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Please join DeSmogBlog and a network of environmental organizations, websites, nonprofits, and social media mavens this weekend in a 48-hour fundraiser to benefit the 12 million people fighting to survive the worst drought to impact East Africa in over sixty years. On the weekend of August 6 and 7, this network is hosting a blogathon benefit, East Africa Famine: 48 Hour Fundraiser.

The UN, after declaring famine in two districts in Somalia, last week announced the entire region of southern-Somalia is in danger of slipping into famine.

Please click the image below to donate to Oxfam, which is mobilizing to provide emergency water supplies in the region.

DONATE TO OXFAM CANADA BY CLICKING THE IMAGE ABOVE AND FILLING OUT THE FORM.
OR CLICK HERE TO DONATE TO OXFAM AMERICA.

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About a month back, I wrote about the “Strange Case of Ralph Hall,” a leading Republican whose Texas district was suffering through severe drought—a condition expected to worsen, due to climate change, in the future—but who challenges mainstream climate science. As I put it then:

I bring this up again now because, as Nick Sundt points out at the WWF climate blog, it isn’t just Hall—or, just his district.

March 2011 was Texas’s driest month on record; 98 % of the state is currently in drought conditions; the stage is set for devastating wildfires; and the current drought is expected to persist or intensify.

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Rep. Ralph Hall, the Republican Chair of the House Committee on Science, represents Texas’s fourth congressional district, which is located in the far northeast part of the state bordering on Oklahoma and Arkansas. A number of its counties—Lamar, Fannin, Red River, Grayson, and Cass—are currently included in federal disaster designations because they’re suffering from serious drought conditions. And according to the National Weather Service, droughts are expected to either develop, persist, or worsen throughout Texas over the course of this year.

So like any good legislator would, Hall has tried to help his district cope with these difficult challenges. For instance, he recently signed a letter to Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack calling for more support to counties in his region as they seek to cope with drought.

Here’s the thing, though: Scientific assessments tell us that under human induced climate change, the risk of drought conditions like these, to Texas, will only increase.

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Three days ahead of an Australian general election, front-running Labor leader, Kevin Rudd has committed to immediately signing the Kyoto Protocol on global warming, describing it as the "number one" priority.

Australian's have been experiencing first hand the effects of a warmer planet with massive drought. Instead of taking a leadership role on the issue, soon-to-be former Prime Minister John Howard ducked the  Kyoto Protocol and only acknowledged the threat of climate change when it appeared to be the politically expedient thing to do.  

Looks like the Australian citizenry easily saw through Howard's ruse, the latest polls show Rudd is set to win with 54 per cent of the vote compared to Mr Howard's 46 per cent.

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What to do when the rain won’t come?

If you’re Georgia Gov. Sonny Perdue, you pray. The governor will host a prayer service next week to ask for relief from the drought gripping the Southeast.

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For the first time in more than 100 years, much of the Southeast has reached the most severe category of drought, climatologists said, creating an emergency so serious that some cities are just months away from running out of water.