Republican Introduces Bill Requiring SCOTUS To Enroll In Ocare

By William Teach June 26, 2015 – 6:57 am

An interesting, albeit toothless, piece of legislation

(The Hill) A House Republican on Thursday proposed forcing the Supreme Court justices and their staff to enroll in ObamaCare.

Rep. Brian Babin (R-Texas) said that his SCOTUScare Act would make all nine justices and their employees join the national healthcare law’s exchanges.

“As the Supreme Court continues to ignore the letter of the law, it’s important that these six individuals understand the full impact of their decisions on the American people,” he said.

“That’s why I introduced the SCOTUScare Act to require the Supreme Court and all of its employees to sign up for ObamaCare,” Babin said.

Babin’s potential legislation would only let the federal government provide healthcare to the Supreme Court and its staff via ObamaCare exchanges.

“By eliminating their exemption from ObamaCare, they will see firsthand what the American people are forced to live with,” he added.

It’s a little too late, and Obama will never sign it. I feel no need to rehash the despicable and bizarre contortion decision from the court yesterday. There are more suits coming. There will certainly be suits filed over forcing people to pay a tax via the individual mandate, which is what Roberts punted to with the previous big decision. Then we have this

Republicans in Congress are moving toward a plan to use a special budgetary process to repeal ObamaCare, after the Supreme Court ruled for a second time to uphold the controversial law.

Since last year’s elections, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) has proposed using budget reconciliation to repeal large chunks of the law.

Again, a little too late, and Obama won’t sign it. Charles Krauthammer says Ocare is here to stay until a Republican wins the White House (and, of course, controls Congress). Even then, it may be too late. The time to destroy Ocare was 2012, prior to any of it being implemented. How often are bad laws repealed, especially big big big ones? Ocare already has its tentacles insinuated with a giant chunk of the economy.

Of course, Ocare is doing a good job in collapsing on its own. Costs are out of control, state implemented Exchanges are way over budget and collapsing, and consumer costs are untenable. What’s the point of health insurance when it’s too expensive (deductibles) to use?

Regardless, it is not “settled law”. Liberals refuse to accept anything as settled when they do not like the rulings/laws. Nor will we. And Ocare, let’s not forget, is still underwater in virtually every poll.

Crossed at Right Wing News.

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E.J. Dionne Totally Knows How To Free Law Abiding Citizens From Their Guns

By William Teach June 25, 2015 – 5:07 pm

Don’t think gun grabbers will ever give up. Ever. E.J. Dionne comes up with an interesting way to circumvent the 2nd Amendment and get the guns from law abiding citizens. While giving criminals a good chuckle

How America can free itself from guns

Advocates of a saner approach to guns need a new strategy. We cannot go on like this, wringing our hands in frustration after every tragedy involving firearms. We said “enough” after Sandy Hook. We thought the moment for action had come. Yet nothing happened. We are saying “enough” after Charleston. But this time, we don’t even expect anything to happen.

What’s needed is a long-term national effort to change popular attitudes toward handgun ownership. And we need to insist on protecting the rights of Americans who do not want to be anywhere near guns.

OK. So, tell you what. Let’s disarm all police officers in the areas of those Americans who do not want to be near guns. Criminals would love this.

That’s why the nation needs a public service offensive on behalf of the health and safety of us all. It could build on Sandy Hook Promise and other civic endeavors. If you doubt it could succeed, consider how quickly opinion changed on the Confederate battle flag.

Interesting. Using the Power Of Government to force compliance and mental attitudes. To shame citizens who believe in their 2nd Amendment rights. Who believe in protecting themselves and their families. Nothing fascistic about it in the least!

“The best way to disarm the NRA rhetorically is to make the Second Amendment issue moot,” Molyneux said. “This is not about the government saying you cannot own a handgun. This is about society saying you should not have a gun, especially in a home with children.”

I thought shaming people and bullying them was Bad? Gun grabbers know that they can never do away with the 2nd, and won’t even try to amend it, so, hey, Government indoctrination.

“Those of us who want to live, shop, go to school and worship in gun-free spaces also have rights,” Molyneux said. “In what way is ‘freedom’ advanced by telling the owner of a bar or restaurant they cannot ban handguns in their own place of business, as many states now do? Today, it is the NRA that is the enemy of freedom, by seeking to impose its values on everyone else.”

Funny how most of those gun free spaces, as well as those with massive restrictions, are the ones attacked the most and have some of the highest crime rates.

The nation could ring out with the new slogans of liberty: “Not in my house.” “Not in our school.” “Not in my bar.” “Not in our church.” We’d be defending one of our most sacred rights: The right not to bear arms.

