29 June 2006

Treaty Obligations, Hamden, al Qaeda and the Supremes

The Supreme Court of the United States has ruled against a military tribunal for the captured Yemeni Salim Ahmed Hamden, a chauffeur for Osama bin Laden, while in Afghanistan by US Forces. Transferred to Guantanamo, Hamdan challenged the authority of a tribunal to decide if he was or was not an unarmed combatant and should be held for military tribunal. To this is the following citation of the Geneva Conventions, looking at them at the genevaconventions.org website [italics mine]:

Customary Laws

The following are rules applicable in all conflicts, regardless of whether the countries in question are signatories of the Geneva Conventions and regardless of whether the warring party in question is recognized as an independent state. Warring parties must obey the rules spelled out in the common article 3 of the Geneva Conventions, which requires that prisoners of war and wounded combatants be protected from murder; discrimination based on race, religion, sex, and similar criteria; mutilation, cruel treatment and torture; humiliating and degrading treatment; and sentencing or execution without a fair trial.

In addition, the following are forbidden towards any persons in an area of armed conflict:
  • Torture, mutilation, rape, slavery and arbitrary killing
  • Genocide
  • Crimes against humanity which include: forced disappearance and deprivation of humanitarian aid
  • War crimes which include: apartheid, biological experiments, hostage taking, attacks on cultural objects, and depriving people of the right to a fair trial.
Now Common Articles also get mentioned, specifically 2 and 3 by the Court, so here they are [italics mine]:

Art. 2. In addition to the provisions which shall be implemented in peace time, the present Convention shall apply to all cases of declared war or of any other armed conflict which may arise between two or more of the High Contracting Parties, even if the state of war is not recognized by one of them.

The Convention shall also apply to all cases of partial or total occupation of the territory of a High Contracting Party, even if the said occupation meets with no armed resistance.

Although one of the Powers in conflict may not be a party to the present Convention, the Powers who are parties thereto shall remain bound by it in their mutual relations. They shall furthermore be bound by the Convention in relation to the said Power, if the latter accepts and applies the provisions thereof.

Art. 3. In the case of armed conflict not of an international character occurring in the territory of one of the High Contracting Parties, each Party to the conflict shall be bound to apply, as a minimum, the following provisions: (1) Persons taking no active part in the hostilities, including members of armed forces who have laid down their arms and those placed hors de combat by sickness, wounds, detention, or any other cause, shall in all circumstances be treated humanely, without any adverse distinction founded on race, colour, religion or faith, sex, birth or wealth, or any other similar criteria. To this end the following acts are and shall remain prohibited at any time and in any place whatsoever with respect to the above-mentioned persons: (a) violence to life and person, in particular murder of all kinds, mutilation, cruel treatment and torture; (b) taking of hostages; (c) outrages upon personal dignity, in particular, humiliating and degrading treatment; (d) the passing of sentences and the carrying out of executions without previous judgment pronounced by a regularly constituted court affording all the judicial guarantees which are recognized as indispensable by civilized peoples. (2) The wounded and sick shall be collected and cared for. An impartial humanitarian body, such as the International Committee of the Red Cross, may offer its services to the Parties to the conflict.

The Parties to the conflict should further endeavorour to bring into force, by means of special agreements, all or part of the other provisions of the present Convention.

The application of the preceding provisions shall not affect the legal status of the Parties to the conflict.
Fascinating stuff! So here is how it goes... al Qaeda is a not a recognized independent State nor is it an 'armed force' of any State or non recognized State. In point of fact al Qaeda is no State at all, but a group of individuals using terror across multiple States to gain their ends. And they categorically REJECT the Geneva Conventions.

Although the Supreme Court finds the non-State recognition persuasive, it presumes that this non-recognized independent organization is a State. The Geneva Conventions, as later noted, are amongst States and non-recognized independent States. In other words, these folks have got to have land under their control and a system of rules of conduct to fall anywhere close to the State based categorization system. All of the Geneva Conventions were drafted with State-based conflicts in mind and with groups, such as guerilla organizations declaring a State but having no international recognition of same, as covering these things. To include entities who are actively AVOIDING becoming a State so as to refuse any State based obligation is to give them much higher recognition than is allowed by the System of Nation States and Treaty obligations. The Taliban, by raising a flag and declaring a State DO fall under this, but al Qaeda and all other Transnational Terrorist organizations do not. Without a State al Qaeda can not even become a Contracting Party to the Conventions.

Further in Article 2, which enjoins that if only one Party to a conflict is a signatory that it shall be bound by these conventions, it does not address the fact that the other side may not be considered a 'party' because it lacks not only recognition but the ability to Contract and BE a party to ANYTHING. al Qaeda scoffs at all laws and treaties between Nations and does not believe in the Nation State, save as a necessary and temporary tool to its global goals. By reasoning that al Qaeda has State based legitimacy to become a Contracting Party is to flout all diplomacy that has been built up over the past 150 years or so.

So Article 2 is uncompelling to my eyes in that area.

The Supreme Court, however, in ruling this way has now ruled that al Qaeda is the equivalent of a non-recognized State. Perhaps we can send diplomats to them, now?

On Article 3 plus 2, note the conflict taking place on the soil of a Contracting Party. The Taliban wasn't and so Afghanistan is not such a place. Now, here is what the Supreme Court has to say on this [bolding mine]:

"4 (c) (ii) Alternatively, the appeals court agreed with the Government that the Conventions do not apply because Hamdan was captured during the war with al Qaeda, which is not a Convention signatory, and that conflict is distinct from the war with signatory Afghanistan. The Court need not decide the merits of this argument because there is at least one provision of the Geneva Conventions that applies here even if the relevant conflict is not between signatories. Common Article 3, which appears in all four Conventions, provides that, in a "conflict not of an international character occurring in the territory of one of the High Contracting Parties [ i.e., signatories], each Party to the conflict shall be bound to apply, as a minimum, "certain provisions protecting" [p]ersons "placed hors de combat by" detention, "including a prohibition on" the passing of sentences " without previous judgment " by a regularly constituted court affording all the judicial guarantees " recognized as indispensable by civilized peoples." The D. C. Circuit ruled Common Article 3 inapplicable to Hamdan because the conflict with al Qaeda is international in scope and thus not a "conflict not of an international character." That reasoning is erroneous. That the quoted phrase bears its literal meaning and is used here in contradistinction to a conflict between nations is demonstrated by Common Article 2, which limits its own application to any armed conflict between signatories and provides that signatories must abide by all terms of the Conventions even if another party to the conflict is a nonsignatory, so long as the nonsignatory "accepts and applies" those terms. Common Article 3, by contrast, affords some minimal protection, falling short of full protection under the Conventions, to individuals associated with neither a signatory nor even a nonsignatory who are involved in a conflict "in the territory of" a signatory. The latter kind of conflict does not involve a clash between nations (whether signatories or not). Pp. 65-68.
...
(d) Even assuming that Hamden is a dangerous individual who would cause great harm or death to innocent civilians given the opportunity, the Executive nevertheless must comply with the prevailing rule of law in undertaking to try him and subject him to criminal punishment. P. 72."
So, even though this conflict took place in a non-signatory State, that being Afghanistan, the Conventions do apply to those who are and are not signatories. And the Supreme Court asserts that this holds into clashes between signatory and non-signatory Nations, which is correct. al Qaeda may not be a Contracting Party under the basis of the Conventions themselves, however, and so are combatants not only of a non-signatory group but cannot be considered to be able to be a part of any signatory organization. Article 3 clearly covers those individuals who are combatants of outlaw Nations, such as the Taliban, who have direct jurisdictional accountability to their Nation and also combatants that adhere to an unrecognized State. al Qaeda does not qualify for this by its outlay and composition, and so any individuals fighting for al Qaeda are doing so in a status not covered by these Conventions.

The problem is not one of falling on one side of a conflict or another. That is clearly demarcated by the Conventions.

The problem is that al Qaeda falls COMPLETELY outside of this framework. To be inside this framework al Qaeda must have the level of stature granted to non-recognized Nations. To be able to be part of this framework one must be part of an organization that can become a Contracting Party and that is what the Court has done.

There you have it, folks. The Supreme Court of the United States has ruled that al Qaeda shall be afforded all of the benefits of a Nation, even a non-recognized Nation, without having any of the fundamentals to actually *be* a Nation.

And since they have further ruled that al Qaeda combatants are to be considered for Civil Trials and not Military Tribunals, they are now outside the jurisdiction of the Armed Forces for prosecution and all the rules of evidence now apply to the Armed Forces when capturing al Qaeda. I hope they trained our troops in the collecting of battlefield forensics... or we could just shoot them on sight as SPIES, which they are also under the rules of War by wearing no uniform and adhering to no State and mis-representing themselves on the field of combat and elsewhere.

Which court system gets to hear these things? Now here is the part that has NOT been considered. From the Constitution Article III, Section 2 in whole [bolding mine]:


"Section. 2.

The judicial Power shall extend to all Cases, in Law and Equity, arising under this Constitution, the Laws of the United States, and Treaties made, or which shall be made, under their Authority;--to all Cases affecting Ambassadors, other public Ministers and Consuls;--to all Cases of admiralty and maritime Jurisdiction;--to Controversies to which the United States shall be a Party;--to Controversies between two or more States;-- between a State and Citizens of another State;--between Citizens of different States;--between Citizens of the same State claiming Lands under Grants of different States, and between a State, or the Citizens thereof, and foreign States, Citizens or Subjects.

In all Cases affecting Ambassadors, other public Ministers and Consuls, and those in which a State shall be Party, the supreme Court shall have original Jurisdiction. In all the other Cases before mentioned, the supreme Court shall have appellate Jurisdiction, both as to Law and Fact, with such Exceptions, and under such Regulations as the Congress shall make.

The Trial of all Crimes, except in Cases of Impeachment, shall be by Jury; and such Trial shall be held in the State where the said Crimes shall have been committed; but when not committed within any State, the Trial shall be at such Place or Places as the Congress may by Law have directed."


Well, it seems that the United States, being a Treaty Signatory and having a beef with individuals who are now of a recognized entity that has the same level as a State should go DIRECTLY to the Supreme Court without any intervening Courts. Why? As there is no original jurisdiction for these cases, starting overseas via the Geneva Conventions and that these individuals have been ruled to be of a State level entity that has no Treaty obligations AT ALL, there is only one set of people in the United States that have, at their fingertips, relevant necessary relevent power as these things have NOT been administered by via Treaty with them.

And that is the Supreme Court of the United States.

Thanks for volunteering! I hope you all get nice travel arrangements to Cuba!

While that last is partly in jest, that is also partly dead serious. The Supremes should get it by the old: "You broke that cookie jar, now you get to sweep up the remains".

The remedy for this is to do what I suggested the President do when he first went before Congress after 9/11:

Ask Congress to declare war on every terrorist organization or other organization that has rhetorically declared war on the US and start that dating back to 1945.

The Supreme Court takes that this is allowable via their ruling.

As they have made this clear, so it should be done.

27 June 2006

Monitoring your interests c/o The Justice Department

My thanks to Lastango at Dailypundit for posting this article and this previous on the topic of the Justice Department requiring Internet Service Providers to keep track of what the Citizenry does on the Internet. Now, being such an astute organization, they have actually realized that various nefarious individuals actually do this thing called *using the internet to exchange information and files*... remotely! That's right, the actual paper mail message and the dumpster-diving to find information is no longer the best way to find out what is going on in messages between individuals. And so the Justice Department realizes that it must do something.... and since this internet-thingy goes around the entire world, why, almost anything could be flooding electronically onto Our Shores.

Why, with so much going on the entire Nation is at risk! So that means that the entire Citizenry *must* be monitored, as you just never know who is doing what and what that nice lady two floors down with the cute dog is looking at on the internet! Society is at risk and so all of society must be observed, yes?

That is, apparently, the attitude of the Justice Department on how to go about finding criminals that also use the internet. And, thus, this MSNBC article on this is a bit on the chilling side to anyone who actually believes in freedom of expression and the free-flow of ideas. Lets take a gander at what is going on:

Five leading online service providers will jointly build a database of child-pornography images and develop other tools to help network operators and law enforcement better prevent distribution of the images.
Ok, they are going to get images that are a crime to distribute for money but, by all accounts, not to actually have in one's possession. That is, there is a for-cost criminal liability for dealing in such things, but if given away freely, then there can be no instance of 'commerce'. So, these five firms want a dirty picture library of child pornography.... just a quick question.... how safe will this be from hackers? I mean, picture this... the entire library is kept online at a secure site so that its images may be used via various groups to see if someone is dealing in child porn or just exchanging pictures of children from the family photo album. So, beyond the fact that there is a presumption of innocence in such transfers, what happens when the security safeguards of this system are thwarted and the images are transferred to, say, an off shore mirror site or sites in Nations not having much in the way of child porn laws or Internet law enforcement? Why, these five companies will have done us a great service by collecting all of this material together for *free* distribution, thus taking the monetary incentive out of the entire thing! Such swell folks!

Let us continue:

The companies pledged $1 million among them Tuesday to set up a technology coalition as part of the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children. They aim to create the database by year's end, though many details remain unsettled.
Now $1M these days doesn't get you much in the way of looking at damned near anything. And for the proposed system this might just be an engineer or two looking at the problem and saying if it is within the scope of what is possible given the state of the internet today. Figure that is good for 3 engineers having two meetings and a bit of 'fact finding' in the Bahama's for those meetings. Don't forget the secretary to take notes!

And just which companies are doing this? Well here they are:

The participating companies are Time Warner Inc.'s AOL, Yahoo Inc., Microsoft Corp., EarthLink Inc. and United Online Inc., the company behind NetZero and Juno.
Time to ditch that AOHELL account, and maybe get some nice encryption add-ons to your Instant Messaging. I hear that there are various Open Source pieces of software to do just that. As to what to say to these companies: Go To Hell. I plan on moving soon, and getting a nice company that will respect my privacy and only yield up information about me for this little thing known as a "Search Warrant". You might want to do the same, too.

Ah, now how will these folks find out about what sort of images you are looking at? Read on from later in the article:

Plans call for the missing children's center to collect known child-porn images and create a unique mathematical signature for each one based on a common formula. Each participating company would scan its users' images for matches.
Oooooo! Sounds scary, doesn't it? 'Unique digital signature' for each image! Now you are hitting in my territory, as I used to work in a related field of how to ensure that images could not be ripped off and all sorts of watermarks and such removed and still have a visually viable image. After over 3 years of looking I can say that the only way to do so is in a 'closed loop' system with proprietary image types and limited forms of software so that licensing schema must be built into the system and the images. Unfortunately, that sort of thing disappears after the first screen capture.

