…is a horrible carbon pollution creating dog, you might just be a Warmist
The blog of the day is Legal Insurrection, with a post wondering if the the public option Obama’s now pushing was the goal all along (me-yes, yes it was.)
It’s girls playing at the beach week!
Read: If All You See… »
Happy Sunday! A gorgeous, but kinda wet (at least in the Raleigh area), day here in America. The sun is shining, the squirrels are scampering, the geese are quiet. This pinup is by Gil Elvgren, with a wee bit of help.
What’s happening in Ye Olde Blogosphere? The Fine 15
As always, the full set of pinups can be seen in the Patriotic Pinup category, or over at my Gallery page. 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. (BTW, since someone asked, the reason I leave links for the previous week up (or you might see a *) is because they are place holders for later in the day or for next weeks. Easier than rewriting all the time. Also, the listing order has to do with how they are added over time, not how good a post is. I just copy and paste from the previous week, then edit. If you see one of the *’s, go ahead and check out the blog anyhow, see if there is an update. I cannot update with my Android during the day.
Read: Sorta Blogless Sunday Pinup »
Democrats have been hysterical over the Citizens United ruling ever since it was announced. They’ve railed against it, trying to whip up the masses…well, the masses of the Democratic Party base, because, otherwise, no one really cares. In all fairness, they have gotten a few polls to go their way, but, really, the same Democrats have taken advantage of the very thing they rail about. Shocking, eh, that Democrats would be hypocrites, right?
(CBS News) Doubling down on a key campaign pledge to take big money out of politics, Hillary Clinton announced Saturday that she intends to back a constitutional amendment overturning Citizens United, the 2010 Supreme Court decision that made way for unlimited corporate spending in elections.
In a video address Saturday to the progressive Netroots Nation conference in St. Louis, Clinton promised that she would introduce the amendment within “the first 30 days” in the White House.
The amendment would, she said, “give the American people — all of us — the chance to reclaim our democracy.” The proposed change is expected to protect against the outsized influence of the billionaire class in U.S. political system.
She might actually recommend it, but, would she fight for it, or just set it aside after an announcement, mentioning it now and then much like Obama has done with Guantanamo Bay detention facility? She goes on to yammer
For Clinton’s own campaign finance reform plan, a campaign official said she intends to sign an executive order requiring all federal government contractors to publicly declare all political spending, in addition to pushing Congress for more effective legislation on donation disclosures.
Intending to close any loopholes allowing for dark money, Clinton would urge more transparency for outside groups and any “significant” donors sponsoring their cause.
The former secretary of state would also promote a Securities and Exchange Commission rule that would require any publicly traded company to disclose their political spending to shareholders, according to the campaign.
So, executive action to limit the 1st Amendment rights of citizens and groups, as upheld by the Supreme Court. CBS finally gets to something important at the end
Clinton herself has benefited from these super PACs, which allow for unlimited donations from wealthy Americans. At the start of June, the pro-Clinton super PAC, Priorities USA, had $52 million cash on hand. And the group told CBS News last month that it has already reserved more than $150 million in advertising for a general election campaign against Trump.
That’s putting it kindly
(Center for Public Integrity) Clinton’s massive campaign machine is built of the very stuff — super PACs, secret cash, unlimited contributions — she says she’ll attack upon winning the White House.
Indeed, a Center for Public Integrity investigation reveals that Clinton’s own election efforts are largely immune from her reformist platform. While Clinton rails against “unaccountable money” that is “corrupting our political system,†corporations, unions and nonprofits bankrolled by unknown donors have already poured millions of dollars into a network of Clinton-boosting political organizations. That’s on top of the tens of millions an elite club of Democratic megadonors, including billionaires George Soros and Haim Saban, have contributed.
CPP is very much a Progressive outlet, receiving money from groups such as the Open Society Foundation, which is a George Soros group. They have lots and lots of Leftists on their board. Even the NY Times and LA Times call them “liberal.” Yet, here they are pointing out that Hillary is a big beneficiary of Citizens United. Nor is that the first time.
What she’s essentially doing is advocating the partial repeal of the 1st Amendment. You may not like CU, but, it is based on the notion of allowing citizens and their groups to participate in the political process, engaging in Free Speech, protesting peaceably, and petitioning for redress of grievance. CU was a 1st Amendment case. Why do Democrats like Hillary want to restrict the 1st Amendment? Of course, they mean for Other People, not for themselves and their groups.
