June 12, 2015
Dear Everyone:
It rained this week! Water
falling from the sky! People
dancing in the streets!
Slippery roadways! Oops.
This has been an “historic drought”.
What that means is that this is not the first time that the
heavens have failed to deliver as much water as Californians would like.
Take the 1860s, for instance.
While the rest of the country was embroiled in the
American Civil War,
also known as The War Between The States, also known as The Unfortunate
Incident of the Northern Aggression,
California was simply broiling.
Crops dried up.
Cattle died in the fields.
And many an Early California Land Baron fell victim to Evil Bankers.
(Note: All Bankers
are Evil. Just look at the
Great Recession of 2007-2008.
And now they’re complaining again about not making enough money
off other people.)
As for California, it has always been on the edge of a desert.
Originally, people sensibly planned for droughts as well as the
occasional “rainy season”.
On the other hand, there is a prevalent theory that the
Mayan Empire
collapsed, in part, because of a 200-year-long drought on the west coast
of the Americas. Try not
watering your lawn for the next 200 years and see what happens.
The problem, of course, is not really about too many people watering
their lawns. The problem, in
a nutshell, is in part, nuts.
California almonds to be exact.
Recent news items have been trumpeting that it takes a gallon of
water to grow one almond.
People used to joke about “saving water” by ordering wine instead.
Cute. Of course, it
takes a lot more water to grow the grapes that eventually produce the
wine.
So, where did all these crops come from?
Ever hear of the
California Gold Rush?
People came to California to “get rich quick”.
Most didn’t. Many
stayed anyway and settled on farms, where you could grow lots of crops,
provided you had enough water.
Fast-forward to the end of
World War II.
American soldiers, returning from the War in the Pacific, came
through California on their way home.
Some never went home.
Some went home, packed up the family, and returned to California.
“Sunny California”, where the weather was almost always perfect.
California grew by leaps and bounds in terms of population, crop
production and water consumption.
All those people needed water.
And they got it, through the simple expedient of stealing it from
somewhere else. Ever see the
movie,
Chinatown?
It was “inspired” by the
California Water Wars.
Back in the late 1800s, a couple of guys named
Eaton and
Mulholland crafted the
Los Angeles Aqueduct, which basically sucked
water from Owens Valley and
Mono Lake, for starters.
About a century later, the water supply is drying up.
Lots of talk about “climate change” being the cause.
I’m sure the ancient Mayans called it something else.
In the meantime, everybody please pray for rain and lots of snow
in the mountains.
Love, as always,
Pete
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