For those who have watched "An Inconvenient Truth"


Gore Delivers Remarks on Energy and the Climate

CQ Transcripts
Thursday, July 17, 2008; 4:45 PM



FORMER VICE PRESIDENT ALBERT GORE JR.: Thank you. Thank you very much, ladies and gentlemen.




And Congressman Sherry Boehlert, thank you for your leadership of the Science and Technology Committee and for your work on the Alliance for Climate Protection.




And thank you, Cathy Zoi, the CEO of the Alliance for Climate Protection.

I'm so happy that all of you are here. I'm especially happy that my wife, Tipper, is here and my daughter, Karenna, is here. Thank you.
(APPLAUSE)
And there are several members of Congress, even though the committees are working and the Congress is meeting, but I want to acknowledge Senator Bernie Sanders, who is here, Congressman Jim Cooper, Congressman Jay Inslee, former Senator Jim Sasser, and Mary Sasser.

I want to say a special word of thanks to my friend, will.i.am, who came all the way from Los Angeles to be here. Thank you so much.
(APPLAUSE)
And, also, I want to make special mention of the presence of the Libertarian Party's presidential candidate, Bob Barr. We've had a number of conversations.

I'm grateful for your presence, Congressman Barr.
(APPLAUSE)
And thank you very much -- thank you very much, Bob. We've had a number of very, very interesting conversations. I appreciate your open mind and your serious approach to this challenge our country is facing.

I have -- have had many conversations, of course, with Senator Obama and with Senator McCain. And one of my objectives in approaching this climate crisis is to try to lift this as much as possible out of the partisan framework that sometimes is a serious impediment to solving serious problems in our country.

Incidentally, I did also want to make special mention of the fact that some of our mutual friends are in mourning today. And I want to extend my best wishes to the family of Tony Snow, whose memorial service just ended a short time ago. And we are keeping his family in our thoughts and prayers.

Ladies and gentlemen, there are times in the history of our nation when our very way of life depends upon dispelling illusions and awakening to the challenge of a present danger.

In such moments, we are called upon to move quickly and boldly and shake off complacency, throw aside old habits and rise, clear-eyed and alert, to the necessity of making big changes. Those who, for whatever reason, refuse to do their part in such times must either be persuaded to join the effort or asked to step aside. This is such a moment. The survival of the United States of America as we know it is at risk. And even more, if more should be required, the future of human civilization is at stake.

I do not remember a time in our country when so many things seemed to be going so wrong simultaneously.
(LAUGHTER)
Our economy is in terrible shape and getting worse.
(APPLAUSE)
People are hurting. Gasoline prices are increasing dramatically, and so are electricity rates. Jobs are being outsourced. Home mortgages are in trouble. Banks, automobile companies, other institutions we depend upon are under growing pressure.

Distinguished senior business leaders are telling us that this is just the beginning, unless we find the courage to make some major changes quickly.

The climate crisis, in particular, is getting a lot worse, much more quickly than predicted. Scientists with access to data from Navy submarines traversing underneath the north polar ice cap have warned that there is a 75 percent chance that, within only five years, the entire north polar ice cap will completely disappear during the summer months.

This will further increase the melting pressure on Greenland. According to experts, one of the largest glaciers there, the Jakobshavn Glacier, is moving at a faster rate than ever before, losing 20 million tons of ice every day. That's equivalent to the amount of water used in a year's time by the residents of our largest city, New York City.

Two major studies from military intelligence experts have warned our leaders about the dangerous national security implications of the climate crisis, including the possibility of hundreds of millions of climate refugees destabilizing nations around the world.

Just two days ago, 27 senior statesmen and retired military leaders warned of the national security threat from what they called an "energy tsunami" that would be triggered by a loss of our access to foreign oil. Meanwhile, the war in Iraq continues, and now the war in Afghanistan appears to be getting worse.

And, by the way, our weather sure is getting strange, isn't it? There seem to be more tornadoes than in living memory, longer droughts, bigger downpours, and record floods. Today, unprecedented fires are burning in California and elsewhere in the American west.

