And it was in that context that I was sworn into office almost four years ago, at a time when the banking system was melting down, at a time when -- the month I was sworn in, we lost 800, 000 jobs, the worst crisis since the Great Depression.

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Yet before it disbanded in 1971, the quartet recorded one of the most effortless-sounding groove records of all time, Melting Pot.

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And yet, at a time of fast-melting glaciers and strange rains, of spreading deserts and rising seas, it is a frail and distant promise.

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At the same time, the rapid melting of Himalayan glaciers promises to deprive the great rivers of the Indian sub-continent, the Indus, Ganges and Brahmaputra, of their summertime source.

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Last week an unnamed tax officer told the BBC the department had not been fit for purpose for a very long time and had reached "melting point" without the staff or resources needed and subject to an "atrocious" computer system.

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It is difficult for them to assess whether the melting being observed at the moment is unprecedented in the context of geological time.

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And the question was whether I was going to have a big budget fight, at a time when I was still trying to figure out whether or not the financial system was melting down and we had to make a whole bunch of emergency decisions about the economy.

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Melting Arctic ice poses serious concerns globally, but it has also opened northern sea lanes for the first time, as well as the opportunity to search for new natural resource deposits.

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