Whomever Biden Picks For VP Will Be A “Karen”

By William Teach May 22, 2020 – 10:30 am

Wait, are we allowed to call people a “Karen” nowadays? Isn’t that mean and racist or something? Technically, wouldn’t they all be Susans, except for Fauxahontas?

No Matter Who Biden Picks, His Running Mate Will Be A ‘Karen’

We’re still at least a month away from Joe Biden announcing who his running mate will be for the 2020 election. It’s hard to tell which way he’s leaning, but no matter who he chooses, it will be “Karen.”

Applying “Karen” as a pejorative is not as fresh as it might seem. Some uses of the name to describe a spiteful, unpleasant woman go back maybe as far as three decades. But the name has been more widely used as a cultural meme in recent months.

With apologies to those named Karen but aren’t “Karens,” a “Karen” in 2020 is, “an entitled, obnoxious, middle-aged white woman,” says dictionary.com. Wikipedia says a Karen “displays aggressive behavior when she is obstructed from getting her way.” She often wants to “speak to the manager” because it’s her nature to complain, hector, and rage. During the pandemic, we’ve seen Karens all over, screeching and nagging about masks, social distancing (both for and against it and on occasion taking both sides simultaneously), and any conduct she doesn’t agree with.

A Karen is a tattletale and a snob, mean girl who got older but didn’t grow up. And her defining traits, bullying, a desire to subjugate others, and rank hypocrisy, fit snugly with progressive-left politics.

The I&I editorial goes on to note the Karen-ness of the possible Biden running mates, such as

Sen. Elizabeth Warren. Maybe the most Karen of them all. Given the pulpit of a vice presidential candidate, and, Heaven help us, possibly the soapbox of the vice presidency, she will constantly howl about economic inequality, Wall Street, profit, and just about any principle that has made America the exceptional nation it is.

“She is a nag. A scold. An ideologue,” law professor Michael Greve wrote in 2012 when Warren was running for U.S. senator in Massachusetts. “An advocate of a nanny state beyond a Swedish socialist’s wildest imagination. A bureaucratic Bruegel who paints an America of victims — pathetic figures in a landscape of unremitting hostility. Also, professor Warren is an economic idiot.”

And Kamala Harris

“As California attorney general, she and her staff fought to uphold wrongful convictions and prevent potentially exculpatory evidence from coming to light (as has been well documented),” the Washington Monthly reported last year.

And while she “sells herself as a girl from Oakland who grew up to fight powerful interests,” it’s been revealed “that Harris relied on San Francisco elites and cushy appointments from her then boyfriend, former San Francisco mayor Willie Brown, to power her political rise.”

Also discusses are Amy Klobutcher and Gretchen Whitmer. What about the other potentials? Could Stacey Abrams be a “Karen”?

Read: Whomever Biden Picks For VP Will Be A “Karen” »

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Here We Go: Michigan Dam Failures Linked To ‘Climate Change’

By William Teach May 22, 2020 – 7:06 am

Well, of course it was. This is what a cult does, make everything fit into their cultish beliefs

‘Expect More’: Climate Change Raises Risk of Dam Failures

The dam that failed in Central Michigan on Tuesday gave way for the same reason most do: It was overwhelmed by water. Almost five inches of rain fell in the area in the previous two days, after earlier storms had saturated the ground and swollen the Tittabawassee River, which the dam held back.

No one can say yet whether the intense rainfall that preceded this disaster was made worse by climate change. But global warming is already causing some regions to become wetter, and increasing the frequency of extreme storms, according to the latest National Climate Assessment. The trends are expected to continue as the world gets even warmer.

No one can say it, but the Warmists at the NY Times will give it a shot

That puts more of the nation’s 91,500 dams at risk of failing, engineers and dam safety experts said.

“We should expect more of these down the road,” said Amir AghaKouchak, a professor of civil engineering at the University of California, Irvine. “It’s unfortunate but this is what the trend is going to be.”

Overall, he and others say, dams in the United States and elsewhere are unprepared for the changes coming in a warming world.

ZOMG!

The dam, at Edenville Township, about 30 miles upstream from Midland, had severe design problems: It had been cited for having spillways that were inadequate to handle a maximum flood, whether affected by climate change or not. (A second dam at Sanford, 10 miles downstream, was overrun by the arriving floodwaters but did not collapse.)

Oh, so, the dam had serious issues?

As Breitbart News reported, federal authorities revoked the license of the private company that owns the Edenville Dam in 2018 due to fears the dam could not withstand heavy floods, and the company’s failure to expand the spillway.

