Potential energy

A cargo bike in its natural defensive posture

  

Don't. Ever. Surprise a cargo bike. 

On guns

© Joshua Stark 2015

First off, I must admit it -- I am a gun nut.

This may come as a surprise to many, many of my friends and colleagues, since I don't work in a field where guns get talked about much, I don't have a political affiliation where being a gun nut is held in high regard, and I don't often even pick up magazines or books anymore that refer to guns.

Contrary to what many may think -- and my birth certificate -- I'm also an 80 year-old man (on the inside), and so set in my ways, and I haven't kept up with all the newfangled gun stuff ("newfangled" probably being any caliber that came out after the .280).  I am especially turned off by the latest fetish with the AR platforms -- maybe because I'm a bit of a gun snob (guns are metal and wood, not a bunch of plastic molding), maybe because I'm concerned about high-capacity magazines, and maybe because I'm turned off by the less-than-subtle racism, rampant indignant victim mentality, and rabid anti-American, pro-Confederacy bluster that all-too often comes along with it.  Also, the .223 is a worthless cartridge for my uses (I don't seal hunt or varmint hunt).
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But, I do own a large number of guns.  These include two deer rifles (one bolt-action .270, one lever-action 30-30), five shotguns (two side-by-side double barrels in 12 and 20 gauge, one over/under double barrel 12 gauge, one single-shot 20 gauge, and one pump-action 12 gauge), and one pistol (a single-action .22/.22 magnum).

To my liberal friends, this may be considered a not-so-small arsenal.  To my conservative friends, it is dangerously lacking in anything appropriate for personal defense.  To my gun-snob friends, the cache has no caché (apart from my not-quite-yet-functional 1887 Greener side-by-side, which would be given a slight nod).

Not one of my guns is available for home defense, should the need ever arise (pray God it doesn't).  No, they are all locked in a safe -- unloaded, and separate from the ammunition.  Instead, we have the standard strategically-placed Large Stick, various long knives, and a hatchet I'm sure I could find if I had the time to spring out of bed and dig through the backpacks.  We also have a MagLite (not the mini version, mind you, but the full-on model made so popular by Ben Stiller in "Night at the Museum").

The purpose for my guns is that I hunt with them (except one).  But I would be lying if I didn't say that I really, really like my guns.

To be completely honest, like most kids, I've liked guns ever since the first time I heard about them, and I have no idea when that happened.  All I can say is, from the time I can remember, I was already fascinated by ballistics, the fit and finish of wood to metal, and the various capabilities, provenance and mystique of certain calibers, gauges and models.

This love didn't come from my family.  My Dad only had one gun -- a Winchester model 20 single-shot 20 gauge that kicked like a 12.  He'd hunted some when he was younger, but he wasn't a "hunter".  He was (and remains) a working-class intellectual -- an English major mud-logger -- but the tomes filling his bookshelves are not Ruark nor Capstick.  Hemingway, yes -- but moreso Shakespeare, Faulker, Vonnegut, Merton; treatises on religious philosophy and ethics, and the Great Works.

My interest in guns did come naturally, inextricably linked with my being completely head-over-heels in love with the Outdoors.  We fished all the time, and I ran barefoot through miles of corn fields, ditches and levees.  I read National Geographics, Field & Stream and Outdoor Life cover-to-cover, along with Olaus Murie's "Field Guide to North American Mammal Tracks".  I watched for birds, and we bought a handheld spotlight and drove the empty levees in search of foxes, coyotes, skunks and other marshland denizens.

And I hunted.  And hunted.

I also kept up with gun-tech.  In high school, I did four years of rifle team, and earned my varsity block my Freshman year.  I hung out with a couple of gun nuts, guys with modified Ruger 10/22's, guys shooting 22-250's and Thompson/Center pistols.  I can still make a cop feel comfortable by rambling on about the good points of a .40 cal over a 9mm.  Target practice and shooting clays is fun -- really fun!

But, I am torn today.

Yes, guns are just tools -- and tools have special purposes.  Hammers are really good at nailing; drills are really good at drilling. I think you know where this leads...

I see the horrific impacts of so many guns on streets, amid rampant poverty and powerlessness.  I do not believe that the 2nd Amendment guarantees a right to private ownership of any and every weapon  (else we'd have to allow for nuclear armaments owned by private citizens), so I'm okay with drawing lines (though I don't know where those lines are).  But, I also find myself cheering on the female Peshmerga Kurdish troops and women demonstrating empowered equality on U.N. missions in Africa.  If I'm happy to see women empowered through being armed (and to be honest, in these cases being armed is a vital part of their empowerment), then why not my own sisters here at home?

I know that gun ownership carries with it a tremendous power and responsibility, and, as a leftist, I don't completely trust that power in the hands of government (especially where I see that government failing to protect many poor folks).  As a Christian, however, I see the gun as a crutch and an obstacle to real power and transformation.  I guess I'm torn like Hamlet, only I don't have to deal with it face-to-face like that poor bastard.

I don't have an answer to the violence of our society.  I know fewer people would be harmed, physically, with fewer arms, but I don't see the disarming of American society going so well in reality.  In the meantime, I see the weak preying on the weaker with arms, and I wonder how best we might protect them.

But when it comes to my own guns, it has little to do with ideas of protection.  I enjoy guns like I enjoy knives and cast-iron pans, binoculars and bows. I like to look at the really nice ones, then, when I can afford one, I might pick up one of the cheaper ones.

Yelling into the Hurricane (yes, my 1st blog post in a long time is about California water)

© 2014 Joshua Stark

There is no such thing as California water.