Higher temperatures lead to drier vegetation that makes kindling for mega-fires of the kind that have been raging in Canada, Greece, Russia, China, South America, Australia, and Africa. Scientists in the Department of Geophysics and Planetary Science at Tel Aviv University tell us that for every one degree increase in temperature, lightning strikes will go up another 10 percent. And it is lightning, after all, that is principally responsible for igniting the conflagration in California today.

Like a lot of people, it seems to me that all these problems are bigger than any of the solutions that have thus far been proposed for them, and that's been worrying me.

I'm convinced that one reason we have seemed to be paralyzed in the face of these crises is the tendency to offer old solutions to each crisis separately without taking the others into account. And these outdated proposals have not only been ineffective; they almost always make the other crises worse.

Yet when we look at all three of these seemingly intractable challenges at the same time, we can see the common thread running through them, deeply ironic in its simplicity: Our dangerous over- reliance on carbon-based fuels is at the core of all three of these challenges, the economic, environmental and national security crises.

We're borrowing money from China to buy oil from the Persian Gulf to burn it in ways that destroy the planet. Every bit of that has to change.
(APPLAUSE)

But if -- if we grab hold of that common thread and pull it hard, all of these complex problems begin to unravel and we find that we're holding the answer to all of them right in our hand.

The answer is to end our reliance on carbon-based fuels.

(APPLAUSE)

In my search for genuinely effective answers to the climate crisis, I've held a long series of so-called "solutions summits" with engineers, scientists and CEOs.

And in those discussions, one thing has become abundantly clear: When you connect the dots, it turns out that the real solutions to the climate crisis are the very same measures that are needed to renew our economy and escape the trap of ever-rising energy prices. Moreover, they are also the very same solutions that we need to guarantee our national security without having to go to war in the Persian Gulf.

What if we could use fuels that aren't expensive, don't cause pollution, and are abundantly available right here at home?


We have such fuels. Scientists have confirmed that enough solar energy falls on the surface of the Earth every 40 minutes to meet 100 percent of the entire world's energy needs for a full year. Tapping just a small portion of this solar energy could provide all of the electricity America uses. And enough wind power blows through the Midwest corridor every day to also meet 100 percent of U.S. electricity demand. Geothermal energy, similarly, is capable of providing enormous supplies of electricity for America.

The quickest, cheapest, most efficient, and best way to start using all of this renewable energy is in the production of electricity. In fact, we can start right now using solar power, wind power, and geothermal power to make electricity for our homes and businesses.

But to make this exciting potential a reality and truly solve our nation's problems, we need a new start.

That is why I'm proposing today a strategic initiative designed to free us from the crises that are holding us down and to regain control of our own destiny. It's not the only thing we need to do, but this strategic challenge is the lynchpin of a bold, new strategy needed to re-power America.

So today I challenge our nation to commit to producing 100 percent of our electricity from renewable energy and truly clean carbon-free sources within 10 years.
(APPLAUSE)

This goal -- this goal is achievable, affordable and transformative. It represents a challenge to all Americans in every walk of life, to our political leaders, entrepreneurs, innovators, engineers, and to every citizen.

A few short years ago, it would not have been possible to issue such a challenge. But here's what's changed: The sharp cost reductions now beginning to take place in solar, wind and geothermal power, coupled with the recent dramatic price increases for oil and coal, have radically changed the economics of energy.

When I first went to the Congress 32 years ago, I listened to experts testify that, if oil ever got to $35 a barrel, then renewable sources of energy would become competitive.

Well, today, the price of oil is over $135 a barrel. And sure enough, billions of dollars of new investment are flowing into the development of concentrated solar thermal, photovoltaics, windmills, geothermal plants, and a variety of ingenious new ways to improve our efficiency and conserve presently wasted energy.

And as the demand for renewable energy grows, the costs will continue to fall. Let me give you one revealing example: The price of the specialized silicon used to make solar cells was recently as high as $300 per kilogram, but the newest contracts have prices as low as $50 a kilogram.

You remember the same thing happened with computer chips, also made out of silicon. The price paid for the same performance came down by 50 percent every 18 months year after year, and that's been happening for 40 years in a row.

