John Kerry: I Take Lots Of Fossil Fueled Trips So I Know Climate Change Is Bad

By William Teach June 19, 2013 – 10:58 am

Not sure if this is published elsewhere, but here’s our high flying Warmist of State

(Grist) Everywhere I travel as secretary of state –in every meeting, here at home and across the more than 100,000 miles I’ve traveled since I raised my hand and took the oath to serve in this office – I raise the concern of climate change. I do so not because it’s a pet issue or a personal priority, but because it’s critical to the survival of our civilization, and that means it’s a critical mission for me as our country’s top diplomat.

Hmm, that seems like quite a few fossil fueled miles. Perhaps John missed the poll showing that “climate change” comes in dead last?

As I said in Sweden in May, climate change is truly a life-and-death challenge for all of us.

Weather has always been dangerous, especially during cold periods and ice ages. Man has flourished best during warm periods.

When we last met with China’s leaders in California just a couple of weekends ago, after productive and candid dialogue, President Obama and President Xi were able to announce that the United States and China have agreed to work together and with others via the Montreal Protocol to phase down the production and consumption of hydrofluorocarbons (HFCs), highly potent greenhouse gases used in refrigerators and air-conditioners. This could eliminate nearly two years’ worth of current global greenhouse gas emissions between now and 2050.

He’s coming for your AC and fridge. Strangely he isn’t giving up his own massive carbon footprint.

Read: John Kerry: I Take Lots Of Fossil Fueled Trips So I Know Climate Change Is Bad »

Posted in Climahypocrites, Global Warming, Kerry | 6 Comments | Trackback URL

Taliban Kills 4 American Soldiers Shortly After Obama Hails Their Return To Talks

By William Teach June 19, 2013 – 8:15 am

This is the same Taliban that the Obama administration has wanted to have peace talks with for most of his presidency

(Yahoo News) President Barack Obama warmly welcomed the announcement on Tuesday of fresh reconciliation talks between Afghanistan’s government and the Taliban, as well as plans to launch a new round of direct negotiations between the insurgent force and the United States.

“This is an important first step toward reconciliation,” Obama told reporters after a meeting with French President François Hollande on the sidelines of the G-8 summit of rich countries. “It’s a very early step—we anticipate there will be a lot of bumps in the road—but the fact that the parties have an opportunity to talk and discuss Afghanistan’s future I think is very important.”

These types of bumps in the road?

A US official said insurgents attacked Bagram Air Base with “indirect fire”, suggesting the soldiers were killed by mortars or rockets.

The Taliban claimed responsibility for the attack. “Last night two big rockets were launched at Bagram (air base) which hit the target. Four soldiers are dead and six others are wounded. The rockets caused a major fire,” Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid said.

The NY Times is more concerned with Obama’s legacy than the actual deaths of Americans, but they do point out that Karzai is not happy with these negotiations

But then came the surprise announcement Wednesday that Afghan officials would cease cooperation with the United States in discussing the presence of American troops after most foreign forces withdraw next year. The Afghan officials were said to be angry that the new Taliban office in Qatar to host the peace talks would be called the “Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan” with the Taliban flag flying there, which Afghan officials felt would grant the insurgents too much legitimacy.

“In view of the contradiction between acts and the statements made by the United States of America in regard to the peace process, the Afghan government suspended the negotiations, currently under way in Kabul between Afghan and U.S. delegations, on the bilateral security agreement,” said a statement by the office of President Hamid Karzai of Afghanistan.

Even someone like Karzai, not the most trustworthy of leaders (but, then, consider what the US has as a “leader”) understands that the Taliban is a dangerous hardline Islamist group, but, Obama would prefer to negotiate with the terrorist group. Even while they kill US soldiers.

Read: Taliban Kills 4 American Soldiers Shortly After Obama Hails Their Return To Talks »

Posted in Barry Obama, War On Terrorism | 4 Comments | Trackback URL

House Approves Enforcement Based Illegal Immigration Plan

By William Teach June 19, 2013 – 7:19 am

While passage of an, for all intense purposes, amnesty bill with barely any border or other security (it’s a plan that requires creating a plan) will pass the Senate, with 4-6 Republicans voting for this mess, the Republican controlled House may take a different approach, and pass piecemeal legislation to deal with immigration and security

(The Hill) The House Judiciary Committee late Tuesday approved its first immigration bill, advancing on a party-line vote a proposal to boost interior enforcement and border security.

After a day-long mark-up, the Republican-led panel cleared the SAFE Act on a 20-15 vote shortly before 11 p.m. It is one of several bills that Chairman Bob Goodlatte (R-Va.) says the committee plans to send to the House floor in the coming weeks.