There is water in California, to be sure, from many varied places and of varying degrees of quality.  Los Angeles, for example, sits immediately next to the single largest body of water on the entire Earth -- and reminds me of a line from Rime of the Ancient Mariner.

If you read any op-ed piece or news article, or listen or watch any reports on our drought, you may be forgiven for thinking that there is such a thing as California water.  Alas, it is not so.  Let me explain.

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California is blessed with more climates than all other states combined; we have literally dozens of micro-climates, as well, and, it goes without saying (almost) that we have hundreds of watersheds.  This is because our topography and our range of latitude are both extreme.  We have the second longest coastline of any state in the Nation, the highest peak in the Lower 48, the lowest and driest places in the country, and the hottest place on Earth.  California's seasonal precipitation varies from 2.5 inches to to ten and one-half feet (see this great map).

California is also very, very large.  For example:  The drive from Sacramento (considered by many in Los Angeles to be "Northern California") to Crescent City is the same distance as the drive from Sacramento to Los Angeles (if you don't know where Crescent City is, by the way, you legally have to move to Nevada and petition to get back into the State).

Now, consider the same water conversation on the Eastern seaboard:  Do we talk about "East Coast" water as if it is one thing?  Rarely do we consider the environmental, economic and social impacts of any policies in Portland, Maine, on Richmond, Virginia; more to the point, we would never consider pumping water from Portland to Richmond.

In fact, we don't even have language that would begin to encapsulate a conversation around water and watershed impacts between those two completely separated regions of our country.  Nor should we -- it would be absurd.

Of course, our political boundaries make all things possible (or impossible)...

The reality is that this year, each region of California is experiencing a drought.  The ecological impacts of one year of drought are tough, but California's weather is so diverse, and we haven't invested in the research to understand the extraordinarily complex implications of drought on each region.

Instead, we let our political boundaries frame our perception of reality, and when we try to shoehorn that perception into the physical reality of our gigantic State, we are left dumbfounded.  This occurs when we try to understand our impacts on water -- like when we unnaturally store and pump water the length of New York City to Charlotte, North Carolina.

But, instead of putting more resources into understanding the implications of our ecosystem-shifting actions (like pumping water, but also like mandating that people stop using outdoor water), we make a boatload of sweeping assumptions:

We assume that we have California water.

We assume that all water has the same value everywhere.

We assume that water's value is only in its commercial or civic use.

We assume that water is "used" like a product -- consumed and poof! it's gone.

We assume that residential water use is always consumptive and bad, and that radically diminishing its use will have only good impacts.

We assume that we dramatically diminish our consumption of water, overall, when we cut back on residential use.

We assume that California (corporate) Agriculture is a foundation of our economy.

We assume that the Central Valley and Southern California would not survive without "Northern" California water.

All of these are terribly inaccurate assumptions, but the worst of all (in my opinion) is our assumption that all human water users everywhere are exactly the same.

But, just as we live in radically different ecosystems throughout our state, our use of water and the impacts of that use on the landscape radically differ.

I can provide myself as an example.  I live 200 yards from the Sacramento River, on the edge of the California Delta and squarely within a riparian (or wetlands) corridor. 

My ecosystem has evolved with certain features, a relative abundance of water being one of them.  With our fluctuating temperatures (over 100 degrees F in the Summer, down to the high 30's in the Winter) and our wildly divergent seasons (all of our measurable precipitation occurs between October and April), this abundance of water has local impacts such as relative humidity, and its ease of access means that animals haven't adapted to go very far or for very long without taking a drink. 

I have a tiny pond in my back yard.  That pond -- plus a dog who doesn't care -- means a safe place for a drink for many local birds.  I have identified five separate species using the pond to bathe, four of them native.  Additionally, the safety of the space from the local feral cat population, plus my gigantic trees, has proven useful for nesting, and I know of four species of birds who are nesting in my back yard, alone (and I'm confident that there are many more).  One species, yellow-billed magpies (endemic to California), is threatened with extinction from west nile virus, and so my pond management (using my pond to water my garden and trees every three days) may even be providing some help, as I have kept my mosquito population pretty low. 

I don't use any fertilizer on my lawn, nor do I spray any pesticides on anything, so our runoff to the local river isn't any more polluted than when it came in.  I'd like to say it's because I'm environmentally friendly, but I've never cared what my lawn looks like.

In fact, my habitat is very thirsty and my soil is porous, and very little of our water actually runs off into our curb (where it would evaporate and pour down a sinkhole, because our street doesn't have a drain). 

When we shower, run the sink or flush the toilet, our water heads to a water treatment plant, where it comes out cleaner than the water that came downriver. 

One variable I don't understand (but I expect is quite large): I do not know how much water is leaked out of bad city pipes and infrastructure on its way to and from my 1/8th acre lot. 

Much of the water that we paid for and "used" then continues downstream, where some of it is collected, pumped 200 miles South, and sold by somebody who claims to own it.  For some reason, my payment for the use of the water never resulted in transfer of ownership of that water to me to sell to this downstream entity. 

Chances are great that this water is then sprayed into a field of alfalfa or an almond orchard, where it collects very large amounts of artificial nitrogen, along with pesticides, herbicides, fungicides and locally occurring heavy metals.  It then either evaporates, sinks into the local groundwater, or runs into the local river.  Such water is not cleaned, and so its costs are borne downstream, in the air, and in groundwater aquifers.  Through this landscape where "my" water flowed, cleaner because of me, it passed thousands of Californians whose groundwater is now so contaminated that they cannot drink it.

If I lived in a desert or a rain shadow, my use of water in such a way may be considered wasteful.  But where I live now, with water such an important part of my ecosystem, dramatically curbing my water use may be the wrong thing to do.