Criminals will know exactly where to go. Of course, this is about denying a right embedded in the Constitution.

 

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If All You See…

By William Teach June 25, 2015 – 1:00 pm

…is a world turning into a desert from carbon pollution, you might just be a Warmist

The blog of the day is Patterico’s Pontifications, with a post about an LGBT woman being thrown out of the White House.

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House Votes To Allow States To Opt-Out Of Obama’s Climate Change Plans

By William Teach June 25, 2015 – 12:14 pm

Many states have already decided, at the Governors level and/or legislative level, that they will not comply with Obama’s EPA rules. Mike Pence, governor of Indiana, has just stated that Indiana will not comply. And

(National Journal) House Republicans advanced a bill Wednesday that would let states decide whether they want to follow upcoming Obama administration rules aimed at cutting climate pollution from power plants.

In a 247-180 vote, the House cleared a bill from Republican Rep. Ed Whitfield of Kentucky that would let governors opt out of the rules from the Environmental Protection Agency, which require states to limit carbon emissions from existing power plants. The bill would also delay implementation of the rule—set to be finalized this summer—until all legal challenges are settled, a process that could stretch on for years.

Obviously, Democrats are very much against this, and Obama has already threatened a veto. Apparently, they want to skyrocket the cost of electricity, put people out of jobs, and increase the cost of living, which would harm the poor and middle classes.

The House will also debate a fiscal 2016 appropriations bill this week that would limit the EPA’s ability to enforce the rule, although final votes on that bill will come after the July 4 recess.

For all the yammering from Democrats about being the party of the little guy/gal, their support of “climate change” rules, regs, and laws hurts the little guy/gal. Their rich donors won’t notice a thing. Of course, this is exactly why Warmists are stating that “climate change” is a health hazard, in order to say “hey, we’re doing this for your own good”. Which is exactly what is meant by calling Progressivism “nice fascism”. Massive government control of individuals, private entities, and economies for your own good.

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Study: The Missing Heat Is Not Hiding In The Deep Oceans

By William Teach June 25, 2015 – 7:36 am

Another nail in the coffin of the Cult of Climastrology, destroying yet another talking point regarding the Pause

(The Hockey Schtick) A new paper published in Ocean Science Discussions directly contradicts the claim that “90%” of the alleged “missing heat” from anthropogenic global warming has disappeared into the deep oceans below 2000 meters. This was, according to the authors, the favored excuse (out of more than 70 ‘excuses’ at this point) for the “pause” or “hiatus” of global warming over the past 18+ years.

Warming of the deep oceans, however, would cause thermal expansion of the deep oceans and add to sea level rise [called steric sea level rise]. The authors examined several datasets including satellite altimetry, ARGO floats, and the GRACE gravitometer satellites, and find that the thermal expansion of the deep oceans and contribution to sea level rise is “negligible,” and thus, there is no evidence that the alleged “missing heat” “trapped” by greenhouse gases has somehow sunken to the deep oceans. In addition, the “missing heat” is also nowhere to be found in the upper oceans, nor the atmosphere (because in reality it was lost to space as increased outgoing IR radiation over the past 62 years).

The authors find the sea level budget of total sea level rise is “closed” with “negligible” contribution from the deep ocean, thus no warming or thermal expansion from the “missing heat” in the deep ocean can be accounted for:

Of course, actual facts will not stop the CoC, nor will it even force them to move on from this excuse. They will continue to propagate the excuse, as well as all the others, and certainly come up with new ones, in order to protect their political beliefs. And they are political beliefs, not scientific beliefs. The Pause contradicts 95% of the computer models. This is very inconvenient for the CoC in pushing their hardcore Progressive policy prescriptions.

As usual, let’s be clear on an important point: the fight is not on warming, but causation. Warmists proclaim that all the warming is mostly/solely caused by Mankind. Yet, most of their excuses involve natural phenomena. Why can’t those same natural phenomena have caused most of the warming?

Excerpts and a link to the full paper available at The Hockey Schtick.

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Why Are We Not Removing All Things Related To Robert “KKK” Byrd?

By William Teach June 25, 2015 – 7:10 am

The “National Conversation” has now spread out from just the Confederate Flag

(Fox News) The debate over the rebel flag that began anew after last week’s church shootings in Charleston, S.C., has morphed into a full-blown Confederate controversy.

While Stars and Bars have long been associated by many with slavery, the latest campaign to remove Confederate emblems has extended beyond the flag to statues, memorials, parks and even school mascots. Never has the debate over what symbolizes heritage and what stands for hate covered so much ground, as efforts to strip icons that have been part of the visual and cultural landscape of the South for decades are afoot at national, state and local levels.