To those who argue that we do not yet have the technology to accomplish these kinds of results with renewable energy, I ask them to come with me to meet the entrepreneurs who will drive this revolution. I've seen what they're doing, and I have no doubt that we can meet this challenge.

To those who say the costs are still too high, I ask them to consider whether the costs of oil and coal will ever stop increasing if we keep relying on quickly depleting energy sources to feed a rapidly growing demand all around the world. When demand for oil and coal increases, their price goes up. When demand for solar cells increases, the price often comes down. That's the difference.
(APPLAUSE)

One source of fuel is expensive and going up, and the other source of fuel is free forever. When we send money to foreign countries to buy nearly 70 percent of the oil we use every day, they build new skyscrapers and we lose jobs. When we spend that money building solar arrays and windmills here, we build competitive industries and gain jobs here at home.
(APPLAUSE)

Of course, there are those who will tell us that this can't be done. Some of the voices we hear are from the defenders of the status quo, the ones with a vested interest in perpetuating the current system, no matter how high a price the rest of us will have to pay.

But even those who reap the profits of the carbon age have to recognize the inevitability of its demise. As one OPEC oil minister observed, "The Stone Age didn't end because of a shortage of stones."
(LAUGHTER)

To those who say 10 years is not enough time, I respectfully ask them to consider seriously what the world's scientists are telling us about the risks we face if we don't act in less than 10 years.

Those leading experts predict that we have less than 10 years to make dramatic changes in our global warming pollution, lest we lose our ability to ever recover from this environmental crisis. When the use of oil and coal goes up, pollution goes up, as it's doing right now. But when the use of solar, wind and geothermal increases, pollution comes down.

To those who say the challenge is not politically viable, I suggest they go before the American people and try to defend the status quo, and then bear witness to the people's appetite for dramatic change. The time is now.
(APPLAUSE)

I for one do not believe our country can withstand 10 more years of the status quo. Our families can't stand 10 more years of gasoline price increases. Our workers can't stand 10 more years of job losses and outsourcing of factories. Our economy can't stand 10 more years of sending $2 billion every 24 hours to foreign countries for oil.

And our soldiers and their families cannot take another 10 years of repeated troop deployments to dangerous regions that just happen to have large oil supplies.
(APPLAUSE)

What could...
(APPLAUSE)
What could we do instead during these next 10 years? What should we do during the next 10 years?

Some of our greatest accomplishments as a nation have resulted from commitments to reach a goal that fell well beyond the next election: the Marshall Plan, Social Security, the interstate highway system.

A political promise to do something 40 years from now is universally ignored because everyone knows it's totally meaningless. Ten years is about the maximum time that we as a nation can hold a steady aim and hit our target.

When President John F. Kennedy challenged our nation to land a man on the moon and bring him back safely in 10 years, many people doubted we could accomplish that goal. But eight years and two months later, Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin walked on the surface of the moon and planted the American flag.
(APPLAUSE)

To be sure, reaching the goal of 100 percent renewable and truly clean electricity within 10 years will require us to overcome many obstacles. At present, for example, we do not have a unified national grid that is sufficiently advanced to link the areas where the sun shines and the wind blows to the cities in the east and the west that need the electricity.

Our national electric grid is critical infrastructure, as vital to the health and security of our economy as our highways and telecommunication networks.

Today, our grids are antiquated, fragile and vulnerable to cascading failure. Power outages and defects in the current grid system cost U.S. businesses more than $120 billion dollars a year. It has to be upgraded anyway.

We could further increase the value and efficiency of a unified national grid by helping our struggling auto companies switch to the manufacture of plug-in electric cars and save those auto jobs and renew our auto companies.
(APPLAUSE)

An electric vehicle fleet would sharply reduce the cost of driving a car, reduce pollution, and increase the flexibility of our electricity grid.

At the same time, of course, we need to greatly improve our commitment to efficiency and conservation. That's the best investment we can make. We can make better use of our broadband networks to save energy.

