Political Angst In America

Name:
Location: Pantego, Texas, United States

Thursday, July 31, 2008

Today Obama said "Nobody thinks that Bush and McCain have an answer to the challenges the nation faces." Since I like McCain's position on the war on terror and energy better than Obama's, I guess that means I am nobody.

Here is a comment on the global warming hoax from "accuracy in Media:"

http://www.aim.org/aim-column/the-greens-are-going-crazy/

Al Gore's propaganda movie "An Inconvenient Truth" included a lot of things that are, in fact, not true. One of these is that the Greenland ice cap is melting, and will soon flood the world. Here is a paper on how Greenland is cooler now than in the 1940's, and that the ice cap is, in fact, growing.

http://scienceandpublicpolicy.org/scarewatch/nyt_sea_level_rise.html

Barack Obama has recently been complaining about the cost of the war in Iraq. He seems to not understand that the soldiers who are in Iraq would be somewhere, and would require food, shelter, etc. The size of the army would not be reduced if we were not involved in Iraq (and in fact, Obama has talked about increasing the size of the army), so the true cost is just the delta that is related specifically to Iraq. At this time, that differential cost is pretty small, since we are not using a lot of ammunition now, not many vehicles are being destroyed n combat, etc. Obama,s argument that we would save $10 billion per month by leaving Iraq is simply not true. Politicians running for off ice are not much concerned about truth.

According to Al Gore Bangladesh is supposed to be sinking under the sea because of pernicious global warming. In reality the seas are not rising according to Gore's plan, and Bangladesh is actually gaining land. But, according to Gore and his friends everything that happens proves global warming, so I guess this is just further proof.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20080730/sc_afp/bangladeshenvironmentunclimatewarming_080730134111;_ylt=Ai1fEIqHFVyfguECUfbGjKvPOrgF

Democrats claim that drilling off shore and in ANWR would not have any effect on prices immediately, and ignorant Republican Congresspeople agree with them. But, in reality, such drilling plans would have an immediate impact on prices. This was borne out recently when President Bush rescinded the executive ban on off shore drilling and oil prices fell $20 per barrel. (The reason T. Boone Pickens plan and conservation plans don't have the same result is that oil producers don't think those activities are going to have any impact over the next 20 years, whereas more oil supply would have an impact within a few years.) Here is an article by an economist, explaining how this works. Nancy Pelosi may not understand this, but I suspect most Democrats from oil producing states do, but are afraid to challenge the DEmocrat establishment who are trying to protect Obama from his stupid position on drilling. Here is the article:

http://mises.org/story/3047

Wednesday, July 30, 2008

Obama is talking a lot about Afghanistan these days. He seems to want to have a surge in Afghanistan similar to the one he opposed in Iraq (and refuses to admit has succeeded). But, the situation in Afghanistan is far different now than that Iraq two years ago. Afghanistan is larger than Iraq in area, and the political situation is not similar. Obama is scary becasue he thinks he understands the situation better than the commanders in the field. History clearly shows that micromanaging a war from Washington is a bad idea, but that appears to be Obama's plan. Apparently he thinks he is a lot smarter about war than the military.

Obama had a meeting with House Democrats Tuesday night. Apparently the meeting was not recorded, but there are reports on what Obama said that have not been disputed. Democrat spinners do say the quotes need to be put into context. Here are the controversial quotes: "This is the moment, as Nancy [Pelosi} noted, that the world has been waiting for." And, "I have become a symbol of the possibility of America returning to our best traditions." I would like to see how those comments could be put into a context that would not still give the impression that Obama is full of himself. The guy does appear to have a messianic complex. These comments fit in with some of his early comments such as "We are what we have been waiting for." I'm just a "typical clueless white person" so I have no idea what that means. I can't help but note the use of a royal "we." I guess he believes that he is, as Maureen Dowd says, the Prince of Chicago. I note that others beside me have observed that he is acting like he is the President of the US without going through the formality of the election. I have read that he wants the Democrats to nominate him by acclimation at the convention, rather than having a vote, so I suppose it is not surprising that he wants the media to make him President by acclimation.

Tuesday, July 29, 2008

Here is more about Nancy Pelosi and her position on drilling for oil. I wonder id the Democrats will finally make clear to the people that their agenda is to limit the supply of energy. Pelosi's comments in the politico article referenced in the following article from Powerline regarding latitude and longitude actually do make sense. Ancient navigators could get their latitude from the stars, but needed accurate time to get longitude. (The modern GPS has highly accurate time that enables users to easily establish position accurate to a foot.)

Democrats Hanging On for High Oil Prices

The Democrats' effort to keep gas prices high is reaching a crescendo, as Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid prepare to adjourn for a five-week vacation without allowing a vote on increasing our energy resources. House Republicans are trying to prevent this from happening.

The Republicans have combined their "all of the above" energy proposals into the American Energy Act, but Pelosi won't allow it to come to a vote. If she did, it would likely pass, as a number of House Democrats disagree with their leadership's policy of keeping gas prices high by limiting supply.

What makes the Dems so perverse? In this rather weird Politico article (http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0708/12122.html)--who is more pretentious, Pelosi or the reporter?--Pelosi says, "I'm trying to save the planet!" Which is, frankly, idiotic. House Republicans are fighting back by trying to prevent the House from adjourning until its members, Republicans and Democrats alike, have had an opportunity to vote on proposals to lower gas prices by expanding our energy resources. Republicans have vowed to vote "No" on the motion to adjourn, and are hoping that some Democrats will join them.

You might think that the Democrats' position, which takes money out of the pockets of all Americans, would be political poison. Not necessarily. The Democrats know who their friends are. Thus, for example, the Sierra Club, whose executive director wrote an op-ed supporting high gas prices and opposing “cheap fuel,” recently announced that it will run political ads in support of House Democratic candidates. If you're in favor of prosperity and economic growth, write your Congressman and ask him or her not to vote to adjourn Congress until members have had an opportunity to vote to lower energy costs by allowing supply to increase.

Leading Democrats are opposed to more oil drilling. Not usually spoken, but they want oil prices to go higher. Obama let that slip when he said he was OK with $4 per gallon gasoline, but thought the increase should have been slower than was the case recently. Nancy Pelosi makes the Democrat's position clear. Today Nancy said she was going to stop the GOP's "failed policy of drilling" because, "I'm trying to save the planet. I'm trying to save the planet." Since she thinks that more drilling is bad, an interesting observation would be that shutting down existing oil wells would be good. So a good question is, why isn't she working to shut down oil wells we have.

The Democrats are really into shouting "Bush's failed policies." I wonder how they rate Bush's energy policy a failure since they prevented more drilling from ever being implemented. Some of the Democrats say some mind-boggling things about drilling. Senator Schumer says that more drilling by the Saudis will bring down the price of gasoline, but more drilling in the US won't. For that to make any since, it would have to be related to the ease of refining oil into gasoline in our limited refinery system. (Oil is not as fungible as dollars because some of it is heavy, and hard to refine: light, sweet West Texas crude is the best for making gasoline.) I'm not sure about this, but I think the Saudi oil tends to be heavier than that from Alaska and off-shore, and so more oil from Saudi would do less for gasoline production than an equivalent amount from the US. Schumer must not realize that, and seems to think the opposite, assuming he is thinking at all while he is talking.

Monday, July 28, 2008

I was watching Bloomberg World News, and found out that most of thr world is in a recession. That is, negative growth, not slowed growth as in the US. Higher oil prices were blamed. It is curious that not much is said about the rest of the world's economic woes in the uS media. I suppose if they can't blame it on Bush it is not worth mentioning. But, why not blame Bush? Or at least Cheney or Carl Rove. The liberals have already proclaimed that everything bad that happens in the world is due to that unholy trio.

Iran executes over 300 people per year for crimes such as apostasy and homosexuality. It is hard to know if the people hanged are guilty of what they are charged with since the police torture people to get confessions. Their torture is not like that alleged to have been done by the US. We know that because people there often die while being interrogated, such as the female Canadian reporter a few years ago. Democrats seem to be concerned about torture and violation of civil rights of people who are not citizens, but don't appear to be concerned about it in Iran. I suppose they are only interested if they can blame it on Republicans.

http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2008/07/more_iranian_rough_justice.html

Deconstructionism has always seemed like a form of nihilism to me. Here is an article by Kyle-Anne Shiver from American Thinker in which she Deconstructs the Obama candidacy. She makes some good points about the Democrat's undemocratic ways.

http://www.americanthinker.com/2008/07/deconstructing_obama.html

I read Obama's kumbaya speech in Berlin, and I am not surprised that the media were impressed by it. They are as ignorant of history as he appears to be. Obama represents the left wing of the Democratic Party going back to Henry Wallace and George McGovern (both of whom opposed the Berlin airlift). Obama seems to not know that the Berlin airlift was an American operation without much support from anyone else except the British. Obama talks about the speeches of JFK and Reagan in Berlin as though they called for some kind of World unity. Actually they called for action against communism, and the Reagan's message was not well received by Europeans at the time. Europeans accused Reagan of "cowboy diplomacy" which they accused JFK of earlier during the Cuban Missile Crisis. Obama's call for unity is just another liberal call for surrender. The liberals really do believe that if we all just try to get along, the Muslims will stop trying to take over the world, just as when I was young they thought that if we would just surrender to the communists, all would be well. I wish Obama would have explained how if we all "come together" then the Muslims will stop killing Christians, Buddhists, Hindus, and Muslims of other sects. It appears to me that the Muslims have their own agenda, and are not likely to stop just because we want them to. Here are some thoughts about the speech from Powerline:

Barack Obama is the most left-wing candidate the Democrats have nominated since George McGovern. If Obama wins the presidency, I think it is fair to postulate that it will be George McGovern's first term. Like McGovern, Obama staked out his territory as the antiwar candidate at the left end of the field of Democratic presidential candidates. His antiwar position, including his concocted critique of Hillary Clinton's purported "saber rattling" on Iran, was his signature issue through the Democratic primaries.