In the age of Photoshop and adjusting hue, color, contrast balance and the such like, there is no way to make a 'unique digital signature' for any image at any scale that will be valid across all possible uses of that image and all methods of encoding it. A bit more on this topic since it is a fun hobby horse to ride, for all the bouncing it does. Lets say you take a standard raster image off the net... a JPEG say. Now, JPEG is a nice international standard for lossy transport of images. There are encoding schema within JPEG for loss-less encoding, but those are mostly used for commercial purposes so that accurate color rendition is kept with a good encoding schema to ensure that there is, indeed, no loss of image tonality, sharpness and so on due to the compression schema. There are, indeed, lossless compression schema available for compression, but they do not save much file space, an so are limited in their use. Being lossy, most JPEG images are compressed with a degradation of some tonality and sharpness but are still 'visually' appealing. Zoom into any JPEG image using an image viewer, say Irfanview, and you will see the compression defects.

So, here begins the problem of the 'unique digital signature'. Will you be using a pristine first generation original file or a multi-generational file that has undergone many re-compressions, each losing some of the tonality and sharpness that characterize the image? Tough one, isn't it? There are some algorithms out there that will do such comparisons for visual rendition of images. The problems is, however, digital image raster editors, of which the best known is Adobe Photoshop. Now, the good folks at Adobe *tried* to include a means in which their software would not, actually, decode images of banknotes. They put in all sorts of algorithms and did all sorts of tricksy things and the result? The Photoshop community found a workaround in about 24 hours. Nice try, fellas! Banknotes are damn near identical in image composition and looking for mask clues within the note so as to stop rendering seemed a certain way to stop the digital remastering of such images taken from high resolution scanners.

Didn't work.

The first strike against such a system: the Photoshop effect of using the various tools available to add noise, soften, change intonation and color schema and, generally, give a totally different digital signature to a raster image from that of the check image.

So, lets clear that hurdle! Some software does a good job with this and using fuzzy logic for comparison is a good way to use an image to image check. Next up, then, on the thwarting side: change raster image type. Yes, there are tens if not hundreds of methods for encoding all sorts of raster bitmap images. Some are even more lossy than JPEG, but use other mathematical approaches to save visually appealing material and discard things not really necessary for visual quality. Again, this is not for the commercial graphics industry, but for the casual user and viewer of images. Now, once you have your grand raster library and 'unique digital signatures' you will be confronted with a file type that is not one you used to get your signatures. In point of fact, you may not even *recognize* that it IS a raster image unless you have a cross-index of every major and most widely distributed minor raster file encoding methods. So, now you have TWO processing steps to check: First change the image over to something the system will understand and decode it, then do your document check against a fuzzy logic search system.

This is not insurmountable, however, and can be automated... right up to the point a little used variant of, say, JPEG encoding is introduced. JPEG had many and extreme variants in its early life and not all of them fell under the JPEG standard. Most were proprietary and then discontinued. They are 'orphans'. People who have the software and can do the encoding can exchange images with individuals who have the old decoder and use that, and modern software will NOT read the file in any way, shape or form as JPEG. The header information is totally out of whack for the file. And I can think of two or three right off the top of my head that fit this, and the companies have *still* not released the encoding schema. Even worse, some of those companies are GONE and their digital assets are no where to be found, so all that is left is the compiled binaries.

So, second strike: use older encoding schema that are proprietary or change over to little used schema that will not be easily converted for rapid checking against a master database of 'unique digital signatures'.

Third up is Steganography. Take a nice image of a landscape... then take a second image and turn it into binary data to subtly alter the original image, but not so much as to degrade it visually. Send file. The 'unique digital signature' is of the visually appealing file and not the hidden steganographic one. In fact, many such files are passed on the internet and many users don't even *know* they have images with secretly encoded information in them. With the proper tools, such images can be examined for steganographic presence, and then the type of steganography being used needs to be determined. Then the hidden information, in this case the digitally encoded image, can be extracted. Bingo! You have just won the way to thwart the Justice Department with commercially available and freely available software. A system to find steganographically hidden information will take processing time galore to see if an image actually *has* hidden information within it and, if it does, how it was encoded and then how to decode it and then determine what that digital information actually *is*. Terrorists do this quite often an are targeted for such examination. That is *because* it is intensive work to decode the information that it is limited as a useful tool to those things important enough to require such in-depth examination.

So, third strike: Steganography via turning one image into digital information and encoding it within a second, innocuous image, so only those who know what to look for can retrieve the information.

This is fun, isn't it? Now, lets take a look at the next freely available technology: encryption. With encryption a digital file is encoded so that it may pass securely between two users that share encryption schema. The foremost of these uses long prime numbers and personal keys and a public/private key system to do such encryption. Public keys are put out by individuals and freely available for anyone wishing a secure communications method with them. A set of digital data is taken along with the recipient's public key and your private key and encrypted. To decrypt the information the recipient takes the sender's public key and their own private key and the un-encrypted message pops out. The internet uses this constantly for secure communications and it is generally well known how to do this. And anyone wanting privacy in their communications uses this as a matter of course.

But wait! There is more! Lets say you take that encrypted information and *hide* it via steganography. Then, when a system has churned through the file, finds that there is hidden data, retrieves the data it then has a jumbled message that is encrypted and cannot be decrypted without knowing WHO encoded it and WHO it is meant for. And since it is passed via steganography, perhaps through a Usenet posting or via a listserv for groups, people will see the original image and not suspect that it has hidden information, while the recipient will know where to look and retrieve that information.

But the best is yet to come! Also add into this that the file is encoded using a little known raster image file type and you have one hell of a processing problem. Finding the image via steganography, finding it encrypted and then putting lots of time to decrypt the information (most of which will most likely be variants of: "u 5uCk d00d!") and then converting it from one file type to another *if* you can figure out which type it is to start with....

Strike four: Encryption mixed with the above.

Am I done yet? No, decidedly NOT. As many individuals tend to send large numbers of files they like to use a file packing system that does some compression. This is known as creating a ZIP archive, but the general terminology covers a wide range of compression technologies for digital files. And some of these compression schema have encryption BUILT INTO THEM so that it can be easily used for passing files securely. And, like so many good things, some are available freely via Open Source Software. Making this even more joyous is the fact that a single archive can be subdivided into multiple parts so that they can be put back together at their destination. Which means that a file can be broken up, sent via multiple email accounts, listserves or other means, and then extracted, pieced back together, un-encrypted, files opened, steganography software used to remove encoded images, those images decrypted and all done as a matter of course and can even be done as a batch job on a PC. Total time to get and decode, etc. varies by the number of images and file size, etc. But it is minor overhead if you know what you are doing.

Strike 5: Archiving, encryption of the archive and multipart dispersal of it across multiple distribution methods so that no full file ever goes to the 'unique digital signature' database.

And the best part of all of this is that you are just exchanging pictures of puppies or kittens or wildflowers or whatever and only someone looking in-depth will be able to get an idea that something strange is going on.

With all of this in mind, think upon this next quote:
AOL, for instance, plans to check e-mail attachments that are already being scanned for viruses. If child porn is detected, AOL would refer the case to the missing-children's center for further investigation, as service providers are required to do under federal law.
What, exactly, is the purpose of this? Terrorists are already using similar means as outlined above to distribute information. Child pornographers can easily do the same. And this is even before we get into anonymizing networks and such things, in which the exact location of an originating file can only be guessed at based on traffic load for that network.

And further:
Ryan said that although AOL will initially focus on scanning e-mail attachments, the goal is to ultimately develop techniques for checking other distribution techniques as well, such as instant messaging or Web uploads.
So, they now want to start profiling YOU the customer, beyond the already highly invasive marketing they do, they will now start seeing if you are doing the things I outlined above and exchanging *secrets* to put society at risk. And what is worse, is that this would *require* companies to monitor the Citizen so as to give a patina of distance between the Government and those doing the observing. They forget that if this is required by LAW then the direct connection between requiring surveillance and reporting it is established and the presumption of innocence goes away.

Remember THAT little bit in our society? Innocent until proven guilty. Not having your life intruded upon unless there is *suspicion* of wrongdoing. How about the concept of a "Search Warrant"? Whatever did happen to Amendments I, IV, V, IX and X?

The United States Government has nor right nor capability to require domestic espionage by companies upon the Citizenry of the United States without justification and then may only do such things under a "Search Warrant" with a presumption of innocence. We the People are to be free of Government intrusion in Our lives save for there being probable cause against an individual. Without probable cause, this requirement is a fishing net to be dragged across the populace in the hopes that a bad apple or two will be found.

The article notes that these fine companies already offer services to combat spam and viruses.... and I wish to offer those seeking solace in that a moment to reflect upon their INBOX. Chock-a-block with SPAM and pornography AFTER they have been weeded through, sometimes two or more times before arriving at my INBOX. Now lets say some hackers get ahold of that master database of images and marry it up to some easily available SPAM emailers and start sending a flood of this stuff across the Nation... for free. Possibly from an off-shore location where server space is rented via anonymous payment.

We the People will ALL be suspects, then.

And those doing the real work will *still* work around the system easily to achieve their ends.

This is an exchange of liberty for ZERO added security. In fact it poisons the public channels of communication with suspicion as all our communications are liable for interception by those with *good intentions* and the rights held only to We the People put at peril by a bureaucracy that figures all communication is suspect and so must be examined. Also keep in mind that the FBI has twice in the past 10 years tried to reconcile all of its databases and give its Agents a way of intercommunicating amongst them so as to make the finding of data easier. After billions were spent, both attempts failed and they are *still* coping with this problem.

Warming thought that the incompetent and incapable feel themselves the master of this new technology to the point they no longer can even figure out how to investigate people and must send out dragnets that impugn the entire online population with a presumption of guilt.

Let us hope that this concept dies a quiet and unmourned death.

Federalism, Accountability and the Union

This is a cross-posting from The Jacksonian Party.

The following is a position paper of The Jacksonian Party.

The compact between We the People arose in 1787 due to the problems with the previous joining under the Articles of Confederation, which left States without means to protect themselves as integral units of a greater United States and need to carry out heavy taxation for individual defense of their States. In this era the States were Sovereigns and gave very little over to the Government of the United States, including the power to raise a militia to defend the United States as a whole. The Shays Rebellion of 1786-87 gave rise to uprisings across the States due to the highly non-representative nature of many States and how they implemented laws and the harshness of placing those on the margins of society in the deepest debt to pay for the budget of the State. Those poorest of individuals saw no recompense in their taxation and, indeed, noted that it was falling disproportionately upon those least able to pay, while those in more urban areas paid far less in proportion.

With this in mind, the Annapolis Constitutional Convention of 1786 called for a greater convention which became the Philadelphia Constitutional Convention of 1787 set about to right these wrongs by forming a stronger Federation amongst the States, so that some burdens would be shared equally so that all of the States would be defended as a whole. Additionally, as paying for the Revolutionary War had still not been done, a higher commerce regulation and taxation authority needed to be set-up so that the debt of We the People could be paid in-full for help given.

As drafted and ratified the Constitution of the United States gives States autonomy *within* the United States so long as there is regularity but not necessarily identicality in due process upholding of rights for the People. Further the States cannot regulate interstate commerce, nor impose taxation one upon the other for that internal trades, save in the current instance of alcoholic beverages which is a hold over of the repeal of Amendment XVIII by Amendment XXI. And the States may keep Militia's, but they will be paid for from the Federal budget and fall under all laws set by the Federal Government for them in training and adjudication of military use. The States may call upon such forces for internal problems, as needed, but these forces are first and foremost, to protect the Union.

Further in areas of Foreign Policy, Treaties, Commerce with Foreign Nations and in protection of the Union, the Federal Government is formed to administer each of these areas and ensure that the Nation is defended and protected, and that the Laws of the Land are administered equally and without favor or prejudice for We the People. Outside of these things addressing the externals of the Nation and those few things seen as necessary to actually *have* a Federal Government to uphold these things, all other power and rights rests with the States and the People. In point of fact the Constitution ensures that the recognition is that the Federal Government is *granted* these few rights and powers By the People to do these things for the good of All the People.

When any member of the Citizenry joins the Federal Government, be it as President, Congressman or Senator, Supreme Court Justice, or even the man mowing the lawn employed by the Federal Government for grounds maintenance, each must Swear and Uphold an Oath to the Constitution of the United States of America. Be they in the political arms or in the military or the civil service in its varieties, each and every individual who takes part in the government to help oversee the Nation's needs takes such Oath and is expected to uphold such and keep all commitments that they are empowered to make by the Government as a whole. Those that are not empowered may not do so, even if they have *appearance* of power, as mere appearance is not the actuality of the thing itself as due Warrants to spend on the behalf of the People is necessary and must be shown and demonstrated on the civil service side. Appropriations and their use is carried out in the First by Congress and in the Second by the Executive as Head of Government.

Thus we come to the crux of the State of the Union by this Federal Government in this year of 2006. The years and decades leading up to this year have not been easy ones and the previous century has seen three Global Conflicts, Two World Wars by name and the Cold War, and the arising of groups that no longer abide by the Peace of Westphalia and seek to diminish or destroy the system of Nation States. Thus those individuals that come together as groups seek to give rise to Transnationalism so that the individual Nation State is no longer considered a Sovereign. A great number espouse that Progressivism in its modern form, be the basis for this broader community. For some decades these individuals have been joined by those using Terrorism to assert goals and ideology that no Nation State follows and force such upon Nations via means of terrorizing Citizens of Nations.

Progressivists work within Nations to diminish the role of the National Government and give rise to conceptions that the concept of a Nation is absurd and useless in modern times, so that such things as National Boundaries, National Sovereignty and, indeed, National Identity should fall by the wayside to a larger, global grouping of individuals via other means. By fighting all laws and activities that seek to define and protect Nations internally, the Progressivists work ardently at undermining individual Nation States so that they will become, in essence, meaningless administrative units more amenable to some form of global group oversight. And as the proponents of such, Progressivists assert that as the formularies of this conception, that they are the best and most able to be that oversight group.

Terrorists seek this very same thing, but do so from outside the context of Nation States and undermine the legitimacy of them by using Force of Arms outside of the Geneva Conventions in an effort to de-legitimize National Militaries and get reactions from Nations that are more brutal and authoritarian. In that reaction the Sovereign Government will *appear* to act similarly to terrorists and decrease their legitimacy until the Citizenry cannot tell the difference between the two and terrorist goals will be seen as just another variety of goals that have the same legitimacy as that of their Government. Once this is done, the National Identity and National Sovereignty is weakened and Terrorists can truly impose their beliefs by dint of being seen as no different from the repressive Governments they have brought about. And, as such Terrorists espouse global conceptions of the World, be it radical religious beliefs, economic beliefs and/or social beliefs, they seek to impose this broader conception upon the world via this means.

The United States of America has been specifically targeted by both of these concepts as it is the sole remaining superpower after the Cold War and that its strength of National Identity formed of radical individualism from the late 18th century is anathema to the goals of Transnationalists of all stripes and order. Being born of Revolution, they see the United States in its adherence to the goals of that Revolution to be out of step with more modern conceptions of Revolution and so seek to delegitimize its Revolution in various ways. Both internally amongst the Citizenry and externally by Terrorists the United States has been and continues to be weakened as a Concept born of Revolution to ensure the greatest Freedom to its People with the Least amount of Government. Transnationalists encourage National Sovereignty to be abridged until it is broken and that National Identity of a Free People is less important than group identities and that as power is derived from the People that smaller units of 'People Power' can be employed all though such groupings do NOT represent the People as a whole, but a sub-group or division or clustering of them.

