Union of Concerned Scientists study GMO drought resistant corn

The document that I was reading last evening, released in June by the UCS, was at times causing me to laugh out loud, thinking about a soil bacteria DNA strand inserted into corn. The narrative will be easier to follow if you are a scientist yourself; but it is worth the effort for anyone interested. The whole text itself is about 21 pp. long-- with cover illustrations and references added on. The good news is that the outcome of the review is twofold. First, the seeds do not really perform all that great. Secondly, they are far more expensive for farmers, and the traditional methods of hybridization are so much more readily accomplished and quickly on the market that the USC suggests more study by Universities should be devoted to the more natural marital bliss of hybrid strains of resilient plants.
http://www.ucsusa.org/food_and_agriculture/science_and_impacts/science/high-and-dry.htmlhttp://www.ucsusa.org/food_and_agriculture/science_and_impacts/science/high-and-dry.html

All of this over a bunch of  corporate nonsense that some people refer to nowadays as FrankenSeeds. ;->
Keeping hope alive that the labelling of GMOs becomes mandatory in California, with the issue on the ballot out there in November.
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/GMOFreeUSA/
http://www.organicconsumers.org/

This is certainly the DRYEST EARTH in my lifetime!

No laughing matter

One day I actually looked up the word "drought' on google images out of wondering how the front yard happens to look like this. Yeah, this is what it is alright. Wet earth is usually expanded through some spongy areas where the water sinks in from intermittent rain. Now it is looking all cracked up, but this is no laughing matter, as the news is telling us.
(click under the picture for this video)
http://www.abc17news.com/news.php?id=7338http://www.abc17news.com/news.php?id=733   

No one wants to have to think about whether the storms in the Gulf that delayed the Republican Convention for a day will blow further north and land a few showers over us. But I remember that happening in some times past. The weather man in the above video says we may have to wait for snow!

In Columbia one landowner is attempting to save a 350 year old tree by carrying water to it. Meanwhile we have been hearing about depleted aquifers and low rivers and streams. And the outlook is not good. You can visit the drought outlook map which pertains through the end of November this year here: National Atmospheric and Oceanic Administration Graphic

To me, after the record temperatures since spring, this looks like climate change. What does it look like to you?