NEW YORK (Thomson Reuters Foundation) – Protecting the infrastructure of American cities from the effects of climate change is rising on the agenda of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, according to a top agency official.
“Increasingly, we’ve moved not only from a security focus to a resiliency focus,” said Caitlin Durkovich, assistant secretary for infrastructure protection at Homeland Security, an agency better known for its fight to curb terrorist threats.
Durkovich spoke Thursday on a panel at the Rising Seas Summit, a three-day conference organized by the U.S.-based Association of Climate Change Officers to discuss tools and ideas on building resiliency, particularly against rising sea levels.
In the aftermath of 2012’s Hurricane Sandy, which devastated large swathes of the Northeastern U.S and caused over $60 billion in damages, Durkovich said her department reviewed the task of rebuilding with a new focus on “how to think about baking in resilience from the get-go.”
To that end, she said, she has assembled a team of specialists, including city planners, in conjunction with the National Academy of Science to develop better tools for planning. The Department of Homeland Security already has launched regional efforts to assess resilience of infrastruction and judge where gaps in adaptation and preparedness may be, she said.
Full story here: http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/09/25/us-foundation-climate-security-idUSKCN0HK2PW20140925
Homeland Security is clearly confused. Their target is supposed to be the black flag of IS not their own green flag of climate change. It is time to sent in the men in white coats to carry them away before they do real damage.
It’s not Homeland Security. It’s the President. The agencies operate under his direction.
Typical civil service job spec. creep. Give them an inch and they’ll take a mile. Job creep gives them the excuse to multiply their numbers like the cockroaches they are.
I think it is planned. How else to you explain the primary mission of NASA being to make those from the “religion of peace” feel good about themselves?
really, I mean primary mission…http://stevengoddard.wordpress.com/2014/09/27/nasas-administrator-explains-their-primary-mission/
I believe this is all part of attempting to force Coastal communities to make laws and regulations based on unrealistic, wildly exaggerated climate models predicting up to a meter of sea level rise by 2100. The goal being to take away prime, private property from the average American.
“To that end, she said, she has assembled a team of specialists, including city planners, in conjunction with the National Academy of Science to develop better tools for planning.”
National Academy of Science? Wasn’t that first known as the State Sciences Institute?
“The Department of Homeland Security already has launched regional efforts to assess resilience of infrastruction and judge where gaps in adaptation and preparedness may be, she said.” ”
Let me rephrase…. “Liberty…. you don’t need no stinkin’ liberty.’
Hmmmm… Are Homeland Security also testing for resiliency against renewable energy blackouts?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Northeast_blackout_of_1965
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Northeast_blackout_of_2003
Long-term blackouts represent the greatest threat to any technological nation that there could possibly be. Nations like the US would go back to the Dark Ages (literally) inside a week. And yet this piece on the 2003 blackout, from the Huffington Post, considers cyber-hacking a greater threat to the electrical grid than renewable energy. Is anyone taking this problem seriously?
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/08/12/northeast-blackout_n_3741203.html
.
I propose a serious WUWT risk analysis question.
Ok, you are living in New York or Washington, and the electrical supply goes off for a week or ten days. Never mind what would NOT be working, we would be here all day. Instead, please give us a list of what civic and commercial systems would still be working, during a long-term electricity outage.
Answers on the back of a postcard (as children’s TV used to say) ……….
Ralph
I guess they must be running short of terrorists. The main national security threat from global warming is solely due to an unhealthy obsession with it when there are other real problems in the world.
Many on this site claim that the readers here believe in evidence and logic. In many ways this is indeed true, but many seem to have a real blind spot when it comes to certain topics. Politics is one of those topics.
The history of the US Empire is one of a continual expansion of power in the center. The central government has taken over and the States are no longer the entities they were in the beginning. We live in a time where even the phrase “state’s rights” is not to be mentioned in polite company. So give up on the idea that you have a representative republic — that is a dead letter.
What you must realize is that the Nation-State itself (hereafter referred to as “the state”) is not what you think it is. Murray Rothbard described the anatomy of the state many years ago in an essay that is well worth your time today to read — and re-read.
Anatomy of the State
Politics is all about control and making you slave for the benefit of those in power. And so, there is nothing “odd” about the homeland security department’s actions at all. It is just more movement toward the total police state that is being built all around you.
In my essay The State answers Winston Smith I quote from 1984 where an official of the “inner party” tells Winston Smith the true aim of the state:
I have to say that the block quotes in this theme are horrid. Work of the devil I say. 🙁
The drop shadow effect is too pronounced; should be about 50% smaller and lighter.
I see planners should always plan for extreme weather caused by climate change. Remember that cool period?
[Transcribed by me from an image – advanced apologies for any errors]
More reports, letters and planning. Why don’t these fools just wait a bit longer and see? Don’t they know that the climate does in fact change?
History repeats itself.
In all fairness, Jimbo, I’ve often wondered if the White House wasn’t on a bit of a hair-trigger about climate issues during the Cold War. Open air nuclear tests, and who-knows-what other stuff that was done, much of which could very well have had bigger effects than intended.
Just a thought.
Then again, it’s also difficult to explain to the younger generation that back in the 70s, we knew that an ice age was coming, just as we knew that our chances of dying in a nuclear war were probably higher than any other way. Because they’re too busy knowing that man-made climate change will kill them and destroy the planet.
The primary concern that faced the framers of the constitution was how to limit the powers of the central government. The entire document is one of restraints, restrictions and specific, enumerated powers. The framers intended to have the states in charge of the federal government. Not the other way around. Then the supreme court got ahold of the commerce clause and decided that the power to regulate commerce between states and with foreign powers meant that they could tell farmers how much wheat they could grow. Even if the wheat was not to be used for interstate commerce, because the threat of the farmer selling it hung over the marketplace and might affect the price. This expanded into other commodities and soon the feds were telling companies what ingredients they could put in their products, how it was to be packaged etc.
. Today, because of the commerce clause, the federal government regulates just about everything in your home. It regulates what kind of car you can drive and the gas you put in it. It regulates your mortgage, provides student loans, regulates the kind of lightbulb you can use. Ask yourself what the government doesn’t regulate. Now they want to regulate co2. Where does it end?
It ends in an oppressive monarchy – which is precisely what the Framers of the Constitution wanted to avoid. But we have people in power to whom the phrase ‘checks and balances’ must be something about finance. And don’t realize that a Congress that is not doing anything is precisely what the Framers intended.
I’ve got a pen. And I’ve got a phone.
Tom J, I understand where you are coming from but has anyone suggested shoving the pen down his throat and the phone up his ….
I’m having trouble trying to decide if I should hit the post comment button. It’s just a thought. Should I do it or not? The world will see my comment. Should I do it? Homeland Security may put me on the watch list. It could be considered disrespectful to the “emperor.”
Ene mene mine mo. I think I just hit the “post comment” button.
To understand what is happening to our society in the area of ‘security’, you need to go back in history to WW2.
Before WW2 governments in the West were small, and mainly ‘outward-looking’ – they mediated relations with foreign states. Then came an era of ‘total war’, and governments everywhere started to take control of their countries’ economies, in order to direct war production. In particular, the concept of ‘extra-judicial’ security services grew – when your country is fighting for its life you can’t afford to go through the ‘usual procedures’ if you see a threat. So you develop ‘inward-looking’ control processes.
A lot of people were involved in these jobs, and they made a good living out of them. A big bureaucracy arose to direct war production – an easy job with no chance of being sacked for inefficiency. Similarly, if you worked in ‘government security’ all the way through the ‘Cold War’ you weren’t even going to be audited, let alone sacked for failure. Compared to the external world, these jobs positively encouraged laziness and concealment of the truth – a mark of bureaucracy everywhere.
Eisenhower warned us. Northcote Smith warned us. Lots of people have pointed the issue out. But when half your population depend on these jobs, no one is going to rock the boat. For ‘security’, the biggest boat rocking came with the end of the Cold War, and the collapse of the justification for the whole secret defence infrastructure.
Ever since then, the US and UK ‘secret security industries’ have been looking for, and frantically trying to encourage, a replacement for the Cold War justification for their existence. They have pushed politicians into continuous destabilisation of the Middle East, at a cost of millions of lives. Amazingly, they are trying to claim that ANY big money-spending craze, such as Global Warming, has a ‘security’ dimension. ‘Wars’ on drugs, on terror, all are justifications for the retention of the budget they have been defending since 1945.
This is NOT an ‘evil government’ trying to take control of our lives. It is worse. It is a cancer of our society – a group of people noticing that they can have a better life by not producing and living off others instead. This group has now become huge and powerful, and, just like a tumour, it will bring the whole body of society down unless it is removed….
This is not new. French revolution would be a good example.
This is the road to disaster…
Mission creep and empire building upon what is already a huge sprawling bureaucracy…
The only hope is every theory associated with any catastrophe or disaster from climate change is soundly disproved… And then future scholars will gaze back at this as a period of collective insanity.
But if it warms, even a little bit, over coming decades… We are doomed to some form of slavery to the bureaucrats, and worse, to security organisations dedicated ti saving us.
DoD has been badgered into listing clmate change as a “threat” for some time. Consider this report from 2007 from the War College:
http://strategicstudiesinstitute.army.mil/events/details.cfm?q=82
And then don’t forget this:
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=121352495
Once the camel’s nose is under the tent…
With the observed and forecast radical slumping solar output, I sincerely hope that they also consider a cooling scenario as threat.
During a heavy rain, a combination of twigs and leaves blocked the gutter causing water to cascade down the back of my house and cause some flooding in the cellar. I had not realized that this required Homeland Security intervention due to it being a national security threat. Next time I’ll call Homeland Security.
Yes, sounds silly, but just as silly as natural catatophies being managed by the same organization created to fight what has become a perpetual war with various nations and groups from the middle east.
