* What a disaster: "What may be the nation's largest spill of coal ash lay thick and largely untouched over hundreds of acres of land and waterways Wednesday after a dam broke this week, as officials and environmentalists argued over its potential toxicity." (The disaster is even worse than originally feared.) -- Steve Benen

As I was reading the article last night -- the original one, before we knew tat he amount spilled was actually triple of the original estimate -- the following quote caught my eye:

The Tennessee Valley Authority has issued no warnings about the potential chemical dangers of the spill, saying there was as yet no evidence of toxic substances. “Most of that material is inert,� said Gilbert Francis Jr., a spokesman for the authority. “It does have some heavy metals within it, but it’s not toxic or anything.�

My feeling was: the guy should be made to drink that water (the stuff is leaching into the rivers) and bathe in it, to prove the truth of his claim.

exlibra, someone should explain to that genius spokeshole that the inorganic arsenic, selenium, and lead present in that ash are among the most toxic and damaging heavy metals. If by "inert" he means that they won't explode he's correct. All they'll do is cause physical and neurological damage for generations.
Anyone who goes around exhorting the benefits of "clean coal" deserves a kick in the junk.

An Iditarod without snow, Florida's coastal towns lost forever to the Gulf of Mexico, wheat farmers in Kansas without crops.

Isnt this the same kind of essentially meaningless anecdotal stuff that was being decried by this blog recently when used by the other side of the divide?

I've had unimpressed with recent copy editing.

"but I think taking prescription medicine to "enhance" one's eyelashes is crazy."

Umm, yeah. But who knew the mascara business was $3.7 billion a year? I can't even think of a time when I noticed a woman's eyelashes. Trust me, a push-up bra is a better investment. I'll notice that.

An Iditarod without snow, Florida's coastal towns lost forever to the Gulf of Mexico, wheat farmers in Kansas without crops.

TG Chicago. You're probably confusing "anecdotal stuff" with 'anecdotal evidence'. Climate crisis deniers use anecdotal evidence out of context. Most of it can be summed up by "Winter came and we have snow - therefore Global Warming is a hoax."

Even with rapid global warming we're still likely to have snow and extreme cold at either pole and it will spill into lower latitudes - at least for the next hundred years. Some models do predict, based upon geological evidence, that we could have near-tropical conditions at the poles if global warming gases reach high enough levels.

What may change in the next 50 years is our ability to grow major food crops - in places like Kansas. We may suffer increased drought in places like the American Southwest. These are extrapolations from long-standing climate models. Most of them have proven to be accurate to date, even with minor increase (so far) in average global temperature.

They're fairly simple to understand if you have a basic understanding of major wind circulation - equatorial and polar region winds. With increased temperatures the wet tropical regions at the equator get narrower, the dry zone that rings the planet in the mid-latitudes (Sahara Desert, Middle East, American SW, northern Mexico, etc.) expands. This will push the dry zone into Kansas and reduce rainfall in the Colorado River basin.

In general we're likely to experience dramatic swings in weather that human civilization has not experienced - except as noted in the most apocryphal passages in the Bible.

I take those eyedrops -- to stave off glaucoma, not to enhance my lashes. I have perpetually red, burning eyes and my eyelids have become so dehydrated that they're a huge mass of wrinkles and feel as fragile as dead leaves -- even the gentlest rub feels like I might rip them.

I've got long, thick, plentiful lashes, but I sure don't want anybody looking at my eyes.

OK, I'll Bite:
"I've had unimpressed with recent copy editing."
Is this an example or are you as poorly versed in grammar as the subject of this post?
Posted by: ym on December 26, 2008 at 6:22 PM
Just thought I'd ask. I am also somewhat disturbed by poor copy editing. I see it in many places, along with headlines that are misleading or uninformative of what is to follow. Being of an older generation (64 yrs young), I was taught the importance of clear and accurate communication. Apparently speed is more important than accuracy. However, when the error is such that it changes the context or meaning of the article, it does make a difference.

Happy Blogging for the New Year!

In Peace,
st john

The Climate Change article on ABC News is one small piece of consistently devastating news from Poznan, the American Geophysical Union Conference, NASA http://climateprogress.org/2008/12/17/nasa-another-brutally-hot-year-for-the-siberian-tundra/, and the International Arctic Change conference http://www.ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=45121

It's been quite a week for new research on global warming - and how the crisis may be upon us no matter what we do.

Take this measured comment from Poznan, "It doesn't matter what the politicians promise. Even if stop emissions growing today, the world will still warm by 2 degrees C, a lot more in some places. It is too late to prevent that." Phillip Ciais, the incoming chairman of the Global Carbon Project. He also states that melting permafrost released a fraction of its huge stores of frozen methane. "Once this process starts, it could soon become unstoppable, [it is one of the] "tipping points" most feared by climate scientists. "It is too early to say if we have passed that threshold. But once it is passed, even zero emissions of CO2 won't stop the warming." Fred Pearce from New Scientist Magazine (not yet available on the Web)

What headline would the MSM print if they believed this report was important?

Scientists Predict Runaway Global Warming

Global Warming Inevitable

Leading Politicians at Odds with Climate Scientists - would be closer to the truth.

Coal slurry also contains measurable levels of radioactive elements. This tidbit might impress folks more than things like Selenium that they've never heard about.

Of course it's far worse to inhale these radioactive particles (think smokestacks) than to drink them, at least as far as I understand. The lungs don't expell them as rapidly as the digestive tract.