I could write a book dispelling the other assumptions made above (eg., agriculture is 3% of our economy and is a huge burden on many Central Valley communities; if we cut all of our outdoor residential water use completely, we'd save about one-third as much water as we use on alfalfa in the State).

But for now, I only hope that this opens up a conversation about water's use and real impacts throughout our gigantic and diverse, and wonderful State.

Trying again: Let's start with frankenfish and consumers' right to know

© 2012 Joshua Stark

According to some producers, wild salmon just don't grow fast enough.  Oh sure, a Chinook salmon can reach 40+ pounds in two years, feeding for free and adding to the health of our lands and waters as it does, but this kind of willy-nilly public resource just doesn't cut it for those who wish to have complete control over their market.  So in the name of profit, these folks have genetically engineered a species of salmon that grows over twice as fast as wild fish.  Meant to be farmed in closed systems, these GE salmon will be fed by fishing for baitfish, presumably, and will not be allowed to enter our oceans, for fear that they will out-compete and destroy wild salmon.  First, however, the producers of this fish must get past the FDA, which doesn't look like too big a hurdle.

While the FDA wrestles with the question of legalizing GE salmon for consumers, California is considering whether or not to require labels identifying such meat as GE in the marketplace.  And while I might address the basic question of even allowing GE salmon at some future point, right now I want to address consumer knowledge in the marketplace.

This, of course, is a no-brainer outside of the halls of governance:  Libertarians to Socialists agree that consumers have the right to know where and how their food comes to be.  Even the opponents of the labeling bill (AB 88) couch their opposition in a manner that acknowledges some leeway in labeling requirements, arguing not that they shouldn't be labeled, per se, but that such requirements are the responsibility of the federal government, not the State.

In reality, the bill's opponents are concerned that if consumers know what they are buying, they will probably choose not to buy it (about 50% say they wouldn't).  Really, consumer choice is the issue here, and California has every right to require labeling.

What is the California Delta to you?

© 2011 Joshua Stark

Dan Bacher has an update on Delta issues - noting that federal representatives of the Delta and North Coast recently met with the new Delta Czar, Jerry Meral.  Their reason:  To let him know that they have "grave concerns" (Mr. Bacher's language) about the Bay-Delta Conservation Plan.  Add their voice to the many groups who've been involved for years fighting to make the Delta whole and healthy.

According to Mr. Bacher, the Reps.' concerns are over a peripheral canal.  However, if you read the quotations, it sounds like those representatives are not as adamant about opposing a canal as is Mr. Bacher.  This is too bad, and we constituents need to let them know that we want solid, explicit language opposing any conveyance around the Delta.

Make no mistake:  Any peripheral canal would be an ecological compromise, at best; at worst, it would be an ecological and economic disaster for a fertile, diverse, unique region. 

Everybody rips on the Delta, but the Delta is California's crown jewel, the source of our very life: from its water, the foods that come from its amazing soil (with no need to go against gravity), and its unique habitats.  From the way it is talked about in the news and in so many watercooler conversations, you would think that it is a festering sore on the face of the Earth, a cesspool of pollution, devastation and death just waiting for a catastrophe to rip it wide open and spread famine everywhere.  But, we have made ugly in concept something that is beautiful in fact - even now - and we do it because we do not understand our physical connection to it. 

You, who drink water in Los Angeles, water that is pumped hundreds of miles and over an entire mountain range, you are connected to the Delta: It infuses your cells, hydrates your body, helps fire your synapses. 

You, who spray water to ever-saltier flats on the West Central Valley, you are connected to the Delta: It lines your pockets, pays your kids' tuitions, keeps your workers happy.

And we, throughout the world, who buy California produce, we are all connected to the Delta:  It grows the largest agricultural industry on Earth, it builds our muscles and bones, forms our staffs of life, grows our children's eyes and brains.  We sanctify it, pray over it, cook it up, add it to our very selves.  We are made of the Delta.

And this is good.

But if we are to continue to benefit from it, then we must treat it right.  Many billions of other lives depend on the Delta, too, and the Delta, as any ecosystem, depends upon those lives for its own health.  There is no separation of a wetlands habitat from its water without loss and significant change, and we, as Americans, have taken on the responsibility of caring for those creatures we have harmed. 

Mr. Bacher notes a sad new record set this year:  more Sacramento splittail minnows were killed at the pumps this year than any other.  Nine million little lives lost for the pumps, while more water was pumped than ever before.

All of this that is the Delta - the devastation as well as the vitality, goes into those things we put in our bodies to keep ourselves whole.

So next time you start to think about the Delta as a horrible place, just remember:  The Delta is You.

Professor Mankiw's frustrating comment - with no chance to comment!

© 2011 Joshua Stark

Sorry for the non-environmental post, but the Harvard Econ. Professor Greg Mankiw has me a tad frustrated this morning.

I'm no economist, and so, if he cared to, I'm sure Mr. Mankiw could come in and take apart my comments here, (frankly, I'd love that, because I want an accurate representation of economics out in the public, and where I'm mistaken, I want to be corrected).  My real problem is that the Professor posts to a blog, but doesn't allow comments.

First, I would hope Mr. Mankiw would understand that the interactive nature of the internet makes it a world-changing phenomenon, and participate wholeheartedly in this interaction.  Second, I think by opening comments, Mr. Mankiw would watch his own posting a bit more carefully.  Case in point:

I'm poking through the cadre of economic minds on-line (starting at Env-Econ, of course) this morning, and I come across a little post by Prof. Mankiw.  He ends this three-sentence post with:

"If you can remember only one fact, make it this one: The middle class (middle quintile) pays 14.1 percent of its income in federal taxes, while the rich (top tenth of one percent of the population) pay 30.4 percent."