What these Transnationalists forget, however, and that We the People must remember, is that each State within the Union is a Sovereign Entity in and of itself, within the confines of the larger Federation. By attacking the Union and diminishing it, We the People as a whole may seek to re-inforce the Union via the States. In the older days of the Republic means and methods to give States broad oversight into who goes into the political arms of control of the Federal Government were set in place. The ability of the States to assert direct influence and, indeed, control over the Federal Government by these means was assured. This was done immediately in Article I, Section 2, reading in part:


The House of Representatives shall be composed of Members chosen every second Year by the People of the several States, and the Electors in each State shall have the Qualifications requisite for Electors of the most numerous Branch of the State Legislature.

No Person shall be a Representative who shall not have attained to the Age of twenty five Years, and been seven Years a Citizen of the United States, and who shall not, when elected, be an Inhabitant of that State in which he shall be chosen.
And in Section 3 to cover the Senate:


The Senate of the United States shall be composed of two Senators from each State, chosen by the Legislature thereof for six Years; and each Senator shall have one Vote.

[and later, skipping the 6 years and choosing thereof]

No Person shall be a Senator who shall not have attained to the Age of thirty Years, and been nine Years a Citizen of the United States, and who shall not, when elected, be an Inhabitant of that State for which he shall be chosen.

[and]

AMENDMENT XVII, Passed by Congress May 13, 1912. Ratified April 8, 1913.

Note: Article I, section 3, of the Constitution was modified by the 17th amendment.

The Senate of the United States shall be composed of two Senators from each State, elected by the people thereof, for six years; and each Senator shall have one vote. The electors in each State shall have the qualifications requisite for electors of the most numerous branch of the State legislatures.

When vacancies happen in the representation of any State in the Senate, the executive authority of such State shall issue writs of election to fill such vacancies: Provided, That the legislature of any State may empower the executive thereof to make temporary appointments until the people fill the vacancies by election as the legislature may direct.

This amendment shall not be so construed as to affect the election or term of any Senator chosen before it becomes valid as part of the Constitution.

[and]
Section 4

The Times, Places and Manner of holding Elections for Senators and Representatives, shall be prescribed in each State by the Legislature thereof; but the Congress may at any time by Law make or alter such Regulations, except as to the Places of chusing Senators.

Taken as a whole, the right of the People to Vote directly for their Representative and Senator is given via the States, that are to choose such means as to give voice to that vote. Notice that the State is given supremacy in deciding the manner and means that such representation of their People may be done. The burden of actually getting these means in place falls to the States. And as the earliest Congresses were chosen, lawfully and legally, by the legislatures of the States to send such Representatives and Senators. This is the entire concept of the Electoral College writ small and first: the States provide the Representatives in accordance with the People of their State in manner made by the State.

We the People have been told, time and again, that the Nation we live in is a Democracy. It is *not* a direct democracy that is the categorical necessity to be a full Democracy. The United States is a Republic that uses representational democracy as its means to create government. And as part of that representational schema, as laid out by the Constitution, the States hold the highest decision making power of who, exactly, is put in place to represent the People in the Federal Government's legislative branches and, via the Electoral College, the President. By blurring the boundaries between Representational Democracy and Direct Democracy, We the People have been ill-served in thinking that we are in the latter and not the former. In a Representational Democracy as given by the Constitution, Accountability *begins* by the States, while in a Direct Democracy accountability is only available via recall to the People for each level of Government. By placing a Sovereign and Representational layer between the People and the Federal Government, additional accountability and checks and balances of Power are available.

The Jacksonian Party adheres to this balancing of Power as given via the Constitution as it allows for speedy condemnation and accountability of the Federal Government BETWEEN elections and makes available means to adjust the Federal Power when it is not used to serve the Union and the States thereof. As a Republic that uses Representational Democratic means to give checks and balances to power and responsibility, the United States of America offers multiple means to ensure that Federal Power is not abused, nor that States become authoritarian towards their Citizenry. The goal of this structure is set out fully in the Preamble of the Constitution and Government, at all levels, is but one MEANS for the People to adhere to their responsibilities to ensure the Nation remains United and Justly administered to the good of the People.

Thusly, the Federal Government of the United States needs to be held accountable by the STATES for the following:

1) Invasion of the Union by Mexico using various incursions and seeking to move their people over the boarder to meet illegitimate *labor needs* of such organizations in the United States that benefit from such slave labor. According to the Dept. of Homeland Security, the Territory of the United States has been breached by Mexican Federal Military and Police, even unto incidents of weapons discharge by such intruders. This is covered in the here and gives evidence from the Federal Government itself that 216 incursions have happened between 1996 and 2005. Each and every incursion by the forces of one Sovereign Nation upon another without due authorization by the second Nation is known as an invasion. This entire conception of Casus Belli giving rise to Jus ad bellum is gone over for other contexts, but the overall diplomatic conception is valid globally and is part of how Nation States agree to interact with each other.

By *not* responding to each and every incident via Diplomatic means, two Presidential Administrations are at fault for not enforcing National Sovereignty and asserting the right of the United States to have its territory free from Foreign influence. This is a clear and direct violation of the Oath of Office sworn to Uphold and Defend the Constitution of the United States.

By this lack of response the individual States are given the burden to defend themselves and worry about their individual sovereignty as States. By doing so the social compact of We the People put in place in 1787 is abridged in WHOLE.

The Jacksonian Party calls upon the Governors of the States to ask this current President exactly *why* he is abdicating his Oath of Office and let this individual know that if the Federal Government cannot protect the States, then the States, themselves, will no longer be bound by this agreement and will seek to bring a New Constitutional Convention in place so as to fix this problem and ensure that the powers available to protect the Nation are actually *used*.

2) From the 99th Congress to the present Congress remains a promise by the 99th onwards that Congress shall, indeed, put in place measures to protect the National Borders so as to ensure National Sovereignty for the United States. This is to uphold their Oaths, one and all, to the Constitution. That was first solemnly promised in 1986. At the 20 year mark no Congress has done this thing nor has even proposed to do so nor has even spent the necessary funds to investigate the means and methods to secure the Borders.

Note that over these past two decades congress has changed hands and some number of seats overturned from party to party so all political parties that have sat in the majority are at fault in both houses of Congress. This is a taint that is equally shared from 1986 onwards and adheres to each and every past and present member of each and every Congress since the 99th.

The Congress, although it can set the regulation of the time and place of elections, may not overstep its bounds there. Further, as each member of the House is seen as a co-equal in stature to the member of the more numerous State Legislative bodies, they are also under the same accountability to that State as they are to the Union as a whole. And as the Legislature of each State validates that the position of each Representative is given by the People, it also serves as the stopping point to call that Representative to account and, in the end, to give writ if a member of the House of Representatives is no longer representing the State or its People. This same logic and methodology is valid and has been tested by *recall* elections from States. But the ultimate power for such is given to the Legislature of each State.

Thusly, if the State Legislature sees that its Representatives to Congress from that State are not working to the good of the Union to protect it or to ensure the Sovereignty of that State within the Union, they may give writ to recall some or ALL of their Representatives and use such necessary powers as to either appoint or elect new members.

Those States that have been ill-served by the abdication of National Security by Congress, which is to say the entire Union of States as a threat to One is a threat to All under the Federal system, can recall their Representatives from the House and deny them validity in representation of that State by an Act of that Legislature.

The Jacksonian Party supports this concept in full as the States are NOT to be supplicants to a Federal Government to *plead* for protection, nor are its Representatives to act as unaccountable Nobility to Reign over the United States instead of merely govern it. Those that have been elected to govern no longer accept that this is their foremost function as individuals and that such governance must be equally applied so that the entire Union is protected first and above all other things.

3) National Security is being abridged by the personnel of the Federal Government and by various members of Congress that have access to such knowledge as is their right by sitting within the Congress and having oversight on these parts of the Government. Over the past few years multiple and numerous *leaks* of classified information on various projects and programs have happened. The *leaking* has been directly to the press, for the most part, and has served various internal agenda's of both the leakers and the press. Each and every one of these is unlawful, and the upholding of the administration of such laws is upon the Executive Branch. The President as Head of Government has not ensured that the laws regarding National Security have been robustly administered and that guilty individuals tracked down, found, and brought to Justice.

The proper means for any individual employed within the Federal Government, when misdeeds or illegal activity may be occurring, is to go to the Inspector General that has independent oversight for that Agency and/or Branch of the Executive. If this, once done, brings into suspicion that the Inspector General has been compromised, then that individual *must* go up the chain to the *next* Inspector General, or, lacking that, go to Federal police, such as the FBI, to look into the matter. If, at that point, the individual sees an investigation being countered by higher up the chain, that individual absolutely *must* go to Congress. Executive abuse at that level needs instant Congressional investigation so as to keep the Executive from seizing power or turning Federal power to their own means.

At no point in this entire chain, which is laid out for each individual in the Federal Government, is the *press* mentioned. The press is not a part of government. The press has no oversight by the People being, instead, a means of the People to communicate with each other on things they find of interest. The press, by having no oversight function, and by having no legal place in the chain of command and accountability, sits outside the legal context for means of redress of problems within the Government on issues of abuse of power, wasteful spending and similar.

Any individual that goes to the press and gives unauthorized disclosure of Federal information is committing an unlawful act. This applies from the lowliest janitor to the highest members of Congress. And the declassification authority for classified information rests solely and completely upon the President who then appoints others to administer such and those individuals have written confirmation of their ability to do so. Congressmen do *not* get that via the laws they have drafted.

The Jacksonian Party sees individuals and groups encouraging leaks to serve political purposes which do not benefit the Nation as a whole and, in point of fact, endanger the individuals in the Military protecting this Nation. Further, by giving such information out, those that seek to undermine the United States are given knowledge on means and methods used to track them down and stifle their operations. Each and every leaker of classified information, or even normal Governmental information not released either by normal bureaucratic acts or via the Freedom of Information Act, needs to be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law for violating their Oath of Office, for putting mere partisan political views above those of the National Interest and for undermining the entire faith of the People in its Government. By degrading the National Security and Interest, such individuals put Us all at peril to personal ends, and are thus abusing their positions of trust to the detriment of the Union.

4) A number of municipal areas have declared themselves to be 'Sanctuaries' for illegal aliens. In this doing each of these municipal units have abrogated the Constitution and have declared their separation from the Union by declaring that they will no longer abide by it. As has been written previously, this is a direct abrogation of all 6 Articles of the Constitution and some number of Amendments, but most particularly Amendment XIII outlawing slavery save as a means of punishment. In a Federal Republic, all areas agree to abide by and uphold the law of the land, which in the case of the United States, is the Constitution. The Constitution and all the resultant Government and laws that come from it, are not a Chinese Menu system of 'choose one from column A and two from column B'. In point of fact it is an all-or-nothing deal with respect to the entirety of the Union. We the People are enjoined to make the Union more perfect via legal means and to adhere to even unjust laws will seeking redress to end such laws. One may not seek to enforce a law at whimsy nor to say 'it is unjust, I will not administer it'. What one must do is go through the proper channels to address such problems via the Federal distribution of powers amongst the entirety of the Union.

To seek to not uphold sections of the law that is applied to the totality of the Union is an act known as Secession. By municipalities deciding that some Federal laws shall not be upheld and that the powers granted by the People to the Federal Government are ones they do not wish to follow, these areas do not seek proper redress of grievances and bad law via legislation and the courts, but, instead, establish law by Fiat. At that point they have broken with the binding document and its backing and are no longer members of the Union, and by harboring those that are here illegally, they put at peril the entire system of laws of the Union and abdicate their responsibility in upholding the National Security. Until such laws are either over-ruled by the courts or changed by the Congress and signed by the President they remain in force for the entirety of the Union.

The Jacksonian Party supports all States in the ending of this secessionary movement so that the Union itself is not undone. For those States that contain such, these municipalities need to be brought into line via States laws for following the laws of the Union. Further, All States need to lobby the Congress and the Executive to get these secessionary areas back into the Union via any and all means, and those within them to only return to the United States as Citizens after reading an Oath of fealty to the United States and then having their right to vote and lobby government stripped from them for the rest of their lives. This is preferable to Civil War.

5) Lastly, but not least, is the mis-expenditure of the People's money by Congress. This is known as 'earmarking' and more commonly as 'pork barrel spending', or 'pork'. This process in one in which the funds of the People are put to use for projects personally inserted by a Congressman or Senator for their own State or District. This is a direct abuse of the power of the purse by Congress as such projects and programs have no legitimate need as presented to the Government as a whole. Further, these projects often are only contained in obscure and hidden Congressional budgetary documents that are *not* a part of the final budget line iteming NOR available to the public at any time.

This has progressed into a National abuse of money so that Federal funds are filtered through lobbyists and extended family of Congressmen and Senators and finds its way *back* to them either for campaigning or as personal funds. The argument is made that some States *need* some projects that just can't be made on a National level and that the State is too poor to fund itself. The counter-argument is that the State agreed to keep to its own funds except for those things in the National Interest presented openly as such so that the Nation could support them. Things that are purely local and serve no National Interest have no place in the Federal Budget or as 'off budget' items from the Federal Treasury.

The Jacksonian Party supports the Executive to take a stance that any item that does NOT show up for signature on the Desk of the President and signed off upon is NOT an official item for expenditure of Federal Funds and such funds shall be returned to the Treasury until such time as an official and public expenditure be put upon his desk. And the 'Black Budget' will suffer similar, save on the classified side. If it is not put out for perusal and reading and justification and appears no where in the budget, the actual project or program is NOT THERE. The Jacksonian Party supports this fully and that the States begin the hard process of actually getting in order those things that DO require National attention and funding and justify them.



In other areas The Jacksonian Party has encouraged States to take upon themselves those things that can help the Nation and the National dialogue so as to make a more perfect Union. On National Security there has been a call for more self-governance. Further, the plain necessity for more Representatives in the House has been an ongoing call so that the American People can have their diversity heard in the halls of power. Also there has been a call to re-examine the right of States to be protected by their lawfully armed Citizenry and thus bring about a change in the way problems of armed conflict may be addressed not only within each State but to the Union as a whole and seek redress of such things. And the founder and author of this article has looked at how States can approach Citizenship and alter the ground upon which there is much vitriolic opining and remove that ground from under them.

The Jacksonian Party cherishes the Constitution in all of its parts and in all of its outlook and adheres strictly to them. It is a fine system for making government, but requires that each level of the Compact be serious about wanting such. And the finality for all such accountability rests with We the People, as it is Our Government to have.

And Our Nation to lose if we are not serious about it.

23 June 2006

How far they have wandered!

Here is a quintessential quote that is very worthy of many a person and with regards to institutions it is also one that is worth adhering to:


There are few things in this world which it is worth while to get angry about; and they are just the things anger will not improve. - Henry Jarvis Raymond
Truer words were never spoken. Unfortunately the successor's of Mr. Raymond and Mr. George Jones have decided that fanning the flames are just what the world needs.

