If All You See…

By William Teach March 15, 2013 – 1:00 pm

…is an evil fossil fueled truck causing a muddy drought world, you might just be a Warmist

The blog of the day is Victory Girls Blog, with a post on Sex Week at U Of Tennessee.

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Krugman Wants Climate Realists Punished In The Afterlife

By William Teach March 15, 2013 – 11:08 am

Yeah, this is the same guy who owns a massive McMansion with a giant “carbon footprint” as he pushes for Other People to be forced onto mass transit

(NY Times) And the thing is that these are externalities that everyone can see. You can deny global warming (and may you be punished in the afterlife for doing so — this kind of denial for petty personal or political reasons is an almost inconceivable sin). But can anyone deny that more drivers means more traffic congestion?

Well, maybe I’m understating the power of denial. But still, this is a totally obvious case for government intervention that’s staring us in the face every time we hit the road.

Gotta love that civil tone, wishing pain and agony on people who fail to share the climate astrologer’s point of view. Oh, and notice how Krugman’s rant morphs into wishing for more fascistic government?

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Obama To Take Fossil Fueled Flight To Propose Program To Eliminate Fossil Fuels

By William Teach March 15, 2013 – 8:55 am

Once again he’s on the campaign trail for his “green energy” meme

(Washington Post) The pitch President Obama will make as he visits the Energy Department’s Argonne National Laboratory outside Chicago Friday involves a bit of policy jujutsu: let’s take the money we make by producing oil to stop using it altogether.

Sequester? What Sequester? It costs $180k an hour to run Air Force One. The six hour round trip flight (to make a quick speech, shake a few hands, ask for some campaign donations, and then boogie back to D.C.) will cost over a million dollars, which could fund White House tours for 15 weeks. He couldn’t make the announcement on the grounds of the White House?

Obama will call for the establishment of the Energy Security Trust, a $2 billion fund over 10 years that takes some of the federal royalties the government receives from offshore oil and gas leasing to invest in research that will shift the country’s transportation sector away from using oil.

The White House selected Argonne because the lab did some of the breakthrough research into advanced battery technology back in the 1990s, before there was a commercial market for such things. Establishing a fund that will not be subject to the uncertainties of the annual appropriations cycle, said a White House aide who asked not to be identified in advance of the president’s appearance, will provide “a reliable stream of funding for critical breakthrough research” in the transportation sector.

In other words, a way to hook up Democrat donors with federal tax money not subject to the annual appropriations cycle, just like with 80% of the allocated Stimulus funds.

The goal, the aide continued, is to “ultimately get our cars and trucks off of oil.”

Yet, Obama will take yet another unnecessary fossil fueled flight, first on Marine One to Andrews, then on Air Force 1, followed by a trip in a fossil fueled limo surrounded by lots of fossil fueled SUVs, make a speech, followed by fossil fueled cars and trucks, then fossil fueled plane trip and helicopter trip. It’s good to be the king.

More: meanwhile, PINO Obama plans on further ruining the economy by expanding the Nixon era environmental requirements for projects to consider Hotcoldwetdry.

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Politico Wonders “What’s The Future For Sarah Palin?”

By William Teach March 15, 2013 – 8:26 am

Sarah Palin is one of the headliners at CPAC this year, with a big speech scheduled for Saturday. But, does she have a future in politics, or has she become, as Politico puts it, another Kardashian type figure, famous for being famous?

In January 2009, Sarah Palin had the world on a string. A potential Republican presidential field-clearer for the presidency, every sentence she uttered was news. A Fox News contract awaited her. So did book deals.

Four years later, Palin is without a clear option for elected office – or a clear sense she has an interest in any position of real public influence. She never took an active, leadership role in the tea party movement, beyond showing up at a scattered handful of events and talking it up on television. For many Americans, her name is now primarily a punchline and if she is envisioning a comeback, it may simply be too late.

