Middle America

Time and again, the Evangelical Radical Right Wingnuts pratal that climate change is a hoax. Time and again a nano-second later, some bidnezz complains that bidnezz is failing because of some climate catastrophe. Some times, not often enough, the bidnezzmen call a spade a spade and name climate change as the source of their misery.

And so it is in today's reporting from the NYT. This time it's the Mississippi river. Turns out that river cruises aren't just on Europe's cornucopia of waterways. Turns out that the Big Muddy has been used not just for commodity barges, but also languid tourism cruising. Not that I would, of course. But times are tough. Turns out, times are tough at both ends: flooding and drought. Both make it impossible, at times, to use the river. So sad.

Just late last month, in St. Paul — the final port for the Trovatos' original itinerary — rising Mississippi River levels forced the closure of shoreline roads, bridges and parks. The river rose 20.17 feet above its banks before cresting, the seventh major flood in St. Paul since 2010, according to the National Water Prediction Service, and the eighth highest crest recorded.

And, for the record, the National Water Prediction Service is part of NOAA, that commie left wing cabal of liars. Just so ya know who to blame.

What's a cruise boat bidnezzman to do? Well, find some coattails paid for by the damn gummint, of course.

The boats themselves are changing, too, to designs that can slip beneath low bridges, motor upstream against strong currents and get to shore in shallower waters. "Our basic design parameter is that if the tow boats can go, we can go," said Mr. Robertson, the chief executive. "Because the Army Corps will move heaven and earth to allow the towing industry to keep moving."

I guess the centuries ago paddlewheelers are doomed. On the other hand, the European boats, showcased in those Viking teeVee adverts, would work. May haps not carry as many cruisers, and possibly too long for parts of the Big Muddy's navigation channel. But, hey, at least the boats can go.

What's the issue?

Even in its historic state, it could be powerfully unpredictable, with flows that oscillated by as much as 60 feet in the space of a season. T.S. Eliot called the river "a strong brown god — sullen, untamed and intractable."

Low

Mississippi River water levels are plummeting to an all-time low this week at Memphis in the wake of a sweltering summer and ongoing drought — setting a record for the second consecutive year, new data shows.

High

The Bonnet Carré Spillway upstream of New Orleans, used during high water, was operated eight times between 1931 and 2007; it was operated seven times between 2008 and 2020.

Not an exact number, as Low, but instructive.