Of course, I'm frustrated by this comment, because it misses a basic economic concept, "diminishing marginal utility".  But, when I scroll to the bottom of the page to respond, I find no way to comment!

So, I'm taking time to point out a couple of mistakes that Mr. Mankiw makes in his implication (as I understand it, he is implying here that our federal tax system is sufficiently progressive).

First of all, as he points out, the richest 1/10 of 1% pay about double in "federal taxes" (we'll get to that definition in a minute) what the middle quintile pays.  My immediate question:  What is 14% to a person making the middle quintile vs. 30% to one of the richest 1/10th?  So, I follow the link he posted, and I find that the middle quintile is defined as people making between ~ $34k and $62k, while the richest 1/10th are defined as making over about $2,468,000.

Then I ask:  What is the marginal utility of this money - the relative impact of 14% on $34k ($4760) vs. 30% on $2,468,000 ($740,400)?  Am I the only one to see that the five grand is way more valuable to the person making $34k than the $750K is to the person making the nearly $2.5 million?  If you don't see that, then realize that I just swallowed the poorer persons yearly after-tax salary in the rounding error for the richer person.

Now, consider that these were just the examples of the poorest in the group.  For the richest of the 1/10th, we are talking billions upon billions of dollars earned per year. 

Upon closer examination, then, it becomes obvious that 14% is a far heavier tax burden on the middle quintile than 30% is on the richest 1/10th.

And there is one other problem.  The "effective federal tax rate" Mr. Mankiw uses doesn't even include federal excise taxes - like the 18.4 cents-per-gallon on gasoline.  For poorer people, these taxes are heavy burdens (one study showed that the folks in the middle quintile pay about a quarter of their income on transportation), but for rich folks, that regressive tax is almost nil.

Professor Mankiw, please consider teaching folks in the ether about real tax burdens and economic concepts (like diminishing marginal utility), and please oh please start participating in the earth-changing world of the interwebs.

I'd be tickled pink if you'd start here.

Sec. Salazar continues the time-honored tradition of promising California hydrological miracles

© 2011 Joshua Stark

Mike Tougher has a good article in the San Jose Mercury News about Interior Secretary Salazar's comments on pumping Delta water to Central and Southern California.

Last year, when I pointed out that Meg Whitman (remember when she ran for Governor?) promised more water, I gave her the benefit of the doubt and chalked it up to the pressures of a live debate (I'm sure I'd look like a complete moron in a live debate, so I'm always judging those events nicely).  Secretary Salazar, when taking questions before the Commonwealth Club, might also get the benefit of the doubt.  It was a live, well-respected audience.

But the comments Mr. Tougher reports show a man flirting with serious conflicts with physics.  And believe me, physics always wins.

From Mr. Tougher's report:  "Salazar said building a new aqueduct around the Delta might increase the flexibility of water operations in such a way that it could lead to more water deliveries."

The Delta needs x amount of fresh water each year.  We aren't sure what x is, yet, but we know that in a typical year it is more than it now gets.  If freshwater is diverted from the Delta, it will suffer an ecological decline.

Mr. Salazar later visited the new fish screens put up to protect fish from the South Delta pumps.  Unfortunately, what Mr. Tougher failed to note is that the sucking up of fish into the pumps is only one of the ways they impact endangered and threatened species.  Their overall impacts on the flow of water through the Delta also kills fish by confusing them and sucking them into predator pits. 


But never forget that removing actual habitat (i.e., through a peripheral canal) is not the cure for pump impacts on tides and flows.  The single greatest ecological and economic benefits for both the Delta and the rest of the Central Valley would come from farming the Westlands for solar power.  


Physics can be our friend.

What's rural? Wild? Urban? Nobody really knows

© 2011 Joshua Stark

Matt Weiser has an interesting article about Sacramento's recent, apparent uptick in violent human/wild animal encounters the past two weeks.  In particular, a couple of animals have been found with rabies (sad and scary, as anybody whose seen Old Yeller can tell you).

Coming from the country, I love how these stories are often told with surprise and awe about how these animals can live in such seemingly unnatural environs; namely, our cities.

First, I don't know how even humans live in these seemingly unnatural environs, but let's look past that, and consider the reality of our habitats and communities:  Nothing in nature respects political boundaries because they don't really exist.

There is no such thing as a "city" in nature.  Roads, rivers, bike trails, ditches, empty lots, power and sewer lines... the list of entryways into cities is long, and animals that have a high tolerance for humans and similar tastes find cities very inviting, indeed.  Cities offer wonderful shelters from weather and feasts for omnivores, and there is little we can do about it.  Conversely, traffic, agriculture, flood and fire control are a few examples of how the "urban" infiltrates and impacts those places we consider rural and wild, altering them completely.

Certain animals thrive under conditions that humans create.  As Bill Tweed, former Chief of Interpretation at Sequoia National Park, once pointed out, scavenging omnivores love food-storing omnivores; and, what are we, if not the consummate food-storing omnivore?  It would be very unnatural if other animals did not take advantage of our largesse.

For its part, Sacramento's wildlife may be wilder than most cities, which can, ironically, help bring down animal encounters.  We are blessed with a Wild & Scenic river corridor running right through the city, providing habitat for pipevine swallowtail butterflies to mule deer.  These wilder habitats offer more appropriate shelter and foods for those raccoons, skunks, opossums, and others who may be tempted to hit up houses and parking lots.

(If you are interested, you can read more of my posts on the illusions of rural, wild and urban here, here, and here).

President Obama concedes the wrong point in pollution regulation

© 2011 Joshua Stark

President Obama has pulled back from his earlier proposal to put stricter limits on ground-level ozone, a major pollutant and cause of asthma attacks and deaths, reports the Associated Press.