America's transition to renewable energy sources must also include adequate provisions to assist those Americans who would unfairly face hardship. For example, we must recognize those who have toiled in dangerous conditions to bring us our present energy supply. We should guarantee good jobs in the fresh air and sunshine for any coal miner displaced by impacts on the coal industry, every single one of them.
(APPLAUSE)

Now, of course, we could and should speed up this transition by insisting that the price of carbon-based energy include the costs of the environmental damage that it causes. I have long supported...
(APPLAUSE)

... a sharp reduction in payroll taxes with the difference made up in CO-2 taxes. We should tax what we burn, not what we earn.
(APPLAUSE)

That's the single most important change that we can make.

In order to foster international cooperation, it is also essential that the United States rejoin the global community and lead efforts to secure an international treaty at Copenhagen in December of next year that includes a cap on CO-2 emissions and a global partnership that recognizes the necessity of addressing the threats of extreme poverty and disease as part of the world's agenda for solving the climate crisis.

Of course, the greatest obstacle to meeting the challenge of 100 percent renewable electricity in 10 years may be the deep dysfunction of our politics and our self-governing system as it exists today.
(APPLAUSE)

In recent years, our politics has tended toward incremental proposals made up of small policies designed to avoid offending special interests, alternating with occasional baby steps in the right direction. Our democracy has become sclerotic at a time when these crises require boldness.

It is only a truly dysfunctional system that would buy into the perverse logic that the short-term answer to high gasoline prices is drilling for more oil 10 years from now in areas that should be protected. (APPLAUSE)

Am I -- am I the only one who finds it strange that our government so often adopts a so-called solution that has absolutely nothing to do with the problem it's supposed to address?
(LAUGHTER)

When people rightly complain about higher gasoline prices that are hurting our country, we propose to give more money to the oil companies and pretend that they're going to bring gasoline prices down? It will do nothing of the sort, and everyone knows it.

If we keep going back to the same policies that have never, ever worked in the past and have served only to produce the highest gasoline prices in history, alongside the greatest oil company profits in history, nobody should be surprised if we get the same result over and over again.
(APPLAUSE)

The Congress may be poised to move in that direction anyway, because some of them are being stampeded by lobbyists for special interests that know how to make the system work for them instead of the American people.

If you want to know the truth about gasoline prices, here it is: The exploding demand for oil, especially in places like China, is completely overwhelming the rate of new discoveries by so much that oil prices are almost certain to continue upward over time, no matter what the oil companies promise. And politicians cannot bring gasoline prices down in the short term by giving more money to the oil companies.

However, there is one extremely effective way to bring the costs of driving a car way down within a few short years. The way to bring gasoline prices down is to end our dependence on oil and use the renewable sources that can give us the equivalent of $1-per-gallon gasoline. And we need to get busy creating that system now.

(APPLAUSE)

Many Americans have begun to wonder whether or not we've simply lost our appetite for bold policy solutions. And folks who claim to know how our system works these days have told us we might as well forget about our political system doing anything bold, especially if it is contrary to the wishes of special interests.

And I've got to admit that sure seems to be the way things have been going.

But I've begun to hear different voices in this country from the people who are not only tired of baby steps and special interest politics, but are hungry for a new, different, and bold approach to genuinely solve our problems. We're on the eve of a presidential election. We're in the midst of an international climate treaty process that will conclude its work before the end of the first year of the new president's term.

It's a great error to say the United States must wait for others to join us in this matter. In fact, we must move first, because that's the key to getting others to follow. And moving first is in our own national interest.
(APPLAUSE)

So I ask you to join with me to call on every candidate, at every level, to accept this challenge: for America to be running on 100 percent zero-carbon electricity in 10 years. It's time for us to move beyond empty rhetoric. We need to act now. And we need to act boldly.
(APPLAUSE)

This is a generational moment, a moment when we decide our own path and our collective fate. I'm asking you, each of you, to join me and build this future.

Please join the We campaign at wecansolveit.org. We need you. And we need you now. One source of fuel is expensive and going up, and the other source of fuel is free forever. When we send money to foreign countries to buy nearly 70 percent of the oil we use every day, they build new skyscrapers and we lose jobs. When we spend that money building solar arrays and windmills here, we build competitive industries and gain jobs here at home.
(APPLAUSE)

On July 16, 1969, the United States of America was finally ready to meet President Kennedy's challenge of landing Americans on the moon. I will never forget standing beside my father a few miles from the launch site, waiting for the giant Saturn V rocket to lift Apollo 11 into the sky.

