Google earth haut-brion

In a blog article about urban sprawl, someone showed this:

Is France still talking about handing out cash incentives for producing more people? That picture is what the North Pole will look like in a few years: perhaps the last park. The funny thing is almost nobody pays any attention to it. All you hear about is how cute the lastest baby is, simultaneously everywhere on the globe, 24/7.

Thank secularism in China for slowing the inexorable march down a tiny bit, there. They will work the last vineyards.

[Jenise]

Hey Covert, got a bottle of Cantemerle on the way. I'll let it settle down for a few weeks, but thought I should let you know I'm on the case.

Is France still talking about handing out cash incentives for producing more people?

Actually, Haut-Brion has been in this situation for years, this is not recent, only the Google mapping is. As far as what a foreign country does within its own borders, I'd leave that to them to worry about. There doesn't seem to be any huge French immigration wave at any US borders yet.

Incidentally, the official candidate for the presidential elections in 2007 is a mother of 4.

I know Haut Brion has been besieged for a long time; read about it in an early Parker Bordeaux tome. Still, the picture tells the bigger story.

From Science Times this morning:

"Anything that we scientists can do to weaken the hold of religion should be done and may in the end be our greatest contribution to civilization."

-- Dr. Weinberg (scientist)

"I don't know how many more engineers and architects need to fly planes into buildings before we realize that this is not merely a matter of lack of education or economic dispair."

-- Sam Harris (author)

Maybe more importantly, a recent statistic shows that half the people in the world suffer to live without potable water. Marie Antoinette would have a (yellow-brown) solution for them.

Hey Covert, got a bottle of Cantemerle on the way. I'll let it settle down for a few weeks, but thought I should let you know I'm on the case.

Cool! Can't wait for your comments. I'm going to try one of my new 2003 Villambis cru bourgeois tomorrow night.

[Jenise]

But Covert, that's a weeknight....

Covert, I understand all the quotes but where exactly are you going with this and what has it to do with Haut-Brion being inside the burbs of a growing city? Is there anything specific we can do to help the problem as individuals?

The picture just showed population crowding; granted, you expect it around cities. Look at an aerial shot of Florida just about anywhere and it looks like that. Fly over the US and see buildings just about everywhere, except in the mountains. I lived on the edge of a swamp, until I drove through it recently and was amazed that it is now all suburbia. Etc. The world is simply way overpopulated, and many people have to drink pee and crap because there is no place where people are not doing their business.

We can't enforce birth control in most developed countries because of the major religions that celebrate births. Religions are supported by the God gene that most people have. In China, where folks are philosophically driven rather than God driven, they have done something about it. In France, most people are agnostic, so they naturally put a lid on production.

Personally I don't care a whole lot, because I was lucky enough to have bought a house in the mountains where the zoning laws will stay in place long enough for me to live out the rest of my life without crowding. But the rest of the world is an eyesore to me, and I feel compassion for the billions of people who are forced to drink pee and eat s---.

We can't as individuals do anything about it because of the God gene in others.

The Jihad business is another facet of the problem, which I won't get into now.

Covert

Why would they plant a vineyard in the middle of an urban area like that??


At least wine grapes still have the advantage in areas inhospitable to development like the steep slopes on the Mosel or Douro!

Another disturbing picture that satellites can't capture is the water problems they are having in Australia - drought, saline water tables... Speaking of "drinking pee and crap", from recent news that's exactly what they may be doing down under. http://www.breitbart.com/news/2006/07/2 ... ra0ek.html

I am a wine certificate student and the words "global warming" are mentioned often in classrooms with nary a pause. Poulation growth. Climate change. What does the near future bode for humanity, much less good wine?

I'd like to think there was something substantial one could do towards a solution. I suppose any solution starts with awareness and recognition of the issues we (and vines) face in the first place. Then one has the obligatory changes to make at his/her home - recycling bottles,etc, seeking out, writing about, encouraging and buying biodynamic or sustainable products/wine.
I maintain that nearly every decision and choice one makes in a given day could have positive or negative contributions. In fact one could go nuts thinking of all the downstream effects of a simple choice like cork or plastic or aluminum stoppers for a single bottle of wine. Yet such is our individual responsibility at this time in history. Every effort small and large, counts in my opinon.

For the larger global social and economic engines that drive overpopulation, industrialization, urbanization, etc., I honestly don't know where to start to effect change. Other than voting at the polls, voting with my wallet and editorializing, I search for meaningful ways to affect change.
Will disease, drought and wars be the changes having most impact?