One of the ironies of Obama's sermon to the Germans last week was his praise of the 1948 airlift that broke the Soviet blockade of Berlin. The heart of the sermon to the Germans was Obama's "one world" message: "This is the moment to stand as one." By avoiding any historical detail regarding the airlift, Obama integrates the airlift into his theme of unity:

The odds were stacked against success. In the winter, a heavy fog filled the sky above, and many planes were forced to turn back without dropping off the needed supplies. The streets where we stand were filled with hungry families who had no comfort from the cold.

But in the darkest hours, the people of Berlin kept the flame of hope burning. The people of Berlin refused to give up. And on one fall day, hundreds of thousands of Berliners came here, to the Tiergarten, and heard the city's mayor implore the world not to give up on freedom. "There is only one possibility," he said. "For us to stand together united until this battle is won...The people of Berlin have spoken. We have done our duty, and we will keep on doing our duty. People of the world: now do your duty...People of the world, look at Berlin!"

Obama does not even mention the name of Harry Truman. It was Truman's will alone, together with the resulting efforts of the United States and British military forces, that resulted in the airlift and its improbable success. As David McCullough notes in Truman:
It hardly seemed realistic to expect a major city to be supplied entirely by air for any but a limited time.

In making his decision, for all the political heat and turmoil of the moment, Truman had consulted none of the White House staff or any of his politica advisers....He simply emphasized his intention to stay in Berlin and left no doubt that he meant exactly what he said.

Jeff Jacoby usefully supplies the history missing from Obama's potted reference to the Berlin airlift.

Also missing from Obama's account is the political context. Arrayed against Truman and the Truman Doctrine specifically and Truman foreign policy generally through the summer and fall of 1948 were Henry Wallace and his supporters urging concessions to the Soviet Union. Is there any doubt that were he alive at that time, Obama would have stood together with George McGovern among them? As Fred Schwarz notes at NRO, contrasting Obama's views with those of Dewey and Truman in the 1948 presidential race, Obama's "political views, socialist at home and internationalist abroad, are much more like those of Henry Wallace, the Progressive candidate."

According to William O'Neill's brilliant chapter on the Wallace campaign in A Better World, Wallace's May 1947 political rally in Los Angeles was the biggest political event there in years. Twenty-eight thousand people paid admission to it, donating $32,000 to the Progressive party organization besides.

The keystone of the Wallace campaign was of course its advocacy of an American foreign policy consistent with that of the Soviet Union. Wallace defended the Communist coup in Czechoslovakia, for example, and Senator Glenn Taylor, Wallace's running mate, said that "Nazis" were in charge of "our government, so why should Russia make peace with them?"

O'Neill recalls the eloquent condemnation of Wallace by the liberal journalist Dwight Macdonald. "Macdonald held that Wallace lacked character," O'Neill writes, "then tried to show why he appealed to certain liberals anyway. Congenial habits of thought was the answer, describing them as follows." O'Neill quotes Macdonald:

Wallaceland is the mental habitat of Henry Wallace plus a few hundred thousand readers of the New Republic, the Nation, and PM. It is a region of perpetual fogs, caused by the warm winds of the liberal Gulf Stream coming in contact with the Soviet glacier. Its natives speak "Wallese," a debased political dialect.
Here, O'Neill notes, Macdonald had fun with progressive jargon:
Wallese is always employed to Unite rather than to Divide (hence the fog), and to Further Positive, Constructive Aims rather than Merely to Engage in Irresponsible and Destructive Criticism.
Further summarizing Macdonald's critique, O'Neill notes:
Wallese employed terms as loosely as possible, so as to avoid antagonizing anyone. A phrase like "the general welfare" was prized because it meant all things to all men. "It is understandable that Henry Wallace would not want to endanger such a concept by defining it."
Macdonald observed that Wallace "took the whole world for his benevolent province, losing whatever contact with reality he had up to then and becoming more and more an oratorical gasbag, a great wind of rhetoric blowing along the trade routes of Stalinoid liberalism."

Toward the end of his account of the Wallace campaign, O'Neill recalls that Wallace once composed a verse set to the music of "Passing Through," his favorite folk song. Wallace's verse includes a critique of Truman foreign policy:

When the Marshall Plan is dead,
And One World is just ahead,
We'll all be brothers
And no longer passing through.


But for the anachronistic reference to the Marshall Plan, it could have been the theme song of Obama's sermon to the Germans.


In David Brooks' column he predicts that Obama's Berlin speech will be the point at which he "jumped the shark." I doubt that proves to be the case. The US is not the same as it was in 1960 or 1980, and we have a lot of people now who eat up that kumbaya stuff.

Sunday, July 27, 2008

I can't figure out why the media, including Fox News, do not point out to Obama that a 16 month withdrawal plan from next January is not the same as a 16 month withdrawal plan when he proposed it in early 2007. (The media also do not point out that the "surge" Obama said would fail has, in fact, succeeded. He was flat wrong.) If the US had started Obama's withdrawal plan 16 months ago we would have lost the war rather than winning it. (This is because it would require an immediate drawdown to get out in an orderly retreat of 16 months, assuming we didn't want to leave our equipment behind; something some liberals actually advocated.) The liberals wanted that outcome, but I think (or at least hoped) that most Americans wanted victory. Here is a view of the situation from A. J. Strata:

Victory In Iraq Is Here - Yet Obama And Surrendercrats Still Crave Defeat Against al-Qaeda

Published by AJStrata at 9:31 am under 2008 Elections, All General Discussions, Iraq, Sadr/Mahdi Army

Senator Obama’s position on The Surge in Iraq is quite a stunning one. Even with victory at hand he stands by a failed plan for surrender and defeat to al-Qaeda. Even with the SurrenderMedia finally admitting Iraq is on the path to victory, Obama has decided he still thinks defeat at the hand of al-Qaeda was the better option!?

Why? What possible benefit could America derive from entering a war in Iraq against terrorism and losing? What is better than having those terrorists flood all their forces into Iraq - diverting them from Western targets - only to be decimated, while the Iraq Muslim street determines the future of Islam is not following al-Qaeda but working within the international community and dealing with the US of A as an ally? What would have been the upside to losing Iraq, to losing our new Muslim allies, of supporting the idea al-Qaeda is the future for Islam in a clash of civilizations that could spread across the globe? What would defeat in Iraq provide us?

The only upside I can see is to imbibe a modicum of credibility upon a group of petty and angry liberals who would tip the world into years of war just to get some political pay-back on George W Bush. Appeasing the emotionally stunted victims of Bush Derangement Syndrome (BDS) is probably the worst reason man has ever created to go to war.

Let me violate my ban on AP for one instance so we can savor the SurrenderMedia finally admitting that Iraq is being won, if not already won:

The United States is now winning the war that two years ago seemed lost.
Limited, sometimes sharp fighting and periodic terrorist bombings in Iraq are likely to continue, possibly for years. But the Iraqi government and the U.S. now are able to shift focus from mainly combat to mainly building the fragile beginnings of peace — a transition that many found almost unthinkable as recently as one year ago.

Despite the occasional bursts of violence, Iraq has reached the point where the insurgents, who once controlled whole cities, no longer have the clout to threaten the viability of the central government.

Emphasis mine. The potential for success was only unthinkable to those emotionally committed to the idea Bush could never be right, Bush could never turn things around, that Muslims would rather be slaughtered and tortured by al-Qaeda than ally with America. Only someone who craved defeat as a beautiful confirmation of their own warped views would so completely ignore the potential for success.

Why? Because one short year ago the Anbar model had been proven successful. Last year was the transition from a localized experiment in counter-insurgency tactics to a nationwide strategy aimed at rolling back the terrorists across the entire country. Which leads me to one last story on how much things have changed, which begs the question of why the left cannot let go of their mistaken desires. This story from the NY Times discusses how completely the Shiite communities have also discarded violence and extremism - showing that both the Sunni and Shiia factions of Islam are not as the SurrenderMedia proclaimed:

The militia that was once the biggest defender of poor Shiites in Iraq, the Mahdi Army, has been profoundly weakened in a number of neighborhoods across Baghdad, in an important, if tentative, milestone for stability in Iraq.

It is a remarkable change from years past, when the militia, led by the anti-American cleric Moktada al-Sadr, controlled a broad swath of Baghdad, including local governments and police forces. But its use of extortion and violence began alienating much of the Shiite population to the point that many quietly supported American military sweeps against the group.

This is the essence of the denial that still infects Obama and the Surrendercrat power brokers. They cannot understand how Muslims could ever turn to America instead of rising up in support of al-Qaeda and Mahdi thugs. That was THEIR horribly wrong assumption. That was THEIR disastrous mistake in judgement. That was why THEY still crave defeat and find themselves alone and looking quite foolish as they stand by their hopes for American defeat in Iraq. They couldn’t see why America could, once again, be the beacon of hope and promise for a people ravaged by the hate of a few extremists.

I have a theory that the GOP and far right began to resemble the fanatical nature of the Islamo Fascists, and that is how they lost support in 2006. They are not identical by any means, but the overheated, religious based bashing of one time moderate conservative allies was too similar, even at that distance, to our radical national enemy. Too many wanted a war on Islam, not a war on Islamo Fascists.

Now the Surrendercrats are looking to be the extremists. To hold onto political animosity to the point war and the potential for massive defeat seem like a reasonable option again raises the specter of radical terrorists. I said a long time ago this was an untenable and unforgiving position to be in. If victory came the Surrendercrats would be decimated. It has come, and there is only one conclusion America can draw from their continued embrace to a now proven horrible plan. McCain is right, too many would accept war to win an election. Thankfully, America is not radical, and actually is repulsed by them. What hit the GOP in 2006 is now about ready to swing against the Surrendercrats in 2008.

There comes a tipping point where obstinate views transform into dangerous, radical ideology. Clearly Obama and the Surrendercrats have passed this point, and there is no return unless they accept their views were wrong. This will not be happening.

