Given the history of California’s water wars, it is not surprising that when a judge issued a ruling last week to clarify a decision he made last month, both sides immediately disagreed what the latest ruling meant.

So much for clarity. What Sacramento Superior Court Judge Michael Kenny did seems pretty unambiguous: He declared the Delta Plan “invalid.” That apparently means either “it’s dead,” or “there are a couple of minor flaws we have to fix.” The Delta Plan is the latest of a string of efforts launched­ to repair the collapsing ecosystem of the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta.