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[ over did it a little this morning {long}, but there's some funny photos at the end ]
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Tuesday, April 1, 2008
Gore Is 'PR Agent For The Planet'
On Sunday’s "60 Minutes" anchor Lesley Stahl interviewed former Vice President turned global warming alarmist, Al Gore, and observed: "There's still a lot of skepticism about whether global warming is manmade...there's pretty impressive people, like the Vice President [Dick Cheney]." Gore then described skeptics like Cheney this way: "I think that those people are in such a tiny, tiny minority now with their point of view. They're almost like the ones who still believe that the moon landing was staged in a movie lot in Arizona and those who believe the Earth is flat." Gore then went on to explain: "That demeans them a little bit, but it's not that far off."
"His slide shows are tailored to his audiences. So, as he showed us in his office, when he talks to Evangelical Christians, he includes passages from the Bible...Gore is trying to redefine this as a moral and spiritual issue."
[well it certainly isn't science based.
Q: if the deluded minority is so small, exactly why do they need to spend 300 Million on a PR campaign?
A lie, told big enough...]
Here is the full transcript of the segment:
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BUOY MEETS GORE
Al Gore often cites computer models used by environmentalists to predict imminent and disastrous climate change. But actual temperature measurements by high-tech equipment show something completely different. Actual measurements of actual oceans by actual instruments have thrown cold water on much of global warming theory, says Investor's Business Daily (IBD).
As Lorne Gunter reported Monday in Canada's National Post, the first of 3,000 new automated ocean buoys were deployed in 2003. They amounted to a significant improvement over earlier buoys that took their measurements mostly at the ocean's surface:
- The new buoys, known as Argos, drift along the oceans at a depth of about 6,000 feet constantly monitoring the temperature, salinity and speed of ocean currents.
- Every 10 days or so a bladder inflates, bringing to the surface readings taken at various depths.
- Once on the surface, they transmit their readings to satellites that retransmit them to land-based computers.
If the Argos buoys had confirmed the greenie computer models and Gore hype instead of natural temperature variations, it would have been big news. The silence speaks volumes, says IBD.
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YouTube Pulls Anti-Gore Ad For Supposed Copyright Infringement
YouTube watchers have often marvelled at the video website's floating enforcement of copyright laws - especially given this weekend's decision by YouTube to yank an advertisement created by the Competitive Enterprise Institute -- as reported by NewsBusters March 12 -- harshly critical of Nobel Laureate Al Gore's hypocritical views on global warming.
“NRECA’s claim of copyright infringement is without merit,” said Competitive Enterprise Institute General Counsel Sam Kazman. “Our use of this miniscule amount of material – from a film which NRECA itself posted on YouTube and distributes freely –meets every criterion of Fair Use. It seems the association’s real goal is not to protect its copyright, but to protect its politically correct image on global warming.”Wouldn't you love to know how YouTube decides when to honor copyright infringement claims and when to ignore them?
[I'd say we do know]
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Return of Inflation?
Beneath the headlines of Wall Street's financial crisis lurks the economic killer for ordinary Americans -- inflation.
It steals from the pocketbook of every American consumer, in an across-the-board regressive tax hitting especially hard those who spend most of their income on food and energy...
[yeah there are other factors - but by an order of magnitude the thing driving inflation in this country at this time is our insane energy 'policies'. Congress is subsidizing the burning of our food while actively blocking any & all attempts to drill for more (now >100$/barrel) oil. It's a deliberate ploy to wreck our economy in time for the presidential election - and it's working....]
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Unfree to Choose
The program Mrs. Clinton is currently touting as her solution to the problems in America's health-care system -- particularly its high number of uninsured citizens -- is officially called the "American Health Choices Plan,"...
Under this program, the government alone, with no input from the free market, is responsible for the regulation and management of health care. Oxymoronically, the plan whose formal title includes the term "choice" is built around what is known as an "individual mandate" -- a government requirement that all Americans, regardless of income or choice, possess at least a (government-established) minimal level of health insurance.
The inclusion of this individual mandate means, of course, that should this plan go into effect, choice at its most basic level -- the choice whether or not to have a certain level of coverage (or to have coverage at all) -- would be eradicated...
Mrs. Clinton told George Stephanopoulos on ABC's Sunday morning show that her "enforcement mechanism" could indeed include "going after people's wages."
In reality, ,,, is a call for government to use its power to force people to accept and enroll in a program they may not want or be able to afford. When the fact that the ranks of our uninsured are filled primarily with people who lack health coverage for precisely one of these two reasons is taken into account, this proposal is shown for the undesirable overreach of government responsibility that it is.
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POLITICIANS AND THE ECONOMY
Believing that most middle-class Americans are only steps from disaster will lead politicians to the wrong policy and political agenda, say Stephen J. Rose, author of the forthcoming, "Mythonomics: Ten Things That You Think You Know About The Middle Class That Are Wrong," and Anne Kim, director of the Middle Class Program at Third Way, a progressive think tank in Washington.