Addendum: I meant to underscore how insane this all is by an analogy to the last time the world faced down a fascist cult. This regret at success in Iraq would be like someone claiming in 1945, after the invasion of Europe by allied forces had freed most of Europe and Hitler was hunkered down in his bunker in Berlin, that the invasion of Europe was not worth the price paid. It would be like preferring a Europe in the grip of fascist madmen than being on the brink of freedom. Everyone could see the invasion at Normandy cost America and the allies immense costs in blood and treasure. And the Western economies and people were under severe economic stress. But it was worth price then, and it is more than worth the price now. This time we stopped the fascist cult before it became so strong the price was millions of dead and injured. And those who cannot see this are themselves in the throws of cult-think.

There is a lot of discussion today about the sustainability of our way of life in the US. Some think that our current lifestyle uses too much energy, and that the road to sustainability is to return to a more primitive lifestyle. I think the thing to do is drill for more oil, and begin to convert to more efficient energy use along with different energy supplies. We cannot conserve our way out of the current shortage of oil over the short haul, so we need more supply that will use our existing infrastructure. It would be good if our government knew how to do an efficient transition, but, sadly, it is incapable of logical action. Here is a discussion of the unsustainable socities in Africa from Coyote blog.

The Aid Conundrum

I think there are a lot of us who scratch our heads over foreign aid. While open to helping starving kids, its not always clear how to do so without simultaneously reinforcing and strengthening despotic regimes and dysfunctional cultures that caused the problems in the first place. At least not without sending in the US military along with a trillion dollars or so for a decade or more.

This question could lead to a fairly interesting discourse, but in reality it does not. Expressing the above quandary merely gets one labeled as unfeeling and insensitive. One of the problems with having a reasonable debate is that the people and groups in the West who most support aid also are philosophical supporters of many of the failed leftish regimes that caused the aid to be needed in the first place, or else they are strong advocates for cultural relativism that feel that it is wrong to criticize any non-western culture for any reason.

While he does not offer any answers to this question, it is nice to see Kevin Myers at least try to raise these complexities, especially at a time when Barrack Obama is trying to make all these questions seem easy:

I am not innocent in all this. The people of Ireland remained in ignorance of the reality of Africa because of cowardly journalists like me. When I went to Ethiopia just over 20 years ago, I saw many things I never reported -- such as the menacing effect of gangs of young men with Kalashnikovs everywhere, while women did all the work. In the very middle of starvation and death, men spent their time drinking the local hooch in the boonabate shebeens. Alongside the boonabates were shanty-brothels, to which drinkers would casually repair, to briefly relieve themselves in the scarred orifice of some wretched prostitute (whom God preserve and protect). I saw all this and did not report it, nor the anger of the Irish aid workers at the sexual incontinence and fecklessness of Ethiopian men. Why? Because I wanted to write much-acclaimed, tear-jerkingly purple prose about wide-eyed, fly-infested children -- not cold, unpopular and even "racist" accusations about African male culpability.

Am I able to rebut good and honourable people like John O'Shea, who are now warning us that once again, we must feed the starving Ethiopian children? No, of course I'm not. But I am lost in awe at the dreadful options open to us. This is the greatest moral quandary facing the world. We cannot allow the starving children of Ethiopia to die.

Yet the wide-eyed children of 1984-86, who were saved by western medicines and foodstuffs, helped begin the greatest population explosion in human history, which will bring Ethiopia's population to 170 million by 2050. By that time, Nigeria's population will be 340 million, (up from just 19 million in 1930). The same is true over much of Africa.

Thus we are heading towards a demographic holocaust, with a potential premature loss of life far exceeding that of all the wars of the 20th Century. This terrible truth cannot be ignored.

But back in Ireland, there are sanctimonious ginger-groups, which yearn to prevent discussion, and even to imprison those of us who try, however imperfectly, to expose the truth about Africa. And of that saccharine, sickly shower, more tomorrow.

via Maggies Farm.

By the way, does it seem odd to anyone else that we in America get accused of having "unsustainable" lifestyles and we are urged to return to simpler, less technological, less energy-intensive lives like those in Africa? I would have argued that "sustainable" means to be able to support your own people with their own effort. By this definition, the US is the most sustainable country in the world. Our prospective efforts not only sustain us so well that even our poorest 20% live better than the upper middle class in African nations, but we also help sustain the rest of the world. We create so much wealth that we are able to consistently import more than we export, creating jobs around the world. And we send more aid to other countries than most of the rest of the world combined.

Saturday, July 26, 2008

Here is something about Obama from Media Blog. A pretty incredible meeting when you think about it. (I wonder if Obama visited his birthplace in Bethlehem while he was in Israel?)

When Reporters Fall in Love [Greg Pollowitz]

This has to be the funniest in-the-tank for Obama piece yet. Think Elaine meeting JFK, Jr. in Seinfeld:

As thousands waited at the Sieges Saule monument in Berlin to hear Obama’s sensational speech, a BILD reporter met Barack all alone – in the gym! Here's the incredible account of Judith Bonesky’s meeting…

It's 16:02pm and I’ve been training in the gym of the Ritz Carlton hotel in Berlin. A man in a suit approaches me and says: "Barack Obama is about to come and train ...“ Shortly after half past four and he actually arrives! Barack Obama is wearing a grey t-shirt, black tracksuit bottoms – and a great smile!

"Hi, how’s it going?“ asks Obama in his deep voice. My heart beats. "Very good, and you?" I say. Obama replies: "Very good, thank you!"

But this rises to a Greg Gutfeld level of funny, although this reporter is serious:

He goes and picks up a pair of 16 kilo weights and starts curling them with his left and right arms, 30 repetitions on each side. Then, amazingly, he picks up the 32 kilo weights! Very slowly he lifts them, first 10 curls with his right, then 10 with his left. He breathes deeply in and out and takes a sip of water from his 0,5 litre Evian bottle.

I saw a brief clip of T. Boone Pickens on TV today. Contrary to what many had presumed, based on his wind turbine advertisements, that he was not in favor of drilling for oil. In fact, he is for drilling, alternative energy, and everything else. His main objective is to stop importing foreign oil. I agree with that. What a lot of politicians seem to fail to realize is that we have a fossil fuel based economy because fossil fuels are inexpensive. As oil reaches a price above $100 per barrel, alternative energy sources will become economically attractive. These sources will not become important to the economy unless and until they can compete with fossil fuels on price. Governments can give favorable tax or subsidy treatment to alternative systems to get them started, but ultimately they must be economically viable. That is the reason why alternative energy sources have not yet supplanted oil and other fossil fuels despite work on alternative energy for the past 30 years. It is that simple. Politicians, and particularly liberal Democrats, believe in the possibility of something for nothing, so they seem to think that the laws of thermodynamics can be circumvented, but they can't be. King Canute knew that he couldn't change natural laws by decree; Democrats, and some VP's I worked for, think they can.

Friday, July 25, 2008

The Global Warmists are concerned about the destruction of wetlands. They say the wetlands contian a huge amount of carbon, that if released would be a "carbon bomb" destroying civilization.
Here is an article describing the situation:

http://www.news24.com/News24/Technology/News/0,,2-13-1443_2360769,00.html

The article says that 60% of the world's wetlands have already been destroyed. So, it appears that the "carbon bomb" has already gone off, without much effect. The "carbon bomb" concept assumes that CO2 will cause significant warming of earth. That has not happened, and there is no data that indicates it will happen.

From PatriotPost here is a comment about the EPA's attempt to control everything.

Earlier this month, the DC Circuit Court of Appeals invalidated the EPA’s Clean Air Interstate Rule (CAIR), a complicated “cap and trade” system of regulating smog and soot. Holding that the EPA’s analysis was “fundamentally flawed,” the court said that the EPA must “re-do its analysis from the ground up.” At about the same time, the EPA issued a report containing its blueprint for reducing the output of greenhouse gases. This report, made necessary by the U.S. Supreme Court’s 2007 decision that carbon dioxide is a pollutant, contains thousands of suggestions for regulating carbon emissions. In fact, it includes regulations on everything with an engine. It also includes regulations on buildings, hotels and retail establishments. Essentially, anything that emits carbon gets the EPA’s attention. The White House immediately repudiated the report.

This illustrates a fundamental problem with the EPA: It is overreaching, and it is doing so incompetently. Under the guise of environmental protection, it seeks to do what the Communists never could: totalitarian micromanagement of every aspect of our lives. Like the Communist central planners, however, the EPA bureaucrats are discovering that micromanaging the lives and the economic activity of Americans is far more difficult than their theories and models predict. Indeed, it simply will not work.

To avoid the inevitable damage to the economy and to our personal liberty that will surely result from the EPA’s efforts, we offer an alternative solution: abolish the EPA.


Under the EPA's proposed standards, everything in America would be in violation of their mandates for CO2 generation. I suspect that no one has told the EPA bureaucrats that each person emits about one kilogram of CO2 each day, or about a metric ton in a year. I feel confident that the EPA would not suggest active population control, but if they figure out that what a person eats marginally affects how much CO2 is produced, so they might enact diet requirements. Even though there is no scientific proof that man's CO2 emissions have a significant effect on climate, but rather there is a claim of scientific proof based on projections from computer models that have failed to predict what is happening now, the liberals/socialists/communists have seized on CO2 induced climate change as the means of achieving their goal of eliminating liberty.

Saturday, July 19, 2008

Now the German magazine der Spiegel reports that the Iraqi Prime Minister al-Maliki has clarified his position on US troop withdrawals, and he does indeed like withdrawal in 16 months. One question that would be interesting is would al-Maliki have liked the 16 month plan back in March 2007 when Obama proposed it? It seems that the so-called surge has made it possible for the US to leave. I recall that Obama said the surge wouln't work, and now says it didn't work. On TV I saw him say that the Iraqi's have not met any of the 18 benchmarks that the Administration set for them. The Administration says that 15 have been met. It is pretty clear that the situation.

