Doomsayers and pseudo-science

The recent rage about World climate changes and the impact in our lives and the planet itself, has mobilized an army of people dedicated to research the “problem” - as they see it - and produced thousands of pages of studies in support of every conceivable theory.

The problem is that most of these studies and research are based on observations taken by fairly recent technologies, such as telemetry, satellites, computer models and such. None of the studies using the best technology available is much older than 10 or perhaps 15 years. Given the very, very old age of our planet, these diagnostics are the equivalent of a doctor trying to pinpoint an illness after examining the patient for 1/1000 of minute.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m all for studies and research, but I also believe that they should be put in perspective and with full understanding of the human limitations. Otherwise they are just personal opinions and projections and nothing else. Many in this field are all excited about their newly discovered techniques and carried away by the technology itself to the point of creating scenarios that would fit their own imagination and beliefs.

One of these scenarios is the preoccupation with the sea levels. According to E. Lynn Usery who lead the team for the U.S. Geological Survey, it was determined that current sea levels are rising between 0.04 and 0.06 inches per year and one quarter of the population lives at just 100 feet above sea level. In the same presentation he mentions the disaster occurred when a Tsunami hit parts of the Indian Ocean in 2004. He also said that 10000 years ago the sea level rose about 20 meters (65 feet) in the span of 500 years due to some natural disaster (the collapse of the ice sheets).

Assuming this is correct (again, calculations based on studies that may or may not be accurate) the collapse of the ice sheets can be construed as natural disaster and as such, unpredictable.
The only real numbers we have to play with are the current numbers, for whatever value they may have. And those numbers do not reflect any major change in the foreseeable future. At the current rate of rise it will take 170 years for the sea level to grow by 1 foot!

Of course, we don’t know (neither the scientists) if external man-made factors or natural ones will produce any changes, but the fact remains that many in the community are crying wolf and creating a doomsday scenario out of little science and much speculation.

A NASA study finds that “based on observations made over the past decade” the Antarctic and Greenland ice sheets hold enough ice to raise the sea levels by 230 feet. So what? Does this mean one day all this ice will melt at once and wipe out more than 1 billion people living below certain level?

To me, statements likes this are nothing more than what they contain: Greenland and Antarctica have lots of ice. We knew that. Why present the potential scenario of a tragic meltdown? It’s beyond me.

I truly believe there is a whole industry dedicated to reinforce the panic view of a catastrophe in global warming and sea levels, while thousands of individuals make a comfortable living playing with numbers and statistics including the crowd at NASA, which have yet to prove the progress we have made on this earth, by all the money invested. Yeah the pictures from out of space are nice but try to feed the hungry with a glossy of Mars.

The only thing we can work with is the fact that sea levels “may” change at the present rate. Nothing else. Now, if we have tsunamis and earthquakes here and there the whole picture can change of course, but since we are not able to predict those natural occurrences, everything else is pure speculation. That’s why I titled this “Doomsayers and pseudo-science”.

Drugs, Killings. Who's to Blame?

Armando Ramirez, a Televisa reporter was slain in plain view after he left his place of work at one of Acapulco’s radio stations and some are calling Mexico the most dangerous place in the Western Hemisphere for a journalist.

This is the latest in many killings of reporters and media people who have spoken openly about corruption, drugs, political figures and their connections with the drug traffic in that country.

However, this murder is just one of many out of hundreds and hundreds of people who have been sacrificed by the thugs running the infamous drug trade. Now, and because of the notoriety of the individual, many are calling for an investigation from the federal government and the public opinion is justly outraged. A recurring scenario in cases like this, which, in time, will be forgotten, and the name of the victim added to the many others who have disappeared or have been murdered.

From our perspective in the U.S. we see this as a distant problem and reinforces a preconceived notion that the solution to the drug problem lies elsewhere, this time in Mexico, when it couldn’t be further from the truth.

The drug problem must be solved in our country once and for all. We have the resources and the money to go after our own street gangs and other more sophisticated distributors who are spreading this poison everywhere. We have the intelligence and the technology to gather information on the routes the traffickers use to enter our country. Most important, the consumers of these infamous products are here, with ready and available money waiting for their next deal.

While it’s true that other less developed countries have their own drug addicts lined up and waiting for the goods, the U.S. is by far the largest costumer. All we have to do is look at maps of drugs trafficking. They all point to the North.

Unless we stop this trend in our own soil, it’s nearly impossible to expect others to do it. The enormous amount of money involved in the drug trade allows the thugs to buy almost anything in places like Mexico, Central and South America, including their own underground army of recruits, ready to kill anyone for a few dollars.

We should set the example by eradicating the use of drugs and going after the enablers, large and small, instead of asking from under funded governments a solution to the problem. Throwing money in other places can’t stop production and distribution of drugs. Colombia is a good example. Millions have been spent there with very little results, if any. We can’t buy our way out of the problem. We must face it at home where it resides by eliminating the access to drugs and prosecuting more traffickers.

We are witnesses of our own gang problems in our major cities, most of them engaged in the distribution and selling of drugs coming from Mexico and other sources and very little is being done in comparison to the crackdown needed.
Let’s think about it for a moment. If we, in the U.S., having more money, more resources and more and better enforcement of the law, can’t find a solution to the use and trafficking of drugs in our own country, how can we demand from others better results than our own, when those countries don’t have even near the same means to go after the problem? Let’s eradicate the consumption and internal distribution of drugs at home. It’s an obligation to our families, our children and ourselves. No Distribution=No Consumption=No Market=No Drugs.

Where do we start? Right in our own backyard! The same as the overly abundant Public Announcements regarding bad driving habits, we could use 24-hour reminders of an anonymous call-in line to denounce the countless punks dealing drugs in every corner of our nation. That’s just the beginning. If we increase the number of tips we will increase also the possibility of tracing the distributors and wholesale providers. Another important step should be to lessen or eliminate the sentences of the petty user and drastically increase the jail term for those heavily involved in the trade. I’m sure many in law enforcement have other and possibly better theories than mine. The question is: Why don’t we do something about it?

The News on Local TV

There was a time when we all sat in our living rooms to watch television, either for entertainment, to see our favorite sports team in action or to get the news. It was a time when the, then, new media was establishing itself and offering a real competition to the printed word in newspapers and magazines.

Years later, television has become such a hybrid that is nothing more than a dispenser of images and sound trying to impress the viewer, often without any meaning. Reality shows are king and provide cheap thrills to diners in prime time, afternoons are filled with fake judges dispensing justice in 30 minutes or less and tantalizing stories about scandals are on all the time.

The only programming that holds steady is sports. With millions of football, baseball and the newly discovered soccer, so-called experts analyze everything up to what kind of underwear player use.

The most damaged of all programs has been the news. We no longer have credible people at the helm, except perhaps some at the national level. The sprouting of so many local channels have created countless talking heads, most of them with nice smiles and good teeth, hitting the airwaves four or five times a day.

So, we have the morning news, at 6am and sometimes again at 7, news at noon, news at 4, 6, 10 and finally 11pm. An overabundance of the same thing repeated ad nauseaum with the ever present weather person remind us how a map looks like and gesturing as if he was delivering a song and dance routine.
Don’t forget the mediocre jokes these guys must exchange among themselves and the fake camaraderie while on the air. With Internet in full bloom, all this is part of a lame attempt to keep us informed. How many times you watch the news on TV just to see what your computer told you already- five hours ago?

I guess this is what has created a “new” kind of journalist - as they like to call themselves - with talking heads going out and doing other things to keep us entertained. Therefore we have the one who “cares” about our safety, another one is very much worried about our health, the pet guy (sometimes the same as the weather guy) reminding us to keep our dog inside because it’s too hot, the crime watcher, showing chummy images with the local police and giving us the insight on murders, rapes and burglaries, as if we live in another planet and those things don’t happen under our very noses.
Yet another tell us why we must change the oil in our cars as recommended, or perhaps keep our thermostats at 72 in the heat of summer to save energy, and also the constant reminder of recent accidents on the road “to avoid that intersection” (I don’t’ have a TV in my car!). Don’t’ forget the hidden commercials offered as news with some local business pitching their wares! In essence, novelty bits, mostly useless, have taken over the local TV newsrooms everywhere. No wonder why people turn to cable, CNN, MSNBC and others to get their news.

The sad part of this is to think that perhaps, and I’m saying perhaps, those talking heads really believe they are in the news business and that gives them the right to patronize all of us with their 60 seconds bits of wisdom and sales pitches. I don’t know about your town but in Las Vegas we get more air than substance.

Gingrich On The Loose

One of the crafters, if not the main one, of the disaster we are in with this failed administration, Newt Gingrich, is making his move to run for president in 08 and, as such, started agitating the conservative base that gave Bush and his cronies the power they’ve abused so nicely.

In a recent speech, Gingrich came back to one of his original favorite themes - make English the official language - by saying that election ballots should be printed only in English and nothing else.

I don’t believe Newt is someone who we can trust as president and much less with the trail he left behind. He’s part to blame for the selling of this presidency to the voters on the promise of change, prosperity and a bunch of other lies.

However, and as much as I’m a defender of immigrant rights, I must admit that on the issue of electoral ballots I agree with him. Since any new citizen must be able to communicate in English, even with a basic vocabulary, there is no reason to print ballots in a foreign language, whichever it may be.

More than that, a person who is going to the voting booth should be able to read and listen about the candidates and what they stand for, directly from the candidates themselves and not from a third person in a different language who may or may not convey the message properly.
How can a person discuss issues with others in the community - in English - if he or she speaks only a foreign language?

The bottom line is, if the voter is not informed properly, how can he or she make a decision that will affect all of us at some point and time?
In matters that affect the entire nation, and when in public, everything should be discussed and clarified in English to avoid misunderstandings, interacting with other cultures without the barrier of the language.

Doing it otherwise would simply make any discussion of important issues a sectarian and ethnic one.