Republicans Prefer That Flood or Storm Take America by Surprise

This is from Science Insider:

In February 2010, NOAA announced its intention to create a parallel entity to its National Weather Service that would issue long range climate forecasts about future weather conditions such as severe storms, floods, and droughts…. Those actions don’t sit well with the Republicans on the House Science, Space, and Technology Committee.

Why the Republicans want the American people to be unprepared for fire, flood, drought and storm remains unclear.

See House Science Panel Spars With Lubchenco Over Climate Service - ScienceInsider

“Just Take The Bus!”: Disability and Car-centric City Planning | nominatissima

“Just Take The Bus!”: Disability and Car-centric City Planning | nominatissima: "For the sake of disability rights, a better community, and a reduction in how much gasoline is consumed, communities should consider how they expand, how cities are planned, and the practicality of having all of the businesses in the city and the residences in suburbs which require driving to and from to get to the city. There is truly no need to have such a wide-set city with poorly maintained sidewalks and bike routes and such a huge distance between houses and businesses."

The Rural People of Highway 12 — Fighting Goliath [#tarsands]

The Rural People of Highway 12 — Fighting Goliath: "The Port of Lewiston, State of Idaho, and Imperial Oil/ExxonMobil Canada are working to convert Idaho’s stretch of U.S. Highway 12 from a Scenic Byway and All-American Road to an industrial truck route for the transport of gargantuan loads of heavy equipment. Combined Imperial Oil, ConocoPhillips and Harvest Energy plan to ship 274 megaloads in 2011, loads that exceed by far the size and frequency of any oversize shipments in the past."

The Empire Has New Clothes, Maybe

In a recent Care2 post by Beth Buczynski, I learned that, in the face of energy shortages, the Japanese government is urging button-down business-types to dress for the heat rather than turning up the air conditioner.  Some of the said business-types are howling in dismay.

They really have no reason to howl.  Business, the way it’s been explained to me, is all about adapting to the marketplace.  If the marketplace says that in the face of shortages energy must be put to rational uses, how rational is it to use electricity to cool people down who are hot only because they are overdressed for the weather?

If business is to adapt to an overheated world with ever-rising energy costs, it must dress for the weather also.

Or, since air conditioning is going to become ever more dear, they will be faced with a culture where the air conditioner is turned off anyway, and the smell of business is the ambience of overheated men in sweat-stained business suits toiling oily in their cubicles.

Sweet.

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Read Beth’s story here It's Getting Hot in Here: Japanese Execs Shed Their Clothes to Save Energy by Beth Buczynski