[HT:SE]
THE Senate is near to pass ing a massive $50 billion Emergency Plan for HIV/ AIDS Relief - a bill whose priorities are based on myth, just like virtually all anti-AIDS efforts worldwide.
The world's top AIDS bureaucrat recently admitted the truth: "It is very unlikely that there will be a heterosexual epidemic" outside Africa, Kevin de Cock, director of the World Health Organization, told London's Independent newspaper. [snip]
"Although HIV causes 3.7 percent of [worldwide] mortality, it receives 25 percent of international health-care aid." ... "In the fight against AIDS, profiteering has trumped prevention," ... "AIDS is no longer simply a disease; it has become a multibillion-dollar industry." ... "We have created a monster with too many vested interests and reputations at stake."
Consider: A 2008 WHO/UNAIDS/UNICEF report demands AIDS drugs for every victim worldwide, requiring spending hikes from $8.1 billion now to $35 billion by 2010. Yet AIDS remains incurable. Conversely, an African with non-resistant tuberculosis is curable with merely $25 of drugs.
There is no precedent in history for such myth-driven "democratization" of a disease, nor for the abominable unfairness in allocating funds away from so many curable illnesses.
READ MORE
Monday, July 7, 2008
A MYTH THAT KILLS
Western Greenland Ice Growing
The ice between Canada and southwestern Greenland has reached its highest level in 15 years.
Minus 30 degrees Celsius. That's how cold it's been in large parts of western Greenland where the population has been bundling up in hats and scarves. At the same time, Denmark's Meteorological Institute states that the ice between Canada and southwest Greenland right now has reached its greatest extent in 15 years.
**Update 22:00--As far as I can tell, no one in the major media reported this.
READ MORE
Energy Myths
[part 1]
Many in Congress seem either disconnected from reality or intentionally disingenuous about our energy crunch. They have well-honed negative responses to common-sense ideas about solving our energy crisis, particularly drilling for more oil.
These responses are based on a number of widely held myths. Sadly, they've somehow [read: media] become the backbone of our energy 'policy'. They include:
• "We can't drill our way out of our energy crisis."
Actually, we can.
Conservative estimates put the total amount of recoverable oil in conventional deposits at about 39 billion barrels. Offshore, we have another 89 billion barrels or so. In ANWR, 10 billion barrels. In oil shale deposits, we have more than 1 trillion barrels of oil.
In perspective, that's about four times the total reserves of Saudi Arabia. And if estimates of shale reserves as high as 2 trillion barrels prove true, we'll have about a 300-year supply of oil - just from shale. [snip]
By 2030, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration, we will need at least 30% more energy to fuel our economy. Nearly 85% of that increase will come from oil and gas, even with expected gains for alternative energy. Can't drill our way out? In fact, it's the only way out of our energy crisis...
[Recommended > ]
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American patriotism highest in the world
Soaring gasoline prices, tumbling stocks, the war, the nukes, the bickering between political parties as trouble looms. It is not the most serene Fourth of July on record, certainly. Yet, despite collective and persistent anxieties, the nation's patriotism remains very much intact.
Alive and well, in fact.
Americans are the most patriotic people on the planet, according to researchers at the University of Chicago's National Opinion Research Center who quantified and compared the national sense of pride in 34 countries.
The United States is at the head of the list, followed by Venezuela, Ireland, South Africa, Australia, Canada, Chile, New Zealand, the Philippines and Israel rounding out the top 10.
It was no random gauge of passing sentiment... [snip]
READ MORE
Saturday, July 5, 2008
Rasmussen Reports 'political class' defined
[Summary: the Political Class believes government knows better than the little people {i.e., tax paying voters} or private industry. Longer answer:] <search: political-class> -- Generally speaking, when it comes to important national issues, whose
The Political Class Index is based on three questions.
All three clearly address populist tendencies and perspectives, all three have strong public support, and, for all three questions, the populist perspective is generally shared by Democrats, Republicans and those not affiliated with either of the major parties. We have asked the questions before, and the results change little whether Republicans or Democrats are in charge of the government.
Preliminary results indicate that 55% of Americans can be classified on the populist or Mainstream side of the divide. Only seven percent (7%) side with the Political Class. When leaners are included, 75% lean in the Mainstream direction and 14% lean the other way.
Thirty-seven percent (37%) of those on the populist side of the debate are Republicans, 36% are Democrats, and 27% are not affiliated with either major party.
Twenty-two percent (22%) of government employees are aligned with the Political Class along with just four percent (4%) of private sector workers.
The biggest surprise so far is that a plurality of the Political Class believes the economy is getting better while 66% of those in the Mainstream say it’s getting worse.
The questions used to calculate the Index are:
judgment do you trust more - the American people or America’s political leaders?
-- Some people believe that the federal government has become a special
interest group that looks out primarily for its own interests. Has the federal
government become a special interest group?
-- Do government and big
business often work together in ways that hurt consumers and investors?
To create a scale, each response earns a plus 1 for the populist answer, a minus 1 for the political class answer, and a 0 for not sure. Those who score 2 or higher are considered a populist or part of the Mainstream. Those who score -2 or lower are considered to be aligned with the Political Class. Those who score +1 or -1 are considered leaners in one direction or the other.
In practical terms, if someone is classified with the Mainstream, they agree with the mainstream view on at least two of the three questions and don’t agree with the Political Class on any.
SOURCE
Thursday, July 3, 2008
Energy Quagmire?
.
Gas prices have topped $4 a gallon, and prices are soaring across all sectors of the economy because of the impact of fuel prices on businesses.. [snip]
THE ROCKY MOUNTAINS The shale rock of thesemountains holds an estimated 7 trillion barrels of oil.
But the mother lode is in shale rock. It's estimated that the Saudis have about 260 billion barrels under their sand. By comparison, with current technology, we can safely recover more than 800 billion barrels of the estimated 7 trillion barrels of oil in the shale rock from the Rocky Mountains. That means that current technology could give us more than three times the entire national resources of oil-rich Saudi Arabia.
Extracting oil from shale rock only recently has become economically feasible. It costs about $70 per barrel to extract and make the oil usable. When oil was $18 a barrel that would have been crazy. But at $138 a barrel, it's a bargain. And American companies can make money by supplying our nation's need, and lowering costs for all of us in the process...