But as Karen Drew and Derick Hutchinson of WDIV channel 4 reported Wednesday evening, the State of Michigan failed to take corrective action once it assumed greater responsibility for oversight of the dam in October 2018:

Excitable Gretchen is also blaming ‘climate change’, rather than the failure of her administration to properly fix the dam. Back to the Times

The average age of dams in the United States is nearly 60. And nationwide, about 15,500 are classified as having a high hazard potential; in Michigan, more than 170 dams are in that category, as was the Edenville Dam. Repairing and upgrading high-hazard dams alone could cost tens of billions of dollars.

So, bad dams, but, hey, it’s got to really be about you eating burgers and driving a fossil fueled vehicle

And there is little doubt that extreme rainfall events are getting more frequent. The fourth National Climate Assessment, issued in 2018, showed that the number of heavy precipitation two-day events has increased in all regions except the Southwest since the early 1900s. And since 1950, extreme events increased by more than 50 percent in the Midwest.

But Bill McCormick, who is in charge of dam safety for the state of Colorado and is the incoming president of the Association of State Dam Safety Officials, said short-duration extreme precipitation wasn’t the only problem.

Rainfall of longer duration but less intensity — an overall wetter climate, which climate models forecast for parts of the United States in coming decades — can contribute to the risk.

None of that proves anthropogenic causation. Also, consider that when those dams were built there was a lot less human construction in terms of roads and buildings, and more trees and land which took up the water. But, hey, the Cult always goes with witchcraft as their excuse.

Read: Here We Go: Michigan Dam Failures Linked To ‘Climate Change’ »

Posted in Global Warming, New Climate Deniers | 1 Comment | Trackback URL

Mitch McConnell Has Choice Words For Pelosi On ObamaBidengate Inquiry

By William Teach May 22, 2020 – 6:45 am

You should probably sit this fight out, Queen Nancy

(Breitbart) “I’d say to the speaker, after the impeachment, you — you’re not in a position to be lecturing us about what the appropriate use of Senate time is,” he said. “The House of Representatives is arguing before the Supreme Court that they’re still looking at yet another impeachment. They’re arguing that before the Supreme Court this week. Look, this is the legitimate oversight responsibility of the Senate.”

“There was a lot of apparent misbehavior going on in the opening of those investigations into General Flynn and others,” McConnell continued. “And so Ron Johnson, the head of Homeland Security, has got subpoenas out for Hunter Biden. Lindsey Graham, the chairman of the Judiciary Committee, has laid out a series of hearings and people that he wants to call to come testify. If the House can spend time on a baseless impeachment effort, then we should at least have oversight over what happened to initiate this whole process a couple of years ago.”

Pelosi’s House wasted innumerable time on their Russia Russia Russia inquiry, along with the Ukraine inquiry. They wasted time on their $3 trillion coronavirus bill, which they knew had exactly zero chance of being discussed in the Senate. It’s so bad, so full of liberal wishes, that it isn’t even being considered as a starting point for discussion. And, considering Pelosi has essentially kept the House out of session for months, she doesn’t have much to talk about.

Read: Mitch McConnell Has Choice Words For Pelosi On ObamaBidengate Inquiry »

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If All You See…

By William Teach May 21, 2020 – 10:30 am

…is champagne which will soon disappear due to climate change, you might just be a Warmist

The blog of the day is 357 Magnum, with a post on a criminal released from jail strangling a child 10 minutes after.

Read: If All You See… »

Posted in If All You See | 17 Comments | Trackback URL

A View Of How Ballot Harvesting Leads To Election Shenanigans

By William Teach May 21, 2020 – 10:30 am

We all know that politicians and political parties cheat, and try to cheat. That’s politics. But, there’s cheating, and then there’s Cheating. Democrats have systemized cheating, and ballot harvesting is there cheat of choice, hence why they want “vote by mail”

(Fox News) Ballot harvesting, or the practice of allowing political operatives and others to collect voters’ ballots and turn them in en masse to polling stations, has drawn bipartisan concerns of fraud from election watchers. (snip)

Some prominent examples of ballot harvesting have already impacted national politics. In 2016, California Gov. Jerry Brown signed into law AB1921, which legalized ballot harvesting. Previously, only a family member or someone living in the same household was permitted to drop off mail ballots for a voter, but the new allowed anyone — including political operatives – to collect and return them for a voter.

