UK Guardian Notes That Obama Should Practice What He Preaches On “Climate Change”

I might have expected this more from The UK Telegraph, not the vastly left leaning Guardian

Barack Obama should practise what he preaches about climate change

Grand speeches on fighting global warming are meaningless if US keeps blocking EU’s efforts to cut carbon emissions

When President Barack Obama gave his long-awaited climate change speech in June, many US environmentalists bought the notion that a green giant was awakening in the White House.

“Sticking your head in the sand might make you feel safer, but it’s not going to protect you from the coming storm,” Obama warned climate laggards then.

Here’s a problem though. One environmental foot-dragger President Obama could have addressed this comment to is … President Obama.

On Wednesday, the Council of the International Civil Aviation Organisation (Icao) is expected to approve a US-backed text that would restrict Europe’s efforts to make airlines pay for their emissions under its carbon trading scheme, and stall global efforts to charge airlines for their pollution until 2016 or later.

Oh, wait, writer Aurthur Neslen isn’t talking about Obama’s massive “carbon footprint”, estimated to be at least 41,000 metric tons, while the average of world citizens is around 2 metric tons. Heck, the average US citizens is just above 19mt. He’s worried about airplanes

Airlines are the fastest growing source of global greenhouse gas output. Already responsible for 5% of the world’s annual global warming, by 2030 their emissions are projected to double from 2005 levels.

Sure they are. And there’s Obama running all over the US and world in fossil fueled travel. I wonder how many private fossil fueled planes will be flown to the up-coming IPCC conference in Poland?

Say, I wonder if Obama will purchase carbon offsets for any airstrikes on Syria?

Read: UK Guardian Notes That Obama Should Practice What He Preaches On “Climate Change” »

If All You See…

…is an evil Gaia killing puppy, using up too many resources, you might just be a Warmist

The blog of the day is Sister Toldjah, with a post on liberal logic.

Read: If All You See… »

Warmists Now Want “Climate Change” Added To Civil Rights Agenda

They really can’t help themselves. Now they’re trying to link the work Martin Luther King, Jr did to hotcoldwetdry

(Should climate change be added to the civil rights agenda?)

This week, tens of thousands of people from across America streamed into the nation’s capital to observe the 50th anniversary of the 1963 March on Washington — and Green for All was among them

We marched against the recent attack on voting rights. We demanded justice in the face of Stand Your Ground laws and racial profiling. We marched to raise awareness on unemployment, poverty, gun violence, immigration, and gay rights. And we called for action on climate change.

Chances are, when you think about civil rights, environmental issues aren’t on the radar screen. But stop and think about it. Remember Hurricane Katrina?

The hurricane that leveled New Orleans showed that severe weather in low-income neighborhoods and communities of colour is a matter of life and death. The images from the storm are hard to forget: bodies floating in water for days and thousands of people stranded without shelter, waiting for help that was too slow to come.

I remember a Democrat mayor and Democrat governor leaving the poor people in New Orleans to fend for themselves both before and after Katrina. I remember these poor people being so brainwashed that they made no attempt to escape N.O. prior to Katrina, because Government wasn’t assisting them.

Climate change isn’t just an environmental issue; it’s about keeping our communities safe. It’s a matter of justice. Because when it comes to disasters — from extreme temperatures to storms like Katrina — people of colour are consistently hit first and worst.

What this article does is provide more proof that “climate change” is not science, but part of the Far Left political agenda.

We have work to do to make sure more people of color have access to the opportunities created by responding to climate change. But if we are successful, we will help create a world where our kids can breathe clean air and drink clean water; where we’re safe and resilient in the face of storms; where more of us share in the nation’s prosperity.

This is Dr. King’s dream reborn. And fighting climate change helps get us there.

Read: Warmists Now Want “Climate Change” Added To Civil Rights Agenda »

How Many Body Armored Police Does It Take To Check For Dirty Water?

The answer would be eight (via Climate Depot

(Alaska Dispatch) When agents with the Alaska Environmental Crimes Task Force surged out of the wilderness around the remote community of Chicken wearing body armor and jackets emblazoned with POLICE in big, bold letters, local placer miners didn’t quite know what to think.

Did it really take eight armed men and a squad-size display of paramilitary force to check for dirty water? Some of the miners, who run small businesses, say they felt intimidated.

Others wonder if the actions of the agents put everyone at risk. When your family business involves collecting gold far from nowhere, unusual behavior can be taken as a sign someone might be trying to stage a robbery. How is a remote placer miner to know the people in the jackets saying POLICE really are police?

Miners suggest it might have been better all around if officials had just shown up at the door — as they used to do — and said they wanted to check the water.

In case you were wondering, the Environmental Protection Agency was involved

The EPA has refused to publicly explain why it used armed officers as part of what it called a “multi-jurisdictional” investigation of possible Clean Water Act violations in the area.