Crossed at Right Wing News.
Read: Hypocrite Hillary Clinton Wants A Constitutional Amendment Against Citizens United »
For all Mike Pence’s faults (which aren’t even close to Trump’s), he’s not a member of the Cult of Climastrology
On Climate Change, Pence and Trump Are a Perfect Match
Donald Trump calls global warming a “hoax.” He claims climate science is “bullshit,” and he’s even described it (supposedly as a joke) as a Chinese conspiracy. So perhaps it isn’t that surprising that Mike Pence—whom Trump just named as his running mate—has similar views. (WT note: I’ve written before that the Chinese thing is idiotic and wrong)
“Global warming is a myth,” Pence wrote nearly two decades ago in an op-ed unearthed by . “Environmentalists,” the Indiana Republican explained, “claim that certain ‘greenhouse gases’ like carbon dioxide are mucking up the atmosphere and causing the earth to gradually warm. Despite the fact that CO2 is a naturally occurring phenomenon in nature, the greenpeace folks want to blame it all on coal (another natural mineral) and certain (evil) coal burning power plants.” He added (inaccurately) that “the earth is actually cooler today than it was about 50 years ago.”
Oh, noes, 20 years ago! And, the computer models have failed over that period of time. Go figure.
He was wrong about being cooler than 50 years prior, which isn’t actually nearly 20 years ago, more like 2001, as you can see from the Wayback Machine archive (seriously, this is how unhinged Leftists get in their research). It was warmer in 2001 than 1951, especially since that was a time of cooling up to the late 1970’s.
Anyhow, he’s expressed a Skeptical viewpoint since, and
Pence has also been an outspoken opponent of policies that would reduce greenhouse gas emissions. He told the Star Press that a cap-and-trade proposal passed by the US House of Representatives in 2009 would raise energy prices and harm the economy. The legislation would have put a limit and a price on the carbon emissions that cause climate change. “I really believe Democratic climate change legislation will cap growth and trade jobs,” he said.
As governor of Indiana, Pence has continued to fight against policies intended to combat global warming. His latest battle? An effort to block President Barack Obama’s Clean Power Plan, a set of Environmental Protection Agency regulations that would limit greenhouse gas emissions from coal-fired power plants. Last year, Pence called Indiana a “proud pro-coal state” on a press call, according to the Indianapolis Star. He vowed to resist the new regulations.
Well, I like Pence on this issue.
Read: Good News: Pence And Trump Are On Same Page Regarding Hotcoldwetdry »
…is a patch of land that evil GOP deniers want to take away from the awesome federal government and probably give to fossil fuels companies, you might just be a Warmist
The blog of the day is Vox Popoli, with a post noting that France needs a new revolution.
Read: If All You See… »
Hey, look, a Pikachuuuuuuuuuuuuuu
(CNN) If all your friends jumped off a cliff, would you too? What if your Pokémon took you there?
Two men in their early 20s fell an estimated 50 to 90 feet down a cliff in Encinitas, California, on Wednesday afternoon while playing “Pokémon Go,” San Diego County Sheriff’s Department Sgt. Rich Eaton said. The men sustained injuries, although the extent is not clear.
Apparently it wasn’t enough that the app warns users to stay aware of surroundings or that signs posted on a fence near the cliff said “No Trespassing” and “Do Not Cross.” When firefighters arrived at the scene, one of the men was at the bottom of the cliff while the other was three-quarters of the way down and had to be hoisted up, Eaton said.
You know that this won’t be the last incident. A girl was supposedly hit by a car while playing (interestingly, I can’t find a news article which mentions the police being called anywhere. How about you?). We even have a guy saying he quit his job to take two months to call all the Pokemon in New Zealand.
All in all, though, it seems a good game, because it gets people up and moving and getting outside. Lots of people seem to be unsure of this “nature” and fresh air thing, and are being reintroduced to being “outside.” Too bad they really do not see what is going on.
Read: Men Playing Pokemon Go Fail To Join List Of Darwin Awards Contenders »
Liberals worship their talking points of diversity and multiculturalism, to the point that they feel a deep, abiding need to defend the indefensible. And they’ll do and say anything to defend it
Our Best Defense Against Terrorists
How we react to terrorism has become a measure of who we are, as individuals and as a society. It is not clear yet whether the heinous massacre in Nice, France, was the work of a “lone wolf†or a terrorist network, but in a way it doesn’t matter. Each new attack, each new convulsion of fear, horror, grief and anger is a progressively greater test of enlightened civilization’s commitment to its core values.