[snip - Re: the current economy and 1929]: "It's not even close" [snip] In 2006, the median income of working-age husband-wife couples (ages 25-59) was $73,765.Eighty percent of Americans over 40 own a home, and it's still the case that relatively few homeowners are at risk of losing their homes over the next several years. Moreover, if the coming recession follows the same pattern of the last seven downturns since 1960, it will be relatively short and shallow.
Politicians should not confuse bad times with pessimism, and should not only offer security instead of success: In 2007 Democracy Corps found that 57 percent of Americans agreed that government makes it harder for people to get ahead in life, and 54 percent thought that government mostly gets in the way of the economy and job growth. I.e., politicians should not assume that economic recessions automatically translate into broad public support for major government interventions.
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"The economy isn’t failing. Has it hit a rough patch? For certain. The subprime mortgage crisis, though it affects about 2 percent of all current mortgages, has put a dent in the housing market. But employment remains strong and inflation remains low. Nationally, the economy has not yet suffered one month of negative growth, much less the two consecutive quarters (six months) that are required before the economy can be said to be in recession..."
Bill Hobbs
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Americans confident in 2009 turnaround
Americans believe the economy will bounce back by next year, according to a survey released Friday. A national CNN/Opinion Research Corp. poll found that 60% of respondents think economic conditions in the United States will be "good" next year.
Of the more than 1,000 American adults surveyed in the poll, conducted March 14-16, 83% said they are "confident" that they will be able to maintain their standards of living next year, and 85% are "confident" they will keep their jobs over the next six months.
Americans also showed faith that they would be able to pay off their future debts, with 90% confident they would pay their monthly mortgage payments for the duration of the mortgage. and nearly as many - 83% - saying they would pay off college loans, car payments, and credit cards in the future.
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Seeking a kinder word for failure
To soothe the bruised egos of educators and children in lackluster schools, Massachusetts officials are now pushing for kinder, gentler euphemisms for failure. Instead of calling these schools "underperforming," the Board of Education is considering labeling them as "Commonwealth priority," to avoid poisoning teacher and student morale. Schools in the direst straits, now known as "chronically underperforming," would get the more urgent but still vague label of "priority one."
[first: control the language...]
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The State of Racism: Part 2 - The Heart of "Whiteness"
If there’s one fear white people have today, it’s to be accused of racism. There’re almost no incidents of open racism in real life (though on TV, one regularly sees shows that involve white violence complete with the N-word). Americans have given up their right to free speech, the right listed in the very first Amendment of the Constitution, in an attempt to eliminate racism. Most people are convinced that racism, not just actions but even mere words, is illegal. [or, increasingly, thought] We are told that freedom of speech does not include the right to insult or offend people, no matter how sensitive or unreasonable these people may be. Of course, when we talk about “people”, we mean “the people of color”...
[tried to parse down - couldn't bring myself to cut anything. Highly Recommended , not to endorse all points made but as a wake up call that if we're to have a true dialog on race we must first dispense with the seemingly established notion that only whites can be racist and address the glaring double standard on what is and isn't permissible to even be discussed - depending on who says it - which currently prevents any meaningful discussion on this important topic. Again, recommended > ]
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Watch out, drivers: in this case, green means 'stop'
Portland work crews were not painting the street green at Southeast Hawthorne Boulevard and Seventh Avenue on Monday in honor of St. Patrick's Day, though it might have appeared that way to passers-by. Instead, the big green swath of pavement marked off the first of 14 bike boxes that will be installed around the city over the next several weeks. When the process is complete, Portland will join New York City as one of the few North American cities with the designated areas that allow cyclists to wait in front of cars during red lights at busy intersections.
[that's right, they're putting the slower 'vehicles' in front of the faster. It's eco-logic: like logic, but different]
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CBS Obama Poll Misleading, Flawed and Biased
... Then I came across what in my view is the single most biased and dishonest public opinion survey I've ever seen: a CBS poll that read, "Most voters following the events regarding Senator Barack Obama and Rev. Jeremiah Wright think Obama's speech was a success."
This lead sentence in the press release appeared in media outlets all over the world. It gave the impression that Obama's speech on Wright had ended any dispute or controversy about Obama being associated with Wright and his many inflammatory comments. Maybe over time that will prove true. But that's not the point ...
... rather than survey registered voters in the customary way -- by randomly finding voters around the nation and asking them their impressions of the issue -- CBS instead adopted the most curious polling methodology I've ever some across. It was probably the only methodology possible on this subject that could reach what was apparently the network's desired outcome...
[Matt Towery (author) is a professional pollster - Recommended > ]
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Congress forgets ban on pet projects
WASHINGTON—Get out the trough, it's feeding time. Congress has decided that an election year is not the time to be giving up those campaign-donation producing "pork" projects bemoaned by both parties' presidential candidates. As lawmakers returned Monday from a two-week spring break, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi quietly shelved the idea of a one-year moratorium on so-called earmarks...