READ MORE
Off-Shore Drilling Environmentally Sound, Panel Says
Expanding oil drilling will not severely harm the environment or put alternative fuel investments at risk, some energy industry experts say. The Institute for Energy Research (IER) responded to questions from various news reporters by way of a conference call on Tuesday. (Snip)
Offshore rigs proved themselves in the Gulf of Mexico during Hurricane Katrina. ''We actually moved oil wells rigs out of the Gulf; they were blown out of the Gulf, and yet (there were) no oil spills at all because of the new techniques that have been used ever since the Santa Barbara oil spill...
[the risk of oil spills from modern drilling rigs is orders of magnitude less than that of ships {think: Katrina} - i.e., the closer to home the rigs, the less chance of spills]
READ MORE
Dems Oppose GOP Call for Increased Domestic Drilling
Democratic senators are skeptical about new efforts by Republicans and the Bush administration to increase offshore drilling, despite a government report by the Department of Interior's Bureau of Land Management showing that there are 139 billion barrels of oil in the United States (onshore and offshore combined).
The estimated oil deposits, which amount to more than the known oil reserves in Iran, Iraq, Russia, Nigeria, and Venezuela, should be largely ignored, according to Democrats, ....
[we'll be voting for more than just a President this November...]
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Big Brother turns wowser
FROM which circle of hell did all these finger-waggers spring? Never have I seen so many preachers so keen to bully others for their own "good".
Last week it was Health Minister Nicola Roxon (again) in her Sass and Bide hairshirt, this time warning smokers they may soon need a permit to puff. A licence for cigarettes, Roxon says, is "one of the types of things" her health taskforce may tell her to impose. Have these people gone mad?
For the first time I feel the temptation to light up a cancer-stick. Indeed, I couldn't think of many nobler causes for which to lay down my wheezing life.
A new breed of puritans is upon us and growing far too puffed up themselves. Consider what plans they've already unveiled to cramp your life and set it to their stern order.
> Sprinklers on your garden? Banned now for years - to "save" country rivers from the new dams that these concrete greens find hideous, or would if they ever drove out to see one.
> Plastic bags to lug home your shopping? To be fined with a 25 cent levy - to "save" the planet from a plastic that smug green baggers find capitalistically crass.
> Pre-mixed drinks? Hit with a new alcopop tax - to "save" teenagers from a drink that these pinot preachers find sick-makingly sweet.
> Petrol? To be made dearer by an emissions trading scheme - to "save" the planet from a warming that these car-haters and salvation-seekers won't admit halted a decade ago.
Cramp, crimp, crush, ban. Designer sackcloth for everyone. Good heavens, so drunk on bans are these people - drunker than any alcopopper - that a forum of St Kilda residents last week even suggested locals be made to wear ankle bracelets so that visitors could be detected after dark and thrown out.
Yes, true, I'm afraid. What next: microchip owners of airconditioners? [no, just the airconditioners so the State can control them]
Judge the censorious mood from this homely planet-saving advice in last month' edition of the Rural Women's Network Newsletter:
"At Easter, we avoid foil-wrapped chocolate eggs by having our kids paint hard-boiled eggs and stones . . . For my daughter's sixth birthday last year we took a tribe of children on a nearby bushwalk and had a rubbish-collecting competitions."Stones for Easter eggs? Rubbish collecting for a little girl's party? This isn't meant to save a planet but to impose someone's joy-killing morality.
It's not just a madness confined to Australia, of course. The Left in every English-speaking land is now indulging its inner totalitarian.
It's increasingly urgent they be resisted.
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Domestic Disturbance
President Bill Clinton’s first major legislative accomplishment - at least from his perspective - was passing the Family and Medical Leave Act. And though presidential hopeful Sen. Obama promises he is a new kind of candidate, ready to make a fresh break with the past, his domestic policy agenda largely begins where President Clinton’s left off. This would include a dramatic expansion of workplace regulations. (Snip) Currently, only businesses with more than 50 employees are affected by FMLA. Obama wants to drag all businesses into the FMLA net...
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CBS Declares Recession - again
On Monday’s CBS "Early Show," co-host Harry Smith talked to economic analyst Mark Zandi who had this to say:
ZANDI: Yeah, it's a self re-enforcing negative cycle. You know, that's what happens during recessions, and that's what we're in the middle of right now.Last week, "Early Show" co-host Julie Chen declared a: "perfect storm of economic woes." Meanwhile, ABC’s Good Morning America used the term "recession" eight times in three days last week.
SMITH: Whoa, is this a recession?
ZANDI: You know that -- that's a debate among economists and policy makers. But in the minds of the average American household I think there's no debate, this is a recession.
[gee, and where do you think the average Joe gets it into his head that we're in a recession?]
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Assimilation of Immigrants and the Imperative of Pride in America
What worries me is that both the remaining presidential candidates support a general amnesty for illegal immigrants. And this amnesty is without any prior successful closure of the U.S.-Mexican Border that would halt further waves of immigrants. McCain pays lip-service to border security and assimilation on his campaign website. Obama's website is similar, listing border security as his main priority, followed by "bringing people out of the shadows" to become citizens. Clinton uses much more flowery language but essentially posits the same message. [snip]
It should be noted that illegal immigrants do not live in the shadows. They attend American schools, use our hospital emergency rooms as though they were a general practitioner's office and work in specific businesses. If the Federal Government wanted to enforce our current immigration laws, which are sufficient to solve the problem, it could. But there is no willpower to do so...
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Climate concerns halt coal plant
[HT:JB]
The US state of Georgia has blocked construction of a new coal-fired power station because of concerns over its carbon dioxide emissions. Environmentalists welcomed the news, and predict the decision will lead to reconsideration of many coal power plants under development in the US.
The judge cited a decision by the Supreme Court last year which issued a ruling recognising CO2 as a pollutant...
[insane decisions have consequences]
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Cooper's CNN Producer Warns of Racial 'Knife' Fight on Obama
On CNN's AC-360 blog, Anderson Cooper's senior producer Barclay Palmer conflated Karl Rove's critique of Barack Obama and Don Imus's latest racial radio flap into a racial knife fight: "anyone who thinks that Obama’s presumptive victory in the Democratic primary means we’re in a post-racial America might want to think again. Race will play the falling knife in this… race. And you can bet your country club membership, we’re just getting started."
[I now suspect he's right - but pay attention going forward to which side keeps bringing up race...]
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California will pay for yet another late budget
The credit crunch could make this year's missed deadline the costliest ever.
SACRAMENTO -- California starts the new budget year today -- and once again no budget is in place.
Legislators are making little progress closing a $15.2-billion shortfall. Democrats demand new taxes. Republicans say that is out of the question. Meanwhile, their inability to strike a deal threatens millions of Californians who rely on the government for healthcare and other services.
