Dangerous weather

By Dave Winer on 1/6/07; 12:47:46 PM.

This morning its 37 degrees in sunny Berkeley. Chilly, but normal for this time of year. In NYC, where it's supposed to be cold and snowy all day every day this time of year, the forecast high is 71. It hasn't snowed in NY yet this winter. On the TV they're grinning and laughing, the idiots. This weather is not cute, it's political, and dangerous. 

In the Spike Lee movie on Katrina, they interviewed native New Orleaneans, who asked, half accusing, half in misery: "Why didn't someone tell us this could happen?" Someone did. Over and over. It was on 60 Minutes, for crying out loud. No one kept it hidden, everyone who cared who lived in New Orleans knew that someday a storm would arrive that the levees couldn't handle. It was also commonly known that the levees either broke or were blown in 1927.  

Global warming? Same thing. Obviously what's happening now is not a cute little fluke, it's part of a major world-level change. To think life will go on as before in this new world would be as naive as believing in the peace dividend after the Soviet Union fell apart (yeah, some people did). An unstable world is a dangerous world. Katrina itself was a warning for all of us.