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Another Reason To Move Away From California: "Conditions Are Like A Third-World Country"
Submitted by Michael Snyder via The Economic Collapse blog,
As if anyone actually needed another reason to move out of the crazy state of California, now it is being reported that conditions in some areas of the state “are like a third-world country” due to the multi-year megadrought that has hit the state. In one California county alone, more than 1,000 wells have gone dry as the groundwater has disappeared. The state is turning back into a desert, and an increasing number of homes no longer have any water coming out of their taps or showerheads.
So if you weren’t scared away by the wildfires, mudslides, high taxes, crime, gang violence, traffic, insane political correctness, the nightmarish business environment or the constant threat of “the big one” reducing your home to a pile of rubble, perhaps the fact that much of the state could soon be facing Dust Bowl conditions may finally convince you to pack up and leave. And if you do decide to go, you won’t be alone. Millions of Californians have fled the state in recent years, and this water crisis could soon spark the greatest migration out of the state that we have ever seen.
Back in 1972, Albert Hammond released a song entitled “It Never Rains In Southern California“, and back then that was considered to be a good thing.
But today, years of very little rain are really starting to take a toll. In fact, one government official says that conditions in Tulare Country “are like a third-world country”…
Near California’s Success Lake, more than 1,000 water wells have failed. Farmers are spending $750,000 to drill 1,800 feet down to keep fields from going fallow. Makeshift showers have sprouted near the church parking lot.
“The conditions are like a third-world country,” said Andrew Lockman, a manager at the Office of Emergency Services in Tulare County, in the heart of the state’s agricultural Central Valley about 175 miles (282 kilometers) north of Los Angeles.
As California enters the fourth year of a record drought, its residents and $43 billion agriculture industry have drawn groundwater so low that it’s beyond the reach of existing wells. That’s left thousands with dry taps and pushed farmers to dig deeper as Governor Jerry Brown, a 77-year-old Democrat, orders the first mandatory water rationing in state history.
The mandatory water restrictions that Governor Brown is imposing are going to be very painful for a lot of people. We have just learned that some California communities will be required to cut their water usage by up to 36 percent…
Californians are going to have to start preparing for a dry summer as the dehydrated state prepares for a water crackdown.
In a somewhat controversial move, California water officials drafted a set of mandatory conservation regulations outlining varying degrees to which communities will be required to cut back on water use, ranging from 8 to 36 percent, depending on their history of water consumption.
The regulations — slated for approval in early May — are part of California’s first-ever attempt at mandatory rationing. Earlier this month, Gov. Jerry Brown issued an executive order requiring a 25 percent reduction in urban water use, a historic step in a series of measures aimed at conservation ahead of the state’s fourth consecutive year of drought.
And of course it isn’t just the state of California that is dealing with drought.
All over the southwest United States, we are seeing conditions that we have not witnessed since the days of the Dust Bowl in the 1930s.
In fact, the water level in Lake Mead is now the lowest that it has been since those days, and it is expected to drop even lower in the months ahead…
One of the most stunning places to see its impact is at the nation’s largest reservoir, Lake Mead, near Las Vegas. At about 40 percent of capacity, it’s the lowest it’s been since it was built in the 1930s.
“Just to see the rings around it, it’s just … kind of scary, you know,” says Darlene Paige, a visitor from New York. She’s standing at a vista point above the Hoover Dam on the Arizona side of Lake Mead.
That “ring” is the infamous bathtub ring around the rim of the reservoir. The levels have dropped 140 feet over the past 15 years, exposing a white stain on the gravelly brown mountains above the water. The level is forecast to fall an additional 10 feet by this summer.
According to the Government Accountability Office, it is being projected that a total of 40 U.S. states will be dealing with a shortage of water by the end of the next decade.
It has been said that “water is the new oil”, and this is just the beginning. The truth is that as bad as things are here, we are actually in far better shape than almost everyone else in the world to deal with the emerging global water crisis. All over the planet supplies of fresh water are disappearing, and the availability of water is going to increasingly become a major geopolitical issue in the years to come.
And even now, the U.S. government is taking all of this very seriously. In fact, the EPA is already trying to train our kids to take showers instead of baths…
Parents across America who struggle to keep their young rambunctious kids clean now have a new obstacle: the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).
