This is a wonderful article. Here is real data about community owned energy generation. It is a model we should work for in every state. Actually I would prefer it more decentralized, and I think that is going to happen. On the island where I live and I am going to see if I can help set this process in motion.

There is an old adage that one is a liberal in youth and a conservative at death. It is an empirical observation made repeatedly in the human narrative. And this research validates the observation.

What I think it misses is the Presentiment Effect. There a significant body of research showing that before you become cognitively aware of something in registers physically in your body — eyes dilate, certain parts of the brain become active. The more emotionally affecting — violence, warzones, sexual imagery — the greater the response. And fear or anxiety produces a very strong response. It affects the right amygdala — the almond shaped structure in our brain that oversees “fight or flight.” When it is active  the capacity for rational thought is diminished. It is associated with conservative politics, fundamentalist religiousity, and fear. And I think that is a factor in these results.

This data also emphasizes why getting younger people to vote is so important if we are to put in place compassionate life-affirming policies. Older people get scared perhaps because mortality is closer.

This story is deep in the wonk weeds but no less important for that. Obama gets full marks for this. By compelling an account of sea level rise he forces it into the conversation, and deniers cannot shove it away. This is a good survey of the subject and I am not surprised it is in the Virginian-Pilot, a newspaper that services the Hampton Roads, including Norfolk and Virginia Beach which are already close to crisis because of sea rise. This large metropolitan area, with its two main cities has, through events, been forced to face the reality of climate change, and what is coming their way as a result of sea rise. They are going to lose whole neighborhoods, and they know it. What makes it even more painful is that much of this property is the most expensive real estate in the area.

As the report notes: “Last month, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration predicted coastal areas will face 30 or more days of flooding by mid-century because of sea level rise. According to the National Climate Assessment, more than $1 trillion of property and structures in the United States are at risk of inundation from sea level rise of 2 feet above current sea level – an elevation that could be reached by that same point. “

I don’t think anyone on either side of the prohibition argument anticipated that the state would give the people of Colorado a tax refund based on marijuana taxation revenue.  And it is true, the taxes are too high. Here in Washington the legalization of marijuana has produced zero effect on public civil life. But the taxes are so high that the pre-existing parallel public market continues. Its happening because of the usual disregard for facts by the Rightists in the legislature. Anyone should have been able to see this coming. But I assume it will sort itself out overtime.

I spoke at a conference today made up entirely of socially progressive men and women, each of whom is actively involved in some kind of compassionate life-affirming project or program. They were  mostly in their middle years, with some twenties and thirties. In my presentation I noted the Wealth Inequality Trend, remarking that 80 people have wealth as great as 3.5 billion people.

As I stood in line to get the organic lunch — quite good — I heard the voice of the French Revolution. A man came up to me and said, “if we talk just about those 80… well, we know where they live, it wouldn’t take much to pull them out of their beds. Would it?” Then he added, “If I can think of this, don’t you think we ought to assume other people have as well? And that someone might act on it.” I thought that indeed, and then I remembered this story I had seen a few days earlier. I run it now because I think the zeitgeist is changing.

I am always on the outlook for new technologies that could help with what is coming as a result of climate change. Here is a very interesting one, a plastic that can be made into pipes and other things that simply by the nature of the plastic converts saltwater to fresh.  It holds promise as at least a partial solution to some of the problems of drought in agricultural areas. My concern about such a system is what happens to the super-salty flush water. But at least this seems to be a place to start dealing with a horrendous planet-wide problem that is only going to get worse. This story is good news.