See, it’s not really people mailing in ballots, actually dropping them off at the post office: it’s allowing ballots to be dropped off. Seriously, nothing bad could happen, right?

Ballot harvesting bounty: How Dems apparently used election law change to rout California Republicans

A minor change in California’s election laws may have had a major effect on last month’s midterm elections that saw Democrats steamroll their Republican rivals and claim all but seven of the Golden State’s 53 House seats.

Despite holding substantial leads on Election Day, many Republican candidates in California saw their advantage shrink, and then disappear, as late-arriving Democratic votes were counted in the weeks following the election. While no hard evidence is available, many observers point to the Democrats use of “ballot harvesting” as a key to their success in the elections.

“Anecdotally there was a lot of evidence that ballot harvesting was going on,” Neal Kelley, the registrar for voters in Southern California’s Orange County, told Fox News.

In Orange County – once seen as a Republican stronghold in the state– every House seat went to a Democrat after an unprecedented “250,000” vote-by-mail drop-offs were counted, the San Francisco Chronicle reported.

“People were carrying in stacks of 100 and 200 of them. We had had multiple people calling to ask if these people were allowed to do this,” Kelley said. (snip)

“We were only down 26 seats (nationally) the night of the election and three weeks later, we lost basically every California race,” outgoing House Speaker Paul Ryan, R-Wisc., told the Washington Post. “Point being, when you have candidates that win the absentee ballot vote, win the day of the vote, and then lose three weeks later because of provisionals, that’s really bizarre.”

It is strange, but, the California GOP saw it coming. The rules were changed so that Democrats, who already controlled California, could take more, because they have no problem cheating. Sure, Democrats say that it was due to other measures, but, imagine this nationwide, with no real attempt to check the veracity of the ballots?

Read: A View Of How Ballot Harvesting Leads To Election Shenanigans »

Posted in Election Fraud | 6 Comments | Trackback URL

The Real Story Is Not ‘Climate Change’, But Climate Speed Or Something

By William Teach May 21, 2020 – 7:17 am

Well, this is a new Talking Point, which builds on the whole “climate change is here, now! Yearrrrrrrggggg (Howard Dean style scream)”

RISING WATERS
Forget about climate change. The real story is climate speed.

A two-hour cloudburst drenched Charleston on Wednesday, turning downtown streets into swirling rivers. Nearly 5 inches fell over the city’s hospitals, turning the medical district into an island. Five inches fell on Johns Island, turning parking lots into lakes. It was a mess. And it’s not normal.

Set aside the notion of climate change. The climate has always changed. The real story is about speed. The pace of change. From rain bombs to higher sea levels, the impacts are coming faster. This is as real as Wednesday’s storm. And the one four weeks ago. And so many others in the past five years.

In the coming months, The Post and Courier will explore these accelerating forces and their many ripple effects. We’ll explore the underlying science and responses by our elected leaders. We’ll look at the winners and losers. We’ll examine potential course corrections.

And we’ll do this in real time, as the king tides rise, the hurricanes gain strength, amid the thunder and lightning. Why? Because a breaking news story only skims the surface of what’s really happening. Deeper currents can remain hidden amid the immediate need to stay dry or move your belongings to higher ground.

In other words, they’ll assign witchcraft, er, anthropogenic causation, to ever storm and tide. Especially in Charleston, where the Post and Courier is located, which is only a few inches above sea level, but is now flooding more than ever. Couldn’t have anything to do with all that construction, could it?

And given what scientists have learned in recent years, big changes are happening now: Seas are rising faster than they did a few decades ago.

And the pace is picking up.

Scientists have good data on this. They’ve been measuring the sea level in Charleston Harbor continuously since 1921. Since then, the sea level here rose about 1 foot.

Part of this has nothing to do with saltwater. When the last ice age ended 20,000 years ago, sheets of ice melted in what today is New England. Freed from the weight, land there moved upward while land to the south, including South Carolina, sank like the lower end of a seesaw.

Known as subsidence, this sinking has happened at a relatively slow rate — about 5 inches during the past century. This gives marsh-building sea grasses time to trap sediment and rise with the water, as long as the pace isn’t so quick.

Hmm, subsidence. They do do something you almost never see: attempt to offer data

From 1990 to 2000, the sea level rose 1.4 inches.

From 2000 to 2010, it added an additional 2 inches.

From 2010 to now: 2.7 inches more.

But, where’s the data from before 1990? Because there are peaks and valleys. And it is still below the rate one would expect during a Holocene warm period.

The sea level data from NOAA actually doesn’t show any real acceleration.