["the most ethical congress in history"]
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Reporter Quits Al Jazeera English for Anti-American Bias
The anti-American bias at Al Jazeera English became “so stereotypical, so reflexive” that former “Nightline” reporter David Marash quit his job with the Qatar-based channel, in part over that attitude. What was even more interesting was Marash's assertion that the anti-American attitude came more from the British administrators than the Arabs at AJE:
Former "Nightline" reporter Dave Marash has quit Al-Jazeera English, saying Thursday his exit was due in part to an anti-American bias at a network that is little seen in this country. Marash said he felt that attitude more from British administrators than Arabs at the Qatar-based network.Marash was the highest-profile American TV personality hired when the English language affiliate to Al-Jazeera was started two years ago in an attempt to compete with CNN and the BBC...
[ah, that explains it then: they were just trying to compete with CNN & BBC...]
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CA Budgets twofer:
California
Mayor's climate aide gets $160,000 a year
In his quest to make San Francisco the greenest city in the nation, Mayor Gavin Newsom recently created a $160,000-a-year job for a senior aide and gave him the ambitious-sounding title of director of climate protection initiatives.
But the new climate protection initiatives director is just the latest person to join the city payroll in the name of tackling global climate woes, raising questions about whether environmentalism is becoming the latest excuse for a bloating government payroll.[*]
San Francisco has at least two dozen other city employees already working directly on climate 'issues' at a cost to taxpayers of hundreds of thousands of dollars...
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Cities pay huge salaries despite fiscal crises
A city nurse earned $350,000. A fire department battalion chief pulled in more than twice as much as the mayor. And a municipal park ranger took home $188,000 in overtime on top of his $71,000 salary. Such generous payouts were criticized for hastening the fiscal downfall of the city of Vallejo, which narrowly averted bankruptcy this month. But the nurse, firefighter and ranger aren't from Vallejo - they're among hundreds of top earners working for the cities of San Francisco, San Jose and Oakland.
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Cultural Affirmative Action
What do you think Bill Clinton was referring to when he said that he wanted his cabinet to "look like America," meritocracy or quota orthodoxy? Yet Clinton isn't alone; he merely gave voice to common practice. Would Joycelyn Elders (the poster girl for AA) have been Surgeon General if she weren't a black woman? Would Ruth Bader Ginsberg and Sandra Day O'Connor have ascended to the Supreme Court and Janet Reno been Attorney General if they weren't female? And, as Ferraro noted herself, she would never have been the 1984 vice-presidential candidate but for her fairer-sex status. Cultural affirmative action manifests itself in all arenas, not just politics...
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Is 'Magic Over' For Ailing U.S.? Facts Say 'No'
"I think the magic is over." That's what French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner recently said about the United States' global reputation. It's never been a great idea to rely on the assessments of French politicians.
The remedies for our current maladies require a moderate curbing of our credit-based lifestyle. Given the vast size of the U.S. economy, we could easily restrain spending and begin paying off our debts at a rapid clip.
We are still the world's third-largest oil producer, with vast amounts of untouched oil. We have the world's largest coal reserves. Americans could use coal and nuclear power to generate most of our electrical needs.
More importantly, there's a growing sense Americans want to sacrifice to ensure our pre-eminence. Many conservatives accept that they can't just cut taxes without spending limits. And many liberals see that more federal programs mean more dependency and debt for our children
The U.S. is so huge, free, wealthy and dynamic, we can cause enormous problems overnight. But by the same token, we can curb these excesses quickly. The solution to so many of the hopeless headlines is entirely in our hands.
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Bush's Africa Legacy
[a 'just for the record' thing]
President Bush showed the world that it isn't words, but actions, that truly make a difference. Millions throughout Africa would agree
... But the real story is not about just this one trip; it is about the commitment the president made to Africa and what the United States has been quietly accomplishing throughout the continent over the past eight years under Mr. Bush's leadership.
While critics here at home, including many in the press, focused on attacking Mr. Bush at every turn, he steadfastly pushed for greater investments to help the families and businesses of Africa. It's the great untold story that has rarely made headlines here in America, but even so, it has truly changed the world for millions of Africans.
As Tanzanian President Jakaya Kikwete noted, for the people of his country and others across the African continent, Mr. Bush's "legacy will be that of saving hundreds of thousands of mothers' and children's lives from malaria, preventing new HIV infections and giving hope to those infected through care and treatment, and helping millions of young men and women get education." Perhaps most importantly, he adds, Mr. Bush leaves "the legacy of assisting African nations and people [in building] capacity for their own growth and development"
[snip]
So why did he do it? As singer-songwriter Bob Geldof pointed out, "There are no votes in helping the poor of Africa, but Bush did it anyway." It clearly wasn't about winning votes or political gain. It was not about fodder for stump speeches and empty promises of hope. Instead of being about catch phrases that simply ring hollow, the president's quiet efforts in Africa have been about action, about compassion and about results...
[more...]
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San Francisco's Finest on display
One of the more blatant examples of media bias we regularly see is how the usually disturbed people who turn out for left-wing protests are routinely portrayed as normal.
There's no better way of observing this disparity than seeing uncensored reports of what lefty protests are actually like. And there's no better chronicler of these events than the anonymous blogger Zombie.
You'll get a real flavor (and several laughs) of left-wing lunacy by checking out her latest report on the fifth year anniversary of the Iraq war in San Francisco...
[mini-sampling - worth visiting link for the rest for humor value if nothing else...]
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