New year floods in Missouri, Illinois, and Congress still has no clue. Happy new year, Love and light and insight to all.

Elected and appointed officials are not likely to come up with a coherent or common sense long range plan to deal with the worsening issues of water on this continent. Some for lack of a real life perspective of the problem. Some influenced by large amounts of money from those that stand to profit from water, and the continuation of the political insanity in America.
 Any way we look at it, it is a giant problem. In 2015 terrible drought from Arkansas to the west coast, Massive floods from Texas to the east coast. 

Giant dams and water systems are not the answer, but a vast continent wide system of local and regional, small and medium water control systems to store, control, move, clean, and use this water, as well as produce electricity to move this water.

Using Hydrodynamic systems, Siphon systems, ram pumps, archimedes pumps,
Also we must refill our water tables. Agricultural systems like permaculture will help slow flooding, along with infiltration ponds and water storage and control systems to move water to the driest places at the time of great rains and floods. 

Micro-hydro Electric systems for pumping water and electricity.
Ram pumps, for moving water up hill. Refilling the water table of the whole continent is of paramount importance.

First to deal with the water problem we must end the destruction of our water, Fracking, tar sand extraction and so on. Agriculture in the style of war, glyphosate herbicide  also called roundup has many problems,  including binding minerals in the body making them unavailable in the process of turning good fats into hormones.   2,4-D which is half of the agent orange defoliant used in the Vietnam war and known to cause cancer.   Atrazine which is know to cause frogs to spontaneously change sex and to cause breast, uterine and testicular cancer, etc. Many are Biocides and, or  cause endocrine disruption, that are destroying our ocean and the health of our people and biosphere generally.  Industrial pollution and plastic going into the oceans. 

We must have
Many vast constructed wetlands on rivers and streams to remove nitrogen, phosphorus and other chemicals and things like plastic, etc, before this water gets to the oceans.

We must come up with a plan to capture as much of the Methane coming out of the permafrost and arctic ocean areas.

Reforestation of the continent from the west to the east. Prevailing wind is mostly from the west in North America in summer.  Trees are a great way to get water in the air and are an excellent way to suck carbon out of the atmosphere.

Regenerative and restorative agriculture systems. Not just sustainable agriculture.

For a great look at water issues world wide see the WaterWired blog.

Huge volcano of methane spews out of California. Why should we care about this invisible gas?

This is enough evidence for me that we have a problem. To be frank I get a bit anxious when I review this kind of thing. Either way it was created, by melting of a pingo hole in the arctic, or from methane on the continental shelf, it is still and an indicator that we must do something about the methane.  This hole in the tundra, or a plume in the ocean, must be a wake up call. We must come up with some ways to collect this methane and use it. How about something like a giant upside down umbrella or several, that are connected to a hose going to a tanker truck or a tanker ship on the ocean. This can be used for growing algae for fuel, or in agriculture or greenhouses or for heating our greenhouses or buildings, or just used in traditional gas fired power plants. Any of this will be better than letting it out in the biosphere. We have real serious mess to clean up but one of the most important thing is to stop stop the stupid stuff like this. I hope and pray as a culture we can do better soon.

In  the L.A.  area a giant leak from a gas storage facility has been leaking for months. Meanwhile, in California, Governor Jerry Brown  declared a state of emergency  Wednesday, January 6th in the Los Angeles neighborhood where an uncontrollable methane gas leak has spewed more than 150 million pounds of methane into our Biosphere.
It is good to talk about problems, and also I think at this time it would be good for a shift in our thinking towards coming up with and implementing solutions.

How about a national methane company owned by state and local governments. The like of Exxon, BP (British Petroleum) Have shown themselves to be untrustworthy of being responsible corporate citizens if you believe that corporations are really persons. These mega corporations should be prosecuted as persons, and all of there upper level executives for there misdeeds. Any excess money from these ventures can go to a permanent sustainable and green infrastructure. This must be a start to decentralization. Local people will know what is happening and what must be done in their area where they live sooner than a federal agency in DC.

I know a lot of Smart people visit this blog of  Thom's. Maybe we cane find some other people who can help out, or come up with some good Ideas .

Intro to Permaculture the case for Permaculture in the Midwest.

Here is a simple and easy to understand why we must end commercial agriculture, and move into long range sustainable agriculture.
 This video is about permaculture. Permanent Agriculture together in a non destructive method to keep your soil streams and rivers healthy.
A great simple explanation of Permaculture.

It is time for Police to return to scaled escalation of force.

I was watching Bill Maher last Friday and he had a clip of three police shooting a man who had been throwing rocks. This man was running.away and fell down and the three police just shoot him dead on the street like he was a rabid dog. This is totally unneeded in this situation. The man was down and could have been arrested and taken to jail . To shoot an unarmed when down and there were three policemen there is inexcusable. The police did not know if this man was mentally ill or had some other kind of emotional instability.
It is time for Police to return to scaled escalation of force. If someone is unarmed and the police shoot that person dead they should be tried in a court of law. Just because fully armed police are able to kill an unarmed man does not make it right. If someone is shooting at the police that might be one thing but to kill an unarmed man that is down is just outright murder. The officers could have easyly subdued him with little harm to themselves or the now dead man
It is time for law enforcement officers to return to a form of scaled escalation of force. If someone is violent but not armed then the police can use some force to subdue that person. Back when the motto to protect and serve was more than just a motto on the side of a cop car, the police would use a response of force equal to what was necessary to subdue an offender. To go from chasing someone to murder is not a scaled escalation of  force. If some one is using some physical violence but unarmed it is wrong to just shoot them dead. For the police to use some physical violence would be alright in such a situation. The militarization of our police in this country is way out of control.
Since the government stopped taking care of mentally ill people back in the President Ronald Reagan days, and the government shut down most of the state run mental institutions in favor of the for profit health care systems this has been a very bad problem in our country. There are many mentally ill people that should be getting care that are not, and many of these people are homeless and out on the streets.
Remember "Hands up don't shoot".  And how about Eric Garner for selling cigarets. This is not a scaled escalation of force. Mike Brown stole some cigars, this is against the law but this is not a capital offense. Eric Garner was selling single cigarets, this would be considered a civil offense and maybe a taxation violation but not a capital offense. Both of these men are now dead. Not a scaled escalation of force.
How many other police shootings were not caught on camera or just police brutality out of proportion to the actual situation. How about an officer shooting at a traffic stop into a van full of children.
If someone has a gun and is not shooting the police should not shoot. If someone has a gun and is shooting then it could be considered justified to shoot. If someone is using violence then it could be considered alright to use some violence by the police. If someone is running away that has committed an offense, then it could be considered alright to run after them. If someone is just acting crazy then it would be alright for the police to act crazy also, but not to just shoot them dead.
It is time for law enforcement officers to return to a form of measured and scaled escalation of force. This is just common sense. Its time to rational and just forms of  law enforcement.