We Hang By a Thread

Although we ourselves have been mercifully spared this time, Southern California is burning, and thousands have fled.

These events are in part the playing out of the ecosystems of this region, which are in the main fire-based. Some of the most common plants require fire to germinate. People have made it worse by settling in the midst of this ecosystem and then suppressing the naturally occurring periodic fires, which then become more devastating when they finally occur.

We also may be at the start of a secular drought cycle in the entire Southwest, the kind that may have erased cultures in the past. Or not.

Meanwhile, though General (Yes Ma'am) Sherman is long dead, Atlanta has blithely ignored the drying of the lake upon which its water supply depends, and has less than 3 months' supply and no backup. We have seen in New Orleans that our vaunted civilization is still vulnerable to the vagaries of nature. The builders of Babel were confounded in their pride. Why not us?

We have given in to gluttony, pride and greed, and have chosen to be ruled by mental and moral Pygmies ("You're doing a heckuva job, Brownie.") Why not a reckoning? Lord, have mercy.