POLITICS, and GLOBAL WARMING


          Any attempt to outline or suggest a new proposal, theory, or system should at least try to explain how it can be applied, helpfully, to one or more genuinely difficult, challenging and troublesome problems, rather than merely claiming to solve one or more easy and/or trivial things, and then claiming proof, success, victory, or whatever. And, today, there are several truly massive and severely threatening problems that need new efforts, new insights, new directions, or something, to help us at least reduce the levels of the catastrophes that will soon that begin to hammer and bludgeon us in ways that most politicians are willing to talk about, but are not willing to face up to, squarely and with genuine and serious resolve, in ways that can actually help solve, or at least reduce, those problems. A short list would include:
          (i) the size of the national debt (about $36 trillion as this is being written). We have now crossed a line where the money we must spend to "service our debts" is greater than we can afford to spend on defense; and, history has shown – repeatedly, and consistently –that THAT is a truly dangerous "inflection point" for ANY nation or empire;
          (ii) the severely dysfunctional level that Congress has descended into;
          (iii) the fact that politicians have created so many contrived, artificial, gerrymandered "safe districts" that our national elections put people into office who have no real interest (or skill) in bargaining, negotiating, or compromising; and,
          (iv) the approaching onslaught of hurricanes, tornadoes, wildfires, and similar events that will continue to grow worse and worse, due to global warming and climate change.
          With that as a preface, the same (environmental) engineer, (patent) lawyer, and inventor who wrote this website, invites any reader to at least consider visiting either of two other websites, depending on where the reader's interests lie and lean.

WWW.2PARTYPARTY.ORG
          The passage below is an excerpt from the Executive Summary, on the first/top page of the 2PP website:

Among other things, this website describes:
          (i) why Congress does not even try (and, for the most part, does not even want) to help solve any of the most divisive, polarizing, and hate-filled issues that are tearing the nation apart. Why not? Because they have learned how to exploit the anger, heat, and steam created by those issues, to power the engines that help them get re-elected, As a direct analogy, steam engines do not, and cannot, run on just plain water; instead, someone must light a fire beneath that water, and then keep pouring fuel onto that fire, to keep that water boiling hot, and creating steam;
          (ii) how extremists, zealots, and `far-wingers’ (aka wingnuts, nutcakes, `culture warriors', `show-ponies', `camera whores', or any other preferred term), out at the far ends of the political spectrum, have come to dominate the nominating battles in BOTH parties, by being so aggressive, unpleasant, and noxious that most moderates and centrists will simply leave, and abandon the contest in disgust, allowing the extremists to win `last man standing’ battles they create and inflict on their parties;
          (iii) why Congress is doing pretty much the opposite of actually helping the middle class, even though it claims and pretends to be doing exactly that. That is tragic, because history shows – repeatedly and consistently – that the best, happiest, strongest, and most productive period, for any city-state, empire, or nation ever in history, was when their `middle class’ was the largest, strongest, and most stable; and,
          (iv) why "third parties" are emphatically NOT the answer, because they ALWAYS, INEVITABLY AND PREDICTABLY end up creating the OPPOSITE of what they actually want, and hope for, and try to do. Why? Because they always, inevitably, and predictably suction votes AWAY FROM whichever party they are closer to, thereby helping elect candidates that their supporters dislike, and even detest, rather than electing the candidates they want. History has proven that fact, over and over; and yet, some people still want, and hope, and try, and choose to ignore those hard facts, and try to gain power for themselves and their small bands of supporters, by claiming and arguing that some "third party" would HELP America.

          Instead of just complaining, or offering up facts without a goal, theme, or purpose, the P2P website describes a number of logical proposals to fix (or at least help reduce and control) the problems listed above. These proposals were thought up, discussed with others, and slowly refined and improved over a span of decades, by someone with an unusual combination of skills, credentials, and professional licenses (including scientist, engineer, lawyer, patent attorney, and inventor).
        And, instead of side-stepping, evading, and dancing away from the most difficult, divisive, polarizing, and hate-filled issues that are tearing the nation apart – instead of simply taking one side or the other, in any of those issues – this website sets forth positions and proposals for how moderates, centrists, and successful problem-solvers can help build bridges, and encourage better communication, between the warring camps on both sides of each of those issues.
          So . . .  those are the kinds of things that are proposed and discussed in the website at WWW.2PARTYPARTY.ORG

