California Drought Update for December 22, 2016

California Drought Update for December 22, 2016

http://www.californiadroughtupdate.org/pdf/20161222-California-Drought-Update.pdf

In this state, this section of the United States, of course, the key is water.  And unless we organize

every drop to be of service to mankind, this state is going to stand still…”

                                                         President John F. Kennedy, Salt Lake City, Utah, September 27, 1963

The state and the nation is at a potential turning point of history. Our field of focus in these reports, is, of course, the drought and the water management system, but whether it is the weather or the economic policy, or the dominating culture, we shall not fool ourselves in thinking that we can not address these more universal topics.

Thus, I included in last week’s “feature” the first point of Lyndon LaRouche’s “Four Cardinal Principles” required to reverse the 40-plus years of economic and cultural degeneration. This series will be continued in next week’s report.

Now, with a new President to take office in one month, the moment for a fundamental change is upon us.

As reported below, at least one section of California’s population (farmers) are announcing that they have had enough. The hearings in Merced, Modesto and Stockton on the state’s policy to increase the flow of the San Joaquin River system to the ocean, cutting that allocated for farms, saw some real passion. You will enjoy the quotes I have included in this section of the report.

While Governor Brown cries out for resistance to the new President, and that he will go it alone on “combating climate change, even launching his own satellite if he deems it necessary, such behavior is indicative of something much more sinister under way. See the section on Brown below for details.

I guess I should mention in this introduction that we have had a lot of rain, up north anyway, but still more than 40 percent of the state remains in the top two categories of drought. The U.S. Drought Monitor tells the story.

Included in this week’s report are the topics of the new Water Bill passed and signed by the President and the increasingly imperiled Water Fix of tunnels through the Delta.

But, please remember, nothing human beings do that is really great is driven forward by being practical:

But what is nobler than the unpractical spirit? The soul is sustained by the regard for that which transcends all immediate purposes. The sense of the transcendent is the heart of culture, the very essence of humanity. A civilization that is devoted exclusively to the utilitarian is at bottom not different from barbarism. The world is sustained by unworldliness.”

–Abraham Heschel, from his book, “The Earth Is the Lord’s” (1950)

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