wildlife, they say, marring a country traditionally known for its clean air and scenic greenery. Many of Lebanon's once pristine beaches and much of its coastline have been coated with a thick sludge that threatens marine life.

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