Follow this curve into the future, and you see a growing threat — a sea level that rises an additional 3.2 inches by 2030.

Then 4.1 inches between 2030 and 2040

And 5.3 inches between 2040 and 2050.

And now we’re into prognostication. But, climate speeding, people! Will it catch on?

Read: The Real Story Is Not ‘Climate Change’, But Climate Speed Or Something »

Posted in AGW Scaremongering, Global Warming | 12 Comments | Trackback URL

North Carolina Set To Enter Phase 2 Reopening, But Bar And Gym Owners Stunned

By William Teach May 21, 2020 – 6:54 am

North Carolina governor Rory Cooper is taking an even handed tone in reopening NC, but, might he be looking at some lawsuits in short order?

North Carolina will move into Phase 2 on Friday; Salons, restaurants can reopen but gyms must stay closed

Governor Roy Cooper on Wednesday announced another step toward North Carolina’s reopening plan and signed a new Executive Order easing restrictions on such businesses as restaurants and salons.

“Last month, we laid out a phased approach to easing restrictions in our state that relied on data science and facts,” Cooper said. “Today we’re announcing another gradual and cautious step while still keeping important health and safety measures in place.”

Officially, Phase 2 will begin Friday at 5 p.m.

The Stay-At-Home order will be lifted but a “Safer-At-Home” recommendation will go into effect.

New guidance provided by state officials require restaurants to operate at 50 percent capacity and have all staff wear masks or face coverings, among other mandates and recommendations.

Personal care businesses, including barber shops, hair and nail salons, tattoo parlors, tanning salons and massage therapists, must also operate at 50 percent capacity.

But, those last ones can only operate on appointment, and everyone must wear a facemask. Indoor gatherings can have no more than 10 people, while outdoors the number goes up to 25. Pools can open and operate at 50%. Camps for kids, both day and overnight, can now open, and daycare can start having kids. (WRAL has a more detailed list of this)

Sports and shows can be held, but no more than 10 people can attend. That would be interesting for a Carolina Hurricanes or Durham Bulls game, eh? But

Notably, bars, nightclubs, gyms and health clubs must remain closed, according to the new order. Though Cooper and health officials had expressed hope the trends in new cases and testing would allow modified openings, the Governor explained that recent data and metrics compelled them to “back off” further lifting restrictions.

Phase 2, moreover, also precludes movie theaters, bowling alleys, and other indoor entertainment venues like museums from opening.

Playgrounds will also stay closed.

Suffice to say, those business owners are stunned

But Cooper said Wednesday that indoor places where people crowd together and often share items could become flashpoints for a renewed coronavirus outbreak, so he left all of those locations off his updated plan for Phase 2, which officials said would last at least five weeks. (snip)

“We had planned to open, and we thought that opening would come either this week or next week,” said Jack Wiggen, owner of Bull City Crossfit in Durham. (snip)

Wiggen said he couldn’t forecast the financial impact of waiting another five weeks to open.

“It’s devastating news financially, he said. “Thinking about another five weeks of this is really hard to wrap my mind around.”

That’s right, five more weeks. Places like Planet Fitness might survive, but independent gyms and other businesses, including bars, probably won’t. Might business band together to sue? What’s the difference between going to a restaurant with 50% capacity and distancing and a bar with the same? People who go to gyms tend to be more healthy, and for many, going to the gym helps with their mental health. Another 5 weeks is not a good thing. Many of the gym owners spent money getting their business ready, with taped off areas, sanitizing equipment, contracting for specialized cleaning crews, and more.

It’s progress, though.

Read: North Carolina Set To Enter Phase 2 Reopening, But Bar And Gym Owners Stunned »

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CDC Quietly Updates It’s Guidance On How Coronavirus Spreads

By William Teach May 20, 2020 – 3:21 pm

Hey, remember when everyone was freaked out and started wearing gloves because they were concerned with touching things and getting Bat Soup Virus? How the media, politicians, and health departments were saying “wear gloves, wash your hands, don’t touch stuff?” People were binge buying cleaners and disinfectants, washing everything? Yeah, about that

CDC: Coronavirus mainly spreads through person-to-person contact and ‘does not spread easily’ on contaminated surfaces

Even before COVID-19 officially had a name, public health officials said the virus could be transmitted through infected respiratory droplets and by touching infected surfaces and then touching your nose, mouth, and possibly your eyes. So, people began snatching up face masks, wearing gloves, and ramping up hand hygiene to try to protect themselves.

