Month: November 2012

With the world's population so far unable or unwilling to cut greenhouse gas emissions, Michael Specter wonders if we should start deliberately altering our climate:

There are people who argue that even discussing the concept will weaken our resolve to change our behavior. They see geoengineering as an easy out, a parachute for an irresponsible world. They have a point. But people deploy parachutes when their only other option is to crash and die. I don’t think any climate scientist can say for certain when we will reach the point at which we need to pull the ripcord. But it certainly looks like we might have to.

The Dish previously looked at the idea of pumping volcano-inspired chemicals into the atmosphere here, as well as Specter's earlier reporting on geoengineering here and here. 

Earth's epic story, condensed:

(Hat tip: Stephanie Haberman)

"You know [Obama] proved [it in] the way he handled this terrible storm Sandy in the Northeast: getting off the campaign trail, putting aside politics, working with the Republican governor of New Jersey, the independent mayor of New York City, and the Democratic governors of New York and Connecticut. It was a stunning example of how ‘we’re all in this together’ is a way better philosophy than you’re on your own," – Bill Clinton, campaigning in Concord, New Hampshire.

"The first thing happens is, don't believe — the public polls are wrong. That's the first sign of a campaign that's about to lose. The second thing, we're going to change the nature of the electorate, and you're not seeing it reflected in the polls. And the third thing is, the only poll that counts is Election Day. When you hear those things, you know you're about to lose," – Matthew Dowd, Republican political strategist.

"Folks I want to remind you, this is the end of daylight savings time tonight. It’s Mitt Romney’s favorite time of year because he gets to turn the clock back. He wants to turn that clock back so desperately. This time he can really do it tonight," – Joe Biden, addressing a crowd in Arvada, Colorado.

Cars being towed from the parking lot across the street from Miami-Dade elections. “This is intimidation!” one woman yells. @miamiherald

— Kathleen McGrory (@kmcgrory) November 4, 2012

Chaos as long lines form for absentee ballots and after long waits, mostly minority people are turned away:

In a confusing turn of events, the Miami-Dade elections department shut down early Sunday afternoon after too many people showed up to request and cast absentee ballots in person. The department had opened its Doral headquarters from 1 p.m. to 5 p.m. as a work-around to an early-voting crackdown law.

But by 2 p.m., around 180 voters had showed up, and department spokeswoman Christina White said the office would not be able to accommodate any more voters who showed up. Additional voters would be turned away, she said.

Elsewhere, there’s been more accommodation:

Last night, voters in Miami-Dade County were forced to wait in line up to six hours to vote. In some precincts voters who arrived at 7PM were not able to cast their ballots until 1AM. In response, Republican-affiliated election officials in Miami-Dade have effectively extended early voting from 1PM to 5PM today by allowing “in-person” absentee voting. But this accommodation will only be available in a single location in the most Republican area of the county.

A reader sent us the above photo yesterday:

Attached is an early voting photo from 7am this morning at the New River Library in Pasco County, Florida. A woman in front of me was complaining about the long lines all week. I said that you can thank Governor Rick Scott for this. She confusingly asked why? I told her he cut early voting in half this year. She still looked confused. I said, “It’s voter suppression!” I said you may want to think about voting for him again. She gave me a look and I said god forbid white people talk about voter suppression. I am white and live in a very confederate county in Florida.

In Ohio, the lines to vote are also staggering. Update from a reader:

I voted yesterday at the early voting location shown in the picture you linked to, which is in the heart of Columbus, Ohio, and I just wanted to point out that despite the fact that the line seems incredibly long, the voting center was huge and had somewhere between 40-60 voting machines running. My wait to vote was about an hour and a half, and the entire time I was there I didn’t see one person turn around and leave.

An hour and a half is still a long time to wait, yes, but for an early voting center operating on a weekend in one of the most populated areas in the state, it really wasn’t too terrible. I really don’t envy the people in Florida, however.

A classy and necessary withdrawal of an off-the-cuff tirade.

Patrick Ross laments the "verbal escalation" evident in our descriptions of events – terms like Frankenstorm, Snowpocalypse, and Carmageddon – which he blames on "the 24-hour news channels that provide us 24 minutes of news recycled all day":

We have been doing this for some time, taking words that already encompass significant scale or impact–like “hurricane”–and modifying or replacing them with no good reason. Take “unique.” The word means “being without a like or equal.” Yet how often do we hear an interesting individual called “pretty unique,” or a rare item called “very unique”? How can you be degrees of unique? Why do we feel the need to insert a modifier in front of an absolute?

Kevin Staley-Joyce adds his two cents.