this is why

this is why I'm spending my weekend in meetings. This pictured valley is under 300 feet of water. This can be another Yosemite Valley. this is why.

A little less evil in the world this morning

Something magical and wonderful has happened in San Jose of all places. Yes, I know San Francisco banned plastic bags a while back, but that sort of action is expected from them, despite their unforgivable sinfulness. Marin is going for it, too. One county and city at a time, I guess.

I actually have a lot of plastic bags in my house right now, on purpose, since I learned how to crochet them into durable, reusable bags from a crafter/teacher in Redwood City. I saw these bags at the county fair over the summer and was so blown away, now I'm trying to collect the bags that are crochet-able and get more people to learn the craft.

Of course, all the crocheters in the world won't get a hold of the billions of plastic bags circulating, polluting land and water, threatening animals of all kinds and using petroleum. So hooray for places like San Jose and Marin. Until then, try making some plarn! And send me your plastic bags. I'm really hoping to get some of those big, bright red Target bags...

(At right is my first attempt at one of these bags; I still need to figure out how to do handles. And yes, it's a bit small; the lego man is there for perspective.)

Top 5 Fridays!

Top 5 Things You and All the Other Humans Need to Accept

5) Gail Collins is the greatest newspaper columnist of our generation

4) Heidi needs to auf herself



3) The dam will come down sooner or later, and the sooner it does, the better off we'll all be.

2) Your life is not complete without one of these, these and these.

1) My Android phone can kick your iPhone's heiny.

Water schmater

This kind of thing just makes me sick. Why can't we just charge farmers for water, for pete's sake?!?

Sue to restore Hetch Hetchy

Oh snap!

Bay Area water hypocrisy exposed

Published online on Wednesday, Jun. 24, 2009

By Bill McEwen / The Fresno Bee

One of these days, a water-starved farmer will walk into federal court and demand that O'Shaughnessy Dam come down, finally restoring glacial Hetch Hetchy Valley to its natural grandeur and releasing a natural flow into the Tuolumne River.

Such a lawsuit wouldn't get the farmer more water. But it would expose the hypocrisy of Bay Area environmentalists who depict San Joaquin Valley residents as ignorant hillbillies making a mess of the desert and the Delta with their irrigated farms.

Hetch Hetchy -- the twin to Yosemite Valley -- should have been restored decades ago, say many environmental groups, including the Sierra Club.

But the only way the dam falls is if a federal judge orders it. And no environmental group will sue. Why?

They say it's better handled with cooperation and education. My explanation is simpler: it's because the dam holds some of the best drinking water on earth -- granite-filtered water reserved mostly for the allegedly environmentally conscious folks of San Francisco and other Bay Area cities.

Amazing, isn't it?

But the only way the dam falls is if a federal judge orders it. And no environmental group will sue. Why?

They say it's better handled with cooperation and education. My explanation is simpler: it's because the dam holds some of the best drinking water on earth -- granite-filtered water reserved mostly for the allegedly environmentally conscious folks of San Francisco and other Bay Area cities.

Amazing, isn't it?

Environmentalists sue to restore the Owens River and Mono Lake. Environmentalists sue to restore the San Joaquin River and bring back its salmon run.

But they won't unleash their lawyers on Hetch Hetchy, one of the world's great wonders, or demand that San Francisco surrender its drinking water so that the Tuolumne River can teem with salmon again.

Can I prove that environmental groups are picking other battles to avoid a backlash among their Bay Area supporters? No. But it sure looks that way.

Here in the Valley, east-side farmers are giving up, on average, 170,000 acre-feet of water each year for the reintroduction of salmon into the San Joaquin.

Shouldn't Bay Area residents forfeit a similar amount -- about half of Hetch Hetchy's storage capacity -- to recharge the Tuolumne, the San Joaquin and the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta with cold Yosemite water?

Shouldn't we enjoy Hetch Hetchy Valley, as it was before powerful San Francisco interests stole Tuolumne water rights -- and broke John Muir's heart -- in the early 1900s?

San Franciscans beg to differ. They claim that the dam has created a beautiful lake and Hetch Hetchy Valley was overrated -- its spectacular vistas mere figments of Muir's imagination. Two of the loudest opponents against restoring Hetch Hetchy are Sen. Dianne Feinstein and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi.

Three years of drought and the dramatic degradation of the Delta are hog-tying west-side farmers. They are trying to survive with a fraction of their usual water deliveries.

What are San Franciscans giving up? Not their precious Hetch Hetchy tap water.

Let's give the San Francisco greenies a dose of aggressive environmentalism. Let's sue to restore Hetch Hetchy.

The columnist can be reached at bmcewen@fresnobee.com or (559) 441-6632. Check out his blog at fresnobeehive.com/news.

"I'll start believing environmentalists when..."

This column by a Central Valley farmer makes some good points, particularly on#10!!

Hopefully I'm not the kind of environmentalist he complains about; I do my best with my solar panels, bike trailers and organic local produce...

#10: I’ll start believing San Francisco environmentalists when they stop taking their drinking water from a national park.