By this act, the President has conceded to opponents the very idea that pollution regulations are job killers, and opened the door to a flood of rollbacks, and the subsequent pollution increases that will come with them.

Hard choices have to be made, and the President has ducked a big one right here.  Sadly, he has done it by buying into the notion that pollution control is a net loss to our economy, thus legitimizing the idea, even though, under our current circumstances, it almost never has merit. 

In our dirtiest places, Americans live like 3rd World countries.  California's Central Valley has thousands of Americans who can't even drink their own tap water, and one-fifth of their children have asthma (for a thorough look at the impacts of asthma and ozone on the Valley, click here).

The regulation that the President has backed off would have direct impacts on asthma rates in places like the Central Valley, improving the quality of life for millions of Americans, particularly the poor.  But, what would be the economic impact?

Well, in 1997 the EPA estimated that asthma cost the U.S. between $9 and $11 billion (today, that would be $12.5 to %15 billion).  And these rates don't calculate lost productivity due to parents' worries over a hospitalized child, stress from losing a child, young people's inability to perform work throughout their life due to their impaired physiques and oxygen loss during growth.

Additionally, these calculations don't take into account the value of individual dollars - a gaping intellectual hole when calculating economic impacts.  Simply put, one dollar is worth more in a poor person's hands than it is in a rich person's hands, especially now.  A poor person, when getting a dollar, will spend that dollar, because it is more valuable turned into food than it is sitting in a bank.  A rich person may spend that dollar, or they may save it, because its value as a saved dollar may be bigger than its value as one more hamburger.

Right now, our economic problem is in large part due to our low total demand for goods and services because we can't afford them, because there isn't enough circulating money.  Money isn't circulating because we have too many people out of work, unable to afford things.

We are in the beginning stages of a vicious cycle, economically-speaking, and this cycle has nothing to do with our pollution.  But, regulating our pollution can go a long way toward ending this cycle and getting us out of our current slump.  Robust pollution regulation can lead to direct job growth in the testing and regulating industries (often public-private partnerships), and it will lead to increased productivity among those who would see improved health.  The additional demand from this growth of more valuable dollars would lead to increased supply to meet that demand, pushing up employment.

Make no mistake, companies who fight these regulations want to pollute.  If they didn't want to pollute, they would not care about the regulation.  They do not care about total demand, they do not care about social health improvements.  The individuals who work in these companies might care, but officially and professionally, they don't make their decisions based on what is good for the nation; they cannot, because the pressures of their fiduciary duties and their pressures to see quarterly profits are too great.


Economic reasons aren't the only reasons for robust pollution controls, and they shouldn't even be the first reasons.  But, there are real economic benefits to robust pollution control, and the President, by ignoring these, has lost sight of the good of the nation and has given over to ideas that will further stunt our growth, economically and otherwise.

Grist wins me over - with sensible talk about population control

© 2011 Joshua Stark

In response to Vice President Biden's comments on China's one child policy, Grist's senior editor Lisa Hymas posted an article debunking some myths about the policy.  But what she really does is bust population control as a place for government intervention, and for that, Grist should be commended.

Sport, or not? Hunting, philosophy, & language

© 2011 Joshua Stark

It's funny, because my title, compared to those at Holly's, Tovar's, and Phillip's, is pretty high-falutin, but I won't go nearly as deep as they.

Currently, these three sites are having a great philosophical conversation over whether or not A:  hunting is a sport; and B:  whether that is good or bad.

Tovar and Holly (and me, to be honest) take the tack that hunting, to us, is not "sport" in the general sense of the word, and that the term dilutes, diminishes, and ultimately harms hunting in the general public's eyes.  Phillip, bless his soul, embraces his hunting as sport, and gently chides us for falling for stereotypes (sport and "trophy" hunters as bad folks), rather than trying to destroy them.  His inference (which he's made more clear at other times) is that the hunting community shouldn't be torn apart by these esoteric distinctions.

Personally, I don't think hunting is a sport, in the general definition of the term.  That is, I believe that the impacts to hunting (physically, emotionally) separate it from the category of sports.  Specifically, I think the fact that you try to kill an animal during hunting (and much fishing) means that it is, inherently, different from other categories of recreation, and "sport" has a dismissive tone to it nowadays that diminishes the gravity of killing.  I, for one, don't use the term for this very reason.

Phillip's argument seems, to me, a bit off-focus.  First, he seems to define "sport" as encompassing all recreational pursuits.  If this is true, then I concede that hunting is a "sport", but I don't buy his definition.  I think there are many pursuits, and that within the realm of recreational pursuits there exists both sports and other things (reading, for example).  There are also some activities that are both recreational and something else, entirely.  For example, many people do not grocery shop as a recreational pursuit, but many people fish for both recreation and food. 

There are characteristics to the common definition of "sport" that do not ethically fit with hunting, especially when considered from the perspective of the non-hunting public.  For example, sport tends to have a competitive element, but when that is applied to hunting, the non-hunting public imagines people who want to kill something in order to beat somebody else, and they tend to be repulsed by this urge.  

It seems as though Phillip is really upset that some hunters condemn certain hunting practices or attitudes, and that this leads to fractures in hunting that may jeopardize it for all of us.  He gives a lecture on the evils of stereotypes, and ends by suggesting that Tovar and Holly are not trying to destroy stereotypes, but are actually bolstering them by taking a side. 