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State workers in Utah shifting to 4-day week
Gov. Jon Huntsman, a first-term Republican, says he's making the change to reduce the state's carbon footprint, increase energy efficiency and provide workers more flexibility. [snip]
It takes some adjusting. "One thing that has to be changed is the level of expectation from taxpayers, because they've always wanted five-day access,"
Byers says. "They have to adjust to offices that are open longer on weekdays, but closed on Fridays." [snip]
Beyond the energy and financial implications, the four-day workweek is a quality-of-life issue for many.
[how nice. The government saves money, 'reduces its carbon foot print' and improves the quality of life - for government employees. Never mind that their customers will just have to adjust their expectations re: the five-day access they've said they want. this is government]
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Broadcast networks falsely suggested that Clark criticized McCain's service
Summary: All three network evening newscasts misrepresented retired Gen. Wesley Clark's comments about Sen. John McCain on Face The Nation, with none noting that Clark praised McCain as a "hero" for his Vietnam war service. ABC's David Wright asserted that McCain's experience as a POW made Clark's comments "especially provocative." CBS' Dean Reynolds falsely suggested that Clark had questioned McCain's patriotism and had "critici[zed]" McCain's "service, including five years as a POW." And NBC's Brian Williams falsely suggested that Clark had impugned McCain's "war record."
[a first for everything: this is from Media Matters, a distortingly liberal site I've made a point of visiting several days a week based on the principle that you should read that which you disagree with, and that any one/thing can change over time. And here we are - they're right on this one: while Clark's remarks were disingenuous they were not the overt 'attack' the MSM is making of them, when taken in full context.
Of course, MM's piece is all opinion with next to no reference links - but let's not expect miracles: it's a 12,000 step process...]
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'Black national anthem' stirs controversy for city
DENVER - Mayor John Hickenlooper's annual State of the City address may get more attention for what wasn't included than what was. (Snip) City Council President Michael Hancock introduced singer Rene Marie to perform the national anthem. Instead, she performed the song "Lift Ev'ry Voice and Sing," which is also known as the "black national anthem."
["One Nation, under God, Indivisible" - maybe not]
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Tables Turned on Intruder During Home Invasion
SAN ANTONIO -- The tables turned on a burglar when a homeowner took matters into his own hands.
Police say the intruder broke in through the garage and had been drinking prior to the break-in. The pregnant woman inside the home was getting ready to give her 18-month-old child a bath when she heard noises. She saw the man walking around outside and called her husband. He confronted the intruder in the kitchen.
Police say the homeowner shot the intruder in the chest. He is now listed in critical condition at University Hospital. He could face burglary charges this morning.
The homeowner will not face any charges.
[notice to criminals: you break into someone else's home at great risk. don't do it]
{especially in Texas - oh, right; that state's perennially below-average crime rates are just coincidence. }
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BUMPER STICKERS LINKED TO ROAD RAGE DRIVERS
Drivers who sport bumper and window stickers on their vehicles are more prone to road rage, say researchers at Colorado University.
The researchers have released a new study which discovered that motorists with personalized items on a vehicle are more likely to be aggressive drivers.
The specific content of the stickers -- be it "Grumpy old Git or "Baby on Board" -- did not make a difference in how aggressive the driver was.
[those damn Baby-on-Board maniacs]
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There Should Be No Fairness-Doctrine Secret Agenda
ACT
Begun in 1934 during the administration of President Franklin D. Roosevelt when AM radio [often just one station per town - and no TV] was king, the Fairness Doctrine sought to ensure that radio listeners would get both sides of a political story by requiring that stations give equal air time to different opinions.
In 1987 the FCC voted to halt the doctrine's implementation when it had become obvious that the government's monitoring of the media led to censorship. Well before the 1980s Radio ceased having any sort of communication monopoly as it did in the 1930s, and has only expanded {many say because of the doctrine's demise} since. [snip]
"Under the rubric of 'broadcast localism' it is clear the Commission is proposing no less than a sweeping takeover by Washington bureaucrats of broadcast media. The proposals and recommendations for Commission action contained in the Notice of Proposed Rulemaking amount to the stealth enactment of the Fairness Doctrine, a policy designated to squelch the free speech and free expression of specifically targeted audiences,"Boehner notes in his letter that forcing the licensees to recreate the so-called "advisory boards" of a bygone era would encumber broadcast media with onerous bureaucratic burdens not faced by cable, satellite, or the internet. The report's assertion that these boards would 'help' radio stations "determine the needs and interests of their communities" or promote "localism and diversity" borders on fantasy. [snip]
The FCC should make it clear, as soon as possible, that it has no intention of reinstating the Fairness Doctrine in any way, shape or form.
Also, the House Leadership should move H.R. 2905 out of Committee and give it a simple up-or-down vote on the House Floor. If they did, just about everyone might come out a winner.
READ MORE
Bring the Broadcaster Freedom Act, H.R. 2905 to the floor now.Pelosi (202) 225-0100 http://speaker.house.gov/contact/
YOUR Congressman > https://forms.house.gov/wyr/welcome.shtml
Wednesday, July 2, 2008
Feds probe S.F.'s migrant-offender shield
San Francisco probation officials - citing the city's immigrant sanctuary status - are protecting Hondurans caught dealing crack cocaine from possible federal deportation and have given some offenders a city-paid flight home with carte blanche to return.
The city's practices recently prompted a federal criminal investigation into whether San Francisco has been systematically circumventing U.S. immigration law, according to officials with knowledge of the matter.
City officials say they are trying to balance their obligations under federal and state law with San Francisco's policies aimed at protecting the rights of the immigrants, who they say are often victims of exploitation
Joseph Russoniello, the U.S. attorney in charge of the San Francisco area, said he was "flabbergasted that the taxpayers' money was being spent for the purpose of ferrying detainees home. You have to have a perfect storm of dumb moves to have it happen..."
READ MORE
“America is very close to succeeding in Iraq. The ‘near-strategic defeat’ of al Qaeda in Iraq described by CIA Director Michael Hayden last month in the Washington Post has been followed by the victory of the Iraqi government's security forces over illegal Shiite militias, including Iranian-backed Special Groups. The enemies of Iraq and America now cling desperately to their last bastions, while the political process builds momentum.
“These tremendous gains remain fragile and could be lost to skillful enemy action, or errors in Baghdad or Washington. But where the U.S. was unequivocally losing in Iraq at the end of 2006, we are just as unequivocally winning today.”
.
Was the Iraq War Worth It?