It may be that al-Maliki simply sees Obama as the next President, and wants to curry favor with him. Obama's tour of Europe certainly indicates that Obama sees himself as the leader of America now. He may be correct becasue the country seems ready to give socialism another try. The Europeans certainly favor Obama, at least in part because they see him as a socialist. Foreigners always favor the Democrat for President. I remember talking about politics with a Brazialian student back when I was in Graduate School. He said he favored the Democrats becasue they were best for Brazil. I asked him who he would be for if he were an American. He said in that case he would be a Republican. I vote Republican because I am for Americans rather than foreigners.

Friday, July 18, 2008

The Democrats keep saying that it will take 10 years for more drilling to have any effect on oil prices. Today on TV I heard the addled Harry Reid say that it will take 30 years. I wonder where they get their estimates. They seem unaware that drillling has already been done off of Santa Barbara in California in a field with 3 billion barrels of proven reserves with an EUR (estimated ultimate recovery) of 13 billion barrels. It would only take a short time to get the oil flowing from this reserve, and the production would make an immediate impact on price. Then there is the Destin Dome off of Destin, Florida in Gulf of Mexico. Production there is shut-in, which means it could be re-started almost immediately.

Regarding how long it takes to get the price down, the price of oil fell almst $20 per barrel after Preident Bush cancelled the Executive order banning off-shore drilling. Imagine how much the price would fall if Congress were to lift their ban. Rather than worry about silly regulations to stop speculators from manipulating the price of oil, they could just announce more drilling and the speculators would drop the price on their own. The regulations Congress talks about would be worthless, and would just result in the speculators moving to other countries. (Most of the speculators that attempt to manipulate the market are not Amricans any way.) Democrats don't like the idea of the price of oil falling becasue their alternative energy schemes are not attractive unless oil is very expensive. If the price fell to $75 or $80 per barrel, most of the scemes would not be economically attractive. What is despicable about Democrats is that they won't tll people what their real agenda is.

Th Obama campaign got its hopes up after NPR reported that Iraqi Prime Minister al-Maliki demanded a timetable for withdrawal of American troops from Iraq. This was widely reported in the news, and Obama scheduled a trip to go talk this over with al-Maliki. Now, according to BBC of all people, not exactly a right-wing group, al-Maliki never said any such thing. He never mentioned withdrawal at all. (Was it a matter of mis-translation, or an out and out lie?) At any rate, Obama's conversation with al-Maliki may not go as he expects. Then again, Obama's main claim to fame is his supreme confidence in his ability to persuade people to do what he wants them to. So, it will be interesting to see how well he does with al-Maliki. Obama has the anchors of the three major news broadcasts with him, so I feel confident that he will be able to get his spin out no matter how the conversation with al-Maliki actually goes.

It is now obvious to everyone that the three major broadcasters, ABC, NBC, and CBS, are in the tank for Obama. There is no way that they can now claim to be impartial.

Obama hasn't even been elected yet, but according to this article by Andrew Bolt, the world's temperature and sea level are alredy falling.

http://www.news.com.au/heraldsun/story/0,21985,24036602-5000117,00.html

On top of that, I haeard a estimate on TV that the the US GDP growth in the 2nd quarter was 3.9%. So, the recession is over before it even started, no doubt just due to Obama's presence, such is his power.

That there is bias in the media in reporting crimes involving different races is clear. In the rare cases when a white person attacks or kills a black person it is a federal case and the media are incensed. And there are calls for more ridiculous hate crime legislation, which, of course, only applies to white people since only they are considered to be capable of hate. In the all to common instances when a black person attacks or kills a white person, there is little concern on the part of the press and the media. In fact, the media considers it to be a racist act if one calls attention to this situation. (For example, pointing out that the government's national crime statistics show that about 1/3 of white women who are raped are raped by blacks, but rape of blacks by whites is so rare that it is statistically insignificant.) Here is an account of one of the horrible crimes committed in recent years that was mostly ignored by the media, and mention of which drew much criticism.

http://patriotpost.us/alexander/edition.asp?id=531

Thursday, July 17, 2008

Obama makes a lot of frightening remarks. Here is something he said back on July 2 that was not reported much in the press, since they are in the tank for Obama, and don't report many of the strange things he says.

As first developed by World Net Daily's Joseph Farah, the story is about what the candidate said in Colorado Springs on July 2nd:


We cannot continue to rely on our military in order to achieve the national security objectives we've set. We've got to have a civilian national security force that's just as powerful, just as strong, just as well-funded.


One feature of dictatorships is that the dictator usually has a private army of some type that is loyal to him, and is separate from the regular military. Roman Emperors had the Praetorian Guard. Hitler had the Brown Shirts, and later the SS. (Naomi Wolf used this criteria in her book explaining how President Bush is a fascist, though Bush's private army never materialized, and he does not appear to be preparing to cancel the election in November.) When Obama has his "Triumph of the Will" extravaganza in his acceptance speech at the football stadium in Denver, it will be a bad sign if his supporters carrying the signs are wearing brown shirts.

Wednesday, July 16, 2008

Obama has plans for education, no doubt drawn up for him by his terrorist buddy William Ayers. He wants the Federal Government to take charge of children's education from their birth until they graduate from college. Does this mean that he wants to take over education of babies from their parents? He is a socialist, so probably he does want to have a mandatory day care system for all pre-school age children. Does he not realize that over one-half of the children do not have a high enough IQ to be successful in college? Probably not since liberals don't believe there is any variance in native intellectual ability, despite all of the evidence to the contrary. here is the article from American Thinker:

http://www.americanthinker.com/2008/07/obama_and_the_independent_scho.html

They say the most dangerous place in America is the space between Chuck Schumer and a camera. He is eager to speak on any subject, regardless of whether or not he knows anything about the subject. He now thinks that more drilling for oil is a good idea, just not in America. How does drilling in Arabia reduce our dependence on foreighn oil? It's not clear to me. Oh well. Here is a blog from "Ace of Spades:"

Chuck Schumer Suggests Novel Plan for Reducing Price of Oil: Drill More! (in... Saudi Arabia)

—Ace
He informs us that just 500,000 extra barrels of oil drilled in Saudi Arabia (which would take years and years to actually come on line, of course) will increase not only present supply but future supply, and thus knock the price of oil down, and stop endless up-bidding on the price by speculators, and all that other good stuff.

He does not explain, though, why Saudi Arabian oil has this magical property of increasing supply and psychologically pulling the carpet out from under speculators, and yet American oil does not.

We should be grateful that Chuck Schumer has at least grasped the interrelation of supply and demand. Now we just need explain to him the notion of fungibility, that a barrel of American oil is precisely the equivalent of Saudi oil as far as supply goes, and we'll be in like Flynn.

And on this point: Of the 18 billion in known reserves in the seas alone, ten million are off the coast of California, and those derricks could start producing oil within a year.

It seems a lot of them already are drilled and capped and ready to produce oil. They've just been shuttered by the ban on offshore drilling.


Californians are opposed to drilling off their coast. It is not clear why. About 1% of the oil that washes up on beaches comes from oil wells. Mostly it is natural seepage. Californians, Democrats, and environmentalists are not interested in facts; they just know that oil is bad.

Obama said in a recent speech that I heard that he will rid the world of nuclear weapons. That is an incredible statement. I wish he would have told us how he proposes to do that. The implication is that his powers of persuasion will do the job. He must really think he is God. I expect the Chinese, Russians, Indians, Israeli's and the others are hoping he wins the Presidential election even as they are laughing at him.

Today Senator Lieberman disagreed with Barack Obama's position on Iraq. Lieberman seems to be the only Democrat who understands our conflict with Islam. Maybe that is why the Democrats are forcing him out of the party.

Here is a blog on oil drilling by "Cheat Seeking Missiles." The Democrat leader's position infuriates me. They demonstrate over and over again that they are willing to destroy the economy of the country to stay in power. The one year to market estimate for drilling off of California seems right to me. If the Brazilians can do it in 18 months a year should be right for us.

July 15th 2008
Dem Position Weakens As Oil Feud Ratchets Up
Posted by: Laer at 12:54 pm

Ever since the great drilling debate was launched, I’ve wondered why President Bush linked lifting the federal executive orders banning offshore drilling to Congress lifting its own drilling bans. It was a ridiculous position strategically, and it’s good that Bush is not so stubborn that he refused to change his tactics.

Now that he’s scratched the executive orders, all eyes are on Congress, where Bush should have directed them in the first place. (Is this really that hard to figure out?!)

From this a.m.’s WSJ, we see the Obama response to Bush’s call for expanded drilling:

Obama campaign spokesman Bill Burton said that if lifting the moratorium on offshore exploration “would provide short-term relief at the pump or a long-term strategy for energy independence, it would be worthy of our consideration, regardless of the risks. But most experts, even within the Bush administration, concede it would do neither.” The White House said Mr. Bush’s proposals would take years to have their full impact.

So? Let’s ask the obvious unasked question: How do oil’s years-to-market compare to the number of years it’ll take to get the ramshackle gaggle of alternative energies to make as big a contribution? No one’s guessing; but anyone with any critical capacity at all can and should question the Dem supposition that it’ll take capitalists sniffing money 10 years to stuff their pockets with bucks from new oil sales.

How about one year instead? Sound more realistic? From the same article:

A Sanford C. Bernstein & Co. analyst said in a report there is a lot of offshore crude that can be produced relatively quickly. The problem: It is located off California, where politicians have built careers opposing new drilling.

The Minerals Management Service said that of the estimated 18 billion barrels of oil in off-limits coastal areas, almost 10 billion are off the coast of California.

“California could actually start producing new oil within a year if the moratorium were lifted,” the Sanford C. Bernstein report said, because the oil is under shallow water, has been explored and drilling platforms have been there since before the moratoria. (emphasis added)

One year! That would generate instantaneous downward price pressure on the oil futures market and would quickly impact the price at the pump.

So what did Obama’s Chicago hack politics buddy and DNC dirty work king Rahm Emanuel have to say about all this?

