Officially, mariner has returned home from Chicken Little’s hen house. He did watch the democratic convention. News is show biz. The actual participants in the convention, however, really put on a professional Broadway show. So the race is about to start: 74 days to election day. One’s vote is just like buying a lottery ticket or a ticket to a Taylor Swift show.

Less acute as an issue but a great deal more impactful is recent news from environmental scientists. They have begun to provide comparatively more accurate timelines about global warming. Speaking very generally, the planet will be a different planet by the end of the century.

One factor is melting polar ice. He just read that they are melting faster each year. If they melt at their present increasing rate, scientists predict a rise of as much as 50 feet in ocean level by 2100. As the years pass, anyone living near the Tropical Zone (between Tropic of Cancer in the north  (23°26′ N) and the Tropic of Capricorn in the south ( 23°26′ S.) will experience a significant increase in temperatures and storms. In terms of the U.S, Phoenix is just 486 miles above the Tropical Zone at 32º18′, Brownsville Texas just 162 miles above at 26º10′ and Florida just 54 miles at 24º49′.

Global warming is an economic issue. Already the United States has had to spend an extra 11 billion on this phenomenon. Add to that overhead the same circumstances in other nations around the world – from Haiti to China.

Whether Donald or Kamala, they will be forced to address this issue in addition to all the economic political arguments we expect to hear.

Ancient Mariner