As part of its effort to help save the planet from the dangers of taking too many baths, the EPA’s WaterSense program is trying to convince kids they should avoid bathtubs in favor of showers, which it says is a far more efficient use of water.
“To save even more water, keep your shower under five minutes long—try timing yourself with a clock next time you hop in!” the “WaterSense for Kids” website says.
For most of our lives, most of us have been able to take water for granted.
But now things are changing, and we are going to have to adjust to these new realities.
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That was 5 minutes of my life I just wasted reading that.
Much like the ZH posted article.
'Millions have fled..."?
And then all the idiot comments to boot.
Fact: Too many houses with lawns.
Fact: So many golf courses you can tee off at the coast and finish up in Phoenix AZ.
Fact: Too much big agriculture
Fact: Cycles of declining rain fall
Fact: Snow pack has not been deep enough or held on long enough (warmer temps at higher altitudes)
And for those that seem to have trouble understanding the food chain, those little smelt feed the bigger fish and birds which feeds even bigger fish and bigger birds. And now the sardine season was called off because of too few sardines. Which might explain all the starving sea lions showing up along the shore lines.
i have an appointment for a sales call in S Chicago tomorrow at 10 am. If anyone here wants to see what third world looks like you are welcome to join me. See, I still pay income taxes on my profits at the end of the year. What really bothers me the most is the ones breaking into my car while I am in a customers house selling my product or trying to, I am the one buying their lunch with their EBT cards. Our nation has become a cluster fuck of haves, have nots, will take what I think I should have, will coerce you with taxes because I don't have enough and Yada , yada yada. I had a group of them look at me very funny until mr Ruger came out of my holster. See, there is across the street and then there is just too close. They were approaching too damn close and I still had samples to put in my trunk. All is fair in love and war.
I think at last check Cook County ballots are printed in nine languages. You want political correctness? Come on down. You want powerful teachers and government unions? Come on down. Now it has just been discovered that someone with ties to the president of the school board was awarded a 20 million dollar contract to tuter "inner city" students. What ? 20 million? Peanuts. It is everwhere. How about everyone who paid a dime of federal income taxes just stays home for a week or two a month until this silliness stops?
Anyone want to see how I make a living? You can ride along, it can be fun. I prefer someone with a CCW permit though and if you are flying in for the adventure you may have some trouble at the airport.
Night all. 3rd world? Indeed.
Life in the heartland of the Uomi tribe.
Better known as Chiraq.
The only water crisis in california is that big corporate mega-farmers have grabbed up ancient unsupportable water rights and can literally use and waste all the water they remotely desire.
Water is part of the public commons yet we use a hodge-podge system of water rights dating back 100 years or more to portion it out. The same day I had to ask for a glass of drinking water in a restaurant I read that almond growers are planting additional acerage this year despite almonds being the most water intensive crop in existence.
We need a complete reset. Place a standardized price on surface water based on current supplies and apply it to municipalities, agriculture and industry equally. Then let the market take over. Set a standardized price on water pumped from the ground based on the depletion level of the water table.
Fuck these current political games of power and influence where the residential customer eats a huge price increase while almond growers get another 100 billion gallons of water essentially for free.
During the drought, farms have not been getting the allocations they've requested. The federal project is making no deliveries to farmers with water rights established after 1914, a move they also took last year. And the state is only planning to deliver 20 percent of requested water. Overall water deliveries last year were down 32.5 percent, according to the Farm Bureau.
Billions of gallons of water have been diverted from farmlands, according to a report by the Washington D.C.-based Heritage Foundation, with the American Farm Bureau estimating that between 400,000 acres and 500,000 acres of crops will be lost.
Meanwhile roughly 21 million-acre feet of water is flushed into the ocean annually.
http://www.scpr.org/news/2015/04/15/50941/10-things-to-know-about-califo...
Didn't you notice that last 70 years US was a command and control economy under guise of "free market". What you talking about are results of decisions taken high above just to do what it takes to hold on to power. What true market would show immediately is that these bunch of goons in charge have to go and that's why we do not have market economy.
It's not like that almond watering water drifts up into outer space and vanishes from the ecosystem. It could well be that the extra humidity it puts into the air is keeping things from getting even worse for you guys. Or that it runs off into the reservoir to buy you some more time to build infrastructure (which won't happen).
