The primary goal of progressives is always to scare people into voluntarily giving up their money and freedom
There has been no change in the frequency or intensity of drought. The 1930’s were much worse. Romm, as always, has no idea what he is talking about – and is being paid to scare people.
We will no doubt have severe droughts in the future. Whether they have anything at all to do with AGW is another question.
Would it be heresy to inform Joe Romm our solar system doesn’t rotate around California?
From the New York Times, in 1994:
“BEGINNING about 1,100 years ago, what is now California baked in two droughts, the first lasting 220 years and the second 140 years. Each was much more intense than the mere six-year dry spells that afflict modern California from time to time, new studies of past climates show. The findings suggest, in fact, that relatively wet periods like the 20th century have been the exception rather than the rule in California for at least the last 3,500 years, and that mega-droughts are likely to recur.
“The evidence for the big droughts comes from an analysis of the trunks of trees that grew in the dry beds of lakes, swamps and rivers in and adjacent to the Sierra Nevada, but died when the droughts ended and the water levels rose. Immersion in water has preserved the trunks over the centuries.”
http://www.nytimes.com/1994/07/19/science/severe-ancient-droughts-a-warning-to-california.html
On the other hand check out the floods of 1851-52 that had one third of the state under water. The entire Central Valley from El Centro to Sacramento was under water. Modern Californians have been living in the most benevolent weather in the Holocene epoch.
Harsh implementation and an ever harsher cancellation of wheat subsidies caused the dust bowl; brought-in the “suitcase farmers”, bad loans, lots of tractors (with disks), and lots of barren soil(s).
Not much difference than the FDR program (communism) to settle people in Alaska; widely known as the Matanuska Colony.
The common denominator is the liberal’s use of the word “change”; they use it to sell hope (like in 2008 & 12) and fear (like always).
The policy of the federal government up to that time was to encourage farmers to bust up all of the prairie sod they owned or leased. That was probably the largest part of the causes of the dust bowl conditions. It created the perfect setup for what happened with the drought and extreme heat.
Yes, you can certainly smell the fear – and not from the children!
How many years has the “pause” been going now?
Romm missed his calling. In the 1800s, he would have made a killing selling “miracle-cure” patent medicine to gullible townsfolk.
Romm said goodbye to his integrity (if, indeed, he ever had any) years ago when he decided to join a gang of pseudo-scientists in their scheme to bamboozle and rip off taxpayers in a cooked-up holier-than-thou crusade against a non-existent bogeyman.
It’s amazing what some people will do for some filthy lucre.
The goal/methodology of Progessivism is to ‘progress’ the race by means of natural or unnatural selection. Eugenics by any means.