From a newspaper.

Far be it from me to actually hold back on the New York Times and their wondrous journey into realms most sordid: reporting on a totally legal but SECRET tracking of terrorist's finances.

Actually, since I have already vituperated on their nonsense once, with John Kerry and his new photos (such a lovely guy to shoot pictures and film in Viet Nam... or, more correctly, to have other people shoot such things FOR HIM and OF HIM and ABOUT HIM). So perhaps one of their local competitors would like to take a stab at them. So onto the NY Sun, a stalwart paper:

The Times reported that it decided to report publicly on the program despite requests by administration officials that the newspaper not publish the story. The officials argued that the disclosure could reduce the effort's effectiveness, the newspaper said.

The executive editor of the Times, Bill Keller, said the newspaper was not persuaded. "We have listened closely to the administration's arguments for withholding this information, and given them the most serious and respectful consideration," Mr. Keller said. "We remain convinced that the administration's extraordinary access to this vast repository of international financial data, however carefully targeted use of it may be, is a matter of public interest."

The Times was already facing calls for its criminal prosecution in connection with a December report on a classified National Security Agency program for warrantless surveillance of telephone calls between America and abroad that are thought to involve people affiliated with terrorism. In that instance, President Bush reportedly summoned Mr. Keller and the publisher of the Times, Arthur Sulzberger Jr., to the Oval Office to ask that the story be killed.

The disclosure led to a series of lawsuits by civil liberties advocates. Some lawmakers also have denounced the program as unlawful and an impermissible expansion of executive authority.

A conservative magazine editor who is one of the leading advocates of prosecuting the Times for its December story, Gabriel Schoenfeld, told The New York Sun last night that the newspaper's latest move could increase their legal jeopardy.

"They're courting prosecution. ... They're increasingly behaving like if we were in the middle of World War II and they learned of plans to invade Normandy. Because they decided it's a matter of public interest, they'd publish it," Mr. Schoenfeld said. "I think this is reckless and likely to encourage Attorney General Gonzales to prosecute them, if not for this story, for some of the other things they've done."

Mr. Schoenfeld said that the latest disclosure by the Times about the financial surveillance was less clear cut as a legal violation because it did not appear to involve communications intelligence, which is specially protected under federal law.

Mr. Schoenfeld said the new report would increase anger against the paper. "They really are testing the limits of congressional and executive branch patience. There's a lot of displeasure with what they're doing," said Mr. Schoenfeld, who edits Commentary magazine and writes a weekly column on chess for the Sun.


Thank you, NY Sun! Mr. Schoenfeld seems to keep the gentlemanly attitude the founders of the New York Times wished others would have. How unfortunate that the Times sees weakening the Republic as a thing necessary for the "public interest". One would think the public might be interested in stopping terrorists and either capturing or killing them, and be a bit less interested in the means and methods to do so.

Now, going perusing through the other daily papers in NYC one finds... silence. An AP story here and the WSJ behind its wall... but nothing to call the NYT on its hubris.

Totally off-topic but the Polish American Journal from Buffalo notes that Polish troops may stay in Iraq:
In an interview with Europe Today, [Polish Defense Minister Radek] Sikorski said Polish forces had encountered less trouble in Iraq than some other countries' troops. He attributed this to a greater reluctance to use force and more respect for the country's religious sites.

"We are a religious country. Maybe the Iraqis pick up the fact that we respect their religious sites perhaps more than some others, and we seem to have good relationships with the local people," he said.
Damn! Figures the Polish community in the US would keep track of such things... heaven forefend the NYT or the Washington Post sully itself to report something so simple.

Now the Blogs are all over this with a rundown at Pajamas Media well worth going through.

Today we are seeing the convulsions that the dead tree print media has been predicting since the mid-1990's if not earlier: in order to compete for time and people, they must get even further and further away from *news* and go deep into advocacy journalism. This trend started in the 1960's and grew from there as the emphasis became to be less on the NEWS and more on the STORY. The 'compelling human interest' angle was always one that was played up, so a simple house fire became a heart rending STORY of tragedy, despair, hope and possible salvation that you would never find out about as the wise men at the paper had decided to move on from there to the latest tragedy. And if you can't get that, then go for graft, greed and corruption! Or an invasive government! Break down those doors to get the *story*...

Even when there isn't one.

And responsibility to the Nation as a whole?

"The public interest" is starting to sound more and more like "human interest", in which the paper will show something... anything... to get reader attention and then drop it for the next *big thing*. But when was the last really meaningful scoop? Its been some decades since Watergate and that is beginning to look more and more like an anomaly of personality than of pervasive government corruption. To get the 'scoop' on the 'big story' hasn't been grabbing anyone for years now... in point of fact readership across the industry is DOWN. Unless you are USAToday and make everything to be read in under 10 minutes and most short articles in under 2 minutes. And they live off of the business travel market and are not that great for in-depth reporting.

There are some catch phrases that are used these days to cover up someone wanting to hide misdeeds or take away rights for one thing or another:

  • "The public's right to know" = Our need for readers
  • "The public interest" = We will tell you what to be interested in
  • "For the children" = We don't want an adult world and want to be forever children
  • "The common interest" = Your taxes are going up
  • "It can't be addressed locally" = We want it done incompetently at a higher level
  • "It's for the public good" = Don't mind the land seizures and "the common interest"
  • "Only the Federal Government can address this" = We want it to remain a problem forever
  • "Count every vote and make sure every vote counts" = But only ours, please
  • "Don't drink and drive" = Except hot coffee from McDonald's
  • "It's for your own good" = It's a right you don't need
  • "Let somebody else take care of it" = It's my problem and I don't care about it
  • "You're a racist" = And you are a segregationist to bring that up, feel better now?
  • "We were put here for a purpose" = We want to screw things up worse and more frequently
  • "We have integrity to consider" = Our asses are exposed to gunfire
  • "We protect anonymous sources" = Especially that guy down at the bar claiming to work for the CIA
  • "Single payer health care is a solution" = Run like the IRS, records kept by the FBI and your health tracked by the Education Department... on a good day....
  • "Follow the money" = Unless it heads towards someone you like
  • "All the news that's fit to print" = Made up fresh daily to our liking
How the mighty have fallen upon hard times to need to put the Nation at risk for mere circulation.

18 June 2006

Geophysics for the common man - pt. 2 Fun with disasters

Everyone loves a good disaster! Just look at the 1970's movie line-up and you get a sheer plethora of star-studded disasters, and many of them from Irwin Allen... so it is the IA decade: The Poseidon Adventure (the original with Gene Hackman), The Towering Inferno, Flood! , Fire! , The Swarm, Beyond the Poseidon Adventure (but why?).

And then others joined in to show that Mr. Allen really *was* the Master of Disaster: Earthquake (when this was up at the same time as The Towering Inferno for *weeks* it was "Shake and Bake"), The Andromeda Strain, Disaster on the Coastliner, SST: Death Flight (ahhh... nostalgia! but it does feature a contagious flu), Encounter with Disaster (which goes over some real-life disasters), The Hindenburg, Airport (and its sequels 1975, 1977, The Concorde 1979), Flight to Holocaust (private jet collides with 20th story of high-rise), The Buffalo Creek Flood: An Act of Man (mine disaster retrospective), Dark Star (one of the best low-budget satires of its kind and the novelization by Alan Dean Foster is even better!), Nippon chinbotsu (aka. Tidal Wave), The China Syndrome, Bug....

Yes, apparently movie goers just wanted to see destruction, mayhem, fire, disease, floods, and all sorts of things that *could* be going on but weren't. And this lovely time I also like to call the Decade of Innocence for Disasters, because, really, the world was quite a calm and placid place for so many decades... the last of the Little Ice Age finally leaving after the dust from Krakatoa settled, a few tidal waves from earthquakes here and there, the odd earthquake in California and other parts of the world, maybe a swarm of locusts... but, really, things were quite quiet. Thankfully, geologists were about to make all of those disasters seem miniscule in comparison to what the normal process of the Earth's surface and environs actually *does*.

So, some background on our planet. Earth, if you check the link is 4.2 - 4.5 Billion years old and in its early stages it was forming as a nice, kind of small planet which was going on its merry way in orbit slowly building up material to be a sedentary kind of planet. Unfortunately there was another object that was about the size of Mars that was being perturbed in orbit and it finally collided with the Earth causing a splash and deep melting of the whole shebang. Earth got lots of new material and the detritus in orbit coalesced into the Moon. From there gravitational gradients of infalling material helped melting to occur, then pressure as the various parts of the planet contracted and compacted caused more melting, until heavy metals with radionucleotides seeped their way into the center to form the solid core. Then things heated up and the entire differentiation process speeded up as the heat from all of this tried to get out. It took a few million years for the crust to finally cool enough to start to form into solid pieces, which were still churned about until the outer layer finally solidified. Over the next few hundred million years tectonic plates were formed and they moved in accordance with those heat flows which had upwellings from the sub-surface structure of the planet.

Now, if you check out the nice little wikipedia article, it gives you the thumbnail sketch of the entire process, which is more than enough to get your feet wet. And if you don't like their description then imagine a vast vat of slowly cooling chicken soup with it cooling enough to let the lighter, more fatty stuff float to the top and form a layer. Keep the vat on LOW and you will slowly see patterns of deformation and breakup on the surface due to the upwelling of material that has been heated and less dense coming up from the bottom. Turn that into a sphere with its own heat source from a huge, dense rock in the center and you have an idea of the entire structure of the planet Earth, save no chicken bits or vegetable material roaming around in it. Oh, and the part we live on? On the soup pot concept we all live on that 0.01mm on the very surface.

Perhaps not a pretty picture, and I am sure someone can come up with custard or gelatine or some such to give a better representation of it. Those have a much better consistancy than chicken soup and would do far better to demonstrate actual plastic flow of material, but somehow letting custard get a crust and then heating it just isn't a pleasant picture. Sorry to have brought it up! And as a technical side note, when one speaks about "The scum of the Earth" that is, technically, the crustal material. And as all of life *exists* on that crustal material, well, to put it politely we are things that live on scum. So calling someone 'the scum of the earth' might be seen as an inadvertant elevation to a far higher position than one is deserving of having... to a geologist at least. So don't let yourself get into a shouting match with a geologist who thinks you are elevating someone above their place when, in fact, you are doing contrary-wise.

So, back to plate tectonics! Now the actual plates of the Earth move so slowly that no one really knew they moved at all... actually, no one even knew that there WERE plates of crustal material until the theory of it was put forth in the 1960's. Now I go into the background of that in this posting, but suffice it to say this has been nailed down as the way the Earth actually works. The entire theory now covers all the known effects of earthquakes, tsunamis, volcanic activity and orogeny. From magnetic orientation of seafloor material to stationary hot spots and moving plates, this takes care of why we have the geophysical features and structures that we see today and has been further backed up by seismic readings, deep magnetometer readings and measuring what is moving on the Earth by actual measurements.

Nothing, and I do mean *nothing* else explains the entire system as a whole. Further, as it is a predictive theory, we can take a look at the features left by past events and try to figure out why they happened. And it is a big, big shock to people when something like the Indian Ocean Earthquake of 2004 happens and the effects of it can be seen across the planet as the rotation of the planet changed slightly, as taken by distance and timing measurements via laser reflectors left on the Moon. Things like this may have a low periodicity rate compared to human life-spans, but are quite frequent and ongoing in the geological record. Thus, being predictive, geology tries its hardest to understand how the entire planet, from core to exosphere and beyond, works as a system. And by doing so the most disasterous of disasters can be gauged and their periodicity given by looking at sedimentation, tree rings, varves, ice cores, seafloor sediment cores and actual rock.

With that we can now see the top 5 disasters for North America! And you thought the nasty stuff had been stuck in the '70s, didn't you? So in reverse order, here are, as I see them, the top 5 pieces of nastiness that could happen tomorrow or 1,000 years from now or more... but they *will* happen based on physics, chemistry and radioactivity. And there is very, very, very little that mankind can do about ANY of them.

Oh, I doubt you will find *these* on the FEMA contingency plan listing.

Number 5 : The 'Big One' for California

Earthquakes, both big and small in California, have a periodicity to them that is pretty well known from sediment analysis and the human record. A Pacific crustal plate (and there are a number of them) is sliding to the north and a bit west relative to the North American plate. The most famous of these contact zones is the San Andreas Fault, which grinds along in a motion that is erratic, but predictable in average period. Actually, by giving release to energy so often this fault not only makes itself plain to understand but also saves us from having to worry about huge releases of energy built up over centuries. So, Southern California should consider itself lucky to have such a nice fault! As these things go, at least.

This type of fault, being a sliding motion between plates, with the pacific plate heading to the north and west relative to the north american plate, is, actually, not so bad. When the pacific plate hit against the north american plate, the ocean between the two plates, being less dense than the oceanic plate, tended to get scraped upwards and into the state we call California. This material is still quite saturated with water and tends to act as a giant shock absorber for earthquakes, thus they do not propogate that far outwards from their initial epicenter. So what happens in California *stays* in California, although Nevada does get its small share of the energy but nothing like the actual fault zone itself has. Marin County has a nice summary of some of their local features, but this entire concept plays out all along south coastal and central California. I remember one geologist looking at San Francisco and identifying rock and features typified of over 60 different geographical regions and ocean floor types and saying: 'This part of California appears to have been a global tourist before coming for a visit here.'

Now, as the good folks at USGS have looked at the fault, we come up with this little observation:

Along the Earth's plate boundaries, such as the San Andreas fault, segments exist where no large earthquakes have occurred for long intervals of time. Scientists term these segments "seismic gaps" and, in general, have been successful in forecasting the time when some of the seismic gaps will produce large earthquakes. Geologic studies show that over the past 1,400 to 1,500 years large earthquakes have occurred at about 150-year intervals on the southern San Andreas fault. As the last large earthquake on the southern San Andreas occurred in 1857, that section of the fault is considered a likely location for an earthquake within the next few decades. The San Francisco Bay area has a slightly lower potential for a great earthquake, as less than 100 years have passed since the great 1906 earthquake; however, moderate-sized, potentially damaging earthquakes could occur in this area at any time.

A great earthquake very possibly will not occur unannounced. Such an earthquake may be preceded by an increase in seismicity for several years, possibly including several foreshocks of about magnitude 5 along the fault. Before the next large earthquake, seismologists also expect to record changes in the Earth's surface, such as a shortening of survey lines across the fault, changes in elevation, and effects on strainmeters in wells. A key area for research on methods of earthquake prediction is the section of the San Andreas fault near Parkfield in central California, where a moderate-size earthquake has occurred on the average of every 20-22 years for about the last 100 years. Since the last sizeable earthquake occurred in 1966, Parkfield has a high probability for a magnitude 5-6 earthquake before the end of this century and possibly one may occur within a few years of 1988. The U.S. Geological Survey has placed an array of instruments in the Parkfield area and is carefully studying the data being collected, attempting to learn what changes might precede an earthquake of about that size.
So, the 1906 San Francisco Earthquake and subsequent fire is on a section of fault that does stick somewhat and, while the fault as a whole has a periodicity or average recurrance time of 150 years for large earthquakes that is just an average with a range not well understood. The folks at the California Geological Survey are, of course, keeping a strict watch on this and the more southernly portions of the fault. And that is the worrying section as that southern fault zone last went in a big way in 1857 and has a 150 year periodicity, which makes it due in our immediate future and, as this fault has seen a constant rate of slippage given its underlying geology, no more than 200 years as an outer time horizon. That last is, of course, a guess.

So, what could be in store for California in the near future? First a good sized quake near the Fort Tejon area in the vicinity of magnitude 8.0... with a range most likely between magnitudes 7.8 and 8.2 for a rough guesstimate. The area is not my specialty, but the range sounds likely given slippage build-up and probably length of fault to move. A repeat of the San Francisco earthquake between magnitudes 7.5 to 8.0 would also be expected in the up to 50 year time horizon, although it may be longer or shorter than that. Actually, the more frequent the earthquakes the smaller the magnitude as the energy gets released more often.

For the Fort Tejon type of quake, Los Angeles could probably expect to feel a quake between 6.8 to 7.8 depending on where, exactly the fault starts to slip and how much of the fault actually does slip. And for this type of fault the longer the slip the higher the magnitude of the quake. Some parts of this fault have not slipped much or at all since 1857 so a long boundary slip would be expected which puts the quake itself in the higher magnitude range.

San Francisco would take the brunt of the quake just outside of downtown and experience it heavily throughout the region. Again, large sections of the fault zone have been quiescent with little release of energy since 1906, and nearby fault zones do not, necessarily, relieve strain on the main fault.

The central portion of the fault slips relatively smoothly and seems to shift relatively easily given the pressures it is under. What the exact dynamic of a Fort Tejon area quake suddenly shifting to catch up with this central portion is not clearly understood. First, would this movement cause a dynamic shifting along the fault zone or would it suddenly lock up? Either of these is troublesome, it would seem to me:
  • A dynamic shifting of movement, while nice for that section of the fault, would transfer energy quickly to the northern section running through San Francisco, which suddenly puts much, much more stored energy into that zone. And here 'suddenly' to a geologist is something under 10 years, just so we have the time scale right. So monitoring of that central fault zone would tell much about the energy dynamics of the northern zone. From that the northern zone quake might push up one entire magnitude on the open-ended Richter scale and thus have 10 times the energy released. Thus a magnitude 8.5 to 9.0 earthquake is not out of the question if the southern zone moves first and its energy is dynamically transferred north. This would be a short and intense earthquake, probably not more than 30-40 seconds in length.

  • If the central zone suddenly locks up, then the entire stored energy of shift from the southern zone pushing into it becomes stored potential energy which could then trigger a very long release once the northern zone shifts. Now there may be enough dynamic separation between north and central so that an earthquake in the north does *not* also include the central zone. That would be a *good* thing, limiting the size of the north quake to 7.5 to 8.0 and lasting 30-40 seconds. If, however, it does slip with the north, then the entire length of north and central release stored energy for a 8.5 to 9.0 earthquake lasting 45 seconds to 60 seconds. A nasty shock to say the least.
So there you have the next few decades for California: big quake soon for the Los Angeles area and within 50 years or so for San Francisco or far, far less depending upon the southern slippage and transferrance rate along the cental zone. Look at the population density map for today and we see that the Fort Tejon quake would affect about 12-15 million people and the San Francisco quake about 7-10 million people. And none of them have experienced anything over a magnitude 8.0 earthquake recently. Needless to say even with new earthquake construction codes, many older buildings will come down and even some of the newer reinforced highway and bridge structures will collapse. Buckling of ground due to differential release of strain is expected, so many highways will be put out of commission, especially those crossing the fault boundary. Also likely to go will be gas, electrical and sewage capability.

Of much greater worry is the lack of a redundant emergency water supply system to fight fires. Even if emergency responders can *get* to a fire, the broken water system will not allow for the fire to actually by contained. Some efforts have been put into sea water emergency lay-down systems, but those have pumping limitations based on the amount of pipe, width of pipe, number of pumps, energy supply and uphill gradient. And while modern concrete, glass and steel buildings are likely to survive the initial quake, they may come to be very susceptible to surrounding fires and the lack of ability to control internal fires on independent systems for more than an hour or so. With large unreinforced masonry building sections in both municipalities and a large amount of wood frame construction, these areas are tinderboxes without fire suppression. Fires starting from ruptured gas mains, ruptured fuel tanks and masonry buildings having their contents catch on fire could see something the equivalent of a firestorm happen in the days after a large quake in either metropolitan area.

About the only thing to be really thankful for is that such quakes rarely cause tsunamis! That would really cause problems on the coast...

Number 4 : Cascadia

(Image Courtesy: Wikipedia)
Cascadia MegaCityAhh, the scenic Pacific Northwest! Lovely coastline! Beautiful forests! Scenic mountains! And volcanos, earthquakes and tsunamis... not that those latter are seen in tourist brochures. The region from northern California all the way up into Canada... Cascadia! And to a geologist this means the Cascadia Subduction zone and its attendant earthquakes and tsunamis. In this region, off the coast, the Juan de Fuca sea floor plate, which is somewhat trapezoidal with the large end being subducted under the North American plate, has been merrily doing so for millions of years. We know this from the volcanic activity attendant to the plate as it melts from friction and subsurface heat and pressure under the North American plate. It has formed the Cascade range of mountains and volcanos. Yes, *something* has to build that wondeful scenery and here it is the geological forces of plate subduction giving lovely volcanos to help dot the landscape and transform it into something truly awe inspiring... and very much so when one releases magmatic pressures under it!

But those are *not* the worry from Cascadia... instead the megathrust undersea fault is the primary concern here as they can cause severe earthquakes and tsunamis. This is the equivalent of the Indian Ocean Earthquake but happening right off the Northwest coast of North America. The last time that the Cascadia subduction zone caused one of these events was on January 26, 1700. This was figured out by a process of narrowing down the time frame for some event or events that had happened along that coastline that had left some very strange artifacts. The primary one being the Ghost Forest of Washington State which showed evidence of massive forest damage in the past, subsidence and then slow uplift over time. The uplift is caused by the locking of the North American plate on the Juan de Fuca plate as the latter moves 44 millimeters a year towards the North American plate.

Now, being locked together like that means that the edge of the North American continent gets slowly pushed upwards. This stores the energy of movement until it catastrophically lets go, and when it does it is usually along the entire fault boundary at one shot. And the last time the Cascadia went in 1700 the land subsided along the coast, allowing water to rush in and that was followed a few minutes later by the tsunami caused by the quake. The year was pinned down by using tree rings and matching them against known tree rings to get an approximate date... which was right after the 1699 tree ring was formed. Once this was known, then consulting with local Native American's confirmed stories about the Thunderbird letting loose and great waves hitting the land. Brian Atwater looked for something more specific, however, and found it with the help of researchers in Japan going through old monastic records which recorded an orphan tsunami, its height and the day and hour it struck at. By backtracking the known wave travel time you get to the exact date and nearly the exact hour and minute it hit.

Now the periodicity for the Cascadia is 500 years, but its range is 300 to 900 years, with sediment work pinning down multiple quakes to give us this range. A quick check of the calendar and we see that we are now within the Cascadia range. So, what exactly has built up over the last 300 years?

First, the Juan de Fuca plate has put in 13.2 meters of stress on the North American plate edge, which is the equivalent of what was released during the Indian Ocean quake. So, when Cascadia lets go, we can expect to see a similar occurance along that region that was seen near the fault in the Indian Ocean.

Second, the shoreline, by being uplifted has allowed for construction of all sorts right along the coastline.

Third, and finally, by not experiencing frequent quakes in the Pacific Northwest, the cities there do *not* build to earthquake resistant codes.

What happens when Cascadia goes? A magnitude 9.0 quake lasting for up to 5 long minutes. Now as the Cascades and coastal range mountains are generally uncompacted sediment, they will, like in California, act as a shock absorber to vibrations. And, since this is a localized land subsidence on the edge of the plate via the megathrust it should not be heavily felt beyond the immediate coastal regions. From the coast up to the coastal range of mountains, however, this will be felt with severity increasing towards the coast. Those directly on the coast will feel it worse and may experience a sudden inrushing of the sea as that part of the plate subsides. Not a good day to go swimming.

Nothing has been tested under such stress, even buildings built to California code, so no one knows exactly what will and will not survive such a quake. Unreinforced masonry buildings will collapse, and there are a plethora of those along all the cities on the coastline there. So if you are in a brick building, you may experience sudden building failure. Steel girder construction structures should fare relatively well, with swaying and some nausea for occupants. As a megathrust fault has a different mix of wavelengths and types that are sustained, some structures may experience failures when very long wavelengths play through them for endless minutes. Really, as we have no record of this type of wavelength mixtures sustained for this length of time, no one knows. And as in California, the largest immediate problem will be fires and disruption of utilities and the breakdown of the highway system, including bridge and skyway collapses. A major oil pipeline from Canada runs through this region and will also be disrupted as it suffers mild to moderate quake damage along its entire length and severe damage on the coast by Vancouver, B.C. and Seattle-Tacoma, Washington. There is a good chance that the coastal region of Cascadia will fall off the power grid and cause power re-routing and blackouts. This is less of a concern in California as their grid knows how to deal with sudden drop offs due to quakes, while the rest of North America does not. Most dams should fare well, save those that are on major rivers and may experience backwash of water due to oceanic flow upstream due to subsidence. California does not have this to worry about as it is a lateral fault not a megathrust fault. The population density, being more coastal, will put a population of approximately 7 million people at risk in the major metropolitan regions, with a smaller and more dispersed number along the entire coastline.

And then, as if a magnitude 9 earthquake lasting 5 minutes and a meter or two of coastal subsidence isn't enough, 10-15 minutes later a 13 meter high tsunami hits the coast! To anyone living on the Pacific Coast of Cascadia, from Northern California to Northern British Columbia: if you are within 3 miles of the coast run, do not drive, as fast as you can away from the coast and/or uphill. It *will* save your life. Do NOT stay on the coast and gawk, if you do you will die. This includes all of Western Vancouver Island. If you are on the Eastern Coast or in the Puget sound I will say that past wave forms are not a great predictor for future tidal waves. Seattle, in particular, has seen tsunami wash along its coastline and I would not want to predict what the reflection and refraction of waveforms will do along the coast. The sea is *not* to be trusted.

If you are in the MegaCity area, especially near the coast or on the banks of major rivers *including* Portland along the Willamette River get *away* from them. You are not safe and past wash sediment deposit indicates the tsunami has pushed backwater all the way to Portland, Oregon.

Tsunamis are multiple wave forms and the first is usually *not* the worst. In the Indian Ocean Earthquake it varied from the second wave to the fifth wave coming in being the most deadly. A tsunami is a front of water that stretches across the entire coastline to the extent of the fault and spreads as it heads to land and can be up to half a mile deep and as high as the megathrust event. Starting with current conditions that is 40 feet high and half a mile deep across the entire coast coming in multiples ranging from 5 feet at the lowest and 60 feet at the highest due to land constriction of waveforms. And the water from a previous wavefront will not have drained before the next one comes in to push the first farther inland. Tsunami's can typically have 20 minutes to 90 minutes between waves. You are not safe until 10 hours have passed. It is very tempting to go and try to rescue people after wave 3 or 4... if you do, you may be on the casualty list. No one can predict ahead of time what the number or severity of waves will be and it varies across the entire fault and coastline.

A 5 minute magnitude 9 earthquake is *not* a drill. It is the real deal. If you can survive the quake, get high enough to wait out the tsunami and then *stay put* until the last of the waves have left and the worst of the collapsing of buildings is over, then you can think about what to do next. I suggest heading inland for help and organization. Others will rush into the disaster area unprepared... that is your right to do so and your life is in your hands as rescue may be hours or days or weeks away.

This is why this event tops the 'Big One' for California: The US and Canada are wholly unprepared for this sort of devastation and we have not built with it in mind. This will be a nasty event until the entire infrastructure of the Cascadia region is re-made to handle it. And some things we can *never* prepare for.

Number 3: New Madrid
(Image Courtesy: USGS)
New Madrid Seismic ZoneWelcome to the Heartland of America! Where the mighty Mississippi flows and good sized cities flourish and earthquakes are rare and deadly. This is the land where the United States experienced its worst earthquake in its short history. Here, between December of 1811 and February of 1812 three earthquakes close to magnitude 8 or more (we don't really know as we have to infer from observation data and not seismic records) rattled not only through the Heartland but rang church bells in Boston, Massachussets and shook Quebec City so that dishes rattled. These quakes and their over 2000 smaller aftershocks ranging from magnitude 3 to 6 made life very uneasy. To understand *why* we must look at the entire zone as a whole and its history. Luckily, the folks at the US Geological Survey have done this for us! And the folks at Wikipedia have also done a good job on the basics.

So let me set the scene at 750 million years ago.

The Earth had cooled and continents had formed and water was in its basins and life was emerging into various and splendiferous forms, radiating into all sorts of strange and interesting designs. The Supercontinent of Rodinia, however, was feeling internal pressures and started to break up into smaller continental forms. Many large and grand rift valleys formed, but not all of them would herald the splitting off of a continent. In the middle of what we know as the North American plate a rift valley also formed, but it was destined not to be one that spread and connected much. Over a few million years it subsided in activity and the plate of North America remained intact, save for this tear where the rifting had started. So by 500 million years ago things had calmed down and the plates started on their merry way of colliding, subducting, producing mountains and volcanic regions and things were *good*. Well, speaking for the crustal portion of the planet, that is.

Continents drifted, life evolved, spread, did all sorts of interesting things, life died out leaving few survivors a few times and things just kept on happening. Life, even conscious life of the last few thousand years, didn't really pay much attention to such things as earthquakes. With the coming of civilization to the shores of the Continent and a very young nation still not well settled, this strange and long series of earthquakes were just something that happened. Unless one was in the zone of them, in which case you were absolutely convinced the Earth was ending.

The thing that drives the energy for this fault is the North Atlantic Spreading Center along the Mid-Atlantic Ridge. Yes, the problems here start at sea, as so many things in life do. The Atlantic seafloor spreads out from the ridge at a slow, but stately 5-10 cm per year. The North American plate is pushed by this and, since it is the direction it wants to go, subduction does *not* take place. Unfortunately the plate hits the Pacific and Juan de Fuca plates and so there is some build-up of energy across the entire plate, but it is pretty evenly distributed as the plate is generally in one piece. Except for that little tear right in the middle. There is room for movement and pressure build-up there and then sudden releases as it lets that energy go. That is the New Madrid Seismic Zone, buried 5 miles down under generally uncompacted sediment and this rift goes through the very North American plate itself.

