Global Warming and Other Problems:
Go Surfing While You Can

I have been surfing a lot lately, mainly because I do love to surf, it is warm here in Hawaii, and surfing is good exercise, fun, and invigorating, but I'm also surfing a lot to NOT spend time thinking (and worrying) about all the shit that is wrong in this country and the world, all the shit that nearly everyone knows about, but that our elected politicians can't seem to get a handle on solving.

First, foremost and the MOST important issue concerning mankind is global warming. If we do nothing to slow and stop fossil fuel carbon (and all the other sources of greenhouse gasses) from contaminating OUR atmosphere immediately, OUR entire planetary civilization (for what it's worth) WILL BE GONE within the next two hundred years. You may think that this is illogical and rash, but, unfortunately there is ample scientific evidence to support this statement. The problem is that the fossil fuel industry is seriously financing a disinformation campaign, denying science, and they own outright nearly half of the politicians in Washington that WE elected to support US and solve OUR problems.

The second largest problem confronting Americans is income inequality, where 95% of all new revenue since 2009 has gone to the top 1%. The middle class is being squeezed out, joining the ranks of the poor because greedy rich folks are getting all the money that is in circulation, and they are hoarding it. Even OUR government is complicit in this fraudulent arrangement, subsidizing already very profitable corporations and giving tax breaks to rich folks who don't need them. For all you folks who flunked Economics 101, here's a small lesson. When wages do not follow productivity (this has been going on for the last 30+ years), and the large corporations do not adequately pay their workers, the middle class and working poor DO NOT HAVE ENOUGH MONEY to buy the goods and services that are produced, and the economy eventually collapses as it did in 1929 and 2007. In both of these collapses the rich had all the money with none left to stimulate the economy. Taking the minimum wage from 1967, and adjusting for inflation, the current minimum wage should be between $20-$25 USD. Each and every year OUR government pays out more than $290 billion to subsidize large, profitable corporations that under pay their employees while the (corrupt) politicians argue over whether to even increase the current minimum wage of $7.25. Is there something wrong with this picture? You betcha!

There are literally tons of problems confronting Americans, but the politicians that WE elected have chosen to ignore them and instead, squabble over whether or not WE, THE PEOPLE should have adequate healthcare with the GOP voting against we, the people over 44 times. Even though there are too many problems to address here, there is one problem that permeates nearly every problem, and that problem is 'dark money' in politics, supported by OUR very own (corporate) Supreme Court with its calamitous decision regarding Citizens United v FEC that allowed untold and unregulated secret political contributions from the rich and powerful to maintain the disastrous status quo. We, the people must demand public financing for federal elections as a bare minimum to begin with. When billionaires can contribute unlimited monies to further their agenda and to buy politicians, OUR democracy is being taken away by the plutocrats, who do not give a rat's ass about anyone except themselves, and WHEN the economy collapses again, and it will, the rest of us, the 99%, could all end up as serfs.

I'll be dead before the dramatic, world changing impacts of climate change hit in about fifty years or so, even though the changes are already upon us with the large wildfires, droughts, and dramatic weather shifts. In case you aren't aware of it, EVERY plant on this planet has evolved to be comfortable with the stable weather that we have enjoyed for the last 11,000 years. We are now venturing into unknown territory with regard to the survivability of plants and animals due to the RAPID global warming that hasn't happened this quickly in recorded geological history except, of course, for the dramatically disastrous mass extinctions. So, I surf and take advantage of weather, temperatures, and ocean currents that my great-great-grandchildren and their descendants will NEVER see, and that time is not that far away because I already have a great-granddaughter...