If All You See…

By William Teach March 17, 2017 – 1:00 pm

…is evil beer releasing evil carbon pollution, you might just be a Warmist

The blog of the day is MOTUS AD, with a post on snow donuts.

Happy St. Patty’s Day!

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Whiny California Judge Seeks To Block Feds From Detaining Illegals In State Courts

By William Teach March 17, 2017 – 10:29 am

Well, this is interesting: remember when Democrats were telling us that federal law took precedence over state law, and federal officials took precedence over state ones? Good times, good times

California Judge Seeks to Prevent Immigration Arrests Inside State Courts

The chief justice of California’s Supreme Court on Thursday asked the administration of U.S. President Donald Trump to prevent immigration agents from arresting undocumented immigrants inside the state’s courthouses.

Chief Justice Tani Cantil-Sakauye said she was gravely troubled by recent reports that federal agents were “stalking undocumented immigrants in our courthouses to make arrests,” in a letter addressed to U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions and Secretary of Homeland Security John Kelly.

“Courthouses should not be used as bait in the necessary enforcement of our country’s immigration law,” Cantil-Sakauye wrote.

“Necessary enforcement.” So, she rather contradicted herself. If it’s necessary to get them in or near courthouses, that should be done. Perhaps if Democrats stopped coddling illegals and stopped protecting them, if they actually worked with federal immigration officials, there wouldn’t be this need.

Cantil-Sakauye stopped short of questioning the legal right of federal agents to enter courthouses to locate and detain unauthorized immigrants.

Her letter said the presence of immigration agents in California courthouses could undermine “public trust and confidence in our state court system,” which serves “millions of the most vulnerable Californians.”

Except, they aren’t Californians. They’re Mexicans, Guatemalans, Hondurans, Chinese, etc. The people undermining our courts and laws are people like Cantil-Sakauyne.

Read: Whiny California Judge Seeks To Block Feds From Detaining Illegals In State Courts »

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Warmist Patton Oswalt Wants OMB Director Prosecuted For ‘Climate Change’ Skepticism

By William Teach March 17, 2017 – 7:15 am

Yesterday I told you about Monty Python member Eric Idle going bat guano insane on the subject of ‘climate change’, stating he wants “deniers” prosecuted in the International Criminal Court, and even going as far as to suggest that they be executed. Now we get

This is in response to

https://twitter.com/lachlan/status/842460206953041921

That’s OMB Director Mick Mulvaney, who stated that spending money on ‘climate change’ is a waste of taxpayer money, and the Trump administration wouldn’t do it anymore. Liberals are pretty tolerant, are they not?

Not really.

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NY Times: Trump Is Not Above The Courts Or Something

By William Teach March 17, 2017 – 7:00 am

Suddenly, the Constitution matters to the NY Times, per Martin H. Redish

Trump Is Not Above the Courts

So much has happened during these early weeks of President Trump’s administration that it is easy to lose sight of the single event that may well have the most powerful and troubling impact on American democratic society.

I speak of the administration’s startling assertion following its first travel ban, which was blocked by the courts, not merely that the president’s executive order limiting immigration from seven nations was constitutional, but that the president is actually immune from judicial review of the constitutionality of his action. The president’s lawyers explicitly made this argument before the Ninth Circuit, and the presidential counselor Stephen Miller has asserted that presidential power over immigration cannot be questioned.

The constitutionality of the president’s bans on travel from parts of the Muslim world — the most recent one was blocked this week, by federal judges in Hawaii and Maryland — gives rise to complex issues on which reasonable people can differ. But what is not in dispute is the ability of the judiciary to determine their constitutionality, free from control by the executive branch of government. Indeed, not only is such thinking largely inconsistent with over 200 years of established American constitutional practice, but it also ignores and undermines the genius of the Constitution’s framers, who saw the judiciary as perhaps the most important deterrent to tyrannical power. By “tyranny” the framers did not mean simply the abuse of power. Rather, it is the very accumulation of such power that they saw as the essence of tyranny, because once the power is accumulated, the harm has already taken place.

One does have to love that, after eight years of Obama accumulating power, Democrats are suddenly Very Concerned about the Constitution. We can debate the Constitutionality of the travel ban….personally, I think he should have moved on after the first, and just done it administrationally, by not bringing in all the refugees…but, what about this

Those are just a few examples of when Obama blew off court orders. Then there are all the lists on the number of ways Obama has ignored the Constitution, which, for the most part, the Credentialed Media, like the NY Times, couldn’t have cared less.

Of course, the media is Very Concerned that Trump might use Executive Orders in the same manner as Obama, mostly to rescind Obama’s often un-Constitutional orders. When Trump is actually ignoring orders from courts like Obama did, then the media might have a case. But, they’d have to explain why they had no complaints about Obama doing the same.