“I’ve been in Washington long enough to know a political stunt when I see one.”

And I know a political party trying desperately to appease its environmentalist, anti-corporate, elitist special interests when I see one.

Tuesday, July 15, 2008

It seems clear to me that al Qeada is losing badly in Iraq, and so is moving the Central front in the war against us back to Afghanistan. It also seems clear that the US is transferring personnel to Afghanistan to counter the enemy's move. That is the way wars are fought. Obama and the Democrats do not seem to understand this.

One of the silliest arguments I hear today is Democrats saying that drilling for oil is not the solution to our expensive energy situation because "it will take ten years for any oil to be obtained." (Brazil just made a major oil find off of their coast and they expect to have the oil to market in 18 months: I believe we could do as well if we wanted to.) The Democrats solution is to start working harder on development of "green" energy. The idea that the Democrat's approach will yield results in less time than drilling for more oil is ludicrous, and it seems to me that most people can recognize that. We started working on "green" energy back during the Carter Administration, and have had only limited success over the past 30 years. Most of the "green" energy systems that I am aware of cost more than oil, even at $140 per barrel. Working on alternative energy systems is a good idea, since the world will have to transfer away from fossil fuel over the next 100 to 200 years. We will need coal, oil, and natural gas while we make the transition. We have a huge investment in the current fossil fuel infrastructure, and Democrats act as though we can just suddenly abandon that investment and simultaneously make an even larger investment in "green" infrastructure. Any economist knows that will have a terrible effect on the standard of living in the US since the green energy will be more expensive than the current system. Usually when a new technology supersedes an old technology the new one is less expensive or more productive. The Democrats position on this astonishes me. I don't see how their position is a winner, even against the inept McCain campaign.

I watched Obama's speech today. Basically he said that if he had been in charge the past eight years, the world would now be a wonderful, peaceful, prosperous place because he would not have made the choices that the evil Bush made. He came across as incredibally naive to me. Anyone who thinks he can solve all problems is a fool. Obama seems to fail that other groups have their own agenda's and will respond to whatever action he takes. It is difficult to ever achieve a clearcut solution to the nations problems. I see no reason for his confidence in himself. The idea that the Islamists will simply surrender because Obama asks them to is ridiculous. Obama discusses going after Osama bin Laden as though Pakistan will allow us to send in an army, something they have consistently refused to do. Obama seems to be unaware that the Pakistani's were barely speaking with the Clinton Administration, and that Bush has gotten far more support from Pakistan than Clinto ever did.

Here is a just released paper by Lord Monckton that details and critiques the analysis behind the global warming hypothesis, and some of the issues regarding the projection of apocalyptic atmospheric temperature increases. Lord Monckton covers the subject very well, explaining what the Stefan-Boltzmann Constant is, what the Clausius-Clapyron equation represents and why it is important, etc. (Who would have thought that a British Lord would be this smart. He must be a Lord through merit rather than heredity.) This paper contains more detailed analyses than I have done myself. I didn’t look at how the IPCC did their analysis, but rather did mine independently. I did get the same answer that Hansen did regarding the effects on temperature of increased CO2 concentration acting alone. I did not agree with the Hansen/IPCC analysis that included a significant positive feedback from increased water vapor in the atmosphere. As has been widely discussed, recent satellite data does not support the IPCC assumption regarding water vapor in the atmosphere in the mid-tropics or temperature increase in that region. I also had a problem with Climatologists doing feedback control analysis on a dynamic, non-linear system such as the Earth’s climate. As is discussed in this paper they used the Bode equation which is inadequate for a non-linear system. The climatologists are probably as inadequate in system control theory as they have proved to be with statistics. As this paper shows, the IPCC temperature projections have simply not come true. (By the way, the IPCC’s chief climate modeler, Kevin Trenberth, always says that their analysis yields projections based on the assumed scenario rather than predictions.) Here is Lord Monckton’s paper.



http://www.aps.org/units/fps/newsletters/200807/monckton.cfm

Sunday, July 13, 2008

I am astonished at the appalling scientific ignorance of the country's political leaders. Here is a piece from American Thinker about Represntative Markey. I have watched Markey discuss energy on TV and he is either a cynic or a fool, or maybe both.

July 13, 2008
Top Democrat Blames Darfur, 'Black Hawk Down' on Global Warming

Rick Moran

Occasionally here at AT, we like to highlight idiocy from officials that is so sublime in its illogic and ignorance that the rest of us just sit there, mouth agape, and wonder at how such a dumb brute could achieve a significant position in government.

This is from Representative Edward Markey (D-MA) speaking before a group of kids on Capitol Hill:


"In Somalia back in 1993, climate change, according to 11 three- and four-star generals, resulted in a drought which led to famine," said Markey.

"That famine translated to international aid we sent in to Somalia, which then led to the U.S. having to send in forces to separate all the groups that were fighting over the aid, which led to Black Hawk Down. There was this scene where we have all of our American troops under fire because they have been put into the middle of this terrible situation."


Um, that's not entirely accurate. Myron Ebell, Director of Global Warming Policy at CEI says that droughts occur whether the temperature is going up or down or staying the same; "To say you know the conflict was caused by global warming is to show how really ignorant you are of the scientific issues involved.”

Now Markey is not some backbench Democratic party flunkie. He is a party leader who chairs the House (Select) Energy Independence and Global Warming Committee.

Those weren't the only words of wisdom Markey gave the youngsters. He also blamed a "drought in Darfur" for the genocide there despite the myriad of other roots to the conflict - including a bloody Christian vs. Muslim war being carried out by the Islamic government - while also blaming hurricane Katrina on the idea that the "earth has a fever" but there's no emergency room for it to visit.

Hurricane experts have debunked the idea that storms are intensifying because of global warming but that doesn't seem to stop Markey from serving up a lot of "malarkey."

So Malarkey Markey belives that Darfur, Somalia, and Katrina are all the result of global warming? I'm surprised he didn't work in climate change as the cause of the Iraq War.

At least he would have been consistent.

You are probably aware that the earth's temperature is not following the upward trend predicted back in 1988 by James Hansen and others. You should be aware of the efforts of those who support the idea of CO2 induced climate disaster to put the best face on the current data. Both current candidates for President have bought into the apocalyptic global warming hypothesis, and promise to undertake draconian measures that will destroy the standard of living of the USA, and reduce the power of the USA compared to countries with wiser leaders such as China, Russia, and India. The public should be interested in knowing that the basis for the attack on fossil fuels is eroding. Here is an article detailing the efforts of the Hadley Research Center to spin current temperature trends. (The temperature monitoring agency mentioned in the article that is fudging the data is James Hansen's NASA/GISS, whose data has diverged from the other three major temperature measuring groups. Hansen is, of course, a Democratic Party activist, and has received major monetary grants from Mrs. John Kerry's foundation. Hansen has recently told Congress that people who disagree with him should be put on trial for crimes against humanity; that seems a curious position for one supposed to be dedicated to science and the discovery of truth.)

http://www.paulmacrae.com/?p=74

Saturday, July 12, 2008

Here is the opinion of Freeman Dyson, the Nobel laureate in physics, regarding global warming skeptics:

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB121564847030041019.html

Friday, July 11, 2008

Democrats don't want to drill anywhere. They are willing to let other countries do the drilling and then sell the oil to us for $140per barrel. The Chinese are drilling off of Florida and the Russians want to drill in the artic. Why do the Democrats not want the US to drill using our advanced technology? Do they want the US economy to tank? Here is an article from Drudge about what one of our primary enemies, Russia, is planning:

Russia's Putin tours new rig in Arctic oil drive

Jul 11 01:52 PM US/Eastern







Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin on Friday toured a new Arctic oil rig intended to boost Moscow's position in the intensifying competition for northern energy reserves.
Putin also met ministers and top oil executives in the Severodvinsk shipyard to discuss prospects for developing more Arctic fields, which are estimated to contain up to a quarter of Russia's proven oil and gas reserves.

"The Arctic zone is a guarantee of Russia's economic power. Oil, gas, gold, diamonds and phosphates -- it's all there," Artur Chilingarov, a member of parliament who is also an Arctic explorer, told AFP before the meeting.

"We need to find new oil fields ... We need to go offshore," he said.

Officials said the rig, which is expected to be completed in 2010, is the first in the world able to operate in temperatures as low as minus 50 degrees Celsius (minus 58 degrees Fahrenheit) and withstand the impact of pack ice.

"Building technology to tap offshore Arctic reserves is a priority for our civilian production," read a statement from the rig's constructor, Sevmash, a secretive plant in northern Russia that also builds nuclear submarines.

Sevmash emphasised the rig's ability to operate in "extreme conditions."

The fragile Arctic environment and disputed boundaries between Canada, Norway and Russia make oil exploration in the region controversial. Russia says it has to drill in the Arctic as existing oil fields are drying up.

The Arctic region is believed to contain 100 billion barrels of oil, according to US official data, and is increasingly seen by the industry as a key source to keep pace with soaring demand amid record-high oil prices.

But environmentalists say there is currently no effective way of dealing with an oil spill in such icy conditions and warn about the impact that drilling will have on Arctic wildlife such as polar bears and whales.

At Friday's meeting, Putin said Russia's declining oil production meant the industry was at a "critical juncture" and proposed to cut taxes and slash bureaucracy to encourage new oil development in Arctic regions.

"The prospects are good but some tendencies worry us. The rate of growth of production has gone down ... In the first quarter of this year, production even declined 0.3 percent," Putin told the assembled ministers and oil executives.

The new Prirazlomnaya rig was ordered by state-controlled energy giant Gazprom for its oil field of the same name in the Arctic Ocean but the project has been delayed by design and financing problems.

Sevmash said it hoped to use the experience to build infrastructure for other planned Arctic projects such as the Shtokman gas field in the Barents Sea and oil fields off the coast of the Yamal peninsula in Siberia.

The base of the rig measures 126 by 126 metres (413 by 413 feet) and it can house up to 200 workers. Once completed, the rig will be dragged by tug boats hundreds of kilometres (miles) from the shipyard to the oil field.