“The SAFE Act maintains the integrity of our immigration system by granting states and local governments the authority to enforce federal immigration laws,” Goodlatte said in a statement after the vote. “The bill also strengthens national security and protects our communities from those who wish to cause us harm.”

“While more work has yet to be done, today’s approval of the SAFE Act brings us one step closer to solving the immigration puzzle,” he added. “We have, and will continue, to take a step by step approach to immigration reform, thoroughly examining each piece in detail and working to find consensus on the other issues we need to fix.”

What’s amazing is that it would take a law to allow States to enforce existing. That’s what happens when you have an administration and its DOJ which sues and does what they can to stop states from enforcing the existing law. The SAFE act stands for Strengthen and Fortify Enforcement (SAFE) Act . In reality, which The Hill fails to mention, is that the SAFE act would allow states to enforce their own immigration laws, which would make ones like Arizona’s 1070B legal.

Obviously, Democrats are upset by this. They do not want any illegals targeted, “racially profiled”, as they put it, that aren’t criminals. I wonder if any intrepid reporter could ask these Dems how we would know that they have no criminal background (other than blowing of our sovereignty laws and living in the US unlawfully, of course) without catching them. SAFE is also a measure that attempts to get illegals to self deport.

It now looks like Speaker Boehner is going to side with the GOP in terms of stopping the Senate amnesty bill. I suspect he was just playing coy during this process, seeing how it shakes out. He will probably allow a quick vote on it, knowing it will go down in flames in the House. Over in the Senate, Marco Rubio (D-Fla) and 4 of his RINO comrades voted against the Thune amendment, which would have required that the border fence be finished. What’s just as amazing is that Thune needed to file an amendment to force the government to finish the job which previous federal law already required.

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Ted Cruz Files Amendment Requiring ID, Citizenship To Register To Vote

By William Teach June 18, 2013 – 4:02 pm

Is it any wonder Ted Cruz is so darned popular with Conservatives? He stands up for, in this case, law and order (via Phineas on Twitter (make sure you follow him)

(Daily Caller) Texas Sen. Ted Cruz will propose an amendment to the comprehensive immigration reform bill that would allow states to require ID before registering voters, after a Supreme Court announced a decision Monday striking down an Arizona law that required that people show proof of citizenship when registering to vote.

“I’ll file amendment to immigration bill that permits states to require ID before registering voters & close this hole in fed statutory law,” Cruz tweeted Monday afternoon.

This goes back to the SCOTUS decision Monday which knocked down the Arizona proof of citizenship to vote law (which also somewhat empowered States to go hat in hand to petition the DOJ to allow certain measure or ask for a court ruling if the DOJ refuses to cooperate).

According to Cruz’s twitter feed, he has filed that amendment along with David Vitter to the immigration bill

“The right to vote is a fundamental building block of our nation’s democratic process and it is crucial that we have the measures in place to uphold the integrity of our elections,” said Sen. Cruz. “This amendment ensures that states can enforce the commonsense requirement that those registered to vote must actually be U.S. citizens.”

The Cruz-Vitter amendment states: “Nothing in subsection (a) [42 U.S.C. §1973gg-4(a)] shall be construed to preempt any State law requiring evidence of citizenship in order to complete any requirement to register to vote in elections for Federal office.” This measure simply amends an existing federal statute; it does not require states to adopt certain voting requirements, respecting the interests of federalism.

We can expect that this amendment will be shot down by the Democrats, along with some of the pro-illegal Republicans, in the Senate. Provided that Harry Reid (D) even allows a vote on it.

However, this still won’t fully solve the issue of people who are not US citizens registering after they are legalized. Many states already allow illegal aliens and non-citizens with visas to obtain state drivers licenses. North Carolina was smart, making sure that their DLs for illegals say “legal status no lawful status”, but, we can certainly expect the far left voter registration groups to simply ignore the status in attempting to create more Democrat voters. ID to register and vote will certainly help, but this breaks down when the human element gets involved. But, the Cruz-Vitter amendment will help.

Read: Ted Cruz Files Amendment Requiring ID, Citizenship To Register To Vote »

Posted in Election Fraud, GOP, Illegal Immigration | 1 Comment | Trackback URL

If All You See…

By William Teach June 18, 2013 – 1:00 pm

…is a wonderful sustainable form of transportation, you might just be a Warmist

The blog of the day is Moonbattery, with a post on male perverts now allowed access to high school girls’ locker rooms.

Read: If All You See… »

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

Accuweather Names 2013 Seventh Warmest On Record

By William Teach June 18, 2013 – 12:21 pm

Are you ready for serious cherry picking?

