[Gore writes:]"We can't wish away climate change" . . . but can I wish away Al Gore?From the standpoint of governance, what is at stake is our ability to use the rule of law as an instrument of human redemption.
What?! I knew this was religion! We're supposed to believe. And please don't use 'rule of law' as a synonym for government regulation.
The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change has been under fire since it was pointed out that the 2007 report included a prediction that Himalayan glaciers would vanish by 2035, although there is no scientific consensus to that effect.With their credibility in shambles, what exactly is the basis for the climate alarmism again?
That brief citation — drawn from a magazine interview with a glaciologist who says he was misquoted — and sporadic criticism of the panel’s leader have fueled skepticism in some quarters about the science underlying climate change. The climate panel’s assessments are a crucial source of guidance for policy makers addressing global warming.
"I pray God when the Democrats take back control we don't make the kind of naked power grab you are doing."And the ignorance displayed by people like Christopher Dodd--in relation to the system set up by America's founders, would be funny if it wasn't so consequential.
"I haven't always agreed with Hedy... like when she was for the Ku Klux Klan marching (at an event in Pulaski years ago)," Haynes said when asked why he pushed a resolution praising Weinberg. "But I respect her. But she believes in the Constitution and the Bill of Rights and has worked hard for 25 years for those principles."On second thought, it complicates things when you consider the KKK's deep roots in the Southern Democratic Party.
24.
The Other Armenian
Ann Arbor
February 18th, 2010
7:47 pm
I find it very interesting that the NYT neglected to print the last part of Ms. Friedman's letter. The right wing has accused the media of being unfair to Sarah the P. The NYT also seems to be frightened of appearing critical to Palin. Had the media done their job Ms. Palin would have been torn to shreds and left in the dust bin of history in September of 2008.
Speaking of neglect; has anyone else noticed that Bristol Palin appears to be Trig's primary caregiver.
25.
lastcallsally
new york
February 18th, 2010
7:47 pm
I'm sick of this equal opportunity offender defense. The mentally disabled lack the ability to stand up for themselves but if you want to use them for some anti-Palin rant go ahead you tool.
"The saying in Washington is that if you're not at the table, you're on the menu," said Whitney Stanco, an energy policy analyst for Concept Capital, a Washington research firm.
I spent the weekend in Vancouver. As always, the Olympic Games were inspiring. But in case you didn’t hear the late-breaking news, the gold medal in the downhill was taken away from American Lindsey Vonn. It was determined that President Obama is going downhill faster than she is.
The real undeniable test of tax policy is not short-term shifts in revenue but long-term shifts in spending that are most clearly manifested by increases in the federal budget. Between 1981 and 2004, current government spending in terms of dollars increased fivefold while the total hovered a little above 20 percent of GDP.
In the mid-1980s, World Bank economist Keith Marsden showed how this is possible: Low tax countries increase their spending three times faster than comparable high tax countries. This is because the low tax economies grow six times faster. For most of the period since World War II, the fastest growing economy in the world, with the fastest growth in government spending, was Hong Kong, with a top rate of 16 percent. A study by Jude Wanniski at Polyconomics extended the analysis through the Reagan era, with the same results. In recent years, Ireland, New Zealand and Russia massively increased spending after drastically reducing tax rates. Russia has increased outlays by some 60 percent after enacting a 13 percent flat tax.
At age 54, Mr. Bayh is leaving Congress but declines to rule out another run for office. Should Democrats ever be open to a Tony Blair message, no doubt Mr. Bayh could be persuaded to return to the arena. He's won five times in a red state while compiling a voting record significantly more liberal than Arlen Specter's or Olympia Snowe's. Yet today he's viewed by many Democrats with disdain as a conservative collaborator.
Nothing better sums up the Democrats' self-inflicted problem.
He said there were no ballistics tests included, and he also thought it odd that there was an 11-day gap between the death and interviews with family members, apparently because they were too distraught to talk sooner.
