World champs! At last!

"Today is a better day for air quality. That is a good thing. Still hotter than heck today, with high humidity. But next week - back to July normal. Was this week our new normal in Minnesota? I sure hope not."

It sure took a while, but we can finally lay claim to being number one in the world. Wait - what? I thought our soccer team was eliminated. It was - I am not talking about soccer. I am talking about something which we should want no part of. But we have it. This week, we hit the milestone. Worst air in the nation. My mistake, not the nation - the world. Whereas an AQI (Air Quality Index) of in the 300's puts you in the awful category, we managed to hit in the 500's for a short period of time. In fact, West Duluth hit an unofficial 600. That is air so thick you could have it for lunch.

I did not really know how to address this issue, but a longtime social media friend of mine (who recently moved out of this hellscape of a state) summed it up nicely. Because he is about my age, what he said really made sense. He was wondering why this spate of bad air has become common and terrible. Whereas when we were growing up in this state, bad air was either non-existent or best case - rare.

Something is making these fires grow more common. Please - please - don't constipate my feed with global warming bs. It was hot and humid when I was growing up just like it is now. And this year, we have had plenty of rain, thank you. No - it is something else. Something different that Canada is doing as well as the greenies in Minnesota. And right now, the main culprit seems to be forest management (or lack thereof).

Back to the world's worst air this week. We are a First World country. Every year, the number of pollutants we put into the atmosphere goes down. Why? Our knowledge on how to have cleaner effluents goes up. This week we had dirtier air than China. Then India. Then any of the Third World countries you could think of. Us - the number one innovator in the world, has the worst air. It was shameful and regrettable.

Two more things on this most sad and embarrassing issue. First, there is some thought that we might have eclipsed and AQI of 1,000 some places in the Arrowhead. To say that boggles my mind would be an understatement. Second, some liberal greenie posted on Facebook this morning that these smoke events were the fault of Donald Trump and Pete Stauber. Here is the problem with that false claim. These smoke events started a couple decades ago. Long before Trump's first term. And long before the seven years that Pete Stauber has been in Congress.

Today is a better day for air quality. That is a good thing. Still hotter than heck today, with high humidity. But next week - back to July normal. Was this week our new normal in Minnesota? I sure hope not.