California // Current TV

Drug czar: There are no good reasons to legalize marijuana

By Eric W. Dolan Wednesday, May 2, 2012 17:13 EDT R. Gil Kerlikowske, the director... more

KB723
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26 days ago
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140 comments

Gov. Brown's Budget Forsakes California Women

In California, women and children are falling behind and the governor's proposed... more

Womens_eNews
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5 days ago
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1 comment

Monterey County Safeway Worker Suspended After Stopping Assault

DEL REY OAKS, Monterey County (CBS 5) – Safeway has suspended an employee at a... more

Radical_Centrist
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10 days ago
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4 comments

Man with TB Arrested for Not Following Medical Treatment

Armando Rodriguez was warned several times to continue taking his tuberculosis... more

TravG73
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12 days ago
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Rural towns devise unique plans to solve water problems

For a good part of its rich history, residents of unincorporated Allensworth, the... more

JanforGore
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15 days ago
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Beaumont, California Woman Monica Hernandez Blinded With Pepper Spray for “Contempt of Cop”

A Riverside County grand jury indicted officer Enoch Clark on charges of assault.... more

Radical_Centrist
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18 days ago
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After dry "rainy season" California faces high wildfire risk

In California, May typically marks the beginning of a warm and dry summer season. This year, however, things are different. Not only has it been warm and dry for the past couple weeks; it’s been warm and dry for months. So dry, in fact, that officials are warning the risk of wildfires across much of the state is going to be much worse than usual, for several months to come.

According to their most recent outlook, the National Interagency Fire Center predicts that large parts of southern and central California, along with forests throughout the Sierra Nevada, are likely to see more wildfires than normal, particularly later this summer.

Three firefighters watch as a wildfire approaches Carbon Canyon road near Brea, Calif., in 2008. Credit: Mike Blake/Reuters

“A big chunk of the state is looking at above-average wildfire risk,” said Rob Krohn, a meteorologist with the U.S. Forestry Service’s Predictive Services Branch in Riverside. According to Krohn, the exceptionally dry conditions in California during most of this winter have left many areas parched and vulnerable to ignition from both human and natural causes.

This summer’s increased threat of wildfires is something Californians can expect to see more often in coming decades. Climate researchers predict that over the next 75 years, a combination of warmer winters, reduced snowpack, earlier snowmelts, and hotter, drier summers will lead to more wildfires in forested parts of the state. Year-to-year variations in the weather will still heavily influence fire risk in the future, as it has this year, but just how devastating this year’s wildfires are in California will be a warning of the forests’ vulnerability to the developing warmer, drier climate.

The past few years have been relatively quiet for wildfires in California, following two devastatingly dry years in 2007 and 2008, when more than 800,000 acres burned.

During a May 9 press conference, California State Climatologist Mike Anderson described the unusual weather in California this past winter.

“December [2011] was the second driest December in over a hundred years,” Anderson said. Several areas of the state received only 5-to-10 percent of their usual rainfall in December and heading into mid-January, it appeared California might have its driest winter on record.

A few days of heavy rain in late January brought a spot of relief. Then, a wetter than usual March boosted total winter precipitation. Nevertheless, all but the most northern parts of California still registered well below average total rain and snowfall, Anderson said.

And in terms of wildfire risk, Krohn said the wet weather in March and early April came too late. By then the damage was done. While the rain may have helped prevent spring wildfires from starting — to date this year only about 1,000 acres have burned in California, well below normal — plants and trees rely heavily on the rain that falls early in the season to help them stay moist and healthy throughout the dry summer season. Without moisture from early rain, the plants simply haven’t been taking up water that fell later in the spring.

Despite the arid winter, California water supplies are in generally good condition leading into summer. Thanks to record wet conditions last year, most groundwater basins and reservoirs are still high, and the California Department of Water Resources says most people — and farmers — won’t suffer from this winter’s drier than normal conditions.

Unfortunately, these reservoirs have little influence on the wildfire risk, And more often that not in California, Krohn said, predictions for bad wildfire years tend to come true.