#9: I’ll start believing the French on energy and environmental issues when they turn off their nuclear reactors. Nuclear power cannot be good in France and bad in the U.S.

#8: I’ll start believing Europeans about organic farming when they stop chain smoking.

Procrastination

In case anyone's wondering: yes, I realize I'm remiss in not blogging about Feinstein's remarks at the inaugural lunch and the Chronicle's alleged dire straits. I just haven't had the time to sit and ruminate about how to do that without degenerating into a screaming rant.

Also, is it dorky to take a blog roll-call? AFAIK, the only people reading this blog are:
Linda
my sister (thanks a lot!)
people with google alerts to "Hetchy"
and people with google alerts to "Terry Gross sucks"

The latest from RHH

Great article on Restore Hetch Hetchy in the East Bay Express.

In related news, did anyone else find it ironic how Diane Feinstein was going on and on about that painting of Yosemite Valley at the post-inaugural luncheon?

Jeans

I have one pair of pants that truly fit me. They are made out of hemp by Patagonia, the greatest retail company in the history of the world. (They gave $10,000, iirc, to RHH a few years ago.) In every other style of jeans, it seems, I have a size 8-10 waist and size 12-14 thighs; European-sized brands like Lucky seem to be especially bad, but Gap jeans are lousy, too. Linda says it's because my quads are huge from cycling, God love 'er (in the parlance of our times), but I suspect it's a combination of weird things happening to my body after having two kids, and clothing designers hating women.

Oh, you mean we don't have to use this much water?

This study is one of those that anyone with an IQ over 100 could have figured out without the benefit of researchers and data: California farmers could save lots of water and lots of money if they would just buy a freaking clue.

About 75 percent of the water used in California is used for agriculture, and the large farms, which grow most of our food by a wide percentage, are very wasteful when it comes to water. Most of this state is in desert-like conditions for most of the year, yet God forbid you should suggest someone shouldn't water their crops or they lawn any idiotic time or way they feel like (yeah, landlord across the street, having your sprinklers go off at 11 a.m. every day, I'm talking to you!).

Why don't people get that we don't have infinite supplies of water? We can't just dump it out everywhere willy-nilly!

Then there's this:

Just one of the proposals—watering crops only when they need it—would save enough water to fill Hetch Hetchy reservoir in Yosemite National Park 10 times over...

WATERING CROPS ONLY WHEN THEY NEED IT?!?!?!?!? What the bloody hell are they doing out there? Do they not have to pay for water at all?? It's just mind-boggling.

Oh, and how dare someone suggest that the farmers grow crops that actually thrive in our environment, instead of RICE.

Top 5 Fridays

Five situations that just should be:

5) You should be able to back out of your driveway and have faith that no one will be coming down the street at twice the speed limit.

4) You should NOT need a flashlight to retrieve something from your closet or cabinet.

3) A person running for president of the US should have the insight to understand when he or she is out of the race.

2) A person who is president should NOT have an IQ under 100.

1) A national park should be free of environmental degradations such as, oh, I don't know, DAMS.

Drain Hetch Hetchy, Lungren says

Rep. Dan Lungren, R-Gold River, believes it's time to restore Hetch Hetchy Valley in Yosemite National Park by draining the reservoir that has been a source of clean water for San Francisco for more than 80 years.

"Rep. Lungren is the first member of the U.S. Congress to come out in support of this," said Ron Good, head of Restore Hetch Hetchy. "It's a breakthrough."

Lungren's endorsement of draining the 360,000 acre-foot reservoir is being announced in an opinion article the conservative Republican is sending to area newspapers. The cost of the valley's restoration is estimated at as much as $10 billion, although Good said environmentalists believe the cost will be far less.

Congress would have to approve the work, however, and that's where the big rub is. Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., has been longtime opponent of the restoration idea. No other Bay Area Democrat in Congress has endorsed the idea, especially House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-San Francisco.

But Lungren is not exactly striking out on his own, either. The Bush administration has included $7 million in the Interior Department's 2008 budget to study restoration.

News Flash! Morons run the Examiner

Here's my reply:

As a resident of San Mateo County and a consumer of Hetch Hetchy
water, let me respond to your sarcastic editorial implying that
proponents of Hetch Hetchy Valley restoration all live outside the
Hetch Hetchy service area.

Your editorial demonstrates a gross misunderstanding of the facts.
First, the O'Shaughnessy Reservoir isn't "mammoth." It's the 20th
largest reservoir in California, and one of nine in SF's system.
Second, draining the reservoir will not reduce the amount of water
flowing to customers. Advocates of Hetch Hetchy restoration propose
moving the water closer to the people who drink it and returning the
valley to its originally intended purpose – the enjoyment of every
American.
Third, you are incorrect in saying Hetch Hetchy is "adjacent" to
Yosemite. It is, in fact, INSIDE Yosemite National Park. Uncovering
Hetch Hetchy Valley, which John Muir considered a second Yosemite
Valley, is doable and would right a century-old wrong.

Something good in the federal budget!!!

Of course, the Wicked Witch of the West is already screaming her shrill warnings about the end of western civilization (i.e., San Francisco) if restoring Hetch Hetchy is even considered.