Wednesday, July 25, 2007

Northside Croquet Club Game 12 Here's the report on Tuesday's North Side Croquet Club Game 12. They write: Great game last night y'all. I'm not sure why I keep saying that, because if they weren't all great games, then why [in the world] would we keep coming back week after week, year after year? Anyhow, action all across the board. The big winner was Sonia, who with her game and poison battle wins, jumps into 4th place with 4 points total. She also passes up Melanie, Jess and Josh to be the highest ranked lady. Mike G moves into the first place bracket in a tie with Shane and Dave at 7 points a piece. His Clay st. Compatriot, Boyd, moved up into his vacant place in 2nd, and into a tie with John at 6 points each. With Mike and Boyd's points, Clay st. moves into a tie for 1st in the House challenge against Ft. Downing, who was shut down all around. Eric, king of the wicket kills for the last few years finally got himself one this year, moving him out of the OPP and keeping the BCH alive in the House challenge. In the NPP ranks, there was a lot of excitement. The Leightrix and Ricky, who we all know deserved a point more than [almost] anybody, both shot out of the NPP ranks and skipped right over the OPP with wicket kills and game wins. Also making a great showing in the NPP bracket were Joy and Genevieve, who, although they didn't win, killed off most of a very formidable game. So that's roughly what happened. 8:24:11 PM

Iraq Andrew Sullivan: "Baghdad is close to being divided into homogeneous neighborhoods, Shia and Sunni. The 600 dumped bodies in the last month are part of the cleansing. We keep talking about the horrors that would follow a US withdrawal. But the horror of cleansing is occurring under our watch." Andrew Sullivan: "It hasn't even begun to tackle Sadr City yet, but in some calmer parts of Baghdad's Red Zone, the surge is clearly doing what it's supposed to do. That means a limited amount, since the critical decisions that the Shia and Sunnis have to make will not be made easy by a handful of successes. But it's also better than nothing." "2008 pres" 7:00:44 PM

Executive privilege Captain's Quarters: "It appears that Congress and the White House will come to a resonating conclusion to the lifelong tension over the use of executive privilege, and it will be fought on the White House's turf. The House Judiciary Committee took the extreme step of recommending contempt citations for two senior administration officials after they refused to testify under subpoena regarding political advice at the White House." Mathew Gross: "Perhaps no White House chief of staff and no White House legal counsel have ever faced contempt of congress charges simply because never before in American history have the chief of staff and the legal counsel been so contemptuous of congress or the constitution." "2008 pres" 6:47:30 PM

Middle Eastern Policy Political Wire: "A new Pew Research survey finds 'large and growing numbers of Muslims in the Middle East and elsewhere rejecting Islamic extremism.' For example, the percentage of Muslims "saying that suicide bombing is justified in the defense of Islam has declined dramatically over the past five years in five of eight countries where trends are available. In Lebanon, for example, just 34% of Muslims say suicide bombings in the defense of Islam are often or sometimes justified; in 2002, 74% expressed this view. However, Palestinians stand out for their broad acceptance of suicide bombing. Seven-in-ten-Palestinians say this tactic is at least sometimes justified.'" "2008 pres" 6:56:38 AM

State of the city Here's the text of Mayor Hickenlooper's State of the City speech from The Rocky Mountain News. 6:37:37 AM

Marijuana possesion Denver's lowest law enforcement priority? Here's a look at the proposed ballot issue to make enforcement of marijuana laws Denver's lowest priority, from The Denver Post. From the article: Thousands of people in Denver sent a literal message to the city this week, saying they want a vote on whether cops and prosecutors should ignore some of the state's marijuana laws. On Tuesday, police and city officials were left asking: Is ignoring a law even possible? "This is an entirely new beast, and I don't know what it means," said assistant city attorney David Broadwell. Almost 13,000 people recently signed a petition for a law to make marijuana Denver's "lowest law-enforcement priority." On Monday, city election officials determined about 6,000 of those were valid - enough to bring the issue closer to the November ballot. "There's not a single law on the books like this" in Colorado, Broadwell said. Among the problems he and others raised is the fact that Denver police officers swear an oath to uphold state laws, some of which say marijuana possession is illegal... Mason Tvert, the leader of the group who organized the petition drive, said police and prosecutors decide every day to ignore certain minor offenses. One example he gave: Drivers who are caught speeding sometimes get off with a warning. "We're not here to tell police exactly how to do their job on the streets," said Tvert, executive director of Citizens for a Safer Denver. "We are here to tell them what the priorities of the people of Denver are." Tvert pointed to a similar law passed several years ago in Seattle, which he called a success. There, marijuana cases taken on by prosecutors dropped by almost half within two years after voters passed the law, according to a 2005 news report. Seattle City Attorney Tom Carr, who originally opposed the measure, told the Seattle Post-Intelligencer: "It hasn't been a problem. You can tell by the numbers." "denver n2007" 6:33:26 AM

Spring Creek flood of 1997 Here's a retrospective about the Spring Creek Flood of 1997 from The Fort Collins Weekly. From the article: On the morning of July 28, 1997, almost 21 years exactly after the Big Thompson flood left 145 people dead, the weather box on the Monday newspaper called for partly cloudy skies and a 40 percent chance of thunderstorms. Afternoon and evening newscasts warned of flash flooding. The weather patterns that day kept climatologists guessing; there was potential for a big downpour but when and where became the questions. Even those familiar with easterly flows and up-slope conditions were not prepared for the non-stop sheet of rain that would send 10 to 14 inches of water down on parts of Fort Collins over a 30-hour period -- or the chaos that would soon ensue as the water collected and began to overflow detention ponds and water sewers. No one, in fact, was prepared for the extreme weather conditions, what has since been called the most intense rainfall event in an urban area in the history of Colorado. The skies that day produced more rain than a 500-year flood event, making the flows of sweet, little Spring Creek roughly twice that of the Poudre River during peak runoff. That flow derailed a freight train, killed five women, left hundreds homeless, destroyed two trailer parks and caused more than $100 million worth of damage to Colorado State University. Citywide, there was a total of $250 million in property damage... The weather had been hot and dry for weeks and residents along the Front Range were happy to have a few days of lower temperatures. On July 27, 1997, a cool front came through Northern Colorado; humidity jumped as moist, tropical air traveled north. Late Sunday afternoon, the front triggered typical thunderstorms around the foothills, giving most of Fort Collins light rain. The storms, however, did not clear away like usual summer weather patterns. The moist, southeasterly winds gained power and the storm hung over the foothills, brewing. While cloudy Fort Collins got a short break from the rains, by Monday morning LaPorte had been soaked with up to 10 inches of rain, flooding the small town. "What was interesting was that these were all just precursors," Doeskin says. "It was all a precursor to the main event."[...] On Monday afternoon, the showers began in Fort Collins and as night fell, they increased, making "an interesting evening for weather-casters," Doeskins says. Different parts of Fort Collins received markedly different amounts of rain. While many residents got a "nice shower," those in the western part of the city received the blunt force of the storm's punch. "From a meteorological point of view it didn't look all that impressive," he says. "There wasn't much thunder or lightening or hail. There were bigger, heavier storms in other counties, and comparably ours was humble-looking." But the storm continued to sit over western parts of the city. Between 8 and 10 p.m. rains in southwest Fort Collins were occasionally hitting a density that equated to six inches per hour, sending the water east, downhill through the city. What made the weather different that day was not the heavy precipitation; the Front Range is occasionally hit by storms that drop a couple of inches of rain in an hour. Doeskin says the storm's deadliness came in its stamina, dropping more than five inches in six hours... A total of 10 to 14 inches of rain fell over 30 hours along the foothills, between southwest Fort Collins up to LaPorte. Around town, detention ponds, ditches and runoff channels filled and started to overflow. Streets flooded with chocolate-colored water. Home and business basements served as makeshift stormwater basins. The rain soon created a runoff stronger than 500-year flows, sending the most dramatic waters through the Colorado State University campus and over Spring Creek. At some spots, the surge along Spring Creek was almost two and a half times that of FEMA's 500-year discharge. The waters raged and by 11 p.m. on July 28, Spring Creek had turned deadly. A plugged culvert blew out, sending feet of water into one trailer park. A liquor store exploded and several trailers caught fire. Waters overtopped a railroad track, sweeping rail cars off the tracks, and sending more water onto the trailer parks. More than 200 people were rescued from the area even before the trailer parks flooded. Hundreds of calls poured into police. People found themselves stranded in their houses and trailers, on top of cars and in trees. As flames lit their efforts, rescuers pulled people to safety. "colorado water" 6:23:09 AM

Has the North American Monsoon started? It looks like the North American Monsoon is upon us, at least in the Grand Valley. Here's an article about it from The Grand Junction Daily Sentinel. They write: Rainy, thunderous evenings, followed by hot days. "I think it is safe to say this is the southwest monsoon," said Norv Larson, a meteorologist for the National Weather Service... According to the weather service, this monsoon pattern could last through September. The monsoon will bring cloudbursts of rain and lightning, as has recently been the case, and it will also bring periods of calm days and calm evenings. It all depends on how much moisture is brought up from the southwest, Larson said. "This pattern will hold through typically mid to late September," he said. "colorado water" 6:07:36 AM

Minimum tillage and efficient sprinklers working for some farmers Here's a look at a project using efficient irrigation techniques near Montrose, from The Montrose Daily Press. From the article: Farming innovations through irrigation and tillage have helped third generation farmer Randy Meaker increase efficiency in the field. Members of the Shavano Conservation District visited his farm on the Gunnison Watershed Tour on Tuesday to observe the results of his implementations. Standing in front of his tractor equipped with a Precision Tillage 1tRIPr strip-tiller, Meaker explained how he can now till 100 acres in one pass. "So I've farmed 100 acres to receive the production off of 100 acres," Meaker said. "On a conventional tillage program where you disc and plow and disc and roll and all those things, you've gone over it eight times and farmed 800 acres to get 100 acres of production." The approach he's taken to irrigation, using a center pivot sprinkler rather than furrows, was first thought to be unworkable in the region because of the soils. "There had been no success with previous sprinklers," Meaker said. "They were high pressure systems. Well, high pressure means that you've gotta have a lot of horsepower and a motor to develop pressure. So they were very expensive to run."[...] The sprinkler uses a hydraulically controlled pivot and has proven successful enough for expansion of the demonstration site in 2005 to cover a 92-acre field. Since the Gunnison Tunnel became operational in 1909, local farmers used furrow irrigation systems, Meaker said. These consist of water "going down in rows every 30 inches from a ditch," Steve Hale, Shavano Conservation District Supervisor said. Although this was common, it was not necessarily the best way to irrigate, especially with regard to water conservation. Meaker said the sprinkler systems are "85 to 90 percent efficient" whereas the furrow irrigation is "probably maximum 50 percent efficient." Irrigation water management specialist Randy Kremer said that although Meaker's the only farmer using the 1tRIPr strip-tiller, there are about a half dozen others using minimum tillage techniques. "colorado water" 5:58:43 AM

Internet Neutrality Here's the Ask a Ninja explaining Internet Neutrality. "2008 pres" 5:49:40 AM

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