Mohamed Lahouaiej Bouhlel, the 31-year-old Tunisian who drove a truck through a festive nighttime crowd celebrating Bastille Day on Nice’s seaside promenade, may well have been avenging some personal grievance with the weapon closest at hand. Or it may emerge that ISIS or some other organized terrorists pushed him to this atrocity, targeting France — the country with the largest Muslim population in Europe and the strongest embrace of secularism — for the third time in 19 months.
But whoever struck the blow, whatever its malevolent purpose or toll, the response cannot be to abandon the respect for human rights, equality, reason and tolerance that is the aspiration of all democratic cultures. Though it has become almost a cliché to argue that the goal of terrorists is to bring their victims down to their moral level, it is also a truth, and it must be reaffirmed after every attack.
Got that? We need to tolerate these brutal people who want to essentially do two things: attack the infidel, and change Western society to conform with hardcore Islamic beliefs as expressed in the Koran. Some of those beliefs are specifically laid out in the Koran, some have been spun by the Islamists.
That is what the French prime minister, Manuel Valls, did in the wake of the assault. Warning France that it had to learn to live with terrorism, he declared that the only dignified response was for the French to remain faithful to the spirit of July 14, “which means a France brought together and united around its values.â€
Just learn to live with it, because it would be “against our core values” to restrict those with the hardcore Islamist beliefs access to our nation. I suggest that refugee camps be set up near the homes of the NY Times Editorial Board.
Should we just have learned to live with the Nazis and the Japanese empire?
Not surprisingly, the National Front, the right-wing party that thrives on aversion to Muslim immigrants, reacted disdainfully to these statements. “Spare us the indignation of the vultures of the main parties who let the wolves in to carry out this carnage,†declared Eric Domard, a senior adviser to the National Front leader Marine Le Pen.
Um, where are they wrong? France has long been a hotbed of Islamic extremism. Is it any surprise they have had so many attacks, not to mention all the violence, burning cars, and crime.
Apart from demonstrating Mr. Gingrich’s woeful ignorance of Shariah, his outrageous proposals would violate several Supreme Court rulings, constitutional amendments and laws barring discrimination on the basis of religion or restrictions of freedom of expression and belief. And in so doing, his ideas illustrated the greatest threat posed by terrorism: a descent into the lawless, hateful demagogy of those who despise the West and its values.
Interesting. If it was a hardcore Christian sect pushing to be able to practice their own rules and laws separate from US laws and rule, and pushing for the government to adopt these laws and rules, would the NY Times think the same? As for woeful ignorance of Sharia Law, are these the things the NY Times wants to tolerate?
That’s just a small list, and the link leads to many more links on Sharia Law.
As Mr. Valls and many others have warned, there will be more terrorist attacks. More innocent lives will be lost. There is no way that the police can track every vengeance-seeking potential killer or neutralize every weapon as commonplace as a truck. What threatened nations and their leaders can do is to firmly instill the idea that the only sure defense is to stay true to what democratic societies really stand for.
Would that be support of violating national security provisions, constant lying, and attempting to hide the work of government? The NY Times has supported Hillary Clinton, and surely wants her to be president. How about using the power of the federal government to intimidate private citizens and entities? The NY Times has supported Democrats who used the power of the government in instances such as the IRS targeting scandal, the AGs going after climate skeptics, and those who targeted supporters of Scott Walker, among others. The Times has been very supportive of Black Lives Matter, and railed at law enforcement.
What’s so democratic about letting in people who want to kill the infidel as well as get rid of Western democracy?
Read: NY Times: In Name Of Diversity And Stuff, You Rubes Need To Get Used To Terrorist Attacks »
Hey, who doesn’t like national forests and national parks? Personally, I think it’s great that we have them to protect the environment along with special places. However, there’s something a bit unhinged (shockingly) from this Jenny Rowland article in the Climate section of Think Progress
GOP Platform Proposes To Get Rid Of National Parks And National Forests
The Republican platform committee met this week to draft the document that defines the party’s official principles and policies. Along with provisions on pornography and LGBT “conversion therapy†is an amendment calling for the indiscriminate and immediate disposal of national public lands.
