From USA TODAY: UNITED NATIONS – In a bracing speech to the United Nations, President Trump threatened Tuesday to "destroy" North Korea if it does not give up its nuclear weapons program.

Is he trying to start a war? For real?

A "bracing speech"? WTF, USA TODAY.

We cannot let ourselves get derailed by the shitstorm the Trump administration calls their foreign policy. We still have to make those phone calls to stop Trumpcare.

INDIVISIBLE just unveiled a new calling tool for folks in Blue States who want to help stop Trumpcare: Calls to Kill TrumpCare. We can't call our Senators--well, we can but mine are both Democrats and they are not the problem here. But we can make calls to our counterparts in key Red States and ask them to call their Senators.

How California — yes, California — could make a Trump reelection more difficult. YES!

Atlas Obscura: Found: 30 Lost English Words That May Deserve a Comeback.

Well, well, well. I think "betrump" deserves a comeback. Betrump: To deceive, cheat; to elude, slip from. Examples: I think our entire country is getting betrumped on a daily basis. Don't let yourselves get betrumped! Curses! Betrumped again! See what I mean? So useful. So accurate.

During Irma’s Power Outages, Some Houses Kept The Lights On With Solar And Batteries. Of course, if the roof has blown off or the living room has been flooded, having solar power doesn't mean all that much. Also, we're paying to help folks rebuild in the same flood zones over and over again. Maybe that needs to change?

USA TODAY: Dear Texas, how many times do we have to rebuild the same house? (You're next Florida). It's a reasonable question, imho.

Two years before NFIP was created, the 1966 Presidential Task Force on Federal Flood Control Policy warned that a badly run program 'could exacerbate the whole problem of flood losses. For the federal government to subsidize low premium disaster insurance ... would be to invite economic waste of great magnitude.' That sage advice was ignored.

The Atlantic: Has Climate Change Intensified 2017’s Western Wildfires? Long story, short: Yes. It has.

VOX: The brilliant, infuriating, boring, hypnotic Ken Burns documentary on The Vietnam War. The documentarian’s latest miniseries for PBS is a staggering achievement — and maybe his best work. I watched the first episode. It was good. I learned new things about Vietnam and its history. We keep making the same mistakes, over and over again. This has to stop.

ARGH.

From Slate: Republicans Are Seriously Getting Optimistic About Passing Obamacare Repeal Again.

That's bad enough but that's not the worst part.

My colleague Jordan Weissmann has written about how the Graham-Cassidy bill is not the moderate compromise its backers make it out to be. The bill would essentially collapse Obamacare’s market subsidies and Medicaid expansion by replacing them with block grants allotted to each state to design their own health systems, with few strings attached. Those grants would be determined by a complex formula that, relative to current law, punishes large blue states or those that expanded Medicaid while rewarding red states that didn’t. Like previous GOP bills, Graham-Cassidy would also set slow-growing per-capita caps on traditional Medicaid, and allow states to waive out of core Obamacare insurance regulations. It would defund Planned Parenthood for one year.

That's right. This bill punishes states like California and New York for expanding Medicaid under the provisions of the Affordable Care Act while rewarding the states that didn't. It takes money away from my state because we provided healthcare benefits for our residents and gives it to the likes of TEXAS, which didn't. TEXAS!

Ending the Affordable Care Act while at the same time rewarding people in the states that did vote for Trump and punishing people who live in the states that didn't vote him. Wow. Now that's a WIN-WIN.

Those FUCKERS.

( More angry ranting )

The INDIVISIBLE website has everything you need to know to help stop this travesty. AGAIN.

You won this before. Now it's time to win it again. Let's #KillTheBill.

VOX: Photos: what Hurricane Irma’s destruction looks like on the ground

NPR: The Rubble And Recovery Of U.S. Virgin Islands: 'Will We Survive The Aftermath?'

Huffington Post: After Irma, Tim Duncan Pens Emotional Plea: Don’t Forget The U.S. Virgin Islands

NYT: Desperation Mounts in Caribbean Islands: 'All the Food Is Gone'

The Rachel Maddow Show on MSNBC: U.S.Virgin Islands facing dire circumstances after Hurricane Irma

You can donate to help the U.S. Virgin Islands. Retired San Antonio Spurs' superstar Tim Duncan has donated $250,000 and will match up to one million dollars.