A conference call was held last week to address the investigation. On the line were members of the Alaska Congressional delegation, their staff, state officers, and the EPA. According to one Senate staffer, the federal agency said it decided to send in the task force armed and wearing body armor because of information it received from the Alaska State Troopers about “rampant drug and human trafficking going on in the area.”

There was apparently some concern over drug smuggling and human trafficking, which absolutely no-one is buying. And only one person was a compliance officer meant to check the water quality.

Read: How Many Body Armored Police Does It Take To Check For Dirty Water? »

Oh My: NY Times Notes The Brutality From Syrian Rebels

One issue of concern regarding any vote to authorize it’s-not-really-war-but-an-action (a Senate panel voted in a split decision to authorize the not a war Wednesday) is the state of the Syrian opposition. And, shockingly, the NY Times actually discusses the state of the rebels and their brutality

The Syrian rebels posed casually, standing over their prisoners with firearms pointed down at the shirtless and terrified men.

The prisoners, seven in all, were captured Syrian soldiers. Five were trussed, their backs marked with red welts. They kept their faces pressed to the dirt as the rebels’ commander recited a bitter revolutionary verse.

“For fifty years, they are companions to corruption,” he said. “We swear to the Lord of the Throne, that this is our oath: We will take revenge.”

And then they shot the prisoners. Remember when a Syrian rebel leader cut out the heart of a prisoner and ate it? On camera? While his companions yelled that special jihadist slogan “Allahu Akbar”?

As the United States debates whether to support the Obama administration’s proposal that Syrian forces should be attacked for using chemical weapons against civilians, this video, shot in April, joins a growing body of evidence of an increasingly criminal environment populated by gangs of highwaymen, kidnappers and killers.

And Islamic extremists, who were able to infiltrate the anti-Assad forces and offer aid since Obama and other world leaders refused to offer aid and comfort previously.

The video also offers a reminder of the foreign policy puzzle the United States faces in finding rebel allies as some members of Congress, including Senator John McCain, press for more robust military support for the opposition.

Much of the concern among American officials has focused on two groups that acknowledge ties to Al Qaeda. These groups — the Nusra Front and the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria — have attracted foreign jihadis, used terrorist tactics and vowed to create a society in Syria ruled by their severe interpretation of Islamic law.

So, if the Senate and House vote to authorize it’s-not-really-war against Assad and Obama finally decides to launch some airstrikes against, well, targets of little consequence with some forceful finger wagging, that’s who we’d be helping.

Crossed at Right Wing News and Stop The ACLU.

Read: Oh My: NY Times Notes The Brutality From Syrian Rebels »

Say, Remember When We Bombed Libya To Protect Oil For France And Britain?

How’s that working out? (via Ed Morrissey)

(UK Independent) Libya has almost entirely stopped producing oil as the government loses control of much of the country to militia fighters.

Mutinying security men have taken over oil ports on the Mediterranean and are seeking to sell crude oil on the black market. Ali Zeidan, Libya’s Prime Minister, has threatened to “bomb from the air and the sea” any oil tanker trying to pick up the illicit oil from the oil terminal guards, who are mostly former rebels who overthrew Muammar Gaddafi and have been on strike over low pay and alleged government corruption since July. (snip)

In an escalating crisis little regarded hitherto outside the oil markets, output of Libya’s prized high-quality crude oil has plunged from 1.4 million barrels a day earlier this year to just 160,000 barrels a day now. Despite threats to use military force to retake the oil ports, the government in Tripoli has been unable to move effectively against striking guards and mutinous military units that are linked to secessionist forces in the east of the country.

Despite all the yammering about protecting civilians during the Libyan civil war, this was really about protecting the flow of oil to France and Britain. Not working out so well, eh? No that much else is working out very well in Libya. Except for Jihadists.

Read: Say, Remember When We Bombed Libya To Protect Oil For France And Britain? »

If All You See…

…are evil meat filled sandwiches and a CO2 infused beer, you might just be a Warmist

The blog of the day is Director Blue, with a post on Obama’s checklist for Syria.

Read: If All You See… »

Hooray! Obama Says His Red Line Is World’s Red Line

I’m not sure if the word “shameless” is strong enough. SCOAMF might work

(CNN) President Barack Obama said Wednesday that the red line he outlined last year regarding Syria’s use of chemical weapons came from international treaties and past congressional action, and now it is time for the international community to make good on its opposition to the banned armaments.

“I didn’t set a red line. The world set a red line,” Obama told reporters on the first day of a four-day trip to Sweden and Russia to attend a G-20 summit in St. Petersburg.

Like most, I was flabbergasted when I heard this live.

More on this at Twitchy. Obama also said that it wasn’t his credibility on the line, in response to a direct question

“My credibility is not on the line, the international community’s credibility is on the line,” he responds.

He also said Congress’ credibility is on the line. Interestingly, Sweden hasn’t rushed out to go bomb Syria. Or even noted that they’re interested. Nor have any other nations.

I was also disappointed that Obama slouched and leaned on the podium virtually the entire time. Rather embarrassing.

More: The Weekly Standard has the video.

Read: Hooray! Obama Says His Red Line Is World’s Red Line »

Warmists Now Claim “Climate Change” Will Steer Big Hurricanes Away From East Coast

In terms of landfalling hurricanes, this seems to be what’s happening. It’s been over 7 years and 10 months since a major hurricane (category 3+) hit the United States. There has only been one barely a hurricane strike since 2008. Superstorm Sandy was not a hurricane at time of landfall. Hurricanes and tropical systems seem to be staying out at sea more often. Could it be a result of a climate that is in the midst of a mostly natural warm period? Sure. But, I suspect this “report” is simply a CYA one designed to protect the Climatologists religion

(Guardian) A recurrence of Superstorm Sandy – which barrelled head-on into the Atlantic coast, swamping New York City and large parts of New Jersey – is less likely under climate change, new research suggests.

Scientists expect stronger hurricanes under climate change, and possibly even more frequent storms – especially those at category 3 and higher. But New York City and much of the seaboard will be at lower risk of taking a direct hit, the study published on Monday in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences said.

Instead, climate change will make it even less likely future storms will follow Sandy’s devastating track. The killer storm made a sharp left turn to slam straight into the Atlantic coast. The odds of a storm like Sandy were already extremely remote – a once in 700 year event – when it hit in October 2012. But it was that trajectory that made Sandy so devastating.

Essentially, what they’re saying is “we don’t know why the humongous 2005 storm year hasn’t become the new norm, why tropical systems are hitting the east coast with less frequency, and why there aren’t more major storms, but, we need the money train to keep a rollin’, so here’s a study”.

The researchers used climate models, based on a tripling of greenhouse gas emissions by 2100, to study whether future atmospheric conditions be more or less likely to blow a storm like Sandy westwards into the Atlantic coast.

Ah. computer models. Which, as you remember, dear reader, fail to even predict what happened in the past. As it stands, hurricane predictions cannot even predict what will happen just a few days out with certainty. But, don’t worry, they know what will happen 90 years from now. When CO2 levels are 1200ppm.  Right. Sure thing. But, if true, doesn’t this mean “climate change” is a good thing? Having lived through many tropical systems here in North Carolina, I’d say so.

Read: Warmists Now Claim “Climate Change” Will Steer Big Hurricanes Away From East Coast »

Thinking Out Loud, John Kerry Won’t Rule Out Ground Troops

Remember the days when John Kerry said that Iraq was the wrong war in the wrong place in the wrong time? When he and other Democrats, including President McBombypants, were constantly assaulting Operation Iraqi Freedom, which freed 50 million people from a brutal, murderous, torturous, rapist, limb cutting off, chemical weapons using regime which saw, according to a statistical study done by a Jordanian doctor, 50 thousand children die every year because they were denied food and medicine? How about when Saddam continued to violate 17 UN resolutions? Supported multiple Middle East terrorist groups? Paid families $25K to send their kids off on suicide bombing missions in Israel? How things change

(Mediate) Secretary of State John Kerry refused to absolutely rule out the possibility of U.S. troops on the ground in Syria on Tuesday.

During a hearing on Syria in front of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, committee chairman Sen. Bob Menendez asked Kerry whether there would be any possibility of ground troops eventually entering Syria at some point.

The administration has “no desire” to do that, Kerry said.

But, “In the event Syria imploded for instance or in the event there was a threat of a chemical weapons cache falling into the hands of al-Nusra or someone else and it was clearly in the interest of our allies — all of us, the British, the French, and others,” Kerry said, “I don’t want to take off the table an option that might or might not be available to the president of the United States to secure our country.”

Kerry quickly walked it back, saying, “The bottom line is, the president has no intention and will not, and we do not want to, put American troops on the ground to fight this, or be involved in the fighting of this civil war, period.”

What could possibly go wrong with limited air strikes on a client state of Russia and Iran which isn’t really targeting the actual chemical weapons caches? Surely, all those jihadist groups fighting against Assad wouldn’t try and do something like get their hands on them, right? And could we possibly have any sense that Obama would listen to the American people and not put any troops on the ground, considering he doesn’t listen to Americans in the first place, and cares not a whit for the Constitution?

Pressed on this point later by Sen.Bob Corker, Kerry said, “All I did was raise a hypothetical question about some possibility — and I’m thinking out loud — about how to protect America’s interests.”

And there’s one of the problems: what are America’s interests in the Syrian civil war, matching a brutal regime against Islamic terror groups? So far, I have yet to hear anything to confirm any American interests. How about you?

Crossed at Right Wing News and Stop The ACLU.

Read: Thinking Out Loud, John Kerry Won’t Rule Out Ground Troops »

Pirate's Cove