The central theme of Fred Pearce’s excellent book on climate change, With Speed and Violence: Why Scientists Fear Tipping Points in Climate Change, is that nature doesn’t do gradual climate change of the magnitude we are facing. As tipping points are reached, change accelerates and occurs quite violently. The indicators are worrying. Glaciers are retreating faster than anyone thought possible; carbon absorption by the biosphere appears to be slowing; CO2 levels in the atmosphere are rising faster than anticipated.

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That’s how it’s spelled. Not “Ghandi”. If you like him so much, learn how to spell his frickin’ name. That’s all.

A few days after the Bear Stearns bailout was first announced, there was generalized panic that another big bank, probably Lehman Brothers, would go under. Lehman’s default insurance rates were soaring and its stock was plummeting. Lehman is a much bigger bank than Bear, with much more diversified and global business, so the market really risked melting down. Then Lehman and Goldman Sachs released their quarterly earnings reports and showed “not as bad as expected” earnings, and the market was euphoric.

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