But, this isn't a case of stereotypes, this is a case of identifying unethical actions and condemning those actions.  I (and probably Tovar and Holly) aren't taking a group of people, identifying them by one shared characteristic and then attributing to them additional characteristics that aren't true.  We are saying that a particular action may be, or is, wrong.  In the case of hunting, there are people who hunt for trophies, there are hunters who kill only to kill, and I (and probably Tovar and Holly) do not believe this is ethical behavior.  We have a different standard from Phillip (we don't draw the ethical line at the law, which is a totally different conversation).  But, that's okay.  Hunting, like all good human endeavors, will thrive when people think more deeply about it and talk openly about it. 

Sunlight is the best disinfectant, and if hunting couldn't survive public scrutiny, then it shouldn't survive it.  I, for one, know that much of it is good and important to pass down, including the ethical considerations.  I know hunting can survive this argument.

(Note:  Phillip's link doesn't seem to be working, so go to his main website page for reference.)

Yo-Yo: Grist with a good article on eating fish

© 2011 Joshua Stark

Grist has a good interview with chef/author Barton Seaver about eating seafood.  It's a tad light on actual tactics for improving our ocean conditions by eating seafood, but it is still worth a read.

This is a big step away from the opinion piece it ran a couple of weeks back on an oyster farmer's desire to own more farms at the expense of other fisheries... well, perhaps I'm being a bit harsh, but that is how it read to me.

Mr. Seaver does explain one tactic for improving our impact, and it happens to be one of my favorites:  Eat lower on the seafood food chain.  He doesn't make the claim so directly, but the fish he points out that need to be replacing the giant, slow-growing (and often toxin-laden) predators we currently eat are smaller prey species like sardines and mackerel.  These just so happen to be the tastiest fish one can eat (we had grilled, whole sardines two nights ago!), and they are also cheaper than the big ones.

It was a refreshing change to read at Grist, though it wasn't a complete rebuttal to the earlier piece.

Level-headed and honest discussions about famine, climate change & overpopulation

© 2011 Joshua Stark

Within ten days, two separate radio programs addressed the controversy around overpopulation, and they did it exactly like it should be done:  in passing, dismissing it as a separate threat, and mentioning it only in the context of sociopolitical pressures and poverty.

These two shows?  Forum, with Michael Krasny, and Talk of the Nation Science Friday, with Ira Flatow.

In the Forum episode, an update on Somalia, Semhar Araia, the regional director for OxFam's work on the horn of Africa, addressed an email from a listener who railed about Somalia's inability to feed its too crowded landscape.  In perhaps two sentences, Mr. Araia stated clearly that Somalia has the ability to feed itself even under the current circumstances.  People were starving to death there because militia groups were preventing them from reaching food.

It is as simple and as horrifying as that.  Somalia doesn't suffer from brown and black people having too many babies, it suffers under the hands of vile militias.

And today on Science Friday, in an entire discussion (I think it was a half-hour) on food, its production, and climate change, only a few scant seconds were given to overpopulation as a problem in and of itself.  Ira Flatow started off with the fear-mongering threat we often hear - by 2050 there will be 9 billion people - and the respondent replied, to agreement with the other speakers, that:  first, we may not even reach 9 billion by 2050; second, we grow enough under current situations to feed all of us; third, the problems are an overpopulation of poverty and distribution - and more specifically, that when people get out of abject poverty, they will want to eat more and different foods; fourth, climate change is going to impact our yield, and so we need to study those impacts and do what we can to mitigate them. 


Again, that was it.  Overpopulation was not the problem.  (For the record, I think Mr. Flatow was lobbing a softball in his question on overpopulation.)


I hope to post a bit more on the Science Friday show, because there is so much in there to take apart related to ethics and the environment, but I wanted to make the overpopulation issue clear:  For most folks seriously working to improve food security, overpopulation isn't the problem. 

Opinion piece in Grist gets it wrong about fishing

© 2011 Joshua Stark

There are few controversies in the environmentalist world quite like fishing.  Most folks agree that most recreational (though I hate that term) fishing is a great way for children to connect directly to the wild in a special way, a way that often begins a lifetime of love and appreciation for the outdoors; fishing is often our gateway.  Really, only the animal rights groups have a problem with recreational and subsistence fishing, and as I've pointed out before, "animal rights" is not environmentalism.

But, then there is "commercial fishing", that ugly moniker attached to images of mutilated sharks, denuded seascapes, and "Whale Wars".

Yet, there is more to commercial fishing than many give credit.  Commercial fishing, when done right, is a powerful way for many people to connect to the wild, through their food.  In fact, commercial fishing is the only major food market left with a direct connection to and need for healthy wild places.  And many organizations and fishing groups have tried to make commercial fishing an ecologically viable enterprise, especially in the past couple of decades, and especially in California. 

Also, consider commercial fishing's impact to wildness vs. farming's impact.  As one fisheries biologist points out, commercial fishing, at its worst, impacts about 30% of habitat, while agriculture, at its best, still impacts very nearly 100%, by completely altering landscapes. 

And the importance of having a group of people whose very livelihoods are affected by the health of ecosystems is vital to ensuring that those same ecosystems have a voice in our democratic systems.

I'm not defending all commercial fishing, but I am arguing that it is a powerful connection to a wild place that would suffer worse without that connection.

This is why I'm disappointed in a recent opinion piece in Grist Magazine titled the, "Sustainable Seafood Myth".  I can expect Grist to go over the top on a typical day, though I am a fan of their reporting and suffer the flash to get to the meat of their stories, but this one didn't have much meat.

Grist uses the very real dangers associated with global warming to pooh-pooh Whole Foods' (and others') attempts to provide real information to consumers about the sustainability of various fish.  Instead of asking Whole Foods why they might still sell fish with a low sustainability rating (I don't know if they do), or simply pointing out that the sustainability rating should include carbon emissions, the piece makes wild claims like, "Sadly, in the era of climate crisis, overfishing and other forms of unsustainable harvest are the least of our problems."