In one Arkansas town, the school board voted unanimously Tuesday to ban the song “Dixie” for the next school year and phase out “Rebel,” the school’s mascot.

Harry Reid linked the Charleston shooting with gun control and the flag. What about renaming the UNLV Running Rebels in his home state of Nevada? Yes, it has a link to the Confederacy, not through action, as Nevada had no part in the Civil War or the Confederacy, but, simply a cool name.

In Maryland, Baltimore County Executive Kevin Kamentz is pushing a plan that would change the name of Baltimore’s Robert E. Lee Park. A spokesman for Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake told The Associated Press she supports the name change and is willing to work with the county to find an appropriate alternative.

Baltimore has more important things to worry about, like crime, murder, violence, mobs, declining property values, tax base, and education, and so much more, but, hey, why not.

Both Democratic and Republican lawmakers in Tennessee have called for a bust of Nathan Bedford Forrest, a Confederate general and early Ku Klux Klan leader, to be removed from an alcove outside the Senate chambers. The bust, with the words “Confederate States Army” engraved on it, has been at the state Capitol for decades.

A group of Kentucky officials, including Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, want to kick a statute of Confederate leader Jefferson Davis out of the state Capitol rotunda, and activists in Minnesota have demanded a lake named after John C. Calhoun, a senator and vice president from South Carolina who supported slavery, be re-christened.

Should we remove George Washington and Thomas Jefferson from Mount Rushmore? How about all statues, streets, monuments, and references to the two? Despite being opposed to slavery, they had been slave owners at one time.

Better yet, why are we not calling for the removal of all things named after Robert “KKK” Byrd (Democrat), as well as any and all statues? The man was an actual high ranking member of the KKK. Fire Andrea Mitchell notes

What’s more offensive? A KKK Grand Kleagle like Democrat Robert Byrd, or a Confederate flag that was on top of the General Lee in the Dukes of Hazzard? Andrew Wilkow has started a petition at change.org to have Robert Byrd from the public space, road ways and government buildings (including schools). The petition to get rid of Robert Byrd from public spaces has been up less than an hour at the time of this post and already has over 100 signatures.

Byrd made many racist pronouncements. He was a virulent racist. Let’s remove all references to him.

How about John F. Kennedy? He voted against the 1957 Civil Rights Act. He refused to send in federal troops to enforce desegregation. He has a mixed record on civil rights, but, hey, it’s the bad things that count. We should remove all statues and such in his name. Hey, get rid of the eternal flame and memorial to this raaaaacist.

Kevin D. Williamson wrote about officially having reached peak leftism. I disagreed

https://twitter.com/WilliamTeach/status/613859073654714368

It’ll never end. They always want more more more. It started with a shooting, and rather than focusing on the racist murderer, they focused on a flag, with help from some Republicans. Then they move to other related notions. Then bring in other things. It’s always something. Give an inch, they take a mile. It never stops. Till they realize that their peak leftism actually harms them in their own lives.

They are coming after the American Flag. Gone With The Wind. Aunt Jemima pancakes and syrup, Uncle Ben’s Rice, Chiquita Bananas’ Miss Chiquita, the ice cream truck song, and The Washington Redskins

Crossed at Right Wing News.

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Surprise: Greens Aren’t Particularly Happy About Biofuels

By William Teach June 24, 2015 – 7:01 pm

And, unsurprisingly, is super expensive. The road to Hell (and economic disaster) is paved with good intentions

(NY Times)  Now, environmental experts are suggesting that some parts of the strategy are, at best, a waste of money and time. At worst, they are setting the United States in the wrong direction entirely.

That is the view of some of the world’s top environmental organizations, including Greenpeace, Friends of the Earth and the Sierra Club. On Tuesday, they argued in a letter to the White House that allowing the burning of biomass to help reduce consumption of fossil fuels in the nation’s power plants, as proposed by the Environmental Protection Agency, would violate the Clean Air Act.

It’s also the view of economists from the University of Chicago and the University of California, Berkeley, who on Tuesday released the disappointing results of a field test of the federal Weatherization Assistance Program, the government’s largest effort to improve residential energy efficiency.

It turns out that burning biomass — wood, mainly — for power produces 50 percentmore CO2 than burning coal. And even if new forest growth were to eventually suck all of it out of the atmosphere, it would take decades — perhaps more than a century — to make up the difference and break even with coal.