I was a young man, 21 years old, who had graduated from college a month before and was enlisting in the U.S. Army three weeks later. I will never forget the inspiration of those minutes. The power and the vibration of the giant rocket's engines shook my entire body.

As I watched the rocket rise, slowly at first and then with great speed, the sound was deafening. We craned our necks to follow its path until we were looking straight up into the air.

And then, four days later, along with hundreds of millions of others, I watched as Neil Armstrong took one small step to the surface of the moon and changed the history of the human race.

We must now lift our nation to reach another goal that will change history. Our entire civilization depends upon us now embarking on a new journey of exploration and discovery. Our success depends on our willingness as a people to undertake this journey and to complete it within 10 years. Once again, we have an opportunity to take a giant leap for humankind.

Thank you for coming. (APPLAUSE)
END


Link

50 Years Ago We had Technology That Could deliver 65 Miles Per gallon!!! It was BLOCKED!!! Political? economy Oriented? the Technology has been There For a Very Long Time!!!! COMPLEXITY!!!! What Would Happen To The $$$$$ Within, If Suddenly a Car That Got 100 Miles Per Gallon was introduced Suddenly???? . Imagine The Repercussions Within The Industry's That Many company's rely on? Checks and Balances in The world!!! Maintaining Stability and Control! .

I will keep all my friends in Texas and Mexico in my prayers. Hopefully, this storm will not cause too much damage.


http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/25783373

Hurricane warnings as Texas braces for Dolly

Up to 20 inches of rain expected in coastal areas as storm gains strength



Michael Zamora / Corpus Christi Caller-Times via AP
Michael Gorsline boards up his home in Corpus Christi, Texas, on Monday. He said he wanted to be prepared in case Tropical Storm Dolly strengthened and made landfall in the Coastal Bend area.

updated 1 hour, 15 minutes ago
McALLEN, Texas - Texas mobilized National Guard troops and residents along the Gulf Coast near the Mexican border were buying plywood, flashlights and other supplies as Tropical Storm Dolly — expected by forecasters to strengthen into a hurricane this week — headed their way.

Hurricane warnings were issued late Monday for parts of the Texas and Mexico coasts, meaning hurricane conditions were expected in those areas by the end of Tuesday.

Dolly was expected to make landfall later this week and bring with it high winds and 10 to 20 inches of rain in coastal areas. Emergency officials feared major flooding problems and urged coastal residents to prepare. Gov. Rick Perry activated 1,200 National Guard troops and other emergency crews and Shell Oil said it was evacuating workers from oil rigs in the western Gulf Of Mexico.

Even as far up the coast as the Houston area, Harris County officials told residents to be ready in case the storm changes course and heads their way.

The National Hurricane Center in Miami issued a hurricane warning from Brownsville north to Port O'Connor. Meanwhile, a tropical storm warning was issued from Port O'Connor to the San Luis Pass, a strait south of Galveston.

Landfall expected late Tuesday
Mexico also announced a hurricane warning from Rio San Fernando north to the U.S. border. A tropical storm warning and a hurricane watch were also in effect from La Pesca to Rio San Fernando.

Forecasters said Dolly was expected to make landfall late Tuesday or early Wednesday as a Category 1 hurricane, which has with sustained winds of 74 mph to 95 mph.

Texas officials said they wouldn't order evacuations along the coast unless Dolly strengthens to a Category 3, with sustained winds of at least 111 mph.

At 5 a.m. EDT Tuesday, the center of Tropical Storm Dolly was located about 295 miles southeast of Brownsville. It was moving west at about 15 mph and had maximum sustained winds near 60 mph. Tropical storm-force winds extended outward up to 160 miles.

Dolly's winds were expected to strengthen Tuesday to hurricane force, which would mean at least 74 mph.

There are about 2 million people in the Rio Grande Valley, which includes popular summer beach resort South Padre Island. Officials readied to evacuate residents in flood-prone areas and urged RV owners on South Padre to head for higher ground.