First of all, the least of our problems are still problems.  Second, if it's in the "problems" category, there is no reason to attack a solution.  Third, it may be the least of our problems, but it ain't the least of fish's problems.

The author of the piece does recommend that sustainability rating systems include carbon footprints, but he then wades into deeper waters with an over-simplified and risky solution:

"...dedicating portions of the ocean to farming -- while reserving large swaths for marine conservation parks. These farms need to be small and decentralized. Industrial aquaculture farms have rightly been branded as large-scale polluters producing low-quality food. Simply replacing destructive fishing fleets with destructive global fish farms will only hasten the demise of our oceans. Guided by principles of sustainability, our shorelines of the future can be dotted with organic fish farms servicing local communities."

Ah.  So, the author (an oyster farmer) sees a solution in ending our connection to the wild and replacing it with seafood only for those wealthy enough to live right next to the sea... got it.

This excerpt is so damaging on so many levels, and so completely dumbs-down so many ideas, that it becomes destructive to the greater good.  First, "marine conservation parks" can be problematic, as they often only disallow fishing, but allow for water pollution and resource extraction, both of which come with far larger carbon footprints and other ecological impacts than well-regulated fishing.

Second, dedicating portions of the ocean to farming is the same thing as saying "completely denuding wild landscapes from portions of the ocean and replacing them completely with man-made operations".  Third, not all large-scale aquaculture is bad - in fact, fully enclosed, freshwater systems are very important alternatives that remove impacts on the oceans and can provide local fish to inland consumers who aren't blessed with trust funds. 

Shorelines and oceans aren't homogenous, but pretending that one stretch of beach is the same as another is detrimental to an understanding of fish, habitats, and fishing.  The same spot that will make a great oyster farm (for example) is very often the very same spot that makes great wild habitat for varieties of species.

Last, fish farming in ocean waters is problematic, not only because of the damage it has on wild systems, but because of the political economy.  Fish farms can scale up and pressure markets and governments quickly, and without commercial fishing operations who need healthy ecosystems, there will be little pressure to keep farms' impacts in check through regulation.  (This is true for any industry:  hence, the "well-regulated" label.)

Commercial fishing has a horrible history, but there are proven ways to operate a well-regulated system that helps the environment - just think of the salmon folks fighting today to recover salmon habitat inland throughout the Pacific Northwest and California.  And the commercial folks' check on  aquaculture is vital to a well-regulated market.  We would be far worse off if we lost yet another connection to our wild oceans.

At the end of the piece, we are tasked to, "reimagine our waters as agrarian eco-spaces designed to curb seafood's carbon footprint..."  To which I say no, thank you.  I prefer not to "imagine" my waters as anything. I prefer to understand my waters as they are, and to understand and improve my relationship with them.  I do not wish to pretend that just by ending commercial fishing they will no longer suffer from global warming.

(In the interests of full disclosure, I am a board member of SalmonAid.)

A short, non-environmental post on the debt "deal"

© 2011 Joshua Stark

The title of this AP piece, and EVERY article about this horrific deal should be:

REPUBLICANS VOTE TO RAISE TAXES; DEMOCRATS VOTE TO CUT

Here's the most important quotation from the above-linked article:

"Yet it appeared Obama's proposal to extend the current payroll tax holiday beyond the end of 2011 would not be included. Nor would his call for extended unemployment benefits for victims of the recession."

Republicans are now running around saying they kept taxes from going up, but what happened is that they wouldn't vote for an extension of a tax cut to working folks, nor would they vote to back-fill these tax losses through taxing corporate jets.

Democrats are running around saying that they get the debt ceiling raised, thus averting catastrophe, but happened is that they were willing to let their major donors in the financial sector get away with not having to deal with the catastrophe they've created, this limping-along recoveryless recovery.  They also voted to cut unemployment extensions and to raise taxes on working people at the same time.

Here's a quick reminder of the definition of "unemployment":  Those who do not have a job, but who are able to work and are actively seeking work.  It's these people that keep inflation in check - and if there are too many of them, they drive down wages and keep recoveries from happening (sound familiar?).

This is a sham, another slap in the face to working people and people who want to work, and another meaty steak for the rich.  What a sorry, sorry state we are in.

Cap-and-trade, when studied under one simplified scenario, beats carbon tax, one study finds

© 2011 Joshua Stark

My title should have been the title to this article out today at California Watch.  Unfortunately, they picked a title with a tad less specificity, and in doing so have picked a side in the debate between the two ideas.  Their title:  Free cap-and-trade system beats carbon tax, study finds.

That study, Inducing Clean Technology in the Electricity Sector:  Tradable Permits or Carbon Tax Policies?, by UC Merced & the University of New South Wales, compares the possible impacts of a carbon tax vs. a cap-&-trade system using a model of a single, small firm that owns a coal-fired power plant.  In the abstract, the authors claim to find that, due to the inherent uncertainty of a tradable permit system, a small firm will more likely hedge its bets by investing in some hybrid form of clean tech. + coal than it would under a system with a more stable carbon price.

Now, I don't have $20 to put down on a copy of this study (chalk it up to microeconomics, both literally and figuratively), but I do have some questions - especially to California Watch:

-The study's abstract says nothing of a "free cap-and-trade system", and in fact, I don't have a clue as to what a "free" cap-&-trade system would look like.  People pay when carbon is priced, period.  So, California Watch, where did "free" come in?

-The study's abstract also explains that other ideas associated with C&T (e.g., offsets) are also more expensive than just a tradable permits system without them.  California Watch, why did you not include this little gem of news?