While the war remains unpopular, our success there has been unmistakable. The Iraqi people, with the help of the U.S. led coalition, have succeeded in establishing the world’s first Arab democracy. Their achievement is a milestone in the war on terror and for the cause of liberty. [snip]
Before the war, state sponsors of terrorism in the Middle East were Iran, Syria, Libya and Iraq. Today, only Iran and Syria remain -- with a democratic Iraq located between them. And in the information age, don't believe for a moment that the infectious seeds of freedom are not being sown in those countries and throughout the region. The promise of freedom for the oppressed is America's greatest strategic weapon in this war. In due time, tyrants in those countries may come to fear their own people more than any army that may threaten them.[snip]
The recent silence from the mainstream news media on Iraq, however, is speaking volumes.
READ MORE
IS IT REALLY A "$3 TRILLION WAR"?
[HT:JH]
In their new book, "The Three Trillion Dollar War," Joseph Stiglitz and Linda Bilmes estimate the true cost of the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq to be $3 trillion, an outrageous figure nearly six times the defense department's own numbers, says John Lott, the author of "Freedomnomics," and a senior research scientist at the University of Maryland.
Stiglitz and Bilmes, make a number of errors in their calculations, says Lott:
• They put their estimate of total costs of veteran injuries at over $900 billion ($630 billion from taking care of the wounded and $273 billion from the harm done to wounded and injured soldiers), although the Congressional Budget Office's Matthew Goldberg testified in October that the future medical care costs, disability compensation, and survivors' benefits up to 2017 would likely range from only $10 to $13 billion.Some notable war critics estimate the costs of the war to be close to $1 trillion, with their most realistic estimates at less than half that amount; still others place the best cost of the war estimates at a sixth of what Stiglitz and Bilmes claim, says Lott.
• On oil prices, Stiglitz and Bilmes argue since oil prices have increased as the war has gone on, this suggests the war has something to do with rising prices; however, Peter Hartley, a professor at Rice University who specializes in energy economics, says that oil experts almost unanimously agree the wars have not affected oil prices.
• The authors also calculate interest rates using a rate that is far too low and makes the future expenditures on the war look larger today than they really are.
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On the Supreme Court’s 5-4 Ruling in Boumediene v. Bush Affording Certain Rights to Terrorist Detainees:
“It is difficult to single out the most outrageous aspect of Justice Anthony Kennedy’s majority opinion in the Supreme Court’s cataclysmic Boumediene ruling last Thursday: The reckless vesting of constitutional rights in aliens whose only connection with our body politic is their bloody jihad against Americans; the roughshod ride over binding precedent to accomplish that feat; or the smug arrogance perfectly captured by dissenting Chief Justice John Roberts’s description of a ‘constitutional bait and switch’ — a Court that first beseeches the political branches to enact a statutory procedure for handling combatant detentions, and then, once a thoughtful law is compliantly passed, invalidates the effort for its failure to satisfy the eccentric predilections of five lawyers.”
.
Ad Featuring Popular Police Pup Sparks Anger
Muslims in the Scottish district of Tayside are outraged by the appearance of a wide-eyed, 6-week-old puppy on postcards distributed by the local police force.
"My concern was that it's not welcomed by all communities, with the dog on the cards," said Dundee councilor Mohammed Asif.
The cute cards were meant to notify locals of a new telephone number for non-emergency phone calls but instead have become a flashpoint for a clash of cultures. Shopkeepers are refusing to display the offending ad and the Dundee city councilor is calling for an investigation...
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IOC raps China for politicising Games
Beijing - The International Olympic Committee has lost patience with China, issuing an unusual criticism of the authorities for linking policy on Tibet to the Olympics. It acted after the ruling Communist Party's top official in the province used a ceremony to mark the Olympic torch's passage through Lhasa, the capital, on Saturday to launch a fresh attack on the Dalai Lama.
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Russian, EU Leaders Discuss Energy and Security
Energy and security dominated the Russia-EU Summit in Western Siberia, where Kremlin leader Dmitri Medvedev called for creation of all-European institutions to replace long-standing structures, including NATO.
In an apparent attempt to increase Russian influence in Europe at the expense of the United States, President Medvedev said security responsibilities should not be passed onto neighbors. He says all European security issues, including missile defense and the Conventional Forces in Europe Treaty should be decided collectively. [snip]
European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso acknowledged EU dependence on Russian energy during a joint news conference at the end of the two-day summit, and praised President Medvedev for helping the European Union hold talks with Iran...
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The Imitators: Part III
Some of the people who are most adamant against outsourcing economic activity from the United States to other countries often seem to think we should outsource our foreign policy to "world opinion" or act only in conjunction "with our NATO allies."
Often there is a blanket assumption that European countries are just so much more sophisticated than American "cowboys." But there is incredibly little interest in the track record of those European sophisticates whom we are supposed to consult about our own national interests-- including, in an age when terrorists may acquire nuclear weapons, our national survival.
In the course of the twentieth century, supposedly sophisticated Europeans managed to create some of the most monstrous forms of government on earth-- Communism, Fascism, Nazism-- in peacetime, and to start the two World Wars, the bloodiest in all human history. After both World Wars, the United States had to step in to save millions of people in Europe from starving amid the wreckage and rubble that their wars had created.
During the Cold War, may European intellectuals once again misread the threat of a totalitarian dictatorship-- in this case, the Soviet Union. When they finally recognized the threat, many saw the question as whether it was "better to be red than dead." They were no more prepared to stand up to the Soviet Union than they had been to Nazi Germany. Worse yet, much of the European intelligentsia objected to America's standing up to the Soviet Union.
Are we now to blindly imitate those who have been so wrong, so often over the past hundred years? These do not seem like people whose sophistication we should defer to...
[Recommended > ]
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North Pole ice melting fear mongers strike out
Kudos to John L. Daly, who has written a very interesting study of ice at the North Pole. Global Warmists are once again observing cyclical changes and declaring them "proof" of the dire effects of global warming.
Among the interesting pictures posted to this site is this one from 1987, when we were supposed to be worried about global cooling:
HMS Superb, USS Billfish, and USS Sea Devil in a North Pole rendezvous in 1987(U.S. Navy Photo)
This was not exactly a harbinger of global warming, as this picture of unbroken ice at the North Pole three years later attests:
USS Hawkbill at the North Pole, Spring 1999. (US Navy Photo)Daly explores the various factors influencing ice at the North Pole. It is accessible to laymen like me. His conclusions:
...both the extent and thickness of Arctic sea ice is certainly subject to variation. But it would be a mistake to assume that a brief period during which the Arctic is in a thinning cycle is anything more than that - a cycle. We know from past history that it has been subject to earlier retreats as suggested by the opening quote from 1817. [snip]READ MORE
There is nothing in the data to suggest anything but natural cycles at work.
