Surprise: Half Of Americans Agree That Mueller Probe Is A Witch Hunt

By William Teach March 19, 2019 – 8:03 am

So far, the collusion narrative has failed. Everyone busted by Team Mueller has been busted over old stuff, stuff that has nothing to do really with Russia and/or collusion, or process crimes, ie, crimes that wouldn’t have happened without the actual Russia Russia Russia probe

Poll: More Americans Think Mueller’s Probe Is a ‘Witch Hunt’ Against Trump

Half of Americans agree with President Trump that Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s probe is a “witch hunt” and that he has been subjected to more investigations than previous presidents because of politics, according to a poll published on Monday.

That is more than 47 percent of Americans who disagree, according to the new poll, conducted by USA Today/Suffolk University Poll. Just three percent did not have an opinion.

The poll also showed that trust in Mueller’s investigation has “eroded.”

“Even among people who said they had ‘some’ trust in the Mueller investigation, half agreed with President Trump’s witch hunt allegation,” David Paleologos, director of the Suffolk Political Research Center, told USA Today.

Broken down by political party, eighty-six percent of Republicans said Trump was a victim of a witch hunt, 54 percent percent of Independents, and 14 percent of Democrats.

And, if that almost two year report turns into a big nothingburger, those Independents are going to be wondering why Democrats have been screaming about collusion since Hillary lost in 2016, and wasting our time and taxpayer money.

Sixty-two percent of Americans say the House should not seriously consider impeaching Trump, compared with 54 percent last October.

There are also divided views on House Democrats’ sweeping investigation of the president, his family, and his ssociates. Forty-nine percent of those polled said Democrats are doing the right thing, but 46 percent said they are going too far.

And Democrats will be doing both things during the run up to the 2020 elections, which will drive more people over to Trump’s side. They may not like Trump, they may think he’s sleazy, but they’ll rather have Trump than a crazy Democrat.

Read: Surprise: Half Of Americans Agree That Mueller Probe Is A Witch Hunt »

Posted in Current Affairs, Democrats, Donald Trump | 8 Comments | Trackback URL

NY Times: Democrats Want To Lower Health Care Costs, They Just Have No Idea How To Do It

By William Teach March 19, 2019 – 7:52 am

This is a case of a different headline on the front page of the NY Times yesterday than in the single page, and it brings up an interesting point

They did call it the Affordable Care Act, did they not? Whenever a Democrat, including then President Obama and the Democrat media, discussed it they referred to it as the Affordable Care Act. How many times did Obama yammer about it reducing costs and saving us $2,500 a year on premiums?

Medicare for All Is Divisive (in the Democratic Party)

No issue animated the Democrats’ 2018 congressional campaigns like health care and the promises to expand access to insurance and to lower costs. But as House Democrats sit down to draft their vision of governance in the coming weeks, lawmakers find themselves badly divided on the issue that delivered their majority.

Centrists from swing districts, with the tacit support of Speaker Nancy Pelosi, favor incremental moves to shore up the Affordable Care Act and to lower the out-of-pocket costs of prescription drugs and medical care. They are pushing a variety of measures, such as shutting down cheap, short-term insurance plans that do not cover pre-existing medical conditions and allowing people to buy into Medicare at age 50 or 55.

But they are butting up against an aggressive and expanding group of more than 100 outspoken Democrats — as well as at least four of the party’s presidential candidates — who want to do just that, upend the whole system with a single government insurance plan for all Americans — the old concept of single payer, now called Medicare for all.

“I reject the idea that single payer is impossible,” said Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Democrat of New York.

This will cause a pretty big fight over the next few weeks and even years as they debate this in the Dem controlled House, as well as between those running for the Democrat presidential nomination.

The idea of Medicare for all is immensely contentious. It would greatly expand the federal role in health care. Critics say it would require a big increase in federal spending, and proponents have not said how they would pay for it. Some versions of Medicare for all could wipe out much of the health insurance industry and replace employer-sponsored health plans that now cover more than 155 million Americans. Supporters say the proposal would guarantee universal coverage and put health care on a budget, reducing what consumers and employers spend. But insurance companies, along with many hospitals and doctors, are waging a vigorous campaign against it, believing that it would reduce the payments they receive for providing care.

