Know Why Hotcoldwetdry Is Dying? Racism

By William Teach October 24, 2012 – 11:02 am

I read this David Roberts piece over at Grist the other day, but, I missed an important part. Fortunately, Steven Goddard points it out. Roberts starts out with

 Watch this absolutely extraordinary video from the 1988 vice presidential debate, dug up by Brad Johnson of Forecast the Facts:

This is from 1988 — 24 years ago. The questioner doesn’t mamby-pamby around with he-said she-said, he states flatly that “most scientists” agree and that future generations are at risk.

And neither candidate bothers with dissembling or dodging. Both acknowledge the problem and promise to address it.

In 1988! In the ensuing 24 years, U.S. politics has moved backward on this issue.

In the ensuing 24 years, people realized that it was mostly a mule fritters issue based on giving government more control of people, the private sector, and shifting even more money to government. With the rise of the Internet, people were able to get a much less biased view as all the facts were laid out, not just the one sided “facts” appearing in the media. Anyhow, here we go

Throughout the decade from 1998 to 2008, Democrats swung around more solidly behind climate concern, but Republican sentiment stayed roughly steady. Right around 2008, however, there was a sharp uptick in skepticism about climate change, almost exclusively among far-right conservatives.

Now, what happened in 2008 that might have turned conservatives against climate? Hm … thinking … wait, wasn’t there an election that year? Why yes, I believe there was. Black Democrat took office, as I recall.

See? It couldn’t have anything to do with unhinged prognostications from Warmists, prognostications that weren’t coming to pass, that people were exposed to the other side of the issue, that science was showing that “climate change” was BS, that the models were failing, that the models were shown to be flawed, manipulated, and wrong, that data was being massaged to show what the researchers wanted it to show, that the researchers refused to release their raw data and methodologies, that the IPCC was shown to be highly flawed (to put it nicely), that those who believed in AGW the most had the biggest “carbon footprints”……no, it had to be raaaaacism.

Yeah, that should be a winning argument.

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Obama Increasingly Angry, Desperate, And Un-Presidential

By William Teach October 24, 2012 – 9:20 am

So writes Commentary’s Jonathan S. Tobin

As I wrote last night, President Obama’s attack mode during the Boca Raton debate seemed to suggest that he was the challenger trailing in the race rather than the incumbent nursing an alleged lead. But the president’s nasty streak is also displaying itself on the campaign trail, where he has been trying out one-liners about his rival like a would-be comic at open mic night at a comedy club. Last week’s big yuck was his “Romnesia” crack that alludes to the fact that Romney has changed his positions on some issues. Today, he doubled down on that one by saying Romney had “stage 3 Romnesia” at a rally in Delray Beach, Florida.

One might ask what exactly about cancer, a disease whose progress is generally referred to in stages in that manner, is so funny? But even if we are ready to give him a pass for showing bad taste, one has to question the strategy being employed here. For several months, the entire Democratic campaign seemed predicated on derision and demonization of Romney. But in the first presidential debate the GOP candidate blew that effort out of the water, changing not only the direction of the race but rendering much of the Obama campaign’s material obsolete if not completely irrelevant. Yet despite that, the president keeps playing the same losing hand aimed at denigrating an opponent who strikes most Americans as inherently reasonable. That makes one wonder whether the president’s condescending attitude as well as his sarcasm has a lot more to do with his anger at Romney’s strength and staying power than it does with any tactical political plan. More and more, it’s sounding as if President Obama is just plain mad at Romney because of the growing possibility that he’s going to lose the election.

One might wonder why Obama is so angry that he might lose the election. On one hand, he seems to like to be president; on the other, he doesn’t seem to like to do president. Might he not feel better if he was just plain old Barack H. Obama, free to play golf and party every day? He can supplement his government provided pension by writing a few more books about himself.

Perhaps it’s the notion that someone would dare speak back to Him, something certainly few have done over the past almost 4 years. Perhaps it’s the notion that he might lose all that power, and no longer be able to chose which target on his kill list to launch a drone strike on, and no longer be able to impose his will on the country through executive fiat. With some, power breeds the want of more power.