Are Volcanoes Melting Arctic?
While the media scream that man-made global warming is making the North Pole ice-free, another possible cause is as old as the Earth itself. They just have to look deeper. (Snip) As reported in the June 26 edition of ScienceDaily, a research team led by the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute (WHOI) has uncovered evidence of massive undersea volcanic eruptions deep beneath the ice-covered surface of the Arctic Ocean. "Explosive volatile discharge has clearly been a widespread, and ongoing, process," according to the WHOI team.
READ MORE
[FLASHBACK> 080627 NNBrief > Study finds Arctic seabed afire with lava-spewing volcanoes...]
Ignorance You Can Believe In
From the New York Times:
Senator Barack Obama took a poke at his Republican opponent on Tuesday, saying that for Senator John McCain to talk of a "psychological benefit" from expanded offshore drilling is to define that policy as a gimmick.The "psychological impact" to which McCain refers is quite simple: The expectation of greater oil supplies in the future would make it more attractive to sell oil now, when supplies are restricted and prices are high, thereby bringing prices down in the short term. Is Obama really too ignorant to grasp this, or does he just think voters are?
Mr. Obama was responding to remarks that Mr. McCain made on Monday in Fresno, Calif., when he observed that even though the nation might take years to benefit from offshore drilling, "exploiting those reserves would have psychological impact that I think is beneficial."
Mr. Obama seized on those comments while speaking at a town hall-style meeting here.
" 'Psychological impact'?" Mr. Obama said. "In case you're wondering, that's Washington-speak for 'It polls well.' "
READ MORE
[good point: anyone really think any known alternative energy will be matured to replace oil in less time than simply bringing more on-line? So why doesn't the 'effect will take years' argument apply to them?].
The EU Trash Police [for a profit, natch]
[UK]
Threatened with steep fines if they dump too much trash, local governments around the country are imposing strict regimens to force residents to produce less and recycle more:
• Many local governments now collect trash only twice a month, instead of every week.
• They restrict households to a limited amount of garbage and refuse to pick up more.
• They require that garbage be put out only at specific times.
• They impose fines (often in the hundreds of dollars) for failure to comply with their rigid restrictions.
• Other forms of punishment include receiving a "sticker of shame" that informs the public a resident has violated local garbage laws.
The British government says the new regulations are necessary if Britain is to adjust to the changing times: Britain has been ordered to reduce the waste it puts in landfills -- by 2015, to 50 percent of what is was in 1995 -- or face untold millions of dollars in European Union fines.
[no wonder Ireland said no thank you to the Lisbon 'treaty'. The moral? It never stops; once government is let out of it Petri dish it acts like a virus, consuming everything before it {think 'Andromeda Strain'}]
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6 Mexico police officers killed in ambush
Mexico's raging drug war claimed the lives of six more police officers, ambushed on patrol in the marijuana-rich state of Sinaloa, authorities said Friday.
The attack followed the slaying Thursday of a senior police commander, part of a long string of killings apparently aimed at eroding public confidence in the government's ability to challenge drug gangs. The six officers were killed when two carloads of heavily armed men cut off their vehicle in the Sinaloa capital of Culiacan.
More than 4,400 people have been killed in drug violence in Mexico, among them hundreds of police officers, since President Felipe Calderon launched an all-out offensive against drug cartels after taking office in December 2006.
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Medco, Wal-Mart Merging Electronic Prescription Networks
Medco Health Systems, CVS Caremark Corp. and Express Scripts Inc., the three largest managers of U.S. pharmacy plans, will merge their electronic drug prescription network with one operated by a group of drugstore chains that includes Wal-Mart Stores Inc.
The merged network expects to transmit 100 million drug orders this year via computer, accelerating the nation's move toward paperless prescribing, said Rick Ratliff, acting chief executive officer of SureScripts, one of the two services. Benefits managers will get the chance to steer more patients toward lower-cost generic or mail-order drugs, while pharmacies save the cost and time of deciphering poorly written prescriptions
[private sector]
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Monday, June 30, 2008
Brave New World?
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But 2008 will also prove in part to be a decisive political contest between the Old America and the New America. Between the thing we were, and the thing we have been becoming for 40 years or so. (I'm not referring here to age. Some young Americans have Old America heads and souls; some old people are all for the New.)
Mr. McCain is the Old America, of course; Mr. Obama the New.
* * *
Roughly, broadly [select few]:
In the Old America, love of country was natural. You breathed it in. You either loved it or knew you should.
In the New America, love of country is a decision. It's one you make after weighing the pros and cons. What you breathe in is skepticism and a heightened appreciation of the global view.
Old America: Tradition is a guide in human affairs. New America: Tradition is a challenge, a barrier, or a lovely antique.
The Old: Smoke 'em if you got 'em. The New: I'll sue. [snip]
I weigh this in favor of the Old America. Hard not to, for I remember it, and its sterling virtues. Maybe if you are 25 years old, your sense of the Old and New is different. Fair enough. As to its implications for the race, we'll see.
America is always looking forward, not back, it is always in search of the fresh and leaving the tried. That's how we started: We left tired old Europe and came to the new place, we settled the east and pushed West to the new place. We like new. It's in our genes. Hope we know where we're going, though.
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Iraqi Army, Coalition Troops Provide Medical Care at School
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More than 200 adults and 80 children received medical care June 21 during a combined medical engagement at the Al Herea School in Farisiyah, Iraq.
“It always puts a smile on my face to see people in need receive proper care,” said Army Staff Sgt. Luke Henry, “I believe these combined medical engagements are what we need to keep doing, because it’s these children that we treat who will remember us when they’re older and in a position to make decisions.”
In addition to the medical care, the Iraqi medics provided preventive medical classes on the importance of washing hands, boiling water and personal hygiene. [snip]
Members of the civil affairs team from Forward Operating Base Iskan also handed out Beanie Babies to children and distributed more than 500 humanitarian aid packages to families.
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Progress in Asia in GWOT
.[HT:MD]
The most dangerous terrorist networks in Southeast Asia are on the run thanks to multinational cooperation, good police work, good intelligence, and well executed military operations:
Three years after the region's last major strike - the attacks on three restaurants in Bali that killed three suicide bombers and 19 other people - American and Asian intelligence analysts say financial and logistical support from Al Qaeda to other groups in the region has long dried up, and the most lethal are scrambling for survival. [snip]
It isn't necessarily a question of "military first" or last or when military action is appropriate. It is the willingness to use it against well armed networks that makes the difference. The school of thought that eschews the military as an anti-terrorist organization generally doesn't advocate attacking terrorists in their camps.