Ms. Pelosi cannot afford to put moderate freshmen in Trump-friendly districts on the spot by putting Medicare for all up to a vote.

“Most people receive health care from their employer,” said Representative Scott Peters, Democrat of California and a vice chairman for the New Democrat Coalition, a centrist group. “They do not want to replace it with an untested government system.”

If a single payer type system cannot work in tiny Vermont, with a population of 626 thousand, how would it work for well over 300 million Americans? Let’s not forget that studies showed that the cost for “Medicare for all” for the state of California would be at least twice the overall state budget. If Democrats want to yammer about this, and there will be lots of committee hearings, they will need to explain just how they plan on paying for it, as well as how it would actually work, as in, how much rationing will there be, how medical care providers will be reimbursed, who will run medical facilities, who will own them, and how much our taxes will go up to pay for this.

Read: NY Times: Democrats Want To Lower Health Care Costs, They Just Have No Idea How To Do It »

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Surprise: Solving ‘Climate Change’ Requires Ending Capitalism

By William Teach March 18, 2019 – 3:38 pm

If you look back five, six, even ten years, Warmists called me a conspiracy monger for suggesting that the whole anthropogenic global warming/climate change movement was really political, and included ending capitalism. Pushing far left dogma, including economic change. Heck, even some Skeptics thought I was nuts. Yet, I kept highlighting the stories, and over the last year this has grown more and more in the way that Warmists are telling us what they really believe and who they really are

Ending climate change requires the end of capitalism. Have we got the stomach for it?

Climate change activism is increasingly the domain of the young, such as 16-year-old Greta Thunberg, the unlikely face of the school strike for climate movement, which has seen many thousands of children walk out of school to demand that their parents’ generation takes responsibility for leaving them a planet to live on. In comparison, the existing political establishment looks more and more like an impediment to change. The consequences of global warming have moved from the merely theoretical and predicted to observable reality over the past few years, but this has not been matched by an uptick in urgency. The need to keep the wheels of capitalism well-oiled takes precedence even against a backdrop of fires, floods and hurricanes.

Today’s children, as they become more politically aware, will be much more radical than their parents, simply because there will be no other choice for them. This emergent radicalism is already taking people by surprise. The Green New Deal (GND), a term presently most associated with 29-year-old US representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, has provoked a wildly unhinged backlash from the “pro free market” wing, who argue that it’s a Trojan horse, nothing more than an attempt to piggyback Marxism onto the back of climate legislation.

Did Phil McDuff read his own headline? Or read the own words he wrote?

The criticism feels ridiculous. Partly because the GND is far from truly radical and already represents a compromise solution, but mainly because the radical economics isn’t a hidden clause, but a headline feature. Climate change is the result of our current economic and industrial system. GND-style proposals marry sweeping environmental policy changes with broader socialist reforms because the level of disruption required to keep us at a temperature anywhere below “absolutely catastrophic” is fundamentally, on a deep structural level, incompatible with the status quo.

We will simply have to throw the kitchen sink at this. Policy tweaks such as a carbon tax won’t do it. We need to fundamentally re-evaluate our relationship to ownership, work and capital. The impact of a dramatic reconfiguration of the industrial economy require similarly large changes to the welfare state. Basic incomes, large-scale public works programmes, everything has to be on the table to ensure that the oncoming system shocks do not leave vast swathes of the global population starving and destitute. Perhaps even more fundamentally, we cannot continue to treat the welfare system as a tool for disciplining the supposedly idle underclasses. Our system must be reformed with a more humane view of worklessness, poverty and migration than we have now.

So, really, getting rid of capitalism. Which worked great in the Soviet Union. When will Warmists stop using the capitalist created Internet?

Read: Surprise: Solving ‘Climate Change’ Requires Ending Capitalism »

Posted in AGW Scaremongering, Global Warming | 28 Comments | Trackback URL

If All You See…

By William Teach March 18, 2019 – 1:00 pm

…is are horrible fossil fueled boats, you might just be a Warmist

The blog of the day is Creeping Sharia, with a post on the Christians killed by Islamic extremists in Nigeria.

