Jan's introduction:
My early autumn adventure to southern California, my previous homeland, wasn't an historic event. But two worthwhile observations bubbled up to fit with two news stories:

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration cites 10 massive weather disasters in the U.S. this year, each exceeding a billion dollars. The nine months of unprecedented weather extremes include these estimates of death and damage:

Hurricane Irene: 50 deaths and $7 billion;
Upper Midwest flooding along the Missouri River: $2 billion;

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My reflection this evening is on the transformation of USAmericans into a leisure society of individuals. It began in the 1950s and flowered in the '60s and early '70s. It developed into guitar playing rebels, surfers -- "Baw dip da dip dip" -- and, above all, television watchers, as prominent types among the new affluent generation. Institutions such as school and church weren't offering much cohesion.

The campaign to halt desecration of a 6,000-year-old village site and burial ground on Ohlone ancestral land has leaped forward.

Blackwelder calls for four major changes:

• Putting a price on carbon through a carbon tax or a fuel tax

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For thousands of years the Ohlone culture, consisting of several related languages, was sustainable, as the people were part of the land and waters. Less is known about them than other tribes or groupings that were not almost entirely obliterated. The Ohlone don't have monuments or other forms of respect, such as dedicated lands, in this valuable real-estate market of the San Francisco-Monterey Bay area.