Alright, I apologize for my shitty tone in the last post, you have valid points and they're well written I feel like a douche. But let's just be aware that neither of us are experts (you work in film and I play in a band. You in L.A. too?)
"We know way different farmers if you think irrigation hasn't gotten way more intelligent in the last three decades."
I just want to start by saying my family has been growing dates in the Coachella valley for the past 50 years. Dates are a crop that is well adapted to the area my family farms, and yes they do irrigate with the help of newer systems. They also use practices I don't support, but that's not what this is about. Yes irrigation techniques have improved and become more efficient, but no one oversees farmers to make sure they are being efficient with their water usage. My assumption is that if the cost to implement such efficient technology was more that the cost of water, the farmer would take the most profitable path. I get it, people need to live and get theirs. But as of now, while a ~15% residential water use in Ca is restricted, an ~80% use in agriculture is not nearly as regulated.
http://www.mullerranch.com/making_news/sacbee_drip_2_2014.html
"Does it drain as fast as they pump? Of course not, because its being filtered on the way. Are they going to pump themselves dry? What if they did? Then I guess they'd be out of business and the Earth, shockingly, would do what it does and repair itself, and if all the growers didn't go belly up at once, you'd end up with a balance."
You don't see a problem with the filtration r fine ate of our water not being able to keep up with our needs? I'm sorry but this stuff works on a geological timescale, and those are some old aquifers that millions of people are tapping into, in a time that they are NOT being replenished. Yes the earth will repair itself and in fact would continue on despite our aquifers drying up. The world would also hum along if the ice caps all melted, if humans went extinct, and if a mile wide asteroid struck it and blanketed the sky in an endless night. Do you want that to happen? The fact that I am but a blip is actually a warm thought for me, but there are people here and now that are being affected by this issue and many other, the fact that we won't somehow end the universe and all of time forever shouldn't try and stop you from addressing a problem.
The fact is we grow food other countries unsustainable crops