Read: If All You See… »

Posted in If All You See | 3 Comments | Trackback URL

Suprise: Historic Snow, Bomb Cyclone In Nebraska Blamed On ‘Climate Change’

By William Teach March 18, 2019 – 11:24 am

They’ve been having a lot of fun in Nebraska with what used to be known as “weather” (and snowfall is the force behind snowfall)

Record snowfall, ‘historic’ bomb cyclone are forces behind Nebraska floods, blizzard

…

In popular culture it’s known as bombogenesis, or a bomb cyclone, an epic drop in air pressure that triggers historic weather.

By itself, the moisture-filled storm would not have dealt Nebraska the crippling blow that has occurred. Our harsh, late winter set the stage. When the two combined, they produced Nebraska’s worst flooding in 50 years and worst blizzard in nearly as many years.

“This storm can be considered historic,” said Greg Carbin, chief of forecast operations for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Weather Prediction Center. “This was a monster, no question about it.”

As the storm roared to life over the Great Plains, it set an apparent record for low pressure in Colorado, set records for snows in Wyoming and Nebraska and shattered flood records in eastern Nebraska.

Wait for it

Bomb cyclones likely have been a part of the planet’s weather system for many millennia. And Nebraska is known for having — over the course of its four seasons — some of the most extreme combinations and types of weather on the planet.

Here we go

But human-caused climate change is warming the planet at an accelerating pace, and that has set the stage for even more extreme weather.

“For sure, the strongest storms are getting stronger with global warming,” said noted climate scientist James Hansen, a native of Iowa. As the Earth warms, its atmosphere has become richer with moisture, which means there’s more latent energy for storms to tap.

Oh, it doesn’t stop there

“There is evidence now in modeling studies that climate change is increasing these factors, supporting the development of more intense bomb cyclones and Nor’easters, packing tropical storm-scale winds and dumping huge amounts of precipitation (often in the form of huge snowfalls).”

Additionally, one of the best understood consequences of global warming is the trend toward heavy rains and snows. That’s what happens on a planet that is more humid.

Last month was Omaha’s snowiest February on record and one of the 10 coldest. This change in winter has increased the potential for a buildup of snow and ice just as spring arrives. The consequence? A greater potential for widespread flooding.

And this was all caused because you drove a fossil fueled vehicle and had a burger. Your fault.

Read: Suprise: Historic Snow, Bomb Cyclone In Nebraska Blamed On ‘Climate Change’ »

Posted in AGW Idiocy, Global Warming | 3 Comments | Trackback URL

Anti-Semite Ilhan Omar Wants Universal Values Applied To All Nations Or Something

By William Teach March 18, 2019 – 7:13 am

There’s zero doubt that Minnesota Representative Ilhan Omar is a Jew and Israel hater. Nor that she has links to the Muslim Brotherhood linked Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), which certainly takes the side of extremist Islam and hates Jews and Israel. She also has other links to extremist Islam. So, of course, the Washington Post gives her a platform to bash America, Israel, and Jews

We must apply our universal values to all nations. Only then will we achieve peace.

Since I began my first term in Congress, I have sought to speak openly and honestly about the scale of the issues our country faces — whether it is ending the crippling burden of student debt, tackling the existential threat of climate change or making sure no one in one of the richest countries in the world dies from lack of health care. As a survivor of war and a refugee, I have also sought to have an honest conversation about U.S. foreign policy, militarism and our role in the world.

This question of how the United States engages in conflict abroad is deeply personal to me. I fled my home country of Somalia when I was 8 years old from a conflict that the United States later engaged in. I spent the next four years in a refugee camp in Kenya, where I experienced and witnessed unspeakable suffering from those who, like me, had lost everything because of war.

Most of that war was caused by extremist members of the Religion of Peace. Funny how she doesn’t become deeply introspective about that. But, hey, she’s here now as a U.S. citizen. This nation was kind enough to take her and her family in, so, she repays the U.S. by going on to bash the country

Valuing human rights also means applying the same standards to our friends and our enemies. We do not have the credibility to support those fighting for human rights in Venezuela, Cuba and Nicaragua if we do not also support those fighting for human rights in Honduras, Guatemala and Brazil. Our criticisms of oppression and regional instability caused by Iran are not legitimate if we do not hold Egypt, the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain to the same standards.