The Norfolk County district attorney at the time was William Delahunt, now a Democratic congressman from Massachusetts. He was traveling in Israel and could not immediately be reached for comment on the case.
[UAH Associate Professor] Joseph Ng told the AP the shooting stopped almost as soon as it started. He said the gun seemed to jam and he and others rushed Bishop out of the room and then barricaded the door shut with a table.(emphasis added). Yes, Bishop could have shot her way back in . . . or started shooting students or others elsewhere in the building.
Ng said the charge was led by Debra Moriarity, a professor of biochemistry, after Bishop aimed the gun at her and attempted to fire. When the gun didn’t shoot, Moriarity pushed her way to Bishop, urged her to stop, and then helped force her out the door.
'Moriarity was probably the one that saved our lives. She was the one that initiated the rush,' he told the AP. 'It took a lot of guts to just go up to her.'
Ng said the survivors worried she would shoot her way through the door, and frantically worked up a backup plan in case she burst through. But she never did.
There were a number of reasons for wanting to keep [Ford, Jr.'s relationship with his then caucasian and now wife] quiet. For one, it was relatively new. For another, a month before his defeat, the RNC put out a now-infamous commercial featuring an actress who claimed to have met Ford at a party at the Playboy Mansion. “Call me,” she mouths at the end. The ad smacked of racism—implying that he was somehow unfit for office because he was a womanizer who liked white girls. (In point of fact, the ad was also deceptive; Ford is said to have been fairly indifferent to race where the women in his life are concerned. He was formerly engaged to a black woman.) Even though the ad was vilified, it did its damage.The point was that he was a playboy (playa?), not that he dated white women.*
About five years ago, [Ford's wife] met Ford at a wedding in New Orleans. At the time, he was known in political circles as something of a player. Says one woman who dated him briefly: “He pursued women vigorously and passionately, there’d be a week or 10 days of him being totally obsessive and then it was over. With me he just didn’t show up for a date.Wow.
Obama came to office under fundamental misapprehensions that hamper him still. It's not true that all that was keeping the Israelis and Palestinians apart was the lack of US engagement, or that the Iranians were amenable to getting talked out of their nuclear program, or that Guantanamo Bay was a pointless contrivance.
Nor is it true that government is a sustainable source of economic growth, or a more efficient allocator of capital than the market. This is why Obama's stimulus program -- inevitably, a dog's breakfast of politically driven priorities -- is such a shambles that his aides never utter the word "stimulus" anymore. It is on to the next program, a nearly $100 billion "jobs" bill that reflects the touching belief that to work as intended a program only has to be named appropriately.
But probably the most damaging report has come from Joseph D’Aleo, the first Director of Meteorology and co-founder of the Weather Channel, and Anthony Watts, a meteorologist and founder of SurfaceStations.org.
In a January 29 report, they find that starting in 1990, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) began systematically eliminating climate measuring stations in cooler locations around the world. Yes, that's right. They began eliminating stations that tended to record cooler temperatures and drove up the average measured temperature. The eliminated stations had been in higher latitudes and altitudes, inland areas away from the sea, as well as more rural locations. The drop in the number of weather stations was dramatic, declining from more than 6,000 stations to fewer than 1,500.
D’Aleo and Watts show that the jumps in measured global temperature occur just when the number of weather stations is cut. But there is another bias that this change to more urban stations also exacerbates. Recorded temperatures in more urban areas rise over time simply because more densely populated areas produce more heat. Combining the greater share of weather stations in more urban areas over time with this urban heat effect also tends to increase the rate that recorded temperatures tend to rise over time.
Their report provides examples of how the systematic elimination of stations and unexplained adjustments in temperature data caused measured temperatures to rise for Australia, New Zealand, Canada, Norway, Sweden, and the United States. Many adjustments change what would have been a drop in temperatures into an increase. Take New Zealand, where D’Aleo and Watts note: “About half the adjustments actually created a warming trend where none existed; the other half greatly exaggerated existing warming.”
