Oops! A new study shows that water in the Colorado River Basin, which feeds a huge chunk of the west, including the fictional cities of Los Angeles, Phoenix and Las Vegas, is disappearing faster than previously feared.

In the past nine years, the basin — which covers Wyoming, Colorado, Utah, New Mexico, Nevada, Arizona and California — has lost about 65 cubic kilometers of fresh water, nearly double the volume of the country’s largest reservoir, Lake Mead. That figure surprised the study’s authors, who used data from a NASA weather satellite to investigate groundwater supplies.

About two-thirds of the water lost over the past nine years came from underground water supplies, rather than surface water.

“We were shocked to see how much water was actually depleted underground,” Stephanie Castle, a water specialist at the University of California at Irvine and lead author of the report, said in an interview.

This is a very slow moving train wreck because eventually, at the current rate of usage, even actual real cities like Denver and San Diego will go dry while we try to fill the needs of the dreams of madmen to build cities in places that have no natural water supply.

I know, on this topic I’m your crazy uncle raving over the turkey at Thanksgiving. But there’s no earthly reason to build cities like Phoenix or Las Vegas where they are situated on the planet.

If I built a kosher deli in the middle of Gaza, because I can, people would think I’m crazy. But if I build an entire city in a desert and have water diverted from rivers hundreds of miles away, because I can, I’m a visionary hero who does not accept the limitations of nature and forges a new reality blah, blah BLAH. Bullshit.

You built massive population areas for humans where one of the necessities of life for humans does not naturally exist. Oh and by the way your cities can’t exist without the excessive use of electricity to power air conditioning.

It’s unnatural I say!! Mark my words it’ll come to no good end!

The Great Recession and Not-So-Great Recovery have been bad news for most Americans, but some people have suffered more than others. We call those people “Southerners.”

Not too surprising that poverty is on the rise as inequality explodes, unions disappear and we get used to the new normal of post-middle class America. But the South is especially hit hard, despite Church membership and gun ownership and abortion restrictions. God must hate these people to be sending them such mixed messages as this.

The real actionable message here is that the South is not a role model and the GOP needs to be smacked across the back of the head if they think that making the rest of the country like the South is a good idea.

If they were smart they’d ask for reparations for the War of Northern Aggression. But even they know they did this to themselves.