There's a long way to go yet. There have been Muslim guerillas in the Phillipines for a hundred years so they are not going away anytime soon. And Indonesia still must deal with a revolt that threatens its stability. But progress is progress. And considering where we were just a few short years ago, what progress has been made has been remarkable.
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US military shoots down separating missile in test
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Kapaa, Hawaii -- The military's ground-based missile defense system destroyed a missile launched from an airplane in the first successful test of the system's ability to destroy a warhead that separates from its booster, the Missile Defense Agency said. The interceptor missile launched off Kauai on Wednesday had to differentiate between the warhead and the body of the missile before destroying the warhead above the Pacific Ocean...
['waste of time', 'waste of money', 'like hitting a bullit with a bullit', 'it can't be done'.
Wrong again. The steps to success: 1) Try...]
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Rocket hits Israel, second violation of Gaza truce
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Jerusalem - Gaza militants fired two rockets into southern Israel on Thursday, further straining a shaky, week-old truce as Israel kept Gaza border crossings closed in response.
Palestinians charged that the continued closure of crossings violated terms of the cease-fire...
[typical]
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Russia's New World Order
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Traveling to Berlin early this month on one of his first trips as president, Medvedev stressed the need for "a new world order."
Leaders call for the founding of a new world order only when they are convinced that their nation will dominate it. [snip]
Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, in a June 20 speech and a follow-up conversation I had with him here, outlined an ambitious agenda of change in a new era of "multipolar cooperation . . . and collective leadership" in international affairs.
A "new world order" cannot be based on "an Anglo-Saxon pattern that some have tried to establish for the rest of the world," Lavrov said. It would involve doing away with "the Cold War architecture for the security of Europe."
He proposed a European Security Conference to bring together the United States, Russia, the European Union and other regional organizations, such as NATO, to establish new controls on armies and alliances in the "Euro-Atlantic space." [snip]
But it does reflect a realization by Russian leaders that they are now seen by the rest of the world as a "veto power" to NATO... [snip]
[How did Russia get so influential?] Energy exports have earned Russia massive foreign reserves, and it is now intending an effort to bring other natural gas exporters into an international cartel similar to the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries. Venezuela and Iran are also said to be pushing the cartel idea for an October unveiling...
[Europe will fold. Our energy insanity is handing influence to our enemies the world over.]
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"What will it take for Congress to enact comprehensive energy policy that includes increased domestic production of oil and gas, renewable and alternative energy, and conservation? It seems to us outside of the Capitol Beltway that virtually every effort to accomplish this is met with criticism and failure. In my opinion, the debate about energy policy is no longer theoretical and abstract. Our failure to enact an energy policy is having real consequences for every American in their daily lives and has begun to affect America's place in the world."
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State renews 'climate battle'
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California's next great experiment [in fleecing the public] starts today.
The state Air Resources Board will outline this morning a plan to slash greenhouse gas emissions 30 percent by 2020 and prepare the state for much deeper cuts in the years beyond.
The bottom line for consumers, according to the agency's analysis: Electricity and fuel prices will rise.
The cuts to climate-warming emissions are required under Assembly Bill 32, a state law passed in 2006 that committed California to the nation's most aggressive global warming strategy.
Industry groups say the plan will dramatically drive up the cost of doing business. [snip]
To get the last 20 percent of the emissions cuts, the board has called for the creation of a market that would put a price on the right to produce greenhouse gases.
The "cap and trade" system, set to begin in 2012, would allow firms to buy and sell emissions permits. The state would control the volume of permits available, and ratchet down the supply over time.
Industry groups argue the permits amount to a heavy tax that will hurt businesses and increase prices for consumers.
[the scam begins. What could we possibly do between now and 2012 - 4 years - to forestall this scam? We could elect non-Democrats...]
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HOW ABOUT A CAP-AND-TRADE DIVIDEND?
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... the real action on climate control commences on Jan. 20, 2009, when a new administration takes over. Both Sen. Barack Obama and Sen. John McCain are on record in favor of cap and trade; the main difference between their proposals is how the carbon permits would be allocated:
- McCain's proposal would initially give out most of the permits for free to the nation's biggest emitters of greenhouse gases; however, he has not completely ruled out a carbon auction.
- Obama has proposed allocating the permits through an auction; every company -- large or small -- would have to buy the rights to emit greenhouse gases.
- If the carbon auction yields $150 billion in the first year, for example, each of America's 150 million adult citizens should receive a Treasury check that year of $1,000.
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GENEROUS TO A FAULT
California
How can cities escape the crushing burden of overly-generous benefits packages for city workers and retirees? Declare bankruptcy...
Vallejo, a mid-sized California city home to nearly 120,000 people, can no longer afford the jaw-dropping salaries it has provided city workers. For example:
• Last year, 292 out of 411 Vallejo employees were paid more than $100,000.
• Vallejo's city manager earns nearly $317,000, more than even Vice President Cheney.
• A police captain earns $306,000 a year in pay and benefits (six times what the average Vallejo schoolteacher earns).
• A police lieutenant earns $240,146 a year.
• The average firefighter earns $171,000 a year.
• When public safety workers retire after age 50, they receive 90 percent of their top salary.
• Wages and benefits swallowed more than 75 percent of what was available in the city's general fund in 2007.
• Vallejo is currently facing a daunting deficit of nearly $17 million dollars.
Experts agree that other state and local governments may face a similar predicament in the future. Judging from the ominous mix of mounting costs for energy and food; declining property-tax and sales revenue, and astoundingly generous pension and health-care commitments to public workers.
[of course, they're all unionized]
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Inaction in boy's killing called justified
The town of Turlock and much of the rest of the nation was shocked when a 27-year-old man beat and stomped his 2-year-old son to death on a rural road. But what was nearly as stunning for many people was that none of the motorists and their passengers who stopped and saw the attack tried to tackle the man.
Police officers and psychologists familiar with violent emergencies, however, said they weren't surprised at all.
A volunteer firefighter and at least five others saw Sergio Casian Aguiar assaulting his son Saturday night on the road west of Turlock (Stanislaus County), but it wasn't until a police officer arrived in a helicopter that the attack finally ended.
Bystanders are justifiably scared and confused in such situations, the experts said Wednesday, and they lack the experience needed to respond with force...
[utter bullshit. this moral vacuum is a consequence of the government {like the moronic 'experts' above} telling us for so long that it's to take care us us and that we're helpless without 'professionals' that some people have come to believe it.