How did the Spring of 2013 Rank?

NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies (GISS) has released their temperature anomaly data for the Spring of 2013 in the Northern Hemisphere, which includes the full months of March, April and May.

The March through May period averaged +0.56 degrees C. or 1.00 F. above the 1951-1980 average globally, thus placing the period as tied for 7th warmest on record with 2011, 2003 and 2001.

If you’re using the 1951-1980 average, well, yes, everything will be above that, because that period saw cooling temperatures, till about 1978 (remember, magazines and scientists were worried about a coming ice age during that period, especially by the mid-1970’s)

However, if we look at the longer term trend, we are slapped in the face with the reality that the US had it’s coldest spring since 1924

The UK had their coldest spring in 30 years. Nations across Europe, Asia, and the Middle East saw their coldest spring in 30 or more years. Many of them never really had a Spring. Russia has seen a cold spring.

Warmists just can’t help themselves.

Read: Accuweather Names 2013 Seventh Warmest On Record »

Posted in Collapsing Science, Global Warming | 3 Comments | Trackback URL

Bummer: Action On Climate Change Comes In Dead Last In UN Sponsored Vote

By William Teach June 18, 2013 – 9:03 am

Some funny “climate change” news for you this Tuesday morning, as The View From Here tells it (via Watts Up With That?)

Back in March of this year, the United Nations Development Program (UNDP) announced an “innovative initiative” in which participants from around the world are invited to vote on what the priorities should be in a post-2015 world.

When I first stumbled across the “For information media • not an official record” of a March 13 Press Conference (and standard photo-op and exhortation from Ban Ki-Moon), I was concerned that this might have been another opportunity missed. Here are some excerpts from the Press Conference (note the use of past tense … all emphases mine -hro):

What this ends up being is a world wide vote looking at 16 different measures, including “action on climate change”, which states

This means that governments should take on binding commitments to reduce carbon emissions to levels which can keep the global temperature rise below 2 degrees, and invest in adaptation measures particularly involving vulnerable communities

and “reliable energy at home”, for which Anthony Watts notes that they slipped in “More of that energy should be sustainably generated” without defining sustainably, but we all know that it is linked to Hotcoldwetdry and that governments should spend tons of money picking and choosing which campaign donors will get taxpayer money for “green” projects.

Anyhow, here’s where it gets funny

Action taken on climate change is dead last in the world, and dead last with people who have low and medium HDI (Human Development Index) which is a measure of the prosperity and health of the country they reside in. Dead last amongst those under 35, and #15 for the other two age groups. As Anthony notes

It seems concern over climate change is a rich person’s pastime, which just goes to show that cheap energy is the path forward to a better HDI, and thus a greater ability to be concerned about the environment. Translation: people just getting by don’t have time for such concerns.

Caring about “Climate change” is a 1st world problem.

As to the rest of the vote, here’s how I voted

  • An honest and responsive government is #3 worldwide, #2 in the US.
  • Sadly, protecting forests, rivers and oceans is #8 worldwide and #6 in the US. Hey, I like the environment.
  • Disturbingly, Political freedoms is #13 worldwide and #11 in the US
  • Equality between men and women is #12 worldwide and #9 in the US
  • Freedom from discrimination and persecution is #9 in the world and #7 in the US
  • A good education is #1 across the board (except for those 55+) but better job opportunities is #4 in the world and, get this, #12 in the US.
  • And you know how Obama’s been running around proclaiming everyone should have access to the Internet? Yup, #15 in the US.
  • And how he whines about infrastructure? Better transport and roads is dead last in the United States.

You can take the poll yourself here.

Read: Bummer: Action On Climate Change Comes In Dead Last In UN Sponsored Vote »

Posted in Collapsing Science, Global Warming | 1 Comment | Trackback URL

HHS Dictates What Forms Of Payment Insurers Will Take

By William Teach June 18, 2013 – 8:37 am

Does anyone remember, during the time when the Democrat controlled House and Senate were looking to pass Obamacare, if the notion that the legislation made any determination as to what forms of payment would be required to purchase health insurance was mentioned? Yeah, me neither

(NJ.com) The U.S.Department of Health and Human Services last week proposed a new rule that would require issuers of health insurance plans to accept different types of payments so that individuals without a bank account will still be able to purchase health insurance once the Affordable Care Act takes effect in January.

The proposed rule would require insurers to accept things like cashier’s checks, money orders and prepaid debit cards.