You probably know by now that I am not a big fan of Sarah anymore, after being a huge supporter even before she was picked to be John McCain’s running mate (it was more like “mccain-PALIN”). That said, that part about her showing up at scattered events and having no leadership is rather disingenuous, as she was a huge force behind the historic 2010 midterms beat down of the Democrats. After that, though, it was flirting with running for president, then saying nope, then really not doing a whole lot to help the Republican candidates win in 2012, especially Romney.

Is it too late for a comeback? Reagan did it. Heck, Joe Biden did it. Others have. How many times did Lincoln run and lose? Of course, there’s the problem: she doesn’t run, and she needs to.

But as a force within the party, Palin has gone from sixty to zero within the span of a single presidential cycle.

“There was a ton of potential there, and it’s conceivable that there could be a second act, but it’s a little hard to see it now,” said Weekly Standard editor Bill Kristol, who championed Sarah from Alaska as a potential VP pick in 2008 for Sen. John McCain.

“She didn’t run, obviously, in 2012, and she hasn’t really made herself a leader on any particular issue,” added Kristol, arguing that one either needs to hold office or make themselves relevant on an issues front . “Usually you have to do one of those things…otherwise you’re just another pundit.”

She can get out there and excite the base with a speech. Her Facebook posts tend to trend. But there’s nothing sustained anymore. What are her positions? I hate to put it this way, but she’s much like Michael Moore and Al Gore. Once a huge force for Liberals, Moore and Gore now are mostly invisible, popping up every once in a while. Then fading out again.

Conservative columnist Charles Krauthammer argued she has as much of a chance of a second act as Joe Biden managed after being “laughed out of the race” in 1988 amid a plagiarism scandal.

However, he added, “Her act as a celebrity is done. Her act as a political figure is possible – if she applies herself.”

Others in the article discuss the celebrity factor. Palin has to decide what she wants to do. Be an occasional pundit, or be a force. To be a force, she needs to run, and win, a federally elected position. I maintain she should have run for the Senate. She still could. And should. But, is it too late?

Crossed at Right Wing News and Stop The ACLU.

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We’re Saved: Nanny Bloomberg To Lead Delegation To Fight Hotcoldwetdry In Sunny Johannesburg

By William Teach March 14, 2013 – 6:01 pm

Yeah, that would be the one in South Africa

(CBS NY) A summit of city mayors will convene in February of next year in Johannesburg, to discuss ways to fight global climate change.

Mayor Michael Bloomberg, who serves as chairman of the C40 Cities Climate Leadership Group, announced plans Tuesday along with Johannesburg Mayor Parks Tau for the fifth biennial C40 Cities Mayors Summit.

“Cities around the world, particularly C40 cities, are taking meaningful actions that have quantifiable outcomes. As a result – as our research shows – we are having a real impact combating the impacts of global climate change,” Bloomberg said in a news release. “While nations and international bodies meet to talk about these issues, the C40 Cities Mayors Summit is focused on the concrete actions we can take to protect the planet and grow our cities.”

They couldn’t Skype? How about a video conference? Go To Meeting? Nope, they have to take long fossil fueled flights to the ends of the Earth to discuss how Other People should be forced to reduce their “carbon footprints”.

The calculated carbon footprint of a flight from JFK to Johannesburg International is 8.9 metric tons (round trip first class, cause we know these mayors won’t be taking business class on the public dime). The average footprint worldwide is 4 tons per year. For Americans, it’s, depending on the source, 18-23 tons per year. So, almost half a years output for Americans to fly to and fro from South Africa for one meeting. And that’s just from NYC. It grows when you head to the western part of the country.

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Posted in AGW Idiocy, Climahypocrites, Democrats, Global Warming | 6 Comments | Trackback URL

Say, About That “It’s Hottest In 4,000 Years” Study…

By William Teach March 14, 2013 – 1:29 pm

…it continues to fall apart, as do most activist studies. And, it is an activist study, with such prognostication as “Over the coming decades (temperatures) are likely to surpass levels not seen on the planet since before the last ice age.” That’s part of the “reproduction.” Shaun Marcott, the study author, referred to “skeptics” as a “troll army.” Obviously, like most Climate Astrologers, he’s not happy about seeing his work put under a microscope. You know, which is what science is about.