You're just reclaiming water that was stored eons ago and is finally being recycled back up to the surface.
But don't worry, California Central Planning is going to give you the Water Marketplace of your dreams.
Almonds water intensive? How about rice grown in the San Joaquin Valley?
A tomato uses 3x that of an almond. Lettuce 3.5x. Walnut 5x. One Broccoli head? 6x. One little grape requires 1 gal. That's just the reality of farming. Get it?
Almonds are not the enemy, and your stats don't pencil out. Nor does your flawed logic. Agriculture wastes water? Agriculture is not the problem. Human stupidity and perfidy is. Corporate money influincing politics is. Geo/climate engineering is. Your rant is completely misdirected.
This is good punishment for electing Feinstein. And I get some nuts to eat while I watch.
Well said Binko. Besides, I don't care for almonds and fuck people that drink almond milk.
and Harry, Jimmy, Trent, wherever you are out there, FUCK YOU TOO!
HOOOOWAAAAHHH!
They should pour salt on the entire state just to speed this up, I'm sick of listening to the democrateeees moaning.
If that state goes Republican or votes for Paul I'll do whatever I can to help.
Love it, can we use Sea Salt? LMAO
Oh come on, it's more than just the drought that makes California a third world country. It's the government, the people, and the total disrespect for private property and the rule of law.
Yeah. And they fact they they invited the entire third world to come live there for free is not helping their new third world status.
Michael Snuder has clearly never even seen the great state of California, the most beautiful state in the country. I wonder where he lives? Bring it Snyder enlighten us, name a place that can compare! Newsflash we've had deserts a long time, we also have the best cities weather and culture diversity mountains beaches islands and oceans and forests. People live in Cali and pay top dollar for a reason retard!
Yeah dude, like Compton and East LA are beautiful this time of year. Ya'll need to visit for the DIVERSITY!
Let me guess, Akron?
My Kingdom, My Kingdom, for a glass of water!
Arizona and Alaska are much prettier than California.
OK, now that all you Okies have settled in and gotten all comfy, it's time to head back east! Don't mind all the frakkin' earthquakes back home. At least they don't shake as hard as the fault line quakes out here!
¡Atention Por Favor! Hombes del Ejercito del Norte: Reportaje a Durango Muy Pronto!
Braindead Californians cut off water 8 years ago to save a little fish that didn't need saving and let the farmland dry up and blow away -- on purpose! So, fuck 'em. Anybody not braindead has moved out already. I hope those farmers moved to idaho and having the last laugh. Don't cry over anybody who won't cry over you.
but the fish, the fish, must save them
Water is the NEW OIL! Hallelujah...I'm fucking RICH...RICH I Tell YOU! Rains every other day here in SE ILLINOIS.....I have 5 Deep wells that can pump 24/7 and never rund dry.....so WTF??? I don't see anyone lining up to buy the shit.
can I get a gallon jug? what's the going price.
Build a bottling facility, hire a big P.R. firm, hit the trade shows. Maybe get a 'brand ambassador' onboard and create some bling. Look what that did for dirt-poor 'Kona Coffee' farmers. Was just another bean before that clever turnaround. Then maybe Nestlé will come-a-knockin....
Come to the ATL, we get more rain than the PNW. It's been wet and stormy for like 2 weeks here. We don't get months of drizzle, we get inches per day! A few years ago we got 79 inches. It's hot and humid here during the summer, but we get tons of sun, and nice warm spells during the winter. Lots of outsides here, but the politics is still run by the Southern elite. The Job market sucks!
On the plus side if you like women of color, there are tons of them! Also, tons of illegal Mexicans!
The main problem is that I can't grow my weed legally!
SH
What is he talking about. There is only 1 bicycle riding homeless person in 5 AA meetings that I attend. And the guy is always incredible clean and well dressed. The last speaker I heard last graduated from Cambridge and spoke about her upcoming trip to base camp at the foot of Everest. I go back to Pittsburgh to an AA meeting and it feels like I'm in the twilight zone. Got hootinannies back there.
Newsflash - California has been 3rd World for a long damn time!
Born in Burbank. Thank god I had the sense to leave in the early 70's.
Holy crap, I live in Arizona. They are going to come swarming over here like cockroaches, I can jus see it now. With any luck maybe they will go north instead. I hear the northwest is nice this time of year...