MACROFACTS.NET
          The MacroFacts website is about global warming, climate change, and the disasters and catastrophes that are coming at us like a runaway train. The "MACRO-" prefix is used in the same why it is used to distinguish between:
          MACRO-economics, which is the study of economic factors that affect entire nations, societies, and trading patterns and laws; versus,
          MICRO-economics, which is the study of economic factors that affect how a single person, family, purchaser, or company will behave.
          One of the worst problems that has thwarted and frustrated any efforts to help reduce, limit, and control carbon dioxide and methane emissions, has been the ability of a small number of people – referred to in the MacroFacts website as "paid disrupters" – to figure out how they can make money, for themselves, by cluttering, complicating, and disrupting any efforts to have serious discussions and debates, by injecting trivial, unimportant, unhelpful, distracting, and disruptive "irrelevant facts and claims" into any such debates. They inject their factoids and falsehoods into any such discussions, not to help improve those debates, but to disrupt, clutter, entangle, and hijack them, so that the people trying to debate seerious issues will not be able to actually change anything. And, "paid disrupters" get paid to do those things, by various companies (mainly oil, gas, coal, and petrochemical companies) that want to continue making profits over the next few years, without having to face up to the long-term consequences of what they are doing.
          As a proposed way to fight back against the "paid disrupters", and help persuade more politicians, reporters, and members of the public to actually face up to the long-term problems our federal government is trying hard to belittle and ignore, MacroFacts.net summarizes and explains a specific set of eight "macro-facts", which it nominates as the eight biggest, most important, most threatening facts anywhere in the entire world, as of now. A listing (with short summaries, and links to the page where each fact s described in more detail) is provided at www.macrofacts.net/macro-facts-list-with-buttons. As three examples:

CRUCIAL GLOBAL WARMING FACT #1
          During the 40 years from 1980-2020, the bright & reflective snow and ice cover that formerly protected the northern arctic (measured in September of each year) was totally destroyed, eliminated, and removed, over an area that was 125 times the size of the state of New Jersey, by 2020. And, the snow and ice cover that remains has been reduced in thickness by half, and has become weak, porous, and fragile, like the bones of an elderly semi-invalid suffering from severe osteoporosis. Why was 1980 chose as the baseline year? Because that is when photographs from orbiting satellites (including X-ray photographs which indicated the thickness of the snow and ice cover) became good enough to create a solid and undeniable baseline, for comparison against subsequent satellite photographs. Rather than facing up to those facts, Trump and his supporters are trying their best to defund any agencies which report facts which they do not want to have reported, or discussed.  

CRUCIAL GLOBAL WARMING FACT #2
          Fact #1 becomes even more important, when one realizes that a white and bright snow and ice cover will reflect away somewhere between 80 and 90% of the sunlight energy that hits it (depending on its age, water content, and coverage by soot, dust, and other particulates). And, that reflected energy will simply be sent back out into deep space, where it will do no harm. By contrast, the much darker land surfaces usually absorb, rather than reflect, somewhere between 30 and 80% of the energy that hits them (depending mainly on how light or dark a specific surface is; and, many of the exposed rock layers in the arctic are quite dark). Even worse, a sea or lake surface will absorb about 94% of all sunlight energy that hits it. That is great, for promoting marine life, but it is a terrible, terrible thing, for global warming in the northern arctic region, which is warming up at rates estimated to be 4 to 5 times faster than the rest of the  planet. So, the loss of arctic snow and ice cover is increasing, exponentially, and we have now passed any point where something might be able to stop it. Soon, it will be entirely gone, not just during September, but during longer and longer times, every summer . . . which means that, like nearly every other major factor that is contributing to global warming, it is now climbing "an exponential curve". And, a reasonable and valid definition of "exponential curve" can be stated as follows: the worse things get . . . the more they will get even worse than that . . . even faster . . .

