rain rain go away

It’s still raining here, we have been under some kind of stalled system that is now producing flash floods and thunderstorms so we are still under a watch.  For days we have been in a band of weather that is coming out of the west and heading north east, an unusual direction for us this time of year.  The air is warm and heavy with moisture, and the seas are suffering from run off.  All along the shore muddy gook has replaced the beautiful blue. The hillsides are so saturated that i worry when ever anyone drives down our steep roads that they may not hold. The long term forecast is for more rain maybe petering out sometime this weekend.

Even with all this rain St. Croix is a beautiful emerald green and everything is growing like mad.  Good for the trees and grasses but it’s not so good for the farmers who are having a hard time with their crops.  Their fields have been flooded, re-planted, and flooded again. My favorite farmer has closed his vegetable stand because his crops have been ruined.  He’s still selling meat and poultry but on a more limited schedule. Usually this time of year all sorts of goodies can be found along the roadside but now it’s not the case, so we all have to buy imported stuff which doesn’t taste as good.

So enough of the weather…i have been collecting tid bits from around the net and thought i’d put a few up today.

1.  Louis de Sousa at the Oil Drum goes into a detailed discussion on why he thinks peak oil is what brought down the Soviet Union.

“The causes of the fall of the Soviet Union are thought to be inefficiency and the Soviet response to the Reagan Administration’s military buildup of the early 1980s. However, a more plausible explanation is the decline in Soviet oil production caused by peak oil. This gives the world an example of a modern economy confronted by peak oil and what lessons we can learn from it.”

2.  Wisconsin Republicans just passed a new law that allows a property owner the right not to replace his septic system even if his land is swimming in s**t as long as it hasn’t impacted his neighbors land.  The old law, which had advised cutting edge septic systems for replacement of old dysfunctional ones, is being replaced by one that will allow sewage to lie openly upon a piece of private property. Doesn’t this sound like a case of individual rights going out of control.  i’m glad i don’t live in Wisconsin.

3.  Free markets don’t exist.  A book just came out that explains that there is no such thing as a free market. “23 Things they don’t tell you about Capitalism” by Ha-Joon Chang who teaches at the Faculty of Economics at the University of Cambridge.  i’ve never read it but the review looks interesting.

4.  The Pentagon under the auspices of National Security is ignoring the climate skeptics in Congress who have scuttled legislation to combat climate change. In a 2011 report called, "A National Strategic Narrative" (pdf), written by two special assistants to chairman of the joint chiefs of staff Mike Mullen, it was argued, "We must recognize that security means more than defense." Part of this entails pressing past "a strategy of containment to a strategy of sustainment (sustainability)". They went on to assert climate change is "already shaping a 'new normal' in our strategic environment". They believe climate change is real and that plans must be implemented now to deal with it as a strategic issue.

5.  Real Estate news:

             According to Core Logic Nationwide, 10.9 million mortgages (22.7 percent)          were upside down in the first quarter vs. 11.1 million (23.1 percent) in the fourth quarter.

• Nevada had the highest negative equity: 63 percent of all mortgaged properties underwater.
• Next came by Arizona (50 percent), Florida (46 percent) and Michigan (36 percent.)
• California only had 31 percent underwater — to an average $93,000 shortfall.
• As for big regions? Las Vegas was tops at 66 percent upside down; followed by Stockton (56 percent), Phoenix (55 percent), Modesto (55 percent) and Reno (54 percent).

6.  Einstein said 98% of the world’s population couldn’t figure out this logic problem.

Clues:

• The Brit lives in the red house.
• The Swede keeps dogs as pets.
• The Dane drinks tea.
• Looking from in front, the green house is just to the left of the white house.
• The green house's owner drinks coffee.
• The person who smokes Pall Malls raises birds.
• The owner of the yellow house smokes Dunhill.
• The man living in the center house drinks milk.
• The Norwegian lives in the leftmost house.
• The man who smokes Blends lives next to the one who keeps cats.
• The man who keeps a horse lives next to the man who smokes Dunhill.
• The owner who smokes Bluemasters also drinks beer.
• The German smokes Prince.
• The Norwegian lives next to the blue house.
• The man who smokes Blends has a neighbor who drinks water.

Who owns the pet fish?

Answer next week unless you look it up on the net, but that is cheating.

See ya