Crossed at Right Wing News.

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On Climate Change, Liberals Are Realizing That Elections Have Consequences

By William Teach March 16, 2017 – 5:17 pm

Trump’s budget, which I mentioned this morning, has sent Warmists into a tailspin, including Excitable Ezra Klein

https://twitter.com/ezraklein/status/842363580003553280

From the link

Among other goals, the budget appears designed to totally unwind the Obama administration’s government-wide commitment to combating climate change.

The antipathy toward climate change programs begins with the EPA, where funding cuts focus on President Obama’s Clean Power Plan, climate change research, international climate change programs, and so forth. But it doesn’t end there.

The State Department cuts also make a point to end the Global Climate Change Initiative and other international efforts on the issue. The Commerce Department reductions includes significant cuts to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), one of the major agencies conducting climate change research, and the budget outlines relatively mild cuts to NASA that target its Earth science programs.

The budget outline eliminates funding for TIGER, a grant-making program in the Transportation Department, most of whose funding has gone to “rail, transit and bicycle projects designed to reduce carbon emissions as well as congestion,” per Politico’s Michael Grunwald. And the Energy Department budget eliminates two programs providing loans for companies working on clean energy and clean vehicles, respectively, as well as ARPA-Energy, a widely praised agency created in the 2009 stimulus bill that provides early-stage funding for clean energy research and development that venture capital often won’t.

In 2009 we were told that elections have consequences. And so they do. The Cult of Climastrology has had 25+ years to insinuate themselves within the federal bureaucracies and with mostly Democratic Party politicians. Their major policies seem to revolve around increasing people’s taxes, spending lots of taxpayer money, and dictating how Other People act, all while mostly refusing to practice what they preach.

You know what?

https://twitter.com/BotchedLobotomy/status/842429631596752897

It is, it definitely is. And Warmists will be very weepy as their precious ‘climate change’ is removed from the federal government.

Read: On Climate Change, Liberals Are Realizing That Elections Have Consequences »

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If All You See…

By William Teach March 16, 2017 – 1:00 pm

…is an evil pool which uses up lots of water and is made with evil concrete, you might just be a Warmist

The blog of the day is Moonbattery, with a post on a pure freakshow.

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Stick With Comedy: Eric Idle Wants To Put Climate Skeptics On Trial. And Kill Them

By William Teach March 16, 2017 – 10:30 am

If you’re not familiar with Eric Idle, he was part of Monty Python’s Flying Circus, an all time classic British humor troupe. But, now, like most Warmists, he’s a bit unhinged (via Twitchy)

Obviously, he’s just one Warmist in the greater Cult of Climastrology. However, this is the way so many of them think, wanting to prosecute people for Wrongthink. And they show it in the replies to the tweet.

But, Twitchy missed a reply that is even more disturbing than the original tweet

Perhaps he meant it another way, but, it sure looks like he’s advocating killing climate skeptics.

Read: Stick With Comedy: Eric Idle Wants To Put Climate Skeptics On Trial. And Kill Them »

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Illegal Alien Supporters Are Aghast At ICE Arresting Illegals At Courthouses

By William Teach March 16, 2017 – 8:36 am

There’s apparently some sort of impropriety over detaining people who are unlawfully present in the country in courthouses

ICE agents make arrests at courthouses, sparking backlash from prosecutors and attorneys

Octavio Chaidez was walking out of a Pasadena courtroom with a client last month when four men jumped up from a hallway bench and rushed toward them.

The men asked his client’s name. Then they pulled out badges.

“They say, ‘You’re Mr. So and So?’ and he says, ‘Yes,’ ” Chaidez said. “They show him a badge, and they say, ‘We’re from Immigration and Customs,’ and they took him in.”

Chaidez, who has worked as a defense attorney in Los Angeles County for nearly 15 years, said he had never seen federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents make an arrest inside the confines of a courthouse.

But in the past few weeks, attorneys and prosecutors in California, Arizona, Texas and Colorado have all reported teams of ICE agents — some in uniform, some not — sweeping into courtrooms or lurking outside court complexes, waiting to arrest immigrants who are in the country illegally.

ICE officials have defended the tactic, saying they make arrests in courthouses only when all other options have been exhausted. But activists, attorneys and prosecutors fear ICE’s increased presence in courthouses could deter other immigrants without legal status from appearing in court to testify as witnesses or answer warrants, which ultimately could endanger prosecutions.

Blah blah blah. It says it in the article: they’re in the country illegally, and this is a last resort. Wouldn’t be an issue if they weren’t here unlawfully.

What’s barely mentioned in this article, and barely or not mentioned in so many that mimic the LA Times one above, is that Mr. Chaidez’s client was a “previously deported Mexican national with a prior felony conviction for drug trafficking”. Coming back into the U.S. after being deported is also a federal felony. Why are we concerned about a criminal like this being made scared?

San Francisco Dist. Atty. George Gascon called ICE’s forays into courthouses “very shortsighted” because some immigrants here illegally will simply avoid court for fear of being arrested.

“The chilling impact that has on an entire community is devastating,” he said.

Well, perhaps they’ll be so afraid that they will leave the country they shouldn’t be unlawfully present in in the first place.

ICE’s recent action in courthouses has been, in part, driven by an increase in the number of local law enforcement agencies that refuse to comply with ICE requests to detain suspects in county jails, she said.

“In years past, most of these individuals would have been turned over to ICE by local authorities upon their release from jail based on ICE detainers,” Kice said “Now that many law enforcement agencies no longer honor ICE detainers, these individuals, who often have significant criminal histories, are released onto the street, presenting a potential public safety threat.”

Cooperate with federal law enforcement, and this won’t be an issue. Furthermore, getting them in courthouses means that the illegal alien in question will have to have gone through metal detectors and screenings, so they are less likely to have weapons on them.

Suspects have to pass through metal detectors before entering courthouses, meaning they are unlikely to be armed. In recent months, ICE has arrested several suspects in courthouses in Portland, Ore., and Southern California who had prior convictions for sex crimes, drug trafficking and drunken driving, she said. The suspect who was arrested in the Pasadena courthouse last month was a Mexican national with a prior drug conviction, according to Kice.

See? Barely mentioned. Makes it seem like he was busted for something low level, instead of trafficking. And, again, why are we worried about the feelings of people convicted of sex crimes and such? Get them out of the country.

As an LA Times op-ed by Henry Olsen notes, are these really the type of people the Democrats want to defend? Because they’ll have a hard time winning elections if they want to defend criminals.

Read: Illegal Alien Supporters Are Aghast At ICE Arresting Illegals At Courthouses »

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Trump Announces The “America First” Budget

By William Teach March 16, 2017 – 8:07 am

Regardless of whether you think Trump is taking a cleaver or a scalpel to the federal budget and federal programs, this is something that hasn’t been seen since the days of Reagan, and perhaps not even then. It is a massive expression of how Trump wants to deconstruct government

Donald Trump Budget Slashes Funds for E.P.A. and State Department

President Trump’s budget blueprint for the coming fiscal year would slash the Environmental Protection Agency by 31 percent and cut State Department spending by a similar amount in a brash upending of the government’s priorities, according to congressional staff members familiar with the plan.

The budget outline, to be unveiled on Thursday, is more of a broad political statement than a detailed plan for spending and taxation. But it represents Mr. Trump’s first real effort to translate his bold but vague campaign themes into the minutiae of governance. The president would funnel $54 billion in additional funding into defense programs, beef up immigration enforcement and significantly reduce the nondefense federal work force to further the “deconstruction of the administrative state,” in the words of Mr. Trump’s chief strategist, Stephen K. Bannon.

Of course, many parts are already (supposedly) being declared dead by even Republicans, ones who are caught up in using The People’s money to patronize people, especially rich donors, in their home districts. And, of course, the NY Times takes shots at Trump and his team, writing

Mr. Trump’s version is likely to be even skinnier than usual, a result of the chaos, inexperience and staffing problems encountered by the Trump White House over the first two months.

Or, it could be exactly what he wants. At the end, the President puts forth a budget, as required by law by a specific date (something Obama usually failed to do), and Congress debates what it wants to do (except when it is Obama’s, and Harry Reid refused to even discuss it in the Senate). These are the President’s priorities. The duly elected lawmakers then decide what to do. A little FYI, in case the NY Times, and other unhinged newspapers acting as arms of the Democratic National Party, have forgotten the way things work.

USA Today has a pretty good breakdown of what Trump wants sliced away.

Trump’s budget says hundreds of programs and agencies would be eliminated — with more than 50 in the Environmental Protection Agency. But his first budget proposal identified 62 specifically. The list includes

  • McGovern-Dole International Food for Education program ($202 million): Trump’s budget says the program — a sort of Third World school lunch project — “lacks evidence that it is being effectively implemented to reduce food insecurity.”
  • Minority Business Development Agency ($32 million): The White House says this minority business incubator program is “duplicative” of other programs in the Small Business Administration. (WT-wacking of duplicative programs is big in this budget)
  • 21st Century Community Learning Centers program ($1.2 billion): The formula grants to states support before- and after-school and summer programs. “The programs lacks strong evidence of meeting its objectives, such as improving student achievement,” the budget says. (lacking evidence of meeting objectives also is bigly in the budget)
  • Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy ($382 million): This alternative energy research program was established by Congress in 2007 with the goal of funding projects that the private sector would not. (a lot of this goes to ‘climate change’)
  • Title 17 Innovative Technology Loan Guarantee Program: This loan fund finances projects that combat global warming. (awesome)
  • State Energy Program ($28.2 million): Gives grants to states to help them work on energy efficiency and anti-climate change programs.
  • Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program ($3.4 billion): LIHEAP helps the elderly and low-income people pay their heating and power bills. (I can’t see this being cut)
  • Community Development Block Grant program ($3 billion): CDBG has been a bread-and-butter funding source for local communities for 42 years, totaling more than $150 billion in grants over its history. “The program is not well-targeted to the poorest populations and has not demonstrated results,” Trump’s budget says.
  • National Wildlife Refuge fund ($480 million): Maintains the Fish and Wildlife Service’s 563 wildlife refuges throughout the country. (won’t be cut)
  • State Criminal Alien Assistance Program ($210 million): Four states receive the bulk of the funding from this program, which reimburses states for the cost of incarcerating criminal immigrants.
  • The Global Climate Change Initiative ($1.3 billion) was an Obama administration proposal to support the Paris climate agreement. It includes the Green Climate Fund ($250 million), the Strategic Climate Fund ($60 million) and the Clean Technology Fund ($171 million).

There are many more at the article. Then there are the “independent agencies” he wants to scuttle, including

  • Corporation for National and Community Service ($771 million): The agency is best known for its Americorps community service program.
  • Corporation for Public Broadcasting ($485 million): Supports public television and radio stations, including the PBS television network and, indirectly, National Public Radio.
  • Denali Commission ($14 million): A state and federal economic development agency for Alaska.
  • National Endowment for the Arts ($152 million): Encourages participation in the arts.
  • National Endowment for the Humanities ($155 million): Supports scholarship into literature and culture.

This is a business person’s budget. It targets spending from the large to the tiny. How often do you see a budget target something like the U.S. Interagency Council on Homelessness, which is just $4 million dollars? It’s also an opening negotiation point. When Congress says “hey, we can’t get rid of the National Wildlife Refuge fund ($480 million)”, Trump says “fine, toast the Transportation Investment Generating Economic Recovery ($499 million).” The art of the deal.

Some, like the $3 billion Community Development Block Grant program, which funds popular programs like Meals on Wheels, housing assistance and other community assistance efforts, can be transformed via the budgetary process. As Trump says, it is not well targeted. Why not upgrade it and make it more effective, make the money go further and use it better?

This is also a budget meant to move power away from the federal government and back towards the States, counties, and municipalities, who know their people better. Obviously, the whole thing is driving the Credentialed Media and Democrats to a higher state of Moonbattery. Which will get worse as time goes on.

Crossed at Right Wing News.

Read: Trump Announces The “America First” Budget »

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Man Caused Global Warming Makes Snowstorms Worse Or Something

By William Teach March 15, 2017 – 4:29 pm

This is not a new meme from the Cult of Climastrology. They’ve been beating this horse for several years now as a means to deflect off of seeing big snowstorms during a period in which the world is supposed to be boiling, especially as Europe and many parts of the world have seen brutal winters over many of the past ten seasons. But, hey, we had Stella, so, the CoC has to reiterated the meme, which states that ‘climate change’ causes snowstorms or makes them worse

Does Global Warming Cause Snowstorms? Weather Like Stella Enhanced By Climate Change

Winter Storm Stella bore down on much of the United States Tuesday, begging the question: What does a snowstorm in March mean for global warming? While it might seem easy to discount the latter because of the discontinuity between the two phrases — snow and warming don’t seem to go together — the changing climate can actually exacerbate extreme weather events like snowstorms in March.

Some point to snow and freezing weather as proof that global warming isn’t occurring. While snowstorms like Stella aren’t directly caused by a changing climate, global warming does cause hotter air. Hotter air, in turn, holds more moisture than colder air, causing heavier precipitation that comes in the form of extreme rain or snow.

As a result, the amount of rain or snow falling in the heaviest 1 percent of storms has increased over the last half century, according to the Union of Concern Scientists. Some areas have recorded up to a 71 percent increase in the amount of precipitation that has fallen in the heaviest storms between 1958 and 2012.

This must mean it was really hot during the last ice age, right? And must have been boiling during the Snowball Earth period.

Of course, at least half of what are considered the biggest snowstorms in U.S. recorded history happened before that 1958 period. One of them, the Blizzard of 1999, only dropped 15 inches. Heck, we had more than that in Raleigh in 1996, with 21 inches outside my door. Of course, the 1999 storm hit a much wider area.

And, we cannot forget that measurements are much better now as technology and a spreading population allows the information to be easier to obtain. If there was a giant snowstorm in Montana in 1800, how many would have noticed? This is the same with tornadoes. If no one saw it, and there was no radar to record it, it didn’t exist.

Regardless, no amount of science or reality will dissuade Warmists from their talking points.

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