This is actually a big problem in Europe, where the draconian “climate change” regs and laws has resulted in more people burning various forms of biomass. You know, like our ancestors did before modern types of energy production were developed.

What this evidence suggests is that climate change strategies too often lack strong analytical foundations, and are driven more by hope than science. Policy makers would be making a mistake to proceed as if their favored methods are working, when the data shows they aren’t.

You don’t say.

The task of replacing the world’s entire energy system within the next few decades requires experimenting intensely along many technological avenues, learning quickly from failures and moving on. Yet too often the goal of bringing the world’s carbon emissions under control is put at the service of other agendas, ideological or economic, limiting the world’s options.

You don’t say.

The King Canute strategy cannot protect us and our children from climate change. We need experimentation that will deliver genuine breakthroughs. And that requires putting wishful thinking and phobias aside and letting science guide the way.

Whether you agree with anthropogenic climate change or not, we do need to invest in research for more viable, more stable, inexpensive, easily obtainable, and cleaner energy sources. Unfortunately, we keep doing the same over and over, which tends to serve an ideological cause, as well as serving the cash flow to ideological groups and big money political donors.

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Posted in Collapsing Science, Global Warming | 2 Comments | Trackback URL

If All You See…

By William Teach June 24, 2015 – 1:00 pm

…is a horrible greenhouse gas outputting refrigerator, which should be banned for Everyone Else, you might just be a Warmist

The blog of the day is protein wisdom, with a post on Obama’s march to get Iran the bomb.

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NY Times Discussion: To Fight Hate, Eliminate Free Speech

By William Teach June 24, 2015 – 10:06 am

The voices of Progressivism (nice fascism). This comes on the Room For Debate page, and, of course,

It’s become clear that the man who is accused of slaughtering nine people in a historic black church in Charleston, S.C., had becomederanged by racial hatred, and was inspired by organized groups who shared his views. Since 9/11, national security agencies have focused on Muslim terror threats from abroad. But the threat of domestic hate groups has grown as government resources to combat them have shrunk.

How should we deal with the threat of rightwing extremism?

Is there any point in delving into all the left wing extremism, the violence, the threats, the fact that so many of these domestic murderers share many beliefs with Progressives? Na. We know it, Leftists are in denial. The NY Times will never admit it. But, let’s consider that 4 out of the 5 Leftists involved with this debate call for suppression of free speech and thought. For the most odious, we do not even have to go beyond Jessie Daniels’ headline

Restrict White Supremacist Hate Speech Online

A clear violation of the 1st Amendment. Mark Pitcavage starts down the right road, then goes off the tracks

Rightwing extremism takes many forms and its adherents engage in many activities, from spreading propaganda to major acts of terrorism. The most effective strategies for responding to these activities involve exposing and countering them, while respecting constitutional boundaries.

As a general rule of thumb, the best response to hate speech is more speech. The First Amendment protects freedom of expression, including hate speech. But people have a right to speak out when they encounter hate: Whether in town halls or on social media, they can drown out the voices of hate and anger. People of goodwill outnumber extremists.

The best response to criminal conduct is effective law enforcement action. When someone engages in bias-motivated violence, law enforcement should enforce hate crime laws. Currently, 45 states and the federal government have hate crime laws on the books but some, including South Carolina, do not. Accurate hate crime reporting is also a must.

Criminalizing thought. Then we have Cornell William Brooks

Five states, including South Carolina, do not have hate crime legislation on their books. All states should have hate crime laws that impose harsher penalties for crimes motivated by a victim’s race, religion, gender, sexual orientation, color, national origin or age.

We need to engage faith communities, business communities and our civic organizations in a robust campaign to combat symbols used by hate groups. Whether for the Confederate flag that flies in front of the American flag at the South Carolina state house or the Confederate flag embedded in the state flag of Mississippi, we must demand an unqualified rejection of such symbols of hate and call on Americans, as both citizens and consumers, to boycott companies that support these symbols as well.

So, enforcing thought crimes and banning certain symbols. Remember, it’s Free Speech to trash, jump on, and burn the U.S. flag, but Free Speech should be stopped for things like the Confederate flag. But, hey, if Mr. Brooks wants to talk about hate, as part of his job with the NAACP, what about charging all those Blacks involved in 50% of the murders, an a goodly chunk of other violent crime, as haters?