The entire superstructure of climate alarmism rests on data that are doubtful and possibly fraudulent. The Science and Public Policy Institute has evaluated surface-temperature records and found, among other things, that 1) instrumental data from the pre-satellite era are virtually useless; 2) fewer than 25 percent of the 6,000 temperature stations that once existed are still operative; 3) comprehensive ocean data have been available only since 2003 and have shown no warming; and 4) higher altitude, higher latitude, and rural stations were the most likely to be lost, leading to a further serious overstatement of warming.
As John Hinderaker of the Power Line blog has reported, the U.N. IPCC report itself does not even accurately represent the views of the scientists who signed it. Key sections expressing caveats and acknowledging countervailing evidence were altered after the purported authors had put their names to it.
It isn’t the snow outside that has discredited global warming. It’s the chill the warmists have imposed on scientific inquiry. They are acting as enforcers of orthodoxy, not seekers of truth.
WASHINGTON—Republican Sen. Bob Corker bucked his party Thursday and began negotiations with Democrats on overhauling financial regulation.Here are some ideas as Corker endeavors to manipulate the nation's financial spine.
Winning the first-term Tennessee senator's support is perhaps the White House's best chance of passing a financial-overhaul bill this year. Democrats need one Republican to reach the 60 votes required to pass legislation in the Senate. Democrats hope Mr. Corker's support also could bring along other centrist Republicans.
Mr. Corker's involvement means the Federal Reserve could play a bigger role in any overhaul, because the senator has been less critical of the central bank than other leading Republicans. He also opposes creating a stand-alone consumer-protection agency, an idea already on life support, but might agree to propose other policies governing products such as mortgages.
Last week, the [Memphis Area Women's Council] held its first Run Women Run event with Tennessee representative Karen Camper, Germantown mayor Sharon Goldsworthy, Tennessee Supreme Court chief justice Janice Holder, and attorney Ruby Wharton.
According to Deborah Clubb, executive director of the local women's council, Run Women Run was held to 'empower women with enough knowledge to know it's not impossible' to be elected to political office.
. . . .
During the non-partisan event, attendees heard advice on running for and serving in a political office. They discussed campaign strategies, financial tips, and the importance of honor and integrity in politics.
Actor Alec Baldwin was treated and released from a New York hospital after a young woman believed to be his daughter, Ireland, called emergency assistance claiming her father was unresponsive, according to NBC News. When paramedics arrived at Baldwin's New York City home, he reportedly was responsive and agreed to seek treatment at the hospital.
The "30 Rock" star was taken to Lenox Hill Hospital and was released after about an hour. His condition was undisclosed. The actor's spokesperson, Matthew Hiltzik, issued a statement saying, "This was a misunderstanding on one person's part. Alec was quickly released from the hospital, he's completely fine and will be at work today."
The Gallup Poll reports that a majority of Democrats, 53%, have a “positive” image of socialism, which includes independents who lean toward the blue party.Which reminds me of Jon Stewart's excellent interview with Bill O'Reilly. Stewart gamely made the reductio ad absurdum argument that "we're all 'socialists'" if we don't rail against every gov't funded entitlement program.
Only 17 percent of Republican and GOP-leaners hold socialism in a positive light. In total, more than one-third of Americans, 36%, have a positive image of socialism.
CHICAGO - Now that the Democrats' nominee for lieutenant governor has dropped out of the race, the next step is up to the Illinois Democratic Party.This is too common of an occurrence for Democrats. Torricelli. Kurita. Who needs primaries?
"Are you saving yourself for marriage?" Tebow was asked last summer during an SEC media day.And this sentiment was reinforced in an op-ed/report from Mona Charen about abstinence education ("Another Undead Conservative Idea" - Mona Charen - National Review Online) From the article:
"Yes, I am," he replied.