Just put up a bunch of Ted Cruz signs on the border and they'll whip a quick U-ie and head for Nevada.
As a fellow Arizonan I dread this possibility. Hopefully we get the Orange County crowd if we get any of them.
I think our state has a reputation that freaks out the more leftist Californians. I used to work on the state line and nearly all my clientele were Californians and they would often have derisive things to say about Arizona. Fuck'em.
My fellow CA residents are being total douchebags crying about why we just don't pipe the water in from other state. After all, we got to keep our pools full, our green lawns that we don't even enjoy green, and golf courses in 115F Palm Springs need to be nice and cool for all the retired golfers and other shits to trample on in comfort.
Radio hosts talking about just pump it out of Oregon. No wonder people hate Californians, CA douchebags feel entitled to their way of life no matter what the cost nor to whom. Like its our water to take!
While my locale is coastal sagebrush desert, it was once also flowing full of small creeks and marshes from natural groundwater sources as well as the usual snow pack melt. The 'developers' and 'planners' of the past decided to damn up the river, drain the water table, and turn the entire area into a concrete shit hole (aka San Bernardino, look it up). The Santa Ana river is being held back by an earthen dam that allows carpet bagger developers to build seas of housing tracts and empty warehouses where water once flowed. So now our river water is in control of some single entity. Not only that, the dam is holding up not fresh clean rain water, but murky shit mud that's worthless to everyone except some land developer who wants to build another 2,000 homes.
My grandparents generation remember days when they could get in a small canoe, row up a stream to downtown, or just enjoy the freshwater springs that dotted the valley. Heck, as a kid I even knew where there were a few springs that hadn't been pissed on or capped off by some developer. Now there is no water to gather from the river, and the only thing downtown has to offer is the usual dead body that was capped by some EBT zombie.
A brilliant and dead-on accurate post.
I remember in the 60's, the vineyards of Upland/Cucamonga, the ginormous citrus groves of S.B/Highland/Highgrove/Riverside. All gave way to the bulldozers and builders. The air quality was deadly, but it was beautiful back then, but there were real winters with snow-capped mountains and abundant winter/spring rainfall.... Those were the days my friend, we thought they'd never end...
Need a border fence now,!!!!!
Give me control of a country's Oil, Gas, Gold and Water, and I care not who prints its fiat money.
Give me control of a nation's supply of firearms and they'll all work for me and my pals, including the bankers.
Couldn't happen to a better group of lefties. I've personally upped my consumption of Nestle bottled water & walnuts from the Central Valley. I've also discovered an appreciation for almonds. Drain them dry.
I've discovered an appreciation for growing my own fruit trees and vegetables, plus a nice green lawn to lie on and look at the stars. Unfortunately, I'm on the Eastern Slope Arkansas watershed rather than the Western Slope Colorado one, but, hey, I'm there for all the lovely California Democrats in theory at least.
I've lived in quite a few different states, but prefer California to them all. The cost of living is higher, but it's worth it to me. And I don't know of anybody that has moved because of the drought. It's total BS to suggest people are leaving because of it.
And as far as weather manipulation...it is absolutely true that it's happening here. I've stood next to the towers along the Sierra crest that spew the stuff into the air. And yes, they use airplanes too. But the big weather manipulation programs actually try to add snowpack and water to the region...not dry out the state. For just one example see this: https://www.dri.edu/cloudseeding
And I like almonds and think it's fine to "waste" water to grow them and all the other food crops that the nation eats that are grown in the central valley. When it comes to wasting water, let's look at the insanely stupid fracking industry, which also gets a pass on the new water restrictions.
stupid is as stupid does. you confirm, CA may have a water drought, but the brain drain is beyond comprehension.
The smart ones have already left. I knew about drought predictions back in 2003 and left in 2006. The 2003 prediction was 40 years out, but it's happening now and is worse than the worst case predictions. I was born and raised in California during its golden years, but those days are long gone. All the places I used to enjoy are overrun by locals and tourists, housing prices are beyond ridiculous, you take your life in your hands driving on the freeway, and air pollution is terrible. Please please please STAY IN CALIFORNIA - we've got too many in my new home state as it is.
Agreed on most points. Agriculture is not the problem. Golf courses and residential subdivisions in the desert, and a continuing proliferation of vineyards (non-essential), and those frikking frackers to name just a few water wasters, are the issue.
Wrong about the weather modification. Returned here to ag-rich central coast winter '11 during the deluge. Since then been watching GE increase in parallel with the deflected winter weather. And the increase of farms/orchards/vineyards for sale. And they are selling. But to whom?
Documentation here:
http://www.geoengineeringwatch.org/killing-california-climate-engineerin...
http://www.geoengineeringwatch.org/the-engineered-incineration-of-califo...
Got weather and/or ag commodities derivitives?
water futures. hmmmm.
What do you do to a tumor that's full of malignent cancerous cells? You wage chemotherapy warfare against it until it pops.
Then all those infected cells will jump into the bloodstream / lymph system and travel through the entire body politic.
I'd like to say this is a fictional account of how a malicious doctor would kill a patient, but it looks like a blueprint for our country.
Millions have left... bullshit.
The State of California is known to cause Cancer.
And yet they continue to allow thousands of gallons of water to be used in their fracking operations
Actually it's millions of gallons.
Hopefully, the "Big One" will hit and wipe out all those Californians and wetbacks so they don't migrate and fuck up the rest of the country!
We've been had. This is the NAU. Better watch out, kitty is on the menu now.
Take a look at how they handle drough in Africa.
http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=1fe_1310865020
Ace of Spades and high speed trains to nowhere in the West LA.
If California allows 5 million more third world immigrants in, the water problem will be solved. Trust me.
..."farmers spending $750k to drill a 1,800 foot water well..."
That is pure, total Bull Shit. I can drill a 525 metre-app. 1,800 feet well here in Canada for $50k American and make a profit.
They need to stampede everyone into dumping their homes at rock bottom prices so they can be bought cheaply, then discover there wasn't a water problem after all.
The solution, as always in a democracy/yidocracy, is to vote for the candidate who promises the most.
I've been wondering for awhile if there is an agenda here to get people to move out of California. I teach my 9-yr-old at home and we have an older social studies book and learn a lot of American history. My less politically skewered social studies book talks about early California, how Europeans rerouted water into the state because it was so dry. What happened a 2-3 decades ago? The environmentalists were going on an on about saving the smelt fish. They claimed the way water had been routed into the state was destroying the smelt fish's habitat. So the govt ok'd rerouting water back out of the state's interior to empty back to the Pacific. Does not anyone else see a problem with this? I learned a few years ago that California has one of the largest economies in the world......like one of the top 3 or 5 economies worldwide. The state is full of resources. We know that Harry Reid was trying to force out ranchers in Nevada to provide a huge solar farm for the Chinese. I'm sure all this is to repay debt. I also read a couple years ago that Nixon made an agreement with foreign nations to allow our public lands to pay back debt if ever the dollar should fail. I don't know all the details on that but is it possible some of the problems in California could be related to all these things? Just a thought.
I've been wondering for awhile if there is an agenda here to get people to move out of California. I teach my 9-yr-old at home and we have an older social studies book and learn a lot of American history. My less politically skewered social studies book talks about early California, how Europeans rerouted water into the state because it was so dry. What happened a 2-3 decades ago? The environmentalists were going on an on about saving the smelt fish. They claimed the way water had been routed into the state was destroying the smelt fish's habitat. So the govt ok'd rerouting water back out of the state's interior to empty back to the Pacific. Does not anyone else see a problem with this? I learned a few years ago that California has one of the largest economies in the world......like one of the top 3 or 5 economies worldwide. The state is full of resources. We know that Harry Reid was trying to force out ranchers in Nevada to provide a huge solar farm for the Chinese. I'm sure all this is to repay debt. I also read a couple years ago that Nixon made an agreement with foreign nations to allow our public lands to pay back debt if ever the dollar should fail. I don't know all the details on that but is it possible some of the problems in California could be related to all these things? Just a thought.
Read Victor Davis Hansen on this topic. He is a retired professor and native of the rural Fresno area where he resides on what's left of the family farm. He's been documenting that area's descent into Third World status for some time. Outside of the coastal plain, it's already lawless chaos.
"$750k to drill a 1,800 foot water well"
WTF???? If everything else in this article is as inaccurate as this I've just wasted 5 minutes of my life reading it.