"That amount of rain will present a big flooding problem for us," said Cameron County Emergency Management Coordinator Johnny Cavazos.

Mindful of the disastrous evacuation before Hurricane Rita hit the Texas Gulf Coast in 2005 — when far more people died from heat-related injuries and auto accidents fleeing the storm than from the severe weather — Gov. Perry also ordered 250 buses to be staged in San Antonio. He also ordered fuel teams to be ready to keep gas stations supplied and to help stranded motorists.

Batteries and flashlights
In the Houston area on Monday, Harris County Judge Ed Emmett asked residents of the state's most populous county to keep their gas tanks full, stock up on supplies and make sure they have plans ready to either evacuate or ride out a storm.

At a Home Depot in Brownsville near the border between the two countries, residents bought plywood, generators, batteries and flashlights, said store operations manager John Paul Martinez. He said a lot of people were just learning of Dolly, which became a tropical storm Sunday.

The federal government was trying to decide whether they could begin construction on a new border fence, which was to be combined with levee improvements along the Rio Grande in Hidalgo County.

While project supervisors met with emergency officials about the storm, large cranes unloaded steel beams and other supplies at a staging area near the levee Monday. Concrete walls will be incorporated into the river side of the levees to keep floodwaters, illegal immigrants and smugglers out.

The county is upgrading other levees and informed contractors Monday they should activate plans to prevent flooding, said Godfrey Garza, head of Hidalgo County Drainage District 1.

Meanwhile, Tropical Storm Cristobal was moving toward the northeast at about 21 mph, away from the U.S. Cristobal was located about 485 miles northeast of Cape Hatteras, N.C., with maximum sustained winds near 60 mph. Forecasters said the storm, which dumped rain on the coast of the Carolinas, was no longer an immediate threat to the U.S.

In the Pacific, Tropical Storm Genevieve strengthened slightly off Mexico's coast, but forecasters said the storm was not expected to threaten land. Tropical Storm Fausto, which had been a hurricane, also was weakening and moving out to sea.

Yeah I agree with you Proud, hopefully, there hasn't been much damage.

Some good news in Darfur:


Prosecutor looks at 3rd war crimes case in Darfur

By JOHN HEILPRIN
The Associated Press

UNITED NATIONS -- With an arrest warrant pending against Sudan's president, the International Criminal Court's chief prosecutor said Thursday he was focusing on another war crime case in Darfur involving two suspected rebel commanders allegedly directing attacks against peacekeepers.

Luis Moreno-Ocampo's comments came days after announcing he was seeking a warrant to arrest the Sudanese president, Omar al-Bashir, on charges of genocide, war crimes and crimes against humanity.

On Thursday, he discussed new details about an investigation into violence against peacekeepers in Sudan's remote Darfur region.

One case of key interest is an attack against the Haskanita military base late last year that left 10 African Union soldiers dead and 1 missing.

"We have information about the names of two commanders who were allegedly responsible for this," he disclosed. "The rebels cannot commit crimes. They have to control their people."

The prosecutor spoke at U.N. headquarters while attending ceremonies marking the court's 10-year anniversary.

Sudan's U.N. Ambassador Abdalmahmood Abdalhaleem Mohamed said Thursday the U.N. Security Council should stop the prosecutor's work on Darfur for a year or the repercussions will open "a gate of fire" on the nation's peace efforts.

The prosecutor's first case resulted in the indictments last year of Sudan's acting humanitarian minister Ahmed Muhammed Harun, who was formerly in charge of security in Darfur, for crimes against humanity, and of Ali Kushayb, known as a "colonel of colonels" among the Arab militia, known as janjaweed.

Sudan refuses to hand over its citizens to the Dutch-based tribunal.

Then on Monday, Moreno-Ocampo announced his second, even bigger case: He is seeking a warrant to arrest al-Bashir on charges of genocide, war crimes and crimes against humanity.

Asked by reporters whether the announcement had been timed to help publicize the court's anniversary three days later, Moreno-Ocampo said it did not and was solely based on when the evidence was ready and the court's schedule.