Anyhow, here’s Dr. Don Easterbrook at Watts Up With That?

As in Part I, this segment analyzes the Marcott et al. conclusions using the scientific method of Feynman in which conclusions are checked against well-established data from other sources,. As Feynman points out, if a hypothesis (conclusion) disagrees with observations and data, it is wrong. It doesn’t make any difference how beautiful the hypothesis (conclusion) is, how smart the author is, or what the author’s name is, if it disagrees with data or observations, it is wrong.

Dr. Easterbrook compares the Marcott “data” to all the existing real world data, and finds

The Marcott et al. conclusion that “Global temperatures are warmer than at any time in at least 4,000 years” is clearly contrary to measured real-time data and thus fails the Feynman test, i.e., it is are wrong.

And

The Marcott et al. conclusion that “Global temperature….. has risen from near the coldest to the warmest levels of the Holocene within the past century.” A heat spike like this has never happened before, at least not in the last 11,300 years” is clearly contrary to measured real-time data and thus fails the Feynman test, i.e., their conclusion is wrong.

All you Believers can certainly attack Dr. Easterbrook personally, but the data is the data. But, but, but, Easterbrook is a “denier”!!!! What about Warmist Steve McIntyre?

Marcott et al 2013 has received lots of publicity, mainly because of its supposed vindication of the Stick. A number of commenters have observed that they are unable to figure out how Marcott got the Stick portion of his graph from his data set. Add me to that group.

The uptick occurs in the final plot-point of his graphic (1940) and is a singleton. I wrote to Marcott asking him for further details of how he actually obtained the uptick, noting that the enormous 1920-to-1940 uptick is not characteristic of the underlying data. Marcott’s response was unhelpful: instead of explaining how he got the result, Marcott stated that they had “clearly” stated that the 1890-on portion of their reconstruction was “not robust”. I agree that the 20th century portion of their reconstruction is “not robust”, but do not feel that merely describing the recent portion as “not robust” does full justice to the issues. Nor does it provide an explanation.

Virtually everything about the study is completely different from hundreds of other reconstructions (which all tend to be close to each other) based on real world data. Even NY Times Warmist Andrew Revkin wrote “This work is complicated, involving lots of statistical methods in extrapolating from scattered sites to a global picture, which means that there’s abundant uncertainty”. In other words, the science can’t stand under the sunshine of reality.

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Posted in Collapsing Science, Global Warming | 5 Comments | Trackback URL

If All You See…

By William Teach March 14, 2013 – 1:00 pm

…is a drought world turning everyone into nomadic hunters, you might just be a Warmist

The blog of the day is Barking Moonbat EWS, with a post on knife crime in the UK.

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Thought Of The Day

By William Teach March 14, 2013 – 11:21 am

That’s what people attempt to do every day at one spot on my drive home from work. I love forcing these people to miss getting on the 440 Beltline at that spot.

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Surprise: Insurers Warn Of Skyrocketing Costs Due To Obamacare

By William Teach March 14, 2013 – 8:58 am

Nancy Pelosi stated that “we have to pass the bill to find out what’s in it.” Well, no, not really, because pundits were saying before hand that Obamacare would cause the cost of health insurance to rise. Looks like they were right

(AP) Some Americans could see their insurance bills double next year as the health care overhaul law expands coverage to millions of people.

The nation’s big health insurers say they expect premiums — or the cost for insurance coverage — to rise from 20 to 100 percent for millions of people due to changes that will occur when key provisions of the Affordable Care Act roll out in January 2014.

Mark Bertolini, CEO of Aetna Inc., one of the nation’s largest insurers, calls the price hikes “premium rate shock.”