The Sevmash plant is in the town of Severodvinsk, a former prison camp and Russia's largest shipyard, located some 1,200 kilometres (745 miles) north of Moscow on the White Sea, a gateway to the Arctic Ocean.


Somehow I doubt that Putin is concerned about what happens to polar bears. I feel confident that he would express some concern for polar bears in support of US environmentalists in their efforts to destroy the economy of the US, a goal Putin also embraces.

The Democrats are willing to sacrifice the country in order to gain political power. They were willing to harm the country with regard to Iraq in the 2006 election, and they are willing to do the same now with regard to energy. I suppose some may say that the Democrats have a plan. If so, they have not said what it is beyond a fantasy about "green" energy. The plan is probably like the plan to reduce gasoline prices that Nancy Pelosi said she had in 2006. She has yet to implement the plan, whatever it was. Here is another item from Powerline on the latest Democrat activities in Congress:

The economy is teetering on the brink, as oil hits record highs and no relief, in the form of increased supply, is in sight. Astonishingly, the Democrats are determined to allow no energy legislation to pass the Congress. This morning, the New York Times reported that Nancy Pelosi has dug in her heels in opposition to gas price relief:

According to accounts from those present, Ms. Pelosi said that if Democrats relented on drilling, “then we might as well pack it up and go home."

So that's what the Democrats will do: pack up and go home, rather than try to bring relief to consumers and businesses staggering under the weight of record energy prices.

The inevitable result will be economic hardship. It's hard to avoid the inference that the Democrats want the economy to get worse, in the expectation that hardship will help their prospects in November. Who knows, they could be right. But it is hard to imagine a more cynical calculation. In Barack Obama, Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid, we have as cynical a political gang as has ever been assembled.

The supporters of the apocalyptic global warming hypothesis rely a lot on anecdotal information, but are quick to discount anecdotal information that does not support the global warming hypothesis. Here is an anecdotal report from the blog Powerline that supports global warming. Of course the report is from 1922. And warming probably was happening then.

The Arctic, getting warmer:

“The Arctic ocean is warming up, icebergs are growing scarcer and in some places the seals are finding the water too hot,” according to a report to the Commerce Department yesterday from US Consul Ifft, at Bergen, Norway. Reports from fishermen, seal hunters and explorers, he declared, all point to a radical change in climate conditions and hitherto unheard-of temperatures in the Arctic zone.
“Exploration expeditions report that scarcely any ice has been met with as far north as 81 degrees 29 minutes. Soundings to a depth of 3,100 meters showed the gulf stream still very warm. Great masses of ice have been replaced by moraines of earth and stones, the report continued, while at many points well-known glaciers have entirely disappeared. Very few seals and no white fish are found in the eastern Arctic, while vast shoals of herring and smelts, which have never before ventured so far north, are being encountered in the old seal fishing grounds.”


This morning's New York Times? No, the U.S. Weather Bureau, 1922
.

The globl warming debate never happened, and probably never will. Those who support the apacolyptic global warming hypothesis simply declared victory before others realized that there was an issue. Since they declared victory, there is no point in further discussion even as their projections of future events do not transpire. Here is an example of resistance to having any discussion at all. Pat Michaels knows a lot more about climate than Hansen, and Hansen knows it. Hansen also knows that the data are not breaking his way.

http://media.www.vainformer.com/media/storage/paper1335/news/2008/04/23/News/Nasa-Climatologist.not.Interested.In.Defending.Own.Views.On.Global.Warming.At.Wm-3386341.shtml

Last year our scientifically ignorant Supreme Court decided that CO2is a pollutant that must be regulated. As they often do, they got this out of thin air since Congress had not included this in thier law on EPA's responsibilities. Now environmentalists and liberal judges can stop develpment of anything that produces CO2 in the US. And this is without having to resort to the protection of polar bears. In the article that follows, keep in mind that the reduction in temerature mentioned by Pat Michaels is based on the projections of the IPCC computer models that have propjected that temperature would have gone up by several degrees over the last 20 years compared to an actual decrease. Here is the article from PatriotPost:

Environmentalists are gleeful over their success in blocking the creation of 100-plus jobs and millions of dollars in revenue for one of Georgia’s poorest counties. Well, they wouldn’t quite put it that way, of course. But according to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, such would have been the benefits of a coal-fired power plant, construction of which State Superior Court Judge Thelma Wyatt Cummings Moore injudiciously blocked last week.

Citing the Supreme Court’s decision requiring the EPA to regulate the emission of CO2, which, incidentally, is both botanically necessary and harmless to humans and animals, Moore nixed the 1,200-megawatt plant in Early County, leaving many to wonder how the state will meet its rising electricity needs in the future.

To make matters worse, the rewards of bowing at the altar of global warming are guaranteed to be virtually nonexistent. Patrick Michaels, senior fellow for environmental studies at the Cato Institute, notes that even if every nation adopted the Kyoto Treaty, the world would rein in global warming by a mere seven-hundredths of a degree Celsius.

So while the Sierra Club elitists herald “a new day,” Georgia’s workers are left to live that day facing continued economic difficulties, thanks to global warming’s mindless minions and one duly-deluded judge.


It looks bad for the US economy with liberal Democrats in control. Here is the view of the intellectual giant leader of the Democrats. Will the American People wake up before it is too late?

"Coal makes us sick, oil makes us sick; it’s global warming. It’s ruining our country, it’s ruining the world. We’ve got to stop using fossil fuel.” —Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Searchlight)

Thursday, July 10, 2008

Here is an example of the sort of legislation that is to be expected when Obama is elected President. This legislation, will in my opinion set in motion the events that will lead to civil unrest in America, and may lead to outright war.

http://article.nationalreview.com/print/?q=ODU5OTVjNjhhOTY4ZDk2MWYyM2I0NTRjZWY3NDA2Njk=

Everyone has probably seen the T. Boone Pickens media blitz about wind power on TV. I think the ads are misleading because wind power is not a complete solution. Wind power can never provide a major portion of electric power. Windmills are only online about 30% of the time, so can never provide base power. Nuclear and coal power stations respond too slowly to backup the windmills, so natural gas fired electric power stations will be required to backup the windmills. (T. Boone sells natural gas.) The main thing the nation needs now is transportation fuel. Natural gas can be that fuel, but that cannot happen overnight. (Iran has a program for converting their cars to run on natural gas because they have no gasoline refiners and so are under the threat of having their gasoline supply cut off.) It takes a lot of infrastructure to set up refueling stations for natural gas, and to convert the existing automobiles to run on natural gas as well as gasoline. Then, it will take a lot of drilling to get the natural gas to fuel the automobiles. (By the way, natural gas running in internal combustion engines produces less CO2 than gasoline; methane has four hydrogen atoms per carbon atom compared to roughly two for gasoline.) Here is an article about T. Boone's plan for American Thinker.

http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2008/07/the_pickens_plan_only_one_part.html

Dr. Phil Graham is correct about the economy not being in a recession except in the minds of the Democrats and the media, and the baby-boomers being a gereration of whiners. That may not be the way to win the election, but is nevertheless true. I think McCain's best chance is to take a Truman-like approach, and tell it like it is, but he isn't doing that so far despite his assertions that he has the "straight-talk express." McCain could beat an arrogant, elitist intellectual like Obama (Americans don't much like intellectuals), but he doesn't appear to be up to the job.

Here is an assessment of how the "greens" got control of energy production in the US. A pretty sad story that illustrates the failure of our society to be serious. Our politicians are wimps, and the media are liberal/socialists.

http://www.americanthinker.com/2008/07/how_the_greens_captured_energy_1.html

Here is a direct quote from Barack Obama,

“Instead of worrying about whether immigrants can learnEnglish - they’ll learn English - you need to make sure your child can speak Spanish.”

That doesn't make me want to support Obama. Of course, McCain is no better in this regard. I saw him say something to the effect that Spanish was the language in Arizona before Americans got there. (I would take issue with McCain, and point out the some form of Apache was more widely spoken than Spanish, though by 1845 many of the Apaches could speak some Spanish. But, just as in Texas, Spanish was never the language of the majority of residents.)

I am in some despair with both McCain and Obama in their appeals to LULAC. I don't like the idea that such a racist group may actually be deciding who the next President of the US will be.

Wednesday, July 09, 2008

The bias of the news agencies toward liberals, Democrats, and Obama are obvious to the most casual observer. The most blatant of the biased organizations are ABC, CBS, NBC, CNN, BBC, NPR, PBS, AP, Reuters, the New York Times, and Newsweek. That covers most of the news that the average person will encounter. Here is an account of bias by ABC.

From Right Wing Dog.

This from Major General (ret) Buckman.

My niece, Katelyn, stationed at Baluud , Iraq was assigned, with others of her detachment, to be escort/guard/watcher for Martha Raddatz of ABC News as she covered John McCain’s recent trip to Iraq.

Katelyn and her Captain stood directly behind Raddatz as she queried GI’s walking past. They kept count of the GI’s and you should remember these numbers. She asked 60 GI’s who they planned to vote for in November. 54 said John McCain, 4 for Obama, and 2 for Hillary.

Katelyn called home and told her Mom and Dad to watch ABC news the next night because she was standing directly behind Raddatz and maybe they’d see her on TV. Mom and Dad of course, called and emailed all the kinfolk to watch the newscast and maybe see Katelyn.

Well, of course, we all watched and what we saw wasn’t a glimpse of Katelyn, but got a hell’uva view of skewed news. After a dissertation on McCain’s trip and speech, ABC showed 5 GI’s being asked by Raddatz how they were going to vote in November; 3 for Obama and 2 for Clinton .. No mention of the 54 for McCain.

Ah, the irony of American Patriots protecting the press from harm while the reporter prepares a completely misleading story about which candidate the soldiers prefer. The reporter obviously thought her escort was comprised of brainless morons who wouldn’t see what was going on in front of them. Wouldn’t be the first time a reporter in the MSM turned out to be the brainless moron.