Being #3 on this list we can now make analogies to number #4 & 5. Think of the North American plate as a dinner gong made of thick iron. The Pacific plate is a bit denser, maybe a denser metal mix with Iron and the edges of these two plates are a bit rough and not evenly formed. The Pacific plate rides next to the North American plate, and due to the bits rubbing off between them you get a slip now and again that doesn't really do much to either gong. The Juan de Fuca plate is being pushed somewhat laterally by the Pacific plate and has a spreading center pushing part of it under the North American plate. Here the denser material slides under the lighter, but their contacting surfaces are like cheese graters pointing in opposing directions. Pressure builds up and then slips, but the gongs themselves don't much feel anything. Now, take the mallet for the North American plate dinner gong and hit the plate just a bit off center and south to the east. The gong rings. That is New Madrid. Except the mallet hits a few times to reshape the pressure ridge there and quite a few lesser mallets are used to also re-adjust it for a few months. Once the pressure is relieved, the mallets are put away. The mallets are the energy releases and shifts in the sub-surface structure of the plate itself and then the adjustments by the overburden of 5 miles of sediment structure of varying densities.

Isn't life grand?

Now, this seismic zone does lots of fun things that other zones also do, but to a lesser extent as they are not as concentrated in their energy release as New Madrid. One of them is to take that uncompacted sediment and jar it enough to liquify it! So as that deep undersurface layer of mostly sand liquifies, the denser upper strata shift and move and do all sorts of interesting things. Sometimes they fault open and sandblows erupt! The liquified sand is under pressure so it erupts upwards and can cause sand eruptions that go 100 feet into the air and will bury things in the immediate 30 to 50 feet in many, many feet of sand. These can *still* be seen on topographic maps of the area. Another thing that can happen is that there can be generalized upthrusts of the overburden layers to suddenly change the topography and also have subsidences as the sand shifts from one area to another. Thus Reelfoot Lake was formed when land near the Mississippi subsided and the river flowed into it. Gasses that were put under pressure released along many fissures and other areas bringing noxious and sulferous fumes with them. The Mississippi River flowed backwards along 30 miles of its extent and further upstream as a sudden island was put in its path. This backflow was charted all the way to the Ohio River. And throughout all of this, strange lights could be observed glowing and flashing in eerie colors at night and day which really made all of this seem like doomsday to those involved.

And the periodicity of this place? That is a real good question... a 50% chance of an 8.0 magnitude or greater event by 2040... but... the areas covered by previous sandblows have not been fully analyzed. Like most of these things it is sitting in the 200 year time vicinity and a real range has not been established for it nor its cycle time. Deformation is a continuous process and does vary from normal plate deformation, but not by much compared to such things as Cascadia. And an examination of sand blows (this paper which may have to be manually navigated to as direct links don't appear to work) seems to show a decreasing time between quakes given the dates they found are 2350 BC, 300 AD, 900 AD, 1450 AD, 1811-12 AD. Such a thing can either be not enough digging for sand blows to find intermediate occurances or a real decreasing in time frequency. The former would show more frequent occurances of large quakes which would not be good... and the latter would indicate that something is causing faster energy build-up and release over time, which is not good. As this fault type is not well understood more research definitely needs to be done!

From: The Louisiana Gazette and Daily Advertiser [sometimes The Louisiana Gazette and New Orleans Advertiser]
"Saturday, December 21, 1811No mail north of Natchez yesterday. Letters from that city state that a small shock of an earthquake had been felt there some days ago. From the principles of earthquakes we are surprized it was not felt here. Earthquakes have generally been felt in southern mountainous countries; sometimes located to a small portion of country, sometimes more extended. Different nations, near the Adriatic and Mediterranean, have felt the shock of an earthquake at the same moment.

The Comet has been passing to the westward since it passed its perihelion -- perhaps it has touched the mountain of California, that has given a small shake to this side of the globe -- or the shake which the Natchezians have felt may be a mysterious visitation from the Author of all nature, on them for their sin -- wickedness and the want of good faith have long prevailed in that territory.

Sodom and Gomorrha would have been saved had three righteous persons been found in it -- we therefore hope that Natchez has been saved on the same principle."

"Monday, January 20, 1812 [indirect copy from another source]
[original seen but not copied]

We have the following description of the Earthquake from gentlemen who were on board a large barge, and lay an anchor in the Mississippi a few leagues below New Madrid, on the night of the 15th of December. About 2 o'clock all hands were awakened by the first shock; the impression was, that the barge had dragged her anchor and was grounding on gravel; such, were the feelings for 60 or 80 seconds, when the shock subsided. The crew were so fully persuaded of the fact of their being aground, that they put out their sounding poles, but found water enough.

At seven next morning a second and very severe shock took place. The barge was under way -- the river rose several feet; the trees on the shore shook; the banks in large columns tumbled in; hundreds of old trees that had lain perhaps half a century at the bottom of the river, appeared on the surface of the water; the feathered race took to the wing; the canopy was covered with geese and ducks and various other kinds of wild fowl; very little wind; the air was tainted with a nitrous and sulphureous smell; and every thing was truly alarming for several minutes. The shocks continued to the 21st Dec. during that time perhaps one hundred were distinctly felt. From the river St. Francis to the Chickasaw bluffs visible marks of the earthquake were discovered; from that place down, the banks did not appear to have been disturbed.

There is one part of this description which we cannot reconcile with philosophic principles, (although we believe the narrative to be true,) that is, the trees which were settled at the bottom of the river appearing on the surface. It must be obvious to every person that those trees must have become specifically heavier than the water before they sunk, and of course after being immersed in the mud must have increased in weight. -- We therefore submit the question to the Philosophical Society."
From: Extracts from Louisiana Gazette (St. Louis)
"Saturday, 21 December 1811

Earthquake

On Monday morning last, about a quarter past two, St. Louis and the surrounding country, was visited by one of the most violent shocks of earthquake that has been recorded since the discovery of our country.

As we were all wrapt in sleep, each tells his story in his own way. I will also relate my simple tale.

At the period above mentioned, I was roused from sleep by the clamor of windows, doors and furniture in tremulous motion, with a distant rumbling noise, resembling a number of carriages passing over pavement- in a few seconds the motion and subterraneous thunder increased more and more: believing the noise to proceed from the N. or N.W. and expecting the earth to be relieved by a volcanic eruption, I went out of doors & looked for the dreadful phenomenon. The agitation had now reached its utmost violence. I entered the house to snatch my family from its expected ruins, but before I could put my design in execution the shock had ceased, having lasted about one and three fourth minutes. The sky was obscured by a thick hazy fog, without a breath of air. Fahrenheit thermometer might have stood at this time at about 35 or 40°.

At forty seven minutes past two, another shock was felt without any rumbling noise and much less violent than the first, it lasted near two minutes.

At thirty four minutes past three, a third shock nearly as tremulous as the first, but without as much noise, it lasted about fifty seconds, and a slight trembling continued at intervals for some time after.

A little after day light, a fourth shock was felt, but with less violence than any of the others, it lasted nearly one minute.

About 8 o'clock, a fifth shock was felt; this was almost as violent as the first, accompanied with the usual noise, it lasted about half a minute: this morning was very hazy and unusually warm for the season, the houses and fences appeared covered with a white frost, but on examination it was found to be vapour, not possessing the chilling cold of frost: indeed the moon was enshrouded in awful gloom.

At half past eleven, a slight shock was felt, and about the same hour on Tuesday last, a smart shock was felt -- several gentlemen declare, they felt shocks at other intervals.

No lives have been lost, nor has the houses sustained much injury, a few chimneys have been thrown down, and a few stone houses split.

In noticing extraordinary events, perhaps no attendant circumstances should be deemed unimportant: This is one of that character, and a faithful record of appearances in such cases as these, may form data for science. Viewing the subject in this way, it may not be amiss to notice the reports of those who have explored the extensive plains and mountains of the West.

On the margin of several of our rivers pumice and other volcanic matter is found. At the base of some of the highest of the black mountains, stone covers the earth, bearing marks of the violent action of fire. Within -0 miles of the great Osage village on the head waters of their river, and 1-0 miles from this town, it is said that a volcano had ceased to burn for the last three years, and it is thought to have now broke out in some quarter of our country. Upon the whole, this has been an uncommon year; the early melting of snow to the north raised the Mississippi to an unusual height. The continued rains in the summer and the subsequent hot weather, and consequent sickness amongst the inhabitants, rendered that period somewhat distressing. -- Autumn, to this time, has been unusually mild, and health pervades the land in every quarter.

Since writing the above, several slight shocks were sensibly felt, to the number ten or twelve.

Editor

*****

Saturday, December 28, 1811

Our correspondent at Cape Girardeau has forwarded us with the following notice of the Earthquake.

Dec. 22, 1811

"The concussions of the Earthquake which commenced at two o'clock on Monday morning still continue. We have experienced five severe shocks which split two brick Houses and damaged five brick chimneys in this place."

J. McF.

The Earthquake was felt at Nashville, Ten. with like effects, and about the same moment it was felt here.

*****

Saturday, January 18, 1812

The earthquake of Dec. 16 &c was felt in the states of Ohio and Kentucky, some houses has been thrown down but no lives lost.

******

Saturday, February 8, 1812

On Thursday morning last, between 2 & 3 o'clock, we experienced the most severe shock of earthquake that we have yet felt, many houses are injured, and several chimneys thrown down; few hours pass without feeling slight vibrations of the earth. Should we ever obtain another mail, we shall be attentive in recording the progress in every quarter.

*****

Saturday, February 15, 1812

A number of our readers having expressed a wish to become acquainted with the opinions of the learned, on the subject of earthquakes, we have principally devoted this number to the theories which are held in the highest estimation, and which the editors of the (last edition) of the Encyclopedia have selected from the volumes written on geology.

From what we have read on that subject, we cannot find an instant, where the earth's vibration has extended to such a vast portion of country as of the last two months concussion: travellers say that it has been felt in New York, Pennsylvania and Virginia: In Kentucky and the state of Ohio its effects were more distinctive to buildings than in Louisiana. Hunters from the west, three or four hundred miles from this place, aver that the shock felt on the 16th of Dec. was extremely violent in the headwaters of the White river. From these circumstances it would appear, that it is not limited to a particular portion of country; its extent, we believe, will be ascertained to be more wide, than any instance of such phenomena on record.

Editor

[This is followed by a five column general article about earthquakes, copied from Encyclopedia Britannica, not copied here.]

*****

Saturday, February 22, 1812
[apparently copied from the Aurora]
Natchez, Jan. 2

IMPORTANT ARRIVAL

Arrived here on Monday last, the Steam Boat from Pittsburgh which had on account of low water been some time detained at the falls of the Ohio; and is destined to run between this place and New Orleans as a regular trader. She was only 221 hours under way from Pittsburgh to this place, a distance of near two thousand miles.

No very satisfactory account of the shocks of Earthquake, and their effects, which have lately happened could be expected; that received from the gentlemen on board, is rather more to than we anticipated.

The shake or jar, produced by the powerful operation of the engine, rendered the shocks imperceptible, while the boat was under way. While at anchor five or six shocks were felt, two or three more severe than the rest. On enquiry at New Madrid, a small town about 70 miles below the mouth of Ohio, they found that the chimnies of almost all the houses were thrown down, and the inhabitants considerably alarmed. -- At the little Prairie, thirty miles lower down, they were bro't to by the cries of some of the people, who thought the earth was gradually sinking but declined to take refuge on board without their friends, whom they wished to collect. Some distance below the little Prairie the bank of the river had caved in to a considerable extent, and two islands had almost disappeared.

From the Evening Ledger

Mr. Evans -- The repeated shocks of Earthquakes, which have been felt in this place since the morning of the 16th, having drawn forth some speculations and hypotheses from the scientific. I shall take the liberty of giving as perfect an account of the phenomena as they occurred, as my own observations, assisted by that of others, will enable me to do.

About 3 o'clock of the morning of the 16th, a shock was felt which produced an oscillating movements of the houses, and lasted for nearly a minute. It was not preceded by any noises which usually portend this phenomenon, nor was its approach announced by any other appearance than a great serenity in the atmosphere. An hour afterwards another shock was felt, but of shorter continuance than the other and a person then up, has said, that he observed at the same time a tremulous undulating motion of the earth like the rolling of waves. At 8 o'clock a noise resembling distant thunder was heard, and was soon after followed by a shock which appeared to operate vertically, that is to say, by a heaving of the ground upwards -- but was not sufficiently severe to injure either furniture or glasses. This shock was succeeded by a thick haze, and many people were affected by giddiness and nausea. Another shock was experienced about 9 o'clock at night, but so light as not to be generally felt -- and at half past 12 the next day (the 17th) another shock was felt, which lasted only a few seconds and was succeeded by a tremor which was occasionally observed throughout the day effecting many with giddiness. At half past 8 o'clock a very thick haze came on, and for a few minutes a sulphurous smell was emitted. At nine o'clock last night, another was felt, which continued four or five seconds, but so slight as to have escaped the observation of many who had not thought of attending particularly to the operations of this phenomenon. At one o'clock this morning (23d) another shock took place of nearly equal severity with the first of the 16th. Buried in sleep, I was not sensible of this, but I have derived such correct information on the fact that I have no reason to doubt it; but I have observed since 11 o'clock this morning frequent tremors of the earth, such as usually precede severe shocks in other parts of the world.

It is something extraordinary, that these shocks so numerous should not be attended with more formidable effects, or that they should not have increased in their severity. There is nothing extraordinary in their frequency, but as in other countries, not so much subject to the influence of the sun as this is, such frequent shocks usually have ended in mischief and desolation, we ought to have calculated upon similar effects from similar causes.

The mildness of those we have felt can be attributed only to the distance of the cause by which they have been produced. On this subject, of the cause of earthquakes, there are numerous and discordant opinions from the ancient philosopher, Anaxagoras, to sir William Hamilton or Mr. Dolomien.

According to the hypothesis of some, earthquakes are occasioned by subterranean fires throwing down the arches or vaults of the earth; according to others the rarefaction of the abyss waters, interior combustion and fermentation, volcanic operations, and lately by the electric fluid.

The latter hypothesis seems to be the most accredited, as it evidently is the most rational. The instantaneous effects of strong[?] earthquakes prove beyond doubt that electricity must be the principal agent in this alarming and terrible phenomenon. Whether according to Mr. Stuckley[?], this electricity is superficial, or is buried in and pervades the bowels of the earth, as is supposed by others, is among those arenas of nature, which human wisdom may be never able to ascertain.

The most rational hypothesis to me seems to be, that earthquakes are produced by an union of terrestrial and atmospheric electricity, as by the former the heaving of the ground upwards is easily explained as the corruscations and explosions which sometimes precede and accompany earthquakes may be accounted for by the influence of the other.

Volcanic operations may have their influence in the production of earthquakes, by giving an extraordinary impulse to the electric matter which everywhere pervades the interior of the earth, and as no bounds can be fixed to the progress of that subtle fluid, the impulse which may be given by a volcano of the Andes would reach us in the course of an hour, or sooner, in proportion to the quantity of electric fluid affected by the contact.

The celebrated earthquake in 1755 appears from all the facts, as they have been carefully compiled, to have travelled four millions of square miles in about one hour and ten minutes.

From the nature, quality and direction of the shocks felt in this city I am induced from a variety of circumstances to suppose, that they may be traced to some of the volcanic operations of the Cordillera de los Andes, and if the hasty remarks which I now do myself the pleasure of submitting are deemed sufficiently interesting for publication, the subject will be renewed with more method and reflection.

A SUBSCRIBER
Savannah, Dec. 23, 1811


ST. LOUIS
Saturday, February 22

By a gentleman just from Arkansas, by way of White river, we learn that the earthquake was violent in that quarter that in upwards of 500 places he observed coal and sand thrown up from fissures in the earth, that the waters raised in a swamp near the Cherokee village, so as to drown a Mr. Carrin who was travelling with his brother, the latter saved himself on a log. -- In other places the water fell, and in one instant it rose in a swamp near the St. Francis 25 or 30 feet; near Strawberry a branch of Black river, an eminence about 1 1/2 acres sunk down and formed a pond.

The Earthquake noticed in our list has been felt in various parts of the country. The paper from Richmond, Edenton, Wilmington, Charleston and Savannah, mention the phenomenon-- In Charleston, six distinct shocks were felt; the first and most violent about 3 o'clock, and one minute and a half in duration. It was very severe and alarming; indeed, the vibration was so great as to see some of the church bells ringing- the pendulums of the clocks stopped, and the picture glasses in many houses were broken.

*****

Saturday, February 29, 1812
EARTHQUAKE
New Orleans, December 26

A letter from Fort Stoddert mentions, that on the morning of the 16th inst., two shocks of an earthquake had been felt. This is precisely the time it was felt at Natchez. It is evident that our being on an island and resting on the water, prevented us from feeling part of the shocks.


Cape Girardeau, Feb. 15th, 1812
The concussions of the earthquake still continue, the shock on the 23rd ult. was more severe and larger than that of the 16th Dec. and the shock of the 7th inst. was still more violent than any preceding, and lasted longer than perhaps any on record, (from 10 to 15 minutes, the earth was not at rest for one hour.) the ravages of this dreadful convulsion have nearly depopulated the district of New Madrid, but few remain to tell the sad tale, the inhabitants have fled in every direction. It has done considerable damage in this place by demolishing chimnies, and cracking cellar walls. Some have been driven from their houses, and a number are yet in tents. No doubt volcanoes in the mountains of the west, which have been extinguished for ages, are now opened.

******

Saturday, March 7, 1812
Orleans, January 13
THE EARTHQUAKE

By a gentleman who came on the Steam Boat we are informed that this convulsion of nature, (the first, we believe that has ever been felt on the Mississippi since the settlement of the country by the whites,) has destroyed several islands in the Mississippi, and has thereby endangered its navigation very considerably. He also states that it has sunk the land in a number of places on the margin of the river.


Mr. Charless,
I here give you an extract of a letter, dated Orleans January 16th, from my friend John Bradbury. It will be found to contain some information relative to the effects of the earthquake of 16th Dec. on the Mississippi river and its banks; permit me to add that you have no information from any source which can be more implicitly relied on.

Yours, H.W.D.

EXTRACT

"Our voyage was from various causes tedious and disagreeable, we being 28 days from St. Louis to this place, Mr. Comegys has fared worse, being two months. Our progress was considerably impeded by an alarming and awful earthquake, such as has not I believe, occurred, or at least has not been recorded in the history of this country. The first shock which we experienced was about 2 o'clock on the morning of the 16th Dec. at which time our position was in itself perilous, we being but a few hundred yards above a bad place in the river, called the Devils Race Ground:* in our situation particularly, the scene was terrible beyond description, our boat appeared as if alternately lifted out of the water, and again suffered to fall. The banks above, below and around us were falling every moment into the river, all nature seemed running into chaos. The noise unconnected with particular objects, was the noise of the most violent tempest of wind mixed with a sound equal to the loudest thunder, but more hollow and vibrating. The crashing of falling trees and the loud screeching of wild fowl made up the horrid concert. Two men were sent on shore in order to examine the state of the bank to which we were moored, who reported that a few yards from its summit, it was separated from the shore by a chasm of more than 100 yards in length. Jos. Morin, the patron, insisted on our all leaving the boat which he thought could not be saved, and of landing immediately in order to save our lives: -- this I successfully combatted until another shock took place, about 3 o'clock, when we all left the boat, went on shore and kindled a fire. Between the first shock and daylight, we counted 27. As day broke we put off from the shore, at which instant we experienced another shock, nearly as violent as the first, by this the fright of the hands was so much increased, that they seemed deprived of strength and reason: I directed Morin to land on a sloping bank at the entrance of the Devil's Race Ground, intending to wait there until the men should be refreshed with a good breakfast. While it was preparing, we had three shocks, so strong as to make it difficult for us to stand on our feet; at length recovered from our panic we proceeded; after this we felt shocks during 6 days, but none to compare with those on the memorable morning of the 16th. I made many and minute observations on this earthquake, which if ever we meet, I will communicate to you, &c."

* 120 miles below N. Madrid


Extract of a letter from Orleans dated Feb. 11, to a gentleman in this place.

"This city has experienced some slight concussion of earthquake, particularly on the 9th, whilst a number of persons were at the theatre and the ball, some of whom were much alarmed, tho' the shock was not severe, nor had done any damage."

*****

Saturday, March 14, 1812

The Earthquake of the 16th of December last was felt as far North as Charlestown, New Hampshire.

*****

Saturday, March 21, 1812

The Indian mode of worship, as happened in consequence of the late Earthquakes.

This alarming phenomenon of nature struck with such consternation and dismay, those tribes of Indians, that live within and contiguous to that tract of country, on the Mississippi, where the severity of the earthquake appears to have been the greatest, that they were induced to convene together in order to consult upon the necessity of having recourse to some method of relief, from so alarming an incident; when it was resolved to fall upon the following expedient to excite the pity of the Great Spirit. [There follows a description of the religious ceremony of the Shawnees. KWD]


We are informed from a respectable source that the old road to the post of Arkansas, by Spring river, is entirely destroyed by the last violent shocks of earthquake. Chasms of great depth and considerable length cross the country in various directions, some swamps have become dry, others deep lakes, and in some places hills have disappeared.


Pittsburgh, Feb. 14
On Friday morning the 7th inst. about 4 o'clock, a shock of an Earthquake was severely felt in this town. The effects of this convulsion were much more sensibly felt, than the one which happened on the 16th of December. Many of the houses were violently shaken."
Unfortunately this is just the normal life of the North American plate.

(Image Courtesy: Wikipedia and
USGS Earthquakes since 1974)
New Madrid Quakes Sind 1974Now this wonderful seismic zone should have the typical looks on the plate of a rift valley feature where the crust is being moved apart. One of the top things I learned in geology class is that on a sphere the hard crustal surface usually breaks in three isometric directions from a center, with each limb 120 degrees offset from the other two. What then typically happens is two of the three directions becomes dominant and then the end point of each of those limbs may serve as another fracture area, using the two of three rule. And that is precisely what we see in the case of New Madrid: a common center with two major sources of quakes and one not so well defined one. The 120 degree offset is a 'perfect rule of thumb' and general only, the offsets can actually be quite set apart from each other and we see this on the shadow section of less frequent quakes that seems to be pointing from the center right at Memphis, TN.


This is, needless to say, worrying to the geologists of Tennessee. The idea of a mangitude 8 earthquake hitting within 50 miles or so of Memphis is one to give a person pause, and since its energy transmission will be quite good it will only be down into the high 7 range at Memphis. Not to speak of St. Louis which can be expected to take a major hit from any seismic disturbance of this magnitude. The folks in Arkansas have done a nice job of showing just how far the last set of quakes went, so we can do a risk assessment. And so has Missouri. And FEMA has put together a comprehensive look via a huge power point download and I will use their numbers... take them with a large grain of salt.

So here it goes for the Memphis, TN area... Over 5 states covering 23,000 sq. mi, 1.9 Million People in 700,000 households with 741,000 people in the expected vicinity of an epicenter, 20 Large Hospitals, 31 Medium Hospital, 10 Small Hospitals, 28 Emergency Operations Centers, 214 firestations, 200 police stations, 7,800 miles of highways, 250 Major bridges, 490 Continuous bridges, 3,660 simply supported bridges, 93 airports, 9 heliports, 76 Potable Water Facilities, 4 Waste Treatment Plants, 5 Major Power Plants, 5,900 miles of water piping,.

Approximately 15% of Bridges Operational, 11,667 Displaced households, 549 operational schools available, 320,000 Households without water, 469,000 Housholds without electricity, 107,000 structures out of 625,000 total are moderately to extensively damaged, 25,000 structures extensively to completely damaged. Debris Generated: 2.5 Million tons of brick and wood, 2.2 Million tons of steel/concrete. Over 1,000 HAZMAT sites to feel moderate to violent shaking with 248 in that last category, 953 Dams with 100 to feel light to violent shaking.

This does *not* address the fact that St. Louis, alone, may feel a magnitude 6 earthquake from each of these events. Further, if this zone plays out like it did last time, a one-time quake is not in the cards and two or three may be a more reasonable number especially with a high number of aftershocks. Nor does it address the critical infrastructure of natural gas, oil, gasoline and other piplines that run through this area. The severing of those *alone* could cripple the North Eastern US as that is the direction the majority of them go.

And we must also remember that these quakes have sudden fissure appearances in the ground, sand volcanos, gas emissions, and sudden thrust/subsidence of large areas. What happens to the Mississippi crossing bridges when the river itself backs up and flows backwards through this region as it did the last time quakes went through here? The railroad lines were also not addressed, and a number of them go through this area including the St. Louis railyards. Also the Mississippi River itself shifted channels and changed its configuration to inundate towns that had been on the river banks. New Madrid was put under water, if memory serves. Addressing *just* the quake does not take these other considerations into hand to be examined.

Of particular worry is that seismic releases may occur anywhere along the rift fault and so could hit much closer to either Memphis or St. Louis or *both*. Not only are the fire hazards going to be high, but the potential of a dam breakage or multiple ones due to changes in subsurface conditions must be considered per dam. Earthen dams ride out other quakes quite well as lateral motion does not impinge upon them much. But land subsidence, fissuring, sand volcanos and gas emissions all threaten these huge mounds of compacted dirt by making them less compacted and shifting their internal structure. The sudden loss of earth to a 2m wide fissure that is 10-20m deep is considerable to such a structure and may promote liquefaction of the dam itself if the fissure runs into the reservoir.

The last time this happened loss of water flow in the Mississippi was noted as one would expect with sudden changes in its direction along with sudden flooding of land that has subsided. This time there will be debris entrained in that fluid flow and it will impinge upon downstream structures depending upon the rate and rapidity of that flow. Add one or more dams to this and sudden overland flooding and surges of water with debris becomes a certainty. And I am sure the USACE has studied the problem, but what *exactly* does happen to the various flood and river control systems when these things happen? Is this entire system survivable? Does this sudden degradation and multiple seismic events change any of the fluid and soil dynamics around these structures?

From this we now know why FEMA is unprepared: they look at limited scenarios not based on past history. In this case the past few thousand years, but that is what it takes to properly determine the possible scope of this problem. No one has even asked what happens to Chicago if one or more high magnitude 4 to low magnitude 5 earthquakes rumble through *that* metropolitan area. They are in the light zone for these events and the region has built up tremendously since 1812. And that is the problem with the New Madrid Seismic Zone. It covers so much territory that everything within its bounds needs to be looked at to see if there is any possibility of mitigating damage even to places not even *close* to the epicenter.

California has been doing its best to deal with these things, so although they have more population at risk they have put in necessary structural codes and at least have real plans to try and meet up with their future. The folks in Cascadia do *not* nor does the mid-west of the US, and when seismic events that are truly large either in magnitude or scope or time or all three happen, there is no preparation beyond what some individual companies and State Agencies have done. While the total population at risk is a bit smaller, the infrastructure and disaster mitigation plans make the possibilities for death, spread of disease and collapse of infrastructure to sustain the Nation more likely. I cannot even put a speculation on the death toll because of this, nor the cost in infrastructure damage, except to say that the FEMA estimate of $14-27 Billion dollars is most likely off by two orders of magnitude on the low side. For a single quake, yes... for the seismic event seen in 1811-12? Far, far off.

Number 2: La Palma landslide and tsunami

Beautiful La Palma island, one of the Canary Islands! Beautiful landscape with the blue of the Atlantic... green of the plant life.... and black of volcanic rock. La Palma has two volcanic peaks: the inactive Caldera de Taburiente and the active Cumbre Vieja along with the ridge between them the Cumbre Nueva. It really does look like a wonderful place to visit. And if you ever do, may I suggest staying on the EAST side of the Island?

Why is that?

Well, a bit of geophysics here, but perfectly understandable. Most geology is pretty easy once you understand the basics.

The old volcano has been eroding pleasantly for thousands of years and the underlying magma chamber causing the hot spot shifted somewhat to the Cumbre Vieja. Merrily over the centuries this volcano built up the island and uplifted it somewhat. In doing that a ridge line formed between the old and new volcanos and many vents started to appear there. As one would expect for a small island in the middle of an ocean, there is much water seeping through everything in La Palma below ground level and often at ground level. All of this is fine and dandy, save that the 1949 eruption of the Cumbre Vieja started to shift the entire mass of the sothwestward section of the island starting from the south and radiating out from the ridgeline to the west or westnorthwest near the old caldera. The rock and soil around the caldera appear to be more compacted and less likely to shift with the other mass, but friction and water filtration there may play a role in the resultant landslide and moving, viscous liquids at high rates of speed to tend to entrain loose material along their contact zones.

As we have seen in New Madrid, saturated sand and soil can liquify given a severe shake and then move as liquid moves and often quickly. Such appears to be the case with this large mass on the western side of La Palma which started to shift downwards during the 1949 volcanic eruption. Looking at other volcanic islands across the globe has revealed evidence of many such slumps by charting out surface material that flowed, as a mass, outwards from the island involved. This is demonstrated multiple times across the Hawaii Islands, especially the more westward and older islands of the chain. But nearly every volcanic island that has a high peak can suffer this sort of slump.

Whenever you take material and start dumping it together it will form a pile. Take buckets of sand and you will be able to build up a sand pile. But as you do that, you will notice that at a certain steepness the new sand put onto the pile will slide downwards. There is an angle at which particle to particle contact can support such a pile and an angle of steepness beyond which it is unstable. This is called The Angle of Repose. From silt to building the Pyramids, every solid has an angle of repose based on grain size, grain shape and contact area and, once you go beyond that angle, the entire structure is either unstable or meta-stable, meaning that it looks stable but a slight change can suddenly alter the system.

So, take dry sand and pile it up and you get one angle of repose. Stick a small hose into the pile and slowly let water seep into the pile. You get a wet pile of sand that still *looks* stable. Give the wet pile a sudden jolt, however, and it will shift downwards, suddenly to reach its new angle of repose and possibly take material and go below that. This is what is happening at La Palma. Hot volcanic rock has one angle of repose. Cool it and water log it and it has a much lower angle of repose. The vents on the ridgeline generally point so that the western side of the island gets differentially more energy than the eastern side during an eruption and off-gassing. The result can be a landslide. Or in this case about 1/3 or so of the island suddenly rushing downhill to the see as a viscous and heavy liquid. It is trying to shift its angle of repose, but has nothing firm to land on and so heads out to sea as a single mass.

That mass of this area is in the ball park of 1 trillion tons (US).

This causes a tsunami. Actually, by all modeling in scale with proper material equivalencies and via computer this causes a megatsunami. One benefit of being at such a distance from the eastern coast of the US is that the initial energy in wave height spreads out across the entire wave front. The wavelength, the distance from normal sea level past wave and trough back to sea level, does not diminish. So the wavelength by estimations of the amount of material in the flow will cause a wavelength of 20-30 km (12-19 miles), so the water onrush will be that distance and push to move the wave height forward. Initial wave height has been estimated at 540m (1,770 feet). Now to calculate the initial wave front at its origin we can look to the proposed slump area here and I will use the ballpark estimate of 40 km (~25 miles).

Now to move to the US side of things starting at Cape Cod and moving to Miami which I will use somewhat older but more readily available numbers here as a rough order of magnitude estimate. Leaving out Maine, New Hampshire and, say 40 miles of Massachussettes and do a bit of rounding to make it a nice even 1,800 miles (~2,900 km). So each initial unit of length will spread out to cover 72 units or so of final arrival coastline (yes, a few things are being left out here and some coastline is further out than others, but this is back-of-the-envelope sorts of things.... if you want exactness, talk to The Shell Answer Man). So the incoming tsunami is 7.5 meters (25 feet) high and then pushed 40km (25 miles) by its wavelength. As seen in the Indian Ocean tsunami, as the wave form gets to shallower water the initial wave height builds as the faster parts of the wave form catch up with it. That tsunami had a wave lenght of about 1.2 km and it pushed up to 5 km inland at some points and less at others due to coastline variations. In comparison this wave will not stop at simple uphill gradients and continue to build up as more of the wave form arrives. Over flat terrain it will just push continuously inland for 20 minutes to an hour due to its long wave length and the fact the trough is half of it. In areas with upslope gradients the water will get higher and higher until the trough portion of the form starts to move in and the ocean flow in behind it to mean sea level. Take 7.5 m as the highest part of the wave and cut that in half for average height over the surge part of the wave form, lessen the speed for hitting the coast but build the height as more water piles up, say at a 6 original km to 1 final km wavelength..... call that 2.5m per minute? Damn fast, no matter how you cut it. On the scale of the Indian Ocean tsunami this would be in the centimeters per minute range due to its short wave length, so barely noticeable after the initial piling up.

Some breakup will happen due to intervening islands in the Atlantic, the fractal geometry of coastline and some other factors on the continental shelf I haven't considered as this starts out as a mid-ocean tsunami and will begin to slow and rise well before it gets to the coastline due to the continental shelf. But the release of energy, wave form and distance are the major factors here. This wave will conform, somewhat, to topography and seek the lowest and shortest distances with the least slope to head into, but hitting islands it will just build and build. All the coastal islands from Virginia to Florida will simply be overtopped and much of their mass entrained with the wave to form a roiling debris flow and then standard tsunami push inland. Long island will be inundated and its southern portion churned by the waveform but it should not diappear completely once the largest wave subsides, but the massive debris flow will still continue onwards at a reduced height past it.

Cities with flat terrain not much elevated from mean sea level or on direct bays or estuaries will be at high risk from Cape Cod to the Florida Keys.

The warning time will be 3 hours or so, and the waveform will be tracked by aircraft flying over this wave and by ships at sea. Expect some ships to be negatively impacted by this wave form, especially those by undersea mounts and other undersea features.

There are lots of *ifs* in this one, but a worst case scenario is devestating. If the initial landslide peels off into faster and slower sections, then high numbers of *multiple* though lesser tsunami waves will impact repeatedly. The one thing that can be said is that this sort of landslide is not a slow motion one: the land stays put until it is in motion and when it moves, it moves quickly.

Number 1: The Yellowstone Caldera Complex

Yellowstone National Park, Wyoming and parts of Idaho and Montana. Some of the most majestic and scenic landscape on the planet and a geologists dreams with its mountains, hot springs, geysers, fumerols and all sorts of other oddities. Many parts are still pure wilderness and have rarely been seen by mankind. A tourist attraction for its natural wonders from the hot springs and boiling river all the way to its geysers. Geologists were kept wondering at it since its discovery and had many strange anomalies showing up: volcanic ash that could be traced from the mid-continent all the way back towards Yellowstone at multiple layers, slow uplift of the region, tectonic activity including minor earthquakes. Something was happening there but no one knew exactly what it was... until aerial photography allowed the entire park to be surveyed and compiled into a mosaic. A geologist looked at that and said that looks like a volcanic caldera... and then realized the scale of it. This is the Yellowstone Caldera and the Island Park Caldera to the south of it. Since then the folks at the USGS have done a fine, fine job of piecing it together since the entire system started 17 million years ago.

The core to the mantle of the Earth have many ways to relieve themselves of excess thermal energy. General convection works for the most part of it, but hot spots of material arise, possibly from all the way to the core, sending a slow and steady jet of heat upwards that is little deflected by the slower convection cycle. Once this hot spot gets to the crust it forms a volcano using the underlying plate material as its basis with some add-ins from its journey. And if the plate it erupts through is moving, then it will shift from spot to spot and form new volcanoes over time. Hawaii is a prime example of that as it and the sea floor mounts that had once been active volcanoes stretch from the head of the chain all the way back to Midway Island. This process started 17 million years ago as a hot spot came through the North American plate and erupted. As the plate moves over the hot spot new volcanoes form and erupt. Continental plates being thicker will tend to slow this process down, but a very active hot spot can still be a good sized volcano chain in its own right. But if the hot spot is slowed sufficiently it will start to build sub-surface magma domes and spread laterally slowly thinning out the crust over it while slowly thrusting it upwards. At some point this structure becomes metastable and a sudden venting of gas or inrush of groundwater due to fractures will let the entire crust fail catastrophically over that magma dome and the volcano erupts.

That is Yellowstone. Its crater from its last eruption was 40 miles in diameter, give or take a bit. And that was its latest eruption with an eruption cycle of: 640,000 years ago, 1.3 million years ago (MYA), 2 MYA, 4.3-6.5 MYA, 7-10 MYA, 8.6-10.5 MYA, 10.5-12 MYA, 13-15 MYA and 15-16.5 MYA. There are differences in agreement on numbers and spacing, but the eruptions did happen via ash deposition in the stratigraphic layers so that is known. Actual position and number of caldera's active is not well understood for the far past, but for the more recent past the cycle appears to be consistent. As with the examination of the sand blow events in the New Madrid area, this pattern shows one of decreasing cycle time over time, which fits well with the understanding of the process of melt fluid having problems getting through the plate initially, but then being able to make more direct upwards paths as the plat shifts over it by using older paths so soften crustal material and change course upwards.

So let us take a look at some Earth history starting a bit back and working forward:

15-16.5 MYA there was a significant oceanic fossil change in the oceans and this fits well into the Miocene epoch and its subdivisions between the Burdigalian and the Langhian. The fossil record is charted by cross-comparison of fossil types and species and abundance so that a more accurate record of what lived when can be cataloged and charted. This work has been going on since the mid-19th Century and continues to this day with the examination of single celled organic fossils now possible in well preserved and undeformed strata. Once a range of time lines for species is done and their beginnings and endings put together en-mass, then an idea of how life evolved over time is formed. If a large number of species end within a very close time range, this becomes known as an 'extinction'. These Miocene changeovers in fossil species are minor extinction events that happened at least for those life forms examined and possibly others.

13-15 MYA has a rough correlation with the Langhian-Serravallian changeover, although it is not a great fit, to be admitted.

5-12 MYA has a good correlation with the Serravallian-Tortonian changeover.


8.6-10.5 MYA falls within the Tortonian and appears to have had no impact on the large scale species line-up for the planet.

7-10 MYA has a good correlation with the Tortonian-Messinian changeover.

4.3-6.5 MYA falls well within the bounds for the Miocene-Pliocene extinction event.

2-2.2 MYA falls at the end of the Gelasian within the Pliocene and gives a good accordance with the Pliocene-Pleistocene extinction event which also marks the beginning of the Quaternary period.

1.2-1.3 MYA falls within the Early Pleistocene and does not appear to be a planetary wide extinction event.

630,000-640,000 YA falls after the magnetic pole reversal marking the Eemian interglacial period, and is a poor correlation with a major extinction event on a planetary scale.

Now, just because an eruption does not cause a mass extinction on a global scale, does not mean that it has no localized impacts. If one looks at the Snake River Plain a clear imprint can be seen of past caldera events is obvious. One of the great topographic signatures of intracontinental megavolcanoes that have been around for awhile is that they leave a tell-tale trace as the continental plate moves. In the case of Yellowstone it is this broad, flat expanse leading out into Idaho for the Snake River to wander through. That is where the Yellowstone hot spot WAS in the past. And that is what it DOES to the landscape.

Now lets go in reverse order and see what the effects were of some of these eruptions, locally. And thanks to USGS for some of this info!

630,000-640,000 YA released 1,000 cubic kilometers of ash, rock, dust and debris along with multiple pyroclastic flows of super hot material traveling at high speeds, locally, which formed the Lava Creek Tuff. Mt. St. Helens, which we all have a good feel for, put out about 2 cubic kilometers of similar material. On rough estimate that previous eruption of the Yellowstone Caldera was 450 times that of the Mt. St. Helens eruption. It formed a caldera 30 km x 70 km (18 miles x 43 miles) within which the modern park is found and welded its ash via pyroclastic flow into the , which can be seen in and around the surrounding landscape. However, this is still smaller than Mt. Tambora which released 100 cubic kilometers of rock and ash, but that was luckily situated in an ocean where most of it could fall back into it and only harm localized sea life. Further, the Mount Tambora eruption, though it did have great force, was a phreatic eruption that took out the entire volcano. Thus the effects of having a 'Year without a summer' as in 1816, would most likely be repeated if not actually worse due to the directivity of the ash eruption and the sheer mass of it. Some will go out in pyroclastic flows, to inundate the immediate vicinity out for many miles, but it does not have water to superheat and forward its progress so a flow like seen from Krakatoa is not expected. And, by-the-by, the smaller Krakatoa eruption in 1883 is usually seen as the closing act of the Little Ice Age. So one does expect Global Warming coming out of that cooling period starting in Medieval times. This last ice age was thought to have been started by the eruption of Mount Toba 75,000 YA which had an ash profile similar to that of Yellowstone. Note that Toba also plays into all of this as do all of these caldera makers.

1.5 MYA last constrained date for the Glenns Ferry Formation in the Hagerman Fossil Bed National Monument, Idaho.

2 MYA sees the formation of the Huckleberry Ridge Tuff which was formed by an ash cloud in the neighborhood of 2,500 cubic kilometers. This was a widely dispersed ash fall across the continent.

3 MYA is the formation of the 280 cubic kilometer Mesa Falls Tuff layer.

5 MYA approximate start time of the Glenns Ferry Formation.

12 MYA sees the formation of the ashfall fossil beds which have a good representation in the Ashfall Fossil Beds State Park in Nebraska. This event is traced to the Snake River plains area and is called the Bruneau-Jarbridge volcano so as to differentiate it from the modern Yellowstone volcano.

17 MYA sees the Hagerman Fossil beds start to be laid down along with basaltic lava flows that covered a wide geographic region that are likely associated with the early caldera making process. Repeated events of lava and ash flows create stratigraphic beds of same that can be researched so as to define the mineralogy and paleontology of each of them so as to use it as a typified stamp for those events. Evidence for this series of eruptive events can be seen at the Kidd Creek Mine in Timmins, Ontario via its stratigraphy. Note that rhyolitic flows and ash events are seen this far away, in some depth and detail although the mine itself is going after deeper deposits and this is just one of the many overburden layers. This would by typical of a startup large caldera going through its most cataclysmic eruptions so as to form itself and get rid of the overburden in the area, which looking at surrounding remaining terrain north and south of the river valley, is pretty rugged.

The conclusion about the Yellowstone Caldera Hydrothermal System?

Bad.

Note that what are given here are HIGHLIGHTS of the worst that this system does. In the past it has seen multiple eruptions of lava flows and other volcanic typical events: earthquakes, pyroclastic flows, debris flows, lahars, subsidence, surface deformation, landslides, and all the fun geothermal vents and geysers we see today. So this system has many different volcanic modes of operation, the worst of which is the caldera event partially emptying the subsurface magma chamber.

150,000 YA the entire Yellowstone Lake and caldera region started to see uplift along with a minor caldera event in the western thumb of the main lake. This deformation continues steadily to this day and has seen shifts in lake levels over the human time scale. In the 1920's docks on the northern portion of the main lake were made and today they are as much as 1 meter above lake level and many pilings now sit on dry land. In 1959 a magnitude 7.5 earthquake rumbled through the zone and was most likely caused by expansion of the magma chamber with the inflow of new material. Current seismic and mapping projects are being set up to help create a subsurface model of the Yellowstone complex to better understand what is happening there. What *can* be said about past eruptions is that they have left meter high deposits out to the Gulf of Mexico and about a foot high out to the eastern portion of the US. Typically a large eruption event coincides with a period of global cooling if not a large scale extinction event. And this complex is now in its prime cycle for a major caldera eruption, after which multiple smaller eruptions and lava flows can be expected as the magma chamber empties as material expands once the overburden pressure is relieved.

Short of an 8 km in diameter asteroid impacting the Earth, Yellowstone and its brethren caldera makers on the large scale are the greatest threat to humanity on this planet. And technology is not there yet and our understanding of the forces involved will not come easily nor quickly. For every person who I read about wanting to get Lasers to 'lance volcanoes' I must shake my head and ask why they wish to do something that will have absolutely unknown consequences? Until we can fully understand the forces, pressures, and directivity of magma currents and interact those in some reasonable fashion with local geology, trying to relieve pressure *now* may start a series of smaller and harder to control events that will have consequences as bad if not worse than a single large event. An asteroid broken into chunks becomes a distributed dust fall that will take decades longer to filter out of the atmosphere instead of the dust thrown up by an impact from the denser lower atmosphere. Similarly starting a chain of smaller volcanic eruptions may cause a faster cycle of smaller eruptions that will entrain dust on a continuous cycle into the atmosphere and generate a global cooling cycle *worse* than a single large event.

The answer for survival is to get off this damn planet.

Earth is a fine *starter home* but the problems with it are beyond repairing.

It is hostile to life, for all the fact it harbors life.

99.9% of all species that ever lived are extinct.

Environmentalists should *want* us to move industry to the vacuum of space where terrestrial pollution will not occur.

Unlimited energy is available from the Sun until we need to get further away from it to explore.

I want the meek to inherit the Earth.

So the planet can kill them.