While touching infected surfaces has always been part of the messaging on how the virus spreads, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) recently shifted its stance online. The CDC now says that COVID-19 spreads from person to person contact, and then lists touching infected surfaces under a section titled, “The virus does not spread easily in other ways.” The CDC adds: “This is not thought to be the main way the virus spreads, but we are still learning more about this virus.” The language is a subtle change from the organization’s warning in early March, when it wrote simply that it “may be possible” to spread the virus through contaminated surfaces.

OK, in all fairness, we just didn’t know enough about COVID-19, so, better safe than sorry. You can understand the early panic. It’s easy to Monday morning QB it all. You’d think this would be bigger news than it is, wouldn’t you? Something rather important to know?

They’ve also released a big plan for re-opening

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has quietly released detailed reopening guidance for schools, child care facilities, restaurants and mass transit systems as states have already started reopening businesses over the past few weeks.

The 60-page set of recommendations encourages communities to use coronavirus transmission rates to determine whether to reopen, adding that restrictions should remain in some locations for now.

The guidance was released without media attention over the weekend after reported delays and internal administration debate about the recommendations.

I’m good with the basics. Wash your hands a lot (I did that beforehand, because I shake a lot of hands, and hands are nasty, and I am 100% OK with not shaking hands, which I never liked to do). Keep your distance. Cover your coughs and sneezes (which you should have done anyhow). I’m personally not happy with having to wear a face mask, but, I have a good cooling bandana for when required. The problem, of course, is some people are, let’s generously call them “assholes”, who can’t follow some basics to safeguard themselves, much less others.

Meanwhile, Kamala Harris should resign, seeing as she doesn’t seem to understand the 1st Amendment

Read: CDC Quietly Updates It’s Guidance On How Coronavirus Spreads »

Posted in Bat Soup Virus | 16 Comments | Trackback URL

If All You See…

By William Teach May 20, 2020 – 1:00 pm

…is coffee that will soon be too expensive for most people to drink due to carbon pollution, you might just be a Warmist

The blog of the day is The Other McCain, with a post on the Battle of Atillis Gym.

Read: If All You See… »

Posted in If All You See | 5 Comments | Trackback URL

University Of California Divests From Fossil Fuels

By William Teach May 20, 2020 – 10:30 am

The divestment craze continues. Guess who will pay for the loss of all that revenue from their portfolio?

UC becomes nation’s largest university to divest fully from fossil fuels

The University of California announced Tuesday that it has fully divested from all fossil fuels, the nation’s largest educational institution to do so as campaigns to fight climate change through investment strategies proliferate at campuses across the country.

The UC milestone capped a five-year effort to move the public research university system’s $126-billion portfolio into more environmentally sustainable investments, such as wind and solar energy. UC officials say their strategy is grounded in concerns about the planet’s future and in what makes financial sense.

“As long-term investors, we believe the university and its stakeholders are much better served by investing in promising opportunities in the alternative energy field rather than gambling on oil and gas,” Richard Sherman, chair of the UC Board of Regents’ investments committee, said in a statement.

The movement against fossil fuels has mushroomed to encompass more than 1,100 faith, educational, government, corporate and nonprofit institutions with $14 trillion in assets in the last decade, according to 350.org, a global climate justice organization. Among them, more than 50 universities have committed to full or partial divestment.

One question every reporter writing these articles forgets to ask is “well, are you going to stop using fossil fuels for your institutional functions?” Because there is no mention from UC that they are going to replace all their fossil fueled vehicles, and fossil fueled travel for things like their sports teams.

At UC, students began organizing for divestment across all 10 campuses in 2012 and formed Fossil Free UC with staff, faculty and alumni. A major win came in 2017, when UC Santa Barbara Chancellor Henry Yang became the first campus leader to endorse divestment following a three-day occupation of the administration building, according to an account by two UC Santa Barbara students.

Remember this from England

And when the kiddies said the response was flippant, the professor replied “It is all too easy to request others to things that carry no personal cost to yourself.” Well, there doesn’t seem to be any sort of personal cost for the UC system or the kids. Or, is there?

In all fairness, this is also due to the massive revenue loss from Coronavirus in multiple ways. Kids aren’t happy, though. Will they be more happy when the revenue from divestment is lost? It won’t be coming back from “green” investments. UC should ban all fossil fueled vehicles from campus. That would be fair, right?

Read: University Of California Divests From Fossil Fuels »

Posted in AGW Idiocy, Global Warming | 1 Comment | Trackback URL
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