Well, here it is — the last day of 2010, a year for the books, as they say.
After an event-marked 12 months, this happy new year’s screed seems a bit optimistic as the entire planet seems to have jumped the snark.

In the wee hours of morning, the weather is quiet, but cold here on northern California’s coastline following what felt like years of rain and hail, as it’s been predicted this weekend is to be fairly nice.
There’s no argument about 2010 being crazy — and if all the obvious continues, 2011 will be mostly shoot (George Carlin said ‘shoot’ is just ‘shit’ with two Os).

(Illustration found here).

As the new year looms, the big three — war, climate change and economics – will continue to fester like a boil on the putrid skin of humanity.
A lot of people (in fact, a rather large shitload of people) will celebrate this evening with hope for the coming new year, but it will be like the lottery — faith and hope in something that doesn’t exist — and since there’s no indication solutions will be found, or some kind of answers to the terrible questions still persisting into 2011.

In war, Foreign Policy has a nasty-looking overview of next year’s wars from around the globe — though mostly in third-world spots like Africa, the conflicts could/can drag the rest of the world into its fiery maul and drag down an already dragging social society.
Although a new poll shows 63 percent of US peoples oppose the war in Afghanistan — despite President Obama’s bright, shiny outlook on the conflict — the mangled operations there will continue into the near year as supposedly there’s a draw-down coming this July.
Don’t hold thy breath.
And even as the US squanders blood and treasure in Afghanistan, past horrors come forth.
Research has linked birth defects in the Iraqi city of Falluja to the 2004 US assault — with another knot going back 40 years.
From the Guardian:

The report acknowledges that other battlefield residues may also be responsible for the defects.
“Many known war contaminants have the potential to interfere with normal embryonic and foetal development,” the report says. “The devastating effect of dioxins on the reproductive health of the Vietnamese people is well-known.”

Wars with the US empire floating around will never cease.

And with climate change, Skeptical Science, has a grahic display that reveals the horror of what is and what’s to come — and from DeSmogBlog comes the 2010 climate B.S award, also never ending.
And see the images from NASA on how the climate has changed.

And via economics, Paul Krugman nails it this morning in his post at the New York Times.
The lede:

Hypocrisy never goes out of style, but, even so, 2010 was something special. For it was the year of budget doubletalk — the year of arsonists posing as firemen, of people railing against deficits while doing everything they could to make those deficits bigger.

Krugman aptly titles the piece, ‘The New Voodoo.’

‘Nough said.
Have a sane/insane new year’s time.