Conde Naste Traveler has international donation suggestions: How to Help Victims of Hurricane Irma in the Caribbean.

Rollcall: Opinion: A Big-Spending Liberal Is a Conservative Who Has Been Flooded.

Popular Mechanics: How to Rebuild Our Infrastructure in This Age of Superstorms | These are not once-in-a-lifetime events.

NPR:
Air Pollution From Industry Plagues Houston In Harvey's Wake

Montanans Pitch In To Bring Clean Air To Smoky Classrooms. We're having a really bad fire season season here in the West and Northwest.

The Guardian: How climate change triggers earthquakes, tsunamis and volcanoes | Global warming may not only be causing more destructive hurricanes, it could also be shaking the ground beneath our feet.

In the wake of the recent hurricanes, monsoon flooding, wildfires, and earthquakes, I hope everyone is taking the time to review their own disaster preparations: check and replenish supplies, go over evacuation plans, update insurance. The time to stock up on water, food, gasoline and batteries is not after the shit hits the fan.

REPOSTED FROM FEMA: September is National Preparedness Month.

Everything South City: Are YOU Prepared for a Disaster? September is Disaster Preparedness Month!

The National Weather Service: Don't Wait. Communicate

The Sweethome: The Best Emergency Preparedness Supplies. I don't know about "the best." It's a decent review site, especially if you have no money worries and infinite storage space. I do appreciate that one of the editors lives in California so earthquake preparedness is addressed along with the usual extreme weather emergencies.

To spread out the pain, for the past few years, I've been trying to buy one or two items a month. I disagree with some of their picks; for example, I can see no reason that anyone's emergency kit needs a $30 water bottle, especially since the site claims the recommendations are for people sheltering at home. What's wrong with using a glass or a cup that you already own? Of course, that wouldn't generate any income for the site, now would it? Unless you lift weights, I wouldn't go for the seven gallon storage jug that weighs close to sixty pounds when full. Where would you keep it in between disasters? Plus you have to remember to dump it and replace the water every year. If money is no object, and you have storage space to spare, why not get Blue Can Water, which has a shelf life of 50 years? I'll never have to buy emergency water again! I can leave it to my son in my will!

One urgent problem that I never see addressed in articles on emergency preparedness is waste management. What are you supposed to do you do when the sewer system no longer functions, for days, weeks, or even, in the case of a catastrophic earthquake, a year or longer? No worries- PHLUSH (Public Hygiene Lets Us Stay Human) has you covered. Under "Emergency Toilet Systems" there is a menu of Nine Actions You Can Take, including instructions on how to Make a Twin Bucket Toilet. You can buy the cheapest bucket/seat combo at REI for about twenty bucks. They're also available at Amazon but only to Prime Members. Yes, those assholes have no shame. Walmart is currently sold out, which isn't surprising given that the USA is coping with two major weather disasters.

The problem is not confined to natural disasters. The way we routinely deal with our pee and poop is in itself a disaster in the making.

Slate: Minds in the Toilet: There's a sewage crisis, so hold your nose and think hard. This review of Rose George's The Big Necessity: The Unmentionable World of Human Waste and Why It Matters (2008) is enlightening enough that I'm adding it to my to-read list. To summarize, Western-style sewage disposal is polluting our water and destroying our oceans; meanwhile, "Four in ten people have no access to any latrine, toilet, bucket or box. Nothing." The bottom line: The way we deal with human waste is unsustainable. Think about it. In a warming world in which drinking water is fast becoming a scarce commodity, it makes no sense to pollute our precious water supply with waste products while simultaneously spending billions of dollars trying to clean it up.

Finally, Behold The Fatberg: London's 130-Ton, 'Rock-Solid' Sewer Blockage. This is a recurring human-caused disaster, one that results from people who dispose of those so-called flushable wipes down the toilet, plus other individuals who dump their cooking grease down the kitchen sink. I can almost understand the wipes because of the way the packaging falsely claims they can be safely flushed (there should be a law against that, dammit), but there is no excuse for dumping grease into a sewer line. EVER.