-And for the researchers: Why study a particular scenario that is unlikely to have much of an impact on carbon?  If energy companies were as the authors envision - small firms owning one coal plant - then uncertainty may lead to hedging.  However, we are talking about creating a contrived, government-mandated market with a number of very, very large firms.  These firms move markets, they tend to suppress volatility (which is why companies want to be big), and they unduly influence political economy in their favor (hence, offsets & free permits to them).  This last point cannot be understated, especially because any carbon price is going to be the result of a government regulation and it will be much easier to "game" the system if it has elements of contrived uncertainty in it. 

Also, consider this:  A clear government regulation pointing to a relatively quick increase in carbon prices will also lead a small firm to switch to clean tech.  In fact, if the price looks high enough, that firm will leave coal completely, thus saving lives.  This regulation will also lead big firms to switch.

Never forget that, no matter how we price carbon, it will be through a government regulation.

Uncertainty in carbon prices may, indeed, lead many companies to hedge their bets, although current history (carbon prices are surely uncertain right now) does not completely bear this out.  And if carbon prices were a commodity, rather than a priced-in externality, I'd be more inclined to allow some uncertainty.  But the fact is that any carbon price will be contrived, because it doesn't have to have a market price.  Since the price for carbon will come out of regulations (even a C&T price) and an artificial scarcity, since large companies can thrive on creating their own certainty and influence shifting and uncertain regulations to a greater extent, and since a clear sign that carbon prices will go up will also induce a strong shift toward clean tech., it is imperative that we have a clear and certain regulatory framework.

Bad Science on levees makes it into the paper

© 2011 Joshua Stark

Alas, having an advanced degree in a field doesn't always mean you are always right all the time.

Take this op-ed piece in yesterday's Sacramento Bee.  In it, a Dr. Lund from UC Davis, a man who is probably nearly a genius in his field, makes some very dubious claims about Central California's levees.  Sadly, here he refers to no studies nor historical evidence to prove his position.

The professor's claim is that we should remove trees from all "urban" levees, per a requirement by the US Army Corps of Engineers, even though doing so may have bad impacts to riparian habitat and recreational values.  He is concerned because trees may weaken levees, and hide burrows from workers checking them.

What does the professor use to support his claim?  The fact that other parts of the world - namely, China, Japan, & the Netherlands - remove trees from their levees.

That's it.

He offers no studies in this article that have shown these levees to be superior to California's.  He offers no examples of California levee failures (or any levee failures) due to trees.  He offers no support whatsoever for such an environmentally devastating act, for an act that will forever change habitats and recreation on our levees.

After some research, I found Dr. Lund's article as a blog post where he actually does cite references.  However, the references are largely skewed (most being from the Corps), or almost never support his position.  For example, this Power Point presentation lists trees and vegetation that are more or less problematic according to their research on European levees.  The list describes a host of bramble bushes - blackberries and such - as less problematic for levees.  However, I daresay that a burrow would be harder to find in a blackberry bramble than under a valley oak.

Another example, from the Ca. Dept. of Water Resources link he cites:  "... California asserts that the Corps’ strict enforcement of the ETL and PGL will adversely impact public safety."

An earlier report by the Sacramento Bee, about the lawsuit by environmental groups against the Corps for this horrid idea, did mention the science on levee failures:
"But it (the Corps) offers little scientific evidence for those conclusions (to remove trees).  A 2007 symposium hosted by the Sacramento Area Flood Control Agency (SAFCA) offered evidence for the opposing view: Tree roots may, in fact, strengthen levees by binding soils together."

I am no levee engineer.  However, a quick google search of images from the last major levee failure on the California Delta, at Jones Tract in 2004, are telling; do you see any trees?  Also, think back to times when you've noticed tree roots, perhaps sticking out of the side of a cut-bank on a road or a creek.  Think about the dirt and rocks sticking to it, and how it and the land touching it stick way out from the eroded places around it, places that only had short grasses growing on it.

Last, I want to make a point about Dr. Lund's tone (and nearly everybody else talking publicly) when talking about levees:  It is super-easy to make dire predictions, because nobody wants to have been the Pollyanna the day one fails, and because the old saw about there being two types of levees (those that have failed, and those that are about to) is true.  But I would like to point out that this year we have experienced well over double our average runoff, and have had no major levee breech. 

It may be time to reconsider a push for drastic actions to redesign a system that has been working pretty well for quite a while.  Eventually, a levee will fail.  Far less likely will multiple levees fail, and the event that would cause multiple failures will also likely go beyond what we actually accomplish to protect them now, regardless of the current wild-eyed rhetoric.  Perhaps we should look at smaller-scale solutions to a recurring issue, rather than panicking about a potential catastrophe.

And for the record, I was born and raised on the Delta, and I live on the Delta now, as do my parents, a sister, and a nephew.

Non-environmental economics post

© 2011 Joshua Stark

But, it's a quick one.

I just wanted to re-post this quotation from Professor Brad DeLong's blog:

"A depressed economy with a slack labor market, low wages, and very low interest rates can be consistent with high asset values and ample corporate profits. But policies that produce such an outcome aren't policies for economic recovery. They are policies for class war. They are not in the public interest..."

California Republicans Have a Strange Way of Shrinking Government

© 2011 Joshua Stark

The Sacramento Bee blog Capitol Alert has a post on a letter from four Republicans in talks with California's Governor over a budget deal.

The Republicans explain the types of reform that must happen in order for them to vote to allow Californians the chance to vote to keep taxes at their current levels.

I found page 3 of the letter - on regulatory reform - fascinating.  In particular, I am blown away that the way Republicans hope to shrink government and reign in spending is by creating a brand-new Office of Economic and Regulatory Analysis.

I don't get it.