William Braniff also starts strong, then finishes with a whimper

Between 1990 and 2013, there were 155 ideologically motivated homicide events committed by far-right extremists in the U.S., killing 368 individuals. From 1995 to 2010, there were 239 arson and bombing attacks committed by the ecoterrorism groups Earth Liberation Front (E.L.F.) and Animal Liberation Front (A.L.F.), approximately 90 percent of which targeted businesses and private homes. And between 1980 and 2013, there were 196 failed and foiled plots associated with Al Qaeda. (In addition, NBC news recently cited a statistic, alleging that 52 U.S. citizens and/or permanent residents have been charged with supporting the Islamic state over the last 15 months – a significant uptick in arrests).

Oh, look, lots of Left wing attacks.

In all of these cases, community-based approaches to countering violent extremism have an important role to play. For instance, Dylann Roof’s acquaintances were generally aware of his racism but were not primed to take it seriously and direct him to an intervention program. It is also possible that existing programs, such as those addressing gang violence, school violence or violent Islamist extremism were seen as the wrong fit for Roof’s issues.

Once we acknowledge that rightwing extremism is among the many forms of violent extremism tearing at the fabric of American society, raising awareness and developing community-based prevention, intervention and rehabilitation programming are the next steps in minimizing the threat.

So, not only deeming thought crimes and restricting free speech, but forced rehabilitation.

Liberals shouldn’t forget the old saying: “Be careful what you wish for. You might get it.” And their fascistic anti-free speech/thought prescriptions would certainly come back and bite them in the ass.

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Harry Reid Calls For Expanded Background Checks, Explains How Democrats Hurt Blacks

By William Teach June 24, 2015 – 8:14 am

Never let a good crisis go to waste

(The Hill) Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) called Tuesday for Congress to expand background checks for gun purchases in the wake of a shooting in Charleston, S.C., last week that left nine dead.

“The United States is the only advanced country where this type of mass violence occurs,” Reid said from the Senate floor. “Let’s do something. We can expand, for example, background checks. … We should support not giving guns to people who are mentally ill and felons.”

Of course, that part about mass violence has already been proven a lie. The Hill forget to tell us what those actual checks are. Politico expands

The Senate’s top Democrat also touched on the issue in a floor speech earlier Tuesday, citing several mass shootings in the United States within the past six years. He called for background checks that would prevent the mentally ill and people with criminal records from buying firearms.

Felons are already barred from purchasing/possessing a firearm. Many with mental illness are, as well. Perhaps Senator Reid’s official website will provide more details

We can expand gun background checks and prevent the mentally ill and criminal from buying guns. Is that asking too much? Couldn’t we at least do this little thing to stop people who are mentally ill, people who are criminals from purchasing guns? The people support it. It has bipartisan support. Americans overwhelmingly agree that those who are mentally ill or are felons should not be able to buy guns. We should act to save lives by expanding background checks.

I guess not. As the saying goes, the devil is in the details. What criminal backgrounds? Should those with non-violent misdemeanors be barred? How about those who got a speeding ticket? A DUI? What mental health? Insomnia? An eating disorder? What? Interestingly, Reid mentions Fort Hood, without mentioning Islamic jihad, and the Navy Yard shooter, who completely failed the federal background check for a security clearance. And, he goes down other roads

One cannot ignore this underlying issue. It deeply troubles our nation. Hatred and bigotry persist. The harsh realities of hatred and bigotry in this country in addition to the consistent lack of opportunity in communities of color have led far too many men and women of color to feel as if their lives do not matter. It’s easy to feel that your life does not matter when the odds are stacked against you on every hand.

Here are some facts African-Americans face on a daily basis:

  • Nearly half of all African-American families have lived in poor neighborhoods for at least two generations, compared to just 7 percent of white families.
  • African-American men are far more likely to be stopped and searched by police, charged with crimes, and sentenced to longer prison terms than white men, 10 percent longer for the same crimes in the federal system. In the state system the numbers are more skewed than that.

These facts alone illustrate that countless men and women face unprecedented challenges and are still judged by the color of their skin and not the content of their character. We have a moral obligation to change these realities. We must do everything within our power to ensure that all Americans know that their lives matter. That means standing for what is right, calling out bigotry and hatred when it’s seen and felt and then taking action to address this bigotry.

This coming from a leader for a Party that sees people, especially Blacks, simply as a large voting block to be pandered to, a Party whose policies have left Blacks stuck in those same ghettos. Those Black men being stopped and searched are typically within Democratic Party run stronghold cities. Why is it that the majority of crime in big cities, which tend to be Democratic Party strongholds, is perpetrated by Blacks, particularly Black men? Why are Blacks typically the vast majority of those who are murdered (by other Blacks) in these Democrat cities? Why are Blacks living in these poor neighborhoods in Democratic Party cities? Sure seems like Democratic Party has utterly failed the Black community, wouldn’t you say?

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