Support the troops. Pass this along.

Tuesday, July 08, 2008

Oneof the serious issues developing in the country is the opposition of liberal Democrats to free speech. If the Democrats get a filibuster-proof majority in the Senate and the White House they will move to end freedom of political expression in America. John McCain has helped them in the past, and the result has been Democrats taking over the government. Democrats want to put a stop to talk radio, whcih is the consevative forum for political speech. The liberals pretty much control the regular media. They will have to take out Fox somehow, probably just by threats. For those who don't agree, just consider the Kerry threat to the Sinclair group during the 2004 election. Her is something about the Democrats current disgraceful actions from the blog "Hotair:"

Why do Congressional Democrats fear free speech?
posted at 6:30 pm on July 8, 2008 by Ed Morrissey

Efforts in both chambers of Congress have Republicans wondering why Democrats seem to fear free speech. Rep. Michael Capuano (D-MA) has proposed limitations on how Representatives can post information to the Internet in a time when we should be demanding more transparency, not less. According to a source in the Senate, Dianne Feinstein has begun her own campaign to force Senators to seek permission before communicating over the Internet.
Soren Dayton at The Next Right has the story from the House:
In typical fashion, House Democrats are trying to pass rules that stifle debate and require regulation. Rep. Michael Capuano (D-MA) sent a letter to the Chairman of the Committee on House Administration Robert Brady (D-PA). The letter is a response to a debate about whether the House should allow members to use YouTube, first raised by Rep. Kevin McCarthy back in April. …
Well, Capuano’s proposal is a disaster. It creates a list of sites, maintained by the Committee on House Administration that members are allowed to post material. Except, those sites have a caveat:
To the maximum extent possible, official content should not be posted on a website or page where it may appear with commercial or political information or any other information not in compliance with the House’s content guidelines.
In the Senate, the problem gets even worse. Feinstein (D-CA) would have the Rules Committee act as a censor board, forcing members to get approval for the act of communicating on external websites. Further, it would appear that the Feinstein proposal would attempt to exercise editorial control over these sites, at least indirectly.
As my source put it, these are the key issues:
Under their scheme, the Senate Rules Committee would become the Internet speech police for everyone in the Senate.
It will be up to the committee to “sanction” which websites and forms of communication they deem appropriate.
The Rules Committee thus gets to pick winners and losers among various websites in terms of which are appropriate for use.
The Rules Committee would get to regulate communication through any site not ending in “senate.gov,” which would include sites like YouTube, Facebook, and Twitter.
Further, this could jeopardize guest posts at sites like RedState and Townhall.
The Rules Committee would require senators to moderate “any public commentary” which would likely mean regulating comments on guest posts and YouTube videos, among other things.
It also raises a number of questions:
Would this rule extend beyond comments to posts on the site?
Would it affect Slatecard & BlogAds?
How about something like The Ed Morrissey Show, which has a live chatroom? Would that have to be moderated?
The Rules Committee would get to act as the “Content KGB” since it can require the removal of content in violation of Senate Rules. And who determines what’s in violation? The Rules Committee.
There are no similar controls on any other form of communication with the public, such as publishing op-eds in newspapers or appearing on radio or television.
The sudden interest in silencing Congress goes right along with the brand-new 9% approval rating the Democratic leadership has earned Congress. Imagine how much worse it will get when they gag their members and force an end to communication through policy sites, blogs, and Internet media.
Want to ask Feinstein what she’s thinking? Be sure to e-mail her through her website or call the Senate Rules Committee at 202-224-6352 to express your support for free speech and transparency. Ask them what they have to hide that the 9% of Americans who still support them shouldn’t find out.
Update: And let’s not forget Feinstein’s other policy goal — re-establishment of the Fairness Doctrine. Hmmmm. Can we detect a pattern here?
Update II: Soren had the identity of the House Administration Committee chair. It’s Robert Brady, not Kevin Brady, a Republican from Texas. I’ve updated the reference in the quoted material.

Liberal Democrats have wanted to raise the price of gasoline to $10 per gallon for years. Sometimes they admit it, but during elections they usually do a tap dance around the issue. It is clear that Democrats do not want more drilling for oil in the US. Here is another view of what is happening in Congress.

Energy bill out of gas
By Jared Allen and Mike Soraghan
The Hill
07/07/08

House Democrats are in a bind on the focal point of their energy plan.

Worried that a floor vote on any energy-related measure would trigger a Republican-forced vote on domestic drilling, the leadership has scrubbed the floor schedule of the energy legislation that it vowed to tackle after the Fourth of July recess.

Republicans pounced, saying Democrats were backtracking after realizing they would be unable to defeat a Republican vote on increased domestic oil drilling in new areas.

“It’s panic time for Democrats,” said a senior Republican aide. “They are on the wrong side of three-quarters of the American people who support increased production of American-made energy.”

“If we could send deepwater drilling over, it would pass the Senate,” said a Republican leadership aide, highlighting just how much an energy vote could backfire on Democrats.

A senior Democratic leadership aide acknowledged this week that there are plenty of members of the majority caucus “who want to drill and want to drill where Republicans want to drill.”

Further complicating matters for Democrats is the growing number of pro-drilling Democrats who are becoming increasingly worried that voters might throw them in with their anti-drilling leadership.

One pro-drilling Democrat predicted that the backlash against Congress for gas prices could rival the outrage voters felt about the Jack Abramoff lobbying scandal.

Another, Rep. Charlie Melancon (D-La.), is frustrated at not being listened to.

“My concern with my leadership is that they’re not letting all the people in the room to present the facts,” said Melancon, a proponent of more offshore drilling. “Where are all the pro-oil legislators? I’m not in the room. I don’t know who is. My feeling is we are not being all-inclusive to pass legislation that can get through the Senate and avoid a veto.”

For now, though, there will be no legislation to pass, as the only energy-related action this week will occur at the committee level.


If there was any doubt that Democrats would do ANYTHING to stop further oil drilling, this lastest action by Pelosi puts it to rest. Democrats have stood in the way of increasing oil supplies for decades.

T. Boone Pickens, the oil man, says that we can't drill our way out of the current situation. So he is going to put up a few thousand windmills in the Texas Panhandle to have an installed capacity of 2 GW. Windmills, at best, are on line about 1/3 of the time, so the wind generation capability must be backed up by some other form of electricity generation. As best I can tell, Texas has about 100 GW of electric power so clearly, we need soething besides wind power. I wonder about T. Boone. He has been talking about $150 per barrel oil for a long time, and now mentions $200 per barrel. I think T. Boone is in the same situation as the major oil companies: he has a lot of oil in the ground that he would like to sell at a high price. Why should he bother with investing money to drill for more oil that will just reduce the value of that that he has in the ground. This is the reason that liberals misunderstood the situation with George Bush and the oil companies. Liberlas thought that Bush wanted to drill to help the oil companies, but the reality is that the major players didn't want to drill; they wanted to cut the supply so that they can make large profits with no effort. That clever maneuver is why the CEO of Exxon got a $400 million bonus. The reality is that Bush wanted to drill, but the big oil companies didn't much want to.

Sunday, July 06, 2008

Jordan has brought charges against Geert Wilders for blasphemy for his short film criticizing Islam for their treatment of women. Presumably Jordan expects the Dutch to turn Wilders over for trial. Islam does not believe in freedom of speech, and the Islamic nations act as though Sharia Law prevails everywhere. Western leaders, including President Bush, act like wimps with regard to Islam. The idea that Islam is a religion of peace is ludicrous. Islam is offended by everything; it is the religion of perpetual outrage. We need leaders who tell the Islamists that we do not intend to change, and that we are offended by their support of Islamic terrorists. Obama is obviously not the man to do that, and I am not convinced that McCain is either, though he is no doubt better than Obama.

For some reason modern so-called liberals always become totalitarian in their attempts to ensure that everyone is politically correct. There is an interesting case in point in Canada where authorities have removed two children from their parents because one of them, a seven-year old girl, drew a swatstika on her arm. Take a look at the video in this blog from the Canadian Kate McMillan:

http://www.smalldeadanimals.com/

The way things are going in Canada they will probably soon have Kate before the Human Rights Commission.

In case anyone wondered about it, there are some problems with the surface temperature record as compiled by James Hansen and NASA. These problems do not show that there is no global warming, but rather that we simply don't know for certain. I particularly like the fact that the record continues with data from a station that went out of existence years ago. That was no problem: NASA just conjures up what the temperature was at that location. Take a look at the weather recording stations and reach your own conclusion as to how accurate they are.

http://www.m4gw.com:2005/m4gw/2008/07/makin_up_climate_data_from_jun.html#more

It is pretty clear that Obama is the most far-left candidate for President we have had, though he has been busy reversing some of his early positions on major issues. His reversals are disturbing because they make it impossible to tell what his real beliefs are. For example, were his associations with radicals just political opportunism? Here is a view of Obama by the conservative Hugh Hewitt.

http://hughhewitt.townhall.com/blog/g/14e4d8a8-6541-4b35-9225-8a23d1b3148f

Obama now says he will call in the Joint Chiefs of Staff on his first day in office as President, and tell them to develop a plan for ending the war in Iraq in 16 months. This is a really stupid pronouncement, even if that is what he actually planned to do. The only way a war can be ended unilaterally is by surrendering. If you tell the enemy that all he has to do is hang on for 16 months, that encourages him. (The definition of treason is providing aid and comfort to the enemy, and that is basically what Obama's pronouncement is.) This sort of pronouncement puts American soldiers in peril because it provides the enemy an incentive to continue to fight in spite of his loses that would otherwise discourage to the point of surrender. Obama and the Democrats are determined to prevent a victory for the US and Bush in Iraq. If Obama is elected, and does announce surrender in Iraq, I hope the Joint Chiefs and the leaders in Iraq have the integrity to resign.

