Desdemona Despair

Blogging the End of the World™

Aging boomers face stark economics

Declining finances, rising health care costs threaten a generation Not so long ago, Michael Blattman lived in the upscale Washington, D.C., suburb of Potomac, Md., earning $225,000 a year as senior vice president for a student loan company. As he reached his 50s, it never really occurred to him that his job wouldn’t last forever. […]

Video: Desdemona News for 5 March 2010

This is an experimental content delivery method, built by using Xtranormal State. Feedback is supa-welcome in reader comments.  Technorati Tags: global warming,climate change,hurricane,endangered species,Asia,Australia,sea ice,icepack,Canada

Extreme weather causing U.S. home foundations to fail

  By KATE MURPHYPublished: March 3, 2010 STEVEN DERSE, the owner of a corporate travel business in Nashville, cannot feel his house move, but he can hear it. “It’s an eerie creaking sound,” he said, and it echoes throughout his two-story Georgian-style house. It started two years ago when a severe drought contracted the soil […]

Coastal erosion threatens evolutionary hotspots in Gulf Region

By Karin Kloosterman on March 5, 2010 – 12:09 pm Coastal waters are evolutionary hotspots, says Jerry Berne, a shoreline expert from the NGO Sustainable Shorelines in the US. Based in Charlotte, NC, USA, Berne is concerned about the toll construction and shoreline projects are having on the world’s marine ecosystems. Looking at the intensive […]

Perth water supplies could halve by 2030

March 3, 2010 (AAP) A worst-case scenario on Perth’s water resources says supplies could dip by nearly 50 per cent in the next 20 years. A CSIRO report has projected a marked decrease in river flows and water yields in WA’s South-West by 2030. It said under the best case scenario surface water yields would […]

Graph of the Day: Methane Fluxes Venting to the Atmosphere from the East Siberian Arctic Shelf

Summertime observations of dissolved CH4 in the East Siberian Arctic Shelf (ESAS) (21). … (D) Fluxes of CH4 venting to the atmosphere over the ESAS. Remobilization to the atmosphere of only a small fraction of the methane held in East Siberian Arctic Shelf (ESAS) sediments could trigger abrupt climate warming, yet it is believed that […]

Madagascar traders ready $50m shipment of illegally logged rainforest timber

www.wildmadagascar.orgMarch 02, 2010 Traders in Vohemar, a port in northeastern Madagascar, are preparing to ship $54 million worth of timber illegally logged from the Indian Ocean island nation’s rainforest parks, report local sources. Some 270 containers are being loaded with valuable hardwoods cut during a logging frenzy that ensued following a military coup nearly a […]

Japan won't comply with bluefin tuna ban

  Reporting by Yoko Nishikawa; Editing by Paul Tait Thu Mar 4, 2010 8:39am EST TOKYO (Reuters) – Japan will not comply if a total ban on international trade in Atlantic bluefin tuna is imposed, a government official was quoted as saying on Thursday, as support grows for the unprecedented trade halt. Bluefin tuna is […]

Common weedkiller turns male frogs into females

  By Maggie Fox, Health and Science EditorWASHINGTONWed Mar 3, 2010 3:36pm EST WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Atrazine, one of the most commonly used and controversial weedkillers, can turn male frogs into females, researchers reported on Monday. The experiment is the first to show such complete effects of atrazine, which had been known to disrupt hormones […]

Rare tiger cub found in China dies of malnutrition

By CARA ANNA (AP) BEIJING — A rare Siberian tiger discovered near the Russian border seemed an auspicious beginning to China’s Year of the Tiger, but within days, the emaciated cub had died of malnutrition. The cub, believed to be about 1 year old, was already in poor shape just after it was found on […]

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