Oh, but, see, that’s really not just about attempting to defend Venezuela, Cuba, Nicaragua, and Iran (which her Hamas linked buddies in CAIR love). Nope. This whole thing, and there were several other paragraphs between those two excerpts, leads to

This vision also applies to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. U.S. support for Israel has a long history. The founding of Israel 70 years ago was built on the Jewish people’s connection to their historical homeland, as well as the urgency of establishing a nation in the wake of the horror of the Holocaust and the centuries of anti-Semitic oppression leading up to it. Many of the founders of Israel were themselves refugees who survived indescribable horrors.

We must acknowledge that this is also the historical homeland of Palestinians. And without a state, the Palestinian people live in a state of permanent refugeehood and displacement. This, too, is a refugee crisis, and they, too, deserve freedom and dignity.

A balanced, inclusive approach to the conflict recognizes the shared desire for security and freedom of both peoples. I support a two-state solution, with internationally recognized borders, which allows for both Israelis and Palestinians to have their own sanctuaries and self-determination. This has been official bipartisan U.S. policy across two decades and has been supported by each of the most recent Israeli and Palestinian leaders, as well as the consensus of the Israeli security establishment. As Jim Mattis, who later was President Trump’s defense secretary, said in 2011 , “The current situation between those two peoples is unsustainable.”

Mattis’ version of the two state solution is different from the Islamist and Leftist versions, which end up with the Jewish state driven into the sea and erased. Ilhan is attempting to soft-pedal her hatred of Israel and Jews here in the same way all the others do.

Working toward peace in the region also means holding everyone involved accountable for actions that undermine the path to peace — because without justice, there can never be a lasting peace. When I criticize certain Israeli government actions in Gaza or settlements in the West Bank, it is because I believe these actions not only threaten the possibility of peace in the region — they also threaten the United States’ own national security interests.

No one is buy that it is just “criticism.” She learned nothing from the Democrats little hate declaration, because it wasn’t aimed at her and anti-Semites. And she is one. We’ve seen this type of fixation on bashing Israel, which is not applied to other nations, which morphs into Jew hatred.

My goal in speaking out at all times has been to encourage both sides to move toward a peaceful two-state solution. We need to reinsert this call back into the public debate with urgency. Both parties must come to the table for a final peace deal; violence will not bring us any closer to that day.

Yet, she never condemns the Palestinians for starting almost all of the violence. For blowing up virtually all attempts at peace. I wonder why?

Read: Anti-Semite Ilhan Omar Wants Universal Values Applied To All Nations Or Something »

Posted in Democrats, Israel | 13 Comments | Trackback URL

ZOMG: Trump Is Skeptical About Autonomous Vehicles!!!!!

By William Teach March 18, 2019 – 6:55 am

Why is this even a story? What’s the Trump Derangement Syndrome angle?

Trump has privately voiced skepticism about driverless cars: report

President Trump has reportedly expressed skepticism on more than one occasion about the move toward self-driving cars.

Axios, citing four sources who’ve heard him discuss the subject, reported on Sunday that Trump doesn’t see the usefulness of autonomous vehicles. He has also reportedly said that he would never let a computer-operated car drive him.

“He’s definitely an automated car skeptic,” one source told Axios.

President Trump’s concerns about autonomous vehicles are not unusual. A survey released last week by AAA found that 71 percent of Americans are afraid of riding in a driverless car.

They’re trying to make fun of Trump over this, but, the survey doesn’t help. Let me tell you, as someone who is constantly testing different brands with some of the sensing packages, and I have it in my own car, I wouldn’t trust one, either. The whole “privately” thing is meant to paint Trump is a kook, though.

The Axios report also says that Trump has acted out scenes of what are supposed to be frenetic autonomous vehicles to make his point that they don’t make sense. He has reportedly acted out these scenes on Air Force One and in the White House.

“You know when he’s telling a story, and he does the hand motions,” one source told Axios. “He says, ‘Can you imagine, you’re sitting in the back seat and all of a sudden this car is zig-zagging around the corner and you can’t stop the f—ing thing?’”

The White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment from The Hill.

See? Despite most people doing that with their hands, it’s an attempt to make Trump look kooky and a technophobe and hates science, especially with the “White House didn’t respond” schtick. Why would they? This is a nothingburger. This is the Credentialed Media.