Perhaps this is just who he is, an angry, narcissistic, and petulant man. We saw brief flashes of this on the campaign trail in 2008. The Greek columns were a big hint. The nastiness displayed to John McCain post-coronation was a second clue. All the rage when Republicans dared to block Obama’s wish list of far left spending and policies. And along comes this Mitt Romney character, who’s dared to assail Obama with Obama’s own pathetic record. And that makes Obama angry. Obama positioned himself as The Savior of America, and people agreed with him, calling him The One and the Lightbringer, took pictures of Obama that made it seem that he had a halo around his head, and now this Romney guy is challenging Him. How dare he!

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Emails Confirm White House Informed Of Possible Terrorist Attack In Benghazi Within Two Hours

By William Teach October 24, 2012 – 8:42 am

Reuters provides their own little “October Surprise”, one entirely of the Obama administrations making. We know that the State Dept. was initially labeling the attack on our Benghazi consulate as a terrorist attack, before switching over to the “it was a spontaneous attack that got a bit chippy”. The White House and State has since thrown the intelligence community under the bus numerous times, but, it seems they weren’t as negligent as they’ve been deemed. And, as This ain’t Hell…. posits “what did the president know and when did he know it?”

(Reuters) Officials at the White House and State Department were advised two hours after attackers assaulted the U.S. diplomatic mission in Benghazi, Libya, on September 11 that an Islamic militant group had claimed credit for the attack, official emails show.

The emails, obtained by Reuters from government sources not connected with U.S. spy agencies or the State Department and who requested anonymity, specifically mention that the Libyan group called Ansar al-Sharia had asserted responsibility for the attacks.

The records obtained by Reuters consist of three emails dispatched by the State Department’s Operations Center to multiple government offices, including addresses at the White House, Pentagon, intelligence community and FBI, on the afternoon of September 11.

The first email, timed at 4:05 p.m. Washington time – or 10:05 p.m. Benghazi time, 20-30 minutes after the attack on the U.S. diplomatic mission allegedly began – carried the subject line “U.S. Diplomatic Mission in Benghazi Under Attack” and the notation “SBU”, meaning “Sensitive But Unclassified.”

A second email, headed “Update 1: U.S. Diplomatic Mission in Benghazi” and timed 4:54 p.m. Washington time, said that the Embassy in Tripoli had reported that “the firing at the U.S. Diplomatic Mission in Benghazi had stopped and the compound had been cleared.” It said a “response team” was at the site attempting to locate missing personnel.

A third email, also marked SBU and sent at 6:07 p.m. Washington time, carried the subject line: “Update 2: Ansar al-Sharia Claims Responsibility for Benghazi Attack.”

The message reported: “Embassy Tripoli reports the group claimed responsibility on Facebook and Twitter and has called for an attack on Embassy Tripoli.”

So, not long after 4pm on September 11th, the POTUS should have been informed of the attack on our consulate and people. A bit after 6pm, he should have been aware that an al Qaeda affiliated group was taking responsibility. Said emails were sent to the “White House Situation Room, the president’s secure command post.” Obama had a briefing scheduled with Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta at 5pm, so we know he was supposed to be at the White House.  Is there anyone who can possibly think that no one would inform the POTUS that a consulate was under attack?

More important than what did he know, is “what did he do?” Was there any attempt to send in forces to protect our people, or did they simply rely on the September 17 Martyrs Brigade?

After that, why did he give a nebulous squishy Rose Garden speech on September 12 which mentioned terrorism, but did not ascribe the attack specifically to terrorism? And then go on to blame a video, including during his United Nations speech, along with others doing the same, such as Susan Rice and Press Secretary Jay Carney? There are two reasons we can deduce: the incompetence of the Obama administration during and before this crisis, which would include the failure to provide proper security in Benghazi, a place that even the press knew was infested with Islamic extremist groups and increasingly dangerous to Westerners.

The second is that if Obama had specifically labeled the attack “terrorism”, he would have been destroyed had he continued on with his Las Vegas campaign appearance. And as we’ve seen over the past almost 4 years, Obama is more interested in campaigning and the perks of the job than the details and duties of the job.

Via Memeorandum, more at CBS News, Politico, The Gateway Pundit, Belmont Club, This ain’t Hell …, Instapundit, Weasel Zippers, Telegraph, The PJ Tatler, Taylor Marsh, Washington Post, Hot Air, Riehl World News, American Glob, BuzzFeed, Jammie Wearing Fools, Atlas Shrugs, Michael J. Totten’s blog, Questions and Observations and Patterico’s Pontifications

Crossed at Right Wing News and Stop The ACLU.

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Who Says Rock Music Sucked In The 1970’s?

By William Teach October 23, 2012 – 7:07 pm

Your non-political/hotcoldwetdry thought of the day comes via a truly moronic DJ from some radio station I was listening to on IHeart Radio, who foolishly proclaimed that music in the 1970’s was horrible. Granted, there was disco, but that was at the end of the 70’s, and really only lasted a few years. So, for the fool, I’ll throw two words at him

Led Zeppelin

Which was interesting, because the fool played Zep’s Black Dog when he came back from commercial break.

I’ve had this conversation before with people, but, I’ve never put it “on paper”. So, did the 70’s suck for music, especially rock? Let’s see

Black Sabbath, Iron Maiden, Judas Priest, ELO, Grateful Dead, Deep Purple, Van Halen, Tom Petty, Bruce Springsteen, The Clash, The Who, CCR, The Band, Eric Clapton, AC/DC, Aerosmith, America, Bad Company, Blue Oyster Cult, Billy Joel, Bob Seger, Cheap Trick, Izzy Pop, Frank Zappa, Pink Floyd (longest album in the top 200 ever!), Def Leopard, Doobie Brothers, The Eagles, Linda Ronstadt, Fleetwood Mac, Foreigner, Neil Young, Greg Kihn, J. Geils, James Taylor, Carly Simon, The Kinks, Little Feet, Lynyrd Skynyrd, .38 Special, Meatloaf, Nick Lowe, Paul McCartney, Paul Simon, Peter Frampton, Genesis, The Pretenders, REO Speedwagon, The Scorpions, Sammy Hagar, Santana, Steely Dan, Supertramp, Ted Nugent, Triumph, UFO, Y&T, Yes, ZZ Top, Steve Miller, John Lennon, Elton John, The Police, Bob Marley, The Sex Pistols, Blondie, Lou Reed, Free, T. Rex, The Ramones, Bob Dylan, BTO, David Bowie, Van Morrison, Thin Lizzy, Golden Earring, The Hollies, Jimmy Buffet, The Moody Blues, Jethro Tull, Kansas, Kiss, Styx,  …..whew, quite a bit, eh?

And there’s certainly more. That list is mostly off the top of my and and a quick scroll through my MP3s. These are all groups that made great music in the 1970’s. Some started in the 60’s, some started in the late 70’s.

Oh, and let’s not forget The Rolling Stones and Rush!

So, no, the 70’s did not suck for rock.

My favorite Zep song

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Michael Mann Actually Files Lawsuit Against National Review

By William Teach October 23, 2012 – 4:23 pm

I really didn’t think he had the cajones to do it, because now Mann will be forced to actually provide all his raw data, methodology, and emails, all of which he has worked hard to attempt to conceal (via Watts Up With That?) From Mann’s Facebook page, which is always the best place to announce a lawsuit

Today, the case of Dr. Michael E. Mann vs. The National Review and The Competitive Enterprise Institute was filed in the Superior Court of the District of Columbia. Dr. Mann, a Professor and Director of the Earth System Science Center at Pennsylvania State University, has instituted this lawsuit against the two organizations, along with two of their authors, based upon their false and defamatory statements accusing him of academic fraud and comparing him to a convicted child molester, Jerry Sandusky. Dr. Mann is being represented by John B. Williams of the law firm of Cozen O’Connor in Washington, D.C.

Anthony Watts writes

I’m sure Mark Steyn is thrilled with the prospect of now being able to do additional commentary on this side show.  I can’t wait for depositions and discovery.

Flashback to Climate Depot, which has good background on the whole issue. My expectation is that Mann will make a lot of noise, hoping the defendants will back down, and when the don’t (you know Mark Steyn won’t!), he will quietly drop the case.

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Posted in Climahypocrites, Global Warming | 3 Comments | Trackback URL

If All You See…

By William Teach October 23, 2012 – 1:00 pm

…is an evil fossil fueled vehicle, you might just be a Warmist

The blog of the day is the Anti-Idiotarian Rottweiler, with a post on the election looking good!

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Hooray! With Two Weeks Left, Obama Finally Finds An Agenda

By William Teach October 23, 2012 – 12:50 pm

Which looks remarkably like the same old same old that has gotten America pretty much nowhere (via Hot Air)

(National Journal) After weeks of being challenged by Democrats and Republicans to lay out his second-term agenda, President Obama’s campaign is releasing a 20-page booklet called “Blueprint for America’s Future” on Tuesday and airing a new television ad to support it.

The 60-second spot, called “Determination,” outlines several policy initiatives the president will tackle if he were to get reelected. Calm and poised, speaking over soft music and images of soldiers coming home, farmers in the fields and manufacturing workers in factories, Obama makes a pitch directly to the camera in the ad.

Obama then describes his plan: “Making education and training a national priority; building on our manufacturing boom; boosting American-made energy; reducing the deficits responsibly by cutting where we can, and asking the wealthy to pay a little more. And ending the war in Afghanistan, so we can do some nation-building here at home. That’s the right path.”

Ed at Hot Air writes

People will rightly ask why Obama waited until 14 days out from the election to bother to make a positive case for a second term — and come to the proper conclusion that Obama’s arrogance led him to believe he’d never have to make that case to voters at all.  He figured he was owed a second term.

That, and that Obama is out of ideas. Platitudes based on the same old same old. What’s the point of education and training if there are no jobs? Manufacturing doesn’t work when people do not want, nor can afford, the product (hint: Chevy Volt). Reducing deficits? Oh, brother. Obama isn’t willing to cut $8 million from Sesame Street. Asking the wealthy to pay more? How does that help? All it does is put more money in the hands of government.

Regarding said “Blueprint for America’s Future”, where is it? It’s not on the URL pimped by the video. It’s not this two page thing linked by Politico. The link to his “plans” on the front page of his campaign website go to the same URL pimped by the video. What we’re getting are the same old failed policies and sticky notes, along with a healthy dose of “donate now!!!!!!” Even if you are a non-US citizen.

Video below the fold

Read More »

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Warmists Really Bummed That Climate Change (Hoax) Ignored In All Debates

By William Teach October 23, 2012 – 10:07 am

Is hotcoldwetdry dead as a political policy? (via Climate Depot, which has a good roundup of hotcoldwetdry being ignored)

(UK Guardian) The Pentagon ranks it as a national security threat and, left unchecked, climate change is expected to cost the US economy billions of dollars every year – and yet it has proved the great unmentionable of this election campaign.

Amid unprecedented melting of the Arctic summer sea ice, new temperature records in the US and a historic drought, the last of three presidential debates wound up on Monday night without Barack Obama or Mitt Romney ever uttering the words climate change.

It was the first time since 1988, the year Congress was first briefed on the emerging threat by the scientist James Hansen, that there had been no mention of climate change in an election debate.

Perhaps they should mention the record Antarctic ice? Oh, and how about Europe having extra cold winters the last 4-5 years? And Europe having very cool springs and summers? Snow in Iraq? Early snows during the winter in the Southern hemisphere? How about abnormal cold during Al Gore’s Live Earth in South Africa and during the IPCC in Cancun? Record low years for tornadoes and landfalling hurricanes? To the rest of us, this is called “weather” as controlled by nature. Especially when the warming trend since the end of the Little Ice Age took its second break during the last 16 years (the first was the 40’s through the 70’s).

By Monday night, the debate about “climate silence” was in full voice. Al Gore weighed in, tweeting during the course of the debate: “Where is global warming in this debate? Climate change is an urgent foreign policy issue.”

Isn’t $100 million enough for Al? He appears rather greedy, wanting all sorts of cap and trade regulations to line his pockets while he travels around on fossil fueled flights.

The Green party’s presidential candidate, Jill Stein, went so far as to label Obama a climate change denier in an interview with the Guardian for his failure to discuss the issue on the campaign trail.

Other commentators argued allowances should be made for Obama’s failure to discuss climate on the campaign trail, and his middling support for environmental concerns while in the White House.

Obamanuts will excuse Obama for anything. Obama probably has one of the largest “carbon footprints” of any citizen of this planet. Hey, remember a few short months ago when Obama said that hotcoldwetdry would be a major focus of his campaign?

Joe Romm’s Climate Progress is besides themselves with no discussion of HCWD

At the end of tonight’s foreign policy debate, CBS’ Bob Scheiffer got the closest of anyone to the issue: “What do you believe is the greatest future threat to the national security of this country?” he asked.

Neither answered HCWD. Because it isn’t. The climate changes. There are many issues which are the greatest threat. Islamists. $16 trillion in debt. Unsustainable and unpayable safety net liabilities. Liberals in government killing our energy.

Time discusses why HCWD has been absent, and comes to the conclusion that it’s because most people could not give two sh*ts about this fake issue, especially when the “answers” to solving it require massive government, taxes, and loss of freedom.

Grist is also pretty bummed, naming Hillary Clinton the winner of the debate, since she recently talked about HCWD.

If you Warmists want “climate change” to be a viable political issue, then you should lead the way and give up your fossil fueled vehicles, refuse to take fossil fueled flights, unplug every appliance when not in use, stop using your icemaker, give up your unsustainable Smartphone, only buy local, take two minute showers, and restrict yourselves to 2 sheets of TP.

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Debate #3: Bayonets, Horses, And Jihadis

By William Teach October 23, 2012 – 9:24 am

I’m not going to write a whole lot about the debate, since I only saw a few snippets, being at a friends house watching the Bears-Lions game, and John Hawkins does a good job of breaking it all down. Two interesting ones I did hear (while walking in the kitchen for a beer or food, friends wife, a big Obama supporter, was watching it). Here’s the first

(Daily Caller) In a debate exchange Monday night that set Twitter on fire, President Barack Obama and Republican challenger Mitt Romney crossed swords over the kinds of equipment and materials the U.S. military uses for modern warfare.

In a response to Romney’s barb that Obama has allowed the U.S. Navy’s inventory of battleships to approach a historic low mark, Obama snarked that “we also have fewer horses and bayonets, because the nature of our military’s changed.”

But horses and bayonets both remain vital parts of the U.S. arsenal.

“I think Gov. Romney maybe hasn’t spent enough time looking at how our military works,” Obama claimed Monday night.

As the article points out, horses were used as the first US soldiers entered the fight in Afghanistan in 2001. “And bayonets remain a fixture in Army infantry training and deployment.” While we certainly do have fewer horses, Obama apparently thinks the only thing we have are drones, which our Nobel Peace Prize president uses to personally authorize strikes using his kill list, which should make Liberals nuts.

Obama also added in that same talking point “We have these things called aircraft carriers where planes land on them. We have these ships that go underwater, nuclear submarines.”

Perhaps we can ask a “corpse-men” about those ships. If you watched that, you realized that Obama wasn’t being snarky, but truly was having a tough time remembering the name for those “ships that go underwater.” Oh, and tip for the Pres, they aren’t referred to as ships, but boats.

Then there was this, also at the Daily Caller

Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney identified “jihadists” as the enemy facing the United States in the Middle East, marking a sharp rhetorical contrast with U.S. defense policy in place since 2001.

“We’re going to have to put in place a very comprehensive and robust strategy to help the — the world of Islam and other parts of the world, reject this radical violent extremism,” Romney said, highlighting the link between Islam and terrorism.

“We can’t kill our way out of this mess … The right course for us is to make sure that we go after the — the people who are leaders of these various anti-American groups and these — these jihadists, but also help the Muslim world,” Romney said.

This is a serious break from both the Bush and Obama administrations, which refuse to really link terrorism to Islam in any form or fashion. They would refer to terrorism, terrorists, violent extremists, and so forth, but rarely would there be any mention that these folks are doing it in the name of Mohammed and Allah. Not long after 9/11, we’d hear about these people who are perverting Islam to kill in the religion’s name, but that dried up quickly. Sure, most realized that the majority of terrorism in the world is performed by those who follow Mohammed (there have been 19809 terrorist attacks since 9/11, the majority by Islamists, ie, Islamic extremists, not too mention all the other things like honor killings, riots, arson, mayhem, vandalism, murders, etc), but the US government tends to take a nebulous approach when naming it.

(Jerusalem Post) One of President Barack Obama’s main themes is to convince Middle East Islamists that America is not their enemy. But the reason this strategy never works is that the radicals know better. The United States is their enemy.

No amount of sympathy, empathy, economic aid, apology or appeasement will change this fact. Nor did such efforts succeed in making either Obama or the United States popular in such circles and the tens of millions of people influenced by them. The only thing surprising about all of this is that so few “experts” and politicians seem to comprehend it.

To defeat something, you have to name something. You have to know what you’re fighting. It doesn’t always have to be direct conflict using bullets and Hellfire missiles: it can be through outreach and education. One of the big problems is not so much the Islamic terrorists, but the spread of hardcore extremist Islam, as taught in the Mosques and madrasas (Islamic schools). This is occurring all over the world. Slowly, more and more are being indoctrinated into this perversion of Islam.

Oh, and one last thing, regarding another snippet I heard regarding Israel

More: Maggie’s Notebook has more on bayonets and others.

Crossed at Right Wing News and Stop The ACLU.

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Questions For Obama On Benghazi

By William Teach October 22, 2012 – 8:11 pm

The Weekly Standard’s Stephen F. Hayes has 20 question for POTUS

If the president really wants to level with the American people, here are some questions he needs to answer.

1. Were there references to Libyan security threats in the President’s Daily Brief (PDB) during the three weeks before the attacks in Benghazi?

2. If there were, did President Obama participate in an intelligence briefing after the Libya threat was raised in the PDB?

3. Did President Obama ask his CIA briefer about threats in Libya during the three weeks before the attacks?

4. Were Libyan security threats discussed in any daily intelligence briefing that President Obama did not attend?

Make sure to read the rest.

I have one myself: didn’t the president think it was strange that all these “spontaneous protests” featured large numbers of people carrying professionally made Salafist flags and wearing professionally made Salafist headbands? Did anyone in the administration think it was strange? How about all the intelligence folks?

Oh, and here’s an interesting one that the Washington Examiner’s Timothy P. Carney hopes is asked tonight

There are plenty of issues to talk about in tonight’s foreign-policy presidential debate. But here’s a pretty straightforward question I want answered: Why does President Obama think it was okay for him to attack Libya without congressional authorization?

Remember, there was no direct or imminent threat posed by the civil war in Libya to the United States, her people (particularly in Europe and the Middle East/N. Africa, or her military assets in the Mediterranean. As the article points out, and has been mentioned many times, Obama even stated that the President doesn’t have the authority to launch a military operation like occurred with Libya.

Oh, and perhaps someone might ask Obama about the disposition of US Navy and Marine ships in the Med, and whether any could have launched air power (plans and gun ships) as well as rapid troop disbursement during the long hours our people were under assault in Benghazi. Where was the Ike? How about any Marine assault ships? Could a few Ospreys or Seahawks have brought SEALs and/or Marines to the rescue within a short time? How about sending a few Super Cobras?

Read: Questions For Obama On Benghazi »

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