Saddam's 550 tons of yellowcake uranium has been transported to Canada. Apparently there are still those who insist that Saddam was not interested in developing nuclear weapons despite his purchase of large quantities of yellowcake. I wonder who sold the yellowcake to Saddam? Joe Wilson says that Iraq wasn't trying to buy yellowcake, but obviously they got it from somewhere.

http://www.theconservativevoice.com/ap/article.html?mi=D91O4NJ82&apc=9009

Friday, July 04, 2008

In case anyone had doubts, factcheck.org is clearly in the tank for Obama. Here is a blog I lifted from Coyote Blog. Factcheck says that the McCain is lying when they say that Obama voted to increase taxes 94 times. It turns out that they do not regard votes against tax cuts as a vote to increase taxes. Also, they do not regard votes to raise taxes only on the "rich" as a tax increase. This is clearly Clintonian parsing.

So Rich People Don't Count?
I generally like the work that Factcheck.org does, and am perfectly willing to believe that McCain's claim that Obama has voted "for higher taxes" 94 times is exaggerated. However, some of their rationale leaves me flat:

Twenty-three [votes] were for measures that would have produced no tax increase at all; they were against proposed tax cuts.

Uh, OK. It strikes me that voting against 23 tax cuts is voting for higher taxes 23 times. I know that politicians work very hard to establish a sort of taxation Stare Decisis, wherein once a tax is in place it can never be questioned, but many of us think that tax cuts are fair game. But then Newsweek, in reporting this story, goes on to repeat this claim over and over, as if that makes it correct:

By our count, about a quarter of these votes for "higher taxes" – 23 to be exact – are votes Obama cast against changing tax rates from what they were at the time. Taxes would not have gone up. They would have been "higher" only compared to the cuts being proposed.

Sorry, but this does not sound like independent fact-checking. This sounds like political spin and hackery by folks in Obama's camp. Voting against a tax cut is a vote for higher taxes.

Eleven votes the GOP is counting would have increased taxes on those making more than $1 million a year – in order to fund programs such as Head Start and school nutrition programs, or veterans' health care.

The implication here, I guess, is that the rich people don't count as people, and that raising taxes only on the rich does not count as a tax increase? We see this same bias that rich people don't count in their summary:

It's true that most of the votes the GOP counts would either have increased taxes for some, or set budget targets calling for such increases. But by repeating their inflated 94-vote figure, McCain and the GOP falsely imply that Obama has pushed indiscriminately to raise taxes for nearly everybody. A closer look reveals that he's voted consistently to restore higher tax rates on upper-income taxpayers but not on middle- or low-income workers.

The other interesting piece of the previous quote is that tax increases don't count if they fund programs such as Head Start that the author of the study, presumably, supports. The article goes on to say:

And in many cases, the legislation in question called for increasing taxes in order to fund popular programs, a fact not mentioned by the Republican opposition researchers. One such amendment by Sen. Christopher Dodd to a 2006 bill, for example, proposed the creation of a "veterans hospital improvement fund," financed by increasing the capital gains and dividend tax rates on those earning $1 million a year or more.

You get it? Its not a tax if it is on the rich or funds a liberal program. By the way, I find this increasing reliance on taxes on people making $1 million or more an enormous threat to the very basis of our democracy. It is always a danger in democracy to have 51% of the people vote themselves benefits at the expense of the other 49%. But this becomes increasingly seductive as the numbers skew, until every politician is crafting programs that take from the top 1% and give to politically influential portions of the other 99%. Here is a great example of that in California, with a program the majority of voters were not willing to pay for, but accepted when it was funded by a millionaire's surcharge:

Already, we see many states funding new programs with surcharges on the rich. Here is but one example:

California voters agreed to tax the rich to support public mental health services.

More than half of them (53.3 percent) voted last month in favor of Proposition 63, which will impose a tax surcharge of 1 percent on the taxable personal income above $1 million to pay for services offered through the state's existing mental health system. The initiative will generate an estimated $700 million a year....

Richard A. Shadoan, M.D., a past president of the CPA, wrote in Viewpoints in the September 3 issue of Psychiatric News, "The scope of the program and its tax-the-rich source will provoke a debate. But it's an argument worth having to make California face the neglect of not providing treatment to more than 1 million people with mental illness."

So what happened? I don't know how many people make a million dollars in California, but it is certainly less than 5% of the population. So the headline should read "53.3% of people voted to have less than 5% of the people pay for an expensive new program." If the 53.3% thought it was so valuable, why didn't they pay for it? Well, it is clear from the article that the populace in general has been asked to do so in the past and refused. So only when offered the chance to approve the program if a small minority paid for it did they finally agree. This is the real reason for progressive taxation. (by the way, these 53.3% will now feel really good about themselves, despite the fact they will contribute nothing, and will likely piss on millionaires next chance they get, despite the fact that they are the ones who will pay for the program).

That example reminded me in turn of this story from history, one of what I call "great moments in progressive taxation," and the ultimate logical end of this desire to have fewer and fewer rich people fund services for everyone:

My story today comes from the Roman Empire just after the death of Julius Caesar. At the time, three groups vied for power: Octavian (Augustus) Caesar, Mark Antony, and republican senators under Brutus and Cassius. Long story short, Octavian and Antony join forces, and try to raise an army to fight the republicans, who have fled Italy. They needed money, but worried that a general tax would turn shaky public opinion in Rome against them. So they settled on the ultimate progressive tax: They named about 2500 rich men and ordered them killed, with their estates confiscated by the state.

This approach of "proscriptions" had been used before (e.g. Sulla) but never quite as obviously just for the money. In the case of Octavian and Antony, though nominally sold to the public as a way to eliminate enemies of Rome, the purpose was very clearly to raise money. All of their really dangerous foes had left Rome with the Republicans. The proscriptions targeted men of wealth, some of whom had been irritants to Octavian or Antony in the past (e.g. Cicero) but many of whom had nothing to do with anything. Proscribed men were quoted as saying "I have been killed by my estates."

I wonder how many of today's progressives would be secretly pleased by this approach?

Postscript: I can't tell if this Newsweek article represents some sort of strategic alliance or deal with Newsweek, or just a one-off. If it is some kind of alliance, I think we can write off any notion that Factcheck.org is still non-partisan. I predict if this is the case we will see more pro-Obama spin out of Factcheck, or as a minimum, a cherry-picking by Newsweek of which checked facts it wants to publish and which it does not.


I have often wondered if one reason that super rich people put their money into charitable trusts is so the government will not benefit from their death. So far I don't think any of out politicians in power would embrace the Roman policy of prosciption, but I think that many liberal friends of Obama like William Ayers and Beradine Dhorn would. Proscription is prohibited by the Constitution, but eliminating that could be the sort of "change" we have been waiting for.

There are a lot of scientists around the world who don't agree with he global warming hypothesis. Here is an example (I lifted this from Greenie Watch):

http://www.engineeringnews.co.za/article.php?a_id=136273

Jack Welsh, the famous ex-CEO of GE doesn't agree with the catastrophic anthropogenic global warming hypothesis, or, one would presume, with the rent-seeking strategy of his successor at GE:

http://newsbusters.org/blogs/peter-sasso/2008/07/03/former-general-electric-ceo-jack-welsh-global-warming-skeptic

In the article Pat Buchanan points out that the AGW supporters hope to achieve what socialism failed at, namely, the destruction of capitalism. (Capitalism, of course, is actually just individual liberty.)

One reason a lot of thoughtful people question the global warming hypothesis is because the use of short-term climate effects to promote panic. One example is the claim that the Greenland ice sheet is sliding into the sea, thus about to create a catastrophic rise in sea level (I heard Obama claim that if he elected President this will not happen; a good bet since it won't happen in any event). Here is a paper that shows that 17 years of observation shows that while the ice sheet velocity varies a lot, over time it has actually slowed. Once again, it is shown that the catastrophic anthropogenic global warming believers were unnecessarily alarmist.

http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/short/321/5885/111

Thursday, July 03, 2008

Here from "coyote blog" is an example of how Obama will invest in "green industries."

Trough Leader
Holman Jenkins argues that despite the fact that GM's all-electric car the Volt will likely lose money on every sale, GM knows exactly what it is doing with this program. The main customer, apparently, is not the end consumer, but the government. GM is betting that an Obama, beholden in his new presidency to unions and environmentalists, will be open to a massive government subsidy of the US auto industry. The Volt program may be part of a plan to buff up GM's attractiveness at the government trough:

GM executives are not nuts. They justify the costs and risks of the Volt as a way of changing GM's image in the minds of consumers and politicians. To commit a pun, the Volt is GM's vehicle for making a bailout of GM politically acceptable.

The company has already started signaling it expects Washington to provide a whopping $7,000 tax credit to Volt purchasers. In Europe and the U.S., under whatever fuel economy and emissions regulations prevail, GM also expects special favoritism for the Volt. The goal is to re-enact the flex-fuel hoax, in which GM receives extra credit for making cars that can burn 85% ethanol, even if they never see a drop of such fuel.

CEO Rick Wagoner last week laid out the case to Barack Obama personally for turning GM into a ward of the state, by way of direct and indirect subsidies to support a transition to "alternative" fuel vehicles. GM has done yeoman's work getting its structural costs (i.e., labor) in line, but shareholders should note that a big part of the company's turnaround gamble consists also of eliciting favor once again from Washington after a period in which the domestic auto makers were nothing but whipping boys on Capitol Hill.


Most industry CEO's are not dogmatic and do not believe in much of anything. They are out to make a fortune for themselves (and for their stockholders if it is convenient). They are rent seekers pure and simple, and will happily join with a fascist political leader if it keeps them in their high paying job. GM may not be able to compete in the capitalist world, but government can make them a success in the socialist world whether they perform or not. The best approach for the world if for GM to go out of business if they are not clever enough to compete for business successfully. I recall GM fired DeLorean for saying in a speech that GM had never tried to make a small, high quality, inexpensive car. The GM mindset was that people should buy whatever they produced. People wonder why so many in industry support Obama. It is no mystery to me: the rent seekers go for those who want government to control everything.