Cherry Grove Community Organization Meets

One of the joys of being on Fire Island in the Spring is the flora. For a few short weeks, the dunes look like they're snow covered but it's not snow, it's Beach Plum blossoms. The blossoms start out pure white, then the blossoms turn pinkish as they mature. In a few weeks the blossoms are gone.

Earlier today I went to the first joint meeting of the season of the Cherry Grove Community Association and the Property Owner's Association. Due to lack of money there will be no "Community Welcome Back" party. There was a lot of talk about the Doctor's Fund, which is promoting their own cookbook to raise money. The Doctor's Fund endeavors to provide the community with doctors during the summer, although if you have anything other than a minor issue you really have to seek medical help on Long Island. There was also lots of talk about the boardwalks, and a lecture from a member of the Cherry Grove volunteer fire department on safety. The Property Owner's Association president talked a lot about his efforts to get politicians to help with various problems that confront the community.

Cherry Grove is a small vacation community. Most of us live here only half of the year and few of us vote here, so we're pretty much powerless and largely at the mercy of the Town of Brookhaven on Long Island, which has political and fiscal control over us. So, we spend a lot of time and effort out here trying to raise money to help ourselves out. It's just the way it is out here in this summertime community.

Jim

More Bad News On Global Warming

7:00 AM: Here's a closeup of the Beach Plum blossom. Literally millions of these flowers cover the dunes here on Fire Island this time of the year. It is a beautiful sight to see.

In the news this morning is a report on global warming that focuses on the amount of carbon dioxide (a "greenhouse gas" produced by human activity) that has been absorbed by the Southern seas. Apparently, the seas, which contain natural carbon, also help by absorbing CO2, are already saturated with the substance, something that scientists did not think would happen for decades. This is bad news for the planet, since the seas act as a CO2 "sink," mitigating the effects of man made CO2. The Southern sea is the biggest CO2 sink on the planet and it's already full of CO2. Scientists are saying that this will accelerate the pace of global warming. World population increases, and the peak period of oil production, which is expected to take place over about the next decade, will further stress the world's ecology. It's not a pretty picture, with forecasts for water and food shortages, the extinction of thousands of plant and animal species, human disease and death. Still, the Bush administration, which has been notably anti-science, is in denial about global warming.

Bush's buddy Tony Blair, on his last trip to the U.S. as UK PM, tried to get Bush to give in on related issues, but Bush refused.

Americablog is quoting the British press on Blair's final failure:

The Independent: NO to CO2 emissions targets. NO to a successor to Kyoto. NO to
a carbon trading market. As Blair leaves Washington, US hardens stance on
climate change

Quotable: Andrew Sullivan on Sean Hannity: "a semi-literate, fascist hack"

Jim

Immigration Compromise

8:00 AM: On Fire Island we have a shrub called the Beach Plum covering the dunes. In mid Spring the Beach Plum produces a beautiful white flower. For a week or so it looks like winter has returned because the dunes look like they have a covering of light snow. Eventually, the flowers turn pink before withering. In the late summer the Beach Plum produces fruit that is edible. Some people collect the fruit and make jam. I'd like to try that sometime.

The immigration compromise legislation hammered out by a bipartisan group of senators and the White House seems to have merit. Anything that the rabid right immediately attacks must have some good points. It will be interesting to see how the senate debate unf0lds on this one. The right wing nut cases are opposed to anything humane, such as a plan to allow undocumented aliens to stay and work toward citizenship, which they consider "amnesty." They conveniently forget that undocumented workers do the work that few others would do for wages that few others would accept. The businesses that have hired these workers for so many years and profited from their cheap labor will suffer no penalty, so why should the workers themselves pay a heavy penalty?

Jim