More at the linkIn California, May typically marks the beginning of a warm and dry summer season. This... more

JanforGore
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18 days ago
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Diversity News Magazine & Diversity News Publications Official Media Partner of The Ferret Squad The Movie

n Wednesday, May 9, 2012 Diversity News Publications publisher of Diversity News... more

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19 days ago
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Funding Underway for New Feature Film Entitled The Ferret Squad and Needs Your Help

Every one, please read, share, like, comment on link, Tweet on our article post and... more

diversitynews
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21 days ago
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Shocking Video Of Kelly Thomas Beating Death Released. Watch With Caution.

The city surveillance video that shows a group of Fullerton police officers beating a... more

Radical_Centrist
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21 days ago
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5 comments

Super Frat: Motivation

The bros get to smoking.

TonyDiGerolamo
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21 days ago
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0 comments

Sound The Alarm

A 2005 shot of Brendan Margison surfing in front of the now-damaged nuclear power... more

covelogibbs
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23 days ago
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5 comments

Dog is My Copilot

Dogs are great. Dogs are good. So is California. What more needs be said?

omnipotentpoobah
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25 days ago
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0 comments

Betty White Makes Her Political Pick | Animal Rights

CNN... . April 30th, 2012 08:07 PM ET . Posted by CNN's Ashley... more

EthicalVegan
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29 days ago
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PG&E: Blowing Up One State at a Time

It's all too easy find naked greed and just plain stupidity in America's... more

omnipotentpoobah
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29 days ago
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California State Athletic Commission Passes Amendment, Exemptions For TRT, Marijuana Now Allowed

The California State Athletic Commission was thrown into the center of the TRT debate... more

JackHerer
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1 month ago
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Santorum's Concerns About Teaching Of American History In California State Universities Gets Quick Follow-Through Action

California accepts the challenge . . .

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1 month ago
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Oaksterdam University raided by the Feds

The US has one fourth of the world's prison population. It seems Obama wants to... more

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1 month ago
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2 comments

Unseen Faces and Unheard Voices of Oakland

Projet En Vue is an online installation featuring the true perspective of Oakland and its Inhabitants in an honest, aesthetically tasteful manner. http://projetenvue.org/

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WHO WE ARE:

We are a photographer and an oral historian living in Oakland, CA. Oakland is one of the most ethnically and linguistically diverse communities in America, and yet outsiders are mostly familiar with it due to its reputation for being poor, dangerous, and violent.

WHAT WE DO:

We are walking around Oakland with a camera and a voice recorder, interviewing the citizens of Oakland. Our conversations range from five to thirty minutes and don’t have any particular theme. Our goal is to paint a portrait of them as an individual. We want to know where they came from, what they are most proud of, where they see themselves in ten years, and what they are most passionate about, among other things.

WHY:

In this era of advanced technology, we are increasingly connected to a global network of people, yet we are losing our connection to those closest to us. Because of this, we are becoming increasingly isolated from our own humanity. The simple mission of Projet En Vue is to bring people together with different perspectives and life experiences in order to create a greater narrative of community as well as what it means to be human in the modern world. We want to do this through a variety of means, both in our own communities and around the world.

IN THE FUTURE:

Closest to home, we want to create a series of interactive exhibitions that will feature fifty portraits of Oakland residents who differ in a variety of ways but who all share a sense of pride in the community. We will bring these exhibitions to local schools, community centers, and galleries to engage people in our work. These events will feature large photographic portraits of the people that we interviewed, along with interactive audio installations that we will commission local artists to design and produce.

A series of zines (24 to 30 pages each) and a full-color photo book will allow Projet En Vue to have a national impact. The photo book will feature beautiful portraits from our interviews, along with the accompanying text. The zines and the book will be printed locally with soy-based inks, recycled paper, and animal-free binding and will be a tangible manifestation of our project.

Finally, our website will help us create a global impact with our work. The website is already being created and is where we feature the photographs, audio, and text. Our multi-media approach to these portraits creates a visceral and deeply emotional experience for the viewer.Projet En Vue is an online installation featuring the true perspective of Oakland and... more

sati
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1 month ago
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Romney Elevates His Distance With Car Elevator - Here's His FCQ (Fat-Cat Quotient)

How many poor families can Romney afford?

mfb1949
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2 months ago
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4 comments

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