CRUCIAL GLOBAL WARMING FACT #5
          When Donald Trump announced in 2023 that he would run for President again in 2024, he said that sea level rise would be "an eighth of an inch, in 300 years". 
          That was utterly, totally, absolutely false. As determined by the top experts in the world – the U.S. Navy – average worldwide sea levels rose about 8 inches, just during a single 100-year span, from 1917 to 2017. Why did 1917 become the baseline year, for those measurements? Because that was when the U.S. Navy began a massive program of rebuilding its naval bases, starting with the world's largest cluster (at and around Norfolk, Virginia, at the mouth of the Chesapeake Bay), and then in other locations, and other coastlines. That rebuilding program was intended, partly to help us get ready to join World War I. However, just as importantly, that was when America began upgrading its naval bases to move beyond old-style ships powered by steam engines (which burned coal), and shift over to diesel engines, which could start up faster, and generate more power and speed. Those needed liquid fuel, rather than coal, and that change required totally new and different storage and handling systems.
     So, the U.S. Navy knows – perfectly well – that President Trump (and any other politicians, and political appointees) are just flat-out lying, when they try to belittle and ignore the real, true, actual, known facts of sea level rise. But, the Navy won't say anything, to correct or contradict the politicians. At least, not in public. Why not? Because they do NOT want to upset, antagonize, and make enemies among Republicans in Congress, who control their budgets.
          By the way – another relevant fact is this: pretty much ALL of the sophisticated computer models agree that ocean levels are now rising nearly FOUR TIME FASTER than between 1917 and 2017. The best computer models all agree, with surprising consistency, that worldwide ocean levels will increase, on average, another 14 inches, in just the 40-year span from 2020-2060 (that fact was included as part of Fact #5, above, rather than getting its own separate number). So, ocean levels around the world will increase nearly 2 feet, in less than 150 years, rather than Trump's totally false pretense, "1/8 inch in 300 years". 
          We all would be better off, if the Navy would begin to openly and publicly warn every member of Congress about what the real and true facts are, instead of allowing them to run for election based on outright lies. And, we all would be better off, if at least some committee in Congress would hold hearings, and ask some top-level Navy officials to publicly state what they already know, about sea level rise. And, if a set of MACRO-facts concerning global warming were known, and talked about, by more people, that might actually happen, some day.
          So . . . those are three of the eight MACRO-facts that are nominated by the environmental engineer who wrote this site, as the eight most important facts in the entire world, as of today. The other five are all listed and summarized, on a single page (each with a link to a supporting page with more information, including original sources where those facts can be found and analyzed by any interested person), at www.macrofacts.net/macro-facts-list-with-buttons.
          The macrofacts.net website also gets into several other hard, solid, provable facts, such as:
          (1) Under a simple and basic definition of the words "prove" and "proof", science simply cannot "prove" that something which has not yet happened, will happen. Instead, science can only PREDICT what will happen in the future. As a simple and obvious example, science cannot PROVE a future statement, even if it is as obvious as, "The sun will rise in the east, tomorrow morning". Instead, it can only PREDICT that that will happen. However, that is not a shortcoming of science; instead, it is the very heart and essence of the strength and power of good science, engineering, and technology. As an example, absolutely every manufacturing operation that is used, anywhere in the world, by any company, using any type of machine, in any factory or other setting, is NOT based on any type of PROOF that it will succeed, if the right ingredients or components are loaded into the right type of machine, which has been set to the right settings, and which has the power input it needs. Instead, absolutely every manufacturing operation that is used, anywhere in the world, is supported by, and paid for because of, the extraordinarily powerful ability of good science and engineering to PREDICT what will happen, if the right ingredients or components are loaded into the right type of machine, which has the right settings, and the power it needs to do what it does. The problem is, a bunch of cynical and/or stupid politicians have learned to abuse and exploit the honesty and candor of good scientists and engineers, by making stupid, shallow, short-sighted, scientifically-illiterate statements, such as, "Since scientists cannot PROVE that global warming is going to become as bad as they say it will, then we should not be asked to spend money to try to help stop it from happening." 
          The best scientists in the world have issued every possible warning, and every valid, realistic, scientific prediction that could possibly be offered, to help explain and justify the need to at least try to limit, reduce, and control global warming, sea level rise, and climate change. But, the politicians prefer to pretend that a bunch of "paid disrupters" know as much as the scientists do, and that the trivia, clutter, distractions, and outright bull-poop and lies being spewed out by "paid disrupters" deserve the same type and level of attention and discussion, as valid and honest scientific warnings.
          One more macro-fact is also worth mentioning here: the macrofacts.net website also explains (and illustrates, with simple illustrations anyone can understand, if they try) exactly how and why the inside of a car will become substantially hotter, than the air outside a car, if a car is left sitting in the sun, on a cloudless summer day, with all the windows rolled up. Why explain THAT? Because EXACTLY the same scientific effects and principles which cause THAT result, also explain how and why the giga-tons of carbon dioxide and methane we have released into the atmosphere are causing global warming, climate change, and "the greenhouse effect". Therefore, in ANY speech, debate, or other presentation, by ANY candidate for ANY position in Congress, it would be entirely fair and reasonable for ANY moderator, or ANY audience member, to ask each and every candidate at that event to explain, to the audience, in his/her own words, why cars get hot inside, if they are left sitting in the sun with their windows rolled up. If some candidate cannot explain THAT basic fact of how nature works, then that candidate will show that s/he does not know enough about the actual causes and effects of global warming, climate change, and "the greenhouse effect", to be trusted to make hugely important decisions that will affect us, our children, our grandchildren, and the future of our nation, and all human civilization.
          So, the engineer/attorney who wrote THIS website – i.e., tetraheed.net, about basic principles of geometry and nature which, if properly understood, can help improve relationships – also wrote another website, at www.macrofacts.net, to help people try to focus more on what is truly important, and to help them find ways to push selfish, dishonest, self-serving "paid disrupters" off to a sideline, where they belong. 
          So, to any reader: if you have just a few more minutes – either now, or later – and if you're willing to accept an interesting challenge, you're invited to click on either of the following buttons: