…is a wonderful green space perfect for a wind turbine, you might just be a Warmist
The blog of the day is Green Jihad, with a post on the social media purges.
Doubleshot below the fold, check out Victory Girls Blog, with a post on social media becoming 21st Century Pravda.
Read: If All You See… »
Joe is laying out his COVID response, and plans on doing….things that are already being done
President-elect Joe Biden on Tuesday laid out a three-point plan to begin defeating the coronavirus pandemic during his first 100 days in office, saying he will sign an executive order the day he is sworn in to require Americans to wear masks on buses and trains crossing state lines, as well as in federal buildings.
Biden also pledged to distribute “at least 100 million covid vaccine shots†during that time, singling out educators, who he said should get shots “as soon as possible†after they are given first to health workers and people who live and work in long-term-care facilities under current plans. He did not specify whether he meant 100 million doses or vaccinating that many people; the two vaccines nearing approval both require two doses.
The other goal of his 100-day plan, Biden said, is to enable “the majority of our schools†to reopen within that time and to remain open. He called on Congress to devote the funding needed to make it safe for students and teachers to return to classrooms.
Yeah, masks are already required on Amtrak, Greyhound, the trains, buses, and even boats going between New Jersey and NYC. And most that are in-state and in-city. It’s like Joe is unaware of what’s been going on for a goodly chunk of the last year.
As far as COVID shots, perhaps those 55 and older should be prioritized over teachers, so many of whom are sticking with their unions in not wanting to have to go back to class, happy to do virtual learning. Is Joe aware of unions resisting the calls to go back to the classroom? Of course, for lots of teacher’s, you can’t blame them, since so many schools in Democratic Party run cities are hellholes of violence.
Biden has said often and urgently that Americans should wear masks, and he reiterated Tuesday that he would work with mayors and governors, encouraging them to impose mandates for face coverings in their jurisdictions. But his remarks were the first time he committed to signing an executive order to require masks “wherever possible†in venues under federal authority.
Um, this has all been happening. Just try going into a federal building without one. 31 states, D.C., and Puerto Rico have mask mandates. In the states without one, cities have no authority, in most cases, to go above state requirements and mandate face masks.
Kinda strange that the Washington Post didn’t mention anything about all this. It’s almost like they’re cheerleaders. You can bet if it was Trump saying this stuff they would have resisted.
It was the warmest year on record for Europe or something, and Spain just got hit with some heat snow. I’m guessing school kids will know what snow looks like
Rare Snowstorm Closes Madrid Airport, Creates Travel Chaos
Heavy snowfall from Storm Filomena left thousands of Spanish drivers trapped in their cars on Friday as roads were blocked and Madrid airport was closed.
The M-30 and M-40 motorways near Madrid were among more than 400 roads where snow hindered vehicles, traffic authorities said. Citizens were asked to avoid non-essential travel because of the highly unusual blizzard.
“I drove to see my husband in hospital and have been stuck here for three hours. It’s a journey which should take 15 minutes,” a woman told Spanish television RNE from her car.
Meteorologists expected Friday’s snowfall to total 20 cm (8 inches), and temperatures hovered around freezing. The Red Cross took food to trapped lorry drivers on the A4 in Madrid.
Airports were closed all over the country
#Climate #Spain #Weather #Snow ????????
Storm ? #Filomena (Greek for ‘friend of strength’) blanket #Spain with exceptional snowfall, much more expected today ?? pic.twitter.com/0ZVdDVt9KR
— Mena Commodities ® (@MenaCommodities) January 9, 2021
Madrid and eight provinces were under the most severe weather advisory for the first time since the system was created in 2007.
Large parks in the capital, including the Retiro next to the Prado museum, were closed as a precaution.
Rare, and probably your fault for that fossil fueled trip you took for Christmas. Why close parks? Isn’t that where the fun happens?
High-speed rail services between Madrid and the southeastern cities of Alicante and Valencia were suspended.
So, we’ll all be stuck when we’re forced onto AOC’s trains?
A record temperature of -35.6 degrees C (-32 degrees Fahrenheit) was recorded at Vega de Lourdes in Leon, northern Spain, the State Meteorological Agency (Aemet) said.
That’s the coldest temperature ever recorded in Spain.
https://twitter.com/WeelTelt/status/1347855598197596161
Storm Filomena: Spain sees 'exceptional' snowfall. I defy anyone to say this is not down to climate change, this is in the warmest part of Spain. If it can snow there it can snow any where & when it melts it will bring local flooding. https://t.co/ksh8Zjpn1J
— phil (@ppjkis) January 9, 2021
There’s not a lot of that yet, but, it is around. Oh, and that BBC article has lots of great pictures
This is the “first test” for China Joe. Will he pass? Say what you will about Trump’s attempt at connecting with Kim Jong Un early in his presidency, North Korea has mostly been non-frisky towards the U.S. for most of Trump’s 4 years. But, Joe is less than 2 weeks from being coronated, so…
North Korea’s Kim calls U.S. ‘our biggest enemy’ in challenge to Biden
North Korean leader Kim Jong Un called for more advanced nuclear weapons and said the United States is “our biggest enemy,” state media said on Saturday, presenting a stark challenge to President-elect Joe Biden just days before he takes office.
Washington’s hostile policies would not change regardless of who occupies the White House but dropping those policies would be key to North Korea-U.S. relations, Kim said, according to state news agency KCNA.
“Our foreign political activities should be focused and redirected on subduing the U.S., our biggest enemy and main obstacle to our innovated development,” Kim said during nine hours of remarks over several days at a rare party congress in Pyongyang.
“No matter who is in power in the U.S., the true nature of the U.S. and its fundamental policies towards North Korea never change,” Kim said, vowing to expand ties with “anti-imperialist, independent forces.” (snip)
Biden, who was vice president under President Barack Obama, called Kim a “thug” during the election campaign. In 2019 North Korea called Biden a “rabid dog” that needed to be “beaten to death with a stick.”
But, Biden will be president now. It’s him who makes the decisions. What does he do?
Biden said in October that he would meet Kim only on the condition that North Korea agreed to draw down its nuclear capacity.
Last month Kurt Campbell, the top U.S. diplomat for East Asia under Obama and considered a contender for a top Asia policy position under Biden, said the incoming U.S. administration would have to make an early decision on what approach it will take with North Korea and not repeat the delay of the Obama era.
We’ll see. The Clinton, Bush 43, and Obama admins were not very good on North Korea, which is a tough one, considering there is little international interest in taking out their nuclear capability nor their missiles/missile production, plus, any military attack could mean Seoul, a city of well over 10 million, along with lots of other very big South Korean cities, getting hit with a massive amount of regular missiles, which could even be loaded with chemical and/or biological weapons. All these South Korean cities are within 30 minutes of the DMZ.
China Joe wanted to be president, now he gets his chance to Do Something. What will Kamala and his wife tell him to do?
Read: North Korea Starts Getting Frisky With China Joe On The Way »
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They’re actually doing just fine, the cute little buggers
Pikas are adapting to climate change remarkably well, contrary to many predictions
Climate change is harming many special places and iconic species around our planet, from Glacier National Park’s disappearing glaciers to California redwoods scorched by wildfires. But for the animal I study, the American pika (Ochotona princeps), there’s actually some good news: It’s not as threatened by climate change as many studies have warned.
I have studied pikas, small cousins of rabbits, for over 50 years and never tire of watching them. These tailless, egg-shaped balls of fluff live primarily in cool mountainous environments in piles of broken rock, called talus.
During summer, observers can see pikas industriously gathering caches of grass and leaves into haypiles that will serve as their food supply through the winter. Their light brown coats blend well with their surroundings, so they are easiest to spot when they perch on prominent rocks and call to alert other pikas of their presence.
When fellow hikers see me observing pikas in California’s Sierra Nevada, they often tell me they have read that these animals are going extinct. I have collected a stack of press releases that say exactly that. But based on my recent research and a comprehensive review of over 100 peer-reviewed studies, I believe that this interpretation is misleading.
The upshot is they’re not being wiped out by a tiny increase in the global temperatures, something that has occurred multiple times in just the Holocene alone, but blamed on Mankind’s carbon footprint this time. Like most animals, they simply adapt. And we aren’t anywhere near the types of climatic changes, both cold and hot, that have led to previous big extinction events, nor will you driving to get a burger make it happen.
In contrast, most sites where researchers believe that pikas have disappeared are small, isolated and often compromised by human activities, such as grazing by livestock. These sites generally are lower and warmer than sites in pikas’ core range.
So, yes, humans are problematic, but, this is an environmental issue, not anthropogenic climate change.
Funny how all these animals that climate cultists say are doomed end up doing well, right?
Read: Bad News, Folks: ‘Climate Change’ Is Not Wiping Out Pikas »
…is a wonderful low carbon carriage, perfect for replacing fossil fueled travel, you might just be a Warmist
The blog of the day is Flopping Aces, with a post on this being the violence the left asked for.
Read: If All You See… »
Desecrating is a hell of a word to use, eh?
‘They desecrated the center of American government’: Michelle Obama
Former first lady Michelle Obama responded to Wednesday’s riots at the Capitol in a blistering statement a day later, saying her “heart had fallen harder and faster than I can remember.” (snip)
“In just a few hours, though, my heart had fallen harder and faster than I can remember. Like all of you, I watched as a gang — organized, violent, and mad they’d lost an election — laid siege to the United States Capitol,” she added. “They set up gallows. They proudly waved the traitorous flag of the Confederacy through the halls. They desecrated the center of American government.”
Like all of you, I’ve been feeling so many emotions since yesterday. I tried to put my thoughts down here: pic.twitter.com/9xzRvrpk7y
— Michelle Obama (@MichelleObama) January 7, 2021
First, I thought it was “just property”? Isn’t that what they told us, that it was just property that could be replaced? Second, desecrate? Most definitions of the word revolve around things that are holy, like graveyards, shrines, temples, churches, and such. Are we actually treating federal buildings like the Capital Building as holy? Was this just a poor choice of words by Michelle, or, does this dovetail perfectly with Democrats belief in Government being super-awesome to the point of being a pseudo-religion, their belief in Statism?
BTW, further in the article, Obama drops some race baiting, claiming that things would be different had the protesters been black people. Because we all saw how they were treated differently. The cops were mostly told to stand down, even in the face of violence.
Read: Michelle Obama Seems Upset About This Whole “Desecrating The Center Of American Government” Thing »
Yeah, yeah, we know all about what you do daily. Taking long showers, using more than two sheets, having sausage with your breakfast, driving your fossil fueled vehicle to work, having a burger for lunch. All your fault!
Climate Change Is Turning Cities Into Ovens
A new model estimates that by 2100, cities across the world could warm as much as 4.4 degrees Celsius. It’s a deadly consequence of the heat-island effect.
Whoa, whoa, is the Cult of Climastrology attempting to hijack the Urban Heat Island effect, the notion that urban areas will be warmer than the surrounding countryside simply because all that metal, glass, concrete, and so forth hold more heat? Yes, that is anthropogenic, but, it is not global
WHICHEVER SIDE OF the subjective city-versus-rural debate you’re on, the objective laws of thermodynamics dictate that cities lose on at least one front: They tend to get insufferably hotter, more so than surrounding rural areas. That’s thanks to the urban heat-island effect, in which buildings and roads readily absorb the sun’s energy and release it well into the night. The greenery of rural areas, by contrast, provides shade and cools the air by releasing water.
Climate change is making the urban heat-island effect all the more dire in cities across the world, and it’s only going to get worse. Like, way worse. An international team of researchers has used a new modeling technique to estimate that by the year 2100, the world’s cities could warm by as much as 4.4 degrees Celsius on average. For perspective, that figure obliterates the Paris agreement’s optimistic goal for a global average temperature rise of 1.5 degrees C from preindustrial levels. In fact, the team’s figure more than doubles the agreement’s hard goal of limiting that global rise to no more than 2 degrees C.
That would mean a rise of 7.92 Fahrenheit in Big Cities. Oh, right, in 2100, so, if we implement taxes and control your life and choices, we can stop that
Mora likens the simultaneous risks of climate change and the heat-island effect to having to battle two foes at once. “Dealing with climate change is like getting into a fight with Mike Tyson,†he says. “With the heat-island effect that these guys just documented here, that is now like bringing Jackie Chan on top of Mike Tyson. So now you gotta face those two guys—there is just no way for people to cope with this.â€
With the arrival of the Biden administration, the US could even revive the New Deal’s Civilian Conservation Corps, putting people back to work greening up cities. That’ll be especially critical in communities of color and low-income neighborhoods, which tend to be less green and thus more likely to suffer from the heat-island effect, a consequence of racist housing policies.
Why not just tear most of them down to minimize the UHI? Go back to living in huts.
Read: Your Fault: Cities Are Becoming Ovens From ‘Climate Change’ Or Something »
Real concern or just looking for more reasons to continue controlling citizens around the world?
New COVID ‘Super Strains’ Could Disrupt Life Again
After 10 months of masks, social distancing, virtual school, fear for vulnerable loved ones, and loneliness, this is the news no one wanted to hear: The virus that causes COVID-19 has changed — once again — in ways that make it more contagious.
At least one new “super strain†of the virus is already in the U.S. Another highly contagious strain from South Africa could be on its way. As bad as things are now, experts believe these new strains are not responsible for the spike in cases seen in many states as people fall ill after holiday travel.
The strains are about 50% more contagious than the virus that has been most widely circulating in the United States, though it doesn’t seem to be more fatal for any one person who catches it.
While that may seem reassuring, it could be disastrous on a wider scale. One public health expert believes the virus is changing itself to adapt and infect more people.
Another, Adam Kucharski, PhD, an associate professor at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine who specializes in the math of infectious disease outbreaks, says the math shows the infectious strain will be more deadly.
So, what could happen?
Already, one new “super strain†of the virus is driving an alarming surge of COVID cases in Great Britain. On Monday, Prime Minister Boris Johnson — who had resisted tougher control measures for weeks — reluctantly ordered strict new lockdown measures in that country, following close behind similar moves in Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland.
Defending his actions against the economic harm they would cause, he said he had no choice but to lock down again as new cases threatened to overwhelm hospitals.
Once again, most children will stay home for school, and people have been asked not to leave home except to do a very limited number of essential tasks, like seeking health care or going grocery shopping.
What happens next? Time will tell. Could it be overblown, a conspiracy theory to think the bigwigs want to keep this going for their own purposes?
Garcetti says L.A. will keep using COVID-19 diagnostic tests that were subject of FDA advisory
Drive-thru and walk-up coronavirus testing sites in Los Angeles will continue using the same diagnostic tests after federal regulators earlier in the week issued a warning about their rate of false results, Mayor Eric Garcetti said.
The Curative oral swab tests used at L.A. city testing sites carry a risk of false negatives, especially when it’s used on people not experiencing symptoms, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration said in a safety communication Monday.
The FDA says the tests could lead to infected people having a false sense of security, increasing the risk of spread. People who don’t believe they’re sick could also be delayed in seeking treatment.
Why continue to use it, if it doesn’t really work well? But, see, Garcetti is using science “But in a COVID-19 briefing Thursday evening, Garcetti said he still trusts the tests “deeply.— See? Science.
Read: Are You Ready For New Lockdown With New COVID Strains? »
Remember, this is all about the Science, you guys!
How Racial and Gender Equality are Critical for Building Climate Resilience
As we gear up for what will be the most crucial decade for climate action, I reflect on a year that turned everyone’s lives upside down. The year 2020 will be remembered for multiple, overlapping crises—the lives and jobs lost to the COVID-19 pandemic, the on-going racial justice crisis, highlighted by the Black Lives Matter protests and various hurricanes along the Atlantic Coast.
In writing this, I reflect on what this moment means for me as a resilience planner and what thoughts to take forward into the coming year. (snip through idiocy)
Last year’s events provided a stark reminder of the inextricable link between the climate crisis and racial injustice. It is clear that Women and Black, Indigenous, and People of Color (BIPOC) bear every crisis’s largest burdens. Going forward, it is critical to involve these groups if we are to develop effective solutions. Here is more on how addressing racial and gender inequality can lead to a healthy and safe future for all:
As I mentioned above, the climate crisis and racial injustice are inextricably linked; and we have seen that BIPOC have been much more severely impacted by COVID-19 and climate change than white communities.
Redlining practices instituted by the federal and local governments in the early to mid-twentieth century prevented Black homeowners from accessing mortgages, which led to decades of community disinvestment. These communities have also had far more exposure to polluted and hazardous sites and much less access to resources to upgrade and repair their homes. It is no coincidence that Black children are twice as likely to have asthma than white children[1] or that predominantly BIPOC neighborhoods are more vulnerable to storms and hurricanes. Racist planning practices are embedded in our cities and institutions and continue to cast a shadow over these communities as many wrongs remain unaddressed.
Wait, so all these “put in a box rather than being thought of as individuals” are in danger because of Democratic Party housing and urban practices? Huh? This is all just more proof that the climate crisis is all about politics and little about science.
Meanwhile
Climate crisis will cause falling humidity in global cities – study
Urban regions around the world are likely to see a near-universal decrease in humidity as the climate changes, a study has found.
The research suggests that building green infrastructure and increasing urban vegetation might be a safe bet for cities looking to mitigate rising temperatures.
I’d think that all the Warmists in Big Cities giving up their own use of fossil fueled vehicles, going meatless at meals, turning their AC up to 80 and heat down to 60, city government putting limiters on their showers to no more than 3 minutes, restricting the number of flushes per day, and more, would be better. Seriously, where are they going to put this urban vegetation?
Jaguar savagely killing ocelot at a watering hole in Guatemala could be sign of climate change
Brutal moment a jaguar kills an ocelot at a watering hole in Guatemala in ‘over-competition’ for water caused by climate change
A deadly animal attack in the Guatemalan rainforest is being blamed on climate change that is causing animals to compete for water.
Got that? A bigger predator kills a smaller one, and this is suddenly your fault for that burger you ate the other day.
Read: Climate Change (scam) Can Be Solved Without Gender And Racial Equality Or Something »
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