OhioNews Bureau

ONB COLUMBUS: News report Friday suggest that Indiana is ready to join a regional, eight-state compact designed to prevent water-challenged states like Georgia or Alabama or others from siphoning off fresh water from the Great Lakes, which waterphiles say hold about 20 percent of the world’s supply of surface fresh water.

"Climate" is a word with several definitions. From Answer.com, here's the dictionary definition:

1. The meteorological conditions, including temperature, precipitation, and wind, that characteristically prevail in a particular region.
2. A region of the earth having particular meteorological conditions: lives in a cold climate.
3. A prevailing condition or set of attitudes in human affairs: a climate of unrest.

For additional clarity (at risk of exceeding "fair use" restrictions), here's the thesaurus listing:

1. The totality of surrounding conditions and circumstances affecting growth or development: ambiance, atmosphere, environment, medium, milieu, mise en scène, surroundings, world.
2. A prevailing quality, as of thought, behavior, or attitude: mood, spirit, temper, tone.

So, to truly address "climate change" in today's world, should we not address both functional definitions -- namely, not just the meteorological but also the social/political?

Chris Adams/McClatchy:
Payments vary greatly for new veterans with mental illness
WASHINGTON — Veterans coming home from the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan with debilitating mental ailments are discovering that their disability payments from the government vary widely depending on where they live, an exclusive McClatchy analysis has found.

Read, learn, try to remain calm. More/earlier articles @ Chris Adams McClatchy page.
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When the well is dry we learn the worth of water. ~~Benjamin Franklin

[Learning the worth of water]
The Nobel Prize-winning Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change's fourth international assessment released earlier this year predicted that "drought-affected areas will likely increase"

Why are oil prices rising? Because they can . . .

FP: Seven Questions: The Price of Fear
"Something funny has happened to the price of oil: It no longer reflects reality. The reason, according to Fadel Gheit, one of Wall Street's top energy analysts, is that “financial players have seized control of the oil markets”. Find out how they did it in this week’s Seven Questions."

[Via Grist.org, which is sponsoring today's candidate forum on climate & energy. Streaming here, just getting started.]