The inclusion of this provision in the Republican Party’s platform reflects the growing influence of and ideological alliance between several anti-park members of the GOP and anti-government extremists, led by Cliven Bundy, who dispute the federal government’s authority over national public lands.
“Congress shall immediately pass universal legislation providing a timely and orderly mechanism requiring the federal government to convey certain federally controlled public lands to the states,†reads the adopted language. “We call upon all national and state leaders and representatives to exert their utmost power and influence to urge the transfer of those lands identified.â€
The provision calls for an immediate full-scale disposal of “certain†public lands, without defining which lands it would apply to, leaving national parks, wilderness areas, wildlife refuges, and national forests apparently up for grabs and vulnerable to development, privatization, or transfer to state ownership.
In reality, what this aims to do is return certain lands back to the states, where it belongs. Why?
In most of the Northeast and South, where the only federal presence is the occasional military base or national park, complaints that the government owns too much land seem laughable.
But out west, the government lays claim to huge, state-sized swaths of land—more than 630 million acres, greater than the landmass of Texas, California, Florida and New York combined. In some states, government agencies are the biggest landowner; in Nevada, 80 percent of land is federally owned.
There’s a map at the link that highlights just how much land the government owns out west, which has long been a bone of contention among people in those areas. Is a state really a state when Los Federales own 80%? Most of it is not a national park or national forest. It’s just land that is owned and unused.
But, as typical, the hysterics on the left are hysterical. You shouldn’t expect different.
Crossed at Right Wing News.
Read: GOP Platform Proposes To “Get Rid Of National Parks And Forests” Or Something »
There is so, so much nuttbaggery in this op-ed by Adam Sobel, I don’t know where to stop. Virtually the entire damned thing could be fisked, but, hey, I’m trying to run off to the gym before this t-storm (caused by my neighbor driving her fossil fueled mini-van) hits
(NY Times) THE United States coastline has been calm so far this hurricane season, just as it has been over the last decade. Since 2005, the year of Hurricanes Katrina, Rita and Wilma, the country has been in a hurricane “drought,†with no major hurricane (Category 3 or above, meaning winds above 110 miles per hour) making landfall. The nation’s most hurricane-prone regions, the Southeast and Gulf Coasts, have been eerily quiet.
Even so, climate scientists like me believe that human-induced climate change will strengthen hurricanes and lead to worse disasters. We know that significant global warming, over a degree and a half Fahrenheit, has already occurred since preindustrial days. So where, you might ask, are the powerful hurricanes?
They’re coming, if we don’t take more aggressive action to slow climate change.
See? They’ve been totally wrong before, like the last 11 years, but, they’ll be totally right in the future. Their computer models tell them so! So, give up your freedom and money to pay tithe to the Cult of Climastrology.
What we have seen recently is consistent with our scientific understanding of hurricanes and climate. That knowledge is far from perfect, but the prediction of stronger future hurricanes is not contradicted by the data thus far.
I’m not even going to delve deep here, I’ve done it numerous times. What has happened is exactly the opposite of what was predicted by unhinged Warmists after a lively early 21st Century, especially after 2005. But, hey, it’s now time for them to get cute
The Atlantic Ocean, where hurricanes affecting the United States arise, generates only a little over 10 percent of the planet’s tropical cyclones…
So, suddenly, the Atlantic doesn’t matter, much like when Warmists scream about hot days in Alaska, drought in California, then, when that changes, they say “eh. Just a tiny part of the Earth.”
You’re welcome to read the rest of the unhinged Warmist propaganda based on models and wishful thinking. I’d also recommend reading Climate Change Dispatch, which takes on this op-ed. Let’s end with the final wackadoodleness
Barring global emissions reductions much larger than anything agreed on in the Paris climate accord (or the development of carbon-capture technology on a significant scale), greenhouse gas concentrations will continue to increase. And without the compensating effect of increasing aerosol emissions, the warming of the future, more than the warming of the recent past, will strengthen the most powerful and destructive storms that the planet can produce.
Read: NY TImes: Hurricane Activity Has Been Quiet, But, EVERYBODY PANIC, IT’S COMING SOON! Or Something »
…is a lake shrinking because Other People drive fossil fueled vehicles, you might just be a Warmist
The blog of the day is Maggie’s Farm, with a post on government destroying private medical practice.
Read: If All You See… »
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