“We’ve done all the math, we’ve shared it with all the regulators, we’ve shared it with all the people in Washington that need to see it, and I think it’s a big concern,” Bertolini said during the company’s annual meeting with investors in December.

It’s not particularly a big concern for Democrats, who love the idea of Obamacare being a bridge to Single Payer. It’ll be amusing next year when all the Obamacare supporters who are hit with the massive price increases start complaining.

The impact of some cost hikes will be wide ranging. The new premium tax, for instance, will affect individual insurance, some employer-sponsored coverage and Medicare Advantage policies, which are privately-run versions of the government’s Medicare program for the elderly and disabled.

Other price hikes will vary due to factors like a person’s current coverage and age. Young people who currently have low-cost coverage may see some of the biggest hikes.

I maintain that this is not a bug, but a feature. The idea is to drive people from private insurance into the hands of the government run exchanges with all their subsidies, along with the Medicaid expansion. But, that money has to come from somewhere, which means rising costs and taxes somewhere else.

But Robert Laszewski, an industry consultant and former insurance executive, said that theory assumes there is no competition in the marketplace now. He noted that a small company may get quotes from as many as 10 insurers competing for business when it tries to find coverage through a broker.

Those who support the exchanges have this notion that they will create competition which could lower costs. Alas, as the above paragraph points out, there already is competition. Costs are costs. When insurance companies start going out of business due to their own skyrocketing costs and dwindling profits thanks to government mandates and taking on lots of sick people, that competition will dry up. Which is also a feature, not a bug.

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Obama: “I’m Not Involved With Drone Policies”

By William Teach March 14, 2013 – 8:18 am

Is there anything Obama does take responsibility for as POTUS/CiC?

(Politico) President Barack Obama’s defense to Democratic senators complaining about how little his administration has told Congress about the legal justifications for his drone policy: Dick Cheney was worse.

That’s part of what two senators in the room recounted of Obama’s response when, near the outset of his closed-door session with Senate Democratic conference on Tuesday, Sen. Jay Rockefeller (D-W.Va.) confronted the president over the administration’s refusal for two years to show Congressional intelligence committees Justice Department Office of Legal Counsel memos justifying the use of lethal force against American terror suspects abroad.

I’m amused that (PINO) Obama has compared himself to the former Vice President. A guy who Constitutionally has no power other than breaking a tie vote in the Senate.

In response to Rockefeller’s critique, Obama said he’s not involved in drafting such memos, the senators told POLITICO. He also tried to assure his former colleagues that his administration is more open to oversight than that of President George W. Bush, whom many Democratic senators attacked for secrecy and for expanding executive power in the national security realm.

The buck stops Somewhere Else. This is from a guy who personally picks the Jihadi recipients of drone strikes overseas, yet has no involvement with any drone memos when it comes to using them here in the United States. Yet, his administration blocked, let’s face it, Obama blocked, the release of all those memos which he had no involvement with to the Senate. Hey, remember all those times Cheney blocked the release of material to Congress? You don’t? Can’t find any stories about that? Weird!

At a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing Wednesday morning, chairman Patrick Leahy suggested he’d recently raised the issue with the president. The Vermont Democrat also reiterated his threat to subpoena one of the classified legal memos if the White House won’t fork it over. Leahy voted against Brennan’s confirmation in what the Judiciary Committee chairman said was a protest over the administration’s refusal to show the relevant memos to his committee, which oversees the Justice Department.

”Every time I asked the question of various people, the attorney general, the president and others, it’s always somebody else’s department,” Leahy said. “This is something we’re very serious about — one [opinion] especially this committee may end up subpoenaing if we can’t get it.”

Perhaps Leahy should directly ask (PINO) Obama who the actual president is, and where the buck stops, who’s in charge. That would be an amusing answer.

Let’s not forget that Obama also blamed the Secret Service for cancelling White House tours. Hey, it’s not like the POTUS could tell them “no” or something, right?

Crossed at Right Wing News and Stop The ACLU.

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