This is based on the issue that approximately 27% of uninsured Americans (a ton of which are illegal aliens and non-citizens) do not have checking accounts, which I suppose leads into these people getting their federal tax credits or something. The article doesn’t say, nor does that “proposed rule” (BTW, that document, which covers several different topics, is another 253 pages of rule-making), what the big bruhaha about this is.

The federal government’s report comes less than one month after Parsippany-based tax firm Jackson- Hewitt released its own report entitled “Uninsured + Unbanked = Unenrolled: How Health Insurance Companies Could Exclude One in Four Eligible Americans from ACA Health Coverage and What the Federal Government Can Do to Stop It,”

What that article alludes to, as does Clark Howard, is the notion that insurance companies typically require consumers to pay their monthly premiums through a checking account. Why? For one thing, they’d like guaranteed payment. However, I’m sure they’d take cashier’s checks and money orders, which are as good as cash. The Jackson-Hewitt article also calls this “discriminatory” towards Blacks and Hispanics, ie, raaaaacist.

That all said, one has to love the notion that the federal government, in this case Health and Human Services, can dictate what forms of payment private companies must take. Doesn’t seem like Liberals are interested in allow some entities to make their own “choice”, eh?

But, where did this power come from? It certainly wasn’t in the 2000+ page Obamacare legislation specifically, nor even in a roundabout manner. It comes from the huge amount of mentions along the lines of “the director of HHS shall (may, can)”, giving the director of HHS the power to make it up as she goes along. Even forcing private businesses to take forms of payment they’d rather not.

But, then, this is the same HHS will force religious organizations to violate their consciences and violates the 1st Amendment regarding the religious clause.

Crossed at Right Wing News and Stop The ACLU.

Read: HHS Dictates What Forms Of Payment Insurers Will Take »

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SCOTUS Takes Down Arizona Voting Law

By William Teach June 17, 2013 – 2:23 pm

Only 2 Justices stood with the writings in the Constitution

(US News) The Supreme Court on Monday struck down an Arizona law that requires people to submit proof of citizenship when they register to vote.

The vote was 7-2. Justice Antonin Scalia, writing for the majority, said that a 1993 federal law known as the Motor Voter Act takes precedence over the Arizona law because of its requirement that states “accept and use” the federal voter registration form.

From WRAL, where I first saw this

The Constitution “authorizes states to determine the qualifications of voters in federal elections, which necessarily includes the related power to determine whether those qualifications are satisfied,” Thomas said in his dissent.

Justice Alito was the other dissenting vote.

Let’s put this into context: The government is looking to legalize up to 11 million illegals. None of them would be citizens, and will have no right to vote as long as they are under the provisional status. Yet, federal law is rather weak on registering to vote, and this SCOTUS ruling means states which have a large population of illegals could see vast numbers registering with no way to determine eligibility. Go look up the requirements to register and see how easy it is to commit fraud.

More: From SCOTUSblog, via the link that Guitar Carver left in the comments that goes to this one

If a reader of the Scalia opinion stopped at the top of page 13, the impression would be very clear that Congress had won hands down in the field of regulating federal elections.   But from that point on, there is abundant encouragement for what is essentially a states’ rights argument: that is, that the states have very wide authority to define who gets to vote, in both state and federal elections.

On the particular point at issue in this case — Arizona’s requirement of proof of citizenship before one may register to vote or actually vote — the Scalia opinion said that a state was free to ask the federal government for permission to add that requirement.   And, Scalia said, if that doesn’t work — either because the federal agency that would deal with such a request is either not functioning or says no — then a state would be free to go to court and make an argument that it has a constitutional right to insist on proof of citizenship as an absolute qualification for voting, in all elections.

However, no one should think that the Obama/Holder heavily politicized and illegal immigrant favoring DOJ would allow any requirements for proof of citizenship, especially if the Gang of 8 immigration bill passes. Democrats will want as many people voting as the can, even if they are not entitled to do so. In fact, as a sidebar, if the bill passes, Dems will immediately agitate and push to make them naturalized citizens ASAP, forget 13 years. But, in the intervening time, they will allow no measures that would require proof of eligibility to vote, and the left side groups will certainly work to register the illegals with provisional status.

As far as court goes, one could expect the DOJ to gum up the works as long as possible, and surely past the 2016 General Election.

Read: SCOTUS Takes Down Arizona Voting Law »

Posted in Constitution, Illegal Immigration | 14 Comments | Trackback URL

If All You See…

By William Teach June 17, 2013 – 1:00 pm

…is a deluge caused by drought inducing CO2, you might just be a Warmist

The blog of the day is Legal Insurrection, with a post discussing the “reformer” Hassan Rouhani.

Read: If All You See… »

Posted in If All You See | 1 Comment | Trackback URL
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