June 22: Record Heat - And a Few Fascist Ideas

 

6/22/21: Large swaths of the United States are currently frying under blistering June heat and every day makes a growing megadrought worse. We have said repeatedly on this blog, that specific weather events, a week of unusual highs, or record lows, or a particularly bad June do not prove or disprove climate change.

 

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“It’s just a little bit warmer than it would have been last year. And if we have this next year, it’ll be just a little bit warmer again.” 

Alison Bridger, professor of Meteorology and Climate Science

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The cumulative effect, however, is at this point impossible to ignore. Unless you are Donald J. Trump. 

Or a QAnon supporter. Or some other kind of fool. 

A “heat dome” has settled over large stretches of the American West, a weather event usually not seen till later in the summer. “It’s not only unusual for June, but it is pretty extreme even in absolute terms,” Daniel Swain, a climate scientist at the UCLA Institute of the Environment and Sustainability tells NPR. “It would be a pretty extreme event for August.”

 

Record high daily temperatures are being set in hundreds of places – record highs for any day, not just in June, including in places where records go back 150 years. “That’s a pretty big deal,” the climate scientist added. 

Palm Springs, California hit 123° last week, tying its all-time single day record. Las Vegas set a daily record of 114° on June 17. Phoenix hit 118°, breaking the daily record by four degrees. The city had never hit such a high temperature in late spring. Sacramento, California saw the mercury touch 109°, also a daily record. Denver topped 100° for three days in a row, something that had never occurred this early in the year. A meteorologist noted that all the three-day-plus-100° streaks in Denver have occurred in the last thirty years. The Great Plains states were also baking in the heat, with Omaha, Neb. seeing a record high of 105. 

Alison Bridger, a professor in the Meteorology and Climate Science department at San Jose State University, explained that this heat dome, “fits with climate change ideas, global warming, meaning that it’s just a little bit warmer than it would have been last year. And if we have this next year, it’ll be just a little bit warmer again.” The heat dome is also blocking any precipitation, and drying out entire states. 

Swain is equally convinced of the danger. “There’s a crystal clear human fingerprint on extreme heat and extreme heat events ... climate change is making these sorts of things worse,” he warns.

 

You can find plenty of evidence to support Swain’s and Bridger’s concerns. Kathleen Johnson, an associate professor of Earth system science at the University of California, tells The Guardian, a British newspaper, “This current drought is potentially on track to become the worst that we’ve seen in at least 1,200 years. And the reason is linked directly to human-caused climate change.” 

Water levels at Lake Oroville, California’s second largest reservoir have fallen so low, that hydroelectric power, generated by the dam there, may soon fail, and leave 800,000 homes without electricity. 

On June 18, an estimated 40 million Americans saw temperatures where they live top 100°. Salt Lake City hit 107°, a record for any day, going back to the heyday of Brigham Young and Church of the Latter Day Saints polygamy. “The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration said the summer of 2020 was one of the hottest ever seen in the US,” the Guardian adds, “with August, in particular, being especially ‘dry and destructive.’” Now the summer of 2021 looks like it will be worse. 

Maybe, much worse.

 

Tucson, Arizona suffered through eight straight days of temperatures above 110°, making last week the hottest on record. 

Phoenix had six straight days of 115°, another record, and one you would not expect to be set in June. Overnight lows were in the 90s, almost assuring that the next day highs would top 115 again. 

On June 15, Billings, Montana saw the mercury rise to 108, tying the hottest temperature ever recorded in the city. 

Sheridan, Wyoming hit 107, also the hottest ever recorded. 

Hot dry weather has led to multiple outbreaks of fire in California, Oregon, Colorado, Utah, and Arizona. Ground fuels, in many areas, are already at record dry levels. Experts now say there is no “fire season” in the West. 

It’s always fire season.

 

Michael A. Crimmins, a professor in the department of environmental science at the University of Arizona, warns that this may be the future for the entire Southwest. This heat wave, “may look similar to other heat waves on a weather map, but the magnitude, intensity and duration of the event is larger because of climate change.” 

In other words: climate change is not “a hoax,” as Donald J. Trump always – cluelessly – liked to say.

FUN F**K-THE-ENVIRONMENT FACT: If you think human activity can’t mess up the environment, you might be happy in your ignorance to learn that crayfish are less depressed than ever. 

That’s because antidepressants are washing into the nation’s rivers and lakes, by way of human urine. (Speaking of urine, 1 in every 8 Americans is taking some kind of mood-enhancing medicine.) 

Experiments show that serotonin, found in many medications to fight depression, made the crayfish bolder. 

And, we hope, more cheerful in their relations with others.

 

FUN LEGAL FACT: Innocent till proven guilty we always say. Still, it’s interesting to know Rejected-President Trump’s former bodyguard, Matt Calamari, and his son, have been advised to lawyer up, as part of the investigation into possible tax shenanigans at the Trump Organization. 

So sayeth the Wall Street Journal. At issue: did father and son fudge, taking free cars and free housing from their employer, but not claiming said benefits for tax purposes, as would be required by law? 

Would an organization run by and for Trump break the law???? History leaves almost zero doubt.

 

DICTATOR-WANNABE FACT: Two sources inform the Daily Beast that in 2018, President Trump began asking if the Department of Justice could clamp down on Saturday Night Live and various late night shows. He was angry because comics were mocking him mercilessly. When an aide told Don that DOJ didn’t handle such matters, the president inquired, “Can something else be done about it?” 

The source responded with some version of “I’ll look into it.” Then this source said he/she figured Donald would eventually forget all about it. I mean, the guy was busy tweeting 55,000 times as president. 

He had the same attention span as a fruit fly.

 

FUN FAN-OF-DICTATOR-WANNABES FACT: One America News’ Pearson Sharp offered up a stunning argument in a segment that aired tonight. As Mr. Sharp sees it, “hundreds of thousands” of Americans were involved in a “coup” against former President Donald Trump.

 

“What happens to all these people who are responsible for overthrowing the election?” he asked viewers. Well, “in the past, America had a very good solution for dealing with such traitors: Execution.”

 

Yeah! Execution for “hundreds of thousands” of Americans. Go right-wing fascist news commentator!