Our federal government has become a bureaucracy without bounds and uncontrolled growth, this becomes especially problematic when certain of those bureaucracies have rationalized themselves to be able to circumvent the rule of law due to being at a war.
DHS fulfilling it’s primary mission—protecting it’s budget from harm.
Obama’s goal will be to grab as much “climate fund” money as possible then dish it out to all the party faithful ; city councils, green groups, religious organisations etc. as possible, with the idea of bolstering support and buying votes for the party at the next elections. If climate change falters as an important issue which it seems it may do, he can suddenly discover that there were certain scientific bodies and scientists that misled government and ramped it up beyond reality. I don’t think I’d like to be sitting in an EPA seat right now?
We really like this blog – keep up the great work!
Would you consider a reciprocal link exchange with Common Cents??
You can find us at http://www.commoncts.blogspot.com
THANKS!
“Rising Seas Summit, a three-day conference organized by the U.S.-based Association of Climate Change Officers to discuss tools and ideas on building resiliency, particularly against rising sea levels.”
What a waste of money. They need 3 days to talk about preparing for 3 cm sea rise in next 10 years? How about preparing for 60 cm sea rise in next 12 hours? It’s called high tide.
“Odd – Dept. of Homeland Security testing programs for climate change as ‘national threat’”
Odd?? Someone should make more of an effort to keep up!
Are they making an effort to deal with trolls, I wonder?
Initially, Adolf Hitler had his Brownshirts; now we will have our Blueshirts. The good news is that if DHS will allow TSA to execute the strategy it will take a very long time to implement and enforce.
The barbarians are literally at the gate, and “Homeland” is talking “climate change”.
The fruits of progressivism are ripening.
I wonder how a dirty bomb in Los Angeles or New York affects the climate.
Don Quijote de Obama obviously hasn’t realized that climate is your friend and not your enemy if you are willing to adapt. So he orders his churl Sancho Homeland to prepare for him the ground for another attack on the sails of the ever turning windmills of change. Yet another battlefield without the slightest chance of victory. Stupidity has a name and is in office….
Not really surprising. Homeland Security is an agency in turmoil, suffering from senior staff departures, endless intramural fights with older federal agencies, and generally low morale. Bureaucracies with huge budgets who can’t find a unifying vision and mission simply go looking for new issues to justify their existence. The same thing happened in the ’80s when the federal purse opened up in response to AIDS. Suddenly everyone was justifying their budget as somehow relevant to AIDS.
This is not unique to US government or even government at all. On the Tonight Show the week of the first Apollo moon landing, Johnny Carson went through the newspaper and showed some ads attempting to link their featured product to that stunning successful event. The only one I remember was for a mattress company, depicting a US Navy ship and stating:
(I may have the company wrong; it’s been a while).
Carson’s point was the specific virtues of these products, whatever they might be, had no actual contribution to the successful moon landing, but the companies wanted to create that association anyway.
Global Warming is a proven winner in budget allocations and the limited attention span of our current President, so Homeland Security is just trying to ride a proven issue to get them out of their present morass.
From Al Gore’s book, ‘Earth in the Balance’ there is this well known quote; “Adopting a central organizing principle – one agreed to voluntarily- means embarking on an all-out effort to use every policy and program, every law and institution, every treaty and alliance, every tactic and strategy, every plan and course of action – to use, in short, every means to halt the destruction of the environment…”
Take out the word ‘voluntarily’ and I think the foregoing is an accurate description of what’s going on here.
What? You don’t think Obama is doing this ‘voluntarily’ ?
While this administration wastes billions, focusing on global warming and human caused climate change that is not happening, we should be doing the complete opposite to prepare for what really is happening……….colder and snowier Winters.
http://www.wallstreetdaily.com/2014/09/02/coal-burning-power-plants/
http://www.emergencymgmt.com/disaster/Snow-Plowing-Punish-State-Budgets.html
http://www.thefiscaltimes.com/Articles/2014/04/16/Hazardous-Roads-Ahead-US-Highways
Oblivious to the reality staring us in the face from the natural cycle shift a decade ago, which will likely bring more brutal Winters over the next 2 decades, the actions of our government, bring to mind the “blood letting” treatment by ancient doctors.
The treatment for a sick patient, weakens and kills them because the doctor is ignorant of the actual illness and the doctor attacks their body, not the invader.
https://www.princeton.edu/~achaney/tmve/wiki100k/docs/Bloodletting.html
You sound like you really believe this is just an error in judgement. Please make no mistake.The president and his administration leaders know where these policies will lead our country. This is not a wrong track. It is the fundamental change Obama campaigned on. Those of us who bothered to look into what he said and took him at his word are not surprised. Disappointed, yes. But, not surprised. Don’t forget he’s still building his civilian army just as big and well equipped. I don’t recall what his purpose was for that civilian army.
Concur. Your statements mirror my own perspectives and conclusions concerning Our Dear Leader and his agenda.