Read: ZOMG: Trump Is Skeptical About Autonomous Vehicles!!!!! »

Posted in Barking Moonbats | 3 Comments | Trackback URL

The Green New Deal Isn’t Global Enough Or Something

By William Teach March 17, 2019 – 5:04 pm

The Cult of Climastrology wants U.S. dollars flowing elsewhere

The Green New Deal Isn’t Global Enough

At the fourth United Nations Environment Assembly in Kenya this past week, experts and officials from around the world debated how to come up with the investment and innovation needed for countries to grow without dooming the planet. National leaders, NGOs and others discussed, among other things, how to create more “sustainable patterns of consumption and production.” What really struck me in Nairobi, though, was what wasn’t discussed: the Green New Deal being pushed by Democratic Party politicians in the U.S.

This is surprising, in a way: It was the United Nations Environment Programme that first called for a “Global Green New Deal” in 2009, hoping to revive the world economy through investment in climate change-related sectors.

That extra word, “global,” suggests why international players today aren’t terribly enthused by the Democrats’ plan. The program — or what little of it can be adduced from what’s now largely a slogan — is focused entirely on green investment in the U.S. The basic notion that climate change is a global problem that requires a global solution seems to have been forgotten. (snip)

By contrast, a global low-carbon transition will require laying claim to resources that are productively employed in carbon-intensive sectors of the economy. It will be expensive. It will require sacrifice. And resources will need to flow more freely across national borders.(snip)

This group will have to sacrifice something if climate change is to be stopped. The truth is that the resources that Democrats want the U.S. government to appropriate and use domestically need instead to flow elsewhere in the world. That valuable finance and capacity is needed to help the developing world pay for cities that don’t stress the planet, to protect those who are losing livelihoods and homes because of climate change, and to ensure that everyone in the world has access to reliable, affordable and clean energy.

Funny how the leftist notion of redistribution (usually of Other People’s money) constantly comes into play, eh?

Read: The Green New Deal Isn’t Global Enough Or Something »

Posted in AGW Socialism, Global Warming | 3 Comments | Trackback URL

If All You See…

By William Teach March 17, 2019 – 1:00 pm

…is a wonderful low carbon bike, you might just be a Warmist

The blog of the day is No Tricks Zone, with a post on how global warming is going in Ireland.

It’s bike week, and, since it’s also St. Patrick’s Day, well, I think you can guess.

Read: If All You See… »

Posted in If All You See | 6 Comments | Trackback URL

Sorta Blogless Sunday Pinup

By William Teach March 17, 2019 – 9:29 am

Happy Sunday! Another fantastic day in America. The Sun is shining, the squirrels are stealing birdseed, and everyone is wearing green. This pinup is by Scott Blair, with a wee bit of help (it’s actually more about recycling, something I endorse).

What is happening in Ye Olde Blogosphere? The Fine 15

  1. Not A Lot Of People Know That discusses the BBC’s climate lies becoming a habit
  2. Watts Up With That? has an analysis of the recent climate hysteria
  3. Independent Sentinel covers the New Zealand egging incident
  4. Weasel Zippers has videos which show the crisis at the border
  5. Victory Girls Blog discusses Congress wanting a pay raise
  6. The Right Scoop covers things MS-13 is still doing as Dems protect them
  7. The People’s Cube wants automotive justice now
  8. The Other McCain discusses God and women’s soccer at Yale
  9. The Last Tradition notes AOC’s favorability ratings
  10. The Last Refuge covers MAGAnomics benefiting the middle class
  11. The American Conservative features Dems being walloped by wokeness
  12. Raised On Hoecakes covers no good deed going unpunished
  13. Powerline covers Paris becoming a war zone
  14. Moonbattery notes what British MPs want on knives now
  15. And last, but not least, Legal Insurrection covers Iran being appointed to the UN Women’s Rights Commission

As always, the full set of pinups can be seen in the Patriotic Pinup category, or over at my Gallery page (nope, that’s gone, the newest Apache killed access, and the program hasn’t been upgraded since 2014). While we are on pinups, since it is that time of year, have you gotten your “Pinups for Vets” calendar yet? And don’t forget to check out what I declare to be our War on Women Rule 5 and linky luv posts and things that interest me

Don’t forget to check out all the other great material all the linked blogs have!

Anyone else have a link or hotty-fest going on? Let me know so I can add you to the list.

Read: Sorta Blogless Sunday Pinup »

Posted in Patriotic Pinup | 2 Comments | Trackback URL
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