You don't wait, you run over there and do what you can. It's scary, you may get hurt. You accept that risk to minimize the harm being done a child. Any man that doesn't, isn't, period. You don't 'need' any experience to respond with force, you need courage.
we're becoming a nation of sheep]
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'I decided to die like a man',
says tycoon who took on 'armed gang who threatened to kill his daughter'
Armed gang learns; Don't mess with Dad
A millionaire yesterday told how he fought off three armed burglars who were holding a knife to his daughter's throat, saying he "would rather die like a man than a dog". Bernard Dwyer, 51, was convinced he and his family were about to be killed so he chose to take on the men - hours after they had allegedly killed a restaurant owner, a court heard.
[from January, but Recommended - one of those 'wow' stories > READ MORE ]
State offers free replacements for ''WTF'' license plates
Raleigh - Thanks to some text message-savvy grandchildren, North Carolina drivers whose license plates have the potentially offensive ''WTF'' letter combination can replace the tags for free. The News & Observer of Raleigh reported Tuesday the state Division of Motor Vehicles has notified nearly 10,000 holders of license plates with the letter combination. Officials learned last year the common acronym stands for a vulgar phrase in e-mail and cell phone text messages.
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Friday, June 27, 2008
Global Tax Bill Coming Soon
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The Global Poverty Act of 2007 (S.2433) is coming up for a Senate vote sometime after the July 4 recess, according the office of Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison. Once Harry Reid and the Democrat leadership put it on the calendar, we could have as little as a week to prepare for the vote.
If passed, it will cost taxpayers $845,000,000,000 over the next 13 years, in addition to our current foreign aid expenditures.
And the best part is that it will be administered in conjunction with...brace yourselves...the United Nations. The same one of "Food-for-Oil" fame.
Here's an abstract of the proposed legislation:
"To require the President to develop and implement a comprehensive strategy to further the United States foreign policy objective of promoting the reduction of global poverty, the elimination [?] of extreme global poverty, and the achievement of the U.N. Millennium Development Goal of reducing by one-half the proportion of people worldwide, between 1990 and 2015, who live on less than $1 per day."The House passed it (H.R. 1302) earlier this year by a unanimous voice vote.
It's about global income redistribution. Their distribution - our income.
Heard much debate about it? The bill is sponsored in the Senate by Barack Obama. Read about it here.
[heaven forbid the media inform us of it before it's passed into law]
READ MORE , Then >
Global Poverty Act of 2007 (S.2433)YOUR Senator > http://www.senate.gov/general/contact_information/senators_cfm.cfm
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Why Do We Call Them 'Democrats'?
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Apparently, the camouflage is no longer needed. The masks are off. They now openly call for the nationalization of private business, the establishment of universal entitlements and increased taxation to pay for them. Why worry about socialist labels? The electorate is complacent, prosperity has numbed our senses and the left has worked diligently for many years to sap our national pride and deface our self-image.
"The American people will never knowingly adopt socialism. But, under the name of "liberalism," they will adopt every fragment of the socialist program, until one day America will be a socialist nation, without knowing how it happened." - Norman Thomas, U.S. Socialist Party presidential candidate 1940, 1944 and 1948Eight years into the twenty-first century, Mr. Thomas' prediction is coming perilously close to fruition; the presidential elections of 2008 may well validate his faith in "liberalism" and its Trojan horse delivery of Socialism. After decades of slow yet persistent desensitization to Socialism in our schools, in our media and in government policy, [many] Americans are blind to its ramifications for our prosperity, our individual freedoms and our national identity. Political candidates and legislators espouse openly socialist policies without eliciting the slightest outrage or significant comment, so successfully have the philosophies of Marx and Lenin permeated the national psyche.
House Democrats, loudly shifting blame from the consequences of their energy policies, threaten nationalization of American oil companies. Mimicking Marxist Hugo Chavez of Venezuela, their answer to the energy crisis is eliminating free markets.
"Should the people of the United States own refineries? Maybe so. Frankly, I think that's a good idea. Then we could control the amount of refined product much more capably that gets out on the market..." Rep. Maurice Hinchey (D-NY) 18 June Press Conference with Democratic leadership.Representative Hinchey is on the Interior Appropriations Subcommittee and the Natural Resources Committee, committees with enormous influence on energy matters. He went on as he stood next to House Democratic Caucus Chairman Rahm Emanuel (D-IL):
"then maybe they'd be willing to have these refineries owned publicly[*], owned by the people of the United States, so that the people of the United States can determine how much of the product is refined and put out on the market. To me, that sounds like a very good idea."Rep. Maxine Waters (D-CA) once considered one of congress's fringe leftists apparently let the Democrat party policy slip during show hearings with oil company executives earlier in the month:
"This liberal will be all about socializing, uh, uh . . . would be about . . . basically taking over and the government running all of your companies."The Socialist Party of America has arrived, wearing Democrat clothing. Socialist control of the presidency and congress would knock America to its knees as nothing has before. What was inconceivable five years ago becomes a frightening possibility with Obama, Pelosi, Boxer and Reid.
If you think gas is expensive now, wait until the socialists in congress run the oil business.
"The past shows unvaryingly that when a people's freedom disappears, it goes not with a bang, but in silence amid the comfort of being cared for. That is the dire peril in the present trend toward statism. If freedom is not found accompanied by a willingness to resist, and to reject favors, rather than to give up what is intangible but precarious, it will not long be found at all." - Richard Weaver, 1962[oil companies already are owned by the people, publicly; they're called shareholders and 401K participants. What Democrats mean by 'the People' is government. Them. Socialist programs are doubly dangerous because, even more than most government programs {and that's saying something}, they're permanent: name a major government program that's ever been meaningfully reduced or eliminated. They only grow; witness all of our entitlement programs, known to be unsustainable, which receive ever greater funding regardless. Once enacted, we'll be yoked with these programs forever, and socialism begets more socialism. Think of our grandchildren...]
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We're winning this War on Terror
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In America, large swaths of the political class continues to insist Iraq is a lost cause. The consensus in much of the West is that the War on Terror is unwinnable.
And yet the evidence is now overwhelming that on all fronts, despite inevitable losses from time to time, it is we who are advancing and the enemy who is in retreat. The current mood on both sides of the Atlantic, in fact, represents a kind of curious inversion of the great French soldier's dictum: “Success against the Taleban. Enemy giving way in Iraq. Al-Qaeda on the run. Situation dire. Let's retreat!”
Since it is remarkable how pervasive this pessimism is, it's worth recapping what has been achieved in the past few years... [much, impressive, Recommended > snip]
Next time you hear someone say that the war in Afghanistan is an exercise in futility ask them this: do they seriously think that if the US and its allies had not ousted the Taleban and sustained an offensive against them for six years that there would have been no more terrorist attacks in the West? [snip]
The third and perhaps most significant advance of all in the War on Terror is the discrediting of the Islamist creed and its appeal.
This was first of all evident in Iraq, but it has spread way beyond Iraq. As Lawrence Wright described in an important piece in The New Yorker last month, there is growing disgust not just among moderate Muslims but even among other jihadists at the extremism of the terrorists... [snip]
The right response to the loss of brave souls is not an immediate call for retreat. It is, first of all, pride; a great, deep conviction that it is on such sacrifice that our own freedoms have always rested. Then, defiance. How foolish is the enemy that it might think our grief is really some prelude to their victory?
Finally, confidence. We are prevailing in this struggle. We know it. And everywhere: in Afghanistan, in Iraq, and among Muslims around the world, the enemy knows it too.
[ Recommended >]
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Know your enemy
.[HT:MD]
... For instance, based on the words and deeds of Muhammad, most schools of Islamic jurisprudence agree that the following are all legitimate during war against the infidel:
- the indiscriminate use of missile weaponry, even if women and children are present (catapults in Muhammad's 7th century, hijacked planes or rockets today);
- the need to always deceive the enemy and even break formal treatises whenever possible [see Sahih Muslim 15: 4057];
- and that the only function of the peace treaty, or "hudna," is to give the Islamic armies time to regroup for a renewed offensive, and should, in theory, last no more than ten years.
- the most notorious among them being the doctrine of "Taqiyya," which permits Muslims to lie and dissemble to infidels.
Deception has such a prominent role that renowned Muslim scholar Ibn al-Arabi declares: "[I]n the Hadith, practicing deceit in war is well demonstrated. Indeed, its need is more stressed than [the need for] courage" (The Al Qaeda Reader, 142).
Then there's Islam's more "eternal" doctrines, such as the Abode of War versus the Abode of Islam dichotomy, which in essence maintains that Islam must always be in a state of animosity vis-Ã -vis the infidel world and, whenever possible, must wage wars until all infidel territory has been brought under Islamic rule.
In fact, this dichotomy of hostility is unambiguously codified under Islam's worldview and is deemed a fard kifaya-that is, an obligation on the entire Muslim body that can only be fulfilled as long as some Muslims actively uphold it... [snip]
Alas, far from taking the most basic and simple advice regarding warfare-Sun Tzu's ancient dictum, "Know thy enemy"- the U.S. government is having difficulties even acknowledging its enemy.
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Protecting the Oil Supply
What if the Chinese were to apply the Carter Doctrine?
"Let our position be absolutely clear," Jimmy Carter declared. It was January 1980, and a year later he would no longer be president. But the doctrine he espoused in his final State of the Union address was, arguably, one of the few policies that outlasted his tenure. The Carter Doctrine:
"An attempt by any outside force to gain control of the Persian Gulf region will be regarded as an assault on the vital interests of the United States of America." [snip]Every couple of years, oil becomes Topic 1 for a while. Every couple of years, attention is paid—and then it fades. The 1970s brought the Arab embargo and the energy crisis. The early 1980s brought the Carter Doctrine and the Iran-Iraq War. In the early 1990s, Iraq invaded oil-rich Kuwait. In 2003, some claimed the United States had launched a war in Iraq because of oil. [snip]
As its needs and dependence on Middle East oil grow, China is more likely to challenge some of the policies the United States is pursuing in oil-rich regions. Using sanctions to help stop the genocide in Darfur appeals to Washington but is disruptive to relations between China and Sudan. Preventing Iran from interfering in Iraq or from building nuclear capabilities is crucial for the United States, but China is becoming more and more nervous that a confrontation will upset its access to oil.
In 2006, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice told the Senate foreign relations committee:
"We do have to do something about the energy problem. … It has given extraordinary power to some states that are using that power in not very good ways."She was talking about Iran, Venezuela, and Sudan. But from Beijing, the picture might look much different: Iran, Venezuela, and Sudan are all more than willing to supply China—but the U.S. is making oil more expensive and less available.
We have to do something about our energy problem.
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Study finds Arctic seabed afire with lava-spewing volcanoes
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The Arctic seabed is as explosive geologically as it is politically judging by the "fountains" of gas and molten lava that have been blasting out of underwater volcanoes near the North Pole.
"Explosive volatile discharge has clearly been a widespread, and ongoing, process,"according to an international team that sent unmanned probes to the strange fiery world beneath the Arctic ice.
They returned with images and data showing that red-hot magma has been rising from deep inside the earth and blown the tops off dozens of submarine volcanoes, four kilometres below the ice.
"Jets or fountains of material were probably blasted one, maybe even two, kilometres up into the water,"says geophysicist Robert Sohn of the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, who led the expedition.
"The scale and magnitude of the explosive activity that we're seeing here dwarfs anything we've seen on other mid-ocean ridges,"says Sohn, who studies ridges around the world. The volume of gas and lava that appears to have blasted out of the Gakkel volcanoes is "much, much higher" than that seen at other ridges.
The scientists say they have explored just one small stretch of the Gakkel Ridge and hope to return in a few years.
[widespread, ongoing process of dozens of submarine volcanoes discharging magma on a scale that dwarfs anything else they've seen, under the ice near the North Pole - and that from the one small stretch they visited. -- So when the Arctic enters its next melt cycle, remember: it's because of your light bulbs.]
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Massachusetts Lawmaker's Pledge to 'Rip Apart' Child Rape Victims
A Massachusetts politician and defense attorney has touched off a firestorm with his shocking public vow to torment and "rip apart" child rape victims who take the witness stand if the state legislature passed stiff mandatory sentences for child sex offenders. Rep. James Fagan, a Democrat, made the comments during debate last month on the state House floor...
[criminals before victims]
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THE AMERICAN DREAM GOES ON
Mortimer Zuckerman, editor-in-chief of U.S. News and World Report, says income inequality has had little traction thus far as a political issue, partly because many middle-class Americans have moved up:
- There are 12 percent more households earning in excess of $100,000 than 20 or so years ago.
- Those making less than $30,000 have not increased.
- So virtually the entire "decline" of the middle-class group has come from people moving up the income ladder, not down.
- Some 82 percent of those born into poverty are much better off than their parents and more than a third of them have made it into the middle class - or higher.
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