"This was my last week to do it, so I did it when I had my evidence ready," said Moreno-Ocampo, noting that the court was about to take a summer recess.

Moreno-Ocampo suggested his investigators also were looking at attacks this month on the United Nations-African Union peacekeeping force in Darfur.

"I am excluding no one. I will follow my evidence," he said. "Anytime they commit any attack against peacekeepers, it's under my jurisdiction, and I will mitigate that."

On Wednesday, another peacekeeper was shot and killed. His death came exactly one week after an audacious attack on a peacekeeping contingent of mostly Rwandan soldiers that left seven U.N.-A.U. peacekeepers dead.

Fighting erupted in Darfur in 2003 when ethnic African rebels took up arms against the Arab-dominated central government, accusing it of discrimination.

This news reminds me of Longfellow - Though the mills of God grind slowly, yet they grind exceeding small;
Though with patience he stands waiting, with exactness grinds he all.

quote:

Originally posted by Mrs. B.:
Yeah I agree with you Proud, hopefully, there hasn't been much damage.

Maybe one of our friends in Texas will give an update. I know she hit as a Category 2 storm, but not really sure how much damage there was. Hopefully, not too much and she will dissipate quickly.

Judge: Girl's name, Talula Does The Hula, won't do

WELLINGTON, New Zealand - A family court judge in New Zealand has had enough with parents giving their children bizarre names here, and did something about it.

"Just ask Talula Does The Hula From Hawaii. He had her renamed.

"Judge Rob Murfitt made the 9-year-old girl a ward of the court so that her name could be changed, he said in a ruling made public Thursday. The girl was involved in a custody battle, he said.

"The new name was not made public to protect the girl's privacy.

"The court is profoundly concerned about the very poor judgment which this child's parents have shown in choosing this name," he wrote. "It makes a fool of the child and sets her up with a social disability and handicap, unnecessarily."

"The girl had been so embarrassed at the name that she had never told her closest friends what it was. She told people to call her "K" instead, the girl's lawyer, Colleen MacLeod, told the court.

"In his ruling, Murfitt cited a list of the unfortunate names.

"Registration officials blocked some names, including Fish and Chips, Yeah Detroit, Keenan Got Lucy and *** Fruit, he said. But others were allowed, including Number 16 Bus Shelter "and tragically, Violence," he said.

"New Zealand law does not allow names that would cause offense to a reasonable person, among other conditions, said Brian Clarke, the registrar general of Births, Deaths and Marriages.

Clarke said officials usually talked to parents who proposed unusual names to convince them about the potential for embarrassment."

Source

Sell, the judge did good and the parents need counseling. For anyone who is interested, here are the banned names:
yeah Detroit;
Stallion;
Twisty Poi; Keenan Got Lucy; *** Fruit;
Fat Boy;
Cinderella Beauty Blossom;
Fish and Chips (twins)

Still accepted:
Violence;
Number 16 Bus Shelter;
Midnight Chardonnay;
Benson and Hedges (twins)p
Talula Does The Hula From Hawaii

Should we ask what Oraha's and JC's are named? LOL...

Number 16 Bus Shelter is banned? Too bad, I guess I'll take that off the list. How about 'Don't be jacka$$, vote Republican' LMAO. This goes to show their should be an IQ test before breeding is allowed.

My last name is Schmitt, so we're going for Pisa and Taeka.

My boys have perfectly normal names. Well, after the family court made me change 'em that is. LOL.

BTW, some of those names on that list were never actually registered, including young Talula's.

quote:

Originally posted by Aroha:
My boys have perfectly normal names. Well, after the family court made me change 'em that is. LOL.

BTW, some of those names on that list were never actually registered, including young Talula's.

LOL.

Aug. 1st Solar Eclipse


Joe Rao
SPACE.com Skywatching Columnist

Friday, August 1 is a red-letter day for eclipse enthusiasts. On that date, the sun will be partially eclipsed over an immense area that includes western and central Asia, parts of northern and central Europe, all of Greenland and even a small slice of northeastern North America.

A total solar eclipse — the first in nearly two and a half years — will be visible along a narrow track that will start over the Northwest Passage of Canada, gives a glancing blow to northern Greenland, then shifts southeast through Siberia and western Mongolia and before ending near the famed Silk Route of China.