The room fell into a hush, followed by tittering: The best college football player in the country had just announced he was a virgin. As Tebow gauged the reaction from the reporters in the room, he burst out laughing. They were a lot more embarrassed than he was.
"I think y'all are stunned right now!" he said. "You can't even ask a question!"
That's how far we've come from any kind of sane viewpoint about star athletes and sex. Promiscuity is so the norm that if a stud isn't shagging everything in sight, we feel faintly ashamed for him.
Now we learn from a study in Archives of Pediatrics and Adolescent Medicine that another prematurely buried conservative idea, abstinence education, works very well indeed.(emphasis added) Yep.
The Obama administration had disdained and defunded abstinence education in favor of “evidence-based” programs to prevent teen pregnancy. (Note the assumption that liberal ideas are founded on evidence whereas conservative ideas spring from prejudice, ignorance, or downright orneriness.) No single study settles things, but this one, conducted by an African-American professor at the University of Pennsylvania, will be hard to ignore."
. . . .
Elayne Bennett, founder of the Best Friends program, is delighted that the Jemmott research reinforces her experience with, mostly, African-American adolescent girls. Offering a mixed program of mentoring, dance, music, and role-playing, Best Friends and its new spin-off for boys, Best Men, has had two decades of success in helping kids abstain from sex, drugs, and alcohol until they graduate from high school. She has found that the kids desperately want someone to tell them it’s okay to postpone sex. It’s a commentary on our times, but there it is — we need special programs to give kids permission to say no.
I'll spit this out quick, before the armies of feminism try to gag me and strap electrodes to my forehead: Tim Tebow is one of the better things to happen to young women in some time. I realize this stance won't endear me to the 'Dwindling Organizations of Ladies in Lockstep,' otherwise known as DOLL, but I'll try to pick up the shards of my shattered feminist credentials and go on.
1Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles, and let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us. 2Let us fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy set before him endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.Kudos to Tebow for seeming to live out that verse pretty well.
That brings us to Part 2 of the liberal conceit: Liberals act in the public interest, while conservatives think only of power, elections, self-aggrandizement and self-interest.
It is an old liberal theme that conservative ideas, being red in tooth and claw, cannot possibly emerge from any notion of the public good. A 2002 New York Times obituary for philosopher Robert Nozick explained that the strongly libertarian implications of Nozick's masterwork, 'Anarchy, State, and Utopia,' 'proved comforting to the right, which was grateful for what it embraced as philosophical justification.' The right, you see, is grateful when a bright intellectual can graft some philosophical rationalization onto its thoroughly base and self-regarding politics.
This belief in the moral hollowness of conservatism animates the current liberal mantra that Republican opposition to Obama's social democratic agenda -- which couldn't get through even a Democratic Congress and powered major Democratic losses in New Jersey, Virginia and Massachusetts -- is nothing but blind and cynical obstructionism.
By contrast, Democratic opposition to George W. Bush -- from Iraq to Social Security reform -- constituted dissent. And dissent, we were told at the time, including by candidate Obama, is 'one of the truest expressions of patriotism.'
No more. Today, dissent from the governing orthodoxy is nihilistic malice. 'They made a decision,' explained David Axelrod, 'they were going to sit it out and hope that we failed, that the country failed' -- a perfect expression of liberals' conviction that their aspirations are necessarily the country's, that their idea of the public good is the public's, that their failure is therefore the nation's.
. . . Seriously: if you were a Bush follower, wouldn't you feel as though you were owed a major apology for all the accusations and the fuss that came from Democrats and media figures, accusing you of supporting radical and Constitution-shredding policies when, it turns out, they actually crave those policies in order to feel safe? Doesn't all of this bolster the Republican claim that those attacks on the Bush administration for civil liberties abuses were not due to genuine conviction, but rather for partisan gain (in the case of Democratic officials) and cheap, preening, wet-finger-in-the-air moralizing (in the case of media stars)?