"I take those eyedrops -- to stave off glaucoma, not to enhance my lashes."

Interesting. I guess it's one of those drugs like Viagra or Wellbutrin. The side effects are more profitable than the original intent. My brother took Wellbutrin for depression, and it didn't work at all. But he did quit smoking. Unfortunately, Carcinoid Syndrome was his real problem. Oh well.

What a disaster: "What may be the nation's largest spill of coal ash lay thick and largely untouched over hundreds of acres of land and waterways Wednesday after a dam broke this week, as officials and environmentalists argued over its potential toxicity.

Cue right wingers to point out that TVA was a New Deal creation.

Of course, a lot of liberals hate the agency as well. When I worked there as an ecologist in the early 90s, some of my more left leaning environmentalist friends referred to it as the "Great Satan."

They did help eradicate malaria in the region, but I hear it could be making a comeback if climate change continues on its current trajectory.

For some people who are cancer patients and have undergone chemotherapy and subsequent hair loss- which oftens includes loss of eye lashes, this new eyelash enhancing drug might be ideal!!!....Not crazy at all...

That darn Palin tyke is another day overdue.
At what point in the time line does their continued silence on the matter become creepy?

"...the inorganic arsenic, selenium, and lead present in that ash are among the most toxic and damaging heavy metals... All they'll do is cause physical and neurological damage for generations."

they must have been leaching into the water already. That would explain why TN is one of the few states that was more red this election than it 2004.

Juan Williams and some blathering head on NPR were talking about and taking great delight in the parallels between Blago and Whitewater.

This WILL dog Obama for the foreseeable future declared Williams. Williams' hardon practically smashed through my dashboard.

Thanks to Carol Blanchard for her point. My wife has had extensive radiation for a brain tumor and while she doesn't take this drug -- she takes enough others! -- it's very clear to me that it could be quite reasonable for many people to take it, and a lot of others it might be cheap fun to mock.

"which oftens includes loss of eye lashes, this new eyelash enhancing drug might be ideal!!!....Not crazy at all..."

Okay, I'm warming up to this drug. My mom lost her eyelashes from chemo. Having eyelashes wasn't going to make her pretty, but I can understand the desire in that circumstance. With cancer, sometimes little things make a big difference. In fact, I've decided to grow my hair out so I can donate again to Wigs for Kids. I have the curly blond hair that every little girl with cancer wants. In fact, I've never met any female who didn't wish she had my hair. But I'm getting old, so I won't have that hair much longer. Being a man, curly blond hair hasn't helped me much, but it sure makes a nice wig. Last time I donated, my shortest hair was 19 inches, and the longest was 33 (pulled straight, of course). I don't think I'll beat that this time, but I'll try.

Sirota: Now, it's true - back in 2004, two UCLA professors published a little-noticed report claiming the New Deal's government intervention prolonged the Great Depression. But that assertion has been subsequently eviscerated by, ya know, actual data.

"Actual Data" show that GDP fell and unemployment rose after FDR's policies were initiated, just as they had done after Hoover's policies had been initiated.

No one knows whether FDR's policies, or Hoover's policies, made things worse or prevented things from being worse than they were. "Post hoc ergo propter hoc", "correlation does not imply causation", and all that. The only economic arguments that have ever been eviscerated by data are the claims that government intervention can prevent recessions. Every intervention that has been attempted has failed, leaving certain economists [e.g. Krugman writing about FDR] to claim that the attempts had been too weak; in writing about the failure of Reagan's policy to end the recession, the notion of bigger budget deficits was called "extra strength voodoo".

Everyone is wondering when the Palin-Johnston baby will be born!

Wouldn't it be interesting if she had on one of the pregnancy pillows that they use in the movies?

Maybe she's not pregnant afterall, and they are looking for a newborn to adopt!!!

That's just something to think about.

The only economic arguments that have ever been eviscerated by data are the claims that government intervention can prevent recessions. - marketeer

I'm guessing that more regulations on rating agencies, auditing firms and CDO's would have helped. In either case, your argument relies on selective acceptance, because clearly many economists disagree.

"Fox News would have us believe that "historians pretty much agree" that FDR prolonged the Great Depression. David Sirota sets the record straight."

I think the operative weasel word here is "prolonged." It allows the Right to grant that in fact economic growth from 1933 onward was quite strong while at the same time contending that recovery could have been *even faster* [than 8 percent a year] had FDR not gummed up the natural healing process. You'll see a version of this argument in Friedman and Schwartz, who, of course, argue that FDR actually did what he needed to do by reversing the Great Contraction and then should have stood aside. It's a reasonable, though I think weak, argument [It's not well backed up by F&S]. And certainly a lot of the stuff FDR did was counterproductive. But it depends on the notion that, with the national economy in the enormous hole it was in in 1933, the economy should have rebounded at an utterly awesome rate. That it didn't supposedly means that FDR "prolonged" the Depression. Sigh.

Unmitigated anthropogenic global warming will most certainly lead to a prolonged depression.

VERY prolonged, in fact.

As in permanent.

Sea levels rising a meter or more (possibly much more) over the course of a century is one thing.

But a global-warming-spawned, continent-wide megadrought could begin in any given year, suddenly, and never end.

What do you think will happen to "the economy" when North American agriculture fails?

That is the global warming sword that is hanging over our heads.

"abrupt climactic shifts"

That's what she said.

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