The path of totality for this upcoming eclipse is never more than 157 miles (252 km) wide.

Where it's visible

The total eclipse begins at sunrise over Northern Canada's Queen Maud Gulf, where the moon's umbra will first touch down on the Earth, resulting in Canada's hosting its first total solar eclipse since February 26, 1979.

As the sun comes into view over the north-northeast horizon its disk will become completely blocked by the moon. This is in the area of the famous Northwest Passage, a sea route connecting the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans through the Arctic archipelago of Canada. The various islands of the archipelago are separated from one another and the Canadian mainland by a series of Arctic waterways collectively known as the Northwestern Passages. Politically, this region belongs to Nunavut, the largest and newest of the territories of Canada; it was separated officially from the vast Northwest Territories on April 1, 1999.

Although the umbral shadow narrowly misses the towns of Cambridge Bay on Victoria Island, and Resolute on Cornwallis Island, its northern edge just clips the northernmost permanently inhabited place in the world: Canada's remote outpost of Alert, which lies just 508 miles (817 km) from the North Pole and has a population of just 5. Here, totality will last 43 seconds.

Crossing the open Arctic, the southern half of the totality path slides across the many fjords of northermost Greenland, coming to within 450 miles (720 km) of the North Pole at 9:38 UT over the Arctic Ocean before turning southeast. Totality sweeps over the Norwegian island group of Svalbard, while the northern edge of the umbra's path just grazes Russia's Franz Josef Land island group, then cuts across the crescent-shaped island of Novaya Zemlya on its way to central Asia. The umbra first touches the Russian coast on the Yamal Peninsula. Not far inland, greatest eclipse, producing 2 minutes 27 seconds of totality, is attained near the town of Nadym (pop. ~46,000), just inland from the boot-shaped Gulf of Obskaja.

Spending part of your summer in Siberia may sound a bit more appealing upon hearing that the central path passes almost directly over the city of Novosibirsk, Russia's third most populous city (pop. ~1.4 million) where totality begins at 10:44 UT and will last 2 minutes 18 seconds. The center of the path will then follow the Mongolia-China border for several hundred kilometers, with Olgij, Mongolia getting 1 min 36s of totality. Totality finally whisks into north-central China, crossing the west end of the Great Wall before leaving the Earth at a point northeast of the major city of Xi'an (pop. 3.9 million).

The northern half of Maine as well as the Canadian Maritime Provinces will experience a partial eclipse at sunrise.

Eclipse expedition

A most unusual attempt to rendezvous with the moon's shadow will be made by an Airbus A330-200 twin-engine long-range aircraft. Following a flight plan optimized specifically for the purpose of viewing this eclipse, all of the many unusual requirements of this flight have been evaluated and satisfied with arrangements by the air charter company Deutsche Polarflug (AirEvents) which has previously operated successful over-flights of the North Pole with this same aircraft.

Glenn Schneider, from the University of Arizona's Steward Observatory and a veteran of 26 total eclipses, has worked out the detailed formulation of the flight plan. He is targeting a point from the high polar north, at approximately +83-degrees latitude and about 440 nautical miles from the North Pole at an altitude of 37,000 feet above the Arctic Ocean.

This will be a unique event in the annals of solar eclipse-chasing since there are no records of any total solar eclipse observations as far north as this. While total solar eclipses in the polar regions are not rare, accessibility is very difficult. Until this juncture in time (and technology) very high-latitude (north or south) total solar eclipses have been elusive. The total solar eclipse of 23 November 2003 was the first in history to have been observed from the Antarctic.

Once again it needs repeating: to look at the sun without proper eye protection is dangerous. Even if you are in the path of the total eclipse you will need to protect your eyes during the partial phases.

* The Science Behind the Eclipse
* Galleries: Solar Eclipse in 2005 and 2006
* Local Viewing Circumstances

Joe Rao serves as an instructor and guest lecturer at New York's Hayden Planetarium. He writes about astronomy for The New York Times and other publications